Do I have to go?

Do Christians have to go to church?  It’s a longstanding question.  I answer here from the perspective of blessing.  Basically, church can wear me out, but for good reason.  With church comes an excitement I love that can lead to a Sunday afternoon nap.  One particular Sunday morning, the Lord poured blessings through the song “Amazing Grace.”  How many thousands of renditions of the song have been offered over the years?  God designed this one for guitar and oboe within a small congregation.  We were solely instrumental at first, joined later with lyrics.  The Lord planted the idea for this instrumental version months ahead, as we sorted through earlier attempts to play the song and found it unfitting until this particular Sunday.  As the traditional melody floated through some ad libs here and there, I looked for the Lord.  He adjusted my embouchure to compensate for my lack of warmup between venues.  He led my fingers to notes on the oboe that blended with my husband’s on the guitar.  He gave flexibility to our group in watching for cues to wait or move ahead.  Within one heart, particularly mine, in maybe less than 15 minutes, the Lord blessed in multiple ways.  Over all, He showed how He prompts an idea and carries it through.  Regularly I ask Him to sing through my oboe, and though I don’t play so much anymore and I’ve lost much of the technique I used to have, He gives a sense of His presence in the resonance through the horn.  Experiences like this are invigorating.  Put together a morningful of blessings that seem to stretch the heart to a new capacity, and sometimes it’s almost too much to handle.  Sometimes I wonder if my knees will buckle and I’ll melt under the weight of blessing.  Yet why would I want to live without blessings that so wonderfully impact my whole being?  Am I forced to attend church?  No.  But God blesses immensely through the church.  Not every Christian has the physical means to travel to a church’s meeting place.  But if you can travel, I encourage all to ask the Lord to lead you.  It’s not a matter of checking an attendance box.  I hope you’ll attend because you want to know the Lord in the midst of the church.  I’ve prayed for you already.

Prayer & a party hat

I’d been wondering about a certain verse.  Knew it was in the Bible but not sure where.  I asked God to show me the verse.  One afternoon my eyes spotted it in the midst of Matthew’s fourth chapter.  Verse 4 says, “… Man does not live on bread alone…”  Seems endless the number of times I’ve heard that quote.  How many food companies have adapted it for their advertisements?  How many motivational speeches have included it?  Yet the portion often quoted is not the complete sentence.  Jesus says, “It is written:  ‘Man does not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.’”  Similar words are in Deuteronomy 8:3.  Tangible, edible bread contributes to our physical survival, but our ultimate sustenance, our ultimate need for all aspects of life, is the Word of God.  The wisdom in the verse is a blessing.  But now we look beyond the verse.  Remember I asked God to show me this verse in the Bible?  He did answer my prayer.  That’s a BIG DEAL because it means He listened to the request of an ordinary girl in an ordinary place.  We’re all ordinary, and can’t we be glad the Lord hears the common man?  We often fill the air with our requests of God, but what about our thank-you’s?  Do we offer thank-you’s and celebrate with Him?  When God answers a prayer, it’s time for a party!  Don’t talk yourself out of the great joy we should take in realizing an answer to prayer.  It’s huge news!  Put on one of those pointy party hats with the stretchy band under the chin.  Celebrate with the Lord first.  Include Him at the top of the party list.  Bake the cake, and expect Him at the front door.  He provides our bread and answers our prayers, and how cool is that!

A new idea, but now what?

A new and exciting idea floats through the brain, and we can be eager to use it.  Why wait?  Back in 1995 as I curled up on the sofa to read one of Jack London's many, the Lord gave me an astounding experience that let me know I would do some writing about slavery.  Though intimidated at first, I did want to stay attuned to the idea of writing.  I dabbled around with it a bit.  In 2002, I quit teaching school to allow some concentrated writing time.  In 2010, I published a book, though on a different subject.  All this to say the initial idea to write prompted much prayer over a period of many years.  Yet on a different occasion when God gave me the idea to teach homebound students, I was quickly on the job in less than a month.  It also was many years from the time the idea of jail ministry first caught my interest up to the December afternoon in 2009 when a phone call with a chaplain appeared to formally connect all the dots.  And one idea that’s still in progress is last summer’s notion to make a video to accompany my bus book.  I’ve seen a few puzzle pieces connect, though many questions remain, and I continue to seek the Lord’s guidance.  To jump in and buy a camera and spend hours and days putting a video together doesn’t seem the thing to do, at least not yet.  Sometimes our new idea is God’s preview of what is to come.  In our waiting, He prepares us, maybe connecting us with people in certain circumstances to accomplish His larger purpose.  One aspect of Christian living that absolutely thrills my heart is realizing how one blessing, perhaps one answer to prayer, is really only a portion of a whole set of blessings all delicately and lovingly designed by God to touch many, many people.  And because God works in infinite ways, what about those occasions when He calls us to act quickly, when not every new idea is a years-ahead preview?  Suddenly our constant prayer and study of the Bible become all the more important.  I want to know God all the while, before and during and after each new idea, asking Him to make my decisions His.  Lord, is this new idea from You?  Don’t let me get carried away with it simply out of my own enjoyment.  Keep me waiting till You deem the time best.  Lead my decisions.

A retreat at the cross

We had a whole slew of differences.  We had a gymnastics coach, an interpreter for the deaf, and a tree trimmer and a fence builder.  We had a hair stylist, a production manager, a history professor, and a guitar salesman.  Few knew the same occupation.  We studied, we sang, we prayed and told stories of God.  We played ping pong, dominoes, charades, and ate loads of brownies and popcorn.  All the while, the Lord knitted people together.  Some of us arrived without knowing each others’ names.  And as we spent time together, our roles did occasionally change.  The gymnastics coach led line-dancing for those who wanted to twirl while they sang.  Our friend who was trained as a social worker became an on-the-spot marriage counselor.  Our science teacher became a dramatist.  Some speakers became listeners.  Our differences became likenesses as we served each other.  We heard how our friend who had been a drug addict found peace through knowing Christ.  We heard how one friend had once preferred aloneness but now found the company of people enjoyable and helpful.  One who had felt outcast was blessed to find acceptance now.  And I’m pretty sure none of us knew that our friend who is blind had an enjoyment for playing drums, and the fact that he felt the freedom to pick up the sticks to play with the band that night inspired us all.  …  The Lord has all kinds of reasons for bringing people together.  Those unemployed by society’s standards can be wonderfully employed by the Lord—no paycheck required.  Our cook may keep cooking.  Our teacher’s assistant may still work at a school.  Our nursing student may practice nursing for 30 years.  But no matter our formal training or lack thereof, the Lord has additional roles in mind.  The Lord loves to use people who are willing to follow Him and deny the what-if’s that torment the human brain when we don’t know the whole scope of a task.  He’s looking for people who will risk their human embarrassment to delve into a role He may not entirely reveal at the beginning.  He loves for us to commit to Him without looking at our bank accounts and for us to prioritize His desires higher than our own comfort.  We can find peace in knowing the Lord holds us in the palm of His hand, and His hand does not falter.  In fact, He has inscribed us on the palms of His hands (Isaiah 49:15).  Our common ground with people is the cross of Jesus Christ, and it’s exciting to see how God connects people with Him in mind.  More important than what we do is who we are as children of God.  Ours was a wonderful weekend retreat.