Things I love; my mom, apple pie, baseball, Fourth of July parades, my truck, fishing, Harley Davidson’s, my wife, and my kids. Not in that order of course. I just wanted to get that out there so there were no doubts about where I was coming from as I write this blog article. Having said that, none of these things are my first love. I am a Christian, and my first love is Christ and He in all the fullness of the Trinity is the only one worthy of my worship. Yet here is my struggle, on Mother's Day, Father's Day, Memorial Day, Veteran's Day, opening day (baseball, or fishing) or even the Fourth of July I am afraid that we forget who our first love is. I am afraid that sometimes we forget why we gather to worship and for whom we have gathered to worship. In my experience on certain Sunday' a year Jesus is forced to share the center stage of our hearts for our worship. As a pastor I always struggle with planning worship on these Sunday's, I struggle with trying to find a balance between worshiping our God and honoring our veterans, mothers, fathers, children etc.
The easiest thing to do would be not to worry about it, but even in the free church movement we have an expected liturgy, unfortunately much of our expected liturgy on these Sunday's has more to do with cultural concerns than Christ. Very seldom (a.k.a. never) do I get a complaint that our services didn't honor Christ enough but hardly a Mother's Day, Veterans Day, or Fourth of July goes by that I don't hear, "Pastor, I was disappointed we didn't do more for our veterans, mothers, founding fathers, etc." I always want to ask, "wasn't Jesus enough? If all we had to offer was Jesus would you still come?" I never do though. I never do. Instead I re-read Exodus 32 and begin planning my vacation days, (Mother's Day. Memorial Day, Fourth of July, etc.) So what do you do? How do you deal with this in your churches? What advice would you give another Pastor? Is this even an issue for you?
I look forward to learning from you,
Brian
