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Almighty, Lord, Grant to me this day the strength to serve You.  In Your Name.   Amen.

  

 

Reading   Luke 13:10-17;  Psalm 112   

On a daily basis LINC Houston serves countless crippled women, such as the one mentioned in this passage. For the most part, these women are single parents trying to take care of a family on a low-income budget; Some they find themselves holding on to an unstable relationship because of their circumstances. My staff and I are called to attend to these women for prayer and to give them words of comfort and encouragement. After getting to know these women and all that they have to face on a daily basis, I can only imagine what it was like to be the crippled woman. Site would be lonely, margined and repelled by society because of her appearance, maybe even ridiculed by others, strayed away from because she was different. Either way, these crippled women feel as they have no hope and cannot see further than their situations and when they seek for help, many doors are closed because of who they are. Do you know any crippled women? What about the women we have sitting in our church pews or standing around the street corner? Is anyone (Pastor or lay person) reaching out to them? The Pharisees were indignant because Jesus had healed on the Sabbath (v. 14) and when questioned about it, Jesus answered by asking them, "Do you not untie your ox or donkey from the stall and lead it to give it water?" (v .15) While many people are in need, and hunger for the Gospel of Christ for forgiveness and salvation of their sins, we the Church, sometimes are indignant and too worried of secondary, non-essential and adiaphora matters, such as the days, times, and style of worship (traditional, blended or contemporary), worship dress code, manners of baptism or what musical instruments are being used for Sunday worship service, and the like. I quote the words from LCC-Daily Devotions dated Friday, Sept. 30, 2011, "Are we being faithful to God's Word if we keep communicating it in an out-dated style that fails to reach people or insist on doing ministry in a way that's comfortable for us, even though it doesn't produce any results? Too many of us are ORTHODOX in our beliefs, but UNFAITHFUL to Christ because we refuse to change programs, methods, styles of worship, or even locations in order to reach a lost world for Him. Vance Havner used to say: 'A church can be straight as a gun barrel DOCTRINALLY, and just as empty SPIRITUALLY.' We must be willing to say with unreserved commitment, "With help of God, we'll do WHATEVER it takes to REACH people for Christ."

 

Let us be driven solely by the vision and mission of God's Kingdom and not by our own ego, tradition, pride, agenda, and interest. Let those who are broken, hurting, rejected, bruised, and crippled because of their sins and under Satan's bondage be freed, healed, forgiven and restored by our gracious Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ who came to seek and save a daughter of Abraham (v. 16) through His sacrificial death on the cross and resurrection from the dead. Who is your crippled woman today that is waiting to hear the Gospel?

 

Let our hearts be broken with the things, which break the very heart of God.

Let us focus and pay attention to where God is at work.

By Rev. David Kim, Mission Director of LINC Houston

Pray for Congregations to grow in their discipleship response to the Gospel including their financial support for kingdom work.   For Stewardship Resources click here. 

Pray for the U.S. Budget Process for 2012 and for the strengthening of our economy in the US and around the world for the continued resourcing of the Mission.

  Steven Misch | Paul Krentz | Mike Newman | Jon Braunersreuther