Message to promote Christianity

 A story has been making the social media rounds a lot lately, and it tells a heartwarming tale of a Pastor Jeremiah Steepek who posed as a homeless man to teach his new congregation. It's quite a great tale, and one that would make anyone think twice about themselves and how they treat people. Snopes.com took on this Internet phenomenon and published their findings on July 23, 2013.

Pastor Jeremiah Steepek transformed himself into a homeless person and went to the 10,000 member church that he was to be introduced as the new pastor that morning. He walked around his soon to be church for 30 minutes while it was filling with people for service....only 3 people out of the 7-10,000 people said hello to him. He asked people for change to buy food....NO ONE in the church gave him change. He went into the sanctuary to sit down in the front of the church and was asked by the ushers if he would please sit n the back. He greeted people to be greeted back with stares and dirty looks, with people looking down on him and judging him.

As he sat in the back of the church, he listened to the church announcements and such. When all that was done, the elders went up and were excited to introduce the new pastor of the church to the congregation........"We would like to introduce to you Pastor Jeremiah Steepek"....The congregation looked around clapping with joy and anticipation.....The homeless man sitting in the back stood up.....and started walking down the aisle.....the clapping stopped with ALL eyes on him....he walked up the altar and took the microphone from the elders (who were in on this) and paused for a moment....then he recited

“Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world. For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.’ “Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?’
“The King will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’

After he recited this, he looked towards the congregation and told them all what he had experienced that morning...many began to cry and many heads were bowed in shame.... he then said....Today I see a gathering of people......not a church of Jesus Christ. The world has enough people, but not enough disciples...when will YOU decide to become disciples? He then dismissed service until next week.......Being a Christian is more than something you claim. I'ts something you live by and share with others


It's a great message to promote Christianity and share with others. In question is if it's all true.
Research shows that there is no mention of a "Pastor Jeremiah Steepek" whatsoever unless it is with this story. If someone is the pastor of a close to 10,000-person church, you figure there would be some mention of him somewhere.
Next up is the picture that accompanies the story when passed around social media sites. That picture is actually of an unidentified homeless man taken in London by Brad J. Gerrard.
The story of Pastor Jeremiah Steepek is one that has been passed along for years in different variations. It could be a retelling of Rev. Willie Lyle who posed as a homeless man for four days in Clarksville, TN, in 2013, and then used his experience to deliver a sermon.
This tale is also one that is extremely similar to something that happened in the opening of am 1897 novel from Charles Monroe Sheldon called "In His Steps: What Would Jesus Do?" The tale was also one that was a social psychology experiment at Princeton University in 1970.
Again, the story of Pastor Jeremiah Steepek is one that is kind, heartwarming, and one that merits much thought. It's true in some regard, but not entirely as it is being made out to be as it makes the Internet rounds.

from here 

Luke

http://sarah-itsnotmyfault.blogspot.com/2012/09/luke-635.html

Everyone loves a story

.......and everyone thinks of their lives in narrative terms (whether it's the romantic "three-act resolution" form of western cinema, or not, it's still some kind of narrative). No one pops from their mother's womb knowing how to read and write (much less 'figure'). Everyone who has these skills and their inherent perspectives had to work to learn them. Thus, humankind is naturally "oral" and "literacy" is an acquired blessing. Humanity's relentless orality may help explain why wordy movies starring Meryl Streep don't translate so well across the globe while those of Stallone, Schwartzennegger, and Chan do; why Gilgamesh, The Iliad and Odyssey, and Beowulf are the earliest 'great literature' and contemporary surviving texts are laws and economic record keeping; why a centuries long tradition of lecture-oriented education so easily falls before the depredations of narrative-based media (TV, cinema, MTV, YouTube).

 
- So, if someone, or some ethnicity, has not passed through the transforming portals of literacy, what do they do? More to the point, what do "we" do? Answer: we do whatever they do, re. communication, learning, and perceiving. By in large, that means storying, presenting a persuasive counter-narrative and calling for a "new birth" from one to the other, to adapt their lives and lifestyles to its parameters, to shift their identity from one basin of (narrative) attraction to another, the gospel. Every new-born baby lacks a narrative with which to locate itself under-stably in the world. They receive this from their Father, perhaps an older brother and certainly a community, all of whom have a work or mission, and share a defining tradition. This is as true for those born of the flesh as of the Spirit, with the difference being that adults of the former chose to shift (by grace through faith, within the sovereign election of the loving Creator) to the latter and start again.

It is here!

After so long, the Karamojong now, finally, have a complete bible in their own language. It was a joint effort with the two churches; Catholic and Church of Uganda (Anglican) and they were busy working on it even when I first arrived in Karamoja back in 13 years ago. How amazing, how wonderful, how right. Of course, very few people know how to read and those that do – read only English. Pray that this will be a great tool for us to story and share the gospel more effectively and that it would encourage more Karamojong to learn how to read