Bible

Why I Left Church

/ EllieJ

You probably don’t know me. If you do, there’s a good chance you don’t know my whole story. I’m not shy about it, but neither have I been terribly public about it. But the truth is, my “story” is a part of who and what I am today and has been a major contributing factor to my current journey.

My journey is my own. I know of many people who are walking a similar path and many who will never set foot anywhere near it. I’m not saying that my way is the right way and your way is the wrong way. I simply want to give context so that maybe you will have a better understanding of where I’m coming from.

As of the writing of this post, it’s been a year and a half since I formally requested a release from the church I had been a part of for over seven years. In those seven years, there wasn’t an area of ministry I had not been involved in in some way or another. From janitorial and building improvement, to kid’s and youth ministry, men’s and women’s ministry, small groups, corporate prayer, graphics and media, worship, and even preaching, I had done it all. I did it for years without question. That was how I’d been raised. But then something changed.

I started to read my Bible—not so different from what all of us who profess to be Christians should be doing, but I wasn’t just reading it and putting it away, I was reading it looking for something to take with me as I went about my day.

The change started slowly. It was (and still is) exciting. I was seeing the Bible in a different way and making connections I’d never seen or heard of before. And while I was making connections on one hand, I was seeing a disconnect on the other hand. The Church of the Bible didn’t look much like the church I was so busy “doing.” I’d read about what Jesus was doing and how He was teaching His disciples, but failed to see how that had been translated in to what I was doing for the church.

Let me be clear, I am in no way knocking the local church. I believe there is a place for it, but I also believe that we all need to take a close look at our part in it and why we do what we do. Most of what I was doing for the church had little or no biblical foundation. Before you get all riled up, I strongly encourage you to look into this for yourself. Forget everything you think you know about what church should look like and go to the Gospels to see exactly what Jesus said He would build. If you’d never been exposed to church in your life and read the first five books of the New Testament and then walked into a church building, would it meet your expectations? Be honest.

The first week after leaving church was strange. I’d never intentionally skipped out on a Sunday service a day in my life. The next week was even more strange, as was the next. I eventually settled in to a new routine and actually found myself able to relax on weekends instead of spending Saturday preparing for Sunday and spending Sunday doing everything I’d prepared for on Saturday. There was no rest for me on the “day of rest.” Without “doing” church, I found rest. I felt like I could breathe again, never having realised I’d stopped doing that somewhere along the way.

Why do I put “doing” in quotes? I think there is a massive difference in going through the motions of church (activity in a local organised body)—the doing—and being the Church (the global body of Christ).

Before COVID hit, I’d attend a local denominational congregation every once in a while. After spending 20 years as a worship leader, I missed corporate worship. I also met on a weekly basis with several other people who found themselves on a similar path. We were all in need of fellowship and encouragement to help with the healing process.

Fast forward to today. I’m part of a local small group with no church affiliations and I’m also part of an online small group with a church affiliation. Both groups are family to me. If the lockdown ever ends, I have no plans to join another local congregation.

Most people would rather forget 2020. I don’t. 2020 was a year of immeasurable growth for me. I learned so much that I wouldn’t trade for anything. I’m learning to forget what I thought I knew and open my mind and heart to what the Bible actually teaches. Verse-by-verse, I’m exploring what it really means to be a part of the Church Jesus said He would build—and I don’t have to be a part of something men are trying to build to do that.

Being a part of the body of Christ is not the same thing as being a member of a local church. The two are not the same thing. I’ve known of people who were involved in a local church that never made a commitment for Christ and I know many strong believers who never darken the door of a church building.

I think this pandemic has offered churches (and their members) across the globe an incredible opportunity to redefine what it really means to be a believer. Many leaders are embracing this time and are re-evaluating and redirecting so that when they are allowed to open the doors again, nothing will be as it was. It’s my prayer that believers everywhere, in establishing a “new normal,” also take this time to re-establish themselves, not in a local church, but in Christ.

What is truth?

