living sacrifice

A week passed quickly, and it was Friday again in the blink of an eye.During this time, I watched all the video sermons on Acts 11 that I was able to collect, and I copied them all, but I knew very well that they were not mine.I also don't have the peace to plagiarize other people's sermons.

Looking at the fragmented materials in my hand, I was devastated.From my point of view, such things can’t be called sermons at all, they are just bits and pieces I found everywhere, not to mention the anointing of the Holy Spirit.How can I feed my brothers and sisters with such crumbs?

I really hope that there will be another seven days, so that I can have more and more time to prepare.

Unexpectedly, God really did this.

In the third week, Brother Sun suddenly called me, and he said: "Lin Xiao, how about this, I discussed it with Sister Zhao, and we decided to give you two more weeks to prepare. Summary of Chapters 1~10 of "Acts", Dong Yiyi will talk about Chapter 10 of "Acts" next week, and I will review it for everyone. I think your previous 10 chapters may not be very solid, so you You can listen carefully."

"Great!"

It's hard for you to imagine, and it's hard for me to imagine that a sermon, only a few 10 minutes, can be so difficult!

In the next two weeks, Big Brother Sun and Dong Yiyi will be preaching, and I am still concentrating on preparations.

I have been preparing for four weeks, but for me, this 11th chapter of "Acts of the Apostles" seems to be a hurdle that I can't get past. I don't know what the center of my preaching is. The topic was given to me, so I didn't know what to say at all, and I couldn't grasp the Lord's will.

I can talk about a lot of background and other hard knowledge, but I don’t have the words of the Lord. I know that such sermons are completely useless. Such sermons can’t meet my own standards. I can deal with Sister Zhao and the others, but I I don't want to talk.

I don't know what to do, I vaguely wonder if it is possible to reject this service, but how do I speak?Everyone is waiting for me to speak, and I have no way out.

God's way is higher than man's way, and God's thoughts are higher than man's thoughts. At such a critical moment, God has done a great thing.

By the fifth week, those materials had long been memorized in me, so I decided to go all out.

At this time, something happened in my family.

My uncle has cancer, terminal stage.

When the family heard the news, they took him from N City to S City to receive better treatment.When I heard the news, a urging voice in my heart said to me: "I'm going to see him this week, and if I don't, I won't be able to."

So I persuaded my mother to go to the hospital to see my uncle. At that time, everyone didn't know why I was in such a hurry to go to the hospital, because although my uncle was sentenced to "death sentence", the doctor said he still had half a year to live.

Actually, I didn't know, but the urging voice in my heart was so urgent that I put down everything I was doing and went to my uncle.

I failed to preach the gospel to my uncle, and I was very upset when I returned home.

I was disappointed, but I figured that maybe, like my mom said, maybe I was just making up the idea of ​​never seeing my uncle again, as my mother said, or maybe it didn't happen.

It didn't take me a week to say "maybe" before God gave me an answer.

——At the beginning of 2020, on the eve of the Spring Festival, the new crown pneumonia epidemic broke out in a large area in Wuhan. The virus was so fierce that the whole of China was almost completely shut down.

I'm the kind of person who reacts very slowly. Everyone knows it, but I don't know it yet.That day, because my aunt had an upset stomach, I went to ask for leave with the new leader after the department transfer.

The male leader's reaction that day was very exaggerated: "Then go back quickly! Why are you still here? Go back and have a good rest. If you don't feel well tomorrow, let me know. Don't force yourself to come to work."

His reaction made me very strange, but unfortunately because of the busy layout that day, although he asked me to leave, I didn't make it in the end.

When he found me still in the office after get off work, his face was blue, and he asked me in a reproachful tone, "Why didn't you tell me to leave?"

"I can't go. Teacher XX said that today's page must be finished."

"Hey, then go back quickly. If you are not feeling well, you must tell me tomorrow. Don't force yourself to go to work. It's almost Chinese New Year, don't let anything happen."

"Thank you leader."

I think it's amazing, because this person never cared about me, why is my body so tense all of a sudden?It was not until I was on the subway on the way back that I saw the news: an unknown epidemic broke out in Wuhan, and many people have been infected.

Stores are closed, schools are closed, companies are released, communities are locked...all of this happened very quickly.The number of infected people is rising every day, hiding at home, many people have nothing to do, looking at those numbers makes people panic.

At that time, we really seemed to be in the last days, you never know who will die tomorrow.The novels I wrote seemed to come true.

Because of the epidemic, the hospital is no longer open, and all patients can only be accompanied by one person, and the accompanying person is not allowed to enter or leave the hospital at will.

When this news reached my ears, I immediately understood that this was the Lord’s will.He knew this was going to happen, so he gave me advance notice to visit my uncle, which means that this epidemic may last for a long time.

But none of us believed it at the time, not even myself.Because we experienced a SARS virus a long time ago, we united as one and quickly overcome difficulties, opened up everywhere, and the economy recovered. This virus never came back to trouble us again.

