Excerpt from an article from Priest - Tom Ehrich

tom_ehrich@cyberfm.com

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It is my experience that the most generous Christians are those who have been healed of some infirmity or failing.

A congregation that embraces strangers probably has alot of people who remember being strangers.

A congregation that builds Habitat for Humanity houses or cooks food for the homeless probably has people who have tasted desperation.

• Who are the first to carry food to a new widow? Women who know the path of grief.
• Who walks with a drunk into an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting? A drunk who happens, by sheer grace of God, to be sober tonight.
• Who sings in the choir, other than the paid? People whose voices recently were choked in sobs.
• Who gives generously? The one whose pocket was recently empty.

It is my experience, also, that the most mean-spirited churchgoers are those who refuse to accept their need of healing.

• They hide, rather than share.
• They brag, rather than weep.
• They scoff at the weak, rather than accept their own weakness.
• They ignore the dying, out of fear of their own mortality.
• They mock the poor as "welfare cheats",
• They castigate those whose ways differ from theirs and find biblical citations to justify their bigotry.
• They plot against anyone who has what they want.
• They speak hatefully.
• They turn away from strangers.
• They demand service.
• They demand respect.
• They demand control.

There are no training courses that can turn the cruel to kindness, or the haughty to greeters, or the stingy into givers, or plotters into peacemakers.

There is only the healing touch of Jesus.

Congregations don't become healthy by attaining perfect doctrine. People become healthy and discover that doctrine no longer matters to them.

The most effective Christians I know are those who themselves are broken.

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