This is Us

True & Proper Worship

Some American Christians are obsessed with showy worship. We love the lights, the fog machine, the drums -- all of it! It’s easy for us to assume that if we are caught up in a flurry of emotion then we’re close to God. We mistake how we feel in the moment for how close we are to the Spirit of God. However, when we think that way, all it results in is us chasing one emotional high after another, rather than truly following and “walking in step with the Spirit,” (Galatians 5:15).

Instead of this running after emotions, the Bible describes a people whose worship flows from their walk of obedience. Paul writes in Romans 12, “Therefore, I urge you, brothers and sisters, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God - this is your true and proper worship.”

What Paul means here is that in view of Jesus on the cross we are meant to offer our bodies and our lifestyles sacrificially to God. Paul thinks so highly of this that he calls it our “true and proper worship!" For from this baseline of obedience we are able to experience a union with God that goes beyond the moment and instead pervades our entire bodies and our whole lives!

Imagine how different our worship services would be if we gathered in genuine celebration for the work God has been doing to make us more like him! Rather than having the expectations on the band or the worship leader to drum up emotion for us -- we bank our whole worship on the work that God Himself has done and continues to do by the power of His Spirit.

This sort of worship is the worship that is expressed in response to the mighty resurrection power that God has extended to us in order to raise us from sin and death to righteousness and life - and it’s something that we can experience today if we truly present our bodies as the “living sacrifices” they were always meant to be.

Ryan Lunde
Young Adult Ministry

by Ryan Lunde

Searching for Worshipers

Imagine being a first-century Jew who traveled to Jerusalem for the annual Passover. You have made this journey dozens of times, but this time it just feels different. For hundreds of years the words of the prophet Zechariah have not been fulfilled: “Behold, your king is coming to you; righteous and having salvation is he…” (Zechariah 9:9a). After the nation has waited hundreds of years, you finally see the one Zechariah anticipated, you see Jesus of Nazareth “humble and mounted on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey” (Zech. 9:9b). He’s here! Messiah! You want to honor the king but all you have is a song, a palm branch, or your outer garment. Because He is worthy, you use what you have to worship your Messiah saying, Hosanna! “Blessed is the King who comes in the name of the Lord!” (Luke 19:40)

Whether it's first century Israel or 21st century North San Diego County, God is looking for the same excitement from people in worshiping the Messiah. In John 4:23 we see Jesus say to the woman “(t)he Father is looking for those who will worship Him that way”. He is looking for people who are willing to humble themselves and approach Him with an honest heart. The location of the worship doesn’t matter; the status of the worshiper doesn’t matter, but a right heart attitude is required. In his letter to the Romans, Paul would put it this way, “present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship” (12:1).

The Father is searching for worshipers who have the right heart. Will you join with others in the church in worshipping today whatever you may be doing? Hiking, chores, work, and school are all places where we can present our worship to God. Going back to first-century Israel, the Pharisees were among the crowd of people and were close enough to tell Jesus that he should tell the people to stop praising Him. Jesus responded by saying, “I tell you, if these were silent, the very stones would cry out” (Luke 19:41). The Father will find worshipers, the only question that remains is whether it will be the rocks crying out, or us, presenting our palm branches and garments, or perhaps a song and scrubbing dishes.

Greg Hill
Faithkids

by Deb Hill

Worship In Truth

by John Riley

Worship in Spirit

“...the Father is seeking such people to worship him.” - John 4:23

What is the Father seeking? Well, the simple answer is, “such people.” But if you read the phrases before and after this sentence, you will find that “such people” refers to the “true worshippers” who “worship the Father in spirit and truth.” Now, I understand the idea of worshiping in truth… that makes sense. Clearly, if you worship a golden calf that you just made from your Great Grandmother’s hand-me-down gold earrings, you will have to know that this is not worshiping in truth. There is nothing true about an idol. We must worship the one true God who made himself known in Jesus. That makes sense to me. What is a little more unclear is, what does it mean to worship “in spirit?” Now, the next phrase after the passage above says that “God is spirit.” So, does that mean that we need to become like God and become a spirit to worship God? I don’t think so, in fact, I really hope not. If that were the case, that would mean that I have never actually worshipped God and that I would have to lose this body (I would have to die) to worship God. That is not what Jesus is saying here. Jesus does NOT say that “the Father is seeking spirits to worship him.” It says that he is seeking “such people.” The Father is seeking PEOPLE! People like you and me, who worship in spirit.