/ EllieJ

Pilate looked at Jesus and said, “What is truth?”

As silence filled the room, Pilate went back out to where the Jewish leaders were waiting and said to them, “He’s not guilty. I couldn’t even find one fault with him.

John 18:38 (TPT)

What is truth? could very well be the most imperative question in society today. In a world of my truth and your truth, what is the truth?

TRUTH: Conformity to fact or reality; exact accordance with that which is, or has been, or shall be.

Noah Webster’s 1828 American Dictionary of the English Language

The fact that Pilate felt the need to pose his question before Jesus leads me to believe that truth was as difficult to find in ancient Jerusalem as it is today. Many people will tell you what they believe the truth to be, but how much of that believe system is actually true?

It is the personal responsibilty of each individual to discover truth for ourselves. We cannot depend on what others may know or think they know or even want to know. In the end, we are all accountable for what we know—intimately experience.

Truth goes beyond fact. Jesus declared Himself to be the Truth.

Jesus explained, “I am the Way, I am the Truth, and I am the Life. No one comes next to the Father except through union with me. To know me is to know my Father too.

John 14:6 (TPT)

The Passion Translation footnote says that the Truth is the True Reality. What we see and experience in this plane of existence isn’t Truth. It’s a shadow. Jesus, the Light of the World, is the lamp that guides the way to Truth—Himself.

Pilate may have been sarcastic in his question, he may have just thrown it out there, or maybe he really wanted to know. We cannot know his attitude, but we can (and should) know our own. Do we really want to know the Truth? Or are we content in our blindness? We need to be willing to let go of what we think we know if we ever expect to know the True Reality.

If anyone comes to Me (responds to the good news of the kingdom), and does not hate (release attachment to) his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sistersm, yes, and even his own life (all the masks we cling to in relationship to others and ourselves), he cannot be my disciple. (Cannot follow Yeshua into an experience of the kingdom now present within all.)

Luke 14:26 (NASB), amplification by Ted Dekker, Rise of the Mystics

As a bit of a celebration for my first post in this new season, readers can download for free my visual commentary page for John 18:38. One day there may be a complete commentary, but for now, it’s simply verse-by-verse.

Visual Commentary – John 18:38Download

If this content has helped you in any way, please consider making a small donation so that I can keep digging deep and creating it to share.

Introducing Verse-by-Verse

/ EllieJ

Before diving right in to this new phase, I want to give an introduction of how and why this commentary has come about and will continue to come and evolve as it goes.

All that has come before has led to this.

The story begins in 2017 when I decided to read the Bible cover to cover in a year—not just read it, but get something out of it. Daily: A Year in the Word of God was born. What began as a new spiritual journey for me ended the year with a series of 13 four-week devotional books with my thoughts regarding some of the scriptures I’d read every day throughout the year. In 2018, my plan was to once again read through the Bible in a year, forcing myself to dig deeper. My original intent was to end the year with another publication.

Sometime in the spring of 2018, God finally got my attention. It turns out I’d been reading my Bible looking for my next blog post rather than the True Reality of Jesus Christ (John 14:6 TPT). So the posts ended and my reading continued. As summer hit, I hit my own block. I felt like I’d run into a wall. My spiritual well felt as though it had run totally dry. So I actually set my Bible aside and started picking up some other books hoping to jar myself out of the funk I’d found myself in.

Books like The Way Back: How Christians Blew Our Credibility and How We Get it Back by Phil Cooke, Letters to the Church by Francis Chan, and Pagan Christianity by Frank Viola started to open my eyes to a version of Christianity I’d never even dared to dream about.

By the time 2018 ended and 2019 began, I was ready to embark on a new journey. Little did I know how deep down the rabbit hole it would take me. On January 19, 2019, I opened my Bible to John 1:1 intent on discovering for myself who Jesus really is and what He really said about His Church.

