A Heart Hungry To Worship Part 6

/ taethne

“Dear God, 
I am so afraid to open my clenched fists! 
Who will I be when I have nothing left to hold on to? 
Who will I be when I stand before you with empty hands? 
Please help me to gradually open my hands 
and to discover that I am not what I own, 
but what you want to give me.”[1]

Chapter 5

Renaldo and Lance’s Stories

            Renaldo rode his bicycle to work, head down against the brisk, chill wind. He mentally beat himself up for driving with a suspended license the week before. It certainly was stupid, but it beat biking to work in the winter. If only he had paid more attention to the cop who was behind him, maybe he wouldn’t be freezing this morning.

            Renaldo was very good at his construction job, which was the only reason his boss kept him on. He had numerous run-ins with the law; DUI’s, fights in bars, drunk and disorderly conduct, etc. When sober, Renaldo did great work; his skills at carpentry and mason work were second-to-none. When he drank, it was a different story.

            Twice married, he was involved in an on-again, off-again relationship with a girl he had dated back in high school, twenty years earlier. The relationship was off now and instead of living at her house, Renaldo had only a little camper that he pulled with his pick-up. 

While he loved construction work, most places in town wouldn’t employ him anymore. Too many work days missed because he was in jail for something or other (most times he couldn’t remember what he was charged with) too many fights with co-workers after hours;  all of these things limited the number of companies which were willing to hire him. His current employer used him on only the most difficult jobs, on a contract basis.

Renaldo reflected on his life as he rode. He wondered how it had turned out this way. He remembered his grandmother; she had passed away last year and he still missed her, terribly. She had raised him from the age of four until he had dropped out of high school and married at sixteen.

“If ever there was a saint,” he mused, “It was grandmother.” She had made sure to take him with her to church and Sunday School every week. He remembered how he had chafed as a teenager, sitting on those hard wood benches as the preacher droned on and on in a monotone voice. Something must have stuck with him, though. He could still remember songs from Sunday School, making crafts at the summer Bible School and somewhere in his camper was the little New Testament he received as a prize for memorizing Scripture verses.

He thought of his grandmother’s last few days. He sat in her room at the nursing home for a week straight, afraid that if he left even for a little while that she would die before he returned. He also thought of the young pastor, about his age, which had spent almost as much time with her as he had. It was obvious that he was close to her as well. Renaldo remembered his grandmother’s last night. Weakly, but distinctly, he heard her say the words to her favorite hymn repeatedly.

He also remembered that he had promised her that he would go back to church. It was time, he resolved, to keep his promise. He would go to his grandmother’s church to honor her memory. Renaldo hoped it would not be as boring as he remembered.

The next Sunday Renaldo showed up for the morning service. He wore his best clothes – jeans that were not too faded and a shirt he had picked up at the Salvation Army thrift store. He felt out of place at first, but then he saw many older people whom he remembered as his grandmother’s friends. He even saw his old Sunday School teacher, who not only remembered him but also welcomed him warmly and invited him to sit next to her.

The thing that struck him the most about the service was the sermon. The pastor was not boring. In fact, he talked about the struggles various people encountered in life and how the Bible talked about Jesus’ promise to be with his followers through their struggles. He was surprised to hear this, since he thought Christians didn’t have (or weren’t supposed to have) problems.

After the service, the pastor asked him how he was doing and expressed how much he missed Renaldo’s grandmother. Before he realized it, Renaldo accepted an invitation to dinner with the pastor’s family later in the week. “Great,” he thought, “He will badger me about Jesus and stuff.” Still, a promise was a promise and Renaldo did his best to keep his promises.

At dinner that Thursday night, Renaldo was surprised to find he was having fun. The pastor’s wife had fixed a simple meal but to Renaldo it tasted better than what he usually heated up on his camp stove. It turned out that the family played board games at suppertime and Renaldo was invited to play with them. After supper, the kids went off to do their chores while the pastor and Renaldo sat on the porch with coffee.

“Here it comes,” he thought, “Now is the time for the Jesus speech.” Instead, the pastor shared his memories of his grandmother and Renaldo responded with his own. As the evening ended, the pastor invited Roberto to drop by anytime he needed to talk, wanted a home-cooked meal or just to hang out. As they walked to the door, the pastor told Renaldo that his grandmother had prayed for him every day. “Every day she prayed you would come back to church. I believe she is very happy to see you come back as she watches from heaven.”

Renaldo lay in his camper that night and decided that he’d go back to church on Sunday. The people were nice, no one looked down on him and he really liked how the pastor’s family treated him. If that is how Christians acted, maybe becoming one wasn’t such a bad thing after all. He would have to give it some serious thought.

As the months went by, Renaldo continued to attend the services at the church. Various members of the church hired him to do construction work on the side, which really helped him to financially get ahead a little bit. He volunteered to help with the sound system, as it allowed him to attend services but keep his distance by being sequestered in the sound room. A church leader even asked him to participate in church activities, to help chaperone some teenage boys on a trip. At first, he protested, saying he wouldn’t be a good role model because of the troubles in his past. They told him that was exactly what would make a good chaperone. With him on guard, none of the kids would be able to get by with anything because he already knew all the tricks. Little by little, Renaldo was drawn into the life of the church.

