Yesterday, I went to church in Gangnam. It was a church I have heard about from
several of my friends, and since I had to go to Seoul for a conference
on Saturday, I figured I’d just stay the night and check it out. I am so, so glad
that I did. First of all, it’s
huge. They have three English services.
There were over 200 people at the service I was at, and people kept making
comments about where all the people were, must have gotten an early start on
the holiday or something, which leads me to believe there are probably twice
that many people that normally go to that service. There were a ton of Koreans,
but a lot of foreigners, too, from all over the world. There were
straight, strong, American men with no Korean girls on their arms. Men praying for each other, talking about
their small groups. I cried the whole
time, obviously. The band was awesome,
and of course, as always happens when I go somewhere new or try out something
different, they started with “Bless the Lord O my Soul,” which is my favorite
worship song. It’s like when I hear
that, I know I’m in the right place. The
pastor was fantastic. He must be Korean-American. He has no accent at all, and I know he was a
youth minister in California for a time.
The sermon was a DIRECT ANSWER to something I’ve been questioning, and
even having conversations about with some friends. I saw a couple videos of healing services a couple of weeks ago…the
super charismatic kind, where there are thousands of people and everyone is
crying, and the guys on stage are healing by “fire” and whatever else they
yell, and I was really having a hard time with it. It seemed so fake and like such a show, I was
really turned off. I don’t even know if
I believe that healing still occurs like it did in Jesus's time.
Anyway, the sermon was on a passage in Acts, about the Holy
Spirit. Peter is quoting the prophet
Joel, talking about how in the end days, God will pour out his spirit, and
people (men and women) will prophesy in His name, men will see visions and
dream dreams, there will be wonders above and below. Then
the Pastor spoke about the gifts we receive when the holy spirit comes on us. And he said, “just because a gift has been
abused and misused, doesn’t mean it should be obliterated, especially if the
Bible doesn’t say it.” He specifically
brought up the example of all the people that do the huge healing services and
stuff, and he said he came from a church like that. But he began to notice in
himself that it wasn’t about God anymore. As these things were happening, he
started to get this, “I’m so anointed!” feeling. Anyway, then he told a separate story about
being with a bunch of 7th grade boys in a youth group, and he just
felt like God was telling him to pray for them, someone was sick. He said, “I’m not trying to be mystical, just
telling you what happened.” So he asked
the boys what was going on, if anyone was sick or hurting, and one of the boys
said that he had been going to a chiropractor twice a month for as long as he
could remember, because one leg was shorter than the other. So he prayed for him. And his leg came out. And the 7th graders saw it. And the pastor called him days later and told
him not to do that kind of thing anymore, because the boy’s mom was
scared! He later called and
apologized, realizing that if God was going to do something so amazing, they
should be thankful. It
just really spoke to me…just because people may be misusing or abusing the
gifts God has given them, it doesn’t mean that those gifts aren’t real, and
they shouldn’t be used at all.
I felt God's love like I haven't in a long time. That He would care enough to answer my
specific question…and the power of that just overwhelmed me. And I realized
that so many things about me need to change.
No matter how much I say I love God, and how much things have changed in
my life, I still haven’t learned to deny myself. Denying myself isn’t fun, and I don’t want to
do it, but isn’t that the point? In this
book I’m still reading, “not a fan,” the pastor/author talks about that very thing.
The chapter I read today was about a couple at his church that wanted to become
members, but because they were not married and living together, they
couldn’t. The pastor told them that we
don’t have to have our lives together to come before God, or to come to church,
but as followers of Jesus, we have to be willing to repent. The woman was mad and said they weren’t going
to do that. The pastor said, “They
wanted to be called Christians without actually making an effort to follow
Christ.” Now, I know that being a
“Christian” isn’t about what we do. It
is by grace we are saved, and that is that.
However, if after we are “saved,” we aren’t doing anything differently,
are we really saved? Do we really love
someone that we refuse to do anything for? Can we show love when we only want
to do what our selfish desires are seeking for us to do? So, that is my lesson learned this week. That is my conscious decision. There are
certain areas in my life that I have been withholding from God. I’ve been denying Him, and seeking only what my
flesh wants. I want to make an effort to
follow what Jesus has called me to do. I
need to stop making unhealthy choices. I
need to focus on modeling for my five year olds how to handle their emotions
instead of getting upset at them. I need to
become less addicted to coffee and Hot Six and more loving toward water and vegetables and
fruit. I want to continually be filled
with the Holy Spirit, which means spending more time with God in the Word, and
less time on my phone checking Facebook.
It means making a conscious effort to love people, not judge them or get
angry with them. I will fail miserably,
because I’m not Jesus. But God loves me
and has given me his Spirit and has given me gifts, and I want to be a light to
the people around me, not a downer. I
want to love people so they are drawn to my God, not scare them away, which also means I have to make different
choices when it comes to what I do and say when I hang out with people I work
with verses other believers. I realize that I can't do any of it on my own. It is only through God that I have the desire to be better, and it is only through the Holy Spirit's power that I actually could be. (That and a NutriBullet...MOM.)
Headed to bed. One more day of work and then a five day vacation thanks to the Korean Thanksgiving. In case you're interested, here is the info on the church in Gangnam: http://newharvestsarang.org.
Also check out "not a fan." by Kyle Idleman.
