Don’t cast your pearls before swine

“People who aren’t spiritual can’t receive these truths from God’s Spirit. It all sounds foolish to them and they can’t understand it, for only those who are spiritual can understand what the Spirit means.” (1 Corinthians 2:14 NLT)

 

Some of us elders have spent much of our careers trying to mobilize “church people” for the kingdom of God. We called for people to be “on mission with God” when most preferred pagan pastimes. We pled for donations to kingdom causes but most chose to spend money on themselves. We might as well have been working the cemetery.

 

Some of you younger ones are wasting precious time in the same way. Don’t cast your pearls before swine. Find those who are spiritual and teach them the Spirit’s truths. Search out the ones willing to deny themselves and make disciples. The Lord is preparing judgment that will begin with his people. Wheat will be separated from chaff and weeds uprooted. Pour yourself into those who have ears to hear. Night is coming.

‘The fires are kindled already’

“Church people” deliberately keep on sinning, while the Holy One calls us out of the world. God’s judgment will sweep away righteous and wicked alike. The fires are kindled already. “It is a terrible thing to fall into the hands of the living God.” (@Ezekiel030709)

What if “it is time for judgment to begin with the household of God” (1 Peter 4:17) and the fires indeed are kindled already? We cannot live in God’s shalom peace without justice for the poor and oppressed. Yet we are complacent about injustice and look to politicians who can bring us neither peace nor justice. Only God’s people can love their neighbors the way they love themselves and make disciples who live God’s way, rather than the world’s.