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@kennethspence
Escaping Reality?
Today, I heard from the Prime Minister of Jamaica, where my people hail from, and I heard the same disturbing news that troubles all of America and potentially the world: There are more murders and troublesome activity than every before. It leaves one puzzled and while there are people in law enforcement agencies trying to combat this criminal phenomenon, there is a question that has been on my…
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BOUND TO COME TO THIS
BOUND TO COME TO THIS
A fork in the road. Now to the road less traveled.
Today I preached a sermon about being all that God called us to become. Truly, living out our purpose. That is a difficult thing to do, honestly. The reason why it is difficult is because one has to live in discomfort. The comfort zone is one that a lot of people fall into because we desire to be “liked”.
When I was younger, a statement…
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PATRIOTIC WITH ANGER
“We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.”
When I was younger in elementary school, I remember falling in…
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HDP Podcast – Abortion Thoughts
What's In Your Diet? @ Overbrook Park
What’s In Your Diet? @ Overbrook Park
**About the picture; “Columbo” was a TV Show that I watched sometimes with my father. He was detective and his catchphrase was “Just one more thing”.
So yesterday, March 31, 2019, in the Greater Philadelphia Area, we had our 5th Sunday Fellowship. I was asked to preach at the hosting congregation, Overbrook Park Church of Christ in West Philly. It was an honor of course because I came up at…
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Above: Federal employees wait in line at World Central Kitchen, a food bank and food distribution center established by celebrity chef José Andrés. The federal government is back open, but it could be several days before workers receive missed paychecks.
Federal Employees Return To Work, But Fears Of Another Shutdown Loom
Hundreds of thousands of federal employees across the country are returning to work after being furloughed for more than a month. Thousands of others in the federal workforce did work during the 35-day shutdown, but didn’t get paid.
The Trump administration promises that by Friday federal workers will be paid the two consecutive paychecks that were missed as a result of the government being shuttered.
ALEX EDELMAN/AFP/Getty Images
Government shutdown cost economy $11 billion, budget office says
Federal employees went back to work Monday after the longest shutdown in government history — but the economic effects will be felt for a long time.
A report released Monday by the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office found that the economy took an $11 billion hit, including $3 billion that’s gone forever, in the 35 days that parts of the federal government went unfunded.
Read more.
The Church of Christ has been a place where we tout truth and preach the Gospel to the best of our ability. Our desire is to see people of all denominations simply adhere to the Bible as it’s only creed outside of the theologies that have been perpetuated by Catholicism, Luther, Calvin or anyone else, eventually shedding the ideology of being a denomination and adhering to what Christ prayed for in John 17. We’ve been good at sharing this information with a number of people for many years. We’ve been firm about making sure that people understand that God seeks people to follow His truth. As a result, we’ve caused people to recognize where they stand: Either with God or not (Matthew 10:34FF). But there has also been a strange thing that has taken place:
The Church of Christ, in large part, is irrelevant.
You don’t believe me? Ask someone today in a major metropolitan city if they know about the Church of Christ. Most can’t give you an answer. Do you remember when people thought that the Church of Christ was a cult? While that was not true, people knew about the Church of Christ. Dating back earlier than that, there were people who when they heard the phrase “Church of Christ”, they knew that “those people” knew their Bible. If you say the phrase “Church of Christ” to someone today, they’ll make a statement in an almost like questioning fashion like “Church of God in Christ”. There is nothing about the Church that is impactful in masse. There are cities where the impact is huge from a local congregation but there is a nothing nationally in terms of impact.
There are many Christians today that think a political party will save them. There are Christians that think the courts will save them. There are Christians that think that all they need to do is show up to Worship once per week and they are blessed immensely. There are Christians who don’t know what it is to live for Christ thus being impactful is not in the realm of reality. Forgive me, if this offends you, but this is a problem that starts from the pulpit and then moves to the pew.
The irrelevant ideology that hurts the Church of Christ, Christ’s Church, the one Church that Jesus said He would build in Matthew 16:18 starts at the pulpit. With that, I have an idea but it’s not original. I don’t have a multifaceted plan that will cause change in your congregation. I don’t have a plan that will increase growth in a easily quantifiable number. I just have one point of execution that as a Minister, if done correctly and Biblically, it will cause the Church to make an impact daily, individually, collectively, congregationally, nationally and internationally.
So what’s the plan?
