There are no Greeks, no Jews, etc... Part 24

God loves it when I am in unity with my brethren. (Ps 133:1-3) He will provide me a way that I can be right in my fellowship. According to Acts 8:1-3 I can be sincerely wrong in my fellowship with other people. It is not until I am in Christ, and have accepted no other name but His that I can be in unity with others in Christ. Do I suffer for to the point of dying for my brethren (1 Thes 2:14-15) and if so what is my motive (1 Cor 13:1-5)? Am I willing to put my love on the line for God’s people even if I do not know them, or worse if I do know them and know that they themselves wouldn’t do it for me? What I should always remember is that Christ and God don’t care what other people do or don’t do, when it comes to what I should do. What really matters is my obedience to God. What does God expect of me? The only way I know that is through examining and studying and committing to my heart His Word. Only then can I accept that Christ is the leader of the church.

Where is Christ? In Ps 48:1-4, God has his city and it is the one location that all will go to praise His Name. That means me, that means the person sitting next to me. That means the people in the church down the road. If Christ is the leader of the church, and Christ is God, then all attributes of His church must come from God, as the Son comes from God. And He will be in that city. In Ps 84:1-10, in God’s strength is my strength. I rest within Him, much as in Hebrews 4. God and Jesus are my Sabbath Rest. If Christ is God, and the Church belongs to Christ, then my ministry and the ministry of those who claim Christ, is to stay within Him, to stay within the Sabbath Rest. That is what makes us different. Not service, not friendliness, but the fact that we know that God is present and that we serve because He served and serves and He wants us in His Rest. If I forget that God is in control and that Jesus’ Word is true, then I have taken myself out of His rest and I am subject to His judgment. Why? Because when I take myself out of His Rest, I am trying to do things on my own, I am being God and He will topple me like the tower of Babel. Lest I forget Ps 87:1-7, that all good things around me are sent from heaven above. (If that sounds like a song out of Godspell, it is.) I, and others that claim Christ, praise Him on His mountain, which He calls Zion. (Ps 102:13-21) On that mountain, all those He calls saints will live and be in peace. And He shall reign always. He wants us to live with Him in Zion. (Ps 132:13-16), and He wants us to enjoy His world in abundance. Does that mean heaven? Actually Zion was a mountain near the original temple of Solomon, along with Mount of Olives and some others. But the Zion that David speaks of is in the future, further than that. He is speaking of a Zion like Isaiah, where all will be welcome and can come to His mountain in His Name and worship in Him. In other words, the church. Heaven, too, but then again the way Christ set up the Church is Heaven on Earth. That is how God wants us to be in His Son’s Church, as though we were in Heaven, praising God and in His Sabbath Rest. And we should never look back toward Eden. We are going to Zion’s completion. (Ps 134:1-3) and our attitude should be one of thanksgiving. (Ps 136:1-6) because our relationship with God, when we are in Him and obeying Him and our attitude is love for Him and for one another, is no longer that of slaves but of children. (John 1:16)

There are no Jews, no Greeks, etc... Part 23

It is disturbing to see how the people of the church mistreat or are insensitive to each other, too often than not. How does Christ want us to treat each other, especially wives and husbands? (Ephesians 5:21-32) With love. I am to treat my husband, if I had one, as though I was looking at Christ, and nurture him as I would myself. I need him to lead me with love, as Christ loves me. We are all members of the one body and should work for peace, not be splintered because we believe this is important and that is important and because one of us thinks Christ meant this or that. God wants me to live in peace and He wants those who are in the Church, or who claim to be in the church, to live in peace. To seek to do God’s will, not present one’s interests as a dividing point or disagreeing point but to actually sit down and see what God says. What those who claim Christ forget is that the church is the Bride of the Lamb. (Rev 19:7-9) and must be spotless before Him. Am I doing all I can to be His bride, to present myself spotless? Am I living in peace? Am I seeking God’s will, or am I seeking to procure for my own interests and what uplifts or excites me the most? After talking to some of my married friends, this more than anything else will hinder a marriage, that I want this and he doesn’t, or he wants it done this way, I think it should be that way. Or he doesn’t do things that excite me or thrill me the way this other man did. Number one, that other man was not chosen to be a husband. Number two, where is the peace and love, where is the "for better or worse"? Sometimes they even go to blows or divorce because of “irreconcilable differences”. What that means is that people are too selfish to give up what they want and so they want to break what God put together.

