When we try to teach others the word of God. emphasizing His will concerning certain specific matters, we will, in many cases, run into one recurring, very frustrating roadblock: familiarity. It stands like a stone wall between the hearer and the truth, and it obstructs the view with great effectiveness. People tend to accept any number of things as right and proper for no other reason than the fact that they have become familiar.

If you are a Christian who has done much personal work at all. you know too well how this works. One way, is like this: When trying to teach people about such things as the sin of denominationalism (John 17:20-22, 1 Cor. 1: 10), singing in worship to God without the unauthorized use of instruments (Eph. 5:19), the truth concerning divorce and remarriage (Matt. 19:9). etc., very quickly we hear something to the effect of, "I just can 't see how that could be wrong." Not from the standpoint of scripture do they argue, but from that of familiarity. Even though it can be shown that God has always upheld marriage and deplored divorce (Gen. 2:21-24: cf. Mt. 19:8), and that both denominationalism and the use of instruments in worship are much newer than the practice of the church in the New Testament, familiarity continues to prevail over truth and reason. [Specific examples are numerous, those mentioned above are commonly encountered in evangelism]

It's true -- let something stay around for a few generations. and people accept it without question. When the truth begins to come around, it just "doesn't seem like God would condemn such things." Hence, tradition, and not truth, becomes the measure of things.

Another way familiarity hinders the receipt of the truth is in the realm of personal experience. Many folks, when confronted with the biblical perspective on such things as dancing and immodesty, (Gal. 5:19. KJV, "lasciviousness", I Tim. 2:9-10), will defend such things, not on the basis of scripture, but from the standpoint of personal, subjective experience. They've always done these things without embarrassment; therefore. it is difficult to see what can possibly be wrong with them. This is a dangerous standard, however, because it says, in effect, "It must not be wrong: after all, I do it, as do other good people I know." This makes majority experience the rule of practice rather than objective truth from God's word.

Of course, some things which are familiar are also right -- not because they are familiar, but because they are right according to God's unchanging standard. And we should be thankful for those things we take for granted from experience which also happen to be right. Concerning the other things however, it is the practice of the world to circumvent truth in order to justify the familiar (cf. Eph. 5:8-1 1), it should never become the practice of Christians.

PW Group “A”
Visitation Team “A” is scheduled to meet today. At the time of this printing we were unable to ascertain the time, place or the other details of that meeting.

PLEASE NOTE....
Due to the number of men who are out of town today, there will be no 5:30 pm prayer group meeting. The group will meet next Sunday evening at the regular time of 5:30.

VBS Recap
Our Vacation Bible School was held last week and was a success to all that were in attendance. The following is a recap of the attendance figures for the week:

MONDAY. . . . . .74
TUESDAY. . . . . 80
WEDNESDAY. . 88
THURSDAY. . . . 74

Thanks to all the teachers, assitants, and refreshment servers - and to all who supported VBS with their attendance.
         We hope to have a slideshow of photos from this years VBS on the website very soon.