More of What Matters, Please.

I want to be less like an American Christian and more like just about any other country's definition of a Christian. Here's what I mean. I spent the week with pastors and missionaries from the US and around the world. I heard stories of people so desperate to hear about Jesus that they walk hours one way to sit on the ground in tiny, overheated, completely inadequate structures just to hear the message. People who risk punishment and financial ruin, who defy their family members and their government, all to know and live for Jesus. I heard about Bible students who are so eager to carry the gospel to others that they travel 9 hours by bike each weekend to minister, and then travel 9 hours back to school when they are done (Cambodia). I heard that one of our Assembly of God pastors from northern Nigeria was beaten and burned to death this last week for his faith.

 

(Just let that sink in for a moment...)

Lord, forgive me for every time I've ever complained about anything in the church that has nothing to do with you and the good news of your gospel. Forgive me for my petty complaints about the sound or the songs, the decor or the length of the service. Forgive us for complaining about the lack of people there who are just like us or that little lyric or bit of the sermon that we just didn't like. Forgive us for being offended by anything and everything. Forgive me. Forgive us. Because not a bit of it matters. 

 

Instead make us like the new believer who can't get enough of you, like the Bible student who'll go any distance for you and like the pastor who gave it all for you!

So this probably isn't a good week for me to be within earshot of anyone saying that there should be more or fewer guitars/drums/keys in our time of worship. I don't want to hear that our leaders should be younger/older/more perfectly middle aged or, heaven help me, that they should dress in any particular style. Or whatever. Because I might just throw up. Because not a bit of it matters! 

And if it does matter to me or to you then we have a heart problem that we need to ask Jesus to help us with. And he will. He'll remind us of what actually matters to him. And we'll be broken again for those who haven't had the chance to hear his name once. Not even once! And we'll be motivated to pray and to give and to go. We'll know just what we need to do, to say and to pray because he'll tell us what actually matters to him.