Desperate for More of Him

As I continually surrender my junk over to God, I can’t help but grieve deeply for the church.  Many know this is a huge passion of mine, and a very real reason why I am feeling called to go to seminary.  I found myself once again laying this whole issue down again at the feet of Jesus, full of tears once again.  You might wonder why I burn so passionately, but this can only be explained through my heart and what God continually teaches me.  I was visiting over at Church Whisperer, who had a great post today on church unity.  The core message was aligning pretty much with what I had just got done praying about only a few moments earlier.  I think sadly, the reason we don’t see more unity and change in our churches today is that we are all pulled in way too many directions.   Think about the physical body, and what it feels like when we over extend ourselves physically.  We get sore muscles that can barely move and need time to rest and recover.  So too, with the spiritual body; people can barely volunteer for this ministry or that ministry because they are way over scheduled and stretched too thin.  It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure this out.  What blows my mind even more is that as a single mom, is how so many couples with two extra hands to help can run around on fumes.  Now, I am not sitting here and judging family A or family B, because don’t know where you are and what your dealing with; but I do know that if we just sat down and really took a hard look at our lives, I think we would be surprised at all the junk we let in. Taking time to list our priorities and how they line up with what we value most in life,(which first and foremost, should be God).   How much free-er and better off in every way, especially spiritually and relationally, if we’d surrender some of our biggest time wasters over to God.  Perhaps then we’d truly have a more balance life, our prayer life would abound b/c we’d truly live surrendered in the moment by moment stuff of life.   And just think about how much more we could get fed by the Word of God, if we’d really let God in and fall in Love with it, but more importantly, fall in love with Him and get to really know Him; for this is truly why we have His Word; Seeing it as a necessity and the spiritual air and water that it is intended to be, instead of just checking off our devotion time for the day.  If The Word is the love letter from God that we claim it to be, then we should be intimately drawn to it, and radically changed by it, desiring with all of us to come and know the lover of our soul.  Deep, perhaps, but the very real truth and power of The Bible!!  Think about it in the light of a human relationship.  When we fall in love with someone, we want the world to know, we want to run out and shout if from the roof tops.  Why then don’t we have this passion for our God and each other???  How is the world ever going to come to truly know that love of Christ if we truly don’t love His whole-heatedly as  we do ourselves and those closest to us.  That would really be some radical transformation!  I think too, we’d start to care for each other more b/c we’d be more receptive to others needs and see them in a more compassionate light. The Bible calls us to live pure, holy, and quiet lives, but sadly in our churches today, it is anything but this. I’ve heard time and time again that transformation and revivalation starts on an individual level, and through surrender.  As someone who has learned this, I plea with you dear reader to physically sit down, get quiet with God, and start letting go of the areas of your life that God has been dealing with you.  If you want change like I do, then it starts with you, and your own relationship and surrender with God.  You know I’m all about surrender here on this blog, b/c I have see it work first hand in my life. Surrender is a way of life, a way of walking with God and growing in His Christlikeness.  So my prayer today is that God would convict your heart of some of the things I have said here, and make known to you the areas that you need to turn over to Him.  May you listen to His voice and obey what He is asking of you to let go of.   Stop putting God in a box to fit into your life, but let God conform you to His image so that we would all truly be the body of Christ on this earth.   Oh, the dreams I have for the body of Christ!  Perhaps one day God will let my dreams come true, but for now, I will just keep surrendering them over to Jesus at the foot of the cross.

