"Thinking out of the box?" (2)

Is  the church today facing the similar pitfall like the Jews? Locking ourselves in a box (4 walls church), building our little kingdom which filled with laws, regulation, rituals and failed to understand our Lord’s heart? Are we playing the church games where result, numbers and ministries are our primary focus? People are just the parts of the ministries? Are we recruiting more parts (people) from the community so that we can assemble a larger  organism machine to fulfill our own desire?

Is it God’s will to have us  building a second “perfect world” (the church) and separate ourselves with the world? Has not He commissioned us to be the salt and light IN the world, and make disciples of all nation?

The greatest commandment which Jesus taught us is “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind”. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself’. How much time & effort have we spent to really reach out to our communities and live with them like Jesus did? Can we sacrifice all the resources the church have for the communities unconditionally? But sadly to say, even  the body of Christ (churches) are not willing to sacrifice for each other, how can we lay down our lives for the world like our Master?

It is crucial for the church today to think out of the box with the help of the Holy Spirit, the spirit of truth who will lead us into all truth! Many time our own fear stop us from thinking out of the box. Lets imagine what kind of impact we will make if all the local churches today united as one to reach out and disciple the communities together? We will share all the resources and let go our own church agenda for the sake of the larger picture- “the Kingdom of God”. But why couldn’t we make this happen? The fear of being taken advantages and losing control have corrupted our heart.  This has blinded us from seeing the truth.

Only when the church is willing to walk out from the box and seek the good, pleasing and perfect will of God, the reconciliation between the church with our Lord and with the communities will take place.

“Whoever has my commands and keeps them is the one who loves me. The one who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I too will love them and show myself to them.”
                                                                                                    John 14:21

“A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.”
                                                                                                John 13:34-35

There is no parameter for God working out of the box since He is not in the box. God know everything and hold the future, He know the best way. He is following His own will and plan since the beginning, He never change. The point is we human could not comprehend His heart, and therefore we are lost at the middle of the road. That’s why we have to be renewed and walk out from the box, only then we would understand His best plan and intention(good, pleasing & perfect will of God).

The problem with church today is we rarely spend time to pray and seek God, and spend time to involve in  people’s life. All we focus is ministries after ministries, works after works, meetings after meetings, what we hold on now is no longer the pure intention & the 1^st love of the beginning.

In Jeremiah 33:3, God told us that “Ask me and I will tell you remarkable secrets you do not know about things to come”. How much time we really spend to wait upon the Lord? When God revel the secret to us, what we do will be viewed as “out of the box” by others. Like Simeon and Anna in Luke 2, both of them recognize that Jesus was the Messiah far before any Israelite. People may thought that they were crazy, “How can Messiah born in such a poor and low status family !” But God work beyond men understanding, we will stand out from the crowd only when His revelation fall upon us.