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Jesus First
by glenn coon We all know that Jesus should be our #1 doctrine. But, HOW do we practice this? For the apostles, their first message was Jesus. The person of Jesus was their rallying cry. It was the doctrine of Jesus that brought the new members into the church. They were baptized into JESUS. If we too would make Jesus our # 1 doctrine, We must begin all of our teaching With the story of His great love for us. It would be entirely fitting for our evangelism To begin with the story of Jesus With the proclamation that salvation is a FREE Gift. Of course, that is not the END of the story, But it should definitely come at the beginning Making certain doctrines (such as the law) Our FIRST teaching, Could lead to faulty ideas, It could taint our Christian experience. When you hear a church member continually harping, 'Taint right to do this, Or 'taint right to that, You can be pretty sure that he has a 'tainted' experience One in which Jesus is not the center. It's not that we should encourage or excuse wrong-doing. But a NEGATIVE approach has no power to save. It IS alright to say 'NO' But saying NO to the world, lacks meaning unless we first say YES to Jesus. Those who have no assurance of salvation are referred to as 'among all men most miserable'! (l Corinthians 15:9) To develop a happy Christian experience, we need to understand that salvation is a free gift, bestowed upon us who are so unworthy, by a great and loving God. He is more interested in our happiness than in anything else! Glenn Coon, Jr. was born on Grenada, an exotic island in the Caribbean in 1932. His parents, Glenn & Ethel Coon had been missionaries in the British West Indies, and returned to the United States when Glenn was two years old. He is a retired school teacher and revivalist. Article Source: http://www.faithwriters.com |