Slowly, Renaldo came to realize that more than anything, he wanted a life like the people in the church, and one like his grandmother had lived. One Sunday morning he surprised himself by walking up to the pastor and saying, “I am ready to stop running my life my way. All I do is mess it up. I want Jesus to take control of it.”

Renaldo had finally found what he had been searching for in his life. God had drawn Renaldo and his life would never be the same. I know this, because I was the young pastor that ministered to Renaldo.

While he still has a way to go in dealing with the consequences of his past actions, Renaldo does not have to face them alone anymore. The Holy Spirit continues to draw Renaldo into a closer relationship with God, who cares about him, and a closer relationship with a church family who is willing to help.

▪▪▪▪▪▪▪▪▪▪▪▪▪▪▪▪▪▪▪▪▪▪▪▪▪▪▪▪▪▪▪▪▪▪▪▪▪▪▪▪▪▪▪▪▪▪▪

Lance was a long-time member of our church. He had been there years prior to my becoming pastor, though much about him remained a mystery. Lance would attend for a few weeks and then disappear for months at a time. When he showed back up, he was always living at a different address and recently employed at either a menial job or unemployed.

For years, the church had been generous to Lance. Both corporately and individually, the church members helped him financially, found jobs for him and even bought him furniture and food. He was always appreciative and grateful. Lance promised each time to repay those who had helped him, but no one ever expected him to. It seemed that he was just one of those people, who tried hard, but could never get ahead. Everyone liked him, but no one really knew anything about Lance. He kept his personal life private, even though many people made the effort to get to know him better.

One fall, Lance attended a series of revival services at church. The Holy Spirit did a mighty work on him that evening. Lance stood in the back, tears running down his face during the closing song. Before the service could end, he came to the front of the sanctuary and asked if he could address the church for a few minutes. The story he shared with us that night stunned everyone in the building.

Lance confessed to the church that he had been scamming them for years. He was actually pretty well off, financially. The reason for his disappearances for weeks at a time was that he went to Alaska and Canada to work. Sometimes, he would work on fishing vessels, other times in the oil fields. He confessed that he made very good money. In between jobs, he would come back home and rent a place to live by the week. While he didn’t need money, he said that it was just so easy to ask the church for help, knowing that they would oblige. The money and food he kept, furniture and other clothes he sold for even more money.

Lance went on to say that until that night, he had never felt a minute of regret for taking advantage of the church’s generosity. He went on to say that he was sorry, that God’s Spirit had convicted him of his thieving and lying, and that he had asked forgiveness from God. Now, he was wondering, could the church forgive him?

There was a silence across the congregation for almost a full minute as his words sunk in. One could see people struggling to process what they had just heard. Finally, hemmed in by people on both sides of his seat, Doug rose up. He had given Lance a lot of money over the years.  Not waiting for those around him to let him out of the row, Doug climbed over the pews and made his way forward. Lance visibly flinched, expecting the worse. Instead, he found the best.

Grabbing him in a hug, Doug publically forgave him. He rejoiced that God had reached Lance’s heart and changed it. The rest of the church was not far behind. Lance experienced the cleansing power of forgiveness that night. He was welcomed into the fellowship of his church family again. His heart became free to worship God, as the bonds of his sinful actions were broken. He was drawn back to God by the convicting power of the Holy Spirit, much like the famous story of the Prodigal Son, found in Luke, chapter 15.

[1] Henry Nouwen, The Only Necessary Thing: Living a Praying Life

A Heart Hungry To Worship Part 5

/ taethne

The next installment from the book A Heart Hungry To Worship, available on Amazon

  “Do you understand what you are reading?” Philip asked the Ethiopian. “How can I?” he said, “unless someone explains it to me?”[1]          

Chapter 4

The Ethiopian Eunuch

            Of all the people whose stories the holy pages of Scripture record, the Ethiopian eunuch stands out as one of the most fascinating. We find clues to who he was in Scripture, though we do not find his actual name recorded. He was from what is present day Sudan.  He was what we would term the Minister of Finance or Secretary of the Treasury for his country: a person, therefore, of power and prestige in the ancient kingdom of Meroe (also called Cush). While the Merovians viewed their king as an incarnation of the sun, the position was largely ceremonial. Considered too holy as a Child of the Sun to be involved in secular affairs, the queen mothers, known by the title, “the Candace,” held the real power in the kingdom.

            Eunuchs were often slaves employed to keep guard over the royal harem. They became so trustworthy and loyal in that role that it became customary to place them over the treasury. After all, if a person could be trusted with the king’s wives then he could be trusted with the king’s money; at least, that is what the Merovians believed. In fact, the term eunuch would become a synonym for “treasurer” in many countries.

            This particular eunuch was returning from a pilgrimage to Jerusalem. Apparently, he had become attracted to Judaism and was seeking further answers. He could not become a full proselyte (convert) to that religion because the Old Testament forbids castrated people from entering the Temple. Now, the passage of Scripture found in Acts 8 tells us that this eunuch had gone all the way from his country in Africa to Jerusalem, in the Middle East, to worship. Unfortunately, for him, he would experience great disappointment when he arrived.

