When I was little I went to the Catholic Church and I also
visited a Baptist church for a little while. I never understood or saw much
difference between the many different churches and their doctrines. When I was
little I thought and still think that God doesn't judge us based on what church
we visit, he doesn't put us in a group. He judges us based on one perfect
example. Jesus Christ. He judges us
based on whether or not he sees Christ in us. So your church isn't as important
as your relationship with Him. That direct link with God through Jesus Christ. In john 14:6 Jesus says: I am the way, the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.
Do you live according to His will or yours? Are
you coming to church because you want to please God and try and work hard to
live the life he wants you to live or just because your parents make you? Or
are you coming because you want to go out with your friends after? What is the motive behind your actions? Is it God or is it your own sinful nature?
A true Christian isn't one who goes to this church or that
one. A true Christian is one who has been washed by the blood of Christ and
daily walks with God. And I must admit a daily walk with God isn't the easiest
task. With our lives filled with distractions, we work, we study, and we want
to do other things like sports, music. One day we are full of passion and a
fire burning from within and the other our fire has totally dimmed and is
barely holding. It happens, we set goals, “I will pray 2 hours each day”, then
it becomes 1 hour than it becomes 5 minutes. And then we stop praying. The danger
starts there.
I love reading and I read this book one time and it spoke about
Romans 12 and Leviticus. He explained how in the Old Testament their sacrifices were animals and How our lives have to be living sacrifices now. In Leviticus 6: 12 -13 the Bible
says: `and the fire on the altar shall be kept burning
on it; it shall not be put out. And the priest shall burn wood on it every
morning, and lay the burnt offering in order on it; and he shall burn on it the
fat of the peace offerings. `A fire shall always be burning on the altar; it
shall never go out.
The fire shall always
be burning. Why? Because it’s hard to start a fire. It was crucial to burn wood
on it every morning. The altar is where
we burn our sacrifices. In Romans
12 we are asked to make of our lives the sacrifice, we want to be a beautiful
aroma for God. But we need to have wood burning on our altar. The fire is the
presence of God, in order to start a fire you need wood. Wood is our prayer, when we pray we are
asking God to be present in our lives. So every morning we shall put wood on
the altar is for us to pray every single day, and put our lives on the altar to
be the living sacrifice God wants from us. Every day worshiping the Lord,
repenting from our sin. It’s a daily walk, We keep on keeping on. We bring our
sacrifices of repentance daily. We are daily washed by His Blood. We are daily
igniting our fire, feeding the passion for our Father. He doesn't want animals he wants You. It's like this, you brush your teeth everyday, if you don't you'll get cavities. If you don't repent everyday from your sins, your life gets filled with cavities, until it rots and falls out.
Once we have that, which is the most crucial, the most
important part of our daily walk. Others will see a difference in us. I mean it
sucks when you've had a friend, your best friend, and you've been a Christian
for over a year, and they don’t know that you are a Christian. It’s bad. Our lives
are the most important testimony. When people see God in us, they will see and
believe that God is God. People don’t listen to what you say. People listen to
your actions. If you don't brush your teeth everyday, your mouth starts to stink.
My mother always says: clean your house before you want to
clean someone else’s house. Why? So you don’t come off as a hypocrite. If you
can’t keep your house clean, you have no business judging my house. What I hear
a lot from friends who aren't believers is the crusades and the Christians who
killed in the name of Christ and the church killed people, the pastors who rape
children, abortion. What god lets kids starve in Africa. You know what, yeah, I know this happens, God knows
this happens, but it’s not God who does these things. It’s the greedy mean,
evil filled, money worshiping people who do this.
We are here to make a
difference, when the church started, it wasn't the church chasing the people to
convert, it was other people chasing the church to wipe out Christianity. So
let’s go back to the roots. Of course not be followed and murdered, which still
happens in some countries, but to give more value the being called a Christian,
a follower of Christ. Let’s truly live what the word of God has for us. What
God’s will is for our lives? Let’s not
be cold anymore, but ignite a fire that we keep on feeding, daily no matter
what happens. Let’s put wood every morning on our altar, and bring our lives as
a living sacrifice on that altar and give it all to God, in Worship. Let us be that beautiful aroma.
I encourage you today, to start over, if you let your fire dim, feed it with prayer, God is there, waiting for you to take that step. He already made the first move. Now it's time for you to make yours.
God bless you and be a blessing for others.
