2. Comfortable Christianity
Some (too many?) congregations:
Content to “warm the pews”
Content to only be fed.
Content to ride the coattails of the labor of others.
This type of “Christianity” is easy.
Practically, Christianity is NOT easy.

3. Our Focus: Jesus
Our focus is to live to glorify God through our lives… like Jesus.
Doing so is no easy task… it requires doing hard things. Mk. 10:37-38

4. Jesus did Hard Things Jesus stepped out of eternity…
Took the form of sinful man. Phil. 2:7 (cp. Gen. 6:5)
Lived in the midst of great evil! Matt. 4:1; Heb. 4:15
Died for people who hated Him. Lk. 23:33-34

5. Theodore Roosevelt “The Strenuous Life” (1900)
I wish to preach, not the doctrine of ignoble ease, but the doctrine of the strenuous life, the life of effort, of labor and strife; to preach that the highest form of success which comes, not to the man who desires mere easy peace, but to the man who does not shrink from danger, from hardship, or from bitter toil, and who out of these wins the splendid ultimate triumph.

6. OUR NEED TO DO hard things

7. Is there something harder?
Hard Things?
Bible readings. Col. 3:16
Memorization of Bible texts. Psa. 19:7-10
Habitual prayers. 1 Thess. 5:17
Attending church services.
Is there something harder?

8. Truly Hard Things
Not just confronting sinful brethren – but doing so through Love. 1 Tim. 5:1-2 (Jn. 15:17)
Loving the people of the world yet willing to be hated by it. Jn. 15:18-21
In other words: we die to crucifying self/die to self so that we can truly do hard things.

9. More Hard Things: The Gospel in Word/Deed
Preach the gospel to a sinful world. Matt. 28:19ff
Christ left all (heaven!) to save us. Phil. 2:7-8
Our 1st century brethren suffered death as evangelistic examples.
Bear with your brother’s (neighbor’s) weaknesses. Rom. 15:1-3 (Rom. 14; 1 cor. 8)

10. “and He Himself bore our sins in His body on the cross, so that we might die to sin and live to righteousness; for by His wounds you were healed.” 1 Peter 2:24

11. Conclusion
Maybe we’re losing our children because we’ve been so comfortable with “going to church”… the status quo.
Rather, they need to see genuine conviction in action (“hard things”) being displayed through the church. Eph. 3:10