It’s really hard to be me someday, and today is one of those days.  There is allot of things that I am passionate about, and I think one of the hardest things for me is to keep giving those things over to God.  When I was a teen I was passionate about Christian music and had a desire to work in the Christian Music industry, but doors never seemed to open and I would find myself frustrated with a passion that I didn’t fully understand and know what to do with.  That passion hasn’t exactly gone away, but it has matured if you will, into a better understanding of who God is and my continued growth in Him.  Today, that passion is now somehow re-directed into the church and the body of Christ.  Today, it seems that the more I grow in Christ and understand His Word and His Ways, I have a burning desire to help people get to that next level in their Christian faith, and to see true, sold-out disciples of Christ moving as His hands and feet to a lost and messed up world.  The only problem is, is that I know it is God who transforms and all my best efforts to try and help God with that is going to lead to a life of frustration.  I know it all comes down to loving people where they are, but there are firey Christians out their leading the charge, and I really want to be a part of that passion and movement; and perhaps I am.  Perhaps God has me right where he wants me, to learn to love those around me, and not so much to change them.  I know God is working in me, and I know that He is going to make His plans clear at some point, and I guess right now, it’s a bit fuzzy.  So I’d ask for prayers from you all, b/c I know God is up to something, I just can’t put my finger on it at the moment.  Once agian, I must find a way to re-channel my passions and trust that He makes all things work for my good. In the meantime, I will continue to share my passions with others, and pray and  trust that God is moving in their lives somehow.   Blessings.

I’m always scouring the Internet for something new and interesting that will feed my soul; not to mention keeping up with the latest church trends, (which happens to be a fave past time lately).  I love how all this web 2.o stuff has really been a vehical for the church.  One of my favorite sites that I have been watching has been lifechurch.tv  They host a multi-Church campus, which one of them is online.  I usually miss the worship times b/c I haven’t stayed on top of it enough, but last night I got my first taste of lifechurch.tv, and I must say, I was impressed!  Now, I have visited the site previously, and watched an older sermon, but it was missing the worship component (by that, I mean the music in the beginning).  I’m a big worship music fan, and am always trying to get my hands on the latest stuff that gets put out.  I think back to that song “If I had a million dollars” by the Bare Naked Laddies.  My version, as it pertains to worship music would go something like “If I had a million dollars, I’d buy me every worship album that I could get my hands on”.  You get the feel for how much of worship music freak I am, right??  Well, last night did not disappoint.  The message was from guest pastor, Francis Chan, who I am a newly passionate fan of!   I heard one of his sermons on being lukewarm and it totally blew me away!  Check out more of him at his church website: http://www.cornerstonesimi.com/   Back to lifechurch.tv;Craig Groeschel is the founder and  Senior Pastor and who’s creative leadership style is changing the way church is done worldwide.  When you visit the site, you can find out more about the church, what they believe, service times and locations (which includes online, with a count down clock on the top of the page).  They also have an awesome leadership blog, and tons of free resources for churches!  I thought I’d share here there intro video and a song that was sung; (though it is from the actual band and not the lifechurch.tv worship guys).  I had an awesome time worshipping online.  I never thought that I would say that, but hey, what better way to get undignified in front of the Lord and rip out some of your best worship moves than in your own house! If you’ve experienced lifechurch.tv, I’d love to hear about your experience and where you worship.  They also have free downloads on itunes, and different groups that meet online.  It’s going to be interesting to keep up with these guys.  God Bless and I hope you will go and check out this awesome vehicle of the gospel that is being used with modern technology. 

Allot of people, myself included, claim the saying, “everything happens for a reason”.  It’s  not so much a mystical idea, but for those who believe it, I believe have some level of reverence for God; that He is sovereign and always in control, able to see everything when we can only see a micro-snap shot, and working out everything in the world for His Glory.  Last March, I was let go from a job that I was only less than 2 weeks into.  I’ve been unemployed for all that time.  Many would be quick to judge, finger point or see me as lazy, but the bottom line is that they don’t have a clue about why that had to happen; but I finally did.  I wrote most of this past year here on my blog, so I won’t repeat  myself; and as I’ve grown, I’ve learned surrender, and many, many lessons along the way.  It has become clear to me that indeed God uses all our circumstances to teach us, grow us, and to ultimately be glorified.  As Ive  tried to understand more and more, God has place a specific burden on my heart.  It is a burden of the church, the true body of Christ, His bride; radiantly white and beaming with purity before Him.   I now can see that my struggles and hardships that I have faced in the church as a child, and as a born-again believer have all occurred to teach me, and purify me with Holy understanding.  There is much I could say about this, as the passion rises at a constant level, but I lay it at the foot of the cross where I know God will deal with it.  A little while ago, I responded to a Church Wisperer,  who wrote  a blog post titled “The Church Jesus expects to find” .  I encourage you to read it, but also wanted to share my response, which is a huge part of what God has been placing on my heart lately.  May it convict you in such a way to begin fearing our Holy Lord again.  

