I decided recently that I’ve been way too blasé in regards to my church attendance. I walk in as the first song is starting, I sing, I sit, I listen, I leave. And unless the sermon is out of this world and my coffee has kicked in to full potential – I’m really not taking much away from it and into my week. Which is absolutely pathetic. And so backwards.
Worshipping together with other believers is a blessing. Listening to a sermon once a week refocuses my heart and mind in addition to teaching me lessons I need to remind myself of daily. And wasting it is sinful.
I remembered back to a few years ago when I went to church with my sister, her then-boyfriend-now-husband, and his family. His sister always brought her journal along and took notes during the whole sermon. It always struck me as being so mature. It was clear how much her faith mattered to her. I imagined that she would look back over the things she wrote, the things she was praying for, and the things she was learning each morning as she sipped her coffee. I always thought it was such a good idea – and I’m really not sure why I never decided to do it myself. Maybe because no one else at my church does it. Everyone just sits there. It’s alarming if the person next to you has his or her own Bible. Not one on a cell phone or iPad. But a real Bible. (Which is a whole other problem for another person to fix). But following the norm is lame and, in this case, really not beneficial or appropriate. I didn’t like the pattern I had fallen into, so I got a journal.
And this past Sunday I wrote and wrote and wrote.
I went to church with Mark’s family and his Pastor is amazing. Such a wise man.
Yesterday he read from Luke 17 – the story of the 10 lepers. He focused mainly on thankfulness and shed a lot of light on the cleansing rituals that took place in the temple by the priest once someone claimed to be cured of leprosy – which I had never learned before. It was really cool – the symbolism between the healing process and Christ’s death on the cross. But the most important thing he said was exactly what I needed to hear…
“You can thank Him in everything, if not for everything”
He said this after sharing a story from his life... He and his wife had just had their first child and were struggling financially. They lived in a small apartment and the landlord graciously replaced the stove when it broke. The only downside was that a family of cockroaches lived in the stove. And the entire apartment became infested. During that time, he went to Mexico to do some relief work (they lived in Southern California) and they stopped at an orphanage before reaching their destination. The two adults that ran the orphanage were both missing for various reasons and the oldest child there, who was a young teenager, was taking care of all the children. He said he walked into a room where a crib had broken and three infants had rolled into the corner. Not one of them had been changed in over two weeks. He said in that moment all he could do was thank God that his baby girl only lived in an apartment infested with cockroaches. She had two parents that loved her, food in her belly, a clean diaper, etc. How true is that? Even when their home was less than welcoming – it was a blessing from God.
Life can be really hard and confusing. Just this past week I said to Mark, “Sometimes it’s really hard to see where Jesus is in all of this.” It’s messy and difficult. And most of the hard stuff makes us question God and beg for change even though we’ve heard that suffering strengthens our faith a hundred times. Sometimes it’s easy to wallow in the bad stuff. Other times the bad stuff just takes us somewhere so dark that the light is easily forgotten.
This week I’m going to do my best to remember: The situation may cause me to grieve but there is something in the situation that God deserves thanks for.
The service closed out with the most beautiful song as a handful of people made their way to the front to surrender their lives to Christ. And it was these words from the song that I’ll continue to echo each day: All my hope is in You, Jesus, Jesus.
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