Meeting God in Different Cultures

Have you ever wondered about the various ways God manifests Himself in different churches and different cultures?

Many Christians expect God to express Himself to others in the same ways He expresses Himself to them, and end up rejecting God Himself in situations where He is not familiar. This is a common misunderstanding between different streams of Christianity and between Christians in different cultures.

I learned some profound lessons about honoring facets of God that were foreign to me when I visited Israel with my husband three years ago.

A Thin Curtain

When I arrived in Israel, I discovered the voice of the Holy Spirit came in loud and clear. I quickly found that the spiritual realm was much louder there than it was in America. As a highly sensitive person, I found it a bit overwhelming. It was like the curtain between the natural world and the spiritual world was thin throughout the whole country.

The good news is the Holy Spirit was able to teach and lead me easily to great effect while I was there.

“Not As You Know Me”

In Galilee we visited some of the beautiful Orthodox churches that had been there for many centuries. At that time I was not yet familiar with the Orthodox Church. Foreign country. Foreign church.

The first church we were to see was the Beatitudes Church. I asked God if He would be there. After all, it was the middle of the week and the church was a tourist attraction. He replied, “Not as you know Me, dear.”

I pondered His answer for a while and wondered what He meant. Finally I told Him I would like to take the opportunity to meet another facet of Him. And I did. Although if He hadn’t prepared me I might have missed Him.

As we walked slowly through the church, I noticed it was a place of great reverence. And the Presence of God was there, but not as I had known Him. I worshipped God as I touched His foreign-to-me, yet still recognizable, Presence. It was a memorable experience.

Silence and Transformation

Next we visited the Loaves and Fishes Church. The signs outside the church called for silence inside and instructed tour guides to speak to their groups outside and to maintain silence in the church.

I have to confess that when I first saw those signs requiring silence in the church, I judged them to be some empty, meaningless religious demand thought up by somebody to make life complicated. What I observed convinced me otherwise.

In spite of the signs, when my husband and I walked into the sanctuary of the church, a tour guide was lecturing in a loud voice to a large group. What most caught my attention, however, was the spiritual environment. Something terrible was happening in the spirit realm. I grabbed my husband and pulled him outside, where I explained that a horrible thing was happening in there.

We waited, pensively wandering around the beautiful outside until that group emerged chattering. We could hear the tourists freely talking to each other as they moved through the church sanctuary and out the door.

After they were clear, we ventured back inside. Another tour guide with a small group was lecturing inside the sanctuary, this time in a soft whisper. It still felt like something bad was happening in there, but it wasn’t as intensely terrible, and we lingered in a corner, waiting for them to leave.

When they finally left, there were the beginnings of shiftings in the spiritual realm and within a few moments it became of place of absolute spiritual beauty. Powerful angelic worship of God began to manifest in the room, the Presence of God was ushered in, and it continued so for the rest of our silent visit.

Rules versus Wise Discerning

Contrary to what I had assumed, I learned that the silence rule was not a burdensome religious rule of man. Instead it was a rule that wisely discerned how God was manifesting Himself in that place.

When the silence was flagrantly broken, it was not just a rule that was being violated. It was a violation of something mysterious and spiritual, like some interface between heaven and earth was being disrupted. I believe what I experienced in that church was that those speaking in the sanctuary in clear disregard to the signs requesting silence were bringing a curse on themselves. It was truly terrible.

My Heart Shifted

As we drove away, the Holy Spirit explained to me that nothing is empty and burdensome religion in and of itself. He told me every stream of the church have those whose hearts love God and also have those whose hearts are hard to Him.

He taught me that, because of how He made me, some things may be personally meaningless to me, but those things actually reflect some aspect of the heart of God that He shares with those who are designed to share that part of Him.

He showed me that for every behavior I think of as merely “religious,” someone is doing it in a meaningful way from an authentic heart of love for God, and God is expressing Himself back in that same language.

And then He kindly said, “Do not judge.”

My heart permanently shifted with His words. May you receive the same gift as you read this.

Blessings!

Gail Ruth