 I really feel, and God’s been pointing this out to me allot lately, that our churches are a mess and we are so divided, and the Bride is ugly because we have truly lost our first love, Jesus Christ. Not only that, but we have forgotten the sovereignty of God. We don’t fear Him, We don’t see Him for who He really is. We don’t bow down before Him in reverence, in true surrender, in true repentance, in true gratitude and worship. I think knowing our church history is important, and it’s something God is showing me more and more. I think knowing why you believe what you do is important; Anyone can call themselves a Christian and say “Yes, Jesus saved my life”; but it goes so much deeper than that. Do you truly get that He was a living sacrifice, and does that change the way you worship and adore Him? Do you love Him for not only who He is, but what He has truly done! Where is the fear and trembling that we are suppose to have? Look at Moses, Look at Job, Abraham… They trusted and obeyed in such powerful ways that God Moved! God does not move today because People don’t want to think too deeply; they leave interpreting and understanding the Bible up to the pastors; church leaders are running around trying to follow every church fad and best seller church success story and be the Purpose Driven Church for All; but this is not what God commands; this is what the apostles warned of. I fear we will never see unity in our church’s, we will never see our prayer meetings overflowing, we will never see our numbers in whatever area of the church that we are dealing with UNTIL we remember How HOLY OUR GOD IS! WE ARE TO BOW DOWN IN WORSHIP WE ARE TO TREMBLE TO THE FOOT OF THE CROSS! That is gone in today’s churches, and unitl it get’s back in us, even starting on an individual level, I really don’t see our churches changing in revivalist ways. God said “If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land.” God’s not moving b/c we’re not truly doing what He commands us. We just try and spin The Word of God to whatever is gonna fill the seats, or whatever we think will make us better leaders, but we are so way off!  I’ll admit, I don’t know squat about church leadership, and I can send my pastors and others tons of info  on everything I find,  but ultimately it all gets put at the foot of the cross in hope and trust. The more God shows me and teaches me, the more this exact messege keeps getting pounded in my head.  I don’t know why God has placed this on my heart so deeply, but I know He is going to use it in some way.  In the meantime I will continue to fear and tremble, I will continue to show people that I am a living testimony of obedience and true surrended by following what God commands of us in His Word as He teaches me.

I use to always think that Mega-Churches were the coolest thing!  I didn’t realize it at the time, but the feel-good, relative  message that they proclaimed, with a dash of scripture, would become the thing I would start to despise.   Jesus said, that man does not eat on bread alone.  Knowing this,  It’s becoming more and more clear to me how very messed up our churches  are; together as a whole bunch who share Christian faith.  I am finding that there is allot being written by many well know pastors about how The Gospel of Jesus and the true authentic, expository teachings of the Bible are found less and less in our American churches, and how all people want now a days is what one pastor calls” a sermon to go”.  Just let me come to church, get a feel good message, O.K. I’ll even let you talk about Jesus and quote a few scriptures if you like, but don’t start convicting me, b/c I’ll be out of here, with my tithe, and I won’t come back!  You may think I am over-exaggerating a bit, but if you go over to Amazon and search around on the subject of say, church relativism, Christ-less, Christianity, mega-churches, alternative  gospel in churches  and the like, you’ll be amazed of how many book have been written on this subject.   It’s good that it is being address, but also very scary that it is such a huge problem, and very sad that this is where we seem to be going more and more.  I wonder if too, this is why so many other religions such as Islam are on the rise.  Perhaps, and this is just my opinion, is that they hold true to their roots and their traditions on what their religion was founded on; where American Churches strive to water down the gospel to a feel-good, pop-culture, relative message, so they can increase their tribe, so to speak.   I myself just picked up a book called Christ-less Christianity by Michael Horton,  and I will be sharing what I find.   It goes something like this :

