I’ve caught myself swept up in something of a person
language phenomenon that I believe requires a certain point of
explanation. I find myself uttering
this phrase with an alarming amount of frequency, “When we truly begin to ‘seek’
God…” Now let’s stop right there for
one moment. I say that I am alarmed
with the frequency I use this statement because I realize that perhaps the
definition of precisely what my words are attempting to communicate might not
be immediately clear to someone who does not speak “Christianese”. The fact is that even some Christians might
not know exactly what I’m talking about. I know that when I first became a Christian I had no idea what this
statement really entailed. For example,
a teacher saying to him or her, “Seek the answer and you shall find it” might
not aid a math student who is struggling with a math problem. What that student really needs is a
practical answer that gives them a fundamental idea of how to dig for that
answer. So the teacher might give this
much better answer, “Well, let’s refer back to our text. Go back to chapter 6. Remember that it was in this chapter that we
talked about the rules involved in factoring. Dig through that chapter and look for some examples that will help
illustrate the answer to the question you’re asking. Now that might only lead to a few more questions but it will give
you a better idea of how to start.” That answer was very guided. Though it wasn’t terribly specific and it didn’t just come right out
with the answer I believe that what the teacher did was to a put a tool in that
students hand so that they would have some idea of how to figure out things for
themselves rather than just depending on the educational nipple of others all
the time. I say that not to be funny or
shocking but rather to illustrate that education and growth is not merely about
opening up, saying ah, and saying, “Thank you sir may I have another?” The reason I tell you all that is to tell
you this: I want to tell you a brief
story about the practical elements that were involved in me learning to seek
God. I want the statement above about
seeking God to be more than some empty motto. I want to offer up to you a simple illustration of how you can make that
part of who you are in every aspect of your life.
Seeking God: My
First Infant Step
I asked myself this question: What is it that I want to know about God?
Now for each person this question may be answered in any
multitude of ways but I think it is one of those fundamentally important
questions that we must start with in order to know where our ambition for
knowledge truly begins. For me this
answer came very simply. I wanted to
know about Jesus. I wanted to know what
the Bible had to say about Jesus. I had
only ever absorbed secondhand knowledge and there came a time in my life when
that just became tragic for me to consider. So I sought those authors who knew Jesus personally or walked closely
with those who had been a direct disciple of Jesus. In short I began my search in the Bible with the New Testament in
the Gospel of Matthew. It is important
to note here that there is no “correct” place to start. You could very well have started in Genesis
or Leviticus or Ruth or Isaiah or Acts or Romans. The starting place is not essential. What I believe is important is that you go to some qualified
source to begin your study and the bible certainly meets that
pre-requisite.
Yet I also understand that not all people are readers and
may also find reading the Bible to be more like tedious homework. So perhaps some people merely need to start
with a conversation. Perhaps others
will simply need a long sequence of curious questions answered. But I believe at some point it becomes
necessary to look at the Bible. I know
I danced around it for a very long time because to be perfectly frank I didn’t
feel like reading a bunch of “thou shalt not” crap. I put it like that only to show you that false conceptions can
get you into trouble. I had an entirely
wrong impression of the Bible. You must
come at it with a fresh mind. This is
easier said than done but achievable nonetheless.
Once you start that study, whether it initially is through
scripture or conversation, you’ll find that many questions will be answered but
even more will be raised. However, I
think that is the true spirit of any great study. The wealth of knowledge that is delivered to us through the
medium of scripture is V.A.S.T.!! It is
only common sense that when we gain tidbits of knowledge we thirst to know the
true breadth of their overall implications. I believe that this is one of the fundamental reasons why we need
fellowship with others. On our own
we’re not always that great but others help highlight things that we might have
never seen on our own. That’s why I
feel like it is pivotal for us to hear speakers, read books, study on our own,
and join in on studies and other mind enriching activities. This is not to say that I think we should
make our lives only about appointments. An appointment or engagement means nothing if you take nothing at all
away from it. Whether we grow in mind
or stature one thing is certain: The
process is slow and not always easy.
