Find Something New

Ecclesiastes tells us that there is nothing new under the sun. People are people, right? Every generation faces questions that other generations have faced. Every sin has been committed by someone else before. Every good has been done before. Nothing surprises God. Who am I to think that I am going to say or do something significant enough to make an impact on a world where it's all been or being done? And then I think of the early church. What they did had never been done before. They were given the gift of the Holy Spirit, who empowered them to proclaim and live the gospel in a way the world had never seen. There may be nothing new under the sun, but the Holy Spirit is not done. Have we grown so accustomed to His presence that we don't look for a fresh empowering anymore? Do we think we have to generate within ourselves the ideas, the methods, the philosophies of ministry that bring relevancy to the gospel for today? I say it's time to surrender our struggle to the Spirit and depend on God's empowerment for ministry in this generation. I know that I'm not smart enough to come up with the right ideas to attract people who don't know the love of God to join in on the community of believers. Thank God I don't have to figure it out on my own!