Nearly two years later, I’m still gloriously mired in John’s gospel. The road has been bumpy (bumpy like a Saskatchewan back road in spring) and it has been long. I’ve experienced more pain than I thought I ever would. But I’ve also experienced joy. Best of all, I’ve experienced Jesus. I’ve come to know Jesus in a light that all my years of church involvment and attendance never prepared me for or introduced me to. For many, 2020 has been a year of hardship and trial. For me, it’s been a year I’d never trade for anything. As I dig deeper into the scriptures I’ve found Jesus in every word of every verse of every translation.

Verse-by-Verse is my way of attempting to share some of what I’ve discovered on my own journey. Nothing I’ve discovered is linear. It’s not a road. It’s more like the Amazon River, running deep and wide while spreading out fingers into any place it finds purchase. Be patient. Don’t rush. And don’t get frustrated if nothing seems to be in order. An incredible thing about God is that He exists outside of space and time and everything fits together within Him. It really all work out in the end because it has already been worked out.

I invite you to join me in this amazing journey. Ask the big questions. Ask the strange questions. Don’t dismiss ideas because they might not align with what you’ve always been taught. You may be as surprised as I have been at the answers you receive.

If the world hates you

/ EllieJ

The world. Unredeemed society, estranged from God, held in the grip of sin and the evil one, blind to spiritual truth and hostile to those who have the life of God in them… Hostility is rooted in spiritual dissimilarity.

Everett F. Harrison, The Wycliffe Bible Commentary

More and more, it would seem, the world hates the Church. I don’t believe that it is so much because we carry a message of hate—our message is quite the opposite—but that they do not understand our message. It’s different than what they’ve been told to think. Talk to anyone who is militantly against faith in Christ. More often than not, they don’t even know why they carry so much anger or hatred nor do they know enough of the Bible to make any relevant argument against the faith.

As frustrating as this can be to Christians around the world, Jesus gave us fair warning.

If the world hates you, keep in mind that it hated me first. If you belonged to the world, it would love you as its own. As it is, you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, That is why the world hates you.

John 15:18-19 (NIV)

People fear what they do not know and that fear can easily be turned into hatred. A child may claim that he hates all vegetables. As it is unlikely that he has tried every vegetable in existence, it can be assumed that their conclusion of dislike for all produce stems from either a bad experience with vegetables or a fear of the unknown. That which hasn’t been sampled can seem strange and different and uncomfortable.

The world’s ignorance is the true cause of its hatred to the disciples of Jesus. The clearer and fuller the discoveries of the grace and truth of Christ, the greater is our sin if we do not love him and believe in him.

Matthew Henry

The mention of Jesus, however, elicits a far stronger reaction than broccoli. Most people who claim to hate Jesus along with those who follow him really know nothing about him and what he really taught. Their opinions are often based on hearsay or that one bad experience. Because we don’t share common values or beliefs, we all become like vegetables—hated for no other reason than being a vegetable, or in our case, Christians.

There are those who believe that, if Christians would just act more like the rest of the world, it would be better. Wrong. It wouldn’t be better. Jesus called us out of the world. We shouldn’t look like the world. That’s like a mother mashing cauliflower and carrots into the potatoes to make her kid eat vegetables. Sure, the cauliflower is still cauliflower and the carrots are still carrots, but they’ve been blended in with the potatoes so much, you can no longer tell what’s what. The original substance, texture, shape, and flavour has all been lost.

How did Jesus respond to the haters? He loved them. It is our love for one another and our love for the world that sets us apart.

But I tell you who hear me: Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you. If someone strikes you on one cheek, turn to him the other also. If someone takes your cloak, do not stop him from taking your tunic. Give to everyone who asks you, and if anyone takes what belongs to you, do not demand it back. Do to others as you would have them do to you.

Luke 6:27-31 (NIV)

Read: 2 Chronicles 17-19, John 15

The Word

/ EllieJ

The first five verses of John’s Gospel may very well be my favourite verses in all of scripture. One could study them for a whole year and still not grasp the full weight and complexity of their meaning. Previously, I’ve been focused on the Light, but today, the Word jumped out at me.

