Monday Matters

Had a kind of tough day yesterday. Since I'm a pastor, you should interpret that to mean that Church didn't go well. Wasn't for lack of effort on the part of any of our leaders. We were here, prepped and ready to go. And I had a sermon I was excited about because I believed it had real potential to help people move closer to God and farther away from their fears. Music went well - we have put more time and effort into that lately than ever (by we I mean Bunny, the band, and the vocalists who practice hard).

But for whatever and a variety of reasons, turn out was low. God sent us some visitors or it would have been even lower. Thanks, Father.

Now I'm going to write something I don't want you to misunderstand. So I'll preface it by saying that I know that the Holy Spirit was here and the size of the crowd didn't affect that. And that since I've been doing this for quite a while now, having preached to crowds of hundreds and in one memorable Sunday evening - to just TWO, numbers are just numbers and I'm going to give it everything I have every time I get the opportunity believing that God will use it and whoever and however many are here deserve everything I have to give. They got it.

Now back to what matters. When you aren't here in church, whether here is New Hope, the Crystal Cathedral, Mosaic LA, FBC whatever and wherever... it hurts the cause of Christ. I am not going legalistic on you. Just stating the fact that your attendance matters a great deal - more than you know. That person you would have been sitting by needed a listening ear and yours wasn't present. Your voice would have made a difference too during the singing. Yes, even your voice. That kid you always speak to never got his weekly dose of encouragement. The little old lady you compliment left without one. You were missed.

When you aren't here, we are less than we ought to be.

Priorities. Priorities.

If you only knew.