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Being a Christian Man: Part Six In His Community Jun. 26, 2006

Being a Christian Man:
Part Six In His Community

This is the final instalment in my series of Being a Christian Man. What I will be examining is 2 points his daily interaction with his community and how he can serve his community.

The first Question of The Westminster Shorter Catechism is; What is the chief end of man? The answer is; Man’s chief end is to glorify God, and to enjoy him forever. This is a good starting point in considering anything in one's life, how are you Glorifying God and Enjoying his blessings in what you are doing. This is the perspective I will be looking at while examine A Christian's role within his community

Daily Living in One's Community
Keeping in mine your chief end is "To Glorify God..." how do you live in your community? Do you live every day to God's Glory, do you show God's Glory in your daily living? Do you put the beliefs you hold fast to on Sunday in to effect the other 6 days of the week? Are you unabashedly unashamed to proclaim your faith?

As a Christian you need to remember that you are a reflection of our Saviour Jesus to the outside world they will see how you act and treat others knowing you are a Christian and make a judgement about all Christians and about Christ based upon what they see and hear. While you can not be a perfect reflection of Christ you should try and be as accurate a reflection as you can be.

An example I can think of in my own life is while still young in my walk as a Christian I did not always keep the Sabbath as well as I ought to have, one day my wife and I went out to dinner after Church, there I saw an older man whom I respected from our church and his wife eating at the same restaurant, my reasoning led me to believe that since this man whom I had no doubt that he was a Christian was eating out on Sunday then surely there can be nothing wrong with it. This man unknowingly was doing me a great disservice as it gave me a false reflection of what being a Christian was and a bad reflection of Christ, because surely Christ would not have broken the Sabbath, in fact Christ makes it known what activities are permited on the Sabbath in the Gospels.

I can think of many examples where I am not reflecting Christ, when I join in complaining or gossiping about others, when I forward an email joke (or tell a joke) that might be inappropriate, when I make a joke at somebody else's expense, when I play upon my wife's gullibility and lead her on for my own (and sometimes others enjoyment). These are just a few, I know there are many, and I know I need to fix them and repent of them. To better understand ho we are to reflect Christ we need to know what those attributes are. He is Holy, He is Truth, He is Wisdom, His is Love are some that jump right out at me. These are the attributes we are to show. We need to remember Matthew 25:40 "And the King will answer and say to them, 'Assuredly, I say to you, inasmuch as you did it to one of the least of these My brethren, you did it to Me.' " We need to remember also that not only are we doing it to him, but as far as the world is concerned we as Christians are doing it in his name

Serving our Community
Now in serving our community we need to remember Luke 16:13 where Jesus tells us "No servant can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or else he will be loyal to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon" We need to remember that we are to be serving God first and when we serve others. Christians need to be desirous to serve in our communities but we need to make sure we are serving Christ first

We can serve our communities by volunteering, there are many opportunities in every community in this nation where one can serve his community and God in this capacity.

Now I by no means am an environmentalist of the tree hugging persuasion, but as Christians we have a duty to take the time to take care of the Earth that God has given us Dominion over, so we can do our part to maintain our communities by participating in an Adopt a Highway program, or helping to maintain community green spaces.

We can serve our community by looking for others that need to be served. Volunteer to help seniors, they have all kinds of needs from making sure they are plowed out to just having somebody to talk to, and you're never to old for this, I knew a man in his 70's who might not of been physically able to help other seniors but because he had a financial background he volunteered and helped seniors complete their income taxes every year. I had a friend in University (he was the person who started my on my road to becoming a Christian) who taught English as a second language, he used The Bible as his text book, you could do the same, or think what a double blessing you could be by helping an adult with a literacy problem be able to read by using the Bible, not only would you being opening new doors to them but you would be exposing them to Christ.

One role that Christians do not take an active enough role in Canada is in seeking election or even working in elections. It is understandable seeing as how Christian's who seek public office are ridiculed for their faith. One need to look no further than former Leader of the Opposition Stockwell Day, who was qualified and experienced, who was honest and held principles, he was attractive, had an attractive family and active and should of been everything the media was looking for in building up a leader, well everything except the principles part if he had any other principles than Christian principles he probably would of been Prime Minister in 2000, but because his principles were not worldly principles which the media upholds he was lambasted by them. The sad thing is if Christians would of embraced him and not voted for the Liberals (who with a very few exceptions) stand against all that is Godly, he would of won despite how the media portrayed him. But alas Christians were not involved and didn't vote for another Christian in the numbers they should of.

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Category: For Christian Men

Untitled Comment

Thank you so much for your response. It has blessed me so much. I had a family member not long ago give me her take on us hs. I ask her would she ever knowingly disobey God. She of couse said that she wouldn't. I then told her that if I didn't hs, I would disobey God. I think that maybe she finally got it. Well, at least for the moment. The truth is I don't believe people will ever understand. But they can't argue against what God says. I am going to remember your response for the next time somebody thinks they know better. Thanks again! Hope

blessmomof3 - 12:08 AM - Jun. 27, 2006

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About Me

I'm a former resident of Nova Scotia, Canada, I relocated to PEI in 2005. I'm married and have 2 adopted children. I am a Reformed Presbyterian and attend the Free Church of Scotland. I live in Middleton, Prince Edward Island, where my wife and I homeschool our 2 children. I run an Online Christian Bookstore. I was raised Roman Catholic, when I was in University I was challenged in my faith over the next few I read Paul's Epistle to the Romans which convicted me enough to know I was on the wrong path, in 1996 I hooked up with Rev. John Shearouse who I had met when I was student and he was part of a student ministry. He had just come back to Halifax, to plant a new Reformed church and I started to attend and made a profession of faith. I have been very active in Federal, Provincial and Municipal Politics, have managed many campaigns and having run as a provincial candidate in 1998.