            We don’t know how this man even obtained a copy of the Hebrew Scriptures or how he started considering Judaism as a belief system. It might have been from a trade delegation to his country from Israel or friendship with Jews from the Diaspora that settled in Meroe. However he received the Hebrew Scriptures, whatever the means of his awareness of the Hebrew God, this man was drawn by a desire to worship Him.

            Understand that a man like this, a man who held an important post in his government, would weigh very heavily a decision to change religious loyalties. The people of his nation believed their king to be a god, a most holy person. For the Minister of Finance to show allegiance to another god would have brought suspicion of treason and sedition. For the eunuch, though, the desire to find and worship the Hebrew God was overwhelming. God’s Spirit was drawing him and thus he is led to plan a trip to Jerusalem, to seek this God in His Temple.  

            Upon his arrival at the Temple, though, he found that he could only enter the outer courtyard, the Court of the Gentiles. Not just because he was non-Jewish, an Ethiopian, but also because he had been castrated. While he could interact with people on the area considered non-holy ground, he could not enter the inner areas, the Temple proper.

            He wanted to worship God, was being drawn to worship God, but his worship was incomplete. There existed a barrier, erected to keep people like him away. He thought that by going to a certain location, he would find answers, but the questions remained. Frustrated, he began the journey home where he fortuitously meets Philip.

            The Holy Spirit has instructed Philip to make contact with the Ethiopian and he does so. Running alongside the chariot, he hears the eunuch reading from Isaiah. In those days, it was customary to read aloud, not silently when one read to their self. Philip asks him a simple question: “Do you understand what you are reading?” The English translation does not do justice to the original Greek wording. Philip’s question really asks the eunuch if what he is reading has any meaning for him, if what he is reading makes any sense.

            The response is so telling! It is a response of frustration, discouragement and disappointment. “How can I, unless someone explains it to me?” Despite his apparent regalia and retinue, no one in Jerusalem had taken the time to answer his questions. No one helped quench his thirst for the knowledge of the One True God. He had a copy of the Scriptures, but could not understand what the words meant. He could read them, he was an educated man fluent in languages, but the meaning, the import, and the supernatural impact of the words eluded him.

            There is a reason why the Bible says that only those who are spiritual can understand spiritual things.[2] Until a person comes to submit their life to the Lord Jesus, the Bible depicts them as spiritually blind, unable to see or comprehend spiritual truths.[3] They need the Holy Spirit to open their spiritual eyes and illuminate their minds. Often, the Spirit uses believers, like Philip, in that process.

            The Ethiopian invites Philip up into his chariot and asks him a question about the passage he is reading. “Who is the prophet referring to?” Without being able to identify the subject talked about, a person cannot make a proper interpretation. Philip begins introducing the Ethiopian to Jesus through this passage. The Book of Isaiah was tailor-made for a person like this Ethiopian. It’s in Isaiah that many prophecies of Jesus’ birth and reign are found.[4] It’s in Isaiah where one finds promises to eunuchs of their inclusion in God’s Holy Temple[5] alongside other worshippers of God. Isaiah described God Himself, high and lifted up, as having compassion on people who have wandered away from the truth; who are like sheep.[6]

Philip begins with the passage the Ethiopian is wrestling with and uses it as a springboard to tell the story of Jesus, God’s Messiah. As Philip expounds the meaning of what the Ethiopian was reading God’s Spirit illuminates his mind. Now, he realizes how a person is to worship God. Now, he realizes that it’s not at a Temple made by human hands but through faith in Jesus Christ that a person comes to approach God. As they pass by some water, he interrupts Philip to ask, “Is there anything that hinders me from being baptized right now?” He understands; he wants to identify with Jesus Christ and he desires to proclaim his newfound faith.

            Water baptism was quite common in those days. In Judaism, it stood as a symbol for a Gentile’s repentance and conversion to Israel’s religion. In Christianity, it stands for each person’s repentance and as a symbol of his or her submission to Christ’s Lordship.

            Philip baptizes the Ethiopian, which shows us an important picture. Philip, an olive skinned man, baptizes the Ethiopian, a black man, into the fellowship of the church. Philip, a former adherent to Judaism, and the Ethiopian, a former adherent to the religion of Meroe, become equal in standing before Christ. In Christ, racial barriers, national barriers, cultural barriers fall. Each person finds themselves equal at the foot of the Cross.

            As Dinah found herself struggling with the meaning of Scripture so did the Ethiopian eunuch. Both of them left the unsatisfying religion of their youth to find true answers in a relationship with Jesus Christ. The Holy Spirit used believers to explain Scripture to them as He illuminated their minds and spiritually enlightened them. He continues to do so today. He continues to reach out and draw people into the knowledge of the truth. What a wonderful God we have, one who is willing and able to reach out to His creation.