So, the good news is that God is not looking for people to somehow get out of our physical bodies to worship. He isn’t wanting us to enter some sort of spiritual trance. He wants us to worship him as people… but a certain type of people… a spirit empowered people. Instead of thinking of being “in spirit” as another place that is outside of your body, think about it as the power that animates all that you are. You see, in Genesis 2:7, it is the breath of God that animates the previously lifeless body of Adam and makes him a “living creature” (ESV). The word that is translated “creature” here is the Hebrew word, nephesh, but the interesting thing is that the more common translations of that word include things like “soul” or “spirit” or “life.” What was breathed into Adam was the animating power that gave him life. When Jesus says that the Father is seeking people who worship “in spirit” he is saying that he wants people who are worshiping him out of a renewed spirit. Remember, the good news is that the old is gone and the new has come. We have been crucified with Christ. You could even say that our old spirit has died, and when we trust Jesus, we are given a new spirit … a new animating power. That is where we now live. That is where we worship from. We worship with, we worship in, and we worship out of a new source of strength.

So, next time you worship God, think about the new source of power that you have been given and allow yourself to worship “in spirit.”

Josh Rose
Teaching Pastor

by Josh Rose

We Are a Temple

Have you ever played Jenga? It is a simple game made up of small blocks stacked upon one another. The point of the game is to keep removing blocks and stacking them on the top, so the structure keeps getting taller and taller until someone removes the wrong block and the whole structure comes tumbling down. My kids loved this game and when they were little, I would keep placing blocks back in weak areas so the structure wouldn’t fall too quickly! It is a good metaphor for the spiritual family or temple we are a part of.

God is building his church and keeps putting more and more pieces together. As God does his work, we see how important the foundation is. Jesus, the cornerstone, must be the base for everything. The spiritual temple is built on his life, death, and resurrection. He gives stability, safety, and the ability to keep building. The woman at the well in John 4 became one of the pieces that were being moved and placed back in the structure, then God worked powerfully to bring in so many more. Jesus was not worried about the physical structure (mountain nor temple, verse 20), he was building up the spiritual body, creating a family that could keep growing.

Individually we are “temples of the Holy Spirit” (1 Corinthians 6:19), God resides in us! He gives us new life (Titus 3:5), gifts to serve (1 Cor. 12:11), and the ability to live for him (Galatians 5:16). God does this for a purpose, to bring us together as one church and one body (1 Cor. 12:13). This way we are built together to become a holy temple and we can become what God is building us to be.

God is building us together while working in us individually. It is not separate or mutually exclusive, God instead is weaving it all together for his purpose and our benefit. As he works in each believer's life, he joins us together to build his kingdom and uses each one of us for a bigger purpose. He wants us to work together for his mission, his people, his church. The question for us is- will we allow Him to work in us and will we join his community? If you need help with either part of this question, will you let us know so we can help?

Pastor Jeremy Johnson
Family Pastor

by Jeremy Johnson

Examine the Questions Asked

Mark 2:1-17 records two stories about healing, sort of. In both stories, “the teachers of the law” were present and asked questions that revealed the distance between their perception of what they were seeing and their understanding of what they were seeing.

It is sad when this happens to people, but it is common. There can be a great divide between one’s perception and one’s understanding, a divide between perception and truth.

A quick look at the stories: In verses 1-12, four men carry a paralyzed man on a mat so that he can be healed by Jesus. The crowd of people seeing Jesus inside a house was so big that they couldn’t get the paralyzed man close. Therefore, they brought him up onto the roof and made a hole in the roof so they could lower the man straight to Jesus. Jesus sees the faith of these men and then says to the paralyzed man in verse 5, “Son, your sins are forgiven.” Interestingly, this isn’t the heart of this story, what comes next are questions from the teachers of the law. In verse 7 they ask, “Why does this fellow talk like that? He’s blaspheming! Who can forgive sins but God alone?”

In the next story, verses 13-17 Jesus invites the tax collector Levi (the later named apostle Matthew) to follow him, and Levi immediately got up from his tax collector booth and followed Jesus. They went to Levi’s house for dinner with Levi’s friends. While there, the teachers of the law ask Jesus' disciples in verse 16, “Why does he eat with tax collectors and sinners?”

In both stories, anger accompanies the questions. If you didn’t picture anger or disgust along with those questions, read them again and imagine a kind of righteous indignation coming from the teachers of the law.

