Does Church Matter?

Lately, I have heard more times than not that people don’t go to church because their faith is private.  They say they know God and that is enough.  They don’t need the church.  Most people who hold this view have something against the church.  They think it’s full of hypocrites, something happened in the past that made them not trust or like church people, or they like keeping their Sundays free. 

I would like to start by saying that it is actually very hypocritical of me to write this blog post.  I myself do not attend church regularly.  There are two reasons: 

#1.  I work as a flight attendant.  It is rare that I am home on Sundays. 

#2.  We moved recently so we don’t have a church to call home.  We attend when I’m home, but we are church “shopping” right now, which makes it easy to skip a Sunday every now and then. 

So, why am I writing this blog post?  The reason is because I am learning how important it is to attend church, and not just to attend church, but to be an active member of a church.  The Bible calls church “The Body of Christ.”  If you really are a Christian (you have admitted that you are a sinner and that you cannot save yourself and you have asked Christ to save you and be the Lord of your life) then you are a body part, whether you attend or not. 

God designed Christians to fit together to form a body.  One Christian is the spinal cord, another is a rotator cuff, another is a pinky finger, another is a pinky toe.  One member is an eye, another is an ear, and one is the mouth.  The Bible says that Christ is the head.  All decisions are made by him and carried out through the members of the body.  If you are a Christian and you are not a member of a body, then you are depriving a body of one of its members.  If a human body is missing a limb that body has a handicap.  The same is true of a body of believers.  Have you ever thought about the fact that your absence in the church might be one of the reasons the people act in a way that you despise.  They are handicapped without you there. 

I am learning through my study of Experiencing God that pure selfishness is the only reason Christians don’t attend church.  If you have an excuse, that’s all it is.  We are designed to be a part of the body of Christ.  Unless we accept this as part of our faith we will never truly be in line with God’s will, which means we will never experience the full capacity of his joy and peace in our lives.  On the flip side, the church can never reach it’s potential without all of its members. 

If you are physically unable to attend church there are other ways to be involved.  You can find a church on the radio or internet.  You can call them and offer to pray for their needs or offer to send cards to people who are sick or haven’t attended in a while, or make phone calls, or offer to pray for the pastor while he’s preaching or for the youth as they meet on Wednesday nights.  You can also tithe to them.  There are countless things we can do if we cannot physically make it to the building on Sunday mornings.  You can make appointments with different pastors in your area and tell them your intensions.  Get to know different ones and see which one God leads you to.  If you can’t make it to them then I’m sure they will be willing to come to you, especially the one God wants you to support.  Doing this might even lead to a new kind of ministry for the church you join. 

As I commit to being part of the body of Christ some of the above will be my only options during weeks when I am traveling.  There is nothing wrong with this.  If you are a Christian then you are missing out by not committing to church.  At the same time, you are crippling the church God has been calling you to.  Pray that He will show you exactly which body needs you and pray that He will reveal to you and the church why you are there.  Trust Him to speak to you and people of the church before you start acting on why you think you are there.  He will show you both, and you will in turn reap incredible blessings as you watch Him at work through you. 

If you are a Christian there is no excuse for not being a member of a local church body.  I am guilty, but as I seek to correct this wrong in my life I pray you will seek to correct it in yours also. 

Lastly, if you are a member of church body I encourage you, and anyone else who is willing, to go through Experiencing God.  If you have already been through it then go through it again.  The last few weeks of the study focus on how the church body should function.  It’s eye opening.  I believe it will revolutionize your church and your ability to reach your community and ultimately the world.  

Church is not just important, it’s vital to our faith.

Thankful on Thursday – God’s Name

All of my life (as long as I can remember) I have heard people pray like this, “Lord, we praise Your name.  We thank you for who you are.” and so forth and so on.  I have even used these phrases myself when I’m not sure what to say, and it’s no wonder because the Psalms are littered with verses that sound just like these prayers.  The funny thing is I never really thought about them until today.  They were just phrases that sounded good when I prayed out loud.  I believed them.  I was truly praising God for His name, it’s just that I never stopped to truly consider “What is His name?”

