It doesn't take long to jump right back into the flow of things once you return from a trip. I hit the ground running as soon as I got back to Northridge from CIY Move on Saturday and it hasn't really slowed down. The intensity of things is already peaking and the schedule is full. In the midst of this I am still processing the experiences of last week and the things that God is sharing with me in the aftermath of His work.
The emphasis on our persecuted Christian brothers and sisters at Move is still affecting my spirit. Seeing the reality of what they must deal with just to be able to worship certainly has an impact on how I perceive our "struggles" here. To see fellow warriors for Christ take bold stands in the face of physical and sexual assault, destruction of property, loss of limbs and even death reminds me of how weak my own faith is. The passion that they exhibit for following their King is remarkable and inspires me to be consistently prayerful for them.
Comparing the enthusiastic passion of the persecuted church with the American church isn't necessarily fair. Our circumstances are obviously incredibly different for many reasons. It is discouraging however to see so much of our focus shift to complaining about the temperature in the room, the selection of songs that are sung, whether someone said hi to us, how clean the church is, or what shirt or shoes someone is wearing. I seriously doubt these are ongoing debates in the underground church.
We have lost focus on the biggest problem-a world that desperately needs to hear of the grace, forgiveness and restoration offered by Jesus Christ and our responsibility to do whatever it takes to make that message heard. What would happen if our respective churches would throw their energies behind solving that problem first?
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