{"id":68,"date":"2016-07-26T14:11:00","date_gmt":"2016-07-26T14:11:00","guid":{"rendered":""},"modified":"2016-08-07T21:47:54","modified_gmt":"2016-08-07T21:47:54","slug":"christian-you-should-love-the-church","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/themajestysmen.com\/gospelpost\/christian-you-should-love-the-church\/","title":{"rendered":"Christian. You Should Love The Church"},"content":{"rendered":"<div style=\"text-align: center\">\n<div style=\"clear: both;text-align: center\"><a href=\"https:\/\/themajestysmen.com\/gospelpost\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/15\/2016\/07\/JANDJ.jpg\" style=\"margin-left: 1em;margin-right: 1em\"><img decoding=\"async\" border=\"0\" height=\"640\" data-src=\"https:\/\/themajestysmen.com\/gospelpost\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/15\/2016\/07\/JANDJ-300x300.jpg\" width=\"640\" src=\"data:image\/svg+xml;base64,PHN2ZyB3aWR0aD0iMSIgaGVpZ2h0PSIxIiB4bWxucz0iaHR0cDovL3d3dy53My5vcmcvMjAwMC9zdmciPjwvc3ZnPg==\" class=\"lazyload\" style=\"--smush-placeholder-width: 640px; --smush-placeholder-aspect-ratio: 640\/640;\" data-srcset=\"https:\/\/themajestysmen.com\/gospelpost\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/15\/2016\/07\/JANDJ-300x300.jpg 300w, https:\/\/themajestysmen.com\/gospelpost\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/15\/2016\/07\/JANDJ-150x150.jpg 150w, https:\/\/themajestysmen.com\/gospelpost\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/15\/2016\/07\/JANDJ.jpg 487w\" data-sizes=\"auto\" data-original-sizes=\"(max-width: 640px) 100vw, 640px\" \/><\/a><\/div>\n<p><b><br \/><\/b><b><br \/><\/b><b>Eph 5:25 &#8220;Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her&#8221;<\/b><\/div>\n<div style=\"text-align: left\"><b><br \/><\/b><\/div>\n<div style=\"text-align: left\"><b>&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;<\/b>If you could get a window into my life a decade or so ago you would have heard me say something like this&nbsp;&#8220;I love Jesus, but not the church.&#8221; I don&#8217;t think I am alone. You been there? &nbsp;Many of you have gone through similar stages that I went through. You had a bad church experience. We think &#8220;It is not supposed to be this way!&#8221; So we complain and sleep in on Sundays. Conclusion? &#8220;I&#8217;ll just pray, read my bible, and just do my own thing with Jesus.&nbsp;<\/div>\n<div style=\"text-align: left\">&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;Until? God open&#8217;s your eyes and heart to a verse like Eph 5:25. Wow! Jesus loves and gave himself up for his bride the church! This, then, is the question that I (You) are faced with. Am I at liberty to say I love Jesus while slandering and neglecting his bride? Answer. No! So I love the local church.&nbsp;<\/div>\n<div style=\"text-align: left\">&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;Consider this from a similar angle. My wife is Jordan. I love my wife. Yes she has flaws. Jordan would be the first to admit that. But, she is fantastic! So I ask you. How do you think I would respond if you came up to me and declared &#8220;Jared? I like you, but your wife! I don&#8217;t like Jordan at all.&#8221; I might just pull out my <i>Kershaw Ken Onion <\/i>knife and cut you! Wait&#8230; Okay not that. But, I would not appreciate your words, as <i>authentic<\/i> as they may be.&nbsp;<\/div>\n<div style=\"text-align: left\">&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; There is a better way. Love what Jesus loves. Get connected with the body of Christ. Love Jesus and love his bride. After all, you claim to be a part of it:) &nbsp; &nbsp;<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Eph 5:25 &#8220;Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her&#8221; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;If you could get a window into my life a decade or so ago you would have heard me say something like this&nbsp;&#8220;I love Jesus, but not the church.&#8221; I don&#8217;t think I [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":108,"featured_media":365,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","wds_primary_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-68","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-uncategorized","8":"entry"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/themajestysmen.com\/gospelpost\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/themajestysmen.com\/gospelpost\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/themajestysmen.com\/gospelpost\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/themajestysmen.com\/gospelpost\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/108"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/themajestysmen.com\/gospelpost\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=68"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/themajestysmen.com\/gospelpost\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/themajestysmen.com\/gospelpost\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/365"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/themajestysmen.com\/gospelpost\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=68"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/themajestysmen.com\/gospelpost\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=68"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/themajestysmen.com\/gospelpost\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=68"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}