invitation to the great supper...
how many invitations have we turned down by making lamed excuses not to attend to the great supper (God's house)?
Luke 14:16-24 Jesus told a parable about a certain man sent many invitations out to his great supper; when time to attend they all made excuses: I brought land & need to see it and I brought animals & need to prove them(what?! you spent money on land and animals before checking it out?!), I just married ( I will think this was a good excuse but NO!)
Excuses, here's some our modern day excuses for not attending the great supper(church):
"I don't like church people" "They fake" or "holy than thou people" We may have attended to one church or better yet NONE and we say we are church hurt and all churches are the same, WRONG!
If we have to deal with hypocritical people in the world and find them in the church as well - where there should be a no-judging zone, then we might feel screwed; questioning why go to church at all! Why attend church when we have the same foolery on the outside?! But we should never attend church based on the people or the pastor. But if we keep our eyes on Christ and block all the negativity even just by reminiscing on the awesome things He has done, we'll find ourselves with arms lifted in joyful praise. Never forsake to assemble yourselves. We may find those "church people" who give Christianity a bad name, but we will also find those who are sold out for Christ. Those who are willing to lend a helping hand, pray with and for us, those we can confide in. But if we flip the script, we will also find those whom WE can help! Those who are going through what God has brought us out of. So at the end of the day, it's not about us or those "church people" it's about Christ and the love and support we can spread to others...even hypocritical "church people".
Find a bible based church, which is a pastor or teacher teaches strictly from the Holy Bible not by what he or she thinks, and we will learn about how Jesus dealt with them so called church people :) please don't let disliking church people stop us from entering God's kingdom,
let's go to church.
"I don't have any money to give them(church)" So we need money to get to heaven? NO! Jesus Christ paid the price. Money will not pay our way to heaven...only by confessing our sins, believing in our hearts, and be saved (Romans 10:9) will get us in heaven.
We may not have money to give to the church but why not offer a praise? We've all heard the saying when praises go up, blessings come down! God wants your praise!
Do you think He will condemn you if you truly don't have money to give to the House of the Lord?
If not having money prevents you from going to church then ask Him who owns the cattle upon a thousand hills! Be bold and set out in faith by going to His House, knocking on His door reminding Him that He promised to look after you - His sheep - and watch Him move on your behalf just because you were daring enough to come and ask for it! Now if you really mean, you don't have any money to give to the Pastor...well... that's a different topic!
For our soul sake, let's go to church.
"I ain't ready yet cause I have some things I need to straighten out first" we all felt this way before: too embarrassed, shameful, and sorrowful to come to church. Not wanting to come to God house with guilt and feeling like dirt or the scum of the earth because of past actions or mistakes. We felt that to present ourselves before the King we should at least stop this or that... And let's not forget those "church people" who may have heard a whiff of your past, looking down at us with condescending glares of judgement. All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. He made us! He sees everything! He knows what we are about to do before the thought even pass our mind.
Jesus is always there, arms stretched wide, saying, "Come, let Me help you with the dilemma that is weighing you down, keeping you from having a desire to attend My house and showing Me some love."
We need to attend church to receive the mind & strength (power) from the church to be able to straighten our situation out there, we cannot do this alone! In Ephesians 6:10-17 talks about being strong in the Lord and putting on the whole armour of God to be able to stand and fight the wiles of the devil...remember we have experienced the same situations and have overcome them by being in the Presence of God & among His people, let's go to church.
It's HOT/ COLD/ RAINING out there! -_- Really?! But we go to work daily faithfully through the rain, sleet, snow, & stormy weathers but cannot attend to an 1 1/2 hour out of 24 hours in 7 days dinner with Jesus, the One who gives us breathe to live the life & strength to go to work?
An excellent example of having persistence paying off, has to be the woman with the issue of blood! If she wasn't persistent and pressed her way even against the modern law of that time; pushing through a mobbed crowd determined against all odds, she would have not received her miracle. Sometime God watches us to see (even though He already know) what actions or excuses we can come up with for not doing the right thing. Even something as simple as attending church in turbulent weather. The safest place in the whole wide world is in the will of God...
Without Him(Jesus) we are Nothing so give Him his time, let's go to church.
All excuses are nailed to the cross when Jesus died for us! Let's go to Church.
Manifest Presence International Church
2764 Mauvilla Drive Mobile, AL 36606
Sunday hours: 7:30am-9am and 9:30am-11am
Do not turn down this invitation, let's fill God's house and have a Great Supper!