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

John 1:1 (NIV)

Revelation 19:13 speaks of Jesus and his name is the Word of God. So, one could read the first verse of John like this:

In the beginning was Jesus, and Jesus was with God, and Jesus was God.

If Jesus is the Word of God, what does the Bible have to say about the Word?

…so is my word that goes out from my mouth:
It will not return to me empty,
but will accomplish what I desire
and achieve the purpose for which I sent it.

Isaiah 55:11 (NIV)

In this context, Jesus had to give himself up as a sacrifice for our sins because that is what he was sent to do. And if God’s Word, Jesus, will accomplish what God desires, Jesus had to achieve the purpose for which he was sent.

For me, this is another one of those big revelations that needs time to roll around and fully form. Read these verses again for yourself and see what God is speaking to you through His Word.

Read: 1 Kings 14-15, John 1:1-28

Losers

/ EllieJ

I think it would be fair to say that most of us do not relish being losers. We all want to win. At everything. But there are some cases in which losing will gain us far more than winning ever will.

But before all this, they will lay hands on you and persecute you. They will deliver you to synagogues and prisons, and you will be brought before kings and governors, and all on account of my name. This will result in your being witnesses to them. But make up your mind not to worry beforehand how you will defend yourselves. For I will give you words and wisdom that none of your adversaries will be able to resist or contradict. You will be betrayed even by parents, brothers, relatives and friends, and they will put some of you to death. All men will hate you because of me. But not a hair of your head will perish. By standing firm you will gain life.

Luke 21:12-19 (NIV)

Anyone who tells you that life as a Christian will be sunshine and roses is a liar. The Bible makes no guarantees that, once we put our faith in Christ, our lives will be stretched out before us like a freshly paved highway on the prairie. It’s more like a narrow path through rock, jungle, desert, and ocean. In just a few statements Jesus told his followers that they will be betrayed by those closest to them, that they will be hated, and that they may even die. But don’t worry, not a hair of your head will perish!

Though we may be losers for Christ, we shall not, we cannot be losers by him, in the end.

Matthew Henry

To those new to the faith, it may seem that Jesus is asking a lot of us. Maybe too much. He’s asking for our lives. If we don’t fully understand the benefits that are afforded to us as believers, we may well be unwilling to do all that Christ asks of us.

But whatever was to my profit I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. What is more, I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them rubbish, that I may gain Christ.

Philippians 3:7-8 (NIV)

For one who has only faith in themself, it is difficult to understand how a follower of Christ could be so willing to give up everything—become a loser—for someone who existed thousands of years ago. But even in the face of complete and utter loss in this life, we have gained far more than they can ever know unless they, too, come to an understanding of the grace by which we stand. We have already won because Jesus has already won. Christ has already defeated the one thing which the world cannot—death. And because we are in Christ, we have already won as well.

Losers in this life we may be, but we have already gained everything in the next.

Read: 2 Samuel 17-18, Luke 21:1-19

Sovereign

/ EllieJ

SOVEREIGN: Supreme in power; possessing supreme dominion.

I doubt many of us have anyone in our lives we’d consider to be supreme in power or possessing supreme dominion. And most of us would probably like to keep it that way. But one man, a very long time ago, recognised someone as supreme—sovereign.

What more can David say to you? For you know your servant, O Sovereign Lord.

2 Samuel 7:20 (NIV)

This wasn’t the only time David referred to God as Sovereign Lord, either. Seven times in this passage, David repeats the moniker.

Maybe you’re a believer in the meaning behind numbers in the Bible, maybe you’re not. But no matter how you put it, saying something seven times over the span of eleven verses seems rather significant, and maybe more so because of the importance of the number seven.

Seven, you see, is the number of completion or spiritual perfection. We see it first in Genesis. On the seventh day, God rested because creation was complete. In the account of David, God has just announced to the king though the prophet, Nathan, that David’s kingdom will endure forever. God has made an everlasting covenant, a covenant that will never be broken. That’s some pretty weighty news for a man who was anointed king as a shepherd boy in the field.

