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Love The Lord

Love the Lord Your God with all your heart, with all your soul and with all your strength…and love your neighbor as yourself.

I am writing this from a teepee in the middle of the woods in Georgia. We are on the Sixth Grade Mystery Trip. Our adventures started with a trip to the Hindu Temple in Lilburn, Georgia. It is a beautiful temple, the largest outside of India. This was the first trip where the guide talked about tenants of Hinduism. To say that the temple is breathtakingly beautiful is an understatement. There are thousands of hand carved images from lotus flowers to multi armed goddesses adorning the walls, pillars, arches and ceilings.  It is designed to draw your eyes from the earth to the heavens. So the higher you look, the more beautiful and intricate are the carvings.

While we were there the temple was open for worship. The worshipers would stand in front of a statue of one of their deities and lay completely flat. Then they would stand up, put their hands in a prayer fashion then bow down again. They do this six times. There was even a child with his dad doing this.

So why do we go to a pagan temple? It’s because of the discussions that come out of the experience. Here are a few:

1. Do you think any of their worshipers would ever play on their phone or talk to the person next to them? They said “No!”

2. Do you think that they complain about coming here to worship? They said, “No!”

3. Do you think that they are unkind, mean, cliquey or gossipy to each other?  Again they said, “No!”

4. Do you think that they welcome all people of all colors and from all backgrounds to join them in worship? They said “Yes!”

Then we discussed how we as Christians act while we are worshiping the One True God. How we don’t pay attention, how we treat each other, how we save seats for people and talk bad about each other.

We talked about how our worship and respect of the Only One True God should far exceed that of those who worship idols.

Around our campfire last night, we talked about how our God, the only One True God, wants to have a relationship with us. He wants to have a friendship with us. He wants us to love, serve and know Him. We talked about prayer and having a quiet time.

The guide kept talking about how to get to their god. It was through living a good life, treating people kindly, through prayer and meditation. We talked about that too. We came to the conclusion that we are going to have to change our ways because those who are worshiping idols, such as a boy with an elephant’s head or a man who is blue from drinking the oceans, take their worship far more seriously than we do.

So I ask you the same thing, how seriously do we take our relationship with the One True God? Do we spend any amount of time in prayer? Do we have a consistent time with God each day? Do we allow sports and other leisure activities to keep us from worshiping together in the House of God? Here is the big question, do we treat God as our Creator, Savior and Lord or do we just go through the motions as one who is worshiping wood, stone and metal?

Brother Greg

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FOCUSED

One of the casualties of aging to which I find myself a victim is the dimming of the eyes.  Ecclesiastes 12 counsels the young person to remember God, their Creator, in their youth before the aging process takes over and various faculties, as listed in verses 1-7, are diminished.

Clear eyesight when we are young may be something we take for granted. However, as we age the realization that our vision is not as sharp as it once was takes hold. “Readers” become standard fare for all intricate tasks. Our once keen laser sharp focus is now blurry and in need of help to restore its youthfulness. That restoration is found through glasses or some sort of rejuvenating surgery. Especially in the early stages of this degenerative eye problem we may be able to fake it and get by, but eventually we must relent and do something to correct the problem.

There is a parallel between physical and spiritual vision. “Turn Your Eyes Upon Jesus” was written in the early 20th century. The hymn writer, Helen Lemmel, was strongly influenced by the artist and later little-known missionary, Lilias Trotter. Miss Trotter started off as an aspiring artist but early on felt a call from God to reach the lost. She began her ministry by rescuing prostitutes from the streets of London. Later she went to Africa, without missionary funding, and served for over forty years. While there she penned a poem that would greatly influence the writing of the hymn “Turn Your Eyes Upon Jesus.”  The poem was entitled “Focused: A Story and Song.” 

The poem centers around focusing one’s attentions fully and completely upon God. She writes that Satan knows that if a person uses all their powers of concentration on being led by God’s Spirit, they will have a great intensity and impact upon those to whom they are called to minister. Lilias Trotter, writing in a more formal use of the English language than we are accustomed, shares some timeless insights which could very easily have been written today but with a different accent. She writes: “Never has it been so easy to live in half a dozen good harmless worlds at once—art, music, social science, games, motoring, the following of some profession, and so on. And between them we run the risk of drifting about, the ‘good’ hiding the ‘best’ even more effectually than it could be hidden downright frivolity with its smothered heartache at its own emptiness.”

The “good” hiding the “best” leads us to emptiness.  Could this be true of us today especially as American Christians? Have we sought the “good” while missing the “best”? The chorus of the hymn, which we will be singing in worship this Sunday, says it best.

                Turn your eyes upon Jesus, Look full in His wonderful face,                                                                                                                                        And the things of earth will grow strangely dim in the light of His glory and grace.

Keith Pate

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