From Publishers Weekly
In another screed on what’s wrong with American Christianity, theology professor Horton, of Westminster Seminary California, bemoans the slide of the American Christian church into what he, and others, call a moralistic, therapeutic deism. Drawing on studies, surveys and anecdotal evidence, Horton reaches the oft-repeated conclusion that American Christianity is self-centered rather than Christ-centered, Jesus is a life coach rather than a redeemer, and salvation is focused on therapeutic well-being. He rants against the purveyors of this watered-down Christianity–Robert Schuller, T.D. Jakes, Benny Hinn, Joyce Meyer–but saves his most savage attack for megachurch preacher Joel Osteen, whom Horton depicts as a snake-oil salesman teaching that God is a personal shopper ready to deliver happiness and prosperity if only individuals let God know their needs. Horton reveals his lack of theological depth when he argues that ancient Gnostics saw God as no different from humans. Yet Gnosticism’s entire point is this difference. Horton regrettably offers no recommendation for the reformation of American Christianity beyond a simplistic call to let the church be defined by the Gospel rather than the laws of the market. (Nov.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Product Description
Is it possible that we have left Christ out of Christianity? Is the faith and practice of American Christians today more American than Christian? These are the provocative questions Michael Horton addresses in this thoughtful, insightful book. He argues that while we invoke the name of Christ, too often Christ and the Christ-centered gospel are pushed aside. The result is a message and a faith that are, in Horton’s words, “trivial, sentimental, affirming, and irrelevant.” This alternative “gospel” is a message of moralism, personal comfort, self-help, self-improvement, and individualistic religion. It trivializes God, making him a means to our selfish ends. Horton skillfully diagnoses the problem and points to the solution: a return to the unadulterated gospel of salvation.

Now if that doesn’t get your attention, I don’t know what will.   It will definitely be eye-opening to be learning more about this; and it made me ponder how this is probably very much intertwined with my recent posts on Unity in the Body of Christ.  As I started reading this book, God pointed out to me that because we are getting so relative, we are being deceived that there needs to be some type of relative/Biblical balance; but what it is really doing is making us weaker in our faith.  We can even try and go out and do the work of the Lord in our communities and do our best to meet the needs of the less fortunate; but if we don’t have our roots in what is Biblical and true, then are we well equipped to really share the Love of Christ with others if our hearts are not focused completely on God at all times?   Watering down the gospel waters down our core traditions, our core doctrine, our cor faith on a personal and church level.  I think this may be why we are getting less united and more divided too; our individualism and relativism of the Truth of Jesus is what Satan is using to distract us from learning and thirsting for The True Word of God.   It happens so suddely, we don’t even realize it sometimes.  We think we’re getting ahead, but if we were to really examine where we are in complete, continual surrender to the will of God in our life and to transform our hearts into Christ-likeness, I fear many would not be able to say much about that.  If we’re not hungering and thirsting after righteousness, then really we are dying, and Satan is winning.  Scary thought, huh?    I always think about what Tommy Tenny was trying to say in God Chasers; that people come hungry to our churches and all we end up giving them are maybe a few crumbs off the carpet. (In my own defense, I am not a fan of Tenny, but He does makes some, not all, good points in the book, God Chasers).    This thought has really made me sit back and think about the church in recent years.  I imagine that this will be a pretty interesting discussion as I post my review.  I hope that you will join me in the discussion and the learning process of this very crucialproblem that we are facing more and more in our churches.  God forgive us for selling you down the river just so we can remain comfortable in our own strength!  I also hope every pastor that preaches to a congregation will consider reading this book, and take seriously the slippery slope we are sliding down.

