Be Kind: Rewind

Or do you despise the riches of His goodness, forbearance, and longsuffering, not knowing that the goodness of God leads you to repentance?

(Romans 2:4 NKJV)

The Bible says the lovingkindness of the Lord leads to repentance. Through repentance, we are encouraged to think about our ways and turn our feet back to Jesus and God's ways. We are encouraged to think about God's lovingkindness in our lives. His favor, His love, and His grace towards us. It helps us focus more on our blessings and less on our problems!

God’s lovingkindness is not just for you to feel better. God saved you to be better.

God’s lovingkindness should motivate us to serve Him with due diligence. We belong to the kind culture, not the cancel culture. We are to rise and be the army of God in our homes, workplaces, and communities! In a toxic culture, where crime, corruption, greed, and hate are rampant-YOU have the power to create change!

for I know that You are a gracious and merciful God, slow to anger and abundant in lovingkindness, One who relents from doing harm. (Jonah 4:2 NKJV)

God is so kind to us. He lavishly pours His lovingkindness upon us, and we can be used as His vessels to pour out His lovingkindness to those around us. This is what God truly desires from us! Be kind because it is the witness that wins over the world!

Check out this powerful message by Dr. Terry Swan, Be Kind: Rewind, and be encouraged to start living out Kingdom Kindness in your own life today!

WATCH IT | DISCUSSION GUIDE | MESSAGE NOTES

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I See Dead People

In the movie Sixth Sense, Bruce Willis stars as Dr. Malcolm Crowe, a psychiatrist attempting to help a young boy named Cole Sear. A fundamental tension exists throughout the plot’s development as Dr. Crowe doesn’t realize that Cole is also trying to help him. Working their way to mutual revelation, Cole finally breaks the tension eerily with a piercing statement, “ I SEE DEAD PEOPLE.” The plot later reveals that this struggle for Cole is the only reason he can see Dr. Crowe. Dr. Malcolm Crowe is dead. But he doesn’t know it.

One guy sees dead people. The other is dead and doesn’t know it. There is something for us to consider spiritually here from a symbolic perspective.

And He made you alive, who were dead in… sins, 2 in which you once walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air... 3 among whom also we all once conducted ourselves in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind... just as the others. 4 But God, who is rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, 5 even when we were dead in trespasses, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved), (Ephesians 2:1-5 NKJV)

Do you see dead people?

Or, maybe I should ask if you are dead or alive personally?

I’m not talking about ghosts. Instead, I am referencing the reality that we can be dead due to separation from Jesus Christ and not realize it.

We can become so enthralled with walking after the course of the world that we remain spiritually dead. And, this state of existence is a dangerous place to be! But, thankfully, we all have the opportunity to become alive, despite all of our sins, by confessing Jesus Christ as our Savior!

In this message, I See Dead People, I share why we need to ensure that we are alive. I also share why your answer may change when processing this all-important question: Do you see dead people? Because, here’s the truth, there are dead people all around us, and God created us to bring the light of life into their lives through good works! I want to help you realize that you were made anew through salvation in Jesus Christ to do good works.

We do these good works because of the good things Jesus is doing in us, not because we are good people! Commissioned to spread the Gospel of Jesus to everyone we meet, it’s only through receiving the Gospel that the dead can be made alive, and God wants to empower you as His son or daughter to serve as a laborer for this cause.

Be encouraged through this message that God created YOU to serve a significant role in the Kingdom of God!

Are you willing and ready to be used by God and do something good that leads to someone’s salvation experience? According to Jesus’ own words, “The Harvest is ready, but the laborers are few.” Let’s go to work!

For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works… (Ephesians 2:10 NKJV)

Check out this message by Pastor Eric and be encouraged to start using your time, talent, and treasure to populate Heaven and plunder Hell!

WATCH IT | DISCUSSION GUIDE | MESSAGE NOTES

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Has Competition Limited Our Ability to Be Unified?

From a very young age, we’re taught to compete. As children, we battle with our siblings for attention, and we compete with our peers to win games. As we grow older, the stakes become even higher, instead of attention and games, we now compete for jobs, recognition, and influence. This competition isn’t necessarily a bad thing; it fuels us, makes us perform better.

But has competition gone too far?

Is it possible that our culture of competition is making us counter-productive? There’s a delicate balance between healthy and unhealthy competition. Healthy competition leads to increased productivity, but unhealthy competition leads to self-isolation and decreased efficiency.

Looking back in history, we would’ve missed out on countless advancements if the competition was as big then as it is today. Take the pyramids; for example, it took years and tens of thousands of men working together to build them. If they had that mindset, it might have looked more like tens of thousands of men, each trying to build the best pyramid by themselves in the shortest amount of time. If this were the case, not only would we not have the pyramids today, they would have killed themselves trying to build them. There is no doubt we are robbing the future of humanity of significant technological advancements. Not to mention killing ourselves, just because we refuse to be united in the name of competition.

So, what can we do about it?

We have to start with what we can control ourselves. We can’t help that some people refuse to work together. But we can control the way we work with others, and the attitude we have when doing so. If we could change our attitude of competition to an attitude of service, we’d turn the world upside down!

No man has ever had an impact on the world the way Jesus did, and part of that is because of his willingness to serve. He said it himself in Mark 10:45, “For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve…” For Jesus, nothing was a competition. His focus was on serving others because he knew by doing that, he’d bring unity. Great unity begins with a spirit of humility and a willingness to serve.

This idea is brought to light in an even greater way in Philippians 2 when Paul shows us how unity under Christ should look. He explains that we must behave in a counter-cultural way if we want to experience unity. In Philippians 2:3-4, he says, “Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves, not looking to your interests but each of you to the interests of the others”. This type of attitude is the opposite of our human nature. We want people to serve us and look out for our best interests, but when everyone has that mindset, we create a lonely world.

To obtain unity, we must act counter to our culture. Instead of embracing competition, we need to embrace service. Paul progressively outlines this truth. First, it starts with not seeking your selfish gain; then, it moves to see others as more valuable than yourself. And finally, it ends by concerning yourself with other people's gain, not your own.

Think about the unity that would arise if everyone was concerned about helping and serving other people. We’re a long way from making that a reality, but we could get one step closer each day. Start small, start little unselfish habits, and mold that into an altruistic lifestyle.

Choose to serve even when it costs you something, be an example of selfless living. When you do these things, a unity will form around you, and you will be able to accomplish so much more than you could have alone. Our spirit of competition has limited our ability to have unity, which has limited our efficiency.

It’s time to move away from the world’s view, if you want to be more productive, spend less time on yourself, and more time on others.