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June 14, 2020 | Be The Church - What Now? (Responding to the Spirit) | Rev. Gary Gibson
Middletown United Methodist Church
English - June 16, 2020 00:00 - 17 minutes - 11.8 MB - ★★★★★ - 2 ratingsChristianity Religion & Spirituality methodist church mumc jesus love Homepage Download Apple Podcasts Google Podcasts Overcast Castro Pocket Casts RSS feed
Today’s passage features two essentials of Christianity: repentance and social responsibility. Repentance is the prerequisite for personal salvation: remorse over sin and sincere faith toward Jesus Christ. Social responsibility demonstrates our compassionate love for God (and creation) and neighbors. A prickly tension sometimes arises over the latter.
The culture surrounding the early church was communal, ours is not. The American rugged individual persona, endemic in our culture, may hinder our ability to remember the communal benevolence practiced by the early Christian church.
Could it be that the purpose of repentance is to redirect our view from self-centered navel-gazing to compassionate consideration of others? Take time to explore the implications of repentance and social responsibility for both the first-century and twenty-first-century church.