Jonah/Paul

Been thinking about Jonah and Paul a lot lately.  Jonah, he waited to see an entire town be destroyed.  He did not joy in the repentance, nor did he expect it.  I do not want to be Jonah.  I would rather those who are following after the wrong path repent, turn and follow after the narrow way…and come to the Father through Jesus Christ by the conviction of the Holy Spirit.  Jonah was speaking to those who were not even trying to be people of  God.  The ones I am most concerned about now are those who taught me for the past several years.  I looked to them for spiritual food and teaching (not only them, I did my own reading and study but not near enough).  If I love them, I will pray for their repentance.  They may think I’m deluded and arrogant, they may even think I need to repent.  Maybe so, and if so, let me be convicted.  Truly.

Paul, this man wrote letters to churches engaged in activities that seem obviously sinful to us now.  In his letters, he would mention his prayers for these churches and list the things they were to be commended for, and then he would lay out what needed to change without flinching.  He did consider them to be brothers and sisters in Christ (am I right here…please correct me if I am not).  So those in my former church, the leadership who are preaching a different gospel, they are to be accursed, but the others who are still there, are they still brothers and sisters?    What of these leaders, like the Rick Warren types, are they brothers in Christ but just wrong on certain things or are they truly unsaved?  How would Paul draft a letter to seeker friendly churches?  What about the emergent churches?  What about all these hybrids of many different denominations that are trying to please the world?  What would his letter look like to them?  Would he even write to them, or would he write to a nearby church instead warning about these people?  I would have to study Paul’s letters a bit more to figure out how to draft a letter like he wrote to the churches in his day.  It’d be interesting to see what Paul would confront and who he would confront.

How would Paul deal with the Universalist thinking presented in the emergent church as written at http://christianresearchnetwork.com/?p=8423

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praying to be

I pray to be a Berean.  I also pray NOT to be a Jonah.  If God will convert and change the hearts, and there will be a turning to Christ and repentance, who am I to judge?  I am only to speak the truth in love and wait.  I beg God to protect me from bitterness and pride, and hope to care with all my heart for my former church.  If they change and never come to me and say, “thank you for showing us the truth and standing for the truth” I cannot be frustrated.  I hope actually to be forgotten by my former church, left behind, never mentioned again.  I hope that they will claim, if there is true repentance, that they were convicted by God.  What I did may have stirred them up, and pushed them further from God.  I do not want this, but cannot stay quiet when I see untruth.  So, I wait, but do not wait for wrath.  I wait and hope for change.  Honestly, I was hoping the church would fail and everyone would leave the pastor all by himself.  That is what I was hoping.  Now, I am hoping for God to work in the hearts of those attending, and hope for many more eyes to be opened.  If there is anyone who can convince and change the focus back on Christ, then I am for that whatever it takes for as long as it takes.

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