What I love about Sundays

So I was not expecting to write on this blog as much as I am, but I just have so many new things to share!

Today was Sunday (obviously) and crew are able to attend church held in our hospital with patients and the staff, a local church with locals, and a church/worship service at 7 pm on board. My friend, Fred, who is from Ghana and has been with Mercy Ships since 1999 (when it was YWAM) invited me to a local church with him, so me and some of the people I went off ship with yesterday left this morning around 9:45 am. When we got to the church, I was freaked out to say the least. A man was in the front yelling into the microphone. I followed Fred all the way up to the front row and before I knew it, Fred started yelling! The more I listened, the more I realized they were praying! What?! In America we pray quietly and to ourselves! Ohh no! These people were shouting and walking around and lifting up their hands! After about 15 minutes of this, the chorus began singing. Now luckily this church was english speaking, but for everything someone said in english (aka really broken english with a thick accent), someone followed up and sometimes interrupted them in french. It was safe to say, I only understood about half or maybe one fourth of the whole three hour service.

Worship was the best part! These people danced their way into the front of the church and made us follow them! They were clapping and dancing and shouting along with the choir! These people were so on fire with Jesus and most of us Mercy Shippers were looking around at each other kind of wide eyed and clapping occasionally. Who are the poor, broken, and miserable ones now? Certainly not the locals. The Pastor touched on a few things that really spoke to me (or at least a few things I could actually understand)

• God wants us to take another position
• When we are together, we are stronger and The Lord is glorified.
• If God literally opened our eyes and allowed us to glance at all of the evil He does keep out of our lives, we would fear and love Him the way we should.
• Obedience is more important than sacrifice.

During worship, boys in the choir would take turns sharing the microphone and sing. When these people sing they don't just sing, they shout, they dance, they sing praise with every bit of their soul. I have never seen worship this intense in America, no where even remotely close. One of the songs sang "God you are good".  I noticed this boy with a beautiful voice singing during part of the song. After the service was over, all of the locals came up to us and shook our hands while saying something like "May God bless you" or "God be with you". The young boy with the beautiful voice who was probably about my age or a little younger came up and shook my hand. He introduced himself as John and told me he was from Liberia. He proceeded to tell me that he escaped the war when he was five and has been living here ever since as an orphan. He sleeps in the market and comes to church every Sunday. I asked him where he learned his english and he told me from the church (obviously he is an avid church-goer). My group was leaving so I had to say bye to John. I shook his hand and told him I would pray for him. On the way back and all day I have thought about John.

What do I pray about for him?

You're probably thinking "Okay Emily obviously pray for this boy because he is an orphan with no where to live."  Well yes, at first I began to pray for John asking Jesus to come into his life and bless him. Then I remembered where I had first seem him. He was in the choir, worshipping Jesus with such passion and enthusiasm, and he was singing with his WHOLE heart "God you are good". 

Let that sink in.

This boy with NO family, NO place to live, and would seem has nothing good in his life, is praising and worshipping God and firmly declaring that God is good. I think Jesus is in his life and has blessed him.

I don't mean to sound like your sterotypical missionary or whatever you want to call it, but we question the goodness in our lives that God has blessed us with when our boyfriend/girlfriend breaks up with us, when we don't get into the college we want to go to, or even if we don't get the grades we want. Image praising God and declaring He is good if your family and home were taken away from you and you were left to fend for yourself in the slums. Would we believe that God is good and faithful in our lives at that point?

Americans often think we are the blessed ones. We have all the money and comfort and food and families and homes and the list goes on! After church this morning, I disagree. Watching all of these people worship the same God I worship and pray to the same God I pray to with much more intensity, love, passion, faithfulness, and honesty than I EVER have made me jealous. The bible says not to be jealous of your neighbor, but I must confess that I was straight up jealous. I yearn to know Jesus like these people do! My only desire is to rejoice in The Lord and love Him like these people so genuinely do. The promise and truth of Jesus is all these people have to cling onto. They can't distract themselves with nice cars or lavish vacations or any of the wordly things we so accesibly have. We often think "Wow I feel bad for the starving people in Africa who don't and probably will never have it good like we do" and although being homeless without food or health care is awful and we should help these people, the "starving people in Africa" who believe in Jesus have it good with The Lord.

Maybe you have realized this. Maybe you don't think this way. Maybe you're perfectly happy with your spiritual life (exsistant or non exsistant) I don't mean to disrespect anyone or their beliefs. I don't want to tell anyone they're wrong because they aren't! For my whole life I thought this way though and I think a good amount of people do. Not because we mean to, but because we don't know any better! We must realize that this is the reality though. We all hear stories about the "Starving kids in Africa". Well people, it's true. They are here, but they are worshipping a good and faithful God.

 Next time things don't go the way we want them to in our lives, will we still proclaim him good and faithful?

If you could pray your own prayer for John, that would be awesome.

"God is FAITHFUL, who has called you into fellowship with his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord." 1 Corinthians 1:9