“Go into all the world and preach the good news to all creation. Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned” Mark 16:15-16. Not too far up the road, a stone ruin stands with trees growing through it. A plaque proclaims that in 1823 President James Monroe stayed there. I am in awe of history the same as anyone, but if we in the present dwell too much in the past, we will not have a future. It’s what we do (or not do) in the present that affects the future. Someone pointed out that “the church is a hospital for sinners, not a museum for saints.” And that is the point of the ending of Mark. If all God wanted was for us to have a record of what Jesus had done, He could have stopped at Jesus’ resurrection, but instead, echoing Matthew and Luke, God gives us a mission. A study of the Restoration is not limited to those courageous leaders in the book of Acts or two centuries ago, who, against difficult religious worlds, threw off falsehood to preach truth as the Bible revealed it. No, it’s ongoing even today … in churches, in individuals, in you, as the good news is preached and obeyed. Do you restore New Testament Christianity?
Doug Kashorek
Plattsburgh church of Christ
Plattsburgh, NY