Your Life is Re-markable! by Jacqueline Scott

Author:Jacqueline Scott [Scott, Jacqueline]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Religion/Christian Life/Personal Growth
Publisher: Elm Hill
Published: 2020-07-02T00:00:00+00:00

~for growth~

Ann received help and care after her horrible experience that greatly aided her recovery. While most of us won’t face that level of trauma, there is often a degree of trauma in all of our lives. How can you live beyond yourself where you are now while wisely caring for your needs as well?

[Your Response Here]

CHAPTER 16

Becoming Members

“…we are members of one another.”

Ephesians 4:25, ESV

“Unity is not an accident or something across which you stumble. It is an active choice. It is my conscious, intentional decision to move from a self-focused, entitled ‘I’ to becoming a member of Team – ‘we’.”

Global Mission Handbook, Hoke and Taylor, p.85

“Innumerable times a whole Christian community has broken down because it had sprung from a wish dream. The serious Christian, set down for the first time in a Christian community, is likely to bring with him a very definite idea of what Christian life should be and to try to realize it. But God’s grace speedily shatters such dreams…By sheer grace, God will not permit us to live even for a brief period in a dream world …The man who fashions a visionary ideal of community demands that it be realized by God, by others, and by himself. He enters the community of Christians with his demands, sets up his own law, and judges the brethren and God Himself accordingly…Christian brotherhood is not an ideal which we must realize. It is rather a reality created by God in Christ in which we may participate.”

Life Together, Dietrich Bonhoeffer

It’s no wonder that working together can lead to some horrendous relational shipwrecks. It’s where we get down to really knowing each other and how we handle our differences. When a group works through the rigors of getting past one another’s rough edges to the point of valuing differences of view and practice, it is a slight taste of heaven.

I think we all do it without realizing it… We think more highly of ourselves than we ought. It shows in our decision making, in our planning and our group dynamics.

This is a common pitfall for all of us and perhaps more particularly those of us in helping professions. We may be prone to an inflated estimate of ourselves because of our altruism or our courageous can-do philosophies. This is one of the reasons Paul reiterates the need for community, i.e. the body of believers.

“Body-life” happens in groups of believers who serve together, complementing one another’s strengths, supporting, challenging and holding one another accountable. Every pioneering initiative has some faith-filled courageous ‘heroes’ on the front end, but they still need body-life.

When Jesus was talking with his team of twelve giving them very specific instructions regarding their work, he emphasized how important it was to wash one another’s feet – that is to love one another selflessly. In fact, THAT would be how people recognized them as His disciples!

“Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.

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