My friends, I hope your Thanksgiving was truly a time of gratitude to God for His blessings, provision, and presence. And I hope you survived Black Friday! (Of course, if you didn’t survive it, you are not reading this, so never mind). As I heard someone recently say, “Only in America, do we follow up a day of gratitude with a day of unrestrained and frenzied shopping where we spend money we don’t have to buy things we don’t need to impress people we don’t even like!”
If you live in the USA, you are among the most materially blessed in the world. If you made $25,000 last year, you are in the top 10 percent of the world’s wage earners. To make the top 20 percent, you only had to make $1500 (yes, annually).
If you are a Christian in the USA, you are among the most privileged of all your worldwide brothers and sisters in Christ.
And that could be a problem.
In his 2015 book, Where I Am, Billy Graham writes: “It always costs something to follow Jesus Christ. Some years ago in a country where Christians were looked upon with suspicion and disfavor, a government leader said to me with an unscrupulous twinkle in his eye, ‘Christians seem to thrive under persecution. Perhaps we should prosper them, and they would disappear.’
There is an underlying truth in this statement. Many rely on Christ when they have nothing to lean on except Him, but they fall away when they climb the ladder of success. They think they can lean on their own power and authority, forgetting about Jesus. They just don’t have time for Him anymore.”
I can’t think of a time when that is more obvious than right now. We are in a season between an election where many American Christians focused on selecting the candidate who would be most likely to “protect our values” and a holiday season where many American Christians will choose to be offended by the words people use to celebrate that holiday season.
You may not be aware that Christianity is growing exponentially all over the world except in North America and Western Europe–the places where the church has enjoyed generations of “favored” status.
Please don’t hear me say that I wish for the persecution or hardship that Christ-followers around the world are experiencing. But I do wish for their passion and focus.
Could it be that God’s purpose in allowing us to be where we are is not so that we would simply enjoy the blessings, but that we would be conduits of His blessings? Could it be that our lives matter most when we are fulfilling an eternal purpose?
Luke 12:48 says, “When someone has been given much, much will be required in return; and when someone has been entrusted with much, even more will be required.”
Question: What might result if we focused less on our blessed position in the culture and more on being a blessing TO the culture?
How about some good music for a great cause?
From April 17-28, 2017, I will be traveling to Ukraine with the Singing Men of North Central Texas. This will be my 4th trip to Ukraine with the Singing Men since 2010. We have seen more than 20,000 people register decisions to become sincere followers of Jesus during these music mission trips.
As members of the Singing Men, we are responsible for our own travel expenses. So, in preparation for the next trip, I’m highlighting the availability of my most recent CD, Distant Music: The Prayer. All proceeds from the sale of this CD will go toward my Ukraine Trip expenses. The regular price is $14.97.
I am offering this for a limited time for $5 off. That is $9.97 with Free Shipping!
To get your discounted copy, click on the add to cart button below. Your item will show up on the shopping cart on the right had side of the page. Please enter the coupon code ukraine17 and hit the apply button to get your $5 discount. You may then check out.
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