Two Saturdays

The last two Saturdays taught me a very important life lesson. The previous Saturday I was in Chennai and somehow I took it for granted the normal schedule of the church in Gurugram due to the fact that I was out stationed in Chennai. Therefore, I did not join the brothers' fellowship in the morning. I missed a lot by skipping this. 

Though I had an afternoon appointment with the brother in the church in Chennai and the brothers serving the work in India, I decided to go see the land I purchased in 2014. According to my estimation, I could just go and come back on time for the fellowship. But the road was full of traffic jams, then it rained that forcing us to stop in between until the rain subsided, and then the bike we rode had a problem with the brake, slowing our speed down, and later we halted for about two hours to repair the brake. Then I missed the Saturday afternoon prayer over the phone with two brothers, and I also missed to attend physically the fellowship with the brothers in Chennai.  I had the heart to go for gospel preaching but we came back very late in the evening. Therefore, many important meetings I missed on Saturday. Later, as I reconsidered how things went too bad the whole day the simple reason being, my heart was not proper towards my responsibility as a brother; I excused myself so easily from important things just for the fact that I was out stationed, which was a fact. 

Last Saturday, I was very exercised in my spirit. As we fellowshipped, I felt the need to address the need of tightening the screw of our church life and services.  So we reconsidered all the service items one by one and also rescheduled the various meetings on the Lord's day. We all just felt like the Lord came and set all things right. We were shaken up for good for the going on of the church. Then I had my Bible reading time, followed by prayer and physical exercise, then the church prayer meeting for an hour and a half, and gospel preaching for two hours. After which I went to spend time in prayer again, clean up the house, took bath, and rested.

These two Saturdays were an example of losing and gaining according to the condition of my heart. On the first Saturday, my heart was complacent about the things of God and I did not take the schedule seriously. Therefore, I lose much. On the second Saturday, I readjusted my attitude and took the service of the Lord seriously which led to my whole day being truly blessed.

In fact, as we were preaching the gospel, I determined to honor the fellowship of the church to spend at least two hours for gospel preaching. The Lord indeed blessed our gospel preaching and we could preach the gospel to at least five people solidly. The Lord also led us to two professional footballers who just visited Gurugram. We believe the Lord brought them to us and pray that we could meet them again and bring them to the Lord fully.

These two Saturdays taught me the need for a proper attitude toward the Lord's service. I should not neglect the work of the Lord.

Cursed is he who does the work of Jehovah negligently, And cursed is he who keeps his sword from blood. Jeremiah 48:10

But if I have a proper attitude toward God's service, then the blessing is all mine.

Blessed is the man who trusts in Jehovah and whose trust Jehovah is.

And he will be like a tree transplanted beside water, Which sends out its roots by a stream, And will not be afraid when heat comes; For its leaves remain flourishing, And it will not be anxious in the year of drought And will not cease to bear fruit. Jeremiah 17:7-8