Worship.

What if we couldn't tell the difference between the way we work and the way we worship?

Stop and think about that statement before you read on.

What if there were no difference in our Sunday behavior and our Monday behavior?

What if church wasn't our weekly 'spiritual re-fueling station'? What if Christ became the source of our strength everyday, and we stopped waiting to hear a good sermon on Sunday morning to convince us to do something for God?

My Pastor, the infamous James Roberts, often says that 'Money shouldn't dictate our ministry, but ministry should dictate how our money is spent.' Let me take that a bit further and say this, 'Our ministries shouldn't dictate our worship, but our worship should dictate our ministries.' Allow me to explain...

Church members usually live in 2 extremes. Not always, but usually. One extreme doesn't like change. To them, nothing is better than the way that it's been done before - the tried and true and retried and reused ways of operating. The only hope for this generation is to get back to the way our grand-daddy's daddy used to do it. I consider myself somewhat of a conservative, but one problem with this viewpoint is...we don't live in grand-daddy's daddy's world anymore.

The other extreme is always looking for the next big thing. For instance, the 'Piety Power' youth group down the street had some huge success doing sign language to 'Stairway to Heaven', so we should be doing that here with our youth. It worked for them, it has to work for us. There were people crying and getting in touch with God and a lot have been coming to the altar. We need to do what works. We need to follow suit. We shouldn't let the 'Grace Filled Holy Ghost Saturated Pentebaptodists' be the only church benefiting from this - But the problem with this viewpoint is this: God doesn't honor programs.

Let me pause here and say, there's nothing wrong with doing it the same (as long as the reasoning is not 'that's the way we've always done it') and there's nothing wrong with programs. We've just forgotten to keep our hearts in check. Like "Are we doing what's always been done because God wants it that way or because we don't like change?" Or, "Do we want this program because it's what God wants for these people in this community or because it's what worked at a mega-church in Texas?"

Apart from basic biblical truths - who cares if it's the way our ancestors did it? Who cares if we have the latest fad? If hymns and organ music or lights and smoke and blaring guitars are giving glory to God and ministering to people...does it really matter who thinks they're right? It seems that a lot of times, believers are looking to criticize other believers instead of reaching those that are outside the walls of the church.

Sound familiar...? It should.

In Mark 9:38-40 John said to Jesus these words: "Teacher, we saw someone who does not follow us casting out demons in Your name, and we forbade him because he does not follow us." Jesus' response: "Do not forbid him, for no one who works a miracle in My name can soon afterward speak evil of Me. For he who is not against us is on our side..."

We're so concerned with being right about our doctrine that our spiritual war has become a fight between denominations. It's become a fight over which genre of music God approves of. It's become a fight of immersion or sprinkling. To speak in tongues or not. To dance or not...and I can't help but picture a Father with His head bowed in disappointment. Wondering if any of His children are listening.

Until we begin to really understand that this whole Christian thing is not about us and what we want or like, we will never be united. We all have these ideas of who God is and how He works, and when someone comes along and says something that makes us think about what we've been taught for many years, we begin to throw up walls. Throwing up walls is not a bad thing, because sometimes that's a good way of defending our foundational beliefs. The problem lies in calling out the archers and rolling out the trebuchet and launching an all-out assault on the person we're defending ourselves against. We talk about how wrong their doctrinal stances are and question how they came to that conclusion from that particular verse; all because we rationalize, like John, and say, "...we forbade him because he does not follow us."

When we get our eyes off of Christ, we begin to focus more on what we want and we like and how we feel about this or that. In turn, it dictates how and whom we worship with. e.g. - "I enjoy the hymn classics and when they start to sing those contemporary songs, I just don't get anything out of it." And vice versa "Those old hymns are so boring and so...old. How can anyone worship with those songs?"

Our personal preferences should never define our worship.

True worship dictates everything we do.

"What's on your mind?"

Facebook is an amazing tool...it's a great place to quickly and easily connect with friends. It's also a great way to see what goes on inside a lot of people's brains per the "What's on your mind?" status updates. One interesting thing that I've noticed is how much people tend to think of themselves. I'm aware that the status updates are a place to update what's going on in your personal life, but in a wierd, funny way it's almost become this type of scenario: 'Out of the abundance of the heart, facebook status updates.'

I notice updates about how bad a person's day has been or how aggravated they are with co-workers or how bleak everything looks at that particular moment in their life. These 'status updates' are usually a good look into what someone is really thinking, quite frankly because people generally put what they really are thinking. It's sort of like when you get caught up in the heat of a moment and blurt out something without thinking about it...with the ability to access the internet so easily with cell phones and what not, sometimes I wonder if people put things online without ever thinking about them. Things that people would never talk about before facebook now are just normal ramblings on the web. Everything that's shared is viewed by hundreds of so-called facebook friends...'friends' you've probably never been to lunch with, but this doesn't stop most people from letting everyone know about how pitiful their lives are that day. In the "good ole' days," if you had a bad day at work, you sucked it up and went on. Now all our facebook friends get to hear about it.

But this isn't about having to hear about bad days, this is about how self-centered we've become. We have things that happen to us, and instead of 'counting it all joy when we face various trials' we feel the need to let hundreds of friends know about what's going on. As a born-again believer, my first priority, surprisingly, is to give glory and honor to God in all that I do. When you stop and think about it, how is letting everyone know how bad I've got it giving glory to God? Basically, we're bringing pity to ourselves, which, unfortunately, is what I think some people like.

James tells us that we should be slow to speak and swift to hear. I think that covers facebook status updates as well. Maybe instead of immediately getting online after something happens to us, we should be asking, "Father, to Your glory, what can I learn from this?"

The main point in this whole subject is this: We all face hardships and trying situations on a daily basis, of course, some worse than others. When it comes time for your next status update, instead of just posting 'I hate my job! Some people need a knife to the knee-cap!' - think about this question...

What's in your heart?

Friends of the Enemy.

John 15:18-20 If the world hates you, you know that it hated Me before it hated you. If you were of the world, the world would love its own. Yet because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you. Remember the word that I said to you, 'A servant is not greater than his master.' If they persecuted Me, they will also persecute you. If they kept My word, they will keep yours also.

Does the world love you?