WHO INFLUENCES WHO?

The Western world today is rapidly becoming a 'Post-Christian' society. Europe is virtually there, Australia and New Zealand well on the way, and the US is catching up fast.

Fifty years ago, those in mainstream Western society attended church regularly, and the values and norms of both society and the Church were similar. Since the Reformation of the 16th Century, the lawmakers had mostly been guided by Christian principles, even if not actively following the faith. So over nearly five centuries there was little obvious differentiation between an 'upright citizen' and a 'good Christian'.

Over the past 50+ years though, since World War 2, we have seen an accelerating, deepening rift between society's values and those of Jesus. To a large extent this change has caught the Church unawares. It has been slow to adapt to a situation where society no longer generally accepts our value system as the norm. As Church attendance has fallen, many have tried making themselves more 'used friendly' by adapting societies values, usually in a slightly modified form, to the Church. This approach has generally failed. The Church has compromised, yet still, the people have stayed away.

But this situation presents a great opportunity for the Church. For now, being a follower of Jesus truly means to be different - as it did in the days of the early New Testament Church. We now have something unique to stand for.

Car headlights shine brightest at night! In the dawn, during the day, and particularly at dusk, your lights are the most difficult to see. As society moves from dusk to darkness, our lights will more brightly shine, becoming beacons of hope to those trapped in the deepening darkness that permeates much of the modern world.

It is so easy to look back to the past, to compromise, to try and restore the respectability that has been lost. Jesus and the disciples were not respectable! But they were effective!

Let's instead 'dare to be different'! To stand up for a set of values that are as true today as ever. And really needed! We must not hide our light under a bushel. But instead, offer a viable, radical alternative solution to the world's problems. Yes, we will be ridiculed, but to those the world hurts and rejects, we will be their ray of 'sonshine' - reflecting the way of Jesus.

Now, let me check that my motor's still running, or my battery will quickly run out with the lights on!

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FROM THE WORD

THE LAMP OF THE BODY
“No one lights a lamp and puts it in a place where it will be hidden, or under a bowl. Instead he puts it on its stand, so that those who come in may see the light. Your eye is the lamp of your body. When your eyes are good, your whole body also is full of light. But when they are bad, your body also is full of darkness. See to it, then, that the light within you is not darkness. Therefore, if your whole body is full of light, and no part of it dark, it will be completely lighted, as when the light of a lamp shines on you.” (Luke 11:33-36)

"Therefore, since through God’s mercy we have this ministry, we do not lose heart. Rather, we have renounced secret and shameful ways; we do not use deception, nor do we distort the word of God. On the contrary, by setting forth the truth plainly we commend ourselves to every man’s conscience in the sight of God. And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing. The god of this age has blinded the minds of unbelievers, so that they cannot see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God. For we do not preach ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord, and ourselves as your servants for Jesus’ sake. For God, who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” made his light shine in our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ." (2 Corinthians 4:1-6)

CHRIST THE WISDOM AND POWER OF GOD
"For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. For it is written: “I will destroy the wisdom of the wise; the intelligence of the intelligent I will frustrate.” Where is the wise man? Where is the scholar? Where is the philosopher of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? For since in the wisdom of God the world through its wisdom did not know him, God was pleased through the foolishness of what was preached to save those who believe. Jews demand miraculous signs and Greeks look for wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those whom God has called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. For the foolishness of God is wiser than man’s wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than man’s strength." (1 Corinthians 1:18-25)

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DAVID'S DOODLINGS

115. You must clamber over the rocks of failure in order to ascend the mountain of success.

116. It takes the Holy Spirit to transform a ‘churchian’ into a ‘Christian’.

117. The world will meander, as long as men philander.

118. Sleep refreshes body, mind and spirit, but you have to wake up to experience the benefits.

119. Failure is often the first rung on the ladder of success.

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A MESSAGE FROM ROY

Although this PGIM! e-letter is sent free, some readers have decided to support this Ministry one or more times a year by sponsoring a week's PGIM! @ USD $50.00. Can I ask you to consider sponsoring a specified week/s? You will get an acknowledgement on your particular week/s of sponsorship (unless you do not want it). If you are interested to help this very informative & helpful newsletter, please email me, Roy McGreevy, as it is God who authored this idea through me in the USA. roy@kscbtv.com. I look forward to hearing from you... thanks. Roy

FROM YOU - TO ME - TO YOU

David

As a Pentecostal preacher, I was very concerned with the Barna research putting American pente’s on the Top of the scale of the divorce ladder.

