Devotions

Nobody Knows the Trouble I’ve Seen

• John 15:20 – Remember what I told you. A servant is not greater than his master.  If they persecuted me, they will persecute you.    

Excuses are a dime a dozen and oh so creative.  I visited a new family years ago that had just moved in down the road from the Church and I invited them to services but they told me…

• Well it’s too far to walk but too short to drive.

That sounds ridiculous I know but no more than the older gal who told me she couldn’t come because in her words….

• When the organ hits a certain note it hurts the goiter in my neck.

It’s amazing the reasons people can come up with when it comes to being absent from Church or serving the Lord.  And when I compare our reasons and excuses for not serving with the fate of some of the believers who suffered for their service it brings me some shame.  Some of these examples come from Scripture, others from historians and others from tradition.

• Matthew – killed by the sword in Ethiopia
• Mark – died after being dragged thru the streets in Alexandria
• Luke  - hanged on an olive tree in Greece
• John – burned in a caldron of boiling oil and banished to Patmos
• Peter – crucified upside down in Rome – (his request because in his words he wasn’t worthy to die the way his Lord did)
• James – beheaded in Jerusalem
• Philip  - hanged against a pillar
• Andrew – bound to a cross and starved to death
• Thomas – run through with a lance in the Indies
• Jude – shot to death with arrows
• Matthias – stoned and beheaded
• Paul – tortured and persecuted then beheaded in Rome

Now what are the reasons we give for being unfaithful?  Ball games, reunions, sermons too long (ouch) – church too hot.  We certainly have it rough don’t we?