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Also, we must not limit our helping other Christians to those in our own congregations. Instead, we must actively work to help other churches, even as Paul did again and again with the churches in the New Testament. He both exemplified and taught churches the practice of tenderheartedness toward other congregations through prayer, sending teachers, and taking up collections. Therefore, our own congregation holds "Weekenders," in which we invite pastors and seminarians to join us for a series of seminars and services on three weekends a year. Our guests neither pay us nor benefit us in a direct way, other than the encouragement of their fellowship; but we hope to bless them and the churches they labor in. We pray publicly on Sunday mornings for other churches in our city, our nation, and around the world. We send out literature and interviews to other churches and church leaders. We began a pastoral internship program. We began 9Marks to accomplish a number of these goals. We support seminarians. We give money to the Southern Baptist Cooperative Program. The church allows me to travel and preach in other pulpits. Does that directly help our congregation? Perhaps it exposes me to other churches, which in turn benefits our congregation. But mostly it is an export of love, care, and concern. Likewise, when one of the elders goes to central Asia, or when one of the deacons travels to Romania, or when members of the congregation head into their many places of ministry, our whole church family prays and attempts together to export this love, care, and concern for other Christians. About one quarter of the money our church takes in we give to purposes outside the walls of this church, and we attempt to increase the missions percentage of our church budget each year. In short, we attempt, by God's grace and kindness, to do the opposite of what the Edomites did to God's people. God calls all Christians and all churches to do the same.

Christian churches should be marked by that kind of generosity as we labor to specially love those whom God specially loves. In the book of Obadiah, God is a fierce personal enemy to the proud and to the opposers of his people, because he fiercely loves his people.

This was excerpted from The Message of the Old Testament by Mark Dever, copyright © 2006. Used by permission of Crossway Books & Bibles, an internationally recognized, not-for-profit publisher of significant Christian books, the ESV Bible (English Standard Version), and gospel literature.

Copyright © 2007 Christianity Today. Click for reprint information.

The Message of the Old Testament: Promises Made is available from ChristianBook.com and other retailers.

It won an award of merit in the biblical studies category of Christianity Today's 2007 book awards.

Crossway has more information about the book, including an excerpt from the foreword, introduction, and "The Whole Bible: What Does God Want of Us?".

MP3s of the sermons in The Message of the Old Testament, including Obadiah, are available online.

Mark Dever is senior pastor of Capitol Hill Baptist Church, and founder of 9Marks.

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May (Web-only) 2007, Vol. 51