Acts 20:9
And there was a young man named Eutychus sitting on the window sill,
sinking into a deep sleep; and as Paul kept on talking, he was overcome
by sleep and fell down from the third floor and was picked up dead.
In this story we have Eutichus, ( I will call him Charles as he represents me), any way Charles is sitting in a window at Church. He is not in with the congregation, he is at church but not in church. He shows up he says hello. When people ask how he is doing he says fine, doing well, not bad. You see Charles is playing church.
By placing himself in the window he can see the world, he can be distracted, he can be easily swayed by what he sees. He is still hearing the service and he occasionally joins in, the rest of the congregation doesn't know hes playing church he puts on a good air that life is good.
This past weekend at my churches mens retreat, (Battles Lines). Charles attended he was looking forward to it, thought developing friendships would be nice, I had already had GOD working on me, I had confessed some buried sin to my GOD my Pastor and to my family. Little did I know that GOD was still working.
During the second session on day 2, we were talking about the roll of husbands and fathers. I listened to the other men, and started to be convicted more of my failures. But a wall was fighting me, I wanted to speak but was being held back.
In the passage of scripture Eutichus (Charles). Charles has become comfortable in his window, he is complacent, he has no accountability, he sets himself appart and as a result falls from church,he is perceived as dead. I can picture the fall, 3 stories down he hits he ground. Some of the other members of the church go to the window and look down to see the accident,
(kind of like looking at car accidents on the road, you just want to see). I can hear them saying "Hes dead, wow did you see that, I heard him hit the ground no way he survived that fall"
Near the end of the session John Burger was getting ready to release us
for free time before dinner. I found myself speaking, I had decided
that I wasn't going to fall out the window from sitting on the edge of
church I was going to dive out the window to show that people don't
really care and I would be perceived as dead. I did not expect what happened next.
Acts 20:10
Paul went down, threw himself on the young man and put his arms around him. "Don't be alarmed," he said. "He's alive!"
I expected to be viewed as dead, but when I looked up I was surrounded by a group of men doing as Paul had done. They through themselves on me and shouted loudly, HE IS STILL ALIVE. They spoke life into me they let me know they would not let me die, they were there to fight for me. They didn't just view the fall as an accident and say hes dead, know they ran to me as Paul ran down the stairs and threw him self on the fallen.
I can see Paul turning and looking up into the window where the others were watching from and shouting up to them. HE'S ALIVE. If Paul had not ran own to him he would have died. If the men of this church had not ran to me I would have died, I would have give up, I would have declared that people don't really care.
I was wrong, these men surrounded my and were not letting go as God took over.
To the men of FLCC, Thank you, for fighting for me, thank you for meeting me at my "Battle Line"
Your friend and fellow warrior
Charles McLemore
