So you think you can PREACH?
Macleod last night, 5 preachers "pitted against" a congregation of young people in a battle for Salvation & Holiness....
Preachers drew a preaching topic out at random and had five minutes to prepare before letting loose on the young people. Topics and Preachers were:
Alana - Trinity
Amazing for a first-time preacher! She had a go at a tough topic and ripped through it in record time! Keep an eye out for this young woman, she's got it!
Pete - Salvation
Shared his extreme passion for souls from a passage in Luke 4 - the bit with Jesus reading from Isaiah. Challenged the youth to lay down their sin before God and step into new life with Christ!
Jo - Worship
I brought a notebook with me to scribble notes on, as I opened it, found I'd scratched out some notes & bible verses on worship ages ago! (praise the Lord!). Preached also from Isaiah 58, using an out of tune guitar as an illustration for our worship being out of tune with God's desire for worship!
James - Holiness
Typical of Jamsie to get his favourite topic! This crafty guy organised a 'backing track' with the band, rocking it out with some holiness passion and laying down truth so thick we didn't know what hit us!
Tish - Choices
Man this girl has a seriously quick brain! She chucked in about 15 verses on choices and gave us the low-down on our choice between wisdom and foolishness.
The "all-in challenge" saw all 5 preachers up the front backed by the band, and being led by the Spirit in challenging some radical response. Tell you what, we saw some serious sanctification happening at the foot of the cross! A massive night for youth, by youth (yay Sarah McIver! love you!), this definitely has to be done again and reproduced across the world!!!!
Labels:
Army,
bible,
fire,
holy spirit,
passion,
REVOLUTION,
salvation,
youth
10 comments:
Thankyou for inviting me to your blog (I'm the David from tcspeak). I have an "activity" for you.
Read the following theological commentary, and critically comment on it:
http://www.savior-of-all.com/perfect.html
You might also want to look at the other writing on this website for greater context.
What an awesome night of praise to our King!! God turned up and lives were touched!!
Well done Jo and all the others who honoured Jesus last night!
Thanks for coming David, hope reading this was an encouragement to your Spirit!
The site you referred to me is interesting, I don't agree with the main point of the whole article, no matter how well it seems to be crafted to support itself.
“Let there be no doubt that God will destroy the wicked and all his evil works (Ps. 145:20; Ps. 7:9), but how can God judge the sinner yet not contradict His love for all men? The answer to this question is so very simple, and yet has been grasped by so few: God will destroy all sinners by making them friends! Paul tells us that this is exactly what happened to us.” (for others - the article is promoting the idea that God's judgement of sinners will be and act of 'cleansing', killing off the earthly nature so everyone will be able to live eternally in God's presence).
Why believe in Christ if this encapsulates the gospel? Let’s eat, drink and be merry, for tomorrow we die! None of this life of holiness and service stuff….
(of course I’m being sarcastic!). If God was just going to save everyone anyway, why would he send Jesus to die? It seems a bit extreme to allow Jesus to be tortured and killed… for nothing! This kind of gospel weakens the power and grace of Jesus' salvation act
I don’t pretend to understand the finer ‘mechanics’ of God’s grace, but I know that God works in the world to give humanity opportunity to know him, our failure as Christians to follow this divine evangelistic plan or humanity’s inability to accept the grace offered do not mean that judgment is too harsh. Thankfully God is in control of this process and I have far more confidence that God will judge people correctly, than I have confidence in humanity to define God correctly! I noticed a discussion of satan and his angels is not addressed at all in that article. This is very important in a debate on the existence of hell and discussion of eternity and judgment. Where is it that satan and those fallen angels exist?
I have to go... but there may be more to discuss here...
Hi Jo,
Thanks for the report on the Preach Off!
If I had ben there, perhaps I would have ben a little biased towards Tish.
Blessings!!!
[Do you have a shorter name so that people can reference you in their comments, "salvo cadet on a mission - for the world and the salvos to be revolutionized for jesus!!!". I don't mean your real-life name, just a blog name for ease of typing.]
I didn't read the saviour-for-all website in the way characterized by your critique. The author still emphasizes God's judgement, which is inescapable.
The bit I found interesting was that he resolved the apparent immorality of eternal suffering as punishment without doing away with the requirement for judgement.
What concerns me is that the Salvo's doctrines seem to leave little room for variation, and, if your assessment is any guide, would not accept this author's interpretations.
Most people call me Jo. ;o)
(I don't have issues with people knowing who I am).
Is it important for you that hell not exist? I find that most variations to what is described as 'traditional' Christian belief is borne out of a desire to make God more self-friendly. Making God in the image of flawed humanity, rather than accepting the sovereignty of God as a 'like' but altogether 'higher' power (which requires less of us personally). Not sure if this reasonates at all, but a bit of self-examination is required in these kind of debates... Would God be diminished in loving humanity and allowing the existence of hell? No way! No more than God allowed satan to choose his own way and condemn himself.
If God loves humanity and hell is real, what does that require of us? of you?
Just a thought...
For those who do not repent this life, there is an awful fate awaiting after judgement. But it is not eternal punishment.
It is a process of punishment for the purpose of finally bringing reconciliation with God.
The arguments are that God wants all men to be saved, and that God's will, will ultimately prevail.
Once again, these articles are better explanations:
Overview of the universalist style arguments:
http://www.savior-of-all.com/restitution.html
"Exposing the Greatest Lie Ever Told" http://www.savior-of-all.com/study.html
and
"Why Repent?" http://www.savior-of-all.com/repent.html
David, its seems you aren't interested in what I have to say on this matter, I had hoped you would like to dialogue about this. Personally, I am not interested in theologically incorrect propaganda being posted on my blog.
Please respect this in future, you are welcome at any time to comment on the issues I post about and please continue to journey in your understanding of God and your own theology. Blessings, Jo.
I recognize your right to dismiss departures from the Salvo's version of orthodox theology (which I realize is very similar to other denominations).
However, universalism, or the restitution of all things, does have a long history stretching back to the ancient church. And I also recognize that good, biblically based arguments can be made for both sides.
Also the concept of Hell has developed over millenia, too - think about the shadowy concept of the Hebrew sheol versus the eternal punishment idea.
It's not my intention to push a particular brand of theology, as I can't claim that any current version today is indeed the correct one, and I don't think you can make that claim either (for example, you would agree that there are authentic Christians in non-Salvo churches, churches with different beliefs). [A side note: however, I'm very quickly learning that the Salvos mob are probably more distant from liberal theology than what I would feel comfortable with.]
Eternal punishment is but one of a number of problems, moral and otherwise, with "standard" Christianity.
For anyone who happens to be reading this, I would recommend a google search on hell, the problem of evil, universalism and other themes - there is stacks of serious material that will make interesting reading.
Thankyou for your patience.
Jo,
We celebrate that God-given gift of preaching and I am encouraged greatly to see more young people using the gifts from God to bring Him glory! Hallelujah!
Check out my new blog! www.stormtheforts.blogspot.com
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