I hope you’ve seen the pictures. Three-year-old Aylan washed up on the shore, drowned while escaping. Masses of refugees crowding streets under the shells of bombed out buildings. Inflated rafts spilling over with people fleeing war-torn Syria. The seventy-one suffocated bodies found in a refrigerated truck, all victims of human trafficking. Refugee camps stretched out acre upon acre of makeshift tents.

If you’re like me, you’ve read plenty of books and opinions about church growth. People tell you everything from how many songs to have in the service to what types of doughnuts to serve.

It is obvious that our world is confused about what is right and wrong. Of all the places in the world that one would think his faith has value and that he could practice it without fear of intimidation, it would be here in the United States of America.

I firmly believe that Christ’s last command must be our first priority. I believe that every Christian individually as well as corporately with their church family should be actively engaged in sharing the gospel year round.

Each generation must contend for, “The faith which was once delivered unto the saints” (Jude 3). If the foundations of faith upon which our freedoms stand are being destroyed, what can we do but lay them again?

Near the end of each summer, our staff pulls away from daily responsibilities for two days of training—usually at an off campus location. I greatly look forward to this time and spend many hours preparing for it. Although we have staff meeting each week, this annual staff orientation is a time when we pause, evaluate, adjust, and move forward as a team with renewed focus and momentum.

At the age of sixty-two, I am irritated by perpetual updates to the functions on my phone which make me continually learn new methods and techniques. I recognize, however, that to be a “technophobe” would diminish my effectiveness in the work of God. It would also alienate me from a significant segment of society.

In the previous post I pointed out seven symptoms of one of the most dangerous spiritual diseases—apathy. A diagnose without a cure, however, is unhelpful. The direct counsel Christ Himself gave to the church at Laodicea was to humble themselves in repentance and recognize their need for Christ:

I almost drowned once. It was at a friend’s birthday party, of all places. I think I was six. Thankfully, I was rescued, but I still remember that sense of helplessness as I was engulfed in the water and knew I couldn’t swim.

For two thousand years, Christians have been persecuted in many places all over the world for teaching and practicing their faith. This is not new.