Wow, I am so moved by my stat. counter lately on this blog.  My post “Unity in the Body of Christ” is the 2nd highest read post on my blog of all time!  It really blows me away b/c I think many realize and share my passion for truly having unity in the body of Christ.  I know for me this past year, it has been an issue I’ve had to work out in continued surrender; and it has been what I feel has driven allot of my spiritual growth.  I have this crazy habit of preaching ,so to speak, in my car when I drive.  I think for me, God has just been over-flowing my little brain with so much stuff that I am trying to figure out how to manage it all, and verbalizing it whenever I can helps.  It seems that when I’m driving, I’m able to really process and organize my thoughts, I even thought of starting to record myself so I can remember what I said at a later time.   So anyhow, I kept thinking about unity, and how I’ve tried to communicate that in the past, out of my own experiences and learning.  Today I’ve come to realize the difference between fellowship and unity.  Many might think they are one in the same, but God pointed out to me that indeed they are different.  I went over to wikipedia to gain some clarity:

Unity: (uncountable) oneness; state of being one or undivided; united in mind or purpose

Fellowship:  referring to individual Christians who are in Communion (Christian) with each other.  It goes on to explain: 

The term Communion is derived from Latin communio (sharing in common).^[1] The corresponding term in Greek is κοινωνία, which is often translated as “fellowship”. In Christianity, the basic meaning of the term communion is an especially close relationship of Christians, as individuals or as a Church, with God and with other Christians. This basic meaning of the word, found in many passages of the New Testament as well as in secular Greek, predates its other, more specific, Christian uses.  If the relationship between the Churches is complete, involving fullness of “those bonds of communion – faith, sacraments and pastoral governance – that permit the Faithful to receive the life of grace within the Church”,[1]it is called full communion. However, the term “full communion” is frequently used in a broader sense, to refer instead to a relationship between Christian Churches that are not united, but have only entered into an arrangement whereby members of each Church have certain rights within the other.

O.K., do you see the difference?  This is exactly what God was point out to me this morning in the car!   We can have fellowship with other Christians, in that we share in the gift of salvation and our core beliefs in the basic doctrines of Christian theology, but this does not mean that we are unified!  In our churches that we go to on Sundays, we can and often do fellowship with other believers b/c we share the same life of salvation and beliefs of the Christian faith, but that alone does not and will never unify us!  It may be a good start, but it barely scratches the surface when we’re dealing with the biblical concept of unity and the heart of God and the way He views unity.  Look at the  trinity; it is perfect, complete, whole, unified; working together for all things.  Let me repeat that: unified; working together for all things.   Look again at the definition of unity:  Unity: (uncountable) oneness; state of being one or undivided; united in mind or purpose. There is Oneness, A state of Undividedness, United in Mind or purpose.  I’d like to say, United in mind AND purpose.  God wants His church to be United! To Be one in mind and purpose.    This brings me back to church, where we go on Sundays.  This is helping me see a conversation I had last night for over an hour with a friend.  I understand that we’re all at different spiritual levels.  I respect where you are, and I will be there for you, praying for you, and helping you to grow in your faith.  But I honestly feel, and this is Biblical, that there comes a time where we have to start growing up in our faith.  We really have to learn surrender if we are going to truly live for Christ!  It’s right here in The Bible:

Hebrews 5:12-6:8 (New International Version)

Maybe I’m wrong, but from my own experiences, I think that our churches are not becoming unified because we’re really not spiritually strong!  We’re really not in the Word, it’s really not speaking to us, because we lack faith and we don’t want to get too uncomfortable.  I mean really, God forbid we have to suffer or let God prune us and work out our own salvation with fear and trembling.  People don’t want to do that; they think that they won’t have endure hardships by following Christ.  Endure, that means continuing on in.   This is exactly what I mean when I say people don’t get me.  Praise God, I am really Spiritually strong, and no, I am not boasting, I am proud of  who I am in Christ!   I’ve endured allot crap to get here! I’ve been refined, I’ve suffered, I’ve paid my dues so to speak, yes, I let God prune me, and it hurt like hell, but I’d do it again in a heart beat! and I’m sure I’ll be pruned some more again at some point; I’m gonna have to be if I want to keep growing!  I guess I really feel like there are always going to be 2 camps on this issue.  There’s gonna be those who are fence sitters, lukewarm in there faith, nursing the spiritual milk, keeping a protective shield around them so they don’t have to endure any degree of suffering for Christ.  Then there will be the rest of us, the true Christ followers, who gave up the Spiritual Bottle at one point and never wanted it back because we found that the meat of The Scriptures and the truth andfeedom found in Jesus was what we really needed to satisfy our spiritual hunger.   So yes, I love my weaker brothers and sisters and I will continue to  love them, to pray for them, and help them along, but man, more than anything I really hope that God will unite me with True followers of Christ who know the difference between these 2 camps and live out their faith in such abandonment that I know it’s gotta make God revel in His glory to see such obedience and faith.  Yes, in this world, we will have trouble, but greater is He who Lives in Me than that of this world.  

