Lately i’ve had many things on my mind which i’ve been discussing, on and off with the Lord, like “the value of church”. Think about it, we go to a central location with other people whom we suppose are somewhat like minded for about an hour to an hour and a half on a particular day of the week, and for some it’s twice per week if their lucky enough to have the opportunity. We sing together for a while, and somehow in that space of time folks are supposed to get it together enough to corporately engage with the Lord and be passionate and raise their hands … for 20-40mins. We sit down, pass the hat to give tithes and offerings, then we listen to someone expound on the scriptures while we nod our heads understandingly, maybe even take a few notes for some undetermined time in the future to be reviewed. There is an offer for prayer if anyone wants it, at which time we gather our stuff and go home. My question to myself was, “Is that really church? Is that what God had in mind when He said in Hebrews 10:24-25, “And let us consider one another in order to stir up love and good works, not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as is the manner of some, but exhorting one another, and so much the more as you see the Day approaching.” Yet, on the other hand Acts 7:48, “Howbeit the most High dwells NOT in temples made with hands. . .”, and “God that made the world and all things therein, seeing that He is Lord of heaven and earth, dwells NOT in temples made with hands,” Acts 17:24.

i’ve been think about what we’re supposed to be doing, and considering the question to myself which is, am i accomplishing the purposes of the Lord in the time frame known as “all my days”? i’ve been part of fellowships that met for the corporate church body meeting on Sunday, and they loved being together so much that when the service was over, they just all continued church at someone’s house, many times the fellowshipping of the saints continued on into the evening. Now see, to me, that’s church, that’s the model of communal table, house to house, believer to believer that was spoken of in Acts 5:42 and Acts 20:20. But what is this other thing we do where we meet for a short time then just leave, some going away so fast it seems they can’t wait to be somewhere else … what is that?

i believe that we’re looking for Jesus. In all our congregating short or long, singing high or low, hanging out, and studying, we’re looking for Jesus, looking to connect with the Lord somehow. We’re not sure how to get “there”, where ever “there” is, hopefully it’s “somewhere” and it’s definitely better than “nowhere”. The topic on the table is titled “looking for Jesus”, and how are we going to do this? Sticky statement for pondering: If we look for Him, He will find us.

Isaiah 58:9-10, “Then you shall call, and the LORD will answer; you shall cry, and he will say, ‘Here I am.’ If you take away the yoke from your midst, the pointing of the finger, and speaking wickedness, if you pour yourself out for the hungry and satisfy the desire of the afflicted, then shall your light rise in the darkness and your gloom be as the noonday.”

i’m Social Porter and this is Outposts, a semi-live production for your edification, think-worthy conversation addressing life in Christ about 3” below the surface of your presentation face. And in case the idea of “presentation face” is perplexing, what i mean is that everyone has a “face” they give to the world around them, and then there’s the real face where they live, the one which presents the reality of where we really live in all our concerns, confidences, fears, difficult questions, yea … all that, i reckon you get my drift.

Come go with me. By the way, your comments are welcome…i don’t mind. i think i’ve been hammered so much, there isn’t much that could slap the Holy Ghost smile off my face anymore, or, at least not nearly as often as in days past.

Where’s Waldo?, as taken from Wikipedia, is a series of children’s books created by the English illustrator Martin Handford. The books consist of a series of detailed double-page spread illustrations depicting dozens or more people doing a variety of amusing things at a given location. Readers are challenged to find a character named Waldo hidden in the group. Waldo’s distinctive red-and-white-striped shirt, bobble hat, and glasses make him slightly easier to recognize, but many illustrations contain red herrings involving deceptive use of red-and-white striped objects.

i think, part of our going to church, initially, was looking for Jesus like people search a picture, looking for Waldo. We look, trying to focus, our mind wanders a little looking at the different characters doing things in the illustrations, then we re-focus, undertaking a renewed effort to find the character Waldo.

In our search for Jesus, some just get tired after a few days, others seem to last longer, yet there are those who find, what i call, a “passion trail”.

i have asked myself a pretty pokey question many times when i feel my interest fading a little, “Just how interested are you in connecting with God?” To be honest, as if there’s any other way to be, it’s a great question, but i rarely like my answer. Am i just peeping around the corner at him….am i facing Him but looking more at the ground or other places, am i looking for Him with anticipation, or is my search just a passive looking around like watching a video while simultaneously playing on my phone?

1 Chronicles 15:29, “and as the ark of the covenant of the LORD came to the city of David, Michal the daughter of Saul looked out of the window…”. Where the English word there is “looked”, in Hebrew it speaks of a very different heart posture than merely openly gazing like looking out across a meadow. It literally means to “peep at” or to “to lean out and gaze from a high window, as surveying a spectacle”, looking with interest while staying out of sight.

