My Life for the Gospel

The last few months I have been church shopping in hope to find a place I can call home. Today I may have found that place in Every Nation Church. A few days ago as I was sitting at the Starbucks on my school's campus, I overheard some girls behind me witnessing to another girl. Encouraged and excited, I approached them afterward to tell them how great it was they were sharing the gospel. We got to talking, and I asked them about their churches. One of them talked about Every Nation. I was immediately excited by it because she said the young adults group was going through the book Crazy Love, which is written by Francis Chan, whom I admire tremendously. The fact that the church is about a mile and a half away from my house didn't hurt either. :)

So this morning I was excited and hopeful to try yet another church out, and I am so glad I did. I was actually on time this morning (which, if you know me and my family this is an unfortunately rare occurance) so I got to enjoy all of the worship. The worship was definitely contemporary, with a full-blown band. I could care less about contemporary verses hymns verses whatever else, but what I loved about this experience is people were so excited! More people than not had their hands up, people were clapping and not to a beat, they were clapping as in a round of applause for Jesus, others were dancing and just when my conservative-brought up self was beginning to feel a little bit anxious, the woman leading us in song prayed "in our worship today, we are not chasing after a feeling or emotion, we are chasing after YOU God." This is how I imagine worship should go, considering we are coming before the King of the Universe!

The message today was on missions, as part of a series they have been doing. The pastor spoke on the great commission, reminding us that it is not called the great suggestion. He pointed us to Romans 10 vs 14-15 which say "How then will they call on him in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone preaching? And how are they to preach unless they are sent?"
He reminded us that there are still over 2 BILLION unreached people! Anyway, the fire and the vision of this church was evident in my hour and a half there. This is a vision I can get behind.

In closing, he invited us to stand and say "My Life for the Gospel" if we were serious about making necessary changes in order to live passionately and sold-out for the gospel. I joined many others in standing to say this, so I am committed. I will be writing further on this in future days. But I just wanted to share my excitement in finding what I will hope will be my new home.