As a leader in Men's Ministry I have found myself more in prayer and leaning on God's word daily. I have come through a season in life that I would call, "Walking through the desert of persecution." I have remained faithful to prayer and to daily Bible reading and instead of trying to change my circumstance, I instead changed MY ATTITUDE toward how I respond to difficult and trying situations. Scripture is very clear when it tells us that those of us who are Children of God will (it doesn't say "May") BUT WILL face persecution.
Thankfully, I have accountability partners in my life (not just my wife, but a few close friends who don't hold back in hold me to the fire) and they have given me wise counsel in difficult situations. I am thankful for these people in my life and I am thankful for the Bible that is practical in the ways of righteousness and obedience to God's will.
Through this season, this Valley, I have been made keenly aware that churches can tend to have a lot of immature spiritual babies who are still on the proverbial nipple and have yet to dig into the meat of the Bible and to move from Spiritual Immaturity into Spiritual Maturity. In putting it in simpler terms: They need to move from milk to meat. My pastor puts it in an even better way - moving from a pew sitter to a heavy hitter.
I really don't put blame on anyone or institution for the immaturity of most believers. Instead, I found the need even more important in today's context. That is, to say, that we are in a world that continues to move even further away from God and does not rely on the very foundation of truth and biblical principles - if you don't believe me - do some research on some ivy league colleges in the US and our founding fathers of this great and wonderful nation.
To put my thoughts as plainly and simply as possible - we need more disciples of Christ. We need to grow the connected (those that are members of church and actively serving) and to have mentors (both men and women) teach the younglings (those who are spiritually immature - I don't care how old they are) how to move from infant to heavy hitter in the Kingdom of God (refer to Hebrew 5 & 6 to see where I am going with this).
I have posted before on three major themes that I continue to keep coming back to and that is: 1) Biblical Purity 2) Biblical Stewardship (which includes Contentment) and 3) Discipleship. This is a call to arms to all of our brothers and sisters who read this blog. If you are a Timothy - then found and pray for a Paul and a Lois & Eunice in their lives. If you are a Paul and or an Elijah, then find a younger Timothy in your life and mentor them. Prepare them and sharpen them as the Word of God calls us to do. Teach the younger women to love their husbands. Teach the young men to lead by their obedience to Christ.
More to follow,
Dante