“Hold them in the highest regard in love because of their work. Live in peace with each other. 14 And we urge you, brothers and sisters, warn those who are idle and disruptive, encourage the disheartened, help the weak, be patient with everyone. 15 Make sure that nobody pays back wrong for wrong, but always strive to do what is good for each other and for everyone else.” (1 Thessalonians 5 v 13-15) The Message says, “Overwhelm them with appreciation and love! Get along among yourselves, each of you doing your part. Our counsel is that you warn the freeloaders to get a move on. Gently encourage the stragglers, and reach out for the exhausted, pulling them to their feet. Be patient with each person, attentive to individual needs. And be careful that when you get on each other’s nerves you don’t snap at each other. Look for the best in each other, and always do your best to bring it out.”
So here are 3 more things that make for a great church and what every Pastor wants of their members!
- They help the weak.
They called Australian retired salesman Don Ritchie “the watchman.” Each day, he sat in his favourite chair at his cliffside home, he would look up and scan the precipice that took the lives of approximately 50 suicide jumpers each year, trying to discern the intentions of visitors.
When somebody seemed to be lingering too long at the cliff, he walked out to talk to him.
“You can’t just sit there and watch them, you gotta try and save them. It’s pretty simple.”
According to official estimates, Ritchie and his wife Moya saved 160 lives during the 45 years they lived near the Gap Park, a famous cliff frequented by sightseers that affords a beautiful view of the Sydney Harbour. However, the unofficial tally is closer to 400, according to newspaper reports.
Although he occasionally used force over the years, his usual approach was friendliness and persuasion, which often ended in an invitation to join himself and his wife at their home for a cup of tea. A former salesman, he saw himself in a different line of sales at the Gap.
“I used to sell kitchen scales and bacon cutters, then I was state manager of a life insurance company,” he told a reporter. “At the Gap I’m trying to sell people life.” Ritchie didn’t pry or preach, but rather smiled and listened, a technique that often worked, though not always. He lost many to the cliff, but saved more than he lost, and didn’t suffer feelings of guilt for his failures. “You can’t do much about it,” he said.
Although it was difficult for him to remember all of the faces he had seen at the cliff during his decades of residency there, he often recalled a woman who had taken off her shoes and had scaled the small fence bordering the ledge, where she sat with a look of confusion on her face. After talking to her and inviting her in for tea, the woman explained that she suffered from depression, and that the medication she had been given was not working. Ritchie and his wife suggested that she ask for a second opinion. Months later, she sent them a bottle of French champagne, and then a Christmas card thanking them for their help.
For his decades of effort to prevent suicides, Ritchie was awarded the Order of Australia, which is the country’s second highest honour, in 2006, and he and his wife were named citizens of the year by the local city council.
Dianne Gaddin, an anti-suicide activist whose daughter killed herself at the cliff in 2005, thought Ritchie may have talked her daughter out of previous attempts and told a reporter, “It takes an enormous amount of courage just to go up to a person who is going to jump. Don has a charisma about him. He makes people feel safe, secure, and calm. I really think he is one special man.” Don carried on being ‘The Watchman’ until his death in May 2012.
The weak are all around us and the Church needs its members to help them.
- They are patient with everyone.
A woman rushed up to famed violinist Fritz Kreisler (1875-1962) after a concert and cried: “I’d give my life to play as beautifully as you do.” Kreisler replied, “I did.”
If you plant a Chinese bamboo seed, it will sit in the ground for five years and appear to not be making any changes. Then, over a six-week period, it will grow 90 feet.
There is a giant Himalayan lily which spends most of its life looking like nothing at all but then after 5-7 years it grows to 9-10 feet tall and produces the most amazing delicately shaped flowers.
However, discouragement is never far away from most people. Many are knocked off course. They are waiting for help. Many have become side-tracked, wandering and drifting and they actually accomplish very little. But the church needs members to dust them down, pick them up and help them to make good decisions.
- They make sure no one tries to get even.
Do you remember when Jesus said something like give your other cheek to be slapped; give the shirt-stealer your coat as well; if you are forced to go an extra mile then go two? It is the upside down Kingdom that the Church belongs to and who its members focus on which make the church great! This new culture says something like this: “I will not do life like you do life. I belong to a different kingdom to you. I choose a higher level. Not out of arrogance or pompous attitude but simply because I will not stoop down to a level of the world which says I should retaliate by ‘hitting your cheek or saying NO to my shirt, that mile, that ask or the loan. Look down on me, make me look unequal to you and my response to you will show the world that we are indeed not equal. Make my life hard and I will expose your injustice by making your life easy. Make me look like some cattle carrying your bags for a mile (the Romans practiced conscription amongst the citizens) and I will show you I will not be demeaned for I will go the extra mile. My generosity will defeat your conscription. Humiliate me but I will not be humiliated in my heart. My humanity will expose your violent humanity by revealing a bigger heart than what is being shown. I will fight within the Kingdom of Jesus not within your kingdom.” Can you imagine being in such a church?!
For those who don’t want to be like a doormat then decide to be a shoe polisher as well and you will turn the demeaning kingdom upside down!
The final two tomorrow!
Missions Paul 