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In more than three decades of my Christian life, I have been blest by 2 types of Daily devos'
(matter not exceeding 500 words) in universal Christian literature. Not only those Devos'
which have a different theme everyday but also the ones which revolve around a certain
theme over a period of time, say a fortnight, have richly edified me. In fact, both
styles have their own inherent advantages. If the former style caters to the varying
spiritual needs of a christian from day-to-day, the latter aims 'to ground'
a child of God in a certain subject in order he derives the full benefits of the
deep insightful study of a certain topic, spread over a fixed span of time.
In my Daily devo page, I have consciously tried to go in for 'a blend of both the
styles' whereby within a constant theme, I would be aiming to focus on different
facets of it which admittedly is a closer imitation of the 'Constant theme' style
than the 'Varying topics' one.
Having dwelt on the topics
- “The Christian journey”
- “ The Conquest of Canaan” and the
- “Lent season”.
in the previous months, now in the months of April and May, considering that
post resurrection of Christ (one of our concluding themes’ you would remember
in the meditations of March, was Resurrection), birth of the Church was a
landmark event in Biblical history, I want to cast the spotlight on the Book of
Acts (which records the birth and growth of the Church). This would ensure to a large
extent continuity of thought albeit under the ambit of new subject.
Once again, let me wish you a happy and an edifying read…
Suresh Manoharan
April 29th
Both sides of the coin!
These things happened as a warning to us, so that we would not crave evil things as they did, – I Corinthians 10:6
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While the Book of Acts gives us many “positives”, it would be wrong to say that it paints
only the “positive picture of the Early Church” and nothing else. What about Annainas and
Sapphira (Acts 5:1-11),
the Early Church equivalent of Nadab and Abihu of Mosaic times
(Leviticus 10:1-2),
in that both got an instant, Divine comeuppance for taking the “holiness of God”
lightly. Then, we also have an account of Baptized believer Simon the sorcerer, trying to bring crass
commercialism into God’s Holy scheme of things
(Acts 8:9-24).
This man, say the Bible historians’
also met with a very tragic end (Refer the meditation dated March 11th, 2009).
The Book of Acts doesn’t present an utopian Church, as it were, but very honestly “both sides of the coin”,
in order we of the modern generation as the captioned Scripture portion warns being aware of the
grave mistakes of our predecessors’ walk the straight and narrow path uncompromisingly.
Prayer:
Father, we surrender ourselves to Thy will completely. Give us wisdom to learn from history and walk
with Thee in reverential fear at all times. In Jesus’ name. AMEN.
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