Chapter Five: The Three Greatest Commandments
So how are you doing in your reading?
We’re seven weeks into our collective reading of The Hole In Our Gospel and I imagine that you’re beginning to craft ideas of what we could potentially do through Grace Church to contribute to God’s mercy mission in the world. I would love to hear your ideas. If you have any thoughts about how we should respond to what we’re reading, please leave a comment here or email me through the church website: www.gracechurchlaverne.org.
In this week’s chapter I was smitten by N.T. Wright’s quotation about the significance of our current work for Christ. Please read these selected words from Wright’s quote and allow their significance to encourage, refresh, and inspire you.
“What you do in the Lord is not in vain. You are not oiling the wheels of a machine that’s about to roll over a cliff. You are not restoring a great painting that’s shortly going to be thrown on the fire. You are accomplishing something that will become in due course part of God’s new world. Every act of love, gratitude, and kindness; every work of art or music inspired by the love of God and delight in the beauty of His creation; every minute spent teaching a severely handicapped child to read or to walk; every act of care and nurture for one’s fellow human being; and of course every prayer, every deed that spreads the gospel, builds up the church, embraces and embodies holiness rather than corruption, and makes the name of Jesus honored in the world—all of this will find its way into the new creation that God will one day make.”[1]
You and I are a part of the greatest work on the planet. Let’s do our part with excellence, diligence, and ever-increasing joy.
[1] Richard Stearns, The Hole in our Gospel (Thomas Nelson, Nashville, TN: 2009): 69.