I am in the middle of the study Experiencing God, which I am doing with my friend Laura.  Today’s lesson is on the name of God, which is I AM.  When Moses asked who he should tell the people God is God replied, “I AM WHO I AM”.  The beautiful thing about this, the thing that somehow never clicked in my brain is that we fill in the blanks.  “Today God is my strength because I am at the end of my rope.”  “Today God is my provider because I don’t know how we are going to pay the bills.”  “Today God is my refuge because everyone is mad at me.”  “Today God is my comfort because those words really hurt.”  “Today God is my joy because life is good.”  “Today God is my peace because I should be stressed, but I’m not.  I know He has it all under control.”  “Today God is my salvation because He has saved me from the life I was living.  He has made me a new person.”  Etc… The list goes on and on because God is who He is.  He is EVERYTHING you need Him to be. 

What I have learned is that experience is the follow-up to this.  We believe these things - “God is provider.” – when we need Him to provide.  He proves himself to us by providing, and at that point we have experienced Him, which is how we gain intimate knowledge that God is provider, which is how we grow more intimate in our relationship with Him.  It’s a wonderful cycle. 

I must say that it is my belief that Jesus clearly stated, “I am the way, the truth and the life.  No one comes to the Father except through me.”  I believe that God works in people’s lives even if they reject Jesus, however, you can not intimately know God or experience Him without first accepting Jesus as Lord and Savior of your life.  To know God, you must acknowledge you are a sinner and that you need Jesus’ salvation.  You must be willing to walk away from everything in your life.  You don’t have to walk away from it before you accept Jesus because He will help you desire to walk away from once He has cleansed you from it (by His death for you on the cross).  You just have to be willing. Once you give your life to Jesus, you will begin to intimately know the Father.  There is nothing more satisfying in life.  NOTHING!  Money and relationships will never provide true and lasting love, joy, peace, comfort, strength, refuge, deliverance, hope, help, confidence, redemption, and on and on.  (There are books you can buy about all the names of God.)

It might seem far fetched that you could wake up and live every day of your life with no anxiety, no worry about the future, no loneliness, no need to prove yourself, no hate toward others, no animosity, no strife, no regrets.  However, it is possible.  This is how I wake up everyday.  It’s also how thousands of others wake up everyday.  Find a Christian, a true Christian who everyday gives their life to God and who trusts Him with everything (you will know them by the light in their eyes), and ask them if this is not true of their lives.  It is true.  Jesus says “He who finds his life will loose it, but he who is willing to loose his life for my sake will find it.”(Matt. 10:39)  Meaning that if you will give up control of your life and give it to God, who has your best interest at heart, you will gain an abundant life here on earth that will carry over into heaven when you die.  Please email me if you would like to discuss further.  I am always open for questions and debate. 

The purpose for this post is to share a song.  This is probably my favorite song right now.  It’s just that after today this song has new meaning for me.  I wanted to share it with you. (Yahweh means: I AM)

Life Lessons: Shoulda, Coulda, Woulda

Have you ever had something small happen that became a metaphor for something much larger your life? 

This happened to me yesterday.  My brother and I were out with Brinkley.  I started jogging with her toward Shane, and as I got closer I could hear him yell something, but I couldn’t make out what he was saying.  Once I realized that he was yelling, “YOU DROPPED SOMETHING!” 

I stopped and turned around to look.  As soon as I saw it my heart sank.  It looked dead on the pavement.  How could I have forgotten it was in my pocket?  I ran back to it, reached down, picked it up and turned it over.  

My heart, and my stomach, sank.  My phone was shattered. 

My case had broken several months ago, and at first I was very careful with the phone.  I always set it down gently.  I always carried it gently.  I always made sure it was in a secure location.  I babied it to make sure nothing would ever happen to it.  But, like most things in life, nothing did happen, so I began to get complacent.   Jason and I had talked about getting me a new case several times, but we never made a move to actually do it.  Also, I secretly liked how well it fit into my back pocket, so I didn’t push it. 

Weeks turned into months, and I started dropping it more often.  I would forget where I’d put it.  I would it toss it onto the couch or the bed.  I just started getting very comfortable with it…too comfortable.

