SHOULDER TO SHOULDER #155 ---- 1/1/01
Posted by: lifeunlimited <lifeunlimited@...>
As We fight The Good Fight In This New Millennium
SHOULDER TO SHOULDER #155 ----1/1/01
Title: "Reaching My City" (#1 ---- "Facts About My City")
My Dear partner and friend in Ministry:
Whether I'm one of the last to greet you in the year 2000 or one of the
first in the year 2001, I count it a personal privilege. At this writing
I am sitting in a motel room in Kansas City, MO, preparing for our
twelfth trip to eastern Europe since 1995.
Jo Ann and I feel blessed beyond description and filled beyond measure.
God has been so good to us you wouldn't believe it if we tried to tell
you. Words fail me ---- and that's a b-i-g thing, as you well know.
It was seven years ago this month that we sat in an Applebee's Restaurant
in Dallas, Texas, weeping over the plight of the people in war torn
Croatia and Bosnia on the one hand, and the need to help train young men
and women of the former Soviet Union for the Gospel ministry. While we
sat and cried, the rest of the crowd cheered the Dallas Cowboys on to a
Superbowl victory.
It's hard to believe that was 1994.
One year later we boarded a plane for our very first journey into the
land behind the former Iron Curtain ---- to Kiev, Ukraine. There we
taught 26 young adults from several different denominations five hours a
day for two weeks. Following that experience we moved on to LCI's Life
Center on the Dalmatian shores of the Adriatic Sea and ministered to 43
bewildered, frightened, and discouraged Bosnias from the towns of Varez
and Kakanj some miles northwest of Sarajevo.
So, as I sit here today and share my heart with you, it is a nostalgic
and emotional time for me. I think of the tens of thousands of miles
traveled, the sights we've seen, the people we've come to know and love,
the broken hearts we've been able to encourage.
I wouldn't trade anything for those experiences and these memories.
But now, it's another day, another year, another decade and century, and
yes ---- another millennium. The International Bureau of Standards even
agrees with me!
And tonight (it's still Sunday at the moment), here Jo Ann and I sit ----
while the world celebrates its little heart away, we are relishing the
moments and the memories ---- and thanking the Lord for being able to
share a little of them with you by way of this letter.
Nearly 200 such letters have come from my heart since I began three years
ago ---- some unnumbered, some mis-numbered, such as the last two. Yes,
this one should be #155 and not last weeks. I somehow skipped #153 two
weeks ago. You can make the adjustments.
OUR MISSION:
There is much on my heart today as we prepare to fly for the second tie
to Kiev, Ukraine. Jo Ann and I have been invited again to teach for two
weeks at St. James Bible College, a training center housed in a former
cultural center of the Communist Party. It amazes me that God has done
such a marvelous work in reshaping the purpose of a huge brick building.
This trip is also taken in cooperation with the Christian university near
where we live. We are taking nine students with us. The first four days
of our trip will consist of travel and two days of sightseeing in Vienna,
Austria, and in Budapest, Hungary.
Then, arriving Friday afternoon, our team will begin an invigorated
regimen of working with area churches in their Sunday services and
Christmas celebration (Orthodox Christmas is January 7, and is what
people of the Christian faith recognize in those countries), ministering
in an orphanage, working with a church ministering to the homeless
people, and perhaps doing some redecorating of the school facilities.
Then, when the students return for classes on January 15, we will join
them in the classrooms where our team members will lead in worship, share
their testimonies, and sit in the classes where I will teach five hours a
day for two weeks on the subject of "Reaching Your City Through Strategic
Ministry and Authoritative Prayer".
Along with the school settings, our team will continue ministering in
various ways, including evangelistic home Bible studies with students and
their unbelieving friends, and other similar activities. The team will
return to the U.S. on January 20th to begin classes on the 22nd while Jo
Ann and I remain an additional week to conclude our teaching assignment.
We will return home probably by January 28.
So, for the next several weeks I'll be writing you from Kiev, Ukraine.
Some of the most special experiences I have are to share the freshness of
my heart with you while on one of these trips.
WHAT ABOUT YOUR "CITY"?
I've thought of many things this past week about which I could write ----
snow, family, empty holes in life's experiences, the winter beauty of the
birds, etc.
However, one thing has been heavy on my heart since I began preparing for
this upcoming teaching assignment, and, unless the Lord directs me
otherwise, I want to do a series of letters on the subject of "You and
Your City".
