God’s House

Hebrews 3:1-6 NIV

Jesus Greater Than Moses

3 Therefore, holy brothers and sisters, who share in the heavenly calling, fix your thoughts on Jesus, whom we acknowledge as our apostle and high priest. 2 He was faithful to the one who appointed him, just as Moses was faithful in all God’s house. 3 Jesus has been found worthy of greater honor than Moses, just as the builder of a house has greater honor than the house itself.4 For every house is built by someone, but God is the builder of everything. 5 “Moses was faithful as a servant in all God’s house,”[a]bearing witness to what would be spoken by God in the future. 6 But Christ is faithful as the Son over God’s house. And we are his house, if indeed we hold firmly to our confidence and the hope in which we glory.

Daniel had been so distracted by the pastor that he forgot about the computer program. When he wiggled the mouse, the program reported 5 errors. He emailed the report to the pastor. Then started on 2024. 

Numbers were running through Daniel’s brain. Page after page of numbers. With great urgency, he realized he needed to pee. His hand rested on the bathroom door to push as noises tore from the men’s room. “Feel” grunt, “this” grunt, “bitch!” That was a male voice. Then he heard the smacking of flesh. “Oh, it’s so hot when you talk dirty to me.” That was a different male voice. There was no way Daniel was going in there. Maybe no one was in the ladies room. 

Back at his desk, he mindlessly scanned in more documents. What had he just heard? Oh, he was pretty sure what he just heard. There was no way he could make it make sense. ‘Not in God’s house!’ He screamed in his head. 

Compile. The program was ready again. This time he pushed the button with anger. ‘10 hours,’ the program reported. While it worked, he marked 2024 off his list. 

He hadn’t really paid attention to the errors from 2025. Curiosity got the better of him. Upon opening the first error report, he discovered what the program did was grouped similar errors. In this one report was 28 errors. It was only mid-July. 28 Sundays of church lunch with no receipts. Now that Daniel had been going to a few of these lunches, he knew no church business was ever discussed but someone was marking these as a church expense. 

Folder number 2, contained limited information for 7 brand new vehicles from a big dealership in town. The program was asking for the remainder of the data. For example; who got the vehicle? And how was it being used for the church? 

Suddenly, Daniel was filled with the need to stop. He didn’t need to look anymore. The more he knew, the more involved he was, the more could be pushed over on him. BLAME HIM! He was just the secretary? Doing a job he was being paid to do?

When he crawled in the pastor’s truck to go to Sunday lunch, he couldn’t help but ask himself if this was one of the vehicles from the report? The pastor needed a vehicle to go out into the community. To spread God’s word. You need a dependable ride. But did it have to be brand fire new? Did God care if it was 1 year old or 5? 

Daniel was shocked out of his head when the pastor commented, “I saw you come out of the ladies room.”

Shivers ran through his body. What was he going to say. He finally blurted out, “I made sure there were no ladies in there.”

“Why did you feel compelled to use the ladies room?”

Daniel said a silent prayer, ‘God, choose my words.’ Then he spoke, “I heard noises coming from the men’s room that I couldn’t define. Thought it best not to intrude.”

“Remember I told you some people don’t have a lot of money so they choose to barter their tithes?”

“Yes, I remember.”

“I’ve noticed you are not tithing.”

“The IRS says you can’t donate to your place of employment. Even though we are a nonprofit, a church, I’m not sure how to handle that. So I’ve divided my tithes between 2 other religious organizations that are not affiliated with us. The IRS scares me.”

“We’ll come up with another way, boy.”

This scared Daniel more than the thought of the IRS. ‘We’ll come up with another way’. That could mean anything!

Since the pastor was talking; Daniel asked, “are you married?”

“Divorced.” Was all he said.