RE: Where do you find value?
aleshanee > 03-13-2021, 10:42 AM
all the works of God are valuable.... but none more so than the gift of eternal life God gave us through His Son Jesus Christ... .without Jesus we are hopelessly condemned... .
but the name jesus has become misused and even abused by humanity.... ...it has been used by everyone from musicians who deny the gospel, but use the name jesus in their music to attract a wider audience.... to corrupt politicians who invoke the name of jesus out of one side of their mouth for the purposes of applying a guilt trip... then openly support the murder and wholesale slaughter of innocent children with the other.... ... the jesus they name is not the same Jesus we know.... even when they try to quote scripture to make a connection their jesus is nothing more to them than another "great" man in the same category as mohammed... buddha and confucius....
they invoke His name... quote the bible.... but then turn around and mock us when we try to make everything we do and every decision we make based on scriptural principles and the precepts / values Jesus taught.... ....so while they claim to be followers of Jesus.. for the sake of convenience..., they demonstrate they know nothing of the true value of Christ and His true teachings..... only those truly redeemed by His blood know that.....
but i must disagree with part of your post.... ...helping others is never meaningless.... even if done for the wrong reasons... .......no doubt helping others for tax breaks... to receive praise or recognition... and numerous other selfish reasons will in the end be meaningless to the person doing the helping.. ..... .. but it;s never meaningless to the person being helped... provided what was done really did help them.... ....we never know the effects even the smallest act of compassion and sometimes the simple act of discarding what we no longer need will have for the person who is on the receiving end......
sometimes even the things we do out of spite or for wrong purposes God turns those things around the uses them for good.....joseph was good example of that.... and Jesus helped people all the time... . He couldn;t resist helping them especially those who came to him in need.......and He commands us to give to those who ask of us too... and to provide help to those who need it.... .just as He commands us to go forth and present the gospel to a lost a dying world....the great commission.... .... but if we preach to them one moment and then refuse to provide assistance to them the next, what does that say about the gospel we claim to believe?....
and don;t forget hebrews 13:2 tells us....be not forgetful to entertain strangers: for thereby some have entertained angels unawares
some bible versions interpret "entertain" as "showing hospitality".... and others will say that even so it has nothing to do with helping beggars on the street..... but i believe it does.... the word hospital and hospitality are closely related...... in that regard the good samaritan showed hospitality to the injured man he found, and also took him to a place where he would receive further hospitality..... ..whether Jesus intended us to view that samaritan as a christian in the parable we do not know... ..but his actions were definitely Christ like.....
there are many scriptures i could refer to here.... and end up making a novel out of a post..... but throughout the bible we are taught that to follow Christ..... we show our love of the saviour obeying His words and keeping His commandments.. ...we show we have put Jesus first by putting others first... caring for the same people He cared for during His time on earth...... .not putting them above Jesus by any means... but by putting them before ourselves, and helping them in the name of Jesus.....