The Gooch Lane church of Christ is a group of people in Madison, Alabama seeking to study the Bible and put God’s teachings into practice. We’d love to have you join us for Bible study and worship.
All in Persecution
Sometimes, evidence is indisputable. When this is the case, the one displaying wisdom will drop opposition to an argument proven wrong by the indisputable evidence, admit the error, and make the necessary corrections. The fool will not.
I often think of the hymn that has the line: “This world is not my home, I’m just a’passing through. My treasures are laid up somewhere beyond the blue.” It and other similar sentiments can be helpful to us. It is especially helpful to me when I find I become too attached to this world. I have this bad habit of following politics. Politics has this tendency to make you angry, and if it doesn’t make you angry, it makes you depressed. It is helpful to be reminded in those times that the troubles of this world are temporary (and politics is often the most temporary of problems). The reminder that there is a permanent home of joy awaiting us can be of extreme comfort.
Surprised by Joy, a phrase from the poet Wordsworth, was the title C.S. Lewis gave to his book, published in 1955. I confess that although I bought the book in the early ‘60s, I did not read it until recently. It is the story of his conversion from Atheism to Christianity and the amazing joy that came with that conversion. This book helped me understand more the nature of joy. While Lewis had experienced moments of joy – “stabs of joy” he called them – throughout his life, he had never experienced the joy that came to him as a believer in God. His comments about the gospels are priceless. His later books: Miracles, The Screwtape Letters, The Problem of Pain, etc., reflect the incredible joy he came to have in his ever-expanding acquaintance with God, His Son Jesus, the Holy Spirit and His plan for our eternity with Him in heaven.
If you do not stay up to date on pop-culture slang, you may be unfamiliar with the terms woke and cancel culture. Though definitions vary, the primary meaning of woke involves maintaining social awareness and the primary idea behind cancel culture is to silence anyone whose opinions are not considered woke; thus, they are deemed unfit for public consumption or consideration. Recent months have seen a plethora of people in the public eye scorned and mocked for having opinions at variance with the woke crowd. While this may seem a rather new concept to a nation whose Constitution enshrines the idea of freedom of speech, it is a concept well-known to those who seek to follow the New Testament as their model for both church and individual decisions and behavior. Primitivists, just as their 1st-century Christian counterparts, are aware of what it means to be canceled.
As Jesus completed His discussion of the Beatitudes, He stated that those who find the kingdom of God are those who are willingly persecuted for righteousness’ sake. This is the culmination of everything discussed in this section of the Lord’s Sermon. Willingness to endure pain for the cause of Christ is characteristic of one who has been emptied of self and fully filled with the principles of godliness.