This is why my heart sank when I saw it.  I knew immediately that this accident was 100% preventable.  If only I’d gotten a case for it.  If only I’d cared enough about it to remember that it was in my shallow hoodie pocket before I started to run.  If only…if only…

I left the screen protector on to try and hold the glass in place and to protect myself because if you touch it you will get glass in your finger.  (Just ask the girl at the AT&T Store.)  Then, I went to the store to get the protector of all protectors, THE OTTERBOX.  I am very lucky that my phone still works.  This is just a surface wound that can be replaced.  But, the wound is still there.  It’s enough to have taught me a lesson about how important it is to protect my phone no matter what the cost.  Here is my phone in it’s new protective gear.  It’s damaged, but it still works. 

I know I’m being dramatic, but it’s because God gave me a valuable reminder though this.  He reminded me that we have to be very careful of how we treat the people in our lives.  Just like our phones, our relationships are fragile.  At first, we take very good care to not do anything that could harm the relationships that are important to us, but as time goes on we get comfortable, and we get complacent.  I’m reminded of a sermon I once heard.  I can’t remember the pastor or even when I heard this, but I remember him talking about a couple who had gotten a divorce.  The husband was totally blindsided and confused because out of thin air one day his wife just declared that she wanted a divorce.  The wife was livid that he acted surprised because they had been having problems for years.  The point the pastor was making is that they were BOTH at fault.  He was at fault for not paying attention, and she was at fault for not explaining to him, in a way that he could understand, that she was unhappy. 

I think as humans the more comfortable we are with people the more comfortable we are at being complacent.  I am reading a book called Making Your Husband Feel Loved, compiled by Betty Malz.  Twenty women share their stories and I am learning a lot from it.  One woman shared that we should  always treat our husbands like we treat our company.  This is because we would never talk to our guests the way that we talk to our husbands.  (I think this probably goes for kids too.)  She explains that women (and men, but the book is by women for women) need to learn that of all people to be nasty to and criticize, our spouses should be the last.  We need to treat each other with kindness and respect.  I think this is very good advice and I am doing my best to live by it.  (It’s a small section of our phone cover, if you will.)

(This picture is linked back to Amazon. I promise I’m not getting kick backs for it.  It’s just a good book that is an easy and enjoyable read.)

In closing, as I thought about my phone, and all of the shoula, coulda, wouldas, I was reminded to not let the same thing happen in my marriage that I let happen with my phone.  I need to fight everyday to keep my marriage healthy and in tact.  I need to do the same with my friends and my family.  It doesn’t take much to shatter a relationship, just like I shattered my iPhone.  I hope you don’t put off protecting your relationships either because, as humans, we will put it off until it’s too late and then all we will be left with are the shoulda, coulda, wouldas.   

One of Life’s Lessons

Recently Brinkley learned one of life’s toughest lessons. 

CATS ALWAYS GET WHAT THEY WANT!

We tried to explain this to her when she first became part of our family,

but I’m not sure she ever fully understood it until yesterday. 

You see, several months ago I made Brinkley a bed.  She had been through countless store bought beds because as it turns out, the only thing they were good for was ripping them apart and eating the stuffing.  So, with all the brilliance I possess, I decided to make her one that didn’t have any stuffing.  I bought a really soft baby blanket and cut a slit in the back of it.  I then cut a twin sized $10 “memory foam” mattress into fourths.  I cut the four pieces to fit snuggly inside the blanket and then I stuffed them in and smoothed them out.  Voila, a doggie bed big enough for 65 lbs to comfortably sprawl across.  I didn’t even sew the slit in the back.  I just threw it on the floor and she was instantly in dog heaven. (This is the project part.)

    

That was until recently, when this started happening.

I felt so bad for Brinkley that I got out an old dog bed that had been given to us.  I sprayed Febreze on it and used a lint roller to get off all the old hair.  I thought I would see if I could coax Bub to start sleeping on the smaller dog bed.  It’s the exact same type of material and everything.  The only difference is that it is made with stuffing and it’s made for a 10lb dog. 

This is what has happened.

     

   

I wish we could help, but we gave up our bed years ago.  This is just one of those things in life that we all have to learn to deal with…

CATS ALWAYS GET WHAT THEY WANT!