I wrote righteous indignation above in order to evoke a certain kind of feeling in your mind, but honestly, it should have been un-righteous indignation. Was Jesus blaspheming? No! Was Jesus able to forgive sins? Yes! Was Jesus wrong to eat with tax collectors and sinners? No! The problem was not in what Jesus was doing but in the minds of the teachers of the law who refused to see Jesus for who he was and what he was here to do. Jesus came, according to his words in verse 17, which is what makes the second story about healing, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.”

What do your questions about life and the people around you reveal about your perspective? Spend some time considering the big questions you have and ask God to help reveal what those questions indicate about the way you see life, see Jesus and see his mission and your part in it today.

Pastor John Riley
Jr. High Pastor

by John Riley

In the Presence of Pain

Mark 2:15-17:

"While Jesus was having dinner at Levi’s house, many tax collectors and sinners were eating with him and his disciples, for there were many who followed him. When the teachers of the law who were Pharisees saw him eating with the sinners and tax collectors, they asked his disciples: “Why does he eat with tax collectors and sinners?” On hearing this, Jesus said to them, “It is not healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.”

A few years ago, a movie called Hacksaw Ridge came out detailing the life of Desmond Doss, a pacifist during World War II who refused to touch a weapon but served in the Pacific theater as a combat medic. In April 1945, Doss and his battalion fought along the ridge where Doss was credited for saving the lives of 75 soldiers during one of the most horrific days of fighting and was later awarded the Medal of Honor upon his return to the states. Despite the dangers faced, he continued to venture into areas with wounded and hurting people in order to bring them rescue.

As we witness in the story of Jesus dining with the tax collectors and other sinners, we see a willingness from Jesus to enter into (and seek out!) the company of the wounded and broken in order to bring about restoration and healing. We see Jesus enter into people’s brokenness and pain and ultimately bring spiritual restoration and salvation to many.

In the battlefield of the world for the hearts and souls of people, there are many who are being wounded. There are many who are hurt. What do we see Jesus doing in these situations? We see him entering into people’s brokenness and embracing them with grace and truth. You see, Jesus is not afraid of people’s pain but I admit, sometimes I am. Why are we afraid of other people’s pain? Maybe it’s because we try to carry the pain of others only meant to be carried by Jesus. Maybe it’s because we haven’t allowed Jesus to enter into our own pain to experience the healing and peace that only he brings. We are people of pain, it’s the effects of living in a broken world. We love, we lose, we lament and yet Jesus enters into our pain and whispers to us tenderly that there is hope.

The world is a spiritual and emotional battlefield that is full of broken people desperate for hope. You and I, we are the medics. We are those who allow Jesus to enter into our own pain and brokenness to experience healing that we then offer to others. May we be reminded of this sacred duty to be bringers of hope in the presence of pain.

Seth Redden 
HS Pastor

by Seth Redden

The Doctor Will See You Now

When I was about 8 years old, I fell on broken glass and cut my leg badly. My dad picked me up, wrapped a towel around the wound, and rushed me to a crowded waiting room in the doctor’s office. He sat down without explaining the injury to the receptionist. When blood began to soak through the towel, the receptionist noticed and took me to see the doctor immediately.  The doctor cleaned and stitched up the wound while Dad held my hand to comfort and encourage me.  Dad knew where to take me to get help. When he saw how afraid and anxious I was, he stayed with me to encourage me and give me hope. The receptionist saw the urgency of my situation, and she knew the only one who could heal me was the doctor. Both Dad and the receptionist brought me where I needed to be.

Jesus invites people to “come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.” (Matthew 11:28). What about people who don’t know how to come to Jesus or won’t come to Jesus without someone to comfort and encourage them? A person who needs someone to actually bring them to Jesus.

Have you ever brought someone to a place where you knew they could find healing? What about healing for wounds that are not outwardly apparent? Wounds that are revealed through a person’s attitudes and actions like the blood that leaked through the towel on my leg. What about the person who needs to be lifted out of the mess of their past life?  Someone who needs to have feet set on a rock and given a firm place upon which to stand – a fresh way to start life over. (Psalm 40:2) A person who might need you to bring them to Jesus?

Just as my dad knew without a doubt that a doctor was the only one who could repair the cut on my leg, I know that Jesus is the only one who can heal, repair, and restore a damaged, weary, and burdened soul.  Just as my dad and the receptionist both had faith in the doctor’s ability to heal me, I have faith that Jesus has the power to heal others. Will you love someone enough to bring them to Jesus for healing and restoration?

