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Section 02:
FELLOWSHIP, Pastoral Level 2c
02 2c: Cultivate motivation through love rather than by ideology
Help your people to see that the heart of our faith lies in a Person, in Christ, rather than in a theology or philosophical worldview.
- Bring the distinction into sharp focus. Help them to see that people who are motivated by ideologies--even good ones--are dangerous because they do not act according to truth and love, but according to what furthers their cause. For them the end justifies the means, which will, in time, include bad means.
- Discuss the difference between building our foundations of faith on a person--our divine Lord and Savior Jesus Christ--instead of on abstract dogma (even though it is absolutely true).
Find in Colossians 2:8 a reason why we follow and love a person rather than an ism.
Find in John 1 why we focus on the system.
Find in Romans 12 why we must be motivated by love for God and each other rather than by programs or mere loyalty to an organization.
Find in Psalms 107-150 examples of cultivating confidence in God and love for His people.
Keep a notebook in which you record the beliefs people hold about reality, their political and ideological preferences.
- Everybody, to some extent, lives in their own perceived world.
- If working cross-culturally, find and read what anthropologists have discovered about the people's perceptual world.
- Then go back to the Bible to see how God reveals himself through Christ into cultures like the one you are researching.
For help:
Research
Menu Sections — Legend — Next Focus Area 02 - 3a
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