Maybe examine ourselves first?

Micah 6.8
He has told you, O man, what is good;
and what does the LORD require of you
but to do justice, and to love kindness,
and to walk humbly with your God?

Before we criticize another religion and boast about having the truth. . .

Maybe we should see if we really believe the basic tenets of the faith we are so proud of.

Are we just, fair to those around us?  Do we love kindness and mercy?  Do I walk humbly with my God?

Before we get ourselves all tangled up with our profession of faith, maybe we should examine our daily confession of faith, the “this is what I believe because this is what I live.”

Please, pause and think about it.  We believe all the grand and glorious truths of God’s holy book, but we don’t step on the simple path of faith in our daily routine.

Matthew 22.34-40
34 But when the Pharisees heard that he had silenced the Sadducees, they gathered together. 35 And one of them, a lawyer, asked him a question to test him. 36 “Teacher, which is the great commandment in the Law?” 37 And he said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.  38 This is the great and first commandment. 39 And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. 40 On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.”

How many times in church does our “concern” or problem or issue (read agenda for all of these) demand preeminence over everything, even the basic tenets of honoring and loving God.

Love your neighbor as yourself.  The scholars, the religious best-of-the-best tested Christ with this question:  “Which is the great commandment in the Law?”  Without hesitation Jesus went to the simple stuff, love God, love your neighbor as yourself, if you want to understand your “Bibles” see them through this teaching.

They didn’t get it then, and often we don’t get it now.

I can remember an elder at one of my churches ready to take me apart because of his wife’s nagging over a VBS play.  When I tried to draw his attention to his horrible attitude outweighing any VBS preparation, he was indignant.  I was accused of being defensive.

We criticize people of other religions for not having the truth, and yet we do not believe the basic truths of God enough to actually practice them when and where it counts.

For many Christians the gap between the body of truth they profess and what they actually believe is so great that they don’t know what they believe.

And don’t give me doctrinal statements.  Intellectual assent means nothing if that knowledge does not drive our will and emotions.

How can I profess to believe in the sovereignty of God when I cannot even trust his “advice” on forgiveness?

Ephesians 4.32
Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you.

Kind, tenderhearted, forgiving. . .

We push this God-given direction aside for our little petty, mean actions and wonder why God isn’t moving in the lives of more people.

C’mon, dummy!