2 Timothy 4:2 (NASB) 2 preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort, with great patience and instruction.
Sounds too simple, doesn’t it? You see, some people miss the thrust of the entire verse: It is to hold the people of God to God’s standard by reproving, rebuking and exhorting with great patience and instruction. In other words, this isn’t just “feel good” sermons and “praise the Lord” sermons; this is learning & understanding sermons (expository preaching isn’t a style). That means the people of God, the Church, need to understand who they are, whose they are and the fact that they are God’s image bearers (they represent God). You see the reason that the Church of Christ is irrelevant is because being a Christian is no longer attractive. People don’t see following God as a peaceful lifestyle because “Christians” on TV look like raving lunatics that are only “Christ-like” when they are together in “service” praising. We look crazy. We’ve misrepresented Christ for far too long. He was among the population and was infectious in everything that He did. This means we’ve got to understand from the scripture what it is to be Christ’s disciple in order to be the Church that is depicted in Acts 2:47
47 praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord was adding to their number day by day those who were being saved.
The Message translation makes it a little clearer as to what verse 47 really means:
as they praised God. People in general liked what they saw. Every day their number grew as God added those who were saved. [Emphasis, mine]
It means that what the people of God were and what they did attract people to see something that they’ve never seen before. Why aren’t we as Ministers challenging the Church to live Holy? Why aren’t we challenging the Church to act Holy? Why aren’t we challenging the Church to act Holy toward people outside of the Body of Christ? You see, if we plant a seed of Holiness among the people of God, we won’t just see a single tree but fruit with that tree. Every piece of fruit having within it a seed. Every seed having the ability to become a tree. The end result of planting one seed over a long enough timeline is a forest. Preaching the Word may start causing a few Christians to live & act Holy, which will impact their circles of influence. Preaching the Word can cause a congregation to live & act Holy which will cause them to impact the congregation’s neighborhood. Preaching the Word can cause congregationS (I did that on purpose) of the Church to live & act Holy to work together to develop programs that show & prove the love of Christ to impact the city.
The end result is something that I think we’re afraid to become because it would prove that we’ve not been doing things well for such a long time. Personally, I’m okay admitting that I haven’t been correct or the best that I could be as long as moving forward, we do better. It is going to take humility but it would cause the Church of Christ to be something that we haven’t been in a long time nationally together:
Relevant.
Disciplined Power
There are several things that I think about regularly.
One of them is Discipline. Discipline comes with an issue though. To get things started, you have to choose to stop something: Procrastination. For every person that realizes that they need to have discipline, there is a reason why. In our walk with the Lord in this life, we need to have a discipline of study and prayer. The reason is because to try to get through this life without being in communication with the Lord is a near impossible thing that will cost you greatly. There are many people that wish to be in constant communication with the Lord. The issue is that, procrastination will have you delaying the desired goal.
Habits in general are hard to develop. It is said that it takes 21 days for a habit to be “installed”. Twenty-one days of doing something over and over again with the same attitude that you began with is a tough thing to accomplish but it’s worth it. Think about it: when New Years comes around, most people set a resolution to earn or retain more money and/or lose weight. Gyms are packed from January to roughly about March... and then gym attendance drops significantly almost back to where it was before the “NYE Resolution” crowd showed up. The reason it never goes back to the exact same attendance is because there are a few people that will choose to focus on creating the habit because they are zeroed in on the goal. Those few people are the people that are choosing to get it done and are not just about talking about it.
In the same way, the discipline of speaking to the Lord in prayer and listening to Him in study are things that champions do. They see the long term blessing and they reach for it. Recognize, however, that one of the helpers of procrastination is what I like to call the false appearance of the load. What do I mean by that? There are many of us that understand that it will take 21 days to develop a habit... and therein lies the false appearance of the load. Each day that a person begins to take a step of execution toward their goal, they think about the complete 21 consecutive days. Say we have a goal to lose 50 lbs. Most people go into the gym everyday thinking about the whole 50 lbs that they desire to lose. After one day of work, the 50 lbs isn’t gone and so there is discouragement. The 21 days get a little bit harder as a result of such discouragement and most people quit after one week.
Here’s a truth that must be considered: You can only take one step at a time when you’re walking somewhere. My meaning is that if I seek to lose weight, when I go to the gym today, I can only worry about today’s progress counting. That’s all that I can do. Tomorrow is truly not promised and the work that I do today has an effect on my life - I’m improving even if I can’t see the difference. The same is true about developing a communication life with the Lord - It takes tell yourself regularly “I’m better than I was yesterday because I did something today”.
