God's People are Passionate...

One thing I've noticed in my time in ministry. Many of God's people are passionate. Unfortunately, they are passionate about things like...

• the color we paint the church
• the kind of seating we have in our gathering place
• the coverings we have over the windows
• the style of music we play
• our expectations of non-believing visitors (we expect them to act like believers even though they are not).

As one who is called to lead worship, my heart breaks when we are so passionate about so many things without being passionate about God. When we gather to worship God together, our worship is often anything but passionate for God. It could often be described as apathetic, uninspired, lacking heart, done out of duty. The atmosphere is more akin to either attending a lecture or a funeral.

If we were only half as enthusiastic, outspoken, and passionate in our worship of God as we are about the petty things, then I believe that 85% of the churches in America would not be dying and over 4,000 churches would not be closing their doors each year.

It's clear, we're passionate, all right! Only we're passionate about the wrong things.

My encouragement to you is to look past all other things and keep your gaze upon Jesus, for "Those who look to him are radiant" (Psalm 34:5a)