Previous Challenge Entry (Level 1 – Beginner)
Topic: Encouragement (among believers) (11/08/07)
-
TITLE: Christianese | Previous Challenge Entry
By Nomsa Yumba
11/09/07 -
LEAVE COMMENT ON ARTICLE
SEND A PRIVATE COMMENT
ADD TO MY FAVORITES
In my 6 years as a christian, I have come to know a special language that only the elect few can understand, only the elect few speak amongst each other, and use to encourage and build up one another. Christianese. A language for the Bible loving, God fearing human kind. Or is it?
I speak it, my friends speak it, the pastors speak it and it comes as second nature when you are amongst believers. The question is, how many of us appreciate being bombarded with it, particularly when you need practical advise, when you need encouragement from an understanding heart?
We are told to encourage one another, build one another up in faith but how often do we miss the mark. Sometimes encouraging a believer doesn’t require you to quote scripture which one might actually be struggling to grasp. You tell me to speak into things that are not as though they are and yet I am in a situation where I cannot see beyond tomorrow. My brother, my sister, I said the same words to you a week ago and you stared at me with a blank eye and told me to speak a language that we all understand.
Tell me how YOU overcame the situation you found yourself in. Tell me how you thought you might not see an end to it but somehow God made a way for you. Do you not know that we overcome by the blood of the lamb and the word of our testimony? It is beyond what God did for Abraham, alhough it is an important lesson of our Faithful God, but it is about what He is doing now, the God of today. There is a time for Christianese talk, but when Paul wrote his letters to the different churches, he was real about what he was going through. He spoke of the situations he was in, and how through the grace of God he was kept. He encouraged people by what he was experiencing because that is what they could relate to. Let us learn from that and stop living vicariously through other people’s experiences of God, and seek for our own.
It’s difficult isnt it? Not to speak Christianese. Here I am complaining about it and yet, I find it is the only way to put my point across.
The opinions expressed by authors may not necessarily reflect the opinion of FaithWriters.com.
If you died today, are you absolutely certain that you would go to heaven? You can be right now. CLICK HERE
JOIN US at FaithWriters for Free. Grow as a Writer and Spread the Gospel.