Growing Pains: Stage
2 of “The Search”
It’s amazing to me that two years have passed since I began
to fellowship with the folks at Oasis Middleport. A lot has happened in that time. Yet I find something personally unsettling when I look back over my life
in Christ. I believe that I was 14 when
I was baptized and made my confession of faith. On November 17th of this year I celebrated my 27th
birthday. That’s an expanse of roughly
13 years. What does it say of me that
it’s taken me 13 years to realize my own personal depravity and begin the trek
of getting my well-settled butt out of the easy chair? Much can transpire over a 13-year
period. Such is the case in my
life. I was in church one minute and
out the next. I believed in God but
defined him with principles that were not godly. I developed personal doctrine that was far from sound. I did everything in the book except look up
God in the book that talks all about him. This is not to say that I didn’t ever see the hand of God in the work I
was doing or in the people that I associated with. Nor is it to say that God taught me lessons in that time. But it seemed like God was always saying the
same thing. For something like a decade
I felt like God was always in my brain pounding away this message, “You’re
looking in all the wrong places.” Yet I
was like many people. I was very
stubborn, even as far to set myself on a course of personal destruction. I was absolutely convinced that my own
intelligence and wit would supply me with everything I needed to live a “good”
life. You would think that I would have
got the message after I kept leading myself down one bad pipe after another but
apparently my mind isn’t wired together with a strong scent of common
sense.
It wasn’t until I engaged in conversation with someone (in
this case Chris) that I began to see what I hadn’t been doing since I became a
Christian. Again I’ll refer back to
some of the things that I stated above. The core elements that were largely missing from life were: Bible study, fellowship, creative
expression, worship, prayer, and sensitivity to the Spirit.
Let me knock these out one at a time. I want to show you what the growing process
has entailed for me on a personal level.
Bible Study: I’ve
pretty much already covered this but let me reiterate that this made all the
difference in the world. There are many
good translations of the Bible available now. There are many great study Bibles available. There are large and small print editions. There are electronic Bibles. There is software that you can but at
Wal-Mart for ten bucks that will help you make good heads and tails of
scripture. The bottom line is
this: There are a lot of tools out
there to help people of all kinds of mental orientations to study scripture. If you find you have trouble reading on your
own try to find somebody you know who could help you. They even make the Bible on tape and CD. Explore your options. Go to a bookstore like Waldenbooks in the
Parkersburg Mall and you’ll find all kinds of cool Bible study tools. Ask someone if they know where a good Family
Bookstore is where their primary business concentration is centered around the
Bible. Go on the internet to places
like www.amazon.com and look for resources
by simply typing “bible” in the search box. Go to a search engine like www.yahoo.com
and just type in the words “bible study”. There is no shortage of information to help you. So I beseech you to get involved. Believe me when I say that it is one of the
most rewarding things you will ever do in your life as far as study is
concerned. Don’t let the conceptions of
others dilute your decisions about cracking the spine on a Bible.
Fellowship: Again,
this is a topic that I’ve already touched on somewhat. It is important to fellowship with others
and by this I DON’T mean that you MUST attend a church service somewhere. Fellowship can happen in several different
ways. Chris and I are going to get
together today either at his house or a coffee shop or some other place in
Athens where the atmosphere is right and the drinks are warm. And guess what…that will be a time of
fellowship for the both of us…and we weren’t “in church”. I know some of the things that we will
certainly talk about but beyond that it’s hard to say what God might lay on our
hearts. But I can guarantee you this
much: I will walk away from today
somehow strengthened because of the fellowship that I’m going to have not just
with Chris, but with my family and loved ones.
Creative Expression: Everybody needs an outlet. For
me my outlet is music. Always has
been. Always will be. But this is not, by any stretch of the
imagination, the only way to have an outlet. Some people’s creative expression may be through writing, while others
may be through art. Yet this category
can extend far beyond the arts. Perhaps
your outlet, or your gift, is that of socialization. Perhaps you are exceedingly good at breaking the ice with people. Perhaps you have incredible compassion. Perhaps you have a giving spirit. Perhaps you have a great talent for public
speaking. Perhaps you have a talent for
fixing things. Perhaps you have a
talent for building things. Perhaps you
are an amazing cook. Maybe you’re a
great teacher. Maybe you have a way
with kids that nobody else has. Maybe
you’re incredibly strong. Maybe you’re
great with computers and technology in general. The point I’m getting at here is that everyone has at least one
thing that they do well. I promise you
whatever your “thing” is then there is a place for it in ministry. You just have to identify what it is and
then seek to discover how that can benefit ministry.
Worship: This is a
tuffy. What is worship? I could spend a whole separate post talking
about just that question. Learning to
worship is one of those initial steps that trouble people. Some people’s vision of worship is that of
people standing with both hands raised in the air with their eyes closed, or
wide open, singing a song at the top of their lungs. This mortifies some because they just don’t identify with that
kind of expression. And that’s
okay. There is no one correct way to
worship. Why is that? Well to put it simply, not everyone is the
same. Because of this we again run into
an elementary example of common sense. Different personalities will bring different kinds of offerings to God
with their hearts. It may look like the
person singing with raised hands or it might look like the person kneeling in
the back with their hands spread out on the floor in front of them. It might also look like the person standing
still doing nothing specific at all but just absorbing. Whatever the case it is essential to find
our personal expression of worship. This doesn’t just take place in the church setting. In fact, I would say that if a Sunday gathering
is the only place and time that an individual chooses to worship then they are
sorely missing some of the best moments that God has to offer. Worship can happen when you wake up in the
morning, or while you’re at work, or while you’re driving home in the car, or
while you’re having dinner with the family, or catching up on old times with a
friend. Worship takes several different
faces. Find your face and then wear it with
pride.
