{"id":640,"date":"2014-10-23T10:14:30","date_gmt":"2014-10-23T15:14:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/?p=640"},"modified":"2014-10-27T10:17:06","modified_gmt":"2014-10-27T15:17:06","slug":"the-fire-that-blazed-the-world-has-it-gone-out","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/?p=640","title":{"rendered":"The Fire That Blazed the World- Has it Gone Out?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Thursday of the 29th Week in Ordinary Time<\/span><\/h2>\n

Eph 3: 14-21; Luke 12: 49-53<\/span><\/h2>\n

Dc. Larry Brockman<\/span><\/h2>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

It was a fire that blazed across the civilized world- Christianity.\u00a0 <\/span><\/span>And it was a phenomenon which conquered the Roman Empire at heart.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>The passion and enthusiasm of its followers spread quickly over the whole world.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>Christians believe in the great commandment- loving God and our neighbor as ourselves.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>We believe in a loving God who blessed us with the presence of his own Son.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>Not only that, after his death, His son returned here in Glory and told his disciples that <\/span>\u00a0\u00a0<\/span>The same glorious fate waits for all those who believe- everlasting life in the Kingdom of God. Yes, Christianity was different.<\/span>\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Whatever happened to that fire, to that zeal, to that commitment for Christ and his message that the early Christians had?\u00a0 <\/span><\/span>Where is it amongst us Christians today?<\/span>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Perhaps our Christian society has gone the way of other societies, like the Romans before us.\u00a0 <\/span><\/span>Complacency and comfort have sidetracked us.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>Our focus is on this life; not on the life God intended for us.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>That\u2019s why over 50% of Christians have something else to do on Sunday mornings than worship God.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>And so our society sort of believes, <\/span>\u00a0\u00a0<\/span>But only half of us quietly on Sundays make a commitment at all.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>And the rest of the week it is business as usual.<\/span>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

And yet, we now see the storm clouds building, the consequences, just as the Israelites and the Romans faced the consequences of their complacency thousands of years ago.\u00a0 <\/span><\/span>Yes, indeed, all the changes happening here are heralds of a coming crisis. <\/span>\u00a0\u00a0<\/span>They are eroding the Judeo- Christian basis for our Democracy.<\/span>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Elsewhere another group is rising up with a different message- the Radical Islamists.\u00a0 <\/span><\/span>They are located in an area of great suffering, persecution, and turmoil.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>And, as distorted as their thinking may be, they have a purity of purpose and resolve like the early Christians.<\/span>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

I don\u2019t know about you, but I prefer the Christian God, a God of love who came among us to teach us the way;\u00a0 <\/span><\/span>a God who advises us to treat aliens with respect, as we will hear Sunday.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>I prefer that to cutting peoples\u2019 throats who won\u2019t convert.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>That doesn\u2019t sound like love to me.<\/span>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

St. Paul tells what is required of us as Evangelizers:\u00a0 <\/span><\/span>On behalf of the Ephesians he asks that God \u201cMay grant you in accord with the riches of His glory to be strengthened with power through his spirit in the inner self;<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>and that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith;<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>That you be rooted and grounded in love\u201d.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>Then he goes on to describe the magnitude of God\u2019s love.<\/span>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

There you have it.\u00a0 <\/span><\/span>That\u2019s the kind of enthusiasm we need for our faith.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>It\u2019s the kind of enthusiasm that Jesus himself expressed when he said he was going to set the world on fire.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Brothers and sisters, it is time for us to set the world on fire for Christ.\u00a0 <\/span>Like the Christians who are losing their lives for the Faith in the Mideast today, we need to hold to our faith, practice it, and evangelize others with the fire and conviction and faith of our early Christian predecessors.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>The time has come. <\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Thursday of the 29th Week in Ordinary Time Eph 3: 14-21; Luke 12: 49-53 Dc. Larry Brockman \u00a0 It was a fire that blazed across the civilized world- Christianity.\u00a0 And it was a phenomenon which conquered the Roman Empire at heart.\u00a0 The passion and enthusiasm of its followers spread quickly over the whole world.\u00a0 Christians […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[5],"tags":[310],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/640"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=640"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/640\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":641,"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/640\/revisions\/641"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=640"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=640"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=640"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}