The Inconvenience Of Being A Christian

 

Introduction:

Have you ever thought of all the things you could do if you weren’t a Christian?

 

Do you ever go back in time when you didn’t have to get up on Sundays or go to church on Wednesday that your life was sort of free and you could mix and mingle with whoever you wanted to and no one cared?

 

Do you remember when you didn’t feel obligated to pay tithes and give offerings but you could use that for some other bill or buy something for the kids or something you needed?

Did you ever want to go back and dress like you wanted got get your hair fixed and your nails done and you were just considered normal like everyone else.

 

Isn’t it an inconvenience being a Christian with all those do’s and don’ts? Don’t you wish that there was no demand in your life to do something you didn’t even understand anyway?

 

Have you ever thought I enjoy the good preaching and the music as long as it doesn’t make me want to change?

I love my Pastor as long as I know he is preaching to someone besides me.

 

Most everyone hates to be corrected and told where there faults lie.

Isn’t easier to see the faults of others but never your own, their kids are more disruptive than mine?

Wouldn’t it be more convenient to just stay at home and watch the preachers on TV than to go and sit through a church service and hear the same thing over and over again?

 

Why didn’t God make it easier for us to serve him without all these demands and all these do’s and don’ts, all this stuff about sacrifice and giving and praying and fasting and all this other stuff he expects from us.

 

Wouldn’t be better to believe when we are saved that we are always saved and don’t have to do anything else except believe in Jesus as our savior?

Now most people could be that kind of a Christian, no laws no expectations for God just simply believe and be saved go on eating drinking marrying and having a good ole time.

 

Why did God have to send Jesus to die for our sins why didn’t he just forgive us without all this blood and death? Why?

Well, let me tell you, Sacrifice is the proof that you are loved more than you are worth, God could have created a sinless world without a devil, without death and he did but he gave mankind a right to choose. God is not a dictator that is why he gave us a will to pick and choose who or what we would serve.

 

Man without a free will is a prisoner in his own body Christ came to make us free through his sacrifice. His life for our life?

 

Romans 6:15-18

15 What then? Shall we sin, because we are not under the law, but under grace? God forbid.

16 Know ye not, that to whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye are to whom ye obey; whether of sin unto death, or of obedience unto righteousness?

17 But God be thanked, that ye were the servants of sin, but ye have obeyed from the heart that form of doctrine which was delivered you.

18 Being then made free from sin, ye became the servants of righteousness.

Love is not expressed by giving of things but of giving of yourself a living sacrifice:

 

Rom 12:1-2

1 I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service.

2 And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.

Christ was not made to die for our sins but he gave his life willingly through love.

 

John 3:16-17

16 For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.

17 For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved.

 

That was an inconvenience to God but he did it anyway out of love:

For a man to conquer his flesh he has to bring it under submission. You can never conquer your flesh until you submit and bring it under subjection.

 

If you never deny the flesh you can never conquer it. It will always be in bondage to something.