The Gutter

I've not been one for doing book studies for Sunday Evening Services, but this book has changed my mind. It brings to light the need to go to the "Gutters" in order to bring people to Christ.

Here is a sort except from the first chapter:

In Luke 14:23, Jesus instructs His disciples to "go out into the highways and byways and compel them to come it." He challenged them to go to the people in need. When I became a youth pastor, I read this passage and realized there was more to it than what I'd thought growing up. It was not only an invitation into a building, a church, or a mass. It was also an invitation into a relationship with Him. It was instruction to go into the street and establish relevant relationships.

In a new millennium, Jesus might say it this way: "Go into the gutters of the city and love people so they will love me."

Instead of demanding that the lost come to the place where religion was being peddled, Jesus went to the gutter and found them. Then He mastered the unlikely: He learned things about them. He found things in common with them. He loved them.

Don't think that this is a book about just reaching the poor and homeless. This is about reaching everyone in their own "Gutters" of life.

There is so much I want to share but I will wait for Sunday Evening.