I think the thing that needed to be made clear with surveys of this sort is that even one divorce is too much. But the high Pentecostal statistics could come from the fact that this grouping have tended to reach out to hurting divorced people more than any other group. Also they have tended to attract People who have been ostracized by other groups.

Thanks for your report David

David
(Australia)

Your comments to me or fellow readers are always welcomed at... david@wwj.org.nz

This is an opportunity for you to express your views, which may not be my views. But none of us have a mortgage on all the truth - except for Jesus!

TUESDAY TEACHINGS

THIS WEEK: THE CHARACTER OF GOD

Getting to know and understand God is a real blessing of our Christian walk. I am just a novice, but God did give me a revelation of His character, that has greatly helped me, and I trust will help you too.

Mailed to subscriber's mailboxes tomorrow. If you are not on the mailing list you can register at tteach-on@wwj.org.nz

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***THIS WEEK'S NEW EZINE!*** 'LAUGHING AT OURSELVES' Subscribe Today

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If we can't laugh at ourselves, others will! A fun way to start your day.

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LAUGHING AT OURSELVES

***Blessed are those who can laugh at themselves for they shall never cease to be amused***

*** "Those who can't laugh at themselves leave the job to others." ***

302. MISTAKEN EMAIL
It is wise to remember how easily this wonderful e-mail technology can be misused, sometimes unintentionally, with serious consequences. Consider the case of the Illinois man who left the snow-filled streets of Chicago for a vacation in Florida. His wife was on a business trip and was planning to meet him there the next day. When he reached his hotel, he decided to send his wife a quick e-mail. Unable to find the scrap of paper on which he had written her e-mail address, he did his best to type it in from memory.

Unfortunately, he missed one letter, and his note was directed instead to an elderly preacher's wife, whose husband had passed away only the day before. When the grieving widow checked her e-mail, she took one look at the monitor, let out a piercing scream, and fell to the floor in a dead faint. At the sound, her family rushed into the room and saw this note on the screen:

Dearest Wife,
Just got checked in. Everything prepared for your arrival tomorrow.
P.S. Sure is hot down here!

301. ROOM IN HEAVEN
One day a doctor, a farmer and the president of an HMO arrive at the Pearly Gates. St. Peter hesitates, because heaven is getting kind of full. Finally he tells the doctor, "You may come in, for you have taken care of the sick in their time of need." Then he turns to the farmer and says, "And you , too, may enter, for you have grown food to nourish your fellow man."

Then St. Peter turns to the HMO executive. "Well, I guess you can come in too - but only for three days."

FREE DOWNLOAD: You can now download the book 'Laughing At Ourselves' in PDF format at LAUGHING AT OURSELVES

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FACTS FOR FUN

LAST WEEKS QUESTION: How long can a horse go without lying down?

ANSWER: Amazingly, horses can go months without once lying down! They have a unique inner structure to their legs allowing them to lock up their bones and tendons while the rest of their body relaxes. They can stand so long as their leg muscles aren't working to support them. Just the bones and tendons. Horses sometimes lie down, but they actually expend more energy lying down than they do when standing up. Lying down can be bad for them as it makes their muscles sore and puts too much weight on their bottom lung.

THIS WEEK'S QUESTION: How were microwave ovens invented?

Answer Next Week.

SOME FUN FACTS
744. PIZZA COUNTRY
Americans, on average, eat 18 acres of pizza every day. (Which is fortunate, as otherwise the country would soon become covered with uneaten pizza.)

745. SAVE ENERGY
If you yelled for 8 years, 7 months and 6 days, you would have produced enough sound energy to heat one cup of coffee. (Many babies inherit this knowledge and are environmentally friendly(?) from birth.)

746. SAVE A LITTLE TO SAVE A LOT
American Airlines saved $40,000 in 1987 by eliminating one olive from each salad served in first-class. (They could, of course, have achieved the same result by reusing all those that passengers, who didn’t like olives, left on their plates!)

A WORD PUZZLE FOR YOU
Make another word from this word using all the letters.