[1] Acts 8:30-31

[2] 1 Corinthians 2:13-16

[3] 2 Corinthians 4:3-4

[4] Isaiah 7:14, 11:1-16

[5] Isaiah 56:3-8

[6] Isaiah 6:1-4, 53:6

A Heart Hungry To Worship part 4

/ taethne

The next chapter from the book A Heart Hungry To Worship (available on Amazon) – Dinah’s Story

Before there can be fullness there must
be emptiness.  Before God can fill us with Himself, we must first be emptied of ourselves.[1]

Chapter 3

Dinah’s Story

            The rapping sound on the door startled me. It was late in the evening and I wasn’t expecting company. I opened the door to find Dinah standing there, looking angry and confused. She asked if she could come in and ask some questions, so I invited her inside and we sat down in the living room. Dinah told me she just left a meeting with her church leaders, asking them to answer a couple of questions that I had given to her a couple of weeks earlier. She informed me that not only was she dissatisfied with the answers they gave her, but also that one question was answered with, “Well, technically, he is correct.”

            Dinah was facing a crossroads of faith. On one side was a belief system she had grown up with, embraced and taught to others that was now being challenged. On the other side were answers from Scripture that stood at odds with what she’d always believed. To change her mind meant admitting that she was wrong and that she had taught her family and other people wrong beliefs as well. This is why she showed up at my door, angry and confused.

            Dinah and I met some months earlier when she showed up at our church. Her daughter, in the military at the time, had joined a church affiliated with our denomination. Dinah took this as a personal affront, an abandonment of beliefs held by their family for generations. She came to our church seeking to know what we believed and how our beliefs differed from hers in the hopes of confronting her daughter and bringing her back to their denomination.

            What Dinah found was her own beliefs being confronted. I answered her questions about our beliefs on varying topics in return for her telling me what her church taught about them. I then suggested we take our church’s official statements of belief and compare them to Scripture and to each other. Where we found discrepancies, I asked her to go back to her leaders and seek understanding of why they believed as they did.

            For weeks, we met, going through doctrine after doctrine. Slowly, she came to an understanding that many of the beliefs she held did not match up to the clear teaching of the Bible. During one session with her leaders, Dinah told me that they said to her that their traditions held the same weight as Scripture. We then looked at verses in the Bible that addressed that issue as well. Dinah began to get frustrated with her leaders as answer after answer came back to “tradition” and not because their belief system was undergirded by God’s Word.

            Finally, there came the night when she appeared at my door. We both knew what it was costing her that night. Pride warred with truth. One of the big hurdles for her to overcome was the fact that by admitting the beliefs she had held for years were wrong, she was also admitting she had taught those wrong beliefs to her family and many others through her work for her denomination. The guilt she was feeling warred with her pride. I silently prayed that the Holy Spirit would cause her to understand the truth of Jesus’ statement, “Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”[2]

Sensing that she was close to making a major decision, I asked her to meet with me the following evening and bring her husband, Ted. A quiet man, Ted would sometimes accompany Dinah when we talked about beliefs and I wanted him to be there with her. While Ted had not participated in our discussions very often, I surmised from the comments that he did interject that he was also wrestling with the same doubts.

            The next evening, I sat down with the two of them and asked a simple, yet direct question. “Now that we have exhausted all your questions about doctrines and beliefs, what is keeping you from entering into a personal relationship with Jesus?” They replied, “Nothing.”

Dinah and Ted both gave their lives over to the Savior that night.

Dinah had read the Bible many times in her life. She never understood the meaning of the words she read until the Holy Spirit started illuminating them. She knew that the Bible contained truths. Her problem, like so many other people’s problem, was that she looked to human tradition instead of Scripture alone. When confronted with clear differences between the two, she realized she had a choice to make. Would she hold to her tradition out of stubborn pride, or would she yield to the teachings of God’s Word?

Dinah and Ted studied the Bible diligently from that night on. They began a spiritual journey that led both of them, in their sixties, to move to another community and help start a new church. Their hearts responded to God’s Word and they began to worship the Creator the way that He intended for them to worship Him. All they needed was for someone to explain to them the meaning of the Scriptures they were reading.

The Bible contains the story of a man who knew God’s Word held answers for his life, but who needed someone to explain their meaning to him. It is the story of the Ethiopian in the Book of Acts.

[1] A.W. Tozer, How to be Filled With the Spirit

[2] John 8:32

A Heart Hungry To Worship part 3

/ taethne

We continue with the next chapter from the book A Heart Hungry to Worship (available on Amazon).

Without worship, we go away miserable.[1]

Chapter 2

The Samaritan Woman

            The interaction between Jesus and the woman at the well in the New Testament book of John, chapter 4, is amazing. Its relevance to our modern world is worth looking at in detail. This woman is one who is desperately longing to worship God but she is confused as to what worshipping Him should be. The result is that she has given up trying to find God. Let us look at this encounter so we can discover how to relate to people searching for hope and truth in God.  

What a story! It is the story of a miserable woman going through the motions of an ordinary day. She was a failure at relationships – not so much in finding them, but at keeping them. She has been married and divorced five times, and is now with man number six. This shows us that having relationships is important to her. She does not want to be alone, and yet, we see that her choices in life have left her very lonely, indeed.

