I struggled last week with posting anything on Facebook. It was Holy Week, Palm Sunday, Good Friday, Easter Sunday, and I struggled with seeing all the memes created to hopefully draw people into church buildings. Several of them were good they were on point and really made you think. A few were Biblically incorrect all together which bothered me but I know the heart behind them was not to deceive, the heart was to encourage people to go to church on Easter Sunday. I just couldn’t bring myself to share about coming to church on Easter Sunday. I did have a couple friends I invited personally but I invite them to church every Sunday it was just the normal weekly, “see you at church tomorrow?” call that they have gotten good at saying sure thing and they never show up.
I didn’t understand why I struggled, why I couldn’t bring myself to share the Easter schedule for my church even. I have been meditating and pondering this in my heart and I keep getting drawn back to a chapter I read the other day in the Bible, 2 Samuel 21. I know it’s not a chapter most people have deeply considered. But it really surprised me! It’s a part of David’s story no one talks about! I had no idea this happened in David’s life. This is why I have been loving reading through the whole Bible one chapter at a time. I have learned so many stories I was never taught in Sunday school doing this.
In 2 Samuel 21:15-22 David had to fight the giants of Philistines AGAIN. He had to kill Goliath’s brother and relatives. You see it was way back in 1 Samuel 17 that David was a boy and had the faith to stand against Goliath. It was when he was just a young man he had the belief and knew God could and would kill the giant in front of him.
All the chapters between 1 Samuel 17 and 2 Samuel 21 are filled with David’s life story. He lived on the run from Saul, he won wars, he sinned, he mourned his sins and repented, he lost his son, he fought more wars, he had to run away from his own son trying to take his throne away, he fought more wars and won as long as he kept his eyes on God. He lost another son that he mourned deeply even though that son tried to steal his throne. He had spent most of his life fighting a battle of some sort and the one time it records he did not go to war to fight is when he was caught up in sin and life turned very bad for him, which left him fighting a spiritual battle.
David had won many battles and now he was an old man and who pops back up to fight him again, the relatives of Goliath, more giants. Not just one this time but four. Four giants to defeat and the fourth one was described with deformities. After all the life he has lived what pops back up but more giants that take him back to his first battle of his youth and some of these giants have taken on new forms.
At this stage in life, was David able to defeat these four giants? His faith should have been even greater now as he has seen all God has done in his life, he has to be able to right? But no the Bible says “David became weary.” David became weary and his friends and commanders and the people whom he had surrounded himself with all his life came to his aide and killed these giants for David. And they kindly said to the king “you shall not go out again with us in battle so that you do not extinguish the lamp of Israel.” His people saw he was tired and weary and they knew he was the one to keep Israel in tack. They stepped up beside him and loved him to help him, protect him, and fight his battles for him.
As I pondered all this last week, it seems there is a very important lesson to learn and I want to share it with you.
I know many people who tell me “I don’t need to go to church to worship God I can worship Him wherever I am.” Yes that is true and I hope we all truly do just that, worship God everywhere we are! Worship Him with every breath and every moment of our lives.
However, remember that feeling you had when you first decided God was who the Bible says He is. That excitement when you realized Jesus was the Messiah and died for your sins and with the simple sinners prayer you were saved. Remember that first giant you killed with deciding to follow Christ with your life? That decision was truly your first giant you had to fight on this walk of life with many many more battles and wars to fight in life. And when we get weary after years of fighting who do you lean on?
When we are weary and tired who are your friends and commanders and your people who are going to help you fight those giants who pop up all of a sudden? If you have chosen to believe you can do life walking with Jesus without any fellow Christian soldiers walking beside you, you don’t need church on Sundays, who is going to be there to step in and kill the new giants that pop up in new forms and the the old forms.
I personally have recently seen some old giants I once slayed popping back up in my life. Old clutches, struggles, things I thought were long in my past just pop up again and I have to fight them off again. I have been trying to fight them off alone, on my own without telling others I am fighting these battles again. And I am weary! I need my people to gather around me and help me fight these mutated relatives of the old giants. I need my people that are fighting the fight for the lamp of God to not be extinguished along side me. I may even need them to take me aside and tell me to just sit down and do nothing right now, because all I am doing is putting the whole thing in jeopardy by trying to fight a fight I am too weary for. I need my people who love Jesus! I need to be surrounded by people who have also made the decision to follow Jesus wholeheartedly because they understand the battle and the giants that are coming at me.
Where do I find these people to be my people? How do I gather this tribe of people? By finding a place with likeminded people who are fighting the same fight. In modern day America we find those people in the church buildings. We find our tribe because we find a church that fits us, that we can be comfortable and sometimes they make is uncomfortable when there are battles that need fought, and that’s a good uncomfortable! But just showing up to church on Easter Sunday and Christmas doesn’t give you people to have your back. You have to chose to go regularly, get involved, love others and allow others to love you! I believe the reason I didn’t want to invite people to come to church on Easter Sunday because I want you there in my tribe, with us every Sunday of the year! Not just on Easter!
With the crazy way this world is going we need each other now more then ever and it’s only getting worse. We need to have our people surrounding us regularly so we can help each other fight the new giants that pop up in life.
As much as this barn has brought a whole group of people together with a common love for the things of old times. If you are on this site you have a sentimental enjoyment of the old barn that has drawn us all together. But even with all this barn has shown us and taught us, and done to bring us together, it is still just an old barn, and if it stands til Jesus comes back it will just be a barn that is gone with the old earth. If this precious old dilapidated barn can bring us together how much more should the choice to follow Jesus with our lives bring us together. We must stick together in this world so when we are all tired and weary we have each other it fight our giants for us!
So if you went to church on Easter Sunday awesome! Now come again this Sunday! Make it a habit, find a Bible teaching church that you love the people in and get involved. Make them your people and be a person who helps others in that church! Find your tribe for Jesus and your people who will fight your mutated giants for you!
Don’t just show up in the building the church meets in, become part of the church.
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