Wellington Church of Christ

One of my hobby horses is to preach that we are saved for the purpose of doing good works.  That it’s not good works that save us, but rather, that we have been saved FOR good works.

I’ve said it so often that even I recognize that I say it often, which, believe me, is saying something because I typically retell stories because I can’t remember that I’ve told them already.

Praise the Lord for a wonderful VBS this year.  We exceeded our number of children from last year with our biggest night having 74 children in attendance.

In addition to the 74 children, we also had 46 adults for a total of 120.

When it comes to following Jesus, sometimes all we can see before our eyes is obstacles.  If this is your experience, don’t be discouraged, it’s the experience of all who have desired to follow Him.

There have been many times in my own life that I’ve wanted to be more involved with the activities of the church in my personal pursuit of following Christ, but it seemed that everywhere I turned, there was only more and more complications.

There are few things in life as satisfying as finding a great shortcut.  We enjoy shortcuts so much, we try to find them for everything possible.

With things like driving and cooking, shortcuts can be great, but are they great for everything?  No. As a matter of fact, they’re not.

Shortcuts are great for things that are not personal or too complex.  When it comes to matters of the heart, or complex challenges, there are no shortcuts to meaningful solutions.

I was confessing something really dumb that I did when I got angry to a few guys, and afterwards, one of those guys said to me, “It does my heart good to know that you sin too.”

I, of course, was shocked by his comment.  My first thought was, “How on earth could anyone ever believe that I don’t regularly sin!”  I then attempted to explain to the guy that he had me all wrong.

When I thought more about what he’d said, I remembered that I once too thought the same way.  When I first began attending worship services as a teenager, I had no doubts that I was the worst person in attendance.

Without anyone telling me the lie that I was only sinner, I somehow believed it.

So where does this kind of thinking come from?

For one, I think that most people attending worship service are on their best behavior, which is good, but may cause a visitor to believe that we’re always on our best behavior, and I know better, speaking for myself that is.

Another reason people may think we’re better than we are is the lack of confession of sin in our culture.  And by culture, I mean church culture. Nobody gets too excited about confession of sin, but this is only true of those who don’t do it.  Those of us who have experienced the healing benefits of confession make it a regular practice.  Of the benefits received, healing is the greatest.

The early church was taught confession of sin by James and we see it practiced most in the Bible by the Apostle Paul who constantly confessed and praised God for His forgiveness given through Christ. i.e.

James 5:16 – ¹⁶ Therefore, confess your sins to one another, and pray for one another so that you may be healed.

Acts 22:4-5 – ⁴ I persecuted this Way to the death, binding and putting both men and women into prisons, ⁵ as also the high priest and all the Council of the elders can testify. From them I also received letters to the brethren, and started off for Damascus in order to bring even those who were there to Jerusalem as prisoners to be punished.

Romans 7:24-25a – ²⁴ Wretched man that I am! Who will set me free from the body of this death? ²⁵ Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!

If we’re not careful, our pride might persuade us to allow others to wrongly put us on a pedestal and if pride does it’s work well enough, we might even begin to believe that we are better than others.

Let’s help the church re-gain its mission.  As often as you have opportunity, tell people that the church isn’t a place for perfect people, it’s a place for people who know they’re not perfect.  It’s a place to worship and honor God for healing us of our spiritual disease, sin, which will never be fully healed in this life, but in the next.

But good for us and for all who put their faith in Jesus, though sin will not be completely healed in this life, it can be completely forgiven in this life!  Praise be to our Lord and Savior, Jesus for accomplishing what we never could.

Much love!

Wes LeFlore (918) 607-8489 or huskerwes1@gmail.com

I remember one of the most frustrating feelings when the 9/11 attacks happened was not understanding who the enemy was.

It was easier to identify enemies in the past.  Hitler was easy to identify.  When the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor, it was easy to understand who the enemy was.

I believe that every generation from the moment that Jesus ascended back to heaven up through today has hoped and maybe even believed that He would return in their generation.

Yard work feels better to me than it ever has before. It’s not because I’m in better shape, I’m not. It’s not because I don’t have anything else to do; I’m never short on work.

It’s simply because I can see a finished product after I’m done.

Okay, so I expected Smokey Mountain National Park to be good, but I kept my expectations low because I didn’t want to drive all the way here and be disappointed.  Why would I think that way?  Why would I be disappointed, you might ask?