Wednesday, October 8, 2008

Insomnia? Or the Holy Spirit?

Well here we are...midnight on Tuesday. The 3rd day (night) in a row...I can't sleep! I do not know what my problem is...except that each night as I've been laying in bed...I have this heavy burden to pray and read my Bible. Well last night I spent the hours praying, tonight I'm reading.
Right now, my mom is the youth & children's pastor in my home church...and actually decided this week that she is going to start classes at Nazarene Bible College and get her local minister's license. Pretty cool!! But there are some issues in the church that I know have been heavy on her heart. And I came across these verses that I think give us a little insight into how Christ believes the church should be, NLT:
1 Corinthians 1:10
Now, dear Brothers and sisters, I appeal to you by the authority of the Lord Jesus Christ to stop arguing among yourselves. Let there be harmony so there won't be divisions in the church. I plead with you to be of one mind, united in thought and purpose.
1 Corinthians 12:26-28
If one part suffers all the parts suffer with it. And if one part is honored, all the parts are glad. Now all of you together are Christ's body, and each one of you is a separate and necessary part of it. Here is a list of some of the members that God has placed in the body of Christ:

first are apostles
second are prophets
third are teachers
then those who do miracles,
those who have the gift of healing,
those who can help others,
those who can get others to work together...
No where in that list are grumblers, complainers, people looking to benefit themselves. The body of Christ exists to serve others...to seek and save the lost. Not to worry about how we are treated or how often we receive something from the church. If we are Christians it is our calling to reach out to others, to serve, to work together for the kingdom...not to worry about how we feel at church. Jesus' entire purpose on earth was to serve others. To look after and help the welfare of others...he led by serving. Whoever wants to be first, must first be a slave to all (Mark 2?) What you have done for the least of these, you have done for Me. So why are we as churches not more worried about who we are serving and helping? Why do we let politics and rules and tradition get in the way of our servant heart?

Also, as I was reading for some reason a couple songs by Rebecca St. James kept running through my head...The first is "Omega":
May the grace of our Lord be with you, Now and always may you stay blameless till he comes. May the Love of our Lord be with you...

And also her song "You then me"...which is all about the last shall be first and the first shall be last. Life should go You then me. We need to put others first. "It's your turn, it's not my turn"

I must admit that I just finished my 20 page research paper on Servant Leadership...so that may have something to do with my thoughts at the moment. But I think it applies in all areas of our lives! Why are we so focused on us? And believe me I'm as guilty as any...

2 comments:

  1. Hi.. Hope all is well.. You know what is really weird is that I've been feeling the same way. The other night hubby and I both couldn't sleep and I felt in my heart to pray and well I didn't which I should have. Hmmmmm makes me think now.. Thanks so much for this post.

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  2. Thank you Michelle for this post! It's great to hear the perspective of a 22 yr. old churched Christian. How exciting to be a part of serving the world with Christ; bringing about "His will on earth as it is in heaven". I'm proud of you!

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