GALENITE

Answer at the end of A David Musing

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BE INSPIRED WITH A MESSAGE FROM INSPIRATIONAL TAPES

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inspirational.org.nz we are pleased to offer you the opportunity to download the following message in MP3 format, free of charge. Inspirational Tapes offers a range of over 4,000 Audio Cassette Tapes, CD's and Videos to members worldwide, for hire, download or purchase.

This week's free download is...

THE TEN COMMANDMENTS - GRAVEN IMAGES, THE LORD'S NAME

By: David Pawson

A series on the 10 Commandments by one of the worlds most respected Bible teachers.

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'TIL DEATH DO US PART!

On Saturday Kathy and I went to the wedding of our friends Graham and Jude. A wonderful time it was too! But, what about after the wedding...

LOGIC
After a particularly rough argument, the wife says to her husband, "I'll tell you what. I'll admit I'm right, if you'll admit you're wrong."

RELATIVES?
Years ago, George and Laura Bush had enjoyed lunch at the only cafe in Crawford, and were driving back to the ranch in silence. They had had a disagreement just before they got into the pickup truck, and were giving each other the silent treatment. As they passed a
small farm with pigs and a mule in the pasture next to the highway, George couldn't resist. Pointing to the livestock, he jokingly asked, "Relatives of yours?"

Laura, quick witted as ever, responded, "Yes ... in-laws."

Much more marriage humour to be found at...

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DO YOU KNOW?

Q. Who was the greatest financier in the Bible?

Answer at the end of A DAVID MUSING.

THE WORLD’S LARGEST CHURCHES

Even though influence is more important than size today, taking a look at the attendance numbers of the world's largest churches gives an impression of the developments in recent years. Much is changing: churches which had an attendance of 300,000 a decade ago, such as 'Ondas del Luz y Amor' in Buenos Aires, now have 'only' 70,000. Completely new models are popping up, such as the Indian University which became a church, regularly seeing 80,000 people attending.

The membership of mega churches fluctuates strongly, so the numbers here are the attendance, not members. Yonggi Cho's church in Seoul claims a membership of 773,000, but an attendance of 'only' 253,000 in the main church and most important satellites.

WHAT IS CHURCH?
The church is starting to see itself completely differently - that is one trend which is growing stronger. It is no longer understood as a single organised fellowship (with a pastor, a building, a programme and a more or less creative name), but as an organic community of Christians in towns and regions, the sum of the members of related house churches, cells, groups and fellowships. This gives the church, as in the times of Acts, a regional instead of denominational identity. "The church in Corinth", Ephesus, Antioch or Jerusalem corresponds today to "The church in Berlin", Boulder, Beijing or Brasilia.......

.......The world's largest churches (with average attendance in brackets) are:

1. Yoido Full Gospel Church, Seoul, Korea (253,000)
2. Works and Mission Baptists Church, Abidjan, Ivory Coast (150,000)
2. Yotabeche Methodist P. Church, Santiago, Chile (150,000)
2. Mision Carismatica Internacional, Bogotá, Colombia (150,000)
5. Deeper Life Bible Church, Lagos, Nigeria (120,000)
6. Elim Church, San Salvador, El Salvador (117,000)
7. Nambu Full Gospel, Seoul, Korea (110,000)
8. AOG Grace and Truth, Kyanggi-do, Korea (105,000)
9. Kum Ran Methodist, Seoul, Korea (80,000)
10. Vision de Futuro, Santa Fe, Argentina (70,000)
11. Ondas del Luz, Buenos Aires, Argentina (70,000)
12. Young Nak Presbyterian Church, S. Korea (60,000)
13. Winners Chapel, Ota, Nigeria (50,000)
14. Yesu Darbar, Allahabad Agricultural Institute, India (40,000-80,000)
15. Soong Eui Methodist, Inchon, Korea (47,000)
16. Ministeria La Cosecha, San Pedro Sula, Honduras (35,000)
17. Chattisgarh/Madhya Pradesh House Church Network, India (30,000)

Taken from Fridayfax, produced by Wolfgang Simson, researcher, journalist and author. It is distributed with permission by the Centre for Mission Direction, New Zealand. Register today at e-fridayfax-subscribe@strategicnetwork.org

To read the full article, including information on mega churches and trends in the US, visit the God Facts page on our site at...

