...A lot of Stuff For a Sunday...
Yesterday was a thinking day for me...The past few Sunday mornings, the street in front of my house has been blocked off. It was a little annoying at first because people who were driving would have to find detours. Sometimes they would make their way onto the sidewalks in order to get around the barriers placed on the street. Motor cyclists decided to make the sidewalk their new road. At the major intersection of my street and another well traveled road, people were posted to make sure that no one could bypass the blockade. At the intersection, we saw a sign that said, "Making Zapopan a Better Place to Live" (in Spanish of course). At first we thought that our street must be under heavy construction, but there was no crew to be see. Why would they go to so much trouble? Then we saw all of the bicyclists waiting for the red light so they could cross to the other side of the street. We then decided that it must be some sort of race...but they didn't seem to be in any sort of hurry. We then noticed the children and the smaller print on the sign that said, "Preserving the Family." They had blocked off the street so that families could spend a few hours riding bikes together. Some people did not have bikes, but had decided to walk along the route anyway. Many motorists found this to be incredibly frustrating, and let the people posted at the intersection and bicyclists know it by blaring their horns. In my opinion importance of this weekly event greatly out weighed the inconvenience. (I don't have a car here anyway...and I'm in no hurry Sunday mornings considering that my church starts about a half hour past the official starting time of 11:00a.m. Even so, I felt that my opinion mattered.)
Family needs to be on the top of our priority list, after God. That's the way it was designed to be. Having a relationship with family may be inconvenient for others... and might even take a few extra hours of your day that you don't feel you have. It's so important to have guards in place because, like the cars...things (probably important things) will try to interfere or at the very least distract from creating and maintaining a meaningful relationship with the people that God has placed closest to your heart. Obviously this doesn't just apply to our biological families... but to our Christian family as well.
When I got to church, I wondered what the sermon was going to be about, and prayed silently that I would be able to get something out of it. Thankfully, the power point was working, so I stopped worrying because I knew I would at least catch the main points. I then began to ponder if I had prepared my heart to hear what God had for me in the service....
At that point it hit me, I had been looking at things all wrong. I don't have to go to church to meet with God. (It's not that I didn't know that before yesterday, I just realized I haven't been putting what I know into practice very well.) I feel God's presence at church during the worship time or feel that a message can be applied to my life, because I go knowing that He is there. I think a lot of times, I forget that I don't "meet" God at the church. He rides with me on the bus to get there. In fact, while I sleep He watches over me through the night. The moment I open my eyes, He's already there. It's not even that I have to do anything special to "meet with Him"...He's inside of me, and all around me. I take that for granted so often. I expect to be close to Him during devotions, church, ministry events... but when I'm doing homework and have three exams to take within two days... it's a different story. I don't go into that situation expecting to hear from Him, or even acknowledging that He wants to go through it with me. I almost compartmentalize my life... but God doesn't pick and choose where to show up. I just have been picking and choosing when to realize His omnipresence.
I guess that's because it's easy for me to be service oriented and miss the intimacy of relationship... for a lot of reasons. God has been revealing to me how desperately He wants my heart, not just my service.
Matthew 7:22-23 is a good example of that.
"Many will say to me on that day, 'Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and in your name drive out demons and perform many miracles?' Then I will tell them plainly, 'I never knew you."
God doesn't define a relationship as doing, doing, doing... but as intimacy with Him. (Martha and Mary is a pretty standard illustration for that point.) Honestly, I don't have quiet times, or go to church, or do ministry enough to only be tuned into God during those times. I often give and settle for so little in my relationship with God. Here's part of Psalms 63. (My mom has a beautiful song based on this Psalm.)
Psalms 63
1 O God, you are my God,
earnestly I seek you;
my soul thirsts for you,
my body longs for you,
in a dry and weary land
where there is no water.
2 I have seen you in the sanctuary
and beheld your power and your glory.
3 Because your love is better than life,
my lips will glorify you.
4 I will praise you as long as I live,
and in your name I will lift up my hands.
5 My soul will be satisfied as with the richest of foods;
with singing lips my mouth will praise you.
6 On my bed I remember you;
I think of you through the watches of the night.
7 Because you are my help,
I sing in the shadow of your wings.
8 My soul clings to you;
your right hand upholds me.
When I took the time to really read this, I was blown away... to David, God was more than food, water, sleep...even life! That's the passionate intensity that God wants me to have for Him in our relationship. Hmmm...
So I know that's not a very good ending to that section...but I'm going to have to continue pondering that... and conclude it another time. All of this transpired over the course of about ten minutes...so I was glad that the pastor had his main points on the power point... because I would have missed that portion of the sermon if he didn't.
After the service Kayla, Tina, and I went to lunch with Jacob and Daniel...some friends from church. We ate in a retro school bus that had been placed on the second floor of the restaurant. It was a fun experience...and I was "muy mexicana" because I put a ton of chile sauce on my torta ahogada. That's pretty much the only thing that they could say is "muy mexicana" about me...because my Spanish is most definitely "muy gringa." Although... it's nice to see how much I've progressed since I first arrived in January.
*Pictured from left to right is Daniel (F.L.), Tina (B.L.), Jacob (R.F.), and me. Kayla was taking the and so her beautiful face is not shown here.
posted by jessika @ 10:14 AM
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