Searching for Him

This is the most powerful story in the world. I love, and yet hate, reading it. I love it and hate it for almost the same reason. I love what Jesus did for me. I hate the fact that it was necessary.

All of us are sinners. Not a single one of us can say we have never done wrong in our lives. It is true that to us, some sins seems worse than others. We, as humans, certainly feel that killing another person is worse than telling our mother we can’t talk on the phone right now because someone is at the door when no one is actually there, for instance. In God’s eyes, however, even a little white lie deserves the death penalty. But, He is a merciful God, and He is a loving God, and He does not want us to suffer that fate. He sent His only Son, Jesus, to earth to teach us, and to pay the price for our ugliness. This fate was not fair to Jesus. He died a horrible death for me and for you. He was tortured and humiliated, and His friends deserted Him. He did not have to do this. He was innocent. But He did it anyway, and all God asks of us is that we accept His gift, that we acknowledge the truth, and that we decide to love Him and follow Him.

I accepted Christ when I was 16. I guess I was old enough then to realize that I was a sinner, but I was also young enough that I didn’t understand the price I would need to pay to be a follower. I made a lot of bad decisions as a teenager, both before and after I accepted Christ. I’ve made some bad decisions as an adult too. I have finally gotten to the point now where I am willing to take a deeper look into myself and see what I need to fix in my life to be closer to what God wants me to be. That’s what I am trying to do as I read my Bible and write this blog. I have not been keeping this blog for long now, but I do feel it has changed my outlook on things in my life. I don’t feel as hopeless about things anymore. For a while there, I think I was in a rut, and I wanted out, and I know God wanted me to get out of it too! He led me to start this blog, and I am sorry to say I have not been as faithful about it as I intended to be in the beginning. I hope He understands.

I really feel sorry for Peter and Judas. I know it sounds weird to feel bad for Judas since He betrayed Jesus. I really identify with both of them in this story. I identify with Judas because I betray Jesus every time I commit a sin, no matter how small it may be. Every time I do something against what God would have me do, I am giving those religious leaders in Jerusalem a reason to kill Him. It’s a depressing and self-depreciating thought, but it is a true one. I identify with Peter too because he denies knowing Jesus three times, as Jesus predicted, because he was afraid the people around him would realize he was one of the disciples and kill him too. I have been around people many times who weren’t Christians and maybe I didn’t flat out deny that I knew Christ, but I certainly didn’t speak up for my God. I’m really not the type to go around preaching the gospel to any and all who can hear it. I guess it just isn’t my calling to do that. In fact, I haven’t to this day told a single person other than my husband that I am writing this blog. That is how much of a preacher I am not! I hope I’ll have the courage soon to send a link to someone I know and have him or her check it out, but I’m not ready yet. Hopefully, God will give me this courage at some point. I’ll do it when He leads me to do it, but not a moment before.

I have not had too many readers of my blog yet, unfortuately, but I am praying that whoever chooses to read it enjoys it and finds a little inspiration for his or her own life in it. It has really helped me rediscover my relationship with God, and I hope it will inspire someone else out there to commit to reading the Bible and praying daily as well. Know that whoever you are, I am praying for you, and I hope you will take some time from your busy life to pray for me as well.

I have always considered myself to be an extremely nice person. I am almost always courteous to others, to the point where I almost feel like I am a doormat sometimes. I try to treat everyone with respect, even when it is someone that does not respect me. It probably sounds like I am bragging about this, but in truth, I sometimes hate this about myself. I wish I had more of a backbone sometimes. There have been many cases in my life where people I know and even complete strangers take advantage of me because of how “nice” I am. I have to admit, my actions are nice, but I don’t always do the kind things I do with a kind heart. I often do something nice for someone, and then directly afterward, I am cursing them under my breath for not saying thank you or smiling at me or anything to show appreciation. Most of the time though, I simply do what is right or kind because it is the right and kind thing to do.

My reading today focused on Jesus returning after the resurrection (chapter 24) and then three parables about being prepared for his return (chapter 25). The signs Jesus speaks about that will signal His second coming sound really dark and scary to me. All this talk about false prophets appearing and trying to lead everyone astray sounds so frightening. It is easy to read Jesus’s words and understand why you so often hear people predicting the end of the world and His return. The events Jesus speaks of in this chapter sure sound a lot like our world today. Many of us have turned our backs on God and are more concerned with selfish pursuits than working to advance His kingdom, and I believe there are many out there right now who are preaching falsely and leading others away from God’s truth. It plainly says in the Bible, however, that Jesus will not come at a time when He is expected by us, so it would certainly be foolish to listen to those doomsday prophecies of Christ’s return. All we can really do is live our lives in a way that glorifies Him. I don’t want to be caught living a sinful life when Jesus returns!

