Monday after Easter
Well, I’m back at work. I’m currently at my desk, it’s 11:09am and I’ve just been reading stuff on churches all morning.
Church yesterday was alright. I was actually not that into it. Could it have been the late nights and the movies? I don’t really know.
The speaker spoke on a few things that I felt funny about… very much along the lines of the prosperity message, God will bless you back if you give, etc etc… financial breakthroughs, selling his own books, speaking about big, grand churches and location, spending money on building the church, God filling teeth with gold and diamonds, faith and prayer, perseverance, complete physical healing, limbs growing…the worst of it all, bargaining for people to accept Christ into their lives after speaking on all these topics, “I’m looking for one more out there…ok, one more thank you… you know what, let’s try this one more time… one more to put up their hands…”
Has Jesus’ sacrifice for us become so cheap? Are mega churches that important? Will God really prosper us in monetary value if we do give? Are miracles just for the sake of being miracles? How will gold fillings enhance my faith? It just sounded way too victorious for me. How can I believe that when over in Iraq, Christians are celebrating Easter by braving the war and uncertainty to go to church? I think their faith has more clout than gold fillings any day. Am I questioning the work of the Holy Spirit? Why doesn’t God just heal the tooth? I don’t know… I shouldn’t be skeptical but it does scare my spirit when I hear such things. It doesn’t sound right. Sure, limbs growing back is freaky…
I mean he was ok in some parts but I just didn’t like how he was glorifying the church … so will it make me more of a Christian if my church is the landmark of KL? I can strut around and say I am part of this church… but the truth is, if a gun is pointed at my head tomorrow asking me if I believed in Jesus, does the church matter then?? The focus is wrong. I guess then people would say ownership and church but… church doesn’t need a glorious building to be succesful. It’s the fruits that are produced that hold my weight in my opinion.
Then he was marketing his own books, selling a conference, asking us to go for it… it’s on financial breakthroughs and I don’t know… giving money was another issue…sure, giving is not of the devil because then you touch more lives with it but then he then said things like … if you give, then God will give back. God blessed us with money but again, you’re limiting God if you say that if you give God all your money he’s sure going to give you back more because he’s faithful and he’ll see you are faithful… what if he doesn’t give you back more? How will this affect your faith? Won’t you say God is a liar then because he is not “honoring” his promise? So we can all be rich (money-rich) if we believe in Jesus? I don’t know about that… ‘cos I’m not… HAHAHAH….I look at the slaves in America who had so much faith but were in captivity, who were beaten, who were bonded as people who were more victorious… they proclaimed the peace from God… listen to the Negro Spirituals…
All this talk about mega churches, money, prosperity, gold, diamonds…it seems to go against what the church leaders that govern the church that I am a member of have talked about over the last few weeks. Just last week, our pastor was talking about healing… his views on it and it seemed different than what was preached yesterday. We’ve been studying the gospel of John and we’ve been looking at Jesus’ miracles and we’ve decided that the miracles weren’t just done for the sake of it… Jesus said many times, “How many times do I have to do this for you to believe?” I’m paraphrasing… he knew that miracles wouldn’t give people the faith… some of the people just lived on miracles…
I don’t think such a message that was given to us yesterday, on Easter Sunday what more, was appropriate for the day. Easter is about Jesus’s Resurrection, his gift of life and what that means to us… his suffering for our sins… taking upon himself our wrongdoings as His own….purifying us with His blood… allowing us the chance to stand before God again… giving us the chance for an eternal life…not about being rich in Jesus… or getting gold fillings… or faith that come from believing such things. Faith is not that shallow… faith can’t be obtained with money… faith is a reflection of our intentions… God looks at the interior, not the exterior…sure God wants us to be victorious in Him but we are already… if He does bless us with extra then yes… praise God but it shouldn’t be the basis of of our faith…
Sure we should believe the impossible with God but … alll that was said yesterday was feeding on man’s desires… on secular desires…
Somehow yesterday’s message, left a sour taste in my mouth. However, some people thought he spoke really well. I don’t know. Maybe I’m jaded…
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Right, that was my rant of the day.
I slept at 12 last night… after sleeping at 4 the last few nights…
