Nurturing Your Faith: Patient Urgency - Session Four (of 5): Living the Paradox
By: Rev. Dr. Michael ZeiglerSession 5 (the final session and full study) will be available in November 2024.
In Nurturing Your Faith: Living the Paradox, we learn about Jesus' paradoxical approach to outreach. He was urgent about His mission, but He was patient in His attitude. For us, too, it requires a dual perspective. There is an urgency-a time-is-running-out mindset-in sharing our faith. And there is a relationship-building view that hinges on personal interaction and following Jesus' example to love.
To follow Jesus' example is to embrace both the long and the short view in connecting with others. He understood the consequences of man's fallen nature-that it was urgent to share the Good News with them. He also understood that people are slow to trust. Therein lies the tension, the paradox. In all things, our mission is relationships, and relationships are our mission.
Genuine, caring relationships take time to cultivate. They grow from one interaction to the next as individuals learn about each other, begin to trust each other, and invest themselves in each other. In Nurturing Your Faith: Living the Paradox, we see how Jesus and His coming kingdom quicken our pace to share the Good News and empower us to love others as He loves us.