Therefore, I was also optimistic at the time that it would take two or three months at most, and when we last until May and June, when the weather is hot, the temperature will naturally make the virus disappear.

So what happened to my uncle?Why did that voice remind me, "If you don't go, it will be too late"?I dare not continue to think about it.

Naturally, the church was also closed because of the epidemic, and we had nowhere to go.

"Our meetings have temporarily stopped, and we are still figuring out how to communicate with each other online. This week's sermons may have to stop again." When Sister Zhao told me this, I was very surprised, because I felt that, This is the Lord hindering me.

The first time, it was my turn, but it was changed to Sister Zhao temporarily; the second time, it was my turn, but it was changed to Big Brother Sun; the third time, it was my turn, but it was changed to Dong Yiyi; the fourth time, It should be my turn, but the epidemic broke out...

I didn't get the chance to go to the podium from beginning to end.

I don't think God is pleased with me doing this at all. He doesn't want me to be on the platform.

I finally started to feel uneasy.

We also have different opinions on whether the church should continue to meet. In the end, after discussion, we decided not to hold meetings, but to hold online meetings instead.Of course, apart from our church, I am afraid that all churches across the country were facing the same problem at that time. Some believed that we should have faith, some believed that God should not be tested, and some believed that we should not judge each other. confusion.

Our church was also chaotic for a while at the beginning.

At that time, I didn't have any serious service, and the company was closed during that time, so I suddenly stayed at home and felt a little at a loss.

At that time, I saw Pastor Tang Chongrong’s sermon on the Gospel of John on the Internet. I didn’t think much about it at the time, and thought it was quite long, but I really wanted to read it carefully, that’s all.

At the beginning of the epidemic, the church initiated a suggestion to fast and pray for the epidemic in Wuhan.

When I heard the news, I was very shocked, because I knew that such a large-scale epidemic could not be stopped just because a few of us prayed. On the contrary, our prayers seemed to show that we were more loving than God.It is true that no one knows why this happened, but are we more loving than God?Do we know what God is going to do?

But I could only convince myself to try fasting and praying. I remember that it was the first time I fasted and prayed in my life.

When everyone was fasting and praying online, several people were crying, and my sister and my aunt declared that Jesus Christ had won the epidemic in the name of the Lord. Such prayers really made me laugh and cry.

When it was my turn, I didn't know what to pray for, so I forced myself to speak.

During the outbreak in Wuhan, some of Pastor Tang Chongrong’s co-workers in Luoyang heard that they went to the places where the epidemic was most severe to preach the gospel and distribute masks. Such behavior seemed to me very brave, and I admired it very much. I honestly can't do it.

However, Pastor Tang criticized some other people in his sermon. He said: “Some people call on others to fast and pray for 40 days to learn about the Lord Jesus. I don’t say whether people can fast for 40 days. Now, do we know what the Lord is doing through this epidemic? Someone asked me what I was going to do during the epidemic. I honestly said, I don’t know, I just know to stand behind the Lord and listen to the Lord’s command. Do something.

In addition, let me criticize those people again. You call on others to fast and pray for 40 days. Don’t you do it yourself?If someone fasted and prayed for 40 days and died, are you responsible? "

I agree with Pastor Tang’s words, and he criticizes heartily, much more frankly than some timid criticisms in our church.I'd like to say that I love this guy's speech, but a lot of people hate him.

We fasted and prayed, but it didn’t take as long as 40 days. I heard that some people tried 40 days, but they failed halfway.I don't know if anyone made it to the end.I was very disgusted with the person who proposed this initiative.

Later, I heard that there was a false prophet who declared that the epidemic in Wuhan would end in a few months and a few days, but it did not end. At that time, some people in the church attacked it.These false prophets are not for the word of God at all, they are just trying to exalt themselves and attract all people to him.Seeing that the prophecy was not fulfilled, he immediately changed his words and said that he had heard it wrong, but God didn’t mean that at the time.

We all fasted and prayed, but the epidemic did not end. Instead, it spread from Wuhan to the whole world. This reflects from one aspect that our prayers did not follow God’s will, but our own, forcing God to listen to our will. To end the epidemic.If our prayers were in line with God's will, the epidemic would not be what it is now.

So what exactly does God mean?To be honest, no one in this world should know, but at least one thing is certain—God wants to use this epidemic to remind people all over the world that time is running out.

The world is coming to an end, and until it is, disasters of all kinds are inevitable. Although I don’t know if I will encounter the catastrophe in the last seven years predicted by the Bible, this world is indeed hopeless.There are other things besides the epidemic. These catastrophes are God's will, and no one can change them.

This is to let people know that they must repent quickly, because the kingdom of God is at hand, and this is not a joke.

God's judgment will come upon the whole earth, and there will be no chance for repentance at that time.