Saturday, February 7, 2009

God tore down the wall ...


this Sunday, we're wrapping up a 5 week series called Honor, the lost virtue ... I'm stoked about this series and what God has been doing in our church ...

this week, we're talking about honoring other churches ... this is such a deep passion of mine ... almost 10 years ago, I was grateful to be apart of a movement in our city we called Celebration ... in less than a year, God brought together more than 50 different churches in our city for a night of worship ... we worshiped God for hours ... we prayed and we sang and we wept and we laughed ... it wasn't about style or music or doctrine or theology ... it was about God's presence ... during those few years, I believe God showed us something about real unity ... God showed us something about Himself ...

in Ephesians 2:14, Paul writes that God "tore down the wall of hostility that separated us" ... God tore down the wall ... we've been united in Christ ... together as one body, Christ reconciled us to God by means of His death on a cross ... in Ephesians 4:4, Paul writes that "there is one body and one Spirit and one glorious hope and one Lord and one faith and one baptism" ... and more than that, "there is one God and Father, who is over all and in all and living through all" ...

so, if God has torn down the wall that separated us, why are we throwing up walls? ...
why are we so divided? ...
why are we so threatened by other churches? ...
why are there over 40,000 different Christian denominations in the world? ...
why is Christ so divided? ...

my prayer is that God would show us how to honor other churches ... she is the bride of Christ ... and He loves her deeply ...

4 comments:

josher said...

sooo good cant wait!

Jenna said...

i'm STOKED.

bet amazing things are happening in the morning gathering right now...as i type...

go God!

Candace said...

Nate, Bobby and I so loved your message today. I never really caught on to the fact that we already are one as Christ's body and we don't need to try to be one. That is super powerful and we just need to walk in that. I really loved this series. It needed to be done and I hope it changed all of us.

Kelly Koolhoven said...

Ya, amazing word today Nate. Fun to think back on the Celebration days and all that God did, and is continuing to do in this city. What a time to be alive...and what a place to live...