Monday, July 6, 2009

God Exists For Us

From time to time those who follow Christ develop a distorted view of God. This distortion can have tragic consequences is left uncorrected. The way we view God matters, in fact folks like A.W. Tozer remind us the way we view God is the most important thing in our lives. Our individual lives suffer when we have a distorted view of God, more significant, the church of Jesus Christ suffers when the people of God have a distorted view.

The way this distortion shows up is in the way we see who was created for who. Was God created for us, or were we created for God? When the visual distortion continues the people of the church begin to think it is God who exists for them. That it is God's job to serve us, meet our needs and do what we tell God to do. We are real good at putting this in religious terms, and sounding holy and righteous. Still in the end it is the same, we are trying to tell God what to do.

The reality which clears up our vision problem is that we are created by God and we exist for God. The follower of Christ, and the church of Jesus Christ exist for one reason and one reason alone, to serve God and God alone. The question of what's in it for me, is not to be a part of the vocabulary. Church members do have rights and privileges, actually they have one right and one privilege, to serve God with all that we are and all we have.

Those of us in the church have lost sight of who the church exits for. It does not exist for humanity. The church exists for God, and is build with humanity to embody the kingdom of God here on earth. It is not about our personal desires and the way we think things should happen, it is about the call of God. The church of Jesus Christ exists to serve God period. No more, no less.