            She does not come to the well in the cool of the morning with the other women. I am sure that she cannot stand to hear the snide remarks and malicious gossip the other women directed at her. She would rather draw water up from a one hundred foot plus well by herself than be subjected to humiliation.

            Outcast, rejected in love, and with her self-esteem shot, she arrives at noon to retrieve her water. She is not alone like she had hoped. A stranger is there; worse, a Jewish one. Jews hated Samaritans. They called them half-breeds, false worshippers, and a people accursed by God. They charged the Samaritans with changing the sacred writings of Moses, intermarrying with pagans and setting up a rival place of worship. All true charges, by the way.

            This Jewish man politely asks her for a drink. Now she is wary. The only time men are polite to her are for illicit favors. “What does He really want from me? She decides to cut right to the chase. “Why are you, a Jew, asking anything from me?”

            Notice the reply of Jesus. It is really somewhat weird, especially to her. “If you only knew who I was you’d be asking me for living water.”

            She is not impressed with whoever this man, this Jew, thinks he is. Therefore, she decides to get rid of him by insulting him. She claims kinship with Jesus by appealing to “our father” Jacob. No Jew would stand for that. No Jew would even begin to admit they had a common ancestor, much less a revered one, with a Samaritan. Jesus should have stomped off in a huff leaving her alone, but he does not.

            Instead of leaving, he starts speaking gently to her and as he speaks, the Holy Spirit starts drawing her. As Jesus explains that his living water is eternal life, the Spirit illuminates her understanding. Her spiritual blindness begins to lift. Her yearning for eternal life explodes.

“Eternal life for me, God’s eternal love is for me? Is it really possible?”

            His words connect. She is so thirsty for real love. She is so hungry for a real relationship. Could God care for one like her? One who failed so many times? One who has failed so often? Eternal life, for her, did she hear that correctly?

            Oh, listen to her in verse 15. “Sir, give me this water, this eternal life, so I’ll never be thirsty again!”

            Do you hear the longing in her voice? She was just going through an ordinary day, one filled with the same misery and drudgery of countless days before and now hope is being offered to her. The hope of a lasting relationship with her Creator has been offered to her. Hope is a powerful thing. She has been given a hope that her future will be better than her past failures. In fact, hope in Jesus operates as both the evidence and proof that her sins are forgiven and her past no longer defines her. Nevertheless, she still needs to deal with one big issue in her life; is she willing to give up everything to receive this eternal life, this living water? How desperate is she?

            Jesus, knowing all about her, asks her a sharp, pointed request. “Go, get your husband, and come back.” The woman then reasons to herself, “Get my husband? I don’t have a husband. I’ve had five but none now. Why does he want to speak to him, anyway? I want to talk about eternal life, not about the part of me that I’ve failed at the most. Why is he changing the subject?”

            Jesus knew that this woman had been trusting in men, in relationships, for her security. He had to get her to admit that she was looking for security in the wrong places. She has a choice. She can change the painful subject he has brought up. She can also avoid it altogether and walk off. She could lie or she could tell the truth. The Holy Spirit continues to call her, to work on her heart. To her own surprise, she blurts out the truth to this stranger, “I have no husband.”

            Jesus reveals to her that he already knew the truth. He already knew her lifestyle and her life history. He knew all that and still offered her eternal life. Do you see how powerful that is? So many people think they have lived such a terrible life, that they have made too many wrong choices for God to desire a relationship with them. Nothing could be further from the truth. God, who knows and sees everything, offers eternal life, living water, to every person. Despite what we do, He still offers it to us.

            Now she is excited! He knew all that and still offered her this gift! He must be God’s prophet. What a wonderful day!  This is why a Jewish man is talking with her, a Samaritan woman. He must be on a mission from God with a message for their town. How fortunate for her that she was able to meet with him, privately.

            Now many people look at her next statement and assume that she is trying to change the subject. This is not the case. She desperately wants eternal life. She craves it. Her heart is hungry to worship God because it is responding to the work of the Spirit who is bringing it to life! Let me paraphrase her response.

            “You are God’s prophet! I see this now. You can tell me where to find God. You just said as much. Where do I go? To which group do I need to belong? What holy place is correct? What ritual must I perform? Please, sir, where do I go to find God? How do I get this eternal life?”

            Can you hear the desperation in her voice, the hope against hope springing up inside of her that she might possibly find a relationship with God after all these years? Do you hear it in the voices of those with whom you interact? People desperately want to believe that they can have a relationship with God but they’ve lost hope of actually finding one. Especially, when God’s people have been quick to judge and cast off as unclean those who have made major mistakes in life. If you listen closely, you can hear her words echoing through their voices.

            “Could it be true that I could be offered eternal life? With my lifestyle, my life history, are you seriously telling me that God is calling to me, wanting a personal relationship with me?”  Yes, I am; In fact, God loves you so much that He sent His only Son for you.

            “Where would I go to find this? To what church do I have to belong? What rituals do I have to perform? With all the different groups claiming to be the way to God, how will I ever determine the truth? Please, sir, where do I go to find God?”

