Requests

I always appreciate getting requests for articles and sermons.  I do not always follow through; sometimes I think the subject is best left alone, and sometimes I just forget.  Sorry.  But the requests themselves are a blessing, in my eyes.  One of the ongoing challenges in my position is coming up with new material.  If a subject is thrust upon me, it naturally comes with the benefit of having at least one person interested before I ever put pen to paper.  Nothing wrong with that.

It is extra effort in a sense, I suppose, but not really.  I was going to do the work anyway.  When I’m following up on a request, I’m just doing the work in a particular area of study and application.  It’s not generally harder to present a lesson on, say, “the Ice Age” (as was requested a few years ago) than on whatever Bible topic or text would have filled that gap in the absence of the request.

All this is to say, I like an interactive church.  I like getting feedback on what I have done.  I like getting suggestions about what might be done in the future.  After all, I’m certainly giving all of you plenty of suggestions for how to do your jobs as Christians; turnabout is fair play.

We are a “body” after all.  What I do affects you (that’s certainly the idea, anyway), and vice versa.  If we are to “grow up in all aspects into Him who is the head, even Christ,” then “every joint” needs to be supplying what the body needs (Ephesians 4:15-16).  We are not just members of Him; we are “members one of another” (Romans 12:5),

So help me help you help me help you.