Redeem Your Church out of its cult of self.

 

Psalm 25:15-22

 

January 12, 2022

 

 

My eyes are ever toward the Lord,   for he will pluck my feet out of the net.  Turn to me and be gracious to me,   for I am lonely and afflicted.  The troubles of my heart are enlarged;  bring me out of my distresses.  Consider my affliction and my trouble,   and forgive all my sins.   Consider how many are my foes,   and with what violent hatred they hate me.  Oh, guard my soul, and deliver me!    Let me not be put to shame, for I take refuge in you.   May integrity and uprightness preserve me,   for I wait for you. Redeem Israel, O God,  out of all his troubles.

 

I just finished a manuscript that the writer is now in heaven, his name was Carrol Ray Jr., a man God used to invest in my life.  He enjoyed writing and had a gift for doing so, one that I did not get.  The manuscript is titled “A View from the Pew” and Carroll points out how the world system has encroached on the Church.  He calls it “a cult of self” and it has no interest in giving up control, not even to God.  In Psalm 25, we get a different picture of a man who understands, he often misses the mark and was quick to point out that he needed God’s forgiveness. 

 

The “Cult of Self” will never fix their eyes on the Lord, and they are putting their trust in self, wealth, government, or someone other than the Lord.  Those who are members of that cult, will not turn to a God they never look to, but it does leave a question, to whom else can forgive sin, who else can bring me out of distress?   In the first 14 verses of Psalm 25, my attention went to a pastor who fed, housed and clothed over 10,000 orphans in his lifetime, his name was George Mueller.  Many of you are putting trust in anything but the Lord, and how easy it is to join the cult of self, I’m a living example of the messes one can make looking only to self-fulfillment.  But Mueller, like David and many others, looks to someone who can speak worlds into being, and give life, eternal life to all who come to Him with a broken and contrite heart.  Do you recall George’s first thing he did;  “I seek at the beginning to get my heart into such a state that it has no will of its own in regard to a given matter.

 

My prayer life has been changing over the many years of knowing this truth, my Master loves me, He has adopted me into His family, and I can do all things through Christ who is my strength.  So, as I read Carrol’s “View from the Pew” I am praying a little differently, each morning as I awake my prayer is; Master, it is Bob your servant, what are my assignments for today.  My heart’s desire is to bring glory to Your name.

 

Redeem Your Church out of its cult of self.

 

From the Back Porch,

 

Bob Rice