Shelby Systems Blog

In round one of this three-part series, I talked about what we are supposed to say, as Christians, when people ask us about our faith. Today is about community, and why God wants us to use our communities to answer these questions and reach out to those who don’t know Him.

Why do laws sometimes get passed (or not passed) when people stand outside of government buildings and protest? Because a group of people says a lot more than one person does.

“Though one may be overpowered, two can defend themselves. A cord of three strands is not quickly broken.” -Ecclesiastes 4:12

Most of us know the story. Luke 15:11-32 talks of two sons who have an inheritance to collect from their wealthy father, the younger of whom asks for his and leaves home with it. The elder son works the land and obeys what his father asks of him. After the younger son spends all of his money and experiences a great famine, he becomes hungry and decides to go back home. His father sees him coming and runs toward him, thankful that he is back.

Keeping up with some of the cool things happening with the United Methodist Church, we’ve found another neat video from YouTube, this time highlighting Pauley Perrette of NCIS. She talks about her faith and her strong relationship with God that seems to grow stronger with age. Perrette finds comfort and knowledge at the Hollywood United Methodist Church and said that she feels like, “Every part of this church’s DNA, every part of it, is about love and non-judgment, complete acceptance, grace, forgiveness, and equality for everyone.”

How great is it to be in church or reading your Bible and realizing that your way of thinking can be totally reformed? Many of us feel that we know the Bible pretty well, so a lot of us feel that these revelations only come around every once in a while.

Surely we’ve all done it. We pray those prayers that we know we shouldn’t because we think we can make some sort of deal with God.

The, “Please let us win this game and I will make more of an effort to be a nicer person. Not that I don’t make an effort now, but I will make so much more of an effort from now on… and BECAUSE of that, You could maybe let us win this game?”

Or the more serious, “Please, Lord, save my dog and I will volunteer more often in the community.”