Wait a minute, I didn't park over here...

One of the things I have had the great fortune to be able to do in my life is experience wonderful church and worship services all over this country and the world. Last weekend in Chicago, I was able to attend a Saturday night Easter service at Willow Creek Community Church outside the city. The campus is a beautiful building with seats for thousands surrounded by fountains and greenery and water falling down rocks. Inside, there is a restaurant, bookstore, children's center, and coffee shop. The senior pastor is named Bill Hybels (or at Wiki) and he delivered a wonderful message about life transformation and the power of the resurrection. It was your typical Easter lesson that did not include much substance or controversey, but with the theater-style videos and the worship band, it was truly a great and inspirational service.

One of the things he mentioned stuck with me, and I think it was because it was something I had never thought of before. If you're like me, you have read the bible through on one of those yearly plans once or twice. Through a lot of the old testament, I would find myself reading just to finish and not appreciating the meaning behind the stories and the laws and the examples. Well, one of those was pointed out to me on Saturday night. Hybels briefly referenced Ezekiel 46:9. Here is what it says:

"When the people of the land come before the LORD at the appointed feasts, whoever enters by the north gate to worship is to go out the south gate; and whoever enters by the south gate is to go out the north gate. No one is to return through the gate by which he entered, but each is to go out the opposite gate."

Hybels asked why we thought God would set up this rule for His people? What difference does it make? Isn't it more inconvenient to do it that way?

Well, the previous eight verses discuss how God's people should enter the temple, what days it will be accessible, how the prince should act, what sacrifices to bring, etc. But in all of these things, God's chosen flock too often missed the point, and he begins to point it out to them in Isaiah 1:11 and elsewhere:

"The multitude of your sacrifices— what are they to me?" says the LORD. "I have more than enough of burnt offerings, of rams and the fat of fattened animals; I have no pleasure in the blood of bulls and lambs and goats."

In all of their attempts to get it right and present their burnt offering for sin atonement, they completely missed the point. The point of this ritual, of the ceremony, is to be in the presence of God and be changed by His power. And that's the point of Ezekiel 46:9. It is a metaphor for them. God basically says, "When you are in my presence, I don't want you leaving the same way that you came in. I want you to be a changed person."

So he created an example for them to follow so they could literally not leave the same way that they came.

God tries to pass on a message to them and to us as well through this scripture. The way I read this, I can see how it directly applies to me today. Our church services and worship and bible studies have too often become ritualistic and structured and "by the book." Too much of the time, I find myself going through the motions, doing what God "wants," and then getting back to my real life. But Ezekiel 46 reminds me that whenever I enter into God's presence, whenever he is around, wherever he works in my life, I can't help but leave a changed person.

In your lifetime, people will come and go, but there are inevitably some that stick out in my mind as ones that have impacted my life to the point where I am a better person because of them. My wife and my parents, obviously; Daddy Jack, Bryan Mason, Adam Gray, David Gibson, Cliff Fridge, and on and on.

I am sure you have a list as well.

But imagine a person like that who was always with you, always encouraging you, always carrying you when you needed it. Could such a thing happen? It does happen. You can't help but be changed when God works, and when He empowers you.

One of the things Hybels kept mentioning Saturday night was, "why can't you leave tonight changed by God? Does it seem so hard to believe? Can you not imagine being a different person tonight?"

Admittedly, sometimes it is hard. Sometimes it does seem impossible. I'm beyond change.

But God's answer is always the same: "Bigger miracles have happened before. Why not come in the north gate and exit through the south. Let's just see what happens."

I don't know about you, but I am excited to see.

-Ryan