blessing #2

warning ... this turned out to be more "preachy" than i had intended.

BLESSING #2: church

since moving back to Brenham, i've been going to a new church. at first it was just during the week for Bible study, but soon after i changed to Sundays as well. isn't it interesting how God moves you around to show you the importance of certain things for that moment in your life?

i was raised in the Baptist church. i went for social reasons, basically, most of my attendance being while i was a teenager. but after graduation, church quickly became a non-essential. when you go to church to see your friends, and then your friends are gone, why go to church? so when i moved to Colorado, i began a search for a new church, but for different reasons. all of a sudden i NEEDED God! and now i wanted a church where i could be with God, but i also wanted to fit in with a group of friends. after many years of church-hopping, growth, and realizations, i finally found a place where i felt like i was being fed. the Bible was actually taught and the music touched my heart. and there i attended twice a week, served in the bookstore, and felt like i was growing up a bit.

i returned to Brenham with no church direction and started my search once again. and not long after i began to search, i found. now i go to Country Bible Church (CBC). it's a small place, but has big teaching. the music doesn't give me an emotional experience, but that's not why i'm going to church. i'm going to learn the Word of God and more about Him, and i'm learning that. so much so that now my way of thinking has completely changed. when i see or hear something in relation to God, my brain filters it through what i've been learning and determines if it's truth or not. if it's not, or if it's only partially true, i turn it off, leave, or tune it out, and often times i am disappointed.

for example, when i was in Colorado to visit my friends, i went to my old church on Sunday morning and walked out feeling disappointed, yet thankful. the music, the same music i used to thoroughly enjoy, bored me this time. 30 minutes of the same theme, the same words sung over and over, and the leader trying to reach out ONLY to the hurting, lost, and broken ... well, it got old. AND, it made me feel as though i should be feeling hurt, lost, and broken in order to be there.

the teaching was ok. i didn't learn anything new, but was reminded about some things. but then it was all over and i left feeling empty. disappointed. like i'd just wasted an hour+ of my life. i don't think God's intention for church was for people to leave feeling that way. granted, i didn't feel that way when i was going there all the time. but that's where i was at the time, in my heart. and i guess it was good for the time, but i feel very thankful that i've grown beyond that. thankful that God has been working in me and changing me. through His grace He's brought me to new levels of learning about Him.

i don't say this to imply that every church, including my former church, is "bad." no, instead i challenge and urge you to look closely at your church's teaching, and determine if you're being fed with the Word of God, the truth, as it is in the actual scriptures. you can be fed in positive, negative, or truthful ways. not all church experiences should be positive (in that you're always feeling super wonderful about life), and not all should be negative (in that you're always feeling beat up). you should, however, feel convicted, taught, and encouraged through the Word, no matter where you are in the scriptures or where you are in your personal life.

God is so awesome ... He has given us EVERYTHING we need to live. if we have a question or a problem, we should be able to look in the Bible and find an answer. we should find our life map in there. and if you're not being shown that through your pastor, i encourage you to seek out a different church. if you're going each week but leave feeling empty, change churches. if you love the music where you're going, but the teaching isn't doing anything for you, you need to move on! that's what was happening to me ... the one church provided great music, but the pastor wasn't teaching me anything. so i prayed about going to CBC, went there in faith, and God has completely taken my supposed music need, in church, away. i've realized teaching is so much more important than just music.

church is not meant to provide an emotional experience. it's nice to have sometimes, like when you finally understand something, or when you're convicted of something. but it's not necessary in order to learn about God. and too often anymore i feel churches think they need to pump up the music and the social activities in order to reach those who are NOT going to church, instead of pumping up the teaching to reach the ones who ARE.

if you go to church because of habit, tradition or ritual, think about this: God doesn't want ritual, He wants relationship. if you go to score brownie points with God, just because you showed up, i have news for you ... it's not working. He doesn't want you to just show up. and whether that's your intention or not, if you're not learning anything, then you're just showing up. and believe me, He's disappointed. He expects you to change. and if that means going someplace new, getting out of your comfort zone, driving farther, not sleeping in, going to the lake later in the day, whatever .... you should do it.

so why is church important, anyway? because God commands us to go. because church is a way to help us stay on the right track, to teach us more about Him through ways we can't learn on our own, to put us in fellowship with other believers ... it's all for Him, really. because the more positive coming from me, the more He's glorified. so i go to church as a means for positive output. don't we take in more than enough negative just by living in the world? i don't know about you, but i want to add as much positive as possible in order to override that other stuff.

do yourselves a favor. look closely at your heart and ask, "where is God?" He wants to give you so much more!