Recently, the was statement made
that, “Many years ago there was a closeness among neighbors. If you needed a
cup of sugar or flour you walked next door to get it. Now we have an
every-man-for-himself attitude. We need to go back to that closeness.” The society
we live in is a major contributor of this attitude and it has trickled down
into the church to the point that as Christians, we are often guilty of almost
finding the “one another commands” a foreign concept.
The
question arises, can we once again become a society that knows and cares about
their neighbors? And, if so, how? How do we move forward? We move forward by
going backward. We constantly hear about new things. Everyone wants to know
what the latest thing is. Anything that is more recent than something else is
assumed to be better. That may be true in the things that men make: cars,
airplanes, and so on. It is not true in the things God makes. When God makes
something, he makes it perfect from the beginning. There has been no
improvement upon God’s sunshine or rain, or seasons, or the productivity of the
ground. When God makes something, He makes it right, and so it is in the realm
of religion. There has been no finer system of this or morals than you find in
Christianity. Nobody has improved on the example of Jesus. Hence, I believe it
follows that no one has ever, or ever will, improve on Christ’s church. God
makes things right. There is perfection in what God does. The essential need of
our time is that all of us simply take a step backward, for that is the only way
we can go forward. When we return to the Bible, speaking where scriptures speak
and being silent where they are silent, develop a loyalty to what God says
above anything that anyone else may say, when we have a “thus saith the Lord,
thy servant heareth,” then we are on the road which God would have us travel.
So
we start at home. By home, I mean our church home. We begin with our local
congregation and we put into practice those “one another commands.” We motivate
one another toward love (Heb. 10:24) and push each other toward salvation.
Toward a faithful life. Toward Christ.
“And let us consider one another to provoke unto love and to good
works: Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of
some is; but exhorting one another: and so much the more, as ye see the day
approaching.”
Hebrews 10:24-25