Children of God together

The children of God need to support, protect and hold one another to God's heart.

Absolutely. Some of the greatest comfort I have comes from the prayers of my sisters in Christ, both at church (Solace and St Jude's) and online through WWAW and CHFWeb. One of the things I find saddest is when the church tears herself apart with internal divisions and strife, with one part of the Body of Christ turning to another and saying "I don't need you!"

This is what I love about the spiritual Re-making course; it allows us to find the good and find the gifts in those other traditions which we would not necessarily appreciate otherwise. Being invited to return to the charismatic roots I abandoned long ago, I am reminded of the great gifts and fire that are to be had there, as well as how necessary it is for the church to have the gifts of the Holy Spirit in the body. I am so glad the gifts of the HS are for today! And even more glad to have a minister gifted with so many of them! And maybe even to have a little of the giftings myself: intercessory prayer, encouragement and sometimes prophecy (which is really listening to God).

When we abandon the Body, when we try to strike out on our own and do it all our own way, discover God's meaning "for ourselves", then we are alone and vulnerable. We risk making mistakes and wrong interpretations without others to correct us, we are open to go to extremes in one direction and completely ignore others. We are very open to sins of pride and self-righteousness, and at the same time less aware of them. We are vulnerable to emotion and doubt in times of weakness with no-one else to reinforce our moments of weakness. God knows us so well! He made the Church to be everything to us that we need, to complete our human incompleteness and to be family for us all. Thank God for His amazing plans to good to us!