This brings me to the last parable in Matthew 25, titled The Sheep and the Goats. This parable deals with Jesus appearing on earth and the people being judged. Jesus separates them intotwo groups-one group, the sheep, on His right, and the other group, the goats, on His left. He tells the sheep that they are blessed because they were kind to Him during their lives. They question Him about this, wondering when it was that they showed kindness to their Lord. He answers that they showed kindness to Him by doing good deeds for each other, because whenever we care for each other, we are also caring for Him. He then tells the opposite to the goats, that they were unkind to Him during their lives. They then ask Him when they were ever unkind to Him, and he tells them it was when they showed unkindness to their fellow man. It is interesting to me that they sheep did not realize, judging by their response, that their good deeds toward others were also good deeds toward God, while the goats seemed to be thinking they always did good things for God, when in reality, they were not doing His work at all. Could this be another attack on the Pharisees? Maybe, but it probably also applies to a lot of us today, who go around saying the right thing most of the time, but who do not treat others with the respect they deserve.

I hope to be counted among the sheep when the day comes, but I think I need to clean up my attitude a little first. I need to stop thinking badly of people for not showing appreciation to me when I do things for them. As a mother, I do things for my family all the time that I never get a thank you for. No one ever says thank you to me for washing their underwear and stinky socks and folding them so nicely and putting them away in the proper drawers where they can easily be found in the morning, but I continue doing the chore, and I never complain. I need to let that attitude be the prevailing one in my life. When I hold the door for someone at church, or let the lady with only five items go ahead of me and my overloaded cart at the grocery store, I am not just doing it for that person. I am doing it for Jesus, and when you consider all He has done for me, it is the VERY least I could do.

Chapter 23. Wow. Jesus really had a lot of things to say about the Pharisees and teachers of the law in Jerusalem. It really, to me, does not sound too terribly different from a lot of the people today who are in charge of our religious organizations. I have mentioned before that I quit going to church for a few years, and today, I think I am going to delve into that situation a bit and share my insights into the problems some of us have with organized religion and, perhaps, what we as individuals need to do about it.

A few years ago, I had a job working at my church. I basically was hired to run the food pantry there, and to oversee a few other programs that dealt with social issues. I worked there as a part-time employee for about 2 1/2 years. In the beginning, I really enjoyed my job there, and felt like I was doing good work for the community, and for God. After a while, however, things began to change. My boss/pastor began making decisions about how the place was run that I felt were wrong and unfair, and at times were even deceitful. One of these deceitful acts involved taking money meant for one purpose, and using it to pay me to continue running the social services operation at my church. I felt really bad about that. Someone in the community donated money to our church for us to start an after school program for kids, and it was used to pay my salary.  I was even asked to lie to that individual when he came to take a tour of the building and see what his donation was paying for. My boss/pastor was out of town when he came, so she asked me to give him a tour and make it look like we had been doing what he donated that money for the whole time. We brought in some kids from the church and had them hang around the place after school for the afternoon and do homework and read. I agreed to do it because I needed the income, but I knew it was wrong the whole time. It upset me even further to know that my boss/pastor’s boss knew about this the whole time and supported it. I even got the impression at one point that the whole thing was his idea. This began my disenchantment with going to church.

It all came to a head a few months later. My boss/pastor became injured and did not come into work during the day for a few months. Things at work got really bad. People called the place during the day and no one was there to answer the phone most of the time since I was the only employee who worked during normal business hours, and I only worked 15 hours each week. People would come by with items to donate to us, and no one would be there most of the time to accept those donations. Our answering machine was full of messages from angry people who wanted to speak to someone at our church but could never get anyone on the phone, or who found the place deserted when they stopped by. I often had to deal with these people, and it created a huge amount of stress for me. Then one day, I got a rare phone call from my boss/pastor telling me someone would be coming by the following day to meet with me about our social services. During that meeting, I found out from this person that I barely knew that my boss/pastor was being relocated, and I was going to be getting a new boss/pastor in a couple of weeks. My boss never told me this, and no one in my church mentioned it to me or anyone in my family when we saw them either. That really hurt. I had been working very hard, and even working extra time I was not paid for, to try and save a little face for my tiny, floundering church, and no one felt it was necessary to let me know what was going on there. I walked out of that meeting and wrote a cold little note to my boss saying I quit and I left that place and did not return for 2 years. I went back to that church twice, I think, during that time, and then quit going again for another year. I think I have finally learned to forgive the people there, and to forgive the organization that I once thought so highly of, though I don’t think I’ll ever trust a church the way I used to again. Reading what Jesus said in Matthew 23, however, makes me wonder if that is a bad thing or not.

