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About Jesus Steve Sweetman Worshipping
Outside Of God's Will God told Jacob to return home toCanaan
after being away for 20 years. Jacob
was specifically told to move to Bethel. He did return to Canaan,
but not to Genesis 32 and 33 tells the story of Jacob's return
home. His brother Esau
invited him and his family to live with him and his family.
Jacob agreed. However,
when Esau headed home, expecting Jacob to follow, Jacob headed the
opposite direction to Shechem.
Once Jacob settled in Shechem he built an altar to
the Lord and called it "El Elohem Israel", meaning, "God, the God of Israel". (Genesis 33:20) His
building project may sound like the godly thing to do, but I think it
was a bit presumptuous. God
wanted Jacob to worship in
Israel
has followed
in Jacob's footsteps, seldom worshipping where God wanted, and how He
wanted. The more I study the
Bible, the more I see that the church is no different than Israel. Like Jacob, we have our
building projects. We
worship the Lord in a place of our own choosing, and in a way of our own
choosing. The general tendency for Israel
was to drift from God into humanism and idol worship.
Generation after generation grew up believing the religion they
inherited was what God wanted, but that wasn't always the case.
They were so far removed from God that they didn't even know they
were removed from Him, thus failing to know what He wanted.
I think much of the western church today is in the
same situation. We think
we're in the center of God's will when in fact a lot of the church is so
far removed from God we don't even know we are removed from Him, thus we
don't know what He wants either.
As in Old Testament days, the prophets must rise up
and call us back to Biblical Christianity. Our
wandering into a humanistic approach to faith, worship, and church, must
end. We must repent, and
find our way back to the Bible, rediscover what Jesus wants for us, and
leave our humanistic ways behind. |