Our devotion is by MUKONDI RAMULONDI who is the Moderator of our General Assembly and serves at St Mungos and Diepsloot.
-------------------------------
How can people have faith in the Lord and ask him to save them if they have never heard about him? And how can they hear, unless someone tells them? And how can anyone tell them without being sent by the Lord? The scriptures say it is a beautiful sight to see even the feet of someone coming to preach the Good News. Romans10:14
Paul asks three rhetorical questions, and these questions present four steps that are critical in sharing the Good News.
1.COMMISSIONING OF PREACHERS.
God calls Men and Women from among ourselves and expects us to join hands with him in sending out those who are responding to the call. There are many ways of participating in sending out preachers: We may commit ourselves to pray for them and by providing financial resources to them.
2.SHARING OF THE GOOD NEWS
Those who are called should preach the Good News. This can be done by almost all of us. Each one of us should be able to share our personal stories of our relationship with the Lord. This can be done in different ways. St Mungo's in Diepsloot touches so many lives in the community through different actions. This includes empowering local persons with life-skills, feeding the hungry, and caring for the sick. Through community action the church is able to restore lost hope and dignity to the people.
3.HEARING THE MESSAGE
Faith without works is dead. People will never make sense of our Christian message if it does not translate to their day to day challenges. How we proclaim the gospel is critical.
4. THE RESPONSE TO THE PREACHED MESSAGE.
This is about believing in the Lord. It's all about people putting their trust in the Lord. If we do our mission properly those who hear us will put their trust in God and give their lives to him.
CONCLUSION
William Temple, Arch Bishop of Canterbury described evangelism as; "To evangelize is to present Jesus Christ in the power of the Holy Spirit, that people may come to put their trust in God through him, to accept him as their Saviour and serve him as their King in the fellowship of the church."
We participate in Mission because:
- Jesus asks us to,
- out of love for others,
- because Jesus was and still is committed to the salvation of human kind and growth of the church,
- because the Bible says this will happen before Jesus returns.(Mt24:14)
PRAYER: Dear God, creator and redeemer of the world, thank you that you are interested in us joining hands with you in the sharing of the Good News. Give us strength when we neglect to carry out what you have commissioned us to do. Help us to encourage each other to participate in the sharing of the Good news. Forgive us of our past failures and lead us to new life and hope for the future. Inspire us to be courageous carriers of the Good News. Amen.
---
--------------------------
Theo Groeneveld theo@emmanuel.org.za
You can see past EmmDevs at http://emmdev.blogspot.com/
