Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, Rejoice. Let all men know your forbearance. The Lord is at hand. Have no anxiety about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which passes all understanding, will keep your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.
April 2016 - Page 3 of 3 - GraceAndWorks
For what have I to do with judging outsiders? Is it not those inside the church whom you are to judge? God judges those outside.
Let all the earth fear the Lord, let all the inhabitants of the world stand in awe of Him! For He spoke, and it came to be; He commanded, and it stood forth.
I just finished reading a fine article by a brother about the dangers of cloning and the sin involved if it is ever done for the wrong reasons. But part of his article made me think of one way in which we have a great need for clones in the church. In the article he said, “Especially pertinent is the question of human cloning. Newsweek asked the question, `Today the sheep tomorrow the shepherd?` Yes, clone the Shepherd!!”
Too many in the church are cloned from other sheep or those in the world. We want to LOOK like everybody else, DRESS like everybody else, SPEND like everybody else, BE like everybody else. When others change, we change. We do everything we can to fit in with the Smith’s and keep up with the Jones`. We are simply cloning ourselves after sheep.
There are examples of those in the Bible who had a choice between being cloned after the sheep or the Shepherd. In 1st Samuel 15 Saul had a choice to make: utterly destroy the Amalekites as the Lord instructed (vs 3) or spare the best as the people desired (vs 21). We know his choice (vss 9, 24). He was cloned after sheep. We also know the result–he was rejected from being King over Israel.
The rulers in John 12:42 faced much the same decision. They heard the word of the Shepherd proclaimed and believed it. But would they be cloned after Him? At present they were cloned after the Pharisees. They decided to stay as they were, “for they loved the praise of men more than the praise of God” (vs 43).
It is time to clone the Shepherd!! The Apostles were His clones. In Acts 5, they are being persecuted for following Him, but in verse 29 they boldly say, “We ought to obey God rather than men.” Oh, for more people with that attitude today!!
Paul makes it clear after whom he is cloned. In Galatians 1:10 he says, “For do I now persuade men, or God? Or do I seek to please men? For if I still pleased men, I would not be a bondservant of Christ.” Notice that Paul admits at one point in his life he was cloned after men (“if I still pleased men”). But in Acts 9 the Shepherd comes into Paul’s life, and he becomes a changed man. In 1st Corinthians 11:1 we see the cloning of Paul to be like the Shepherd when he says, “Imitate me, just as I also imitate Christ.”
Can we speak like Paul to others? Are we imitating the Savior to that degree? Have we cloned the sheep or the Shepherd? CLONE THE SHEPHERD!!
This is shared from the Desert Church of Christ bulletin. Pahrump, Nv.
David said, “The Lord is my rock, and my fortress, and my deliverer, my God, my rock, in whom I take refuge, my shield and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold and my refuge, my savior; thou savest me from violence. I call upon the Lord, who is worthy to be praised, and I am saved from my enemies.”
I will bless the Lord at all times; His praise shall continually be in my mouth. My soul makes its boast in the Lord; let the afflicted hear and be glad. O magnify the Lord with me, and let us exalt His name together.
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