Hope Begins In Him

The Purpose of Church

We do not want to talk about hopelessness. If we have time to talk, we would rather talk about something hopeful, not hopeless. However, hopelessness is real in the world, communities, families and even in churches. Don’t we all come to church to find hope? I believe everyone comes to church to find hope, not to lose hope. Unfortunately, churches encounter different challenges and sometimes, people find no hope in church from the unfortunate incidents. 

But setting aside unfortunate incidents, God’s church must be functioning in a certain way based on the purpose God has given us. One good example is this. God’s church must be a community where they shine the light to the people who don’t know God. 

“Arise, Shine; for your light has come! And the glory of the LORD is risen upon you. For behold, the darkness shall  over the earth, and deep darkness the people. But the LORD will arise over you, and His glory will be seen upon you. Gentiles shall come to your light, and Kings to the brightness of your rising.” Isaiah 60:1-3 NKJV

Jesus also pointed out the same thing when He preached sermons on the mount. 

“You are the salt of the earth; but if the salt loses its flavor, how shall it be seasoned? It is then good for nothing but to be thrown out and trampled underfoot by men. You are the light of the world. A city that is set on a hill cannot be hidden. Nor do they light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a lampstand, and it gives light to all who are in the house. Let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in Heaven.” Matthew 5:13-16 NKJV

Be the light of the world by shining the light from God; this must be the motto and purpose of the church. At  Southview SDA Church, we try to do this. We set our vision as uplifting Jesus, serve the community and enriching lives, with our church logo. We planned community outreaches, and tried to recruit more willing members to get involved with that effort and I am thankful for your service. You have done a lot, and I want to encourage all of us to do more for the glory of God. I am truly thankful for what God is doing in our church. 

But at the same time, being an active church, we need to be careful as we do more. We can find this mindset in the scripture in the book of Judges. 

Hopelessness

The book of Judges tells us stories of Israelites from the time when they entered the promised land until the time when the Israelites asked God to give them a human king. The judges were appointed by God, led God’s people but we certainly see the spiritual darkness existed in the time of judges. Their spiritual connection had gotten weaker to the point where spiritual darkness covered God’s people. The typical expression we can find from this book is this, “In those days there was no king in Israel; everyone did what was right in his own eyes.” Judges 17:6 NKJV  The exact same wording is found at the very last verse of this book as well, in Judges 21:25. Some may argue that the author was biased towards a pro-king agenda, and that is certainly a plausible explanation. But further, the Israelites, God’s people were certainly not fulfilling the purpose of God by shining the light. 

There was a guy named Micah, he stole his mom’s eleven hundred shekels of silver (27.5 pounds, about $7,164 today’s silver value) but returned it back to his mother because he was afraid of the curse that his mom put on him. His mom was touched and she said, “I had wholly dedicated the silver from my hand to the LORD for my son, to make a carved image and a molded image; now therefore, I will return it to you.” (v.3) When his mom asked a silversmith to make the image, Micah put that in his house. 

“The man Micah had a shrine and made an ephod and household idols; and he consecrated one of his sons, who became his priest In those days there was no king in Israel; everyone did what was right in his own eyes.” (vv.5-6)

Micah had his own private sanctuary, he had an ephod, which was designed for the priest, he consecrated the priest by himself. The sanctuary is a place where God dwells (Exodus 25:8-9), the ephod was for the priest to discern God’s will (Exodus 28:6) and he consecrated his own priests. Priests were consecrated by the high priest, which represents God, eventually the Messiah! But he privatized all these things to himself in his own house!

Further there are more problems. A Levite from Bethlehem, was wandering around, and when Micah saw him, asked him to join in his private sanctuary. Micah was offered a good benefit package. “Dwell with me, and be a father and a priest to me, and I will give you ten shekels (4 ounces /110 g) of silver per year, a suit of clothes, and your sustenance.” (v.10)

So Micah now has his own, a private sanctuary with filled with idols, he hired a Levite priest, who would provide all the benefits and he felt good. The problems are as follows:

  In this story, even from the beginning of the chapter, it is just odd. Nothing is right. Everything is so human centered. Even more interesting one chapter later? In chapter 18, when the people of Dan came to the house of Micah, 600 armed men threatened Micah and the private priest. 

“When these went into Micah’s house and took the carved image, the ephod, the household idols, and the molded image, the priest said to them, “What are you doing?” and they said to him, “Be quiet, put your hand over your mouth, and come with us; be a father and a priest to us, is it better for you to be a priest to the household of one man, or that you be a priest to a tribe and a family in Israel?” so the priest’s heart was glad and he took the ephod, the household idols, and the carved image, and took his place among the people.” Judges 18:18-20 NKJV 

What?! Can you believe what you see now? This human centered religious experience was totally shaped by 1) personal feeling, 2) money and 3) power. No commitment at all. When the Israelites lost their focus on their redeemer, merely learned the traditions and rituals, all this nonsense was happening. 

When we allow our human preference to take over our focus on God, and worship, this nonsense can happen. 

Here I am to Worship

In the Bible, who had all of those three things? Who had so much power so that he was able to express his feelings whatever way he wanted. He was so rich so he could do anything he wanted. I can come up with a name, King Nebuchadnezzar. King Nebuchadnezzar was the king of Babylon, which was the most powerful and glorious kingdom. He had many chances to learn and witness God through Daniel and his friends. But he was eventually convinced and it took awhile for him to truly understand God. He had a dream in Daniel chapter 4, about judgment he might face. Eventually King Nebuchadnezzar lost everything for 7 years, he became like an animal in the wilderness. But after seven years, when he lifted up his eyes and finally understand who is the true king, he praised God like this:

“I blessed the Most High and praised and honored Him who lives forever: for His dominion is an everlasting dominion, and His kingdom is from generation to generation.” Daniel 4:34 NKJV

It wasn’t when this king had power and money to do anything he wanted to do for himself. He found God when he lost everything. Nebuchadnezzar found hope in God as he found God and be able to truly worship God. 

Consumer vs. Committed 

We are living in a world where everything is available and possible when we click or swipe on our personal devices. This is comfortable. I totally agree that technology has made our lives easy and comfortable. But somehow, we have the same expectation when it comes to the community. There is nothing wrong with the different ministries we have here at Southview, and praise God for all the ministries we have so that we can reach out. I will keep working with the ministry leaders and volunteers so that these ministries will be a huge blessing for many. 

However, church is not about your experiences from children’s programs, youth programs, young adults events, Southview social events, church music and all other stuff we do. You may have been trying to find a perfect church who provides all different kinds of programs, events and ministries. But look at the early churches in the book of Acts, they did not have all these different Sabbath schools, but they came together, spent time together, praying together and reading the scripture together and experienced the amazing presence of God! And that was enough for them!! 

If you see a needed ministry at Southview, step up and build that ministry to bless others. If you see there are ministry needs, please step up, pray about the ministry and come and talk to the leaders. That particular ministry is not happening maybe because you are not stepping up. If you think that there must be a ministry, which will bless people to come to know God, that must be God’s call for you. When God calls you to do something, do it instead of trying to find that ministry somewhere else. 

Hope Begins in Him

Our hope must be rooted in God when we take actions according to His will. Our hope shouldn’t be based on waiting for somebody to bless us. God calls us to be the light, and that’s the call we have today. Pray and ask God what He wants in your life. Don’t wait for hope. Find hopin Jesus and begin your journey today.