09/18/2020 —
Many of today's Christian leaders desperately seek relevance. But they do so by abandoning the thing that makes the Church relevant: the words and message of our Lord Jesus Christ.

We'll be relevant when we're relentlessly connected to the pre-eminent issue of our time: people are either saved or they are lost. And there is one path to salvation: faith in Jesus. Do we dare to be relevant?
 
 
Romans 5:3b-11
"Even in times of trouble we have a joyful confidence, knowing that our pressures will develop in us patient endurance. And patient endurance will refine our character, and proven character leads us back to hope. And this hope is not a disappointing fantasy, because we can now experience the endless love of God cascading into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who lives in us!
"For when the time was right, the Anointed One came and died to demonstrate his love for sinners who were entirely helpless, weak, and powerless to save themselves.
"Now, who of us would dare to die for the sake of a wicked person? We can all understand if someone was willing to die for a truly noble person. But Christ proved God’s passionate love for us by dying in our place while we were still lost and ungodly!
"And there is still much more to say of his unfailing love for us! For through the blood of Jesus we have heard the powerful declaration, 'You are now righteous in my sight.' And because of the sacrifice of Jesus, you will never experience the wrath of God. So if while we were still enemies, God fully reconciled us to himself through the death of his Son, then something greater than friendship is ours. Now that we are at peace with God, and because we share in his resurrection life, how much more we will be rescued from sin’s dominion!
"And even more than that, we overflow with triumphant joy in our new relationship of living in harmony with God—all because of Jesus Christ!" (TPT).
 

•  When Pastor Parsley started this ministry's first television program some 40 years ago, the leading prayer request to TBN was for the salvation of an unsaved family member. Now, it's for personal financial blessings.

•  We equate material wealth with God's blessing. Jesus, by contrast, said if you have two robes you should give one to someone who doesn't have one.

•  Few words spoken in a lifetime are more meaningful or of more lasting value than those spoken with a dying breath. Consider Jesus's final words from Calvary:
•  "Father, forgive them, for they don't know what they're doing."
•  (To the thief on the cross) "Today you will be with me in paradise."
•  (To Mary) "Woman, behold your son. (to John) Behold thy mother."
• "My God, My God, for this moment You have kept me!"
• "I thirst."
• "It is finished (I have accomplished all You sent me to do."
• "Father, into your hands I commend my spirit."

• The cross is too often not preached, because it's too ugly, mean and brutal. We don't look at it, so we don't receive from it. And yet everything we need can be found there.