Check yourself

DISCLAIMER: This is mainly about my church but I’m sure that most churches struggle with that same things. There are a lot of things I want to say so this is all over the place. Hope you still understand. So recently, I was speaking to someone about the things we love about Jesus, and the person I was speaking to said that he loves how Jesus said things the way they were, just like in the temple when he was flipping the tables and just wrecked everything that they were doing. He saw that it was wrong and he dealt with it. He saw that they were making the temple a place of selling things and making profit. (Matthew 21:12-13, Mark 11:15-18). So here I am, trying to do the same. So if you feel offended by anything I say in these blogs, maybe you should really check yourself or just talk to me about it because I might be wrong. So recently, at my church, I have been a bit frustrated and I thought it was because of the leaders and the lack of effort and I told them this in an anonymous survey we did, but I was wrong. There has been so much stuff going on in our church and the leaders/elders are really trying hard to make the church the best it can be because they truly love it. (If you’re an elder/leader and you’re not, you probably should start or step down). So, yes I blamed them for the way church is, and I said they were being lazy, but I was wrong and I’m sorry to everyone who I offended during all of this and I really hope to help on the journey of our church. If someone said this to me about my ministries while I put in a lot of effort, I would be heart-broken. So here’s what I was actually frustrated at. I am frustrated at the members of our church, I’m frustrated at the fact that we have 10/50 people actually come to church on time. I’m frustrated at us complaining about the leaders and everything that is going on but not trying to help in any way. I’m frustrated at the comfort of us living in sin. Every week I see members of church constantly doing this, including myself. I want to encourage you to check yourself, check your life, are you living in sin, or not putting in effort to come to church on time, or complaining about our church and not trying to help in anyway? There are so many things that we can do as members of our church to help. We can put in effort to come on time. We can stop complaining and pray and trust that God is in control of the church. We can offer our hand with the people doing things. There is another issue I have with our church, there are so many of us not doing anything. I personally believe that every member of a church should have a ministry and be doing something, so if you aren’t doing something or aren’t content with what you are doing, you should definitely start. There is plenty to do. There have been so many complaints about there not being enough youth leaders (especially female). Us as youth leaders cop so much flak and struggle a lot with only have one female youth leader (she is also very busy at the moment). So, I ask you, what are you doing in our church? There are so many things that need to be done and can be done. I’m sure that the leaders/elders would appreciate any help they can get. Another issue I have been thinking about is the fact that our church isn’t very open to new and young people. We have so many young people in our church that don’t feel comfortable to be around the older people. Why is this? In all honesty, it’s because we’re all happy to be in our small bubble of friend groups and go hang with the same people every week without including others. So please, put in the effort to include the youth into your lives, they are such great people and I’m sure would appreciate anyone that is there to help them during their walk with Christ and would appreciate more people to look up to. I can tell you confidently that there are only like max 5 people that the youth can comfortably talk to and ask for advice. The sad thing is, I could go on about what our church is struggling with, and if I was to write about what our church is really strong at, I could guarantee it wouldn’t be long. But I don’t blame any group of people for that, I blame all of us as a church because we’re all here to play a part. So in conclusion, I want to encourage you to check yourself and have a look at what you are doing for our God and our God. I also want to push the fact that everyone should start coming on time, it is really frustrating that we start at 10:15 (still with like 20 people max) every week because people don’t put in the effort to come before 10. Also, please think about your ministry and if you’re happy with what you’re doing. I’m sorry if I offended you in anyway with this, but if I did, that’s good. Means that you realise that you need to be doing more. Psalm 119:69 “When I think on my ways, I turn my feet to your testimonies;”