restoring our biblical and constitutional foundations

                

The Buck Starts Here

 David Alan Black  

We all know where the buck stops in the church. There is only one Lord and Master of the church, only one Head of the Body. It is Christ and Christ alone who rules the church. But where does the buck start?

In one sense it starts with us, His blood-bought people. We cannot claim to know the Great Master unless we are found doing His bidding. Inactivity belies our profession to be disciples of Christ. There are plenty of such people in our church congregations. They are like Zacchaeus – glad to be spectators and not participants. They have come to look on, to watch, to observe, but they never dream of doing anything themselves. They are tree sitters, not servants.

Have you noticed how we tend to abdicate our responsibility to others, especially those whom we have hired to work in our stead? We forget that, though Christ’s work for us is finished, His work in and through us is not. He told His disciples, “You will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be My witnesses.” Each of us is a debtor to Him to complete the unfinished work.

Speaking personally, I have begun to judge everything in this world by the light of the cross of Christ. I have come to reevaluate my ambitions and activities in terms of service to Him. I am learning the importance of setting my whole heart and affections on things above and not on the things of this earth. Christ is gradually becoming my life, and serving Him by serving others my one passion.

I disagree with those who say our young people are to be recruited into “full-time” Christian service. Every Christian is meant to be in full time service to the Lord Christ. As long as His work is not finished, neither is ours. We cannot give God the scraps, the fragments, the leftovers of our lives and call ourselves followers of the Way. These are unfitting gifts for the Giver of every good gift. He bids us, “Occupy till I come!” That is our one and only obligation.

The buck stops with Him, but it starts with us. Each and every one of us. We deceive ourselves if we think we can advance the kingdom of God by standing aloof from other Christians like a solitary brick on a building site. A church that is nothing but a collection of strangers is not a true church at all in the deepest sense of the term.

May 10, 2007

David Alan Black is the editor of www.daveblackonline.com.

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