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Trinity Lutheran Church
In Mission...
Listening To Jesus' Voice
Rejoicing In His Grace
Telling Others About His Love |
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From the Pastor
But in your hearts set apart Christ as Lord.
Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone
who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have.
1 Peter 3:15
A good amount of my recent teaching and preaching has centered on our responsibility and privilege to "make disciples" within the context of our individual daily vocations. Our motivation for such is Christ's love which compels us to tell those who are perishing without Him of His love and about His gift of eternal life. That's hard to accomplish if we ignore the compulsion of His love. Consider these words:
Around the corner I have a friend,
In this great city that has no end;
Yet days go by, and weeks rush on,
And before I know it a year is gone.
And I never see my old friend's face,
For life is a swift and terrible race.
He knows I like him just as well
As in the days when I rang his bell
And he rang mine. We were younger then,
And now we are busy, tired men;
Tired of playing a foolish game,
Just to show that 'I'm thinking of him.'
But tomorrow comes - and tomorrow goes,
And the distance between us grows and grows
Around the corner - yet miles away
'Here's a telegram, sir
Jim died today.
And that's what we get and deserve in the end:
Around the corner, a vanished friend.
- Charles Hanson Towne, Poems that Touch the Heart, Doubleday:1941.
It's very easy in our lives to forget to show Christ's love to those with whom God blesses the routine of our daily lives, and even easier to do so to those outside that sphere of daily contact. In fact, it's very much easier to love ourselves so much that it results in the virtual exclusion of all others. Well, how about it? Is there a "friend around the corner" who needs to hear of and be shown Christ's love? Don't you think it best to tell him or her before he or she vanishes? God will bless you ... and them ... in your telling and showing!
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