When I first began to study the idea of God's interest in the "cities" of
the world, I was overwhelmed by the literally hundreds of references in
the Bible to "cities". By that I mean any gathered group of people in a
local area for the purpose of community, safety, commerce, and identity.
It can be a metropolis of millions or a small burgh of some 150 people or
less such as where I live.
As I studied those passages, God began to formulate in my mind a number
of principles that are critical to understand if you and I are ever to
gain the same compassion for our communities that Jesus has. And, I'm
sure you'd agree that few people, if any, have ever come to that point.
So, here we go with the first installment.
FUNDAMENTAL FACTS:
1. All of life, even in rural settings, revolves around a "city" ---- a
unit of people ---- of some kind. From earliest Biblical times people
have clustered together in community. As early as Genesis we find the
formation of the very first city ---- Babel.
2. Defining a "city" is nothing new. For example:
1) Thorndike says: "A division of local government having a charter
that fixes its boundaries and powers"
2) Funk and Wagnall: "A place inhabited by a permanent, organized
community"
3) Again, Funk and Wagnall: "A citadel or central section used by the
dwellers
in a district as a market, a place of worship or festivity, and a
refuge in time of invasion."
How would you define a city? Your city? How would God define it?
3. Therefore, you are, in some way, a part of a "city". You may even
live, as I do, out in the rural area miles from the nearest town, but you
are still part of a gathering of people, no matter how small.
4. The Bible shows us God's heart and how He views "cities". Just read
books such as Ezra, Nehemiah, Judges, Jonah, Joshua, the Psalms, etc.,
and you see that God has a special place in His heart for "cities".
He loves the people there; He hates the sin there; He intends to redeem
them. God's heart, my friend, is clearly for the "cities", including
yours. How about you?
Take time to read some of these passages: Judges 1:22-26, Psalm 127:1,
Proverbs 11:10-11, Proverbs 21:22, Isaiah 26:1-6, Genesis 18-19, II
Kings 19:33-34, Jeremiah 30:18, Jeremiah 31:38, and Deuteronomy 16:18.
You can find dozens more.
There is no doubt about God's view of the "city", and that includes
yours. You may have thought He had forgotten yours, but, as we shall see
in days ahead, He has not.
5. The Bible also indicates God's attitude toward godless "cities". He
hates the godlessness, and punishes such conditions. For example, read
Deuteronomy 2:34-36, Deuteronomy 13:13-16, II Chronicles 28:25,
Habakkuk 2:12, and Matthew 12:25
Would you consider your "city" to be a righteous one or a godless one?
Does it concern you at all how God feels about your "city"? Or, have you
become so accustomed to it that it doesn't bother you any more? Or maybe
you've just given up.
6. The Bible also shows us how Satan and man view "cities". Man wants
to enjoy them and benefit from the pleasures of them, while the Prince of
Darkness wants to dominate and eventually destroy them. Look at Genesis
11:4-5, Ezra 4:8-24, II Kings 17:9, Ezra 4:13-ff, Esther 3:15, and
Joshua 17:12
Everyone is after your city ---- people are, Satan is, God is. Are you
after it?
7. Also, and perhaps most encouraging, the Bible reveals the heart of
Jesus Himself toward "cities". How encouraging! Consider Luke 13:34,
Luke 14:21, Luke 19:41, Luke 24:49, Matthew 9:35, Mark 6:56, Luke 4:43,
Mark 1:38
Now ---- this is where I start getting excited!
8. The Bible also shows God's commitment to those who will deliver a
"city". For example, look at II Kings 20:6 and Psalm 31:21. Does it
surprise you to learn that, if you have a heart for your city, God is
committed to you?
We often talk about our commitment to God, but consider His commitment to
you.
Now, if you're not particularly burdened for your "city", then that's
another story.
9. The Bible also shows God's provisions for the spiritual leaders in
the "cities". He has promised wisdom, protection, courage, wise counsel,
blessing, divine aid, and scores of other provisions for those who assume
spiritual leadership and influence in a "city".
Take a look. Numbers 35:4-5, Luke 24:49, Acts 9:6, Acts 18:10, Titus
1:5, Joshua 10:1, II Chronicles 14:5, II Chronicles 15:8, Isaiah 40:9,
Isaiah 61:4, Luke 19:17, and other passages.
