The Church's mightiest influence is felt when she is different from the world in which she lives.
Her power lies in her being different, rises with the degree in which she differs and sinks as the difference diminishes.
This is so fully and clearly taught in the Scriptures and so well illustrated in Church history that it is hard to see how we can miss it. But miss it we do, for we hear constantly that the Church must try to be as much like the world as possible, excepting, of course, where the world is too, too sinful; and we are told to get adjusted to the world and be all things to all men. (This use of the passage, incidentally, points up Peter's saying that Our beloved brother Paul wrote some things which the unlearned and the unstable wrest to their own destruction.)
One sure mark of the Church's heavenly character is that she is different from the rest of mankind; similarity is a mark of her fall.
The sons of God and the sons of men are morally and spiritually separated, and between them there is a great gulf fixed.
When religious persons try to bridge that gulf by compromise they violate the very principles of the kingdom of God.
verse
If you belonged to the world, it would love you as its own. As it is, you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world. That is why the world hates you.
— John 15:19
thought
How much are we hated by the world not because of personal peculiarities or hypocrisy but because of likeness to Christ? The world hated Christ. What is its attitude to us?
prayer
Lord, in seeking to love the people of the world may I clearly reject the world's values and practices. I am Yours not theirs.
https://cmalliance.org/devotionals/tozer/
It was a saying of George Mueller that faith grows with use.
If we would have great faith we must begin to use the little faith we already have. Put it to work by reverent and faithful praying, and it will grow and become stronger day by day.
Dare today to trust God for something small and ordinary and next week or next year you may be able to trust Him for answers bordering on the miraculous.
Everyone has some faith, said Mueller; the difference among us is one of degree only, and the man of small faith may be simply the one who has not dared to exercise the little faith he has.
According to the Bible, we have because we ask, or we have not because we ask not.
It does not take much wisdom to discover our next move.
Is it not to pray, and pray again and again till the answer comes?
God waits to be invited to display His power in behalf of His people.
The world situation is such that nothing less than God can straighten it out.
Let us not fail the world and disappoint God by failing to pray.
verse
Devote yourselves to prayer, being watchful and thankful.
— Colossians 4:2
thought
Said Wesley Deuwel: "Prayer is not limited to the humanly possible. Prayer is a work of faith. The purpose of prevailing prayer is to bring to pass things that are divinely possible and that are in God's will. . . . He has chosen to make us His co-labore
prayer
Father, what unbelievable resources You have given me ? prayer, believing prayer. I can touch the world through prayer. May I grow in faith as I believingly pray.
https://cmalliance.org/devotionals/tozer/