Building Tents & Pitching Altars

It was about eighteen months ago that I began to detect that I had something seriously askew in my soul.  I had begun an awakening process that I was consciously resisting with all of my strength.  And yet, every day, regardless of my best efforts to stay asleep, I knew, I saw, I experienced, and I was consistently reminded that I was awakening to a very disturbing reality.  

The reality I was awakening to, was that my world had increasingly become about "maintenance" and about "self-preservation."  And, that I had lost my sense of purpose, vision, and of risk taking mission.  I began to understand that I had "pitched" my altar (life risking, daily mission with God) and "built" a tent (a new building and a highly predictable position of ministry). 

This gradual "awakening" journey of mine, culminated in a personal Epiphany in which I knew that I had personally stopped risking everything to follow Jesus.  And, that I had begun asking Jesus to come and bless everything I was "not" doing...  I had become a Wesleyan "deviant" in the sense that the world was no longer my parish, and that the parish ("my parish") had become my world.  It was from this moment of personal Epiphany that I then knew I had the power to choose to walk a new and a different road than I had ever walked before.  So... I did.

Without question, this new road that I chose changed almost every aspect of my life, and affected almost every relationship I had.  And, though I still know not where this road will lead, I have this sense of the presence of Jesus, on this road that I am traveling, that I have never had before.  

So, does (and will) this road lead to "success" or "prosperity?"  Part of me hopes that it will, and yet... part of me remembers my tendency to "pitch my altar and build my tents."  So, my pre-determined personal goal, walking forward from this personal Epiphany, is that I would walk where Jesus leads, that I would pitch my tent wherever it is in the World that the Spirit of God leads me to be about the building of an Altar of sacrificial Worship. Somewhere, I believe, where the Church truly needs to be, between the house of God and the world (Genesis 12:8).

Rob Schmutz, Pastor
The Church at Park City