Sunday Devotions: The Quiet Life

Paul urges us to lead a quiet life, minding our own business, and working with our hands. It's a Christian pipe dream, because the world always invades our space. In China, a Christian businessman has been arrested for national security reasons because he was letting other Christians worship there. The crime is punishable by death.

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1 Thessalonians 4:11 Make it your ambition to lead a quiet life, to mind your own business and to work with your hands, just as we told you.

It sounds like the ideal way to live a Christian life. Wouldn’t it be great if we could all just get along together? Leading a quiet life and minding my own business seems like an idyllic way of existing. No squabbles, no arguments, no worries, and no concerns. Just keeping your head down, working at your business, and getting on with life. It would be heaven on earth.

But then reality invades my world and I realize that this is just a Christian pipe dream of Paul’s. Life is far from quiet and is in fact much too noisy. No matter how hard I try to mind my own business, someone always says or does something that affects me. And often, when I go to do my work, something occurs which changes my schedule and I have to set aside the projects I wanted to accomplish. I would love for Paul’s Utopia to exist, but unless I joined a silent monastery in a far off place, I’m never going to accomplish it.

I’m also reminded that Christians around the world don’t have it so easy either. Take Alimujiang Yimiti for example. He was quietly working at his business in Uyghur, China in September last year, when Chinese government officials closed it down. They stated that he was using his business as a cover for “preaching Christianity among the Uyghuri people.” Four months later, Alimujiang was arrested and accused of “subversion of the national government and endangering national security.” This crime is punishable by death. Ali has been in prison for six months awaiting trial.

So much for just living a quiet life and working with your hands! Ali became a Christian more than ten years ago and has been an active member of the growing Uyghur Church.

We Westerners get so upset in our churches when things don’t go our way, but I really wonder what we would do if we were threatened with arrest for national security reasons just because we are Christians? The things that are perhaps important to us pale into insignificance when we put them beside what Alimujiang and thousands of other Christians in China are enduring.

Prayer: Lord Jesus, we all want our lives to be smooth and trouble-free. We want our needs to be met and our desires to be fulfilled. Sometimes we forget that our wishes and ways are not what You ask of us. Sometimes we need to be reminded that faith isn’t a leisure pursuit or a group activity; it’s a serious life commitment and one that others are being imprisoned, tortured, and even killed for, across the world. In Your Holy Name, we humbly pray. Amen.

John Stuart is the pastor of Erin Presbyterian Church in Knoxville, Tennessee. If you would like to comment on today’s message, please send him an email to: pastor@erinpresbyterian.org

Sunday Devotions: A New Oprah - Christians Beware!

In the next couple of weeks, our church will be studying a book that has been highly recommended by Oprah Winfrey. It’s called “A New Earth” and is written by Eckhart Tolle. He writes about a new evolutionary spiritual transformation that he believes will take place this century amongst enlightened people. He draws from the teachings of Christ and Buddha, as well as the theories of Carl Jung. It’s a typical new age type of book, but his hope is that it becomes sacred scripture in the years to come.

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I’ve read the first chapter and already I’ve come across several areas where Tolle’s teaching misinterprets Christ. He relies upon his own feelings about Jesus as a great teacher and messenger to make his points. He does not proclaim Christ as the Son of God or Lord of all creation. Tolle also avoids calling our mistakes sinful; instead he declares them to be a form of madness which, in effect, does two things: it takes away personal accountability and it discards the need for Jesus to die for our sins.

John 16:33 "I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world."

The book troubles me and I am sincerely sorry that Oprah has become involved and infatuated with this false teaching. It is countering Christ’s message and duping many women into believing the old heresy that salvation comes from within us.

I will be leading a ten week discussion about the book to show people where it dangerously digresses from Christian teaching, in order to help them avoid the pitfall of accepting popular superficial spirituality, as opposed to the deep meaning of Christ’s Gospel.

The discussions will take place at the church on Monday nights beginning May 5 and on Sunday mornings on May 11. I’ll also be starting a new online study class during the week of May 5 -11, so if you would like to be included, please send me an email at pastor@erinpresbyterian.org. Put “A New Earth” in the subject line of your email.

Some people may wonder why I am tackling this. It’s because in every generation, we have to defend our faith from misconceptions, mistaken beliefs, and misleading spiritual teachers. It’s properly called Apologetics, and has been in existence ever since the New Testament was written down.

Prayer: Lord Jesus, You are our Holy Teacher and Sacred Guide. You are the Prophet and Messenger of the Gospel. But You are also much more than these – You are the Christ, the Messiah, the Son of the Living God, and the Only One with the words of eternal life. Keep us focused on Your ways and keep us away from false teachers and superficial celebrities, whose teachings are not Your own. In Your Holy Name, we pray. Amen.