I remember sitting in the dark in our little duplex in Austin, TX back in 1999. I was a sophomore in High School and my dad had just left my mom to pursue another woman who he assumed would make him happier. Mom wanted us to still have a relationship with dad, so we moved to Austin to follow him as he followed her. I love Austin, but at that point, I was just mad.

We started going to this church called Bannockburn Baptist Church. “Cool,” I thought, “We’re going to a church named after the field that Scotland won their freedom in the Academy Award winning movie, Braveheart.” Yeah, I was a dork, but that’s neither here nor there.

My youth pastor, Charlie Harrisberger, was quite the God-send. He took me under his wing and really became a father figure to me. I can honestly say that his influence shaped me more than any other man in my life. He began to give me books by Piper, Tozer, Sproul, Edwards, etc. and really challenging me to pursue Christ, and it was in the midst of that that our story picks up.

I sat alone in that dark duplex, 10:30 at night, reading a Piper sermon called The Depths of Christ’s Love: It’s Lavish Benefits, that changed my life forever. It was about 2 warring tribes in Rwanda, and a man losing His son in the process of trying to save the life of a child from the enemy tribe. In the wake of the disaster, he clothes, feeds, rescues, adopts and gives everything He owns (which is surprisingly substantial) to this enemy child.

It was illustrating that the power of the gospel for us is in our adoption. I woke up this morning thinking about this and the profound impact it made on me as a 16 year old boy. Now 11 years later, I have often thought about this obscure sermon that Piper preached so many years ago. How it impacted me then, and still impacts me now. How it was really the first front that the Lord used to move my heart to displaying the gospel through adoption… to follow His example.

I don’t know a whole ton of 16 year old boys who want to adopt. I think that can tend to be a girl thing. My 6 year old wants to adopt. It’s not unique to girls, but for a boy, that’s pretty weird. But I distinctly remember thinking, “I can not be the same. I want to adopt.” And I began praying that the Lord would send me a wife when the time was right who would have a heart for adoption as well. I’m so glad He did.

I’m so glad that God had given Amanda a heart for children and orphans and to respond to the call to take care of the fatherless through adoption before we ever met.

I’m so glad for that night in 2005 at the Frank Irwin Center in Austin, TX when Steven Curtis Chapman challenged an auditorium full of people who called themselves Christians to actually live out their faith through adoption, and all the conversations that sparked then. The passion it ignited in us as a married couple. And the journey it got back on track.

I’m so glad for meeting Aaron Ivey back in 2008. How he has become such a dear friend and fellow worship pastor, and reminds me what it means to be a man of God. Who displays the gospel with his life and reminds others to do the same. Who does the hard work of obedience, not for the sake of legalism, but out of a righteous heart to see the glory of Jesus Christ known in all the Earth. And who challenges me to do that through adoption.

I am so glad for moments that I can look back at and see time and time again how the Lord has been bringing us to this moment for the last 11 years and reminded that it is He who will carry it through to completion. And He will… for His name’s sake.

It has now been a few months since we officially decided and announced our plans for adopting.  Amazing how things change over a couple of months.  We began researching to find a good adoption agency that could help us adopt from Kazakhstan, and it seems like every agency we spoke with was really encouraging us toward Ethiopia.  So we began to pray and look at Ethiopia, and as we did, the facts were astounding!

It is one of the oldest countries in the world, being an independent state since ancient times.  As such, it’s the second most populous nation in Africa with nearly 80 million people living there, out of which, there are 5 million orphans, a number which increases annually!  The growing number of homeless and parentless children is a mushrooming crisis that the government warns is tearing apart the social fabric of the country.  The main cause of the rising amount of orphans is the sheer poverty, leading to parents dying of malnourishment, AIDS, tuberculosis, etc.  As such, the government is very open and willing to make it as easy as possible to adopt and is making efforts to reverse this tragedy.

As we began seeing pictures and looking at the faces of these beautiful children, and the poverty and hopelessness they live in, we could just feel the Lord drawing us to this country and changing our hearts.  So we are planning on adopting from Ethiopia, using the International Adoption Guides agency to help us through the process.  They have come highly recommended from some of our friends who have also adopted and we are very excited to be working with them to bring our next child home. We are open to any age or sex, but are prayerfully considering adopting a boy between the ages of 0 and 4 years old.

Some of the good news is that we are no longer aiming to raise $50,000, but rather only $25,000… exactly half of what we would have had to raise to adopt from Kazakhstan.  So we continue on our journey to try to raise that money and have designed a shirt that we hope you will consider purchasing.  It is $20 and every penny will go to funding our adoption.  We will have them printed on high quality unisex shirts in sizes XS – XXL.

