SO good to be at church...is it wrong to feel selfish about church? I have been loving being in there and covet the time... I wish I could be in there every week BY MYSELF or just with JEFF and the older kids without worry of Kate...soon it will be so in fact, when Kate grows a bit more but still, I feel like it's a little piece of baklava that I savor when I get it...I worry so much in fact that I am savoring it, that I end up much of the service praying that I stay worshiping Him instead of basking in His presence...or maybe reveling in His glow is the RIGHT thing over humble submission? I don't know but I DO know that I hold back in worship...my desire is to LOVE Him...but for all of CC's no distraction rules, I worry!
The bigger point of course is that I KNOW that I am fast again approaching that I could better serve...it reminds me of something I learned long ago..that first you are served in a church and then you SERVE. If your personal walk is right for a long time, then the once a week service should not be the apex of your walk. So Is the Honeymoon over? Nah, I hope not! But I am feeling the prompting and cannot deny it. When I am hungering for deeper knowledge, I know that it is my PERSONAL walk that will feed me best and so I need to better nurture it...church cannot do it for me...Darn! LOL
OKAY! ON to the teaching already!
No matter what Doug said, hearing the scripture:
"Stop sinning or something worse may happen to you" John 5:14
is scary. Doug said it was a compassionate word of advice or something of the sort...but I hear it and go YIKES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
(other denominations, don't latch onto this...God is NOT a punisher!)
Does that make me a worse sinner? Perhaps in my own eyes?
I have been dealing with someone in a mentor position expressing to Sloan that one could lose one's salvation (FYI: you CANNOT!)
and other things...but still, the idea that "something worse may happen to you" does not sound like compassion to me but more like a stern admonishment which parents OUGHT to do when faced with disobedience. I can't HELP but like it. Sounds parental to me. And God often is a tough parent! Much like good human parents are!
Don't do it again, OR ELSE!
Suffice to say, that CC does the real thing...teaches the Word of God, without a bunch of fluff or wrong doctrine.
Wrong doctrine, or the absence thereof, is a killer of faith when the rubber meets the road.
Thanks CCOTL...we are learning to get along...
2 comments:
Steph... are you wanting to dance or zumba? ;) We had a lady at church that wanted to jump up and down waving her arms around during worship, even after everyone was seated. No one is ever discouraged from raising arms, even while seated... sometimes there's even encouragement to... and there's been times when people do stand back up quietly with raised arms but she was (quietly) asked to stand in the back and jump... wasn't told not to it, but to stand in the rear please. I didn't get a chance to meet her, she didn't stay too many services. I'm sure she felt wronged and that made me feel bad because I'm sure she didn't leave blessed by the wonderful teaching of the Word (she didn't give that a chance!) but upset because she didn't get to worship as she wanted. But it's like Jim says, if your style is more ritualistic, there're churches that provide that, if it's dancing in the aisles, they're out there. He's not telling people to leave (we keep growing!), he's just sayin'!
I think I get what you're meaning about the "yikes" and KNOW if you keep going in your sins, there are consequences! I looked at the passage again and this is what I got... after Jesus healed the man and HE told him to "take up his bed and walk," the Jews tried to make him forget about that and focus on their strict teaching... maybe that's where the compassion was coming from... Jesus knew that the man was struggling with that when He met up with him again so He gently reminded him again who He was and that He had been healed by Him, don't loose focus and worry about them! The man then tells them it was Jesus who made him well and didn't even discuss the bed part (personally, I hear a "so there!" tone in the passage.) But of course that just made the Jews more intent to kill Jesus... they were loosing ground fast! If the Son has set you free, you are free indeed!
oh my gosh... I'm sorry, I probably should have emailed that because it's so long!
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