Our Lord Still Demands New Testament Standards

     By A. W. Tozer

     That ye might walk worthy of the Lord
    unto all pleasing, being fruitful in every
    good work, and increasing in the
    knowledge of God .    -  -  -  Colossians 1:10

        Not the naked Word only but the character of the
    witness determines the quality of the Christian convert.
    The church can do no more than transplant herself.
    What she is in one land she will be in another.  A crab
    apple does not become a Grimes Golden by being carried
    from one country to another.

        God has written His law deep into all life; everything
    must bring forth after its kind!

        It would appear logical that a subnormal, powerless
    church would not engage in missionary activity, but
    again the facts contradict the theory.  Christian groups
    that have long ago lost every trace of moral fire never-
    theless continue to grow at home and reproduce them-
    selves in other lands.

        There is a weakness too in world missionary activity
    carried on by the evangelical wing of the church. That
    weakness is the naive assumption that we have only to
    reach the last tribe with our brand of Christianity and
    the world has been evangelized!  This is an assumption
    that we dare not make.

        Evangelical Christianity is now tragically below the
    New Testament standard.  Worldliness is an accepted
    part of our way of life.  Our religious mood is social
    instead of spiritual.  We have lost the art of worship.
    We are not producing saints.  We carry on our religious
    activities after the methods of the modern advertiser.
    Our literature is shallow and our hymnody borders on
    sacrilege.  And scarcely anyone appears to care!
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    Yours in Christ,
    Paul N. F.