John 16:33 (New International Version)

I just got home from church and my whole being is just electrified, for lack of better words.  My pastor Rocks! , Actually, it’s Christs’ amazing work through Him that Rocks!   As much as I have laid my issues at the cross, God has been transforming me in such amazing ways.  Sometimes I wonder if people even get half the stuff that comes out of me, but this too, I have learned to let Go and place in God’s hands.  You see, as much as we can talk a good talk about being Christian, it’s our actions that really matter.  I know we all struggle at some level of complacency, but I have also learned that the more I give my heart over to God, the more it truly starts taking shape like Jesus’.  We can run around and call ourselves Christians all we want, but if our actions don’t line up, we’re just giving God lip service, and worse yet, we’re giving Christ a bad name;  and really,  who wants to follow a hypocrite?   I know when I got my fire back for God, it really freaked me out in a way b/c I knew the standard, and I knew that I’d never measure up, but through Gods grace, and love and strength of the Holy Spirit in us we can do al that God calls us to do.  Sometimes I get so frustrated b/c I wonder if  some of the people that I highly value understand where I’m at, and today, on Mother’s Day, God gave me an awesome gift that indeed my prayers are being heard and perhaps my blog is being read by some pretty influenceal people that I know (thanks Pastor Jim).  I know this b/c some of the things that I have been writting about were echoed loud and clear today at church.  Maybe for some reading this, you may be thinking, well what’s the big deal?  Read some of my blog and you’ll understand more of my heart.  I want to share with you my reader a very fundamentalal issue of our faith, and my prayer is that you would really let this get  inside you and mess with where you are in your walk.   Christianityis not a social club.  We are saved and set apart to do good works and shine the light that should be radiating out of us as Jesus constantly is making us brighter and more complete in Him.   We’re not to stand around waiting around for heaven, as I have mentioned before.  We are Salt to a decaying word that is rotting before our eyes.  We are light to a world of darkness and sin.  Don’t take this lightly.  Let it sink in. Think about it.  Go look up scriptures that talk about it and pray for God to help you  live it.  Pray for God to change your heart, and that you would truly hunger and thirst after righteousness, that you would become desperate for more of Him!   If you really want to be everything for Christ, then humble yourself at the cross and ask for His help.  If your just being a christian because that’s the way you were raised or because y9u want to feel good or gain God’s approvalalal or a ticket into heaven; get out of the way, b/c you’ve got it all wrong!   Don’t believe me? Well start reading your Bible, but don’t just read it to know, read it to be changed.  It’s living Water; Do you understand that?  We are to become like Christ in EVERY WAY!  Yeh, it’s a tall order, and no we can’t do it without Him, but it’s why He saved us!  My pastor played the following video that moved me in such a way that I couldn’t  help but stand up in praise, in gratitude, in a scream out to God that yes, God you are the God of our City and we are your people who you chose to use, to make a difference in this world, in our cities and community, to be your Salt and to be your light.  I was praying for everyone in that congregation that they would be moved, that something inside would change.    So I want to thank Pastor Jim for unashamedly preaching the Gospel of Jesus Christ.  May His words echo in the hearts of all who heard and my their hearts be moved to the heart beat of God!