Devotion of the Day

Back to Antioch

The disciples were called Christians first in Antioch.
Acts 11:26

In this modern Babel we would do well to get back to Antioch again. Well might some “Jesus man” call us back to Christ Himself and the glorious privilege of being “just Christians.”

The traveler has been lost in the baggage. We are so cluttered with all the things that go with the Christian life that we can hardly identify the Christian. We become so identified with a fragment of the truth or a segment of the church that it is hard for people to think of us as representatives of Christ Himself.

Through the ages men have risen who sought to recapture the simplicity of New Testament Christianity. But the simple soon becomes complex, and they end with another denomination, the very thing they started out to get away from. There is a man, a movement, a machine, and a monument!

No, the solution does not lie in that direction. A man may continue in the same set-up, but he can transcend it and even restore to it the luster it once had by being a real New Testament Christian first of all.

Devotion of the Day

Gatherers

He that is not with me is against me; and he that gathereth not with me scattereth abroad.
Matthew 12:30

Our Lord here joins position with practice. We are first with Him – not just for Him – and out of that grows duty: we gather with Him. “Follow me and I will make you fishers of men” – there again He joins relationship with results, fellowship with fruitfulness: “Abide in me…much fruit.”

Our business is to become better Christians ourselves, help others to be better Christians, and win still others to become Christians. It grows naturally out of being a believer and disciple that one should also be a witness. Andrew did not have to take a study course in soul-winning to send him after his brother Peter, nor did Philip have to be urged during an annual “revival” before he did “personal work” with Nathanael.

When anything good comes our way we usually tell it. Strange that the greatest good tidings of all should find us holding our peace. Maybe we have just become canvassers looking for “members” instead of gatherers looking for souls.