Hands and Feet of Christ

Wow... I look at my last post and wonder where I fell off with posting.  I guess life just got busy.  Plus, I start wondering if posting is even important anymore.  Do I have anything anyone really wants to hear?  Am I supposed to sit back and battle through the emotions quietly while the rest of the world passes me by?

The struggle is still real for me.  I wake up every day just going through the motions. I question myself all the time.  I question what my purpose is mostly.  I question God constantly.  Why is He allowing this season of life in our family?  I question my feeling toward the church constantly.

I guess that brings me to the purpose of this blog today.

We are supposed to be the hands and feet of Christ.  We are taught that very same thing at a young age.  However, why is the church the BODY but not the hands and feet?  We need our hands and feet to do things in life... at least make them easier.  The church needs the hands and feet as well.  If we are just concerned with the body, we are neglecting things outside our own bodies.  By using our hands and feet, we are normally doing something for someone else.

So, why do I feel like the church has abandoned us?  Why do I not want to go to church anymore?  I ask these questions to myself daily.  I have no desire right now to be in church and my heart aches because of that.  I have always loved being part of the ministry of the church.  However, I feel, that since I've needed that ministry in my life, no one has stepped up to provide it.  Now I know why people get so disenfranchised with the church.  I am not asking for handouts... by no means.  But, just one day, it would be nice if someone actually prayed with me and not told me "I'm praying for you."  I think my stomach is sour from hearing those words.  Do you know how many people have said "I'm praying for you"?????  Countless people have said that.  However, are they really?  or are those empty words?

I feel like I have abandoned everything I know to be right.  But, the issue I am having is that so many other people I talk to feel the same way.  They are also disenfranchised with the church as well.  And the church sits back wondering why membership has fallen off or why their programs are not working now when they once worked.  The church is not meeting people where they need to be met.  They aren't willing to minister outside the body with their hands and feet.

This whole year and a half I have had the opportunity to sit back and be ministered to.  However, I haven't felt anyone taking their time to minister to us.  And, this hurts me to my core.  Yes, we have people who have checked on us from time to time.  I do not want to say we haven't been reached out to at all because that would not be true.  Sometimes I wonder if it is me.  I don't know how to accept the help maybe.

Before the stroke happened, we had people all the time reaching out to us to host a get together in our home, to go to their home for an evening or even just to go out to dinner.  Since the stroke, I can count on one hand... yes ONE HAND... how many people have asked us to do anything at all.  This hurts so much.  It is like now we do not exist in some people's eyes.  We aren't worthy of friendship anymore.. or so it seems.

I wish I had the answers.  I wish I didn't feel this way. I wish my view of the church wasn't what it is today.  Do I still believe in God?  YES.. emphatically yes.  I believe more every day that I have abandoned God and He is still holding onto me.  However, do I feel like the church is doing anything to help?  NO.

Do we as the body of Christ even know what it means anymore to be the hands and feet?  I believe the church believes in their programs... in their ministries WITHIN the church.  We need to be more focused on OUTSIDE the church.  We need to focus on people who will not step foot inside the church because of all the hurt they have experienced there. Putting fliers on people's doors and inviting them to Easter service or VBS this summer isn't meeting people where they need to be met.  Why don't we go to the Emergency Rooms of hospitals and pray with people who are battling for their sanity while a loved one is battling for their life?  Why don't we go to the baseball field and hand out water on a hot July day to baseball parents who have found their Sunday church on the baseball field?  Why don't we go to the bars and figure out why people find their god in the bottle of beer and with the camaraderie of the people they can commiserate with there? Why do we hole ourselves up in the church building waiting for people to join us instead of joining them and meeting their needs where they are?

I am just as guilty.  When I was attending church, I did not feel the need to get out of my comfort zone of the church walls.  I was fine when people were coming to me but going out to others wasn't in my vocabulary.  Yes, I went on mission trips.  It is easy to minister to people who live somewhere else in worse conditions than I live in.  However, I have realized that ministry is next door.  It is in our backyards and we don't do it.

I hope I didn't offend any of my 'church friends' by this post.  That is not my intention.  I do hope I have placed the mirror out there, though, for people to take a long hard look.  I don't expect anyone to pick up the phone and call me and "pray" for me over the phone... or worse.. show up at my doorstep and ask to do the same thing.  Now, it would be a moot point since I've posted about it.. don't you think?    I do hope you analyze your life and ask are you being the hands and feet of Christ or the body only.

I always leave a song.  This one has always spoken to me.  If you tell someone you are going to pray for them... DO IT!!!! MEAN IT!!!!

I Cor 12:15-20

¹⁵ Now if the foot should say, “Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body,” it would not for that reason stop being part of the body. ¹⁶ And if the ear should say, “Because I am not an eye, I do not belong to the body,” it would not for that reason stop being part of the body. ¹⁷ If the whole body were an eye, where would the sense of hearing be? If the whole body were an ear, where would the sense of smell be? ¹⁸ But in fact God has placed the parts in the body, every one of them, just as he wanted them to be. ¹⁹ If they were all one part, where would the body be? ²⁰ As it is, there are many parts, but one body