Jesus spends this entire chapter condemning the religious leaders of Jerusalem. He says in it that they have missed the point of the laws they were preaching about. They were focusing so much on the small, ridiculous details of the law that they were missing what really mattered-loving God and treating others with respect and love. They were hypocrites. I have heard so many people say before that they don’t go to church because of all the hypocrisy in churches today. I agree, it is rampant. I really think we all are hypocrites about something, and it is really easy to find a hypocrite when you are wanting to find one. All churches have hypocrites in them, unfortunately. There is always going to be someone there who claims to have it all together for Jesus, but really is as lost as those Pharisees were so many hundreds of years ago. I was one of them when I lied to that man about what we were using his money for at my church.

I think churches have too many rules. We call it “doctrine”, but it’s really just a bunch of rules. My church, the same one I used to go to, by the way, does not take communion, for example. I don’t like this. I don’t think it is something we should just skip. Jesus said “Do this in remembrance of me,” did He not? But, I have decided to take a different attitude toward this. It is not forbidden just because I won’t be doing it at my church on Easter Sunday. I realize that simply because my church does not so this, it is not forbidden to me. I am able to make my own choices, and if I choose to take communion, whether at another church or simply doing it at home on my own, it’s ok. I cetainly don’t think I’ll go to hell for it! I really think that where churches are concerned, you have to find a place that you feel comfortable enough  that you are willing to get out of bed on Sunday and go there instead of staying in your pajamas and watching CNN with a cup of coffee all morning long. You are going to find things in any church that are going to disappoint, and maybe even disgust, you. A church is, after all, a group of humans, and humans screw things up! You really just need to walk close to the Lord’s side, and if something really bothers you, speak up about it. I wish I had done that a long time ago at my church. And, if no one will listen, then leave. Hopefully, they will miss you, and your absence will give them something to think about.

By the way, my church is now under new management, and I really think the people in charge now are walking close with God and are at least trying to make decisions every day for the good of us all. Of course, I’m a little reluctant to get too heavily involved yet because I’m afraid I’ll see things differently if I’m there too much. I’m learning to trust them more though, and hopefully soon I’ll want to be more active in the church. I don’t think I’ll ever want to work at a church again though. Of course, God may have other ideas…

I felt compelled to read more than one chapter today because I really want to finish reading Matthew by Easter. I am so amazed by the life of Jesus. He showed so much compassion and love for the people around Him. He performed so many miracles and healed so many, and yet there were those who hated Him, and who still hate Him today. It saddens me to think that God loved us so much that He decided to come down here and try to take us back, and so many of us have resisted Him throughout the years. I understand that following Him is a choice that each of us must make individually, but it is impossible for me to understand how someone could study what Jesus did and choose to reject it. Even though I am going through some rough patches in my life right now, I am choosing to follow Him and to love Him, and to believe that all these things are happening to refine me and help me to grow and understand Him better than I do today. I do not like the bad things that are happening, but there is a lot of joy in my life too, and I know all of it comes from God. He is letting all of these things happen because he loves me, and He wants me to experience life in the fullest way possible, which means I have experience both the good and the bad.

At the end of Matthew 21, I read the parable of the tenants. It basically is a metaphor for God sending His Son, Jesus, to earth to take us back for Him. He sent Jesus here to reclaim His people and all of the earth. According to Matthew, after Jesus told this story, the Pharisees anger against Him reached the boiling point, so to speak, and they began to actively look for ways to to arrest Him, and most likely they were hoping to have Him killed. I have always wondered exactly why the Pharisees hated Jesus so much. I think I see the answer in this scripture. They were very legalistic, and so I am sure they felt that Israel was their inheritance. Jesus was telling them in this parable that God was going to take His kingdom away from them and hand it over to those who loved Him and would do His work. I am sure they hated Him for that. They did not believe that Jesus was the Son of God, and so they felt He had no authority to say such things. It must have seemed blasphemous to think that a man could claim to know the heart and the ways of God as Jesus did. I am happy to say that I am one of those who will be handed the Kingdom of Heaven!

The beginning of Matthew 21 speaks of Palm Sunday and Jesus’s glorious entry into Jerusalem. It is, to me, a solemn week with a rapturously happy ending, and I am hoping to have plenty of opportunities this week to study the last few days of Jesus’s life before His betrayal and death. I think I have read about this more than anything else in the Bible, and I never get tired of reading about the events of this week. I am looking forward to studying it more and writing about it here. My hope and my prayer is that God will allow me to view this familiar story with new eyes this week.

I am sorry, everyone, for not posting for a few days now. I am still new to this blogging thing, and I am finding I sometimes just don’t have the time to sit down and write! Sometimes, there is just no way to account for the things life throws at us.

In Matthew 18, one verse struck me particularly today. Verses 19-20 say: “Again, I tell you that if two of you on earth agree about anything you ask for, it will be done for you by my Father in Heaven. For where two or three come together in my name, there I am with them.”

