5-5-20   THOUGHTS

My heart is once again stirring about our holding TOGETHER in a time of absence and insolation.    The STRUGGLE between flesh and spirit is apparent.  I want to see you, to be there with you as people together...  But I can only imagine in my heart your being!  And I say to myself, “Stop sniveling Phil!”   The bond we share is FIRST spiritual...   in the heart!  So its’ time to grow that bond “IN THE LASTING PLACE!”  It grows in the eternal heart! There’s an old saying “absence makes the heart grow fonder”.  Let’s make that happen.
Jesus discusses the physical and the spiritual with a woman in Samaria...
John 4:20-24    "Our fathers worshiped in this mountain, and you people say that in Jerusalem is the place where men ought to worship." 21  Jesus said to her, "Woman, believe Me, an hour is coming when neither in this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you worship the Father. 22  "You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews. 23  "But an hour is coming, and now is, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth; for such people the Father seeks to be His worshipers. 24  "God is spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth."

My spirit must grow in this time.  I must renew my INTENTION, that I will make that happen.
Is it happening Phil?  Did it happen last week?   Our spirits are knit together IN CHRIST!  We must strengthen the TIE THAT BINDS.  The isolation uniquely serves to cause me to see the PRECIOUS nature of the church of Christ that is God designed and Savior purchased.  It s the FAMILY of believers, the SAINTS.  IT IS US!

1Cor 12:12-14    For even as the body is one and yet has many members, and all the members of the body, though they are many, are one body, so also is Christ.  13  For by one Spirit we were all baptized into one body, whether Jews or Greeks, whether slaves or free, and we were all made to drink of one Spirit. 14  For the body is not one member, but many.
1Cor 12:25-27   so that there may be no division in the body, but that the members may have the same care for one another.  26  And if one member suffers, all the members suffer with it; if one member is honored, all the members rejoice with it. 27  Now you are Christ’s body, and individually members of it.
Eph 4:15-16   but speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in all aspects into Him who is the head, even Christ, 16  from whom the whole body, being fitted and held together by what every joint supplies, according to the proper working of each individual part, causes the growth of the body for the building up of itself in love.
My Prayer:
Oh God of salvation in Jesus, you have promised that your people, the Church will live with you forever.  We believe that father, and beg for its happening.  Knit our hearts together in Rescue oh Lord.  May our love for YOU kindle our love for each other in a way and to a degree that we will boldly make known your name and the name of Jesus in this time and this place.  Restore unto us the “joy of your salvation.”  May your hand be upon each of us this day.
           In the precious name of our Savior              Amen