Toongabbie Anglican Church Blog

Church This Week

Power in weakness, Sunday 5th Feb 2006

Wednesday 1 February, 2006 · Posted by Editor

Traditional Church (8am) and Family Church (9:45am) continue the series “Like Father - Like Son”.  This week God is Generous looking at Matthew 6:25-34.  The brand new childrens program ‘Kids Church‘ starts this week at 9:45am.

Sunday Night Church (6pm) continues the series “When the going gets tough…”.  This week Power in weakness looking at 2 Corinthians 4.

OK… Chapter 4 sees Paul move into defensive mode again.
As I write that, I keep thinking “that sounds so negative! Defensive mode.“ But you certainly don’t get that vibe when you read 2 Corinthians 4. And that’s because Paul takes a personal attack against him and turns it around to speak about the gospel.
But he’s not doing that in any manipulative way. In fact his plain, unambiguous explaining of the gospel is at the centre of his defence.
He also manages to turn a truthful observation of him (of appearing weak and unimpressive in person) into a great section about how God chooses powerless people (like Paul and us) to work through, so that everyone will see how it is God at work and not human beings.

Couple of questions/issues to consider:

• What do we look for in gospel workers? What kind of qualities? Now, I reckon I know exactly what most of your answers will be! But what do we really look for? I reckon despite knowing what we should be seeking, we actually do let a desire for impressive speech and appearance sneak in!  Time for a reality check.
• Secondly, if God really does choose the weak and powerless to do his work, then that lays the challenge firmly at our feet. God wants to use you and me for his work. For some that will preaching the gospel (literally), for others, other tasks that support that preaching. But it means we have a role to play. There is no such thing a ‘just a pew-warmer’!
Are you playing your part?

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