I was recently thinking about our church plant and how we may set up the greatest church programs, have the best worship and preaching, reach out to the lost and hurting of Muskoka, and try all we can to foster a community of love and grace … and yet nothing we do physically will change hearts. We need a spiritual work to accomplish a spiritual goal. This is where the power of prayer comes in. John Wesley said that “God does nothing but in the answering of prayer”
I was completely blown away when we visited another Harvest church plant and heard of prayer after prayer being answered. They saw God's Spirit do some amazing things when people were on their knees in a humble place, and in a position to receive more of God. Our church plant group is meeting in different homes tomorrow evening to pray together and hopefully begin a pattern and habit of doing this – humbly putting Christ first in everything about this plant and in everything in our lives.
"I have been crucified with Christ.
It is no longer I who live,
but Christ who lives in me."
Galatians 2:20
As I begin to think more deeply about looking to Christ for a new church my thoughts were drawn to Galatians 2:20. We all need to have Christ in, over, and through us. He needs to be in me … and not just in the "Jesus, come into my heart" sense of 'in me.' He needs to have full access to everything in my heart … he needs to be allowed to see even the dark spaces no one else has ever seen.
He needs to be over me … no more hierarchy of Jesus, family, ministry, hobbies, etc. It is all Jesus … everything else finds its meaning and purpose and place in Him. It is all in Christ … I need to seek Him first and allow His the authority in all of it … then I can stop with the competing needs that pull me in all directions.
He then needs to be able to live through me. I need to be nothing—except Christ like. I need to allow Him to transform the way I live and interact with people. He has already changed me … I now need to allow the change to live out in my life. I can be so prideful sometimes and want people to recognize me for my accomplishments, my humour, my personality, etc. It seems I want to be known for things other than Christ-likeness. This has got to change … I want people to be able to see Christ in me - living out in love, grace, holiness, meekness, humility, and wisdom.
Christ in us, over us, and through us.
2 comments:
its sometimes hard to let those changes live out. Its often easier to let the world dictate who you are and what you are going to be doing about it.
keep this blog going kaj, its refreshing to be challegened to think on my own about hard things.
Totally true, Matt ... I can't do it on the "once-a-week diet" of church. It's hard enough sometimes even when I spend good daily time in Word and prayer. The whole transformation of self to Christ-likeness is a painful process ... I guess that's why Jesus and Paul use the analogy of death. And it isn't just some part of me that needs to die it is ALL OF ME ... I am thinking more and more about this idea of dying to self daily. Maybe another post :)
Post a Comment