There is a brother in my congregation that is close to 50 years old. I’m 33 years old. He made a statement to me that he wishes that he had gotten involved in the depth of study that I’m at when he was younger. Here’s the truth that he can’t see: It started when I decided to study for a few minutes per day many, many years ago. There are scriptures that are stuck in my brain because I was ONLY focused on reading 10 verse of scripture each and every day. It started when I was 12. I picked it up when I was 28 and the load has increased ever since. But it started because from the very first day, I knew that what I did today was better than what I did the day before. I made my mind up to believe that.
Your mind has to be made up first before you can accomplish any little feat of discipline. This is slight edge principle - little actions compounded over time make the biggest difference in the world.
Let me leave you with a short plan that everyone can do:
Listen to the sermon this coming Sunday and write down the scripture focus of the sermon. Do the same next week.
Make it a point to read the WHOLE chapter in context throughout the week.
Only read 10 verse of the chapter each day.
If it’s a short chapter, include the chapter before and/or after.
Jot down any questions that might come to mind. Take them back to Worship/Bible Study the next time that you’re present so you can have them answered.
Set a time to pray for 10 minutes each day.
This can take place in your car while you drive on your way to work or on your way back.
Talk to God about the things that are of concern to you.
And that’s the exercise that I started with in studying God’s Word and it was a blessing since. Now I read a lot more but it started with taking a simple step.
I hope that this blog has been a blessing to you.
God bless, KS
(via https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yEOi4LY4hfs)
For everyone who is a believer in Christ, you need to watch this lecture.
Narrow Learning
How do you learn? Do you learn the “how-to”s of how something operates and then go ahead and do it? How about learning from people’s mistakes? How about learning from people’s examples? How about learning from your enemy? How about learning from people you don’t consider correct but actually do things that you cannot get correctly?
One of the things that I’ve learned from the great preacher, Arnelious Crenshaw, Minister of the Northeast Church of Christ in Oklahoma City, OK, is that there are “some things that you can learn from your denominational neighbor”. Now some of you are perhaps might read and say “Wait a minute, we don’t need to learn anything from denominations”. To that individual, I say something simple: How many of God’s statutes do you see people in the world live better than people in the Church?
Let’s be honest: the determination that the Jehovah’s Witnesses have to share their faith IS NOT the same determination that members of the Church have...
The same dogged determination that Mormons have against fornication IS NOT the same determination that members of the Church have...
Perhaps, we ought to realize that there are some things that we can learn from them. Perhaps, we ought to look at those programs and things that they put into practice in their homes so that we can examine what we might be doing wrong.
We have taught in the Church exactly what the Bible says about salvation and worship. As a matter of fact, in these recent years, that’s what our principled focus has been. I’ve learned that while those are excellent and necessary what have we taught Christians about Holy Living? We have members of the Church that can quote Acts 2:38 forwards and backwards but have no idea what it means to “walk in the light” as stated in 1 John 1:7. We have Christians that have thoroughly understood what Mark 16:16 means but completely miss what it means to bear fruit (Matthew 7:17; Galatians 5:22).
Here it is that while we’ve been so bent on teaching others what it means to obey the Gospel (1 Corinthians 15:1-4; Romans 6:1-7), we’ve forgotten the second part of the Great Commission noted in Matthew 28:18-20 (NASB)...
18 And Jesus came up and spoke to them, saying,“All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth. 19 Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, 20 teaching them to observe all that I commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.”
... Teaching them to live Holy lives.
So my question is simple: How are you learning? Because what I’m learning is that as a Minister, I don’t want God to say “Good job teaching and baptizing people... but how come you never taught them how to live?”
While I know that there will be no going back and forth with God, it would stick in my mind “Well if the Mormons and Jehovah’s Witnesses could do it...”
Jesse Williams just gave one of the most powerful speeches we’ve ever heard for Black Lives Matter
Watch the full speech to see why Samuel L. Jackson called it worthy of one of the great civil rights speeches of the 1960s.
Gifs: thg2nd
WATCH THE VIDEO
(via https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ispGKpeGH6A) If you've never understood what the anger is all about, if you've never understood what the frustration was all about, LISTEN to Jesse Williams acceptance speech at the BET Awards.
The Difference Maker
I’ve noticed something within the brotherhood of Christ that has me kind of tilting my head to the side and saying “Huh?”
In recent times, I’ve noticed that amongst churches of Christ that there are congregations that are changing their names. What I mean is that they are changing their names from “[Insert name here] Church of Christ” to “[Insert name here] Community of Christ” or “[Insert name here] Center” or “[Insert name here] Church: A Missional Community”.