The “high window” says to me she was looking down on David from her high place of dignity. Not eye level, but peering at him who was “down low” implying a sense of he was somehow less than. i wonder how often i look for Jesus from the elevated platform of my own making, and rather than really chasing after Him, i peep at him from around the corner of my high place? Is this a question you’d be willing to entertain, and if you did, what is your answer to yourself?

Michal’s attitude towards David dancing before the Lord spoke volumes of her heart towards the Lord. The Hebrew word used in reference to Michal in 1 Chronicles 15:29, is the same word used of Jezebel in 2 Kings 9:30 in that she peeped at Jehu, gazed down at him from her high window. She lost her life from that high place she had gotten for herself. i would imagine Jezebel, like Michal, had a habit of looking down at the little people from a place where she could see them but the people couldn’t necessarily see her.

1 Peter 5:6-7, “Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God so that at the proper time he may exalt you, casting all your anxieties on him, because he cares for you.” Let yourself be known to the Lord, expose to Him your heart, mind, and body. His mercy endures forever and there is no way He’s going to hammer you. He thinks you are beautiful. How bad do we want to find Him? He’s not going to allow Himself to be found so easily, as long as we peep at Him through the curtains of our high windows. Our purpose and reason is not to discover our purpose and reason but to discover and apprehend Jesus, and it is nigh impossible if we’re always hiding and looking down on the little people.

           Psalm 38:11, “My friends and companions stand aloof from my plague, and my nearest kin stand far off.” Matthew 27:55, “There were also many women there, looking on from a distance, who had followed Jesus from Galilee, ministering to him,”

Both scriptures pass along to the reader a sense of looking on and observing… it’s more than gazing from a high place, but an earnest, continued inspection. The whole mood is one of interest, not just passive observance, but being attentive to what was going on to understand the situation, yet not wanting to get “too involved”. Do you see it? It is still from a distance, not wanting to exactly be involved altogether. Sort of like watching a friend get arrested … you dare not get directly involved, you’re not completely removed with indifference, but not exactly over there intervening and preventing harm to your friend.

In Matthew 27:55, the women had been attendant to Jesus, they were following, but they didn’t dare get too close lest they incur the wrath of the Roman guards who were doing the crucifying in case they get a beating for appearing to intervene, or worse, get crucified themselves for good measure.

Are we seeing Jesus in our lives but we’re not getting too close? Maybe we are afraid of being known, fearing maybe others will see us for who we are and they won’t like us so we hold ourselves at a distance, being careful to not get too involved. Maybe we don’t get too involved with the bankrupt and blind, the poor and prodigal sons lest some of their bad juju rub off on us. i mean, the attitude is like, “i hope all those homeless guys come to know Jesus, but, well, i’m not sure i want to shake hands with a really smelly guy with bad teeth, wild hair, and unknown sticky stuff on the side of the hand he wants to use to shake hands.”

i’m looking for Jesus, however i have to get there, and i pray God will give me courage to go where i need to be in order to connect with Him. How important is it to you to find Him? How far are you willing to go to find Him? Many folks only seem to look for Jesus in the obvious places, looking in the ground floor windows which are easy to get to, knocking on the doors which aren’t behind fences. In their quest for the Lord they seek Him among people which look clean, nice, and friendly.

And then last Monday, the day after traditional church, there was the homeless man, standing at the red light, holding out his hands or holding up a sign, asking for handouts. As is our custom, we cast our eyes away from him. It’s a pretty uncomfortable moment, isn’t it? We say within ourselves, “We gave at the church already, gosh.” So in the moment, we stopped looking at Jesus standing there, with His hand out.

i think a lot of the church is looking for Jesus, but it’s from a distance, sort of aloof from really being involved. I don’t know what we’re going to do next week in worship. Maybe as it turns out, we’re much more interested in feeling spiritually high and lifted up than we are in actually seeing Jesus in his actual “glory.”

Matthew 25:35-46, “For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, I was naked and you clothed me, I was sick and you visited me, I was in prison and you came to me.’ Then the righteous will answer him, saying, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you drink? And when did we see you a stranger and welcome you, or naked and clothe you? And when did we see you sick or in prison and visit you?’ And the King will answer them, ‘Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me.’ “Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. For I was hungry and you gave me no food, I was thirsty and you gave me no drink, I was a stranger and you did not welcome me, naked and you did not clothe me, sick and in prison and you did not visit me.’ Then they also will answer, saying, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison, and did not minister to you?’ Then he will answer them, saying, ‘Truly, I say to you, as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to me.’ And these will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.”

Jesus is being painfully pointed here. Notice, He called the first group brothers, but there was no such relationship mentioned with the second.

