Simply Dynamite

DAN ANDERSON/CNN.COM

“And now the Word of the Lord is ringing out from you to people everywhere, even beyond Macedonia and Achaia, for wherever we go we find people telling us about your faith in God.”—1 Thessalonians 1:8

Here is one of those drive-right-past-it, mind-blowing verses....But think about: No email, Twitter, Facebook, Instagram cell phone videos, or satellite TV, and yet the life-changing power of God through a bunch of no-name regular folks who chose to daily abide in Christ spread like wildfire to distant places beyond their imagination. It defies logic and all of our techno-modern sensibilities. How could this possibly happen?

All we know from a verse a bit earlier is that these everyday, multi-generational men and women were known not for any of the things we tend to think of that make for an influential church today. For one, they knew that getting friends and neighbors to "come to church!" sounded great but wasn't always practical. Instead, they seemed to follow in these footsteps:

"Andrew then went to find his brother Peter and told him, 'We have found the Messiah!' And he brought Peter to meet Jesus." (John 1:41-42, Living)

They brought the Church with them by simply and obediently and lovingly and regularly lighting three sticks of supernatural dynamite:

• Spirit-empowered, prayer-fueled, everyday works, talents and abilities produced by their faith in Christ
• A steady heartbeat of everyday servanthood, rooted in a deep and abiding love for Christ
• Endurance to stay the course in this crazy world, to swim upstream against all trends and odds, inspired by hope and trust in Christ … and His promised return.

The moral of this story might be that Good News does indeed travel quickly, that a person or group of people who are abandoned to God is an incomparable power, and that we don't have to over-complicate our witness efforts but just be salt and light where people are. But surely, this was just a great story about the early Church. Just a one-shot moment in time. But then there's this...

“Even if it was written in Scripture long ago, you can be sure it’s written for us. God wants the combination of his steady, constant calling and warm, personal counsel in Scripture to come to characterize us, keeping us alert for whatever He will do next.”—Romans 15:4, The Message

Selah....

(Adapted from journal entry, August 17, 2014)