I’ve asked myself certain questions regarding this. I even understand what these Ministers intend to do with “changing the name”. You see, in times past, the Church of Christ has had a rich history of fighting in order to prove to others that they were wrong. In all honesty, there are only few of these incidents that have taken place however, it only takes a few to give the Church a bad name. In all honesty though, I don’t think people in general care about the phrase “Church of Christ”. I have come to the point where I wonder if these Ministers are focused on the bad more than anyone else. Selah.
Understanding that the phrase “Church of Christ” is not a name but rather a designation, there is no foul being done in planting a congregation and naming it “[Insert name here] Church” or the “The Church at [Insert name here]”. In all honesty, it is not the sign that makes a congregation the Church of Christ but the doctrine being taught. This is what makes supposed non-denominational churches stand out: If they are truly un-denominational, then why do some of them teach a Calvinistic, Wesleyan or “Other” doctrine?
From the moment that I decided that I would be a Minister within the Lord’s Church, I never had a thought to change the name of the congregation. My focus was perhaps change or improve the congregation’s culture. I am firm in my belief that if the culture is changed to match the OLD culture of the first century Church, that we see spoken of in the scriptures, regardless of what people have heard about the “Church of Christ”, they will be proud to be a part of these congregations because their focus would be on being in the Body of Christ.
It bothers me that what Ministers of the Church have chosen to focus on is a “name”. It begs the question: If a person is familiar with the COC and after recognizing where they are ask, “How come you changed the name”, would the response be “marketing”? Truthfully, I don’t believe that anyone would ask the question even if they are familiar with the Church of Christ.
I want to point one thing out, albeit several times:
The Northside Church of Christ in Jacksonville, FL is 2,500 members strong and has a multitude of services that have truly impacted the community around them.
The North Peoria Church of Christ in Tulsa, OK is 700 to 1,000 members strong and has influence in the community around them that would make certain people freeze in admiration.
The West End Church of Christ in Atlanta, GA is around 1,200 members strong and is a force to be reckoned with in Atlanta.
The Central Pointe Church of Christ in Dallas, TX is so large they had to create a second campus in Mesquite, TX and are now in a place where they can reach and influence people and communities in two different places.
The Newark Church of Christ in Newark, NJ is 700 members strong and is a place where everybody stops by when the want to reach the community around Newark.
The Schrader Lane Church of Christ in Nashville, TN is somewhere around 1,500 (I’m not certain about this number; it could be & probably is more) members strong and in built up like a miniature city, blessing people all over the city.
If you ask members of each of these communities “have you heard of the COC”, they’ll proudly say “Yes”.
These are just a few of the congregations in the US that have tremendous impact on the world around them and aren’t afraid of the phrase “Church of Christ”. My goal as a Minister is to teach people what the Word of God says and what it has for their lives. I don’t believe people care about names, but about understanding what God has to say, which in all honesty is what this whole thing is about. I’ve met people that are familiar with the COC and when the approach me with ugly stories about us, I simply say “In time past, we haven’t been the best in reaching people where they are without disrespecting them first. I apologize for that. [Even if it was 40 years ago, in spite of the fact that I’m 33, at the time of this writing) Why don’t you stop by Camden COC and give us another shot?” Hear me when I say this: I’m a man and men take responsibility. When I say I’m sorry because of the indignation of my brothers and sisters in time past, I mean it. Why? Because they met someone who wasn’t mature in the faith and the person that I speak with wants resolution to that past ill. If all that they will get from me is an apology because of how they have been treated in time past, I have done a good job. The next time they have something negative to share regarding the Church, it’ll be in their mind that I apologized for actions my brother/sister committed. We need to be focused on our impact.
When most people come through the doors of Camden Church of Christ, they are shocked by what they get hit with: Love, Honesty & Integrity. There are people who ran from the Church that I run into on a regular basis and the response is always the same: THEY COME BACK. Why? Because what we focus on is the culture of Christ that is outlined in His word, not the phrase that helps people identify us.
Let me be clear when I say this: There is nothing wrong with the names “[Insert name here] Church”, “The Church at [Insert name here]” or ““[Insert name here] Center”. The mentality of many of these Ministers is to re-create the culture of the Church as outlined in the scriptures. And that leads me to a question that I don’t think if anyone will answer thoroughly:
What is the purpose in doing so in the first place?
The district attorney says he's not confident that Judge Aaron Persky can be fair in the unrelated case. Critics want to recall the judge who sentenced Brock Turner to six months for sexual assault.
This was a terrible situation but this will stop that judge from sentencing people in a biased way.
Stan's Tires 4420 Market Street Philadelphia PA 215-222-6993 Black Owned & Good Business, been taking care me and my family for 10 years.
Not close to #Philly or #Camden? Got you covered! #Ready2Receive #churchOfChrist
