Who (or what) is Your God (or god)?

Disclaimer- This is not intended to be blasphemous. Nor is it supposed to be an open theological question/post for people to post their opinions about religion or which they think is best. This IS a post for Christians to think about in terms of what rules them.

Let me set the stage for you. Students play soccer, football, and other various fall sports. in the winter- more of the same, and in the spring- yet again, the same. This is great- I'm a big sports fan (thanks to college- before that i only really liked hockey- and a bit of baseball- Go red SOX!) and I'm all about students getting into something that is very positive for them. I was involved in music in middle and high school. before I became a Christian, that was a very positive influence for me and probably one of the few reasons i stayed a good kid instead of going the path of drugs and bad stuff...

But what does this have to do with my post? Well- sunday mornings have seemed relatively empty these days. and youth meetings have been sparsely attended. I don't have a large youth ministry normally, anyway, but we had 3- as in- can count them on one hand, even if i accidentally cut off two fingers in shop class. Now, I know that students are busy. I know parents are busy. And I'm not just picking on the students or the athletes here. I had my opportunity to miss church for various stuff in school- the only time i ever missed is if i was out of town for jazz competition or something... even when my church switched to a Saturday night service- I was there- never missed.

So where is everybody? Why has church become another option in our already filled option society? Even the best intentioned of people make half-hearted efforts sometimes. I set worship schedules for the singers on my worship team- and I inevitably have people approach me AFTER the schedule has been made for one of two reasons- either something has been planned and they will not be there (sometimes an acceptable reason, sometimes not) and they just didn't tell me before I set the schedule. Or they tell me they are going to be gone some sunday because of something that has been planned after i made the schedule and they have no sense of obligation to be there (whether it is a good reason or not).

What if I did church that way? Oh sure, it's my "job". whatever- just cuz i'm a worship leader/youth pastor/young adult pastor- sunday mornings do not count in my hours for the week. So what if i treated my job that way? "Oh well... I really needed to sleep in this morning, so worship will only happen during 2nd service. show up then if you want to sing." or "Gee- i was too busy this week to prepare! I don't have any songs- does anyone have a favorite song they want to sing this morning?" I mean- it's unacceptable for me to say something like that or act that way. Why not for anyone else? I know- it's because of my last post- i gotta be perfect. I spend enough days a week at church doing parts of my job- maybe i should just have my office converted into a bedroom?

What is important to us? I am not saying that we must be in church legalistically every week- but why would you not want to make every effort to be there? Even if the football game was late the night before- is that a valid excuse? The scriptures tell us that we are not to forsake the gathering together as believers (not as some are in the habit of doing). What is impotant to us?

So we may not have a buddah in our beds. Or a Shiva statue on the playing field. But is that really much better than what often happens? Personally- I prefer the nice round buddah- no more poking my eyes out with pointy finger gods.