            Jesus is so gentle with her. “Lady, the place is not important. God can be found anywhere. If you worship in spirit and in truth, the physical location is not important. The relationship with Him is important. He can be found right now, right here, through Me.”

            She is confused. She still does not quite grasp what he is saying to her. Hear the wistfulness in her voice as she makes the next statement.

            “When the Messiah, God’s Anointed One, comes, He will clear up the confusion. He will explain things to us. How I wish He were here.”

            Jesus says to her, “I am He.” The last blinders fall from her spiritual eyes. She sees and understands. She accepts what He says. How do we know this? She goes and gathers her neighbors to come and hear Him. Verse 41 says, many more believed. Many more than just this woman comes to believe in Jesus Christ and worship Him. Listen to their words in verse 42 – “We no longer believe just because of what you said; now we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this man really is the Savior of the world.”

 He is not just a teacher but also a Savior. He is more than just a prophet; He is a Savior. He is more than just a Jewish Messiah; He is the one and only Savior of the world.

            Notice in the story how she gets a crowd to come to Jesus. She goes and tells the townspeople, “come see a man who has told me everything I have ever done.” The men came to see if Jesus knew they had been involved with her sexually. The women came to hear if their husbands were among the adulterers named. The servants came to hear scandal and gossip. They whole town comes to hear Jesus speak; they are so impressed that they ask Him to stay for two days. It is after spending time with Jesus that the Bible says that many of them believed.

            Their hearts were hungry for worship because the Holy Spirit was already working in them, drawing them to Himself. There are people in every town of every country whose hearts are hungry for worship because the Spirit is calling them. They long to worship God, they long to enter into a personal relationship with Him but they simply do not know where to start. That is our job. Those of us who are in a relationship with God are the ones qualified to explain to those desiring a relationship with God how they can have a relationship with Him through Jesus Christ.

            We need to be quite clear that this relationship does not depend on which church or to which denomination one belongs. We need to be quite clear that it doesn’t depend on a ritual or one’s moral, ethical or religious performance. Jesus explained that a relationship with God is based on worshipping in spirit and in truth.  Before we explore that statement in more detail, I want to introduce you to Dinah.

[1] A.W.Tozer, Worship: The Missing Jewel of the Evangelical Church

A Heart Hungry To Worship Part 2

/ taethne

Years ago I published a book, A Heart Hungry to Worship, (available on Amazon) that focused on relating the stories of Biblical characters to people I have encountered in my ministry. For 2024 I would like to upload a chapter at a time to encourage people. Below is the first chapter from the book. Yet, if he would, man cannot live all to this world. If not religious, he will be superstitious. If he worships not the true God, he will have his idols.[1]

Chapter 1

Sheila and Maggie’s Stories

            Sheila is a creative, vibrant woman in her mid-twenties who is the new owner of her own art gallery. Response in the first few months has been better than expected, but her expectations were not high to begin with.

Sheila is grateful for a chance to start her life over, given that she almost ruined it during her high school years. Known as a wild party girl, Sheila led a life filled with alcohol, drugs and numerous boyfriends. Finding herself pregnant after graduation shocked her. She got an abortion before anyone knew she was pregnant. To her surprise, the experience was not as easy or painless as she believed it would be. The scarring caused by the procedure rendered her incapable of bearing children; nightmares still haunt her sleep two or three times each week.

Her parents are distant. Her mother is an alcoholic, wrapped up in her own miseries, while her father, disgusted by her behavior in high school, has pretty much disowned her. Sheila knows her lifestyle has to change, but the pull of friends who still view her as the party girl is strong. So is facing the continual scrutiny and gossip in her small town.

For the first time in her life, Sheila is contemplating spiritual things. She tried reading an old family Bible a few times, but she could not understand the Victorian-era English. Twice she even tried attending church. Since she had no idea what any of them believed, she tried the large church downtown first. Sheila reasoned that she would be anonymous in a large crowd.

She came away disappointed. She felt as if she had stepped into a cold marble vault. Everything was very solemn and the service was spoken in a foreign language. She did not know when to stand, sit, or when to respond. She could see that for many people it was a meaningful experience, but for her it was just confusing.

The next week she chose a nearby church that had a more modern feel about it. The atmosphere in this church was different: vibrant and alive. While the songs were unfamiliar, at least they were upbeat and the people singing them seemed happy. Then, unexpectedly, multiple people started talking loudly in what sounded to her like multiple languages.  When it reached a crescendo, Sheila was out the door, shaken and confused. Maybe a person had to learn another language to be a Christian. If that was the case, she was out of luck. The one semester of French she took in high school had been a spectacular failure.

It will be awhile before Sheila ventures to church again. Maybe, if she could go with someone who could explain what was going on, she would try. Which church would accept someone with her past, though? The people at the churches she visited already looked like they had their lives together.

Sheila feels guilty about her abortion and believes God will punish her for it. While she longs to know Him, she is deathly afraid of meeting Him because of her past actions. She has reached the point where something has to change in her life. She wonders, “Is there any hope for a person like me? Is there any way to bury the demons from my past that haunt me?”