Sharon Chapman
Truths that Transform Leader

by Arianna Quiroz

Maslow and the Messiah

Abraham Maslow created an explanation for how human needs work and how we try to fulfill our needs at five basic levels. Essentially the first level is our physiological needs (Basics: breathing, eating, etc.). Then are we safe, are we loved/belong, how we feel about where we are, and the top of the hierarchy is self-actualization (are you okay with who you are). When you think of our hierarchy of needs and we apply it to this story in Mark 2 about the paralyzed man, we see how Jesus has a completely different idea of what is really needed. Jesus knows what we need, better than we do.

The man and his friends came to Jesus because he needed healing. His basic needs were not being met, so they came to Jesus to find healing and find a better life situation. The man's friends knew Jesus was the best chance to have his life’s basic needs met. When they cut the hole in the roof and lowered their friend Jesus saw the real need. Jesus simply said, “Son, your sins are forgiven.” This was so much more than just fixing the man’s body so he could get his basic needs met. Jesus addressed the real need, the real problem, and created a hierarchy of needs that our world doesn’t want to believe. Jesus revealed through his words, sin has to be forgiven before other needs can really be met. Fixing sin is the first need to be met so God can heal everything else. The brokenness that sin brought to humanity, needs healing and that only comes through the forgiveness Jesus can offer.

For most of my life, I’ve tried to make sure my needs and the needs of the people around me are met.  I enjoy cooking and making sure people are comfortable, but Jesus looks at our hearts and wants to make us holy and righteous. He wants to bring us into his family so we can find what we need in God first, not just comfort. Will we let him actually take care of us, will we allow him to really forgive our sins, or will we try to do this on our own? Here are two things I am going to ask you to do: 1) Spend some time with Jesus and ask him to show you where you need him today.  2) Like the friends in the story, who do you need to share the hope of Jesus with?

Pastor Jeremy Johnson
Family Pastor

by Jeremy Johnson

Carrying the Corners

Have you ever heard yourself say that you can’t force someone to seek help; they have to want it for themselves? I’ve said those words myself, but as we studied Mark 2, my view started to change. Four men saw a paralytic, looked at the packed entrance to the building where Jesus was teaching, and decided to take matters into their own hands. The reality was that the paralytic was not able to help himself, so if he was going to get to see the physician, he had to have help.

These four men took four corners of a mat, cut a hole in the roof above Jesus, and lowered the mat with the paralytic to a position where all he would have to do was say, “yes, please heal me.” Who were these four men and what role might each of them have played in the life of the paralytic?

One man may have held the corner of faith. Without faith, these men would not have dared to disrupt such a large gathering and go to the work of destroying a building. They had faith that Jesus would heal otherwise they would have not attempted such a feat.

A second man may have held a corner that declared the truth. The paralytic was most likely painfully aware of his physical state. Yet how many people do we encounter on a daily basis who are in denial of their broken state; numbed by drugs, food, or toxic beliefs? John 8:32 says that the truth will set you free. When in bondage though, freedom is often only a distant dream. A good friend will continue to speak the truth in love even if the truth hurts.

The third corner may have been held by an encourager. This man provided hope, telling the paralytic to hang on; the journey was not going to be easy but healing and wholeness were waiting on the other end.

And the fourth? He may have been the prayer warrior. He was the one who called out Scripture, declaring that the Physician was the way, the truth, and the life. He would cry out to God asking for strength to endure.

Stop and think about a time when you were struggling and needed someone to come alongside you and offer one if not all four of these forms of assistance. Has there ever been a time when you knew in the depths of your soul that you needed healing but you also knew that you couldn’t do it alone? Making the final decision to receive healing or forgiveness does belong to the person seeking help, but that person, while crying out on the inside, may not have the ability or willingness to ask. Their brokenness may have them crippled; unable to stand and seek help for themselves. As followers of Jesus, we are called to carry one another’s burdens. That may require shedding light on sin by speaking bold, honest truth, and by having faith that God can heal even when the crippled person has lost all hope. It will require encouragement and prayer, but what a privilege it is to carry a corner for a friend in order to bring them to the feet of Jesus, our forgiver, our healer, and our source of all hope. Jesus is our Great Physician.

Lynette Fuson
Director of Care & Counseling

by Lynette Fuson