Mark 1:37, “… Simon and those who were with him searched for him, and they found him and said to him, “Everyone is looking for you.”” In Luke 2:49, when Jesus was in the temple and His parents were looking for Him, He asked, “Why were you looking for me?” i believe He knew the answer to the question and His question was meant to inspire them to examine their own faith concerning His true identity. The Greek word for “looking” used in both scriptures doesn’t mean looking, as in peering at, but looking in the sense of seeing with their eyes with the intent of seeking and searching to apprehend.

Today, in this season we live in, whether people admit it or not, everyone is looking for Jesus, seeking to connect with Him, just like in the days when Peter said those words to Jesus, “everyone is looking for you”. i’d say nothing has changed much since then. Mankind still acts the same as they did back then, and we’re all … still … looking for Jesus.

There is a different sort of looking for Jesus found in Mark15:43where Joseph of Arimathea was also himself looking for the kingdom of God, in other words not only was he seeking the Kingdom, but it’s a word which also implies he was looking in earnest and waiting with confidence. It was the passion of his life to find Jesus, and when he did he was bold and courageous to request the body and prepare it for burial.

Some folks seem to think the Lord is typically found in real big fancy places with mega seating, and mega sound systems run by mega technicians, managed by mega pastors and mega in-house mega marketing committees. Others think He’s found in old beautiful stones of ancient places, all with incredible art and high arched ceilings. They say God is surely in this place considering all the prayers that have gone up from that old stone building. Well, in that case, the county jail is probably twice as spiritual as the big beautiful churches. Think about this, prison and jailhouse walls are saturated with the prayers of desperate people who pray day and night, 7 days/week.

In another way, according to Paul, “high and lifted up” is precisely where God is not to be found, maybe we find Him among the lowly and down trodden instead of among the “high and lifted up”. We often find Him in unexpected places, sometimes He is looking at us out from under the eyelids of the most unlikely people. Some folks are always looking for Jesus in wondrous signs and others think they’ll find him in glorious wisdom. 1 Corinthians 1:22-23, “For Jews demand signs and Greeks seek wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to Gentiles.”

Now in Hebrews 11:26 there is another interesting use of the word “looking” which i think is relative to understanding this thing we do, “looking for Jesus” and what does it mean for our lives? To me, it’s important we understand our “looking for Jesus”. It is obsessive, and passionate, day in and day out. It seems important to know something about how we do it and why. Don’t you think?

Can we shape our “looking for Jesus” habits to be more productive? In Hebrews 11:26, Moses is spoken of as having considered the reproach of Christ a greater wealth than the treasures of Egypt, because he was “looking to the reward”. The word “looking” is unique here in that it means Moses looked away from the riches of Egypt, he looked away from everything else and fastened his eyes on the Lord. And because the word “looking” is an imperfect tense it wasn’t a onetime thing, it was a continual and repeated action. There, right there is a major clue in not only how we “look for Jesus” but also how we successfully find our savior.

Then in Hebrews 12:2 Paul uses a Greek word for “looking to Jesus” that’s not used anywhere else in the Bible, only there. It’s a two-part verb, the first part meaning a separation from the whole, and the second part means to see with the eyes, to see with the mind, to stare at and discern clearly. It is not only a physical action but a mental action, both. The Hebrew equivalent means to “experience by perception, BEHOLD!”

Peter uses a different word for looking in 1Peter 3:12 and again in vs 14, but in this case the translators called it “waiting for” because this concept of “looking for Jesus” comes with the idea of confidently watching, looking for and anticipating.

Now you see, that’s how i want to go about “looking for Jesus”, with all breathing, all my thinking, and all my feeling. That’s it right there, “experience by perception … BEHOLD!”, turning my eyes from this world and fixing them on Jesus and the Kingdom of God. That’s looking for Jesus to me. Yea.

Another example of how i want to “look for Jesus” is in Jeremiah 13:16, “Give glory to the LORD your God before he brings darkness, before your feet stumble on the twilight mountains, and while you look for light he turns it into gloom and makes it deep darkness.” The phrase “look for light”, meaning we wait, collect with expectation, anxiously looking for His return, weaving together the facts and stories of God while waiting in anticipation. i don’t know about you, but to me that is fascinating.

Isn’t that sort of what we do while we’re “looking for Jesus”? We wait, we collect information about the object of our affection while waiting in confident anticipation of finding our beloved, touching Him, seeing His eyes. We know if we find Him, He will have found us first, and as long as we can see Jesus, everything will be ok.

