Mission and Worship

Last night we met with our community group (other churches call them small groups, life groups, city groups, etc.)  The night’s discussion turned to mission.  Our church has been pushing mission for the past few months now, bringing in guest speakers and our own pastors preaching on the message of mission.  Mission is key in bringing the gospel of Jesus to those that have never heard it proclaimed before.  I love mission; its what Jesus told us to do and we should follow his teachings.  The book of Acts is full of mission and it is beautiful to see what the apostles went through to spread the gospel.

Something I have noticed about the early church in Acts is that no matter what happened - arrests, death, snakes - the apostles continued to teach, preach, and WORSHIP.  It was Tim Hughes who once wrote that “Worship without mission is self-indulgent. Mission without worship is self-defeating.”  I would like to extend that and say that you cannot be on mission without experiencing worship first.  If you do not praise the greatness of Jesus Christ and what He can do, your mission is worthless.  To me mission without worship is nothing more than help for the needy, and does not glorify God in the highest at all times.

I feel you cannot glorify God without worshiping Him first.  You must have an encounter with God, and be filled with his Holy presence before even considering mission.  You must understand the gospel of Jesus, and embrace it as law before even moving forward to help those in need of the gospel.  Without worship, your works are selfish and there is NO way you can win others to Christ without picking up your cross and bearing witness to Him. Worship teaches us that.  Worship to God equips us for mission.  How do you know if you are ready for mission?  The only way you will know is to be filled with the Holy Spirit, and that is accomplished through much prayer and worship.

Let’s flip around and focus on what Tim Hughes said about worship without mission.  This is true and evident in our Christian culture.  When we only worship and praise the Lord, and we try to keep God for ourselves and away from others, we are not acting on mission.  American Christians do that. We get wrapped up in our world and forget Jesus as soon as the doors open when church lets out. When we are told "we are sent" it means that we MUST take our worship out of ourselves and pour it into the world. This Earth needs our worship, it craves it.

Let us not be afraid to use Jesus when on mission. He should be first and foremost when on mission. And finally, let us be on mission all the time and use our worship to fuel the mission, and vice versa.

Verses to chew on:
We've been sent - Matthew 28:16-20
We are called to mission - Mark 12:28-31
We are called to worship - John 4:16-26

Christ Following Friends

Tonight was a great night. We have been feeling lost and convicted over the last few weeks and we invited some friends to dinner tonight. We ate and worshiped together and talked about our convictions. We got such words of encouragement and guidance from them and it helped put into perspective the things we have been feeling. I am happy to have friends like this whom we can call and say lets eat and fellowship together for an evening.

For those whom feel convicted or don't understand what they are feeling, go to Christian friends and talk. Don't sit and wait for answers. Sometimes the answers you seek, your friends have for you. God works in mysterious ways and the answers seeked are sometimes right in front of us, we just have to open our eyes to see and open our ears to hear.

Blog Terms

In the world of blogging, it is easy to offend.  We have read many blog posts where either the blogger offends someone, or the replies offend the blogger, or everyone gets offended.  Jennifer and I feel that this blog will be no different.  We believe what will offend people more will be our faith alone.  Non-believers will find our posts foolish (1 Cor 1:18) and sometimes offensive. Jennifer and I love Christ first and foremost, before anyone or anything else, and what may be written will hopefully be blessed by God.

So, we have made a decision to lay out some ground rules for this blog to keep the offenses at a minimum.  If anyone has ever installed any program on their computer, they know that through all the crazy menus asking all sorts of information there is always a Terms of Use or Agreement to use the software.  Jennifer and I are reversing these terms, so to speak, as our terms of use will be to you the reader.  These are our solemn promises to the reader, and any of these promises broken by us will result in a quick apology.

1. We will not use any names in our blog posts, not even made up names.  We cannot guarantee what we post is not about the people in our lives, but we will never use names.
2. We cannot guarantee that we will not offend (Jesus offended many, the offended were the Pharisees) but we will never use offensive or hurtful language.
3. We pray that what we write will be from God’s grace.  Our goal is to pray, write, pray, before posting.  We pray that there is no room for the enemy at this spot on the Internet.

We ask of you, the reader, the following:

1. Please keep an open mind and open heart when reading.  Please think and pray about what you may say before replying.  Make sure your replies are meant to be open for discussion.  Any angry or hateful replies will result in your post being lovingly removed.
2. Please do not use offensive language or hurtful critiques.  Any offending language will result in your post being lovingly removed.
3. Please show love to everyone.  Any hate towards others will result in you being lovingly removed.

“Dear Lord, we give thanks that you have given Jennifer and I the abilities to observe and write about who you are and show people what you are doing in our lives.  We pray that our walk with you can be seen to all those around us, and will be used as a blessing and encouragement for those around us, and that the Holy Spirit uses us to build up His church.  Please give Jennifer and I a mind that is clear for your word and direction.  Please guide us in steadfastness when composing words for this blog.  Please continue to use us oh Lord, for your honor and glory.  It is in His glorious name we pray, Amen!”

All glory and praise be to our Lord God Almighty!

We're Live!

Our blog is now live for action!  Looks like all the bugs and kinks are worked out and Twitter and Facebook posts are working.  You all can use your favorite reader to keep up on our blog at http://sthjlh.blogspot.com (I'm a fan of Google Reader myself).  Let's glorify Christ together!

New

Starting a Blog on our Daily Walk with Christ. To some these will be silly to others they will mean something. I hope that it will touch you in one way or another. You can comment on our blogs as we go along if you feel a need to. This is the first one, more as a test to begin the process.