Easter: Worshippers or Watchers

“God loves you as you are and not as you should be! He loves you beyond worthiness and unworthiness, beyond fidelity and infidelity, He loves you in the morning sun and in the evening rain, He loves you without regret, boundary, limit, or breaking point.”~ Brennan Manning

One of my great joys has been to serve in a church service and somehow try and help people to see Jesus. Ours is not slick and polished service. In fact we don’t want to be. Real? Yep. Honest? Sure. Churchy? Nope. It’s one of the places where raw honesty meets illuminating truth through amazing grace. A place where we come out of hiding, quit trying to seem impressive, and acknowledge our total dependence on God and the reality of our sinful situation. 

On the cross the open arms of The Crucified reached out to feel the pain and suffering of you and me. Think of it as God in the flesh, here to absorb the guilt, rejection, shame, and failure of the ones He calls his brothers and sisters. One writer says, “ He did not come to us with the crushing impact of His glory, but by the way of weakness, vulnerability, and need. Jesus was a naked, humiliated, exposed God on a cross who allowed us to get close to Him. The world doesn’t understand this type of vulnerability.

Have you experienced that moment of truth when defenses fall and the masks drop, in an act of humility? You see, the Kingdom of God, in a sense, belongs to people who aren’t trying to impress anybody, even themselves. They aren’t plotting how they can draw attention to themselves, worrying about how their actions will be interpreted, or wondering if they’ll get gold stars for their behavior. This is sometimes very obvious on Easter morning in churches. Between the looks and the “ likes,” the specials and the spectacle Easter can become more about people and polish than the Person of Jesus. 

So on Sunday, lets choose to worship, not just watch, participate not just spectate. The heavy lifting has already been done. His arms, opened wide for us on the cross was His move, now what’s yours? Here’s a start. He said, “Come, repent and follow Me.”

 I hope you find a Good Friday and Easter service to attend…and bring a friend. It could be life changing! 

There’s No Place Like Hope,

Stefan!