A Pause to Ponder God's Word
Personal But Not Private!
        Recently we experienced severe thunder storms with very high winds. My neighbor had a tree which the winds tore off several large limbs. Because the limbs were large it took him several days to get them cut up and removed. There was one very noticeable thing about the limbs that lie there on the ground tore from the trunk of the tree. They died. This may sound very trite and you may be saying, "well of course they did! A limb cannot live separated from the tree." I too know this fact, but seeing them lying there dying drilled home the reality, "apart from the tree the limb cannot survive."
        This fact of nature was used by Jesus as an metaphor for the Christian life. I am the vine; you are the branches. If a man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing. If anyone does not remain in me, he is like a branch that is thrown away and withers; such branches are picked up, thrown into the fire and burned. (John 15:5-6) We cannot live the Christian life and be fruitful Christians apart from Christ any more than those limbs could live after being tore off the tree trunk. Every branch draws its identity, its sustenance, it life from the vine. No two branches are alike and yet they are all the same. Paradoxical as it is, it is true. Every Christian is unique and yet every Christian is the same. Our identity is derived from the Vine. We are known by the Vine. We receive our sustenance and life from the Vine.
        Being connected to Jesus means that we are connected to His Church. The Church is the visible enfleshment of Jesus on earth. One cannot be connected to Jesus and be separate from His Church. In the privatized, individualistic mentality of our society this sounds foreign. We have mistakenly made the Christian life a private individual matter. But the fact is, that as personal as our life in Christ is, it is never private. We cannot live our life in Christ in isolation. If we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from all a sin. (1 John 1:7) Walking in the light with Jesus is communal. It is through community that we are cleansed and purified. The Church does not purify and cleanse us. Jesus does. But it is through our fellowship with Him and His people that His sanctifying work is accomplished. There is no fellowship with Christ apart from fellowship with His people and there is no fellowship with His people apart from fellowship with Christ. Being connected to the Vine connects to the other branches on the Vine.
        Al Truesdale and Bonnie Perry beautifully state this fact in their book "A Dangerous Hope." "As we study the New Testament we realize that on the Christian Journey no one travels alone. No one knows Christ or lives the holy life in isolation. We are redeemed apart from our sisters and brothers no more than the lungs draw breath apart from the heart, or the mind interprets colors apart from the eye." John Wesley emphatically declared, "Christianity is essentially a social religion.... To turn it into a solitary one is to destroy it.... The Gospel of Christ knows.... no holiness but social holiness."
        Beloved, regular, active involvement in a local church is not an option for a Christian. Our lives in Christ and our fruitfulness as Christians are absolutely dependent upon full participation in His Church. Our life in Christ is very personal, but not private!

Keep Close To Jesus
Pastor Gerry


A Pause To Ponder God's Word is written and distributed by Gerald Whetstone, Ordained Elder and teacher in the Church of the Nazarene. These devotionals may be transmitted, duplicated, used in part or in entirety without permission for nonprofit purposes only. Responses welcome. To Subscribe Click Here.
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