Don’t we review the facts and stories of His exploits in our minds, and we retell to others the great things He has done? When we review we also relive the moment and emotion of the memory. It’s not like we are alone in our memories of His great deeds either. When we re-live the stories and weave together facts we’ve gathered while “looking for Jesus”, suddenly the memories become Holy Ghost charged, He assists us in our remembrance of Jesus. God inhabits the praise of His people. i figure, besides learning how to renew our minds, when Paul wrote those famous words in Philippians 4:8-9, he knew it would be more than just renewing, he was encouraging us to re-weave together the stories of Jesus which would inspire us to continue, with diligence, our pressing on “looking for Jesus”.

When i think of noble things, my highest dream is of Jesus. When i review what is just, pure, and lovely, my highest memory is of Jesus. When i put together the facts i’ve found while “looking for Jesus”, it’s not long before i began to sense God’s riveting virtue, redemptive goodness and, before i know it, anything praiseworthy starts coming to mind…shortly, a little fire is burning in my heart and my mind follows after. His presence draws all things together in His wake, and the hem of His robe and the glory of the Lord fills the temple. If we look for Him, He will find us. Do you get it?

i can’t speak for you, but i want to find what i’m looking for. i don’t believe i’ve ever met anyone who was searching for something they didn’t want to find. What person searches for something they earnestly don’t want and truly have no interest in? No one searches for what they do not want in the same sense that no one knowingly and willingly dies for a lie.

Our purpose and reason is not to discover our purpose and reason but to discover and apprehend Jesus. We have our hope set on the living God, who is the Savior of all people who will believe in their heart and confess with their mouth Jesus is Lord. We have tasted and have seen, therefore we search and “look for Jesus” because there is no one and no thing who satisfies our souls and makes us right before God.

How do we “look for Jesus”? We call out to Him with our voice and actions, we pour ourselves out for the hungry and satisfy the desire of the afflicted. We praise and worship Him, we study to find Him in scripture for He is revealed in the Bible and inhabits the praises of His people, “If you look for Him, He will find you.” We look for Him with the seeing of our eyes and the vision of our mind and heart with the intent of seeking and searching to apprehend. To see what we see, we’ve got to be interested to know what we’ve found.

We look for Jesus in earnest and wait for Him with confidence. Finding Jesus is the passion of our lives, and we are bold and courageous to break out of our church model to be where He is. i will break your rules to touch the hem of His garment if i have to, but i must touch Him above all things. i will lose my titles, platforms, and positions of honor, i’ll call Him Father, Jesus, Holy Spirit, or all of the above, whatever it takes to get close to Him, using everything i am to know Jesus. Are you willing to walk alone in the wilderness to find Him, or maybe sail violent seas, or camp in a desert place that’s just dry as far as you can see in any direction because the Lord said “wait here”, willing to look away from everything else and fasten our eyes on the Lord?

We are “looking for Jesus”, so we wait, collect details of His presence with expectation we will see our Savior, we anxiously look for His return, searching the sky for the fulfillment of His promise to return for us who love Him. We relish weaving together the facts and stories of God, recounting His extraordinary exploits.

The only way we’ll stand is on our knees with our hands raised, being strong and courageous to attain the prize of the high calling of God in Christ.

This could gloriously go on and on, so i’m going to say “think about it” and bounce. Think about it.

Mark 16:6, “And he said to them, “Do not be alarmed. You are looking for Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He has risen; he is not here. See the place where they laid him.”

i don’t know how to tell you how i feel in my “looking for Jesus”. The closer He gets to all things, the more all things become like Him. You don’t need to go out and look for a guru that claims to have some special revelation. You can find everything you need to know about God in the pages of the Scripture, the Holy Spirit will guide you on a path, especially for you, to find Him whom you seek. As you pray and study His Word, you can begin to know Him, and He will begin to work in your life, He will open your eyes to see Jesus. It may be a glimpse here and there, but every time we see Him, we are changed from glory to glory, when we see Him, we shall be like Him.

One-way Jesus, He’s the only one i could live for. i tried the others possible gods and found, conclusively, they are all lifeless hulks of imagination and stone, and were so corrupt they were no one even the worst of humanity should follow after.

i’m Social Porter and this is Outposts, cool jazz and contemplative conversation, broadcast from the deck of a rural cafe at the end of Old Field Road which overlooks the beautiful Ockluhwahhah River, where the trees gently lean over the rivers edge and every evening is pleasant.

Are we “looking for Jesus” like someone who simply has a passive regard for what they see, or are we looking for Jesus with eyes wide open, gazing at Him like looking at something amazing? Are we watching for Him with anticipation, looking with eyes, mind, and heart, straining to hear the wisdom of God’s heart. We all are looking for Jesus in one fashion or another, whether we know it or not….He is the desire of the ages and one day, every eye shall see Him and none can turn away.

Be strong and courageous this week, take your time, breath easy, one step at a time, it’ll all come around. Amen, and amen.