Are you missing out?

Ok, a quick history.

I’m sure whoever has read this knows that I was not born into a Christian family. Well, being raised in a Mexican-American family were pretty much Roman Catholic by default. My grandparents were actually upstanding and loyal members at our local church. My grandfather was an usher and they were always involved in all the events.

I had a lot of fun, went to Sunday school and really enjoyed being at church. To this day my grandparents have family friends there.

All that was great and I have great memories at that Catholic church however, in the entire time although I learned some “believe-in-God” basics I never learned about anything written straight from the bible. Stories from the Bible yes, but I never learned any of the actual word.

Maybe God was laying down a foundation, maybe it was my youth and lack of dedication to scripture. Maybe it was the vagueness of growing up in church life. Where going to church is about going to church. Giving your hour or so of weekly sacrifice so you can clean yourself of all of last weeks sins.

Typical, we go every week and yet nothing changed. In fact as soon as we hit the door my grandfather starts yelling at my grandmother.

For any and all of you who have experienced this and if this is the notion of what you think about church life I would first like to extend my deepest apologies. Unfortunately, church folk who are church folk  just for the sake of being able to say they go to church are pretty much all the same no matter what religion you belong to.

Jesus our Lord is the only reason to be there. Unless you have a relationship with Him going to church really doesn’t matter or make any difference. In fact I would say that if you do struggle with this, it’s not your knowledge or the people preaching to you. It’s Christ, fix your eyes on Him. Get to know Him, talk to him, tell him all your silly ideas and thoughts. Tell Him your dreams, thank Him and smile at Him when your happy. Cry to Him when your sad.

So yeah, I got saved and all that changed for me. Over the years I’ve gotten to know Jesus and it’s changed my life. Getting to know and having a personal relationship with God is a phrase that is said so much in our church circles that it’s become cliche. It’s not any less important than it was on with Adam and Eve however because the word God has  become so vague in our society that you might as well be saying you need to have a personal relationship with the Easter Bunny.

You will find that most non-atheists will say they believe in God in some form or another. They believe that there is a creator and perhaps someone or something watching from somewhere, sometimes not. But what does it mean to have a personal relationship with God?

First of all God is not just God but he is Yahweh, or Jehovah and his many descriptive titles. He is referred to by many titles and names in the Holy Bible but one of my favorites is King of Kings and Lord of Lords. Now without getting off track, what is he the King of? Who is he the Lord of?

Look up! See everything in the sky? Buy a telescope and look up as far as it will allow, if you want to get crazy check out some images from the internet from the Hubble telescope. Scientists figure that there are billions of stars in our galaxy and there are billions of galaxy’s in our known universe. Do you realize that each dot in the sky is a star similar to our sun? Perhaps there are planets around that dot and perhaps some of those planets have moons around them. Each one and you can do the math.

Now look down, look at the earth. Count each grain of sand on the beach the next time you go. Multiply that by the number of beaches on the earth and for good measure go ahead and throw in all the sand in all the desserts as well. Then look at the dirt that is like coffee grains, go ahead and count all the little dots of dirt in your yard, multiply that by all the yards in your neighborhood, then all the neighborhoods in your city, and all the city’s in your state, all the states in your country and all the countries on your continents and all the continents on earth.

Count the blades of grass, the grains of salt in your salt shaker, the pepper corns. For good measure why don’t you start counting the hairs on your head and then count each hair on your skin from head to toe.

Mathew 10:30

³⁰And even the very hairs of your head are all numbered.

You can count the hairs on your family members, friends and well you get the picture. You can count all the cells in your body and so on. All the components of each cell.

You could count the molecules in the air, the atoms that make up the molecules, the protons, neutrons and electrons that make up each atom and son and so on and son on.

Do you know what? God, Yahweh, Jehovah made each one of those with a purpose. He knows them all by name and created each one in accordance with the universal balance that allows for each individual and unique form of matter to live in harmony with each other.

Try imagining a puzzle whose pieces are about the size of a bean and it would take a puzzle the size of North America whose unique one-of-a-kind pieces were all hues of blue just to color your eyes. It is  much bigger and much more complex than that.

Do you know what? Each grain of creation is subject to his rule. He is the King of all creation, he is the Lord of all matter, physical and metaphysical, in each of the four dimensions  that make up our existence, length, width, height and time(duration).He is the King and creator any and all dimensions that are beyond our finite existence. He is the King and creator and the eternal dimensions.

Heard of the speed of light?

Genesis 1:3

³ And God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light.”

To create man God had to form some mud and then breath his breath into to the form to create him. To create woman he had to anesthetize Adam, remove a rip then construct each cell and grow them around that one rib using it’s unique DNA and having to add to the information to create a second unique being that although being completely human was complementary and not in conflict with his existing creation.

But light, the speed of light which as of now it is impossible to travel at. It is impossible to experience, he created with four words.

Hopefully you know where I’m going with all this so now I will make my point.

God is a personal being, he is a person for all intents and purposes. Not a person in our limited sense but a person nonetheless. He is unique, identifiable, intelligent and universal all at the same time.

When I began to grasp the personal identity of God then and I began to learn who He was as a person in the personal sense then I began to truly understand what it meant to have a relationship with him.

It’s difficult to grasp the idea of having a relationship with an unseen universal being but it’s much easier when you consider that he is as uniquely identifiable as your father, mother, brother, sister or friend then the Bible begins to make much more sense. The term, having a personal relationship fits in a way that vague concepts don’t.

My friend, are you going to church for the sake of going to church? Is it a choir? Do you hate missing football on Sundays? If your parents are dragging you then you complain about it?

Husbands, is your wife nagging you to go? Do you do it just to appease her and avoid a week of hell?

My friends, I have been there in all those instances. Please consider all that I have said and begin to speak to God, tell him all your dreams, your fears, concerns. Express to him your doubts, your hopes and even confess your failures and ask him for help. Build that relationship, God is personal.

On the subject of him being a King, he is the ruler of well, everything and you have an opportunity to have a personal, one on one relationship with THE KING, not just a King but THE KING of The Kingdom of Everything!

God sent his son to die for you, to pay the price so you no longer had to go through complicated processes to have communion with him. You are free from traditions, free from systematic religiosity. You are free from all the red tape.

Why are you in church? Are you missing out? You have an opportunity to a much greater, and deeper relationship that will lead to greater understanding. Peace a level that you have never understood and even been able to fathom.

The King invites you to his house. In fact, he has at your house, at the door of your heart. He is asking you if you are willing to let him in.

Revelation 3:20

²⁰“Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with him, and he with me.”

Will you get to know him and reap the rewards of being friends with the King of the Kingdom of Everything?

John 15:9-16

⁹“As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love. ¹⁰If you obey my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have obeyed my Father’s commands and remain in his love. ¹¹I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete. ¹²My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you. ¹³Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends. ¹⁴You are my friends if you do what I command. ¹⁵I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you. ¹⁶You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit—fruit that will last. Then the Father will give you whatever you ask in my name.

Then the Father will giver you whatever you ask in my name? That’s one heck of a claim.

So then, what are waiting for?

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