I’ve seen, watched, known and listened to many people over the years in various congregations.
If asked“Do you keep your eyes only on Jesus?” the answer would surely be “Yes.”
But the truth would actually much more likely be closer to “Maybe not so much.”
What happens so many times that people seek a “church home.”
They look for a place to where they enjoy going.
They seek a place where there will be friends who are happy to see them.
They seek a place where a dynamic, and relative message will be preached — maybe even having a well-known and accomplished lead pastor.
They look for a place where the children will be engaged, where the music presentation is powerful.
Those are all things of man.

Yes, I know those have all been found efficient at generating higher attendance.
Those have also been found efficient at achieving a powerful impact of sorts in the community.
But, those are all things of man.
Jesus is something else, something different from all those things.
Jesus, to be of any importance to you at all, must live inside of you, guide you, walk with you, talk intimately with you, hold you, comfort you, and if you vary in your focus back to the things of man listed above, rebuke you.
Do not let a man, or a place, become an icon to you.
Do not rest your gaze upon the man or woman at the front and fall upon their words.
Do not let a pastor, or a cathedral, or anything at all be the object of your focus, for if you do, then you have just supplanted Jesus with an idol made with the hands or actions of man, and have become diverted from your directed path.
Instead, be focused on Jesus, only Jesus, and let these other things fall away like scarlet leaves from a tree.
Gordon Furr lives in Rowan County.