Quote:
Originally Posted by Ohio
Knowing the Lord personally brings us our joy, in other words, joy is the fruit of the spirit. Recently, my wife and I were discussing this topic ... again ... and she made the simple observation, "look at their faces after church is over." Quite telling. How many times I left a meeting without a joyful heart. I was not alone. But no one was aware of it, because we all were in the "same boat." One must checkout out other "boats" to find some who are filled with joy.
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One thing Lee stressed repeatedly was that the long faces do not form the basis of an accurate guage of a "local church." I don't know about that. Perhaps you can't take a temperature on a single day but over a relatively short period of time the reality should become quite clear. (There I go, talking about "realities" again!)
If I started to hate some group's meetings, which they all appeared to hate as well, I'm pretty clear that it would be because Christ wasn't actually present in any very substantial way (i.e. reality). Jesus is a most excellent and enjoyable Person and when He's around, I've found that I can't help but be joyous on some level. Stephen being stoned wasn't moping but rejoicing.
On the other hand, I also remain unable to appreciate the Christian flotilla.
