I really do not know if thrilled or excited captured the way I was feeling, I would rather have described myself as ecstatic that morning. I could already see and imagine what I was hoping for, I even dreamt about it. It is not like I get exceptionally excited about things this often, but believe me this was called for. I believe I was more excited about going to this church than even going to a new city, after all the Hillsong church did not seem like child's play to me.
So that was the bubble that got me so excited. I was going to the Hillsong church. I had certain expectations from the church. A large stage, a big auditorium, probably as big as a stadium, a great seat I could see clearly from and most importantly great worship. Boy oh boy, was I prepped up for this.
I woke up as early as I could, got ready and checked I did not leave a thing behind. I got to the bus on time and took a seat. As I sat through the bus ride, I was ruminating on how the service was going to be. I could practically feel the type of worship I was anticipating. I was simply thrilled. Irrespective of the many excited feelings that appeared to be jumping around in my system, I had this pull in my spirit(Holy Spirit at work :)). The Holy Spirit drew my attention to the fact that me enjoying His presence was not dependent on the church I attended. Instead he made me understand that the presence of God already exists in me. "For indeed, the kingdom of God is within you"- Luke 17:21
If you have been to any modern or anglican church, you will be used to the conventional atmosphere of the church. By conventional I mean a church where things are in order, you get ushered to your seat and the likes. Well, that was what I expected at the Hillsong Church. The service was to start at 10am and I got there at about 10:10am. My first shocker was right at the entrance of the church. Since I was late I simply ignored and rushed along.
Yep, that was the look I got on my face when I got up the stairs, talk about a total shocker. The place was packed with people as I expected, but the environment was the complete opposite of my expectations. If the little knowledge I possessed was correct this venue did look much like a pub. Hmmmm, this was gonna be one service.
Simply identifying with the current location I found myself, my high hopes seemed to shy away slowly. There was no sitting space anywhere, which implied I was going to stand through out the service. At this thought, I began to wonder if all my hopes were dashed. I could not even see the stage well enough, except through the monitors and mehn I was sad.
A part of me seriously wanted to just shy away and stay in the background, after all no one really knew me there. I felt a nudge in my spirit again, which reaffirmed the purpose my going to church was for: making the spirit of God I already have in me fellowship with others. I kept my mind open irrespective of how things looked and just got ushered into the atmosphere of worship. Time flew by without me even noticing I was on my feet the whole time, worship flowed with such elegance and lack of concern that I hardly remembered my presupposition compared to my current surrounding.
That was my situation, but then the reality of it is that, we have presuppositions that usually do not depict the reality we expect. Times when we have a glimpse of things in our minds and simply expect the reality to surface like that... Yeah, we all have those times. And very often we see the reality of our unreality, and how things do not fall into place like we hoped for.
Most often we simply shy away from what we get, because we believe we deserve better. It's in the process of neglecting or shying away that we forget the true purpose of a situation. If I chose to hold on to my initial dissatisfaction of the environment, I probably would have missed out on the experience I had with God that day. The same applies in our lives, if we simply shy away because things are not the way we expect or want them to be, we would often miss the relevant lessons we are to learn from things being the way they are.
Life as it is, is full of many surprises. While there are some we like and would love to experience everyday, there are some which rock us. However, with every single experience there is a relevant lesson. So embrace each situation and neglect the disappointment, ("
Trust in the Lord with all you heart, and lean not on your own understanding"- Prov 3:5) move on to achieve as much as you can with the little you get. After all the bible even admonishes us not to despise the days of small beginnings.
The sky is indeed our limit, we can choose to let disappointments reign, or simply stand on the disappointments and get every ounce of victory we can.
Anglican church: In relation to their specific church structures.
Tomorrow, when I arise and see new things,