David responds by referring to God as Sovereign Lord, acknowledging God’s supreme dominion over him. For many men, news that their lineage would last forever could have gone straight to their heads. But not David.

Do as you promised, so that your name will be great forever. Then men will say, ‘The Lord Almighty is God over Israel!’ And the house of your servant David will be established before you.

2 Samuel 7:25b-26 (NIV)

Hundreds of years before Jesus arrived on the earth, God’s covenant with man was made and acknowledged to be complete by the man with whom the covenant was made. David couldn’t have known that his lineage wouldn’t sit on an earthly throne forever. Nor could he have known that God Himself would plant a seed in one of his descendants. A seed that would grow up to be known as the Son of David.

God, though, being sovereign, knew exactly what He was doing when He made such a great promise to David. He set in motion an extravagant plan to save mankind from their sinfulness. Unlike David, God knew that the man with whom He made a covenant would stumble and fall. So would his son who succeeded him on the throne. And so would countless others in the long line of King David.

Yet it wasn’t so much the obedience that God was looking for—He knew the standards He set before men were impossible to keep, but He was looking for willing humility.

For the Lord takes delight in his people;
he crowns the humble with salvation.

Psalm 149:4 (NIV)

David’s humility earned him a crown which led to salvation for all. Like David, we can never know the far reaching effects of our willingness to set ourselves aside and acknowledge God as Sovereign Lord, supreme in power. The best that we can do is humble ourselves before the Lord, accept what He has so freely given to us, and continue to chase after his heart like David did.

Read: 2 Samuel 7-9, Luke 19:1-28

Waiting room

/ EllieJ

Sometimes life, for all it’s hurry, seems like a long stint in a waiting room. When you’re a kid, you wait to grow up. When you grow up, you wait to find the right person to spend the rest of your life with. When you’ve found that person, you wait to start a family. And those are just the big things. We wait for bedtime. We wait for the alarm clock to ring. We wait to start work and we wait to finish work. We wait at lights and stop signs, checkouts and check-ins. And in all that waiting, what are we really doing?

Israel had waited a long time to obtain their promise. When God sent Moses to get them out of Egypt, it should have just been a few weeks at most before their arrival in the land of milk and honey. Instead, it was over forty years. And that was just to get across the river! There was a lot more waiting involved once they crossed over. By this time Joshua, a young man when he was first sent to scout out the land, was old. He’d seen a lot in his day. He’d led Israel into their promise and fought with them to take hold of it. And after all that waiting, Israel still waited.

So Joshua said to the Israelites: “How long will you wait before you begin to take possession of the land that the Lord, the God of your fathers, has given you?”

Joshua 18:3 (NIV)

Here Israel stood, in their promise. And they stood around waiting to take hold of it. They got exactly what God told them He would give them and still they waited.

This week, Major League Baseball begins a new season. My team is the Toronto Blue Jays. I’ve followed the team all through the off season and have watched as many spring training games as have been aired on television. I know that there were some pretty major trades since the fall. I know some players got healthy, while others will begin the season on the disabled list. I also know that, through the spring, the coaches and trainers have worked with all of the players to make sure that they’re in the best shape they can be, that they know their roles on the team, and know the plan for the team in the season ahead. They’re prepared.

Let’s say that opening day arrives and the Blue Jays take the field at Rogers Centre. Pitcher J. Happ takes the mound and the first Yankee in the lineup steps up to the plate. The Jays stand in the middle of the field as though they have no idea what’s going on.

Joshua must have felt like the manager of such a team. All that time, preparation, and waiting led them to where they were and then they waited while all that time, they could have been taking possession of a fruitful land!

I bet God feels that way with us sometimes. He’s given us everything we need to succeed. We have what we need to see His many promises come to pass. But most of us sit waiting for something to magically happen.

