Lazy busy summer time . . .

Not much happens in the church during the lazy months of summer; after all, people need their time off to rest and relax, so church attendance is dismal.

So, an occasional vacation Bible school or two is arranged with a summer camp to get the kids out of their parent’s hair. Ironically, this is about all the Bible these kids get since hockey, and gymnastics, and wrestling, or soccer . . . let’s not forget football, either . . . just about eats up all of their waking hours during the school year, including just a whole lot of time in which they could be getting their homework done.
 

Why such rush? Where are we going in such a crazy speed? Is life really that urgent?


It doesn’t stop when parents ship them off to college, either. Mom and dad keep up the hectic pace to fill in the boredom of the empty nest syndrome. Then really seem surprised when little Johnnie or cute Susie comes home and announces that they have met their significant other and have decided to move in with them to save money. No, they are not going to church while at college, either. Things are tough, you know, with all the studies and other stuff that is going on. Of course, they never get around to defining the “other stuff.”
 

Now, mind you, not all kids are like this, but surprisingly a number are. Good kids, raised in a good Christian home—but, and here is where the rub comes in, not a good Christian environment.
 

Yes, that’s right, not in a good Christian environment. Sporadic table prayers, or occasional church attendance with a home atmosphere that is permeated with a “do as I say, not as I do” attitude backed up with inconsistent discipline will not do the trick. It takes more. Much more.
 

It takes love. Sometimes tough love. But, it also takes commonsense. Sense enough to admit that as a parent you are not perfect. Sense enough to know that only prayer will bring the answer—usually, allowing God to speak to you as a parent with words of wisdom, not necessarily to slay little Johnnie or cute Susie with an on the road to Damascus event. It’s terribly hard to unscramble eggs. In fact, impossible. So, parents should not expect to reverse the head on collision that looms just ahead for the kids unless they are prepared for some major disappointments. Johnnie is just as bull headed as dad was; and Susie can be just as sassy as mom. So, we must keep it in focus that kids are only modeling behavior that they learned, primarily through osmosis. In short, parental example.
 

So, what’s the bottom line?

 

 

There is no bottom line. The game of life is already on. We Christians just need to be smart enough not to play it.
 

Sadly, however, the mania is not confined to America. It has spread around the world. Once idyllic communities of calm and serenity are now caught up in the whirl of modernity, chasing the end of an ever illusive fleeting rainbow. Some find it, only to discover that instead of a pot of gold there is nothing there but a cauldron of festering disappointment and spiritual disillusionment.
 

Church, we need to wake up. Church, we must wake up. We have no choice. Love demands it. The love that took God all the way from Heaven to the Cross. This is the answer. The only answer. Yes, more than ever Christ is the answer.
 

Christ is the answer for the family, the neighborhood, the city, and to an ever increasing concentric circle of peoples around the globe.
 

Thank you for helping us to make our ministry more than just a calling, or a burden for the lost. Thank you for making the Great Commission a reality in and through our lives.

Yours For A Greater End Time Harvest,

P.S. Continue to pray for our ministry in the former Soviet Union and in Southern Asia.