Sheila has one last straw to which she is clinging. She has a Christian friend that has been supportive and willing to listen to her pour out her heart during late night phone calls. She has kept him at a distance because of her fear of being too vulnerable. He has offered to take her to his church sometime or even hold a Bible study with her.

Maybe, just maybe, Sheila thinks, she will be able to find answers to her questions. While she is not yet ready to visit another church, she is willing to study the Bible with someone who knows and accepts her as a person. Perhaps there is hope for someone like her. There needs to be because she does not think she can face fifty more years like her first twenty-five.

Maggie has just turned forty. A hard working single mother, Maggie has struggled with finding meaningful relationships all of her life. Maggie experienced sexual abuse, as did her older sister, by a distant relative. As is all too often in small communities, where just about everyone is somehow related, very few believed her story and those who did wanted this dirty secret covered up so as not to bring scandal or embarrassment to the family.

            Maggie married young and had two children with a man who turned out to have a problem with drugs. Not wanting to have her children raised around a drug addict, it was not long before she filed for divorce.  After their divorce, she married again, this time to a person who promised her the world but who crushed her spirit by cheating on her. After moving, with three children, to a new town in order to start over, she attempted marriage number three. This marriage started fine but quickly soured due to the suspicious and jealous nature of her husband. Verbal and emotional abuse took its toll and this marriage collapsed after only a few years.

            Maggie vowed not to marry again. She threw herself into her work and her children’s lives. After the oldest two graduated high school, she began to think about herself. She felt she deserved love but was scared and hesitant to make herself vulnerable again.

When an old boyfriend from high school came back into her life, she wondered if he was the love she had been looking for all along.

            The first month flew by. So much for taking it slow, she was falling head over heels in love. He seemed to care about her and her children. He was attentive and caring. Then he got drunk and physically abusive one night and her world shattered, again. “Never again!” she vowed, would she allow herself to open up to anyone who would hurt her. Deep down, though, Maggie still desired to be loved and to love back. Her fear is that her desire for love will open herself up to hurt again.

            Maggie has one philosophy that she believes in: “Everything happens for a reason.” She just cannot grasp the reason behind what has happened to her. “Why was I abused?” ” Why has every marriage failed?” “Why have all my relationships fallen apart when I try so hard?” “When will I ever find love?”

            Maggie thinks of God from time to time. She believes in God, at least the little she has heard about Him. She has only been to church a few times in her life, mostly for funerals. What she believes about God is that He is a person worth knowing, someone who is perfect and holy and who expects His followers to be that way. She doesn’t feel she would qualify to be a follower because of her past failures. She doesn’t believe that God would want anything to do with her. Maggie lives without hope and truly believes she will spend life after death in hell; “After all,” she thinks, “It cannot be much worse than the life I am living now.”

            Deep down she would like a relationship she can count on, but she is so terrified of being disappointed again that she is not even willing to give God a chance to initiate one with her.

            Maggie and Sheila’s stories are not unique. In fact, their stories are of people I know and work with who have had similar life experiences. I count them as my friends but I have yet to penetrate the shields they have erected around their lives.

            I long to offer them the hope they so desperately need but are afraid to accept. We talk often, especially when crisis happens in their life. They know they need help beyond that which humans can offer, but they are not ready to ask God. Their reasoning is simple: “God is my only hope and if He lets me down, I truly have nothing and no one left.”

            The Bible contains the story of a person just like Maggie and Sheila. With a past that haunts her, this woman finds herself constantly entering one failed relationship after another. A woman who is desperate to find love, who wants to believe that God can love her, but who struggles to make sense of the world she finds herself in. Let us look at her story.

[1] Theodore Parker, The Transient and the Permanent

A Heart Hungry To Worship

/ taethne

Years ago I published a book, A Heart Hungry to Worship, (available on Amazon) that focused on relating the stories of Biblical characters to people I have encountered in my ministry. For 2024 I would like to upload a chapter at a time to encourage people. Below is the introduction from the book.

 It is in the process of being worshipped that God communicates His presence to men.[1]

Introduction

            God created each of us with an innate desire to worship Him. You would think, then, that it should come naturally to us. Yet millions have no knowledge of who God is, so worshipping Him is impossible. Millions more are confused as to how to find Him or how to approach Him when He is found. Still others are convinced that even if they met God He would not accept worship from them. They feel so unworthy they cannot believe He would want any kind of relationship with them.

You will meet some of these people in this book. These are people like you and I, struggling to make sense of this world, convinced there is something more than what we are experiencing. People hoping against hope that someday they will have a relationship with a God they desperately want to love them, a God they crave to worship. People like Maggie, Sheila, Dinah and Renaldo who could be your neighbor, co-worker or cousin; people who long for the closeness that salvation by grace brings.

            One of the neat things about the Bible is that it contains true stories of people like this – like us! People who are desperately seeking to be found by God but do not know where to start. They are people like the Ethiopian eunuch in the book of Acts or the Samaritan woman in John’s gospel. They are people who have a desire to worship God but are confused how that worship comes about.

