Which god/God will you choose to follow?
Today, so far, is a cloudy warm day. I’m sitting under a Church in Iquitos, Peru: Iglesia Berea. The people in this church don’t come to this building because it has nice floors, or because it’s a beautiful building, or because the music is awesome. No, they come here because God meets with them here. They come because they know that they are welcomed. They come because they are yearning to learn about Jesus. I’m amazed at these Peruvians hearts. When it rains here, it pours. The only way to get to the church is to walk. The mud is everywhere and it gets all over you when you walk through it. But these Peruvians are here for every service. They want to learn. They want to sing to the Lord. I think there is a huge difference between this church and the churches back home in the sates. Back home, we find churches with no excitement about their walks with the Lord, and why would we expect more than that? Everything is so easy for us in the sates. Most Americans have access to all the biblical material, all the churches, all the transportation… you name it we have access to it. It’s almost like there is no more mystery to who God is in the USA. We have created a god that we understand… we have created a god whose facets have all been discovered. If you want to know the answer to any question regarding that god you can go to any local bookstore and you will have a book on that very topic. Is that who God is? A god who has no mystery? A god who is easily understood? A god who can be explained through the knowledge of man? Don’t get me wrong, there is a ton of good Christian books out there in the world that are beneficial to read and apply to your life, but I just wonder if one of the reasons the walks of these Peruvians is so much richer is because they have discovered God through their own searching of the Scripture, and through their personal time of talking to the Lord and communing with him. They don’t rely on a spiritual book to tell them who God is. They know God for themselves. They know God through his word and through their experience with the Lord. No wonder their walks with the Lord are so much more personal and richer and sweeter. I think that too much information can be a bad thing sometimes. We look to our own man based understandings of who God is rather than asking God who he is and asking him to show us who he is. I know that there are churches in the states that are asking these questions and being filled with the truth of who God is. I also know that there are churches here in Peru who aren’t asking these questions. I’m not saying that churches in Peru are more spiritual than those in America or visa versa. I’m just speaking truth of what my eyes have seen in my 22 years of living. Who doesn’t want a richer, more real, sweeter, loving relationship with the Lord? I know that I want that! I’m tired of believing in a god that man has made boring, that man has solved all the questions about. Part of the draw to God is that he is mysterious. People are drawn to him because he is not so easily figured out. And when we come to him he is gracious to show us parts of who he is, but he still leaves us in mystery about different facets of himself. People can’t help but be drawn to him. The wonderful thing about God is that once you meet him, once you taste of his goodness, once you get a true glimpse of who he is, you can’t help but long to know more and more about him. Maybe the question to ask about these churches that have lost their excitement for the Lord is who or what god/God are you serving? A god that man created, a god that you have learned through man alone? Or THE GOD? The God who has revealed himself all over scripture, the God who has revealed himself in his creation, the God who hears when you cry out to him, the God who is longing to save you from you sin and the punishment of sin? That’s the God I want to serve. The one who meets with me daily and who has a relationship with me.
Which god/God will you choose to follow?