Prayer: Anyone who
says that communication is not essential is crazy. Communication is one of the most fundamental elements of any
successful relationship. When you think
of the word prayer a picture might jump right into your mind. That picture might look something like
this: A whole bunch of people with
their heads solemnly bowed and talking in very strange language. You might envision them saying things like
“thou” this and “thou” that. You might
also conceptualize an individual taking on something that is not even remotely
conversational but almost rehearsed and practiced. It should be known that there is no one correct way to pray. If you want a good example of how to pray
then stop reading this article right now, find a bible, turn to John 17 and
begin reading Jesus’ prayer for his disciples and himself. Jesus simply talks to his father much like
we might speak to our own parents. He
speaks to God with reverence, respect, humility, and love. When you read it you see this portrait of a
good son talking lovingly with his father. Prayer is not about being artificial. Prayer is about being you right there in front of God. Prayer makes you very transparent if you do
it honestly. A contrived prayer is the
worst kind of thing because you may or may not have any personal attachment to
it. When you are learning how to pray
it is good to use others as an example. Using the Lord’s Prayer that we find in scripture is a good illustration
of this because Jesus hands out this very practical example of how to pray. But then we later see Jesus pray beyond even
that. There is a lesson to be learned
from both examples. Try this as a start
to prayer. Just open up your mouth and
start talking. Talk about the things
that trouble you. Get them out in the
open air. Say whatever comes to
mind. At first you might feel a little
silly because it may seem as though you’re just talking to space but trust me
your words are being listened to very intently by something that you cannot
see. God hears us whether we
acknowledge it or not. Try just talking
first. From there you then need to
learn how to listen. Which leads me
into my next point.
Sensitivity to the Spirit: This is also somewhat tricky because to many this might seem like such
an abstract idea that it borders on the absurd. However, God does respond to us. We might catch it and we might not. The point is to learn how to not miss it. God doesn’t always respond with a big flaming pie coming down
from the clouds. It’s often more subtle
than that. Sometimes I hear God. When I say hear I mean I literally hear God
in my head. If that statement makes you
feel weird then don’t bend your brain on it. Not everything you see or hear has to make complete sense to you right
away. That’s part of the growing
process. Remember knowledge and
realization often come on in a tediously gradual way. Sometimes God might respond to you by putting you in a situation
where you’re given resolution to a standing issue. For example, my car was on the fritz for about two weeks. It was starting to get rather expensive for
people to continuously run me back and forth to work on top of taking
themselves to work. Then one night
Chris shows up at my house and I tell him what had been going on with my
vehicle. There wasn’t really anywhere
locally to take it so we had been trying to fix it ourselves but it just so
happened that Chris knew of a great place just down the road from his
house. It also happened that Oasis has
a ministry van for people like me who are in a jam but need transportation. In one night, and completely out of the blue
I might add, someone had shown up at my doorstep that solved two major issues
that I wasn’t sure how I was going to fix. There were also a small myriad of other convenient occurrences during
this experience. Some might look at
that situation and say that I was just incredibly lucky but when I look at that
situation I see God using others to help out someone else in need. I know it’s a seemingly menial example but I
believe that God is involved in our lives in that microscopic of a way. I think about that situation and my mind
goes directly to the grace and mercy of God. Instances in our lives that just seem too perfect or just worked out too
well are, I think, often times the tell tale fingerprint of God’s hand on a
situation. Try to recall the convenient
occurrences that have befallen you recently. Perhaps they were no coincidence at all. That might just have been a God response and you didn’t even
realize it. There is much to be learned
from the age-old art of subtlety. God
often illuminates truth in not only unexpected ways but also seemingly odd
ways. Yet it’s God all the same.
Where Do We Go From Here: Life in Full Spiritual Maturity
To be quite honest, another individual who is much wiser
than I am will better finish these next lines. I’m still growing. All that is
above in this article is merely a representation of how the growing process has
gone for me. And I’m sure that there
are more unexpected bends in the road ahead. I’ll let you know what I find when those corners are met and
turned.
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