Different Worshippers and their Common Perk in Life

I have heard of intellectual worshippers before. I am pretty sure I initially assumed that the term was a nice way of saying, “You’re a scardy-cat.” Now I think very differently.

If an emotional worshipper ( and I assume that it what I would be coined) is someone who feeds off of feeling God’s Presence and having an emotional encounter with Him, then I assume an intellectual worshipper is one who feeds off of having new levels of understanding about God and having intellectual encounters with him. Hmm.

At least that’s what I thought. There are down sides to both: With an emotional worshipper, they may struggle whenever they don’t feel God. Also, they must learn how to go through life without feeling like everything is good and feeling like God will come through. On the other hand, an intellectual worshipper might struggle when they do not understand God. Along these same lines, they must learn how to of through life without understanding everything and understanding that although God will come through, it is on His terms, not ours.

I have always been an emotional worshipper, so life is basically over when I do not feel like everything is going dandily. Up until yesterday, that is. For the past few months I have had to keep going with the public face that everything is okay. Sometimes I felt the need to do this with my friends because it seemed idiotic to me to be down all the time. I was constantly urged to not meditate on the negative. “You can’t do that, you have to trust God. You have to think on all the good that has come out of this and know that good will come out of it.” To which I mentally responded, “Because every time something good came out of the pain and frustration, more bad trailed behind it. Yeah, so that makes perfect sense… Focus on the positive while life and God screw you over. Yeah… what an idea.” These things should not be uttered out loud, just to warn all of you. You will either cause them to draw back in surprise and hurt OR you will light their fire and they’ll repeat what they said in hopes that by hearing their lecture three more times you’ll get it through your skull. Both of these types of people love me dearly and I am blessed to have them in my life.

I needed to hear their words of encouragement and spurring on—even in lecture (a.k.a. emotional torture) form. I also needed to be left to hurt at some points, like yesterday. Yesterday I came home from church and driving around with some family members, and I had to stew in my room. I looked back over the day and realized that nothing had gone bad, nothing big. I also realized that I was livid. My heart had been broken (something I had to let happen for my own good) and I wanted to know what God expected me to do and to have the desire to do it. I was not happy with just getting by; what reassurance did I have that the next time He would be there to help me by again (like say, in the next five minutes??)?

I can say that two things have kept me going, kept me seeking Him, two reasons why I have not done a lick of homework, two reasons why I am joyful despite the frown you may see on my face right now: Obedience and taking an honest look at God’s Word. So if God told me to pray about something and I did not know what to pray or was afraid to pray (for fear that He’d answer… another story), I would ask Him to do as He willed to do in that area, life, situation. And when He nudged me to read His Word, I did so with brutal honesty… and was very much changed with the encounter. I believe that is when I began to appreciate intellectual worship. Because while my heart was a bloody mess of an organ, my mind was being renewed by Truth. It did not matter that bad things would continue to happen, it did not matter that my friends were so much more intelligent and hopeful than I, and it didn’t matter that my future husband was someone I was not too keen on praying for.  All that mattered was that God was who He said He was, and if He wanted to grow me up during this breaking season and tell me to trust and obey, well then by His Grace I was going to do just that.

There is hope for us emotionally and intellectually-based worshippers alike. His name is Jesus; head-bang into His Grace and find hope and life J

God is SO good! Reality has set in. Dreams I had wished to acquire sooner seem to be put off until later. Pain is a real part of life and must be experienced if I am to grow in Christ and compassion. People will not understand and people will not always be there. What we want takes effort on our part, and this is only the beginning. Where is the joy in all of this? Where is the hope? In the very first line, the very first word. GOD. He is so good! Why? In all of this, He has given me reassurance time and again that He is ever faithful. Sometimes that comes about by His arms circling around me, sometimes in the moments I sense He calling me to worship Him through an unforeseen (by me, not Him) hurt. No matter what, when I reach for Him and determine to love and trust my Faithful Friend, He is ever there. Goodness, even when I don’t, He reaches out to me in one way or another. But this is a relationship. He came 99.999% of the way. It is my job to come that measly .001%. Even when that fraction of a step costs me even more pain and wondering if it’s really worth it, the Holy Spirit reminds me of the suffering Jesus did for me—the cross, the being misunderstood, the beatings, the talking to people who just would not receive Him—and I have the strength to reach up to my heavenly Father and receive His Grace and Renewing Love. I tell you what, when I am weak, He is strong. I’ll take His strength over mine any day.

Pain

For years, my heavenly Father and I have had this discussion about pain and how I tend to cling to it. A little while ago He showed me that outside of Him, the only other thing I saw as constant was pain, and so I clung to it (me having this fear of people I love leaving me, and whatnot). After He helped me let go of pain and not pursue it like an imaginary lover I was determined to make mine, the I began to cling to Him in fear. He had just begun to break me of that yesterday when I, without realizing it, picked up pain’s hand again. He told me to let go, and I did, but not willingly; for some reason, even though I know that my Savior and friend will never leave me, my flesh still deems it a great idea to find other gods to run after…

This morning while I was worshiping Him, God told me, “The enemy has no power compared to mine. He can tear apart, but I can fix. He can cause storms, but I can move mountains. He can cause pain, but I can heal.”