Our Lord and Savior who?

So I was helping to lead worship this Sunday. It was the first week of a new series called Heart Attack, which takes a look at our relationships and things that wage war against them.

We had a number of things go wrong this morning from microphones not working and buzzing during worship, to our pipes freezing, to the computer crashing numerous times... so many system breakdowns that it would take a post all on its own to address them all.

But if I were to point out the Number 1 thing that went wrong on Sunday, it would have to be me.

At one point during our worship set, I felt compelled to pray. I wanted to express to our congregation that the only perfect love they will ever experience is the love of Christ. But when it came time for me to speak I got scared. I started second guessing myself. I started to think that my prayer was too radical for the unbelievers or new-to-faith in the audience. That the word Jesus Christ was too offensive.

So instead I said something like, "Thank you for the perfect love that only you can give, our Lord."

It wasn't until this morning that it hit me!

The ONLY message that an unbeliever or new-to-faith NEEDS to hear is that Salvation comes through submission to Jesus Christ.

If we preach that message every single Sunday, it would never get old because it is the ONE and ONLY thing that saves souls from entering the gates of Hell!

Every message we preach, every song we sing, every prayer we utter should at its very foundation be about salvation through Jesus Christ!

Nothing has been revealed to me more clearly. If we go a single Sunday morning service without even touching upon the saving power of the blood of Christ, then we have not done the will of God. If nothing we say invites an unbeliever to commit his life to Christ, then we might as well pack up and leave the building.

One should never be scared, ashamed, or intimidated to share the GOSPEL--the Good News--that God sent His only Son, Jesus Christ, to LIVE as a man and to Die on a Cross, offering himself as the perfect sacrifice as atonement for our sins, but that is not all--3 days after he died on the cross, he rose from the dead! And whoever should believe in Him will not perish but have Eternal Life!

I pray to God to give me the strength to allow this to be at the heart of everything I do or say! I ask him to fill me with His mighty power and that through the holy Spirit, I commit myself to pray bold prayers--never again allowing the devil and his lies to penetrate my worship again.