Where has worship gone?

[DeanZF]

Good words here!!



We had something spoken on Wednesday evening past that fits here, too. It was a marvelous bit of wisdom brought by a man who himself had received it from someone else who had received it when he was in deep need.



Figure out when the last time you were in one of those maddening situations where you were just stuck spiritually speaking. Nothing felt right, nothing tasted good, everything was uncomfortable and if there was a path for God that you were supposed to be on, you surely could not see it. Been there? Me, too. The speaker shared that he had been there and someone gave him a wonderful bit of wisdom. Simple enough, maddeningly simple, actually. Go back to the last time you knew that you knew what it was that you were to be about and do that!



Pastors who get so scattered doing all the good things that need to be done. Artistic folks and others who can do a great many things and who also end up doing too many of the good things that they can do instead of the very specific things that God called them to be doing. "I'm spread sooooooooo thin." "There just don't seem to be enough hours in the day."



Not blaming here, hopefully just identifying. Yes, there are seldom enough hands in small to medium churches to get all the things done that could/should be done, but what would happen if we could somehow give up some of the good things so we could concentrate our efforts and be more intentional about the God things?



This is not a new message. As I type it, I can hear several sermons from my mental collection of the last 30+ years. I can hear it from my own lips to a certain clown friend, and I can hear it echoed back at me years before or years later from that same clown friend! Ah, the late night coffee times with the deep and amazing discussions of what and how the Lord was doing in our lives and in those around us and how we could cooperate with that.



Our pastor has been hammering on the letters of the Revelation. He spent many weeks there when he was planning on spending perhaps two. I feel as though he spent at least a month pounding one particular nail with several names. It had to do with luke warm, loss of first love, and things like that. Did we actually LOSE that first love or did we let it get diluted with all the stuff that can come along with it?



And we heard yet another sermon on the burning bush. His point was that Moses saw the bush, paused, considered the bush, and TURNED ASIDE. He did not keep on going, he did not turn AWAY. He stopped and paid attention to something that was important enough to get his attention. THEN God spoke to him! ONLY after he stopped and considered. BOOM, right between the eyes. Yes, Lord...



I think that some in our local circle are about to make a covenant to do something about the situation and see if we cannot collectively step back a little, find out where it was that we really did recognize His voice, drive a stake, and try to be about Father's business as He called us to be. We'll keep you posted!