By Its Cover
“Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven.”
Remember, we don’t judge a book by its cover, Jesus says in Matthew 21:28:
“But what do you think? A man had two sons, and he came to the first and said, ‘Son, go, work today in my vineyard.’ He answered and said, ‘I will not,’ but afterwards he regretted it and went. Then he came to the second and said likewise. And he answered and said, ‘I go, sir,’ but he did not go. Which of the two did the will of his father?” They said to Him, “The first.”
You know, our book publishers told us a story once about how they did a study, they carried out this study to show the importance of the presentation of a book cover. They took a beautiful book, bright and shiny and colourful and put it on the shelf. They watched how many of their customers came into the shop, looked at the book, took it off the shelf, went straight to the counter to pay for it. Then the assistant said to them, “Please open the book”, when they opened the book there was nothing inside except blank white pages. Remember, the proof of the pudding is in the eating. Not all nice looking puddings taste nice do they, children?
Don’t tell people that you love them and then don’t show them that you love them, rather show them by the way you love Jesus.
In the 90’s we were doing a campaign in East London at the Orion Theatre right on the beachfront. It was a beautiful evening, the waves of the sea wash right up, underneath that magnificent stadium. There was a great expectancy and I got up and started preaching. There was a man sitting right in the back - He had a beer bottle in his hand. He had his cowboy boots on the seat in front of him, with his cowboy hat on and he started heckling me. He said, “Where does it say that in the Bible?”, making a big noise and trying to get everybody to look at him.
I was trained as a young preacher to never entertain or engage a heckler. You ignore them - You carry on preaching the sermon. We had a nice team of trained young men who just quietly came up and gently and firmly, took the heckler out of the stadium. After the meeting as we were walking out, this same man who was very drunk was sitting in the corner. He said to me: "Hey preacher, I want to talk to you!"
I said to him firmly and in love: "I don’t speak to people about my Jesus when they are drunk."
We left but you know, about two weeks later we had a phone call from East London. The organisers of that event said: “We just wanted to tell you that two weeks ago that man gave his life to Jesus Christ.”
You never judge a book by its cover.
Have a wonderful day and God bless you.