IT'S A MAD, BAD, SAD WORLD, BUT. . .

The role of the Christian is unusual. Some would even say it's Just plain weird! And you know, from a strictly human perspective, they're right. As A. W. Tozer pointed out: 

Philippians 3:17-4:1

  A real Christian is an odd number anyway. He feels supreme  love  for  One  whom he has never seen, talks Familiarly everyday to some one  he cannot see expects to go to heaven on the virtue of another, empties himself in order to be full of, admits he is wrong so he can be declared right, goes down in order to get up, is strongest when he is the weakest, richest when he is poorest, and happiest when he feels worst. He dies so he can live forsakes in order to have, gives away so he can keep, sees

the invisible, hears the inaudible, and  knows that which passeth knowledge.' Convincing, isn't he? Christian really are odd number.

Why? Because of a unique and unusual relationship with the living God. Through faith in christ we have been born Into God's eternal family. Yet we still must live on this earth Now our true home and citzenship is in heaven and that poses a problem how to be in the world, but not of it. Even though the earth may not be our home, it is our current residence. And living here, we face a powerful pressure to abandon our heavenly Father and adopt the prodigal lifestyle of a lost and rebellious world. Which raises the question, why does God leave us in such a hostile enviroment today? Why doesn't He move His own into heaven just as soon as they're converted?

Our Lord's Strange Strategy

Leaving heaven -bound people in a hell-bound world is not a simple oversight on the Lord's part. He has a reason, a Plan; yes, you might even say a strange strategy for His Unusual followers. One that His Son revealed to His disciples during their last supper together. Distilled, Jesus' counsel can be summed up in three definitive statements.

First, we can have inner peace in the midst of outer pressure and pain. Listen carefully as Jesus describe the pain and Peace. "These things I have spoken to you, that you may be kept from from stumbling. They will make you Outcasts from the synagogue, but an hour is coming for everyone who kills you to think that he us offering service to God." 

(John 16:1-2) "But when He, the Spirit of truth, comes, He will guide you into all the truth; for He will not speak on His own. Initiative, but whatever He hears, He will speak; and He will disclose to you what is to come," (V.13) "These things have spoken to you, that in Me you may have peace. In the world you have tribulation, but take courage; I have overvome the world." (v.33). Does Christ promise an easy going, laid back existence? We only wish He did! Instead He just gurantees suffering and pain for His disciples. Christian can be treated unfairly.we can be abused and neglected. We can lose all our savings in a scam or be robbed or raped. Yet even in the worst of life's circumstances, a deep, inner peace is available to those who trust in christ. Not a  peace that erases the pain; rather, a peace that supernaturally enables christians to endure in it. A peace that offers assurance, hope, even joys amidst adversity.

Second, we are insulated by divine power, yet we sre not to live an isolated existence. Again let's listen to Jesus, this time as He prays for his disciples. "And I am no more in the world; and yet they themselves are In the world, and I come to thee. Holy Father, keep them in thy 

Name, the name which thou hast  given Me, that they be one, Even as We are. While I was with them, I was keeping them in thy name which Thou hast given Me; and I guarded them, and not one of them be perished but  the son of perdition, that the scripture might  be fulfilled. But now I come to  thee; and these 

things I speak in the world, that they may have My joy made full In themselves. I have given them thy word; and the world has hated them, because  they  are not of  the world, even as I Am not of the world. I do not ask thee to take them out of the world, but to keep them from the evil one." (17:11-15) Christ's prayer is not that we be kept from evil, but from the Evil one. This sinful world isn't something we are to avoid by Cloistering ourselves behind sactimonious walls of self-righteousness. That's taking ourselves out of the world. Rather, Jesus wants us in the world so that His light will shine in the darkness where satan rules over the lost. So don't withdraw; reach out with Christ's power and His protection.

And the third, we may be unique, but we must unified. This, Too, comes from Jesus' prayer in the Upper Room. "They are not of the world, even as i am not of the world. Sanctify them in the truth; Thy word is truth that they may all be one; even as thou, Father, art in Me, and I in Thee, that they also may be Us, that the world may believe that thou didst send Me in them and Thou in Me, that they may be perfect in unity, that the world may know that Thou didst send Me, and didst love them, even as thou didst love Me." ( vv16-17, 21,23). God has left us here for a reason: to reach out those who are still in the dark and bring them into the light of Christ. When you understand that, you realize this strategy isn't so strange after all. In fact, it is the most sane and loving strategy ever to be conceived or executed.