This Sunday we will hear from Luke 10, the sending out of the 70 to proclaim the kingdom of God to heal the sick, cast out demons, cleanse lepers, and raise the dead. This is the church on mission. The time is urgent. If they don’t accept you where you go, Jesus says, wipe the dust off your feet and move on. Get going.

The 70 return in Luke 10:16. Their mission has been faithful and fruitful. Yet Jesus, in the midst of the victory and seeing Satan fall like lightening from the sky, warns the disciples to remember who they are and where their names are written. Life has a way of dulling our senses, especially in the midst of things going very well for us or not.

You will hear a testimony this Sunday from a good friend of mine who has known the basics of the faith for a long time. But, like all of us, there were years of wandering. Through a series of events, you will hear how God has faithfully drawn him back to remember who he is and where his name is written. Given the possible shortness of life that he has left, and who knows, it may be much more, he has a message.

It is a message we all need to hear often. We have to recalibrate our standing in the midst of God‘s grace. We spend so much time trying to write our names of power, success, popularity, beauty, family, etc. If you are not sure you have Jesus, but you have popularity, not sure that you have Jesus, but you have friends, good family, money, what do you really have? You really don’t have anything. It’s not that those things are wrong in themselves. But is God just a concept? Is your life being transformed by his grace?

Go to him and say "accept me because of what you’ve done on the cross" and your name will be written in heaven. We don’t earn our way by obeying 10 Commandments or other laws. Christ has earned it for us. This salvation is given to us by his grace. What is your testimony? Come Sunday and hear one.

Come and see.

+Philip