Please consider buying a shirt and also passing the word along.  If you feel God calling you to give a larger amount, you can always donate to our paypal account  adoption@stephen-miller.com.  We pray you would consider doing this as well.  $25,000 is a big number, but God is much bigger.

We so long to proclaim the gospel that the Lord, our Father, adopted us, and made us children and heirs, regardless of our race or ethnicity, nation or language.  We want to have a family of different races, cultures, and skin tones and feel called to display the gospel in this way.  Please join with us. Buy a shirt today.

I was reading in Leviticus 10 earlier today and the first words of the chapter just really jumped off the page at me… probably because I’m a worship pastor.

Now Nadab and Abihu, the sons of Aaron, each took his censer and put fire in it and laid incense on it and offered unauthorized fire before the Lord, which he had not commanded them. And fire came out from before the Lord and consumed them, and they died before the Lord. Then Moses said to Aaron, “This is what the Lord has said, ‘Among those who are near me I will be sanctified, and before all the people I will be glorified.’” And Aaron held his peace.
Leviticus 10:1-3

There is something so raw and uncensored about this passage that just rips apart any sense of what we deserve or how we think of fairness. I mean they were trying to worship God right? Shouldn’t that be commended? Wouldn’t you think that God would be sitting up in heaven thinking, “Awww, they’re offering me sacrifices…” Or at least acknowledge their efforts with a golf clap or something…

But that’s not the case! God takes it as an offense that these 2 so-called priests would dare come near Him and try to worship Him in a way that He hasn’t commanded. And He straight up smokes them!

I learn a couple of things from this. First off, God doesn’t NEED our worship. I just watched “Clash of The Titans” last week and it was laughable to think that the premise of the movie was that Zeus, the “god” of the world actually NEEDED the worship of the people he created in order to maintain his immortal status… that’s a pretty small, pathetic and crappy god if you ask me. That’s not our God. God doesn’t need us! He doesn’t need our worship.

Paul deals with this very issue in Athens when he encounters all the crazy polytheism of that culture.

The God who made the world and everything in it, being Lord of heaven and earth, does not live in temples made by man, nor is he served by human hands, as though he needed anything, since he himself gives to all mankind life and breath and everything.
Acts 17:24-25

I LOVE IT that I serve such a big, grand, glorious, mysteriously magnificent God. One who isn’t served by me. One that I can’t at all comprehend and get my brain around! He doesn’t need my meager offerings. So with that, I must infer that worshiping God is my privilege, not my right – it’s none of ours! And with that privilege comes responsibility. Since we get to worship God, we must come to Him, not on our own terms, to serve Him as how we would mold Him, but rather, come on His terms and worship Him for who He is, always has been, and always will be!

I think the biggest implication is that we must invest the time in knowing Him. How can we worship Him rightly if we don’t know Him rightly? And how can we know Him rightly? How do we see Him for who He is and engage Him on His terms? How do we know His character, His ways, and what He’s required? It can only be through His word. By pouring over His Word day in and day out.

Jonathan Edwards, the great Puritan pastor of the Great Awakening, says it like this,

“This [Bible] is the fountain whence all knowledge in Divinity must be derived, therefore, let not this treasure lie by you neglected.”

Or as Bob Kauflin, in his book “Worship Matters”, states,

“The better we know God through His Word, the more genuine our worship will be. In fact, the moment we veer from what is true about God, we’re engaging in idolatry. Regardless of what we think or feel, there is no authentic worship of God without a right knowledge of God.”

If we are neglect this incredible gift the Lord has given us to know Him, we will be quite tempted to fall into the trap of Nadab and Abihu… and what was that trap?

Nadab and Abihu were trying to come to a god that they had formed in their image to worship on their own terms. They were engaging in idolatry. Maybe they had good intentions. Maybe we do too when we worship things that do not deserve our worship, or try to worship God in a way that isn’t really worshiping Him at all.
I know this looks different for everyone, and I could create a laundry list of ways that we do this, but I won’t because:

1. This is a blog, and you don’t wanna read forever.
2. We are sinful people and as sure as I miss something, you’ll think, “well he didn’t mention _____ , so it must be okay.
3. I want you to really pursue, draw near to, and KNOW God through His word, prayer, and community.

For you worship leaders reading this – it’s your privilege to lead – and it’s your enormous responsibility to be sure that the way you are leading your people in worship is the way the Lord desires and has articulated in scripture.

Ultimately, God will have His glory and he doesn’t need you. It’s your privilege to worship.

Let us all draw near to Him for who He is, and worship Him rightly.