There are no Jews, Greeks, etc. Part 22

Because it is on His Holy Mountain, the church is holy, as the altar and tabernacle were holy (Exodus 30:26-29). Not because of the ground itself, not because of the building, but because of the intent, and the atmosphere of obedience to God, and the people that He has called His own. Not just the backbone of the church, in actuality that is God and Jesus, but the flesh. Because I clothe myself with Him in baptism, because, as it says in Gal 3:26-29, I am an heir of God, I have surrendered the old man and all the sins that accompany that creature and have become the new creation in Christ that Paul speaks about in 2 Cor 5:17. As is everyone who also has clothed themselves with Him. And how do I keep holy? How do I keep this place with others holy daily and forever? By remembering Jesus’ sacrifice in the Lord’s Supper. Just as Passover supper was to remember how God saved the Jews from Egypt, I and those who are in communion with God partake of the bread and wine to remember that Jesus gave His body and soul so that I and others could join God and Him in heaven, that we are part of that realm today, now, every day, and to act accordingly. The memory is the covenant, God’s Word stamped on my soul, and when I am hardened, I deny that stamp is there, but when I actually believe and live as God wants me to that stamp lives forever in my heart and guides me to action. The covenant is so important, because all who believe are directed first by Jesus then by Paul to take the meal in all seriousness because the death, burial, and resurrection resembles not only what Jesus did but why He did what he did. Similar to the Hebrew’s memory of being rescued from Egypt and why each portion of the meal is important. God is so sweet that He will provide for us even if His people grumble. (Exodus 16:1-23) But He also understands that this mercy doesn’t preclude the fact that people must still obey Him, and so whether the people wander four hundred years, or Moses cannot enter Canaan, or our own deaths are the result of the lives we lead in our sinful nature, we must realize that He expects obedience. Not what excitement we get from the relationship. Some people want to make this into a love relationship where each one gets a thrill from the other. That is not the case between our relationship to God. In God we are children. We are the bride of Christ collectively, but individually we are the children of God and must treat Him as a Father. It is a mystery, but when I come together with my brethren to worship God collectively, we are being prepared to meet God, Jesus loves us as though we were His bride and our love for Jesus as Saviour is as a bridegroom. Hence we must treat each other with the respect and honor of that relationship. This is why God through Paul tells us not to lie, not to gossip, and other things that would hurt one another. (Ephesians 5)

Paul pleads with me for unity, because I am part of the bigger body, the same body of Christ. (1Cor10:17) Yet another reason for the constant remembrance of the Lord through the Lord’s Supper, a breaking of the bread, a communal meal that means that I am he and he is me and I am my brother and sister and they are me and we are all together. Unity begins with something simple, as I am no different than any other human being and when I die God will look at me no differently than He would any other man. I have to adhere to the same set of standards – if I call myself His – than anyone else would have to. If I have fellowship with other Christians there are really no separations and no differences between us. That doesn’t mean that my talent is the same as another person, but that I am considered no less or more important than another. I can dig a ditch. Yipee!!! I can write a symphony. Bravo!!! I can clean a dog kennel perfectly so that it is sparkling clean and the vet’s office is spotless. Wonderful!! God is proud of me no matter what I do. Whether or not I produce plays, roses, offal, pick up the trash, play soccer, whatever. God is proud of me and loves me and He also loves everyone else with equal fervor. There are no favorites, although it may seem so. Why it is uneven is that there are men that consider something more important one decade something more important another decade. Whether I dance better than Sue or play the piano better than Jane doesn’t really matter to God, although it sure matters to humans. Humans don’t want to listen to bad voices or wrong notes. They don’t want to hear the humanness when a preacher is in the pulpit or a choir is in front. Or maybe they do, humans being humans…God doesn’t care that I can sing in a choir, or can produce a video on the suffering of Jesus, or give testimony. He only cares that I am His. (Eph 1:10; Eph 3:15,16; Col 3:11,15) I am an heir, as all those who are Christians, all who partake of His body, all who believe and walk as His Son did. And I guess that is my biggest concern about people that can only see the gifts of the Spirit (ie tongues, prophesying etc) and not that there are more important issues. Instead of worrying whether I can or not speak or teach or preach etc., which in Him all things are possible, why not concern myself with learning about His depths and drink from His well. Gifts, such that they are, do not indicate my spirituality one way or another, nor do gifts indicate anyone else’s spirituality for that matter. If they did then even Paul would be in trouble. Gifts are peripheral, icing on the cake, given so that Christians could be a witness of God in lieu of what was coming, the written word. Are the gifts defunct? Without putting myself on the limb let me say this, “Does it matter?” Does it truly matter that I can speak or teach or sing or play piano or speak Spanish or anything for that matter? Does He love me more? I doubt it. Will He use me? Only if I let Him. And only if I am in His rest, and realize that He is in control of me and that there is nothing I can do to improve His image…to anyone. The passage of 1 Corinthians 14:19-34 demonstrates just how much God loves us the way I am, with my talent, or lack thereof. It also shows while He wants to use my talent, while He thinks that my talent can influence more, He also loves me in spite of my talent. And He calls for me to live in peace with all others, no matter whether or not I can do anything better than them. Isaiah 56:3-10, speaks of this and that all peopels will come to God because of the new covenant that is coming. Not just Jews but Gentiles, not just those that can sing but those that can't. All peoples will be welcomed if they accept what God says to them. All will be welcome if they call upon the Lord and are joined to Him will come to His Holy Mountain.