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INTERESTING WORDS AND PHRASES FROM THE BIBLE

LIKE A LAMB TO THE SLAUGHTER

First used Isaiah 53:7 to describe the promised Messiahs willingness to accept His fate. Now usually describes an innocent or naive victim losing something in their life.

Lot's more interesting God Facts at...

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IS DIVORCE A SIN?

More from the Barna Report on Marriage in the US...

Although Bible scholars and teachers point out that Jesus taught that divorce was a sin unless adultery was involved, few Americans buy that notion. Only one out of every seven adults (15%) strongly agreed with the statement “when a couple gets divorced without one of them having committed adultery, they are committing a sin.” A similar percentage (16%) moderately agreed with the statement. The vast majority – 66% – disagreed with the statement, most of them strongly dismissing the notion.

Faith perspectives made a difference in people’s views on this matter – but not as much as might have expected. Born again adults were twice as likely as non-born agains (24% vs. 10%) to strongly affirm this statement. However, a majority of the born again group (52%) disagreed that divorce without adultery is sin. Three-quarters of all non-born again adults (74%) disagreed with the statement.

A majority of both Protestants (58%) and Catholics (69%) disagreed that divorce without adultery involved is the commission of sin.

There was no difference in point-of-view on this matter across the generational groups. The largest difference among subgroups of the population was between blacks and whites. Just half of the black segment (49%) disagreed with the survey statement compared to seven out of ten white adults (70%). Hispanics were in-between those extremes (64% disagreed.)

Check out the full report at...

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A DAVID MUSING

To great excitement over the weekend, our friends, Graham and Jude Pritchard, were married. Not ones to do things by halves, they are off on honeymoon to Samoa, Thailand and India! So if you manage to see this somewhere on your journey - this is for you. But you will probably have other things on your mind!

TYING THE KNOT

"Come into my parlor," said the spider to the fly,
Never know what you'll find there, taking your eye.
Peaches and cream, such a delight,
Day to remember, into the night!

But when Graham and Jude tied the knot,
Gave everything to God - yes the lot!
As the three were melded into one,
God's will today, was truly done.

No doubt you will have trials, they beset us all,
But with God in the mix, upon him you can call.
So your future together is really bright,
For your desire is, to walk in the light.

Yes, our God has a special plan for you,
For He loves you, through and through,
To take His message into the world,
His banner of hope, now unfurled.

Enjoy your honeymoon, everywhere you go,
As the threesome love, you do now show.
Through the sunshine, cloud and even the rain,
We're waiting here, to welcome you home again!

HAPPY HONEYMOON GRAHAM AND JUDE!

Until next week...

MAY GOD BLESS YOU AND YOU BLESS GOD.

His servant and yours

David Tait

Today's 'Word Puzzle' Answer: GELATINE

Today's 'Do You Know?' A: Noah. He was floating his stock while everyone else was in liquidation!

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ABOUT US

WALKING WITH JESUS MINISTRIES is a non-profit, non-denominational, Bible based ministry located in Mount Maunganui, New Zealand. A ministry dedicated to developing discipleship, fostering unity amongst God’s people to achieve the Great Commission, and in doing so, preparing for Christ’s return. It is securely based upon the foundational principles of the Apostles Creed while recognising the wide and rich diversity of beliefs amongst Christians in other areas. In accordance with the Lord’s direction, materials produced by the ministry are available, free of charge, to genuine enquirers upon request. The ministry is solely funded by donations, as the Lord provides. A list of materials available (plus some fun!) is obtainable and freely downloadable from our website
wwj.org.nz or by contacting us as follows.

Walking With Jesus Ministries
3 Hetley Crescent
Taradale
Napier 4001
New Zealand

Phone: (06) 8449-377 International (+64) 8449-377
Email: enquiries@wwj.org.nz
Web: wwj.org.nz

Our role is to bless and encourage those in ministry while promoting co-operation and unity of direction amongst the body of Christ, as emphasised 3 times by Jesus in His longest prayer, immediately prior to His arrest and crucifixion. "… so that they may be one as we are one." (John 17:12, 21, 23-4) Our website is currently being developed to encourage your participation one with another, to share resources, and to enable you to promote events and items of interest to the body as a whole – and have a smile while doing it!

For comments upon and contributions to this service, please contact
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