Let me start by saying this. I go to a church that is currently fairly small by most people’s standards. I quit going there for about 3 years for reasons I shall not get into, but recently started going back because I felt the Lord drawing me back to it. When I was going there 3 years ago, it was MUCH smaller than it even is today. I am talking 3 or 4 or maybe 5 families there each Sunday. Usually, when I heard this verse quoted, it was in reference to the small numbers we had gathered for church that day, but today, it had a slightly different feel to me. I think God was speaking to me about my marriage.

My husband and I don’t pray together. I have no doubt that we often are praying for the same things, but we never sit down together and ask the Lord for anything as the united couple we are. I have always felt awkward about praying out loud in front of people. I pray out loud when I am alone, or more accurately, I kind of just talk to God more than formally pray as you would hear someone do in church or whatever. I don’t know why I feel so funny praying in front of my husband. After all, the man has seen me naked. What could I possibly hide from him? But, I think I need to get out of my prayer comfort zone and let my husband into my prayer life. He’s going to a job fair this afternoon, and I am thinking this would be the perfect opportunity to give this a try. I don’t know if the jobs at this fair are what we should be looking for, but I am willing to accept whatever God will have us do.

I don’t know why I’ve never heard a sermon on Matthew 17:24-27, The Temple Tax. I know the obvious thing that should have really struck me to write about would have been the transfiguration of Jesus, but I guess at this point in my life, the smaller miracles speak more to me than the really flashy, impressive ones. I suppose finding money in the mouth of a fish is a pretty awesome miracle, but I’m sure it paled in comparison in the mind of Peter to seeing Jesus bathed in light and accompanied by Moses and Elijah. I think if I had been there, I would have thought the same thing.

I love how Jesus supplied the money for the paying of the tax. He told Peter, who was a fisherman before deciding to follow Christ, to go fishing. He assured Peter that inside the mouth of the first fish he caught would be a coin that would pay for Jesus’s tax as well as his own. I can only assume, since it doesn’t really say, that Peter did this as he was told, and indeed found the coin and paid the tax. It’s wonderful to me to think that Jesus used Peter’s earthly profession to provide for the paying of this tax. It shows how God can use you in your own work for His purposes. You may have a job that does not seem particularly important to the advancement of the Kingdom of God, but He can use your work to do whatever He chooses.

In my case, I am a stay-at-home mom. I personally consider raising a child to be one of the most fulfilling and important jobs any of us can ever have. It also gives me just a tiny bit of free time during naps to study my Bible and write this blog. I am going to think of my blogging as the coin in the fish’s mouth for me. God has asked me to give Him my time, and ever since I began my writing, my baby girl has been taking long naps of at least an hour or so in her own bed. This is a far cry from before, when I could only get her to take a nap if I held her in my arms for the duration. So, even though I am giving more of my time to God, I actually am finding that I have more time available to give.  I think this is also another illustration of the fish and loaves thing I’ve written about in my past two entries. I’ve given what I have to God and He’s blessed it and multiplied it. It kind of makes me feel like going fishing!

Reading today made me laugh a little. I guess I never recognized before that Jesus performed the miracle of feeding a crowd of people with a small amount of food twice. I know I’ve read the Gospel of Matthew before, but I guess I never really let this sink in. I wrote about it yesterday, and I am going to discuss it again because I feel like this is something God really wants to etch onto my heart. He can take the little I have and do wonderful things with it…way more than I can imagine.

I don’t think I am alone in taking this for granted. Jesus healed this group of people for three days, and they had nothing to feed the crowd during that time. Jesus had compassion for them and told his disciples He needed to give food to them because He was worried about them collapsing from exhaustion and lack of nourishment on the way home. His disciples, who had already witnessed Him feeding the five thousand, asked Him where they could get enough food to feed the four thousand who were with them. They seemingly either forgot or did not believe He could do the miracle again. Interestingly enough, they had seven loaves of bread and “a few small fish” this time which Jesus broke and fed the crowd with- more than they started with when He fed the five thousand in the previous chapter! I did notice in this chapter that Matthew says they fed four thousand besides women and children, as it did in chapter 15. I suppose it could have been a much larger crowd than the one before, depending on how many women and children there were this time compared with last time. Maybe this is the reason for their doubt. Still, they doubted, as I often do, that Jesus would continue to pour out His blessings on them when the situation seemed so impossible.

Right now, I am still one of those doubting disciples. I have enough money in the bank right now to pay the mortgage next month, and hopefully most of the bills, but not much more than that. My husband, who works on commission as a loan officer, is making terrible money despite working long hours. I think he would be making more if he worked part time at Walmart right now, and trust me, he has considered trying it! Still, we are hanging on, by the grace of God. I have been worried about how we can possibly continue to make ends meet, but I don’t think it’s my job to worry about that. Jesus has it under control. He can take my meager funds and give me what I need to survive the journey, just as He did for these four thousand (or so) people. I need to trust Him, and believe He can do it. Easier said than done, obviously, but I am working on it.