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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.
1 Corinthians 1:18

#churchleadership #faith #Jesus #Messiah #salvation #TheMessage

https://lightforthelastdays.co.uk/articles/christians-issues/the-message/
Transcript
00:00What is to be done?
00:05What is to be done is actually a title of a very famous pamphlet
00:09written in about 1902, I think.
00:13Anybody know who wrote it?
00:15No, you're all good Democrats.
00:18It was written by Lenin, Vladimir Lenin.
00:23And if you don't know me, before I became a Christian,
00:26I was into sort of left-wing politics
00:27and joined the Communist Party for a while.
00:30Met my first wife, Nikki, at an anti-Vietnam War demonstration
00:33where she was handing out leaflets about Jesus.
00:36And I was demonstrating against U.S. imperialism in Vietnam
00:38and all that kind of stuff.
00:40Then I became a Christian and met up with Nikki and again
00:45and married her.
00:48And she was already evangelizing leftists and Marxists
00:52at these demonstrations, so I joined her.
00:54And in the process, I learned a bit more about communism
00:58than I knew beforehand and read this pamphlet by Lenin
01:01called What is to be Done.
01:03Basically, Lenin's thesis was there were two things you need to do.
01:07One was to spread the message of communism.
01:09And the second was to build up a cadre of dedicated revolutionaries
01:13who would then put the message into practice
01:16and would eventually make the Communist Revolution,
01:20which they did in 1917.
01:21And the second one was actually the more important one to him.
01:24He wanted to build up disciples, if you like, for communism
01:28and use them then to bring the Communist Party into power.
01:33So he had a two-pronged program.
01:35Spread the message and also raise up disciples
01:38who will carry the message through.
01:41Anybody else who followed that kind of pattern?
01:45Anybody?
01:46Jesus.
01:46What did Jesus do?
01:47He wanted the message to be spread out,
01:49but he also wanted to build up disciples,
01:52and he did take old disciples,
01:55train them up with the message that they would then go out
01:57and preach the gospel into all the world.
02:00And although Lenin's program was thoroughly anti-Christian
02:04and led to the persecution of Christians,
02:07Jesus' program, of course, was godly, Christian,
02:10and the one which we want to follow.
02:11So what is to be done?
02:14Well, I have one or two critics of some of my talks
02:18saying that you don't do enough to build up disciples.
02:21You're not discipling people.
02:23Okay?
02:24And someone also said that my last talk,
02:25particularly the one about the state of the UK,
02:29was too negative.
02:30In fact, I had a comment on the comments section
02:33underneath the YouTube channel.
02:36It said,
02:37Negativity, please spend more time teaching believers
02:39how to personally live in these times.
02:43Then spoke of the danger of depression,
02:44even suicidal tendencies,
02:46as people see the situation and difficulties
02:48relating to end times.
02:52You talk a lot about what to tell others.
02:54Pastoral care is missing from our fellowships and congregations.
02:58Okay, well,
03:00in one way it's a good point,
03:02and I take the point.
03:03We actually do need to know what to do about it.
03:05We need to train up disciples,
03:07and we need to be those who are able to live
03:10in difficult situations
03:12and not be overwhelmed by the negativity
03:14of the situation in our world,
03:16but to be overcomers
03:18and be hopeful
03:19and have a hope and a trust in the Lord.
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