            I tell their stories in the pages ahead. Stories about those who God is drawing into a relationship they desire but are scared to enter. Those who the Holy Spirit has begun drawing but have not quite arrived. Those whose hearts are hungry to worship the One True Living God.

[1] C.S. Lewis, Reflections on the Psalms

God Rest Ye Merry, Gentlemen

/ taethne

God rest ye merry, gentlemen – a timely Christmas carol for 2020. The phrase “God rest ye merry” was a common greeting in the 15th and 16th centuries, roughly meaning “May God fill you with joy”. How? How are we to be filled with joy in such a time as ours?

2020 has devastated almost everyone I know – friends, family, co-workers, fellow business owners. The year that started with such dreams, hopes and promises has long since crashed and burned. Many have lost loved ones, not just to the virus but to depression and despair. Many have seen their livelihoods ripped away by draconian regulations. Others have seen dreams postponed, put away or simply crushed by this dystopian age we are living in. How can we have joy?

Because in the darkness there has shone a great light. That is a common motif in the Bible. The world is presented as dark and disturbed, a place where the wicked flourish and the righteous struggle against overwhelming odds. The whole Christmas story is set against this background. The Savior is sent into the world to set captives free, to shine a great light and banish darkness, to lift up the fallen, bruised and weary. We can rest merry because we remember that into this world Christ our Savior has come to save us all from Satan’s power. That is tidings of comfort and joy. We have not been left alone, helpless against the darkness. We have hope in Jesus Christ.

In the song “o Holy Night” there is this line – “a thrill of hope, the weary world rejoices for yonder breaks a new and glorious morn”. Now, perhaps, there is no better time to dust off the old carols and pay attention to the lyrics. Hope, joy, promises of peace to those who trust in Jesus – this is what Christmas is about. Into a crazy, mixed up, wreck of a world we can still find hope. We can still rest merry because our Savior reigns and will come again.

His first coming brings us assurance of His second. The world may rage and the devil howl but I can rest in the promises of Him who is faithful. I may not be able to see the light. The darkness may be too pervasive, I might be too far down into a pit of despair but the light is still there. Behind the clouds lies the sun – this I know to be true and this is clung to. “In this world you will have tribulation”, Jesus told us, “But take heart for I have overcome the world.” (John 16:33)

As 2020 comes to an end, 2021 doesn’t offer much hope that things will be much better. Thank God He offers that hope. It is time for us to explore once more how to find our joy in Him, to reconnect with He who made us for Himself, and to rest in Him. May God rest ye merry, gentlemen.

God rest ye merry gentlemen
Let nothing you dismay
Remember Christ our Savior
Was born on Christmas Day
To save us all from Satan’s pow’r
When we were gone astray
Oh tidings of comfort and joy
Comfort and joy
Oh tidings of comfort and joy

In Bethlehem, in Israel
This blessed Babe was born
And laid within a manger
Upon this blessed morn
The which His Mother Mary
Did nothing take in scorn
Oh tidings of comfort and joy
Comfort and joy
Oh tidings of comfort and joy

Fear not then, said the Angel
Let nothing you affright
This day is born a Savior
Of a pure Virgin bright
To free all those who trust in Him
From Satan’s pow’r and might
Oh tidings of comfort and joy
Comfort and joy
Oh tidings of comfort and joy

God rest ye merry gentlemen
Let nothing you dismay
Remember Christ our Savior
Was born on Christmas Day
To save us all from Satan’s pow’r
When we were gone astray
Oh tidings of comfort and joy
Comfort and joy
Oh tidings of comfort and joy

Gentle Mary – A Timeless Carol

/ taethne

This beautiful song was written by Joseph Cook in 1919.  Mr. Cook was born in England in 1859 but immigrated to Canada where he attended Wesleyan College and McGill University in Montreal.

The lyrics show a progression from wondering if this baby, born to peasants in humble surroundings could really be the Savior of mankind. The answer – just ask those transformed by Him.  Surely the people of Jesus’ day asked this question too. How could a baby in a manger have more power than King Herod, who ruled from nearby palaces and fortresses?

Yet in his humility, Jesus did have more power than Herod. In today’s culture, where the rich are admired and superstars are praised, Jesus is still the humble King who really deserves our adoration. No longer a stranger to the world, people from every nation and ethnic group on earth rejoice at Christmas, singing – “Praise His Name in all the earth, hail the King of glory!”

 Gentle Mary laid her Child
Lowly in a manger;
There He lay, the undefiled,
To the world a stranger:
Such a Babe in such a place,
Can He be the Savior?
Ask the saved of all the race
Who have found His favor.

Angels sang about His birth;
Wise men sought and found Him;
Heaven’s star shone brightly forth,
Glory all around Him:
Shepherds saw the wondrous sight,
Heard the angels singing;
All the plains were lit that night,
All the hills were ringing.

 Gentle Mary laid her Child
Lowly in a manger;
He is still the undefiled,
But no more a stranger:
Son of God, of humble birth,
Beautiful the story;
Praise His name in all the earth,
Hail the King of glory!