10. The Bible, finally, shows us how believers should view "cities".
Tragically, we often don't see the "cities" of our lives the way we
should, such as is described in the following verses: Judges 20:11,
Deuteronomy 20:10, Joshua 11:19, Joshua 19:50, Judges 18:27-28, Judges
20:11, II Samuel 5:7-8; 6:12-ff, II Samuel 15:25 and a dozen other
passages.
11. Your "Cities" are in Great Need, and It is in God's Heart To Help
You Restore Them. This is a truth which we both believe and don't.
There is no doubt that you and I know our "cities" and others are in
desperate need. Great and small, they are falling apart. We believe
that part.
However, we often find it impossible to believe that it is actually in
God's heart to do something specific about it. We're like Jonah ----
"God, just wipe 'em off the face of the earth! Destroy 'em!"
That's not Plan A for God. It may be an end result, but only after He
has exhausted all other resources to bring them to redemption, just as
with Ninevah.
Many of us, though, would rather see Him do to our "cities" what He did
to Sodom and Gomorrah.
One reason for that is because we are so indignant over the sin we see,
that we've lost the heart broken compassion that Jesus demonstrated for
Jerusalem.
Another reason is because we know it's going to take some work. And that
work is going to fall on our shoulders.
If you look at my statement above, you'll find that it says it's in God's
heart to help YOU restore your city.
Yep ---- you got it right, friend. It's you and me.
You may feel you don't have the influence or the will to do it. You may
feel you're a "nobody" that can do little.
I know how you feel ---- been there, done that.
And yet, I can tell you from personal experience how God gave me favor
with business, educational, religious, and political leaders in one of my
"cities" where I lived in the past. And over a period of years we began
to see some extraordinary things happen.
God is looking for such a man or woman. Could you be that person? Would
you be that person?
There's a profound statement made in the Old Testament book of I Samuel
that grabs my heart every time I read it: I Sam 9:6 And he said to him,
"Behold now, there is a man of God in this city, and the man is held in
honor; all that he says surely comes true."
"There is a man of God in this city." ---- Wow! What a statement.
It continues, "the man is held in honor".
How can such a thing happen?
Well, it can happen when the reason is right. When that man or woman is
committed to truth, integrity, and the welfare of the city, God will
first break that person's heart over his "city", He will create character
and honor in his life, he will be held in high esteem in the eyes of the
people, and he will become a person who can influence the affairs and
future of the city.
All it takes is a man or woman of God who walks in such integrity that he
is held in honor because he's honest ---- and he loves his city.
12. The ministry of Jesus (Luke 4:18-19) and the message of the Gospel
convince
us that we can see cities restored.
Perhaps like you, I have read Jesus' prophetic public announcement of His
ministry that I've missed part of it ---- the last part. Look at this:
"The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,
Because the Lord has anointed me to
Bring good news to the afflicted;
He has sent me to bind up the broken hearted,
To proclaim liberty to captives, and freedom to prisoners;
To proclaim the favorable year of the Lord,
To comfort all who mourn,
Giving them a garland instead of ashes,
The oil of gladness instead of mourning,
The mantle of praise instead of a spirit of fainting.
"Then they will rebuild the ancient ruins,
They will raise up the former devastations,
And they will repair the ruined cities!"
Isaiah 61:1-4
DO YOU LOVE YOUR CITY?
I mean REALLY love it?
If not, why not?
If you do, what are you going to do about it?
Interestingly, much of what we do pertains primarily to busy work that
justifies our right to be there, but gets little if any results. For the
most part we shoot far below what we should be aiming at. And the reason
for that is because we're focusing on too small a target.
We go after an individual or a family when we should be claiming a
neighborhood.
We cry out against a specific sin when we should be addressing
principalities and powers of darkness.
We huddle in our own little denominational teams when we should be
joining forces to storm the gates of hell.
In the coming letters I hope I can share some things that will encourage
you to revolutionary action.
In the meantime, just be reminded of some of the things I've shared today
---- it's in God's heart to reach your "city". It's in the mission of
Jesus to save it.
So ---- how is it with you?
Rejoice in the fact that God wants your "city" saved. And, rejoice in
knowing He can give you that same desire and drivenness.
God is for your city! Hallelujah!
In His Bond,
Bob Tolliver ---- (Rom 1:11-12)
Copyright January, 2001. All rights reserved.
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Hang in there! I'm with you!
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