Over two years ago, I began a Bible study in our home with some of our closest friends. I was the music director in a large denominational church at the time, of which I was one of six founding members some ten years earlier. Growing from six members to eight hundred was no small feat. Over the years, my wife and I had served in nearly every capacity: finance committee, nominating committee, deacon, Sunday School teacher, outreach…whatever was needed. The home Bible study grew out of a desire to get more spiritual food than a Sunday morning sermon and our church “busyness” had offered.
At this same time, I met a fellow on the Internet–a Christian some 1,200 miles away in Kansas who was as enthralled with e-mail capability as I was! We established an immediate “online friendship” and within a few letters, had challenged one another to read through the Bible together. The sharing of God’s truths we enjoyed during that next year was phenomenal, and the Lord began to open my eyes to things I had often questioned but never confronted.
Our study of 2 Timothy in our home was such a blessing to our small group that I decided to offer the study at our church on another night. The group there grew to over 50 attendees! While the study was incredibly rewarding, something was very unsettling about it all. It was obvious to me that people were excited about growing in the knowledge of the Lord and His Word, as was I, but the fact that there were so many things that were not being practiced in the church according to scripture began to gnaw at me. Over and over our discussions in the study would center around this issue. Then the study would end, and everyone departed feeling good about having discussed it, yet never seemingly moved to do anything about it. We would discuss how we were to “study to show thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth,” yet there was little evidence that we believed what we were learning, enough to change our actions.
The 2 Timothy study ended and we plunged into Romans…and my e-mail buddy and I were now discussing deep theological issues. I began to share some of my concerns with this objective friend, who always steered me back to Scripture for answers! The interesting thing in all of this was the apparent thriving success of my ministry and our church. I say apparent, because in terms of numbers and emotions it was THE place to be. The music was exciting, our community “following” for special programs was incredible…and the feel-good atmosphere was all anyone could ask for …except…I…was… miserable! Months of study, searching, and struggling ensued… until I finally yielded to the truth–it was not “success” that brought deep, abiding joy and peace to the soul…rather, it was a life lived in obedience to the Holy Word of God!
Time and space constrain me from sharing all that has since happened. Suffice it to say, however, that once the decision was made to obey God, the rest came easy! “The rest” you ask? Things like leaving a large congregation where I was a well-known, well-respected elected official in the community with a large following…things like coping with losing every close friend we thought we had because they could not “do what we had done”…things like forgoing an extra monthly income that helped pay the college tuition bills…things like struggling with our children who thought we were already serving God correctly…and little things like continuing to hear rumors and speculations about why we left the church and what we were currently “doing.”
I failed to mention that my e-mail friend is an elder in a Wichita, KS assembly. And I failed to mention that there is a local assembly less than four miles from my home in Richmond, VA (I had never even heard of a New Testament assembly!) Coincidences? Not a chance! The sovereign hand of an Almighty God? Most definitely! Through the Holy Spirit’s convicting power and my friend’s influence, my family and I now worship at Grace Gospel Chapel with some of the dearest Christian brothers and sisters one could ever hope to find. Oh, and one other thing I forgot to mention…God also spoke to two other couples during the course of our Bible studies who became equally convicted and decided to follow the Lord in obedience to His Word. They have become not only our best friends…but our family through all of this!
I am so inexpressibly grateful to the Lord and humbled by how He has worked through this experience. I have grown to love His Word immeasurably and to appreciate that it ALL is important and relevant to our lives. And I praise Him for leading me to an assembly ordered on the New Testament principles of gathering, where the truth is unashamedly taught, where Christ is the center of all, and where my family and I can grow in the knowledge and wisdom of the Lord.
I cannot say that the price for this experience has not been costly, but I can say that God’s grace truly has been more than sufficient! It is His strength that has brought us through! So often these past few months I have looked back on my forty-two years with regret that I have not progressed further for the Lord. And yet, what He has taken me through, what He has allowed me to experience has deepened my commitment to Him in a way that perhaps might not have happened otherwise.
None of us ever fully arrives at where we need to be for the Lord, and we can never complete the task of figuring it all out this side of heaven. And I am convinced that the joy and peace that comes from making our life’s journey one that is yielded to and led by our Lord Jesus Christ is known by precious few.
Our challenge in the New Testament assembly is to boldly share what we know with those who are seeking the Lord…and encourage others to search out the scriptures as the only standard by which we are to live every area of our lives. Only then can we hope to seek Him with all our heart and our soul…and truly find Him!