In Exodus 12, as God was establishing the Passover, He told the children of Israel that they should celebrate the day as a memorial unto all generations. It was to be an experience that they would relive and teach to their children.
This week in Shiloh, I and many Pastors from throughout the Living Word Fellowship spent some time together working on telling the stories of our individual relationships with the Lord and how we came to be the people we are today. In a modern way, we have been having a testimony meeting. We have worked together to reveal in writing our personal, intimate stories of how God has moved in each of our lives to guide us toward His destiny for us.
The idea of a testimony has always seemed a little funny to me. I remember flipping past the religious broadcast stations as a child and being amused at the funny accents and the cute stories the people were telling. At the time, while I believed in God, I had not had a personal salvation experience with Him, so the idea of a testimony was very foreign to me.
This week, as I have been sitting with other Pastors and leaders and watching them relive the story of their own personal creation in God, I have been impressed with the power and impact that the process is having on each one of us. I realize that the idea of a testimony is far more than a technical experience of reviewing your historical timeline. It is in fact a reliving of the intimate course of God’s interaction in our lives throughout that history. I have witnessed many tears being shed, both over our own stories, as well as in reviewing the stories of each other’s relationship with God.
I am seeing that God’s command to Israel to celebrate the feasts as a memorial (Ex 12:14) was not merely another technical element of law, it was an entreaty; “come relive this moment with me, look again at how I sustained you, how I cared for you, how I walked with you through your circumstances.” God was giving Israel a powerful opportunity to relive and re-experience His moving in their lives year to year, generation to generation. In Christ we also have the daily opportunity to tell our own personal story of how God moved us from the domain of darkness into the Kingdom of His Beloved Son. And as we tell our story, and we see God’s hand powerfully and personally guiding us along, we can once again humble our hearts and receive the great love He has for us.
Have you told your story lately?