I understand that some people may be waiting for a word from the Lord regarding a specific situation, but that’s no excuse to put everything else on hold. The Bible is our rulebook, playbook, and instruction manual all in one. It has guidelines on how we should live, methods on how we can do it, and practical examples of how others were able to accomplish it.

We can add to all of the waiting we must already endure or we can take Jesus’ lead and go out and take hold of God’s promises for us. The Blue Jays are going to do everything they can to win the World Series this year. They’re not going to wait for it to come to them, because it won’t. It takes hard work, endurance, and determination. The same went for Israel as they took the Promised Land. And the same goes for us if we want to see God move on our behalf.

Read: Joshua 116-18, Luke 5:1-16

Lessons learned

/ EllieJ

There are many ways that people learn. Some learn in certain ways better than others or by a combination of methods. Some of these methods are:

  1. reading
  2. speaking
  3. hearing

I was homeschooled in my early years. Once I could read on my own, I could go off, read my lessons, and complete my assignments. I still love learning through reading.

Once I began public school, I learned that not everyone could be so easily self-taught. Some of my peers struggled through silent reading time. There were kids in my class who had to hear the lesson in order to retain the information. And there were students who had to repeat main points back to the teacher to ensure that they grasped the concept. And there were some still who used a combination of these things, as well as others, to learn.

In the days of Moses and Joshua, silent reading was almost unheard of. When the Book of the Law was read, it was read aloud.

Do not let this Book of the Law depart from your mouth; meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do everything written in it. Then you will be prosperous and successful.

Joshua 1:8 (NIV)

Do you know that only 19 percent of churchgoing Christians read the Bible daily? (A Christian is considered to be churchgoing by attending church just 3 of 8 weeks.) It is no wonder that the Word of God has so little power in our lives.

Consider this, if every professing Christian were to read a portion of the Bible every day, how would you expect the world to change? If we all read the scriptures out loud, would there be even greater change?

Consequently, faith comes from hearing the message, and the message is heard through the word of Christ.

Romans 10:17 (NIV)

If just over 7 percent of Christians read their Bibles daily, it is no wonder the church has lost its influence on society. It is no wonder we are perceived as weak hypocrites.

There is a reason why God was so emphatic about Joshua keeping the Book of the Law near him.

Be strong and very courageous. Be careful to obey all the law my servant Moses gave you; do not turn from it to the right or the left, that you may be successful wherever you go.

Joshua 1:7 (NIV)

Our success, both personally and as the body of Christ, I believe, is based entirely on our grasp of the Word of God. Most Christians have never seen a move of God. They don’t even know what it’s supposed to look like because they’ve never read or heard about it. The more I read about all that God has done, all the miracles Jesus performed, the power that came with the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, the more I crave those things. I yearn to see God move the way He did in the days of the early church.

Our mouths are required for a move of God. We need to open up our mouths and pray. We need to speak the Word of God with boldness and courage. We won’t see the Word come to pass until the Word passes our lips.

Read: Joshua 1-3, Luke 1:57-80

They are your life

/ EllieJ

They are not just idle words for you—they are your life.

Deuteronomy 32:47 (NIV)

How often do we read through the Bible and see nothing but words on a page, a combination of letters, spaces, and punctuation that may or may not carry any meaning for us? God did not merely say a bunch of things so that we could have a big book of nice platitudes. He gave us, through His word, life.

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. In him was life, and that life was the light of men.

John 1:1-4 (NIV)

Far more than just ink on a page, the Word of God can bring life to us. It can bring hope in a hopeless situation. It can bring joy in sorrow. It can be light in the darkness. God’s words are never just words, they are your life.

And the closer we keep those words to us, the more effective they will be for us.

No, the word is very near you; it is in your mouth and in your heart so you may obey it.

Deuteronomy 30:14 (NIV)

Neither God, who is life, nor His words, that bring life, are far from us in any moment.

Now what I am commanding you today is not too difficult for you or beyond your reach.

Deuteronomy 30:11 (NIV)

God, and the life we receive through his Word, are never out of reach.

Read: Deuteronomy 31-32, Luke 1:1-23