While still sweating as my fever recurs and breaks, at least the nausea is gone and I can eat. I'm thankful for all the prayers that have been ushered to God on my behalf the last few days, and the Lord is surely healing, but I was unable to preach this morning. This has only happened a few times in my 6+ years of preaching, and every time it has it feels so weird not to be proclaiming God's word. Because I love God, I love to preach His word. I miss it when I cannot do so. Even on weeks where Ashley and I are on vacation we are in church somewhere, so a Sunday morning at home is a rare thing indeed.
I love to listen to and watch preaching. Part of my normal Sunday morning routine before I head to church for prayer is to watch Jonathan Falwell, Jack Graham and James Merritt. This morning in addition to those I also caught some of Charles Stanley, David Jeremiah and D. James Kennedy. All of these men of God feed my desire to learn and grow in God's word.
However, as we all know, most of religious television is dominated by questionable if not heretical teachers that pollute our airwaves. This morning out of curiosity I also caught part of Creflo Dollar, Gregory Dickow, Kenneth Hagin, Jr., Kenneth Copeland, Ron Carpenter(of Greenville's Redemption World Outreach), Joel O'Steen, Frederick Price and, gulp, Robert Schuler. My goodness the heresy that passes for the gospel these days.
It is sad and disturbing to me that so many have been deceived by these wolves in sheep's clothing. They are men who preach to itching ears and felt needs, propagating "name it and claim it" and that material wealth is a part of the Christian faith. I've never felt as though God owed me anything, but rather, I owed God everything. But to listen to this rabble you'd think the Almighty was in our debt, and subject to our command, rather than what the bible teaches that we are to be under his control and to be obedient to Him.
I must say most of them started out soundly, but after about 5 minutes of decent biblical exegesis, they all drifted into a "what's in it for me" mentality. Worshipping God in not about me, it is about Him, but vast numbers of churches today have made church about man's needs, instead of God's desires. Name it and claim it; prosperity now; be a better you; you are pleasing to God just as you are. So this is why Jesus died?
Through my faith in Jesus Christ God is not required to give me anything other than eternal life as He has promised. And that is by His grace and mercy, and by nothing on my account. His word tells me my "treasures are in heaven," not here on earth. I should want nothing in my life that is not the will of God; whether it be riches, or health, or comfort, or peace. His word tells me I will suffer, be persecuted, hated by the world. It does not say I will show Myself, God Almighty, by how wealthy or prosperous I will make you. But you'd find that hard to tell by watching TV this morning.
Also, as I know in my heart, there is a reason for everything. Why did I get sick this week. Well, early this morning, a young couple in our church suffered a terrible tragedy. They suffered a miscarriage. I found this out on Facebook when I normally would not have been home. They did not call as they thought I'd be at church. Though unable to be with them due to illness, I was able to minister with them over the phone, and will surely be with them when I'm no longer contagious. Pray for the Riggan's as they undergo this trail. I'm very proud of Brian and Lauren and with the faith in which they are dealing with this.
What else this Sunday holds I do not know. But Adrian Rogers is on in 10 minutes. While I did not have the privilege of feeding the sheep this morning, this sheep still wants to be fed. Thankfully interspersed between the false teachers and money grabbers, we do find gems from time to time. Everyone have a blessed day! For this is the day "the Lord has made."
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