NEWS BULLETIN

 I was in a meeting, a purely secular meeting, which often gives a glimpse of the mindset of the unbeliever and that's what happened. The moderator of the group tossed out a thought question and wanted us to shout out our answers which were to be, "Off the top of our heads." 

The question was, "Name what you consider to be your best quality." There were several who answered, one person said, "Teachable," another said, "Dependable," but one lady's answer caught my attention when she said, "Non-judgmental." Then she explained, "I  don't care what your religion is and I don't care what your politics are." That didn't strike me as being commendable, but she considered it to be an applause-magnet.Then a day later, I saw a T-shirt proudly carrying the words, "News Bulletin--Nobody cares." 

But the lady's assessment that her best quality was her I-don't-care-what-your-religion-is-attitude struck me as something that could be said about many Christians who are submarine silent about their faith and so blase` about the Great Commission that while giving a nod to God every Sunday, they really and truly don't care that those they know, their firm and fast friends for years, are on their way to an eternal hell that, like Las Vegas, will never sleep. 

But "I don't care" wasn't the attitude of Christ who said to the citizens of Jerusalem, "How often I wanted to gather your children together, the way a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, and you were unwilling."It wasn't the attitude of Christ when He spoke by a Samaritan well, to crowds on hills, by a lake, or in the Temple. 

It wasn't the attitude of God the Father when He so loved the world that He sent His Son into the world.

And how about Paul who wrote of his concern: "I am speaking the truth in Christ—I am not lying; my conscience bears me witness in the Holy Spirit— that I have great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart. For I could wish that I myself were accursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my brothers, my kinsmen according to the flesh." Paul traveled deep and wide, a a life-long trek the size of the American Confederacy because he cared. Even under house arrest as the end drew near, he cared: "Now Paul stayed two full years in his own rented lodging and welcomed all who came to him, preaching the kingdom of God and teaching things about the Lord Jesus Christ with all openness, unhindered." 

We see Paul's concern for the lost in his sharing of his prayer request: "Praying at the same time for us as well, that God will open up to us a door for the word, so that we may proclaim the mystery of Christ, for which I have also been imprisoned; that I may make it clear in the way that I ought to proclaim it."

A missionary friend of mine, one whose mission was to the Jewish people said that he dreamed one night about their lost estate and woke up crying. He was the opposite of the lady in that meeting who was indulging in a bit of brag-a-mony when she essentially said, "I don't care whether you go to hell or not."

May her tribe decrease.