What church is about is recalling God’s love and loving each other. The community of the church is God completing the love he has for us. In the church we get a glimpse of what God and his love are like.
“No one has ever seen God” says John in verse 12 “ BUT, if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us”.
I have never seen God, but I