I’ve been preached to a thousand times about the body of Christ, but it’s been taking a while for the information to click with me. It’s the whole moving from head knowledge to heart knowledge thing. Recently I’ve had another “ah ha” moment about unity.
The last few days in the compass have been about this topic. I was reluctant to read because I assumed I already knew what I need to know about unity, but I went along with it anyway. To my surprise, something is beginning to click with me.
You have a role to play and a function to fulfill while on this team. God has placed you on this team and wants to use you with the gifts and talents He has given you. You have a part on this team; you have a role to play, a have a job to fulfill. (p. 12)
Can you imagine if all of you had the gift of leadership? It would be a nightmare for the leaders on your team. Or what if every one had the gift of evangelism? You’d see a lot of people saved, but not a lot encouraged, taught, or discipled. It would be a dysfunctional team. It wouldn’t work. (p. 13)
The Holy Spirit has distributed those gifts in a way that works best. Everyone on your team has a different gift. (p. 13)
This isn’t some mission trip that God decided to throw us into for fun… this isn’t a set of random events that we just so happen to be a part of. God chose each and every one of us, out of every Christian teenager (and adult!) in America, to be in this amazing group of nine people. He chose us for our gifts and talents, and even for our personal struggles so we may begin healing. We each have a different job to fulfill and I can’t wait to figure those out during training camp! 11 more days!
Morgan, YES!!! Thank you for posting this. I totally agree the compass has been great! I’m getting a lot out of the lessons on unity too. I have a study bible, and yesterday I was reading the notes under Ephesians 4:12,13. They said that not only will our team work more affectively as the body of Christ if we each exercise the gifts God has given us, but we will be obeying God more fully. This was a huge “ah ha” moment for me. I didn’t realise how important it is for each of us to use our spiritual gifts and be united as a team. Individually we can only accomplish what “our part of the body” is capable of accomplishing, but together, as the whole body, we can truly accomplish what God has called as to. Thus, we obey him more fully when we work in unity.
Anyway, I feel like I finally get the purpose of unity. It’s so much more than just getting along and being nice to each other!! =) I’m so excited!!
There’s one thing you touched on that really struck me. Out of all the teenagers in America, we were chosen to be on this team. That’s kind of humbling and supporting at the same time. If God chose us to be on this team, we really must each have a purpose on it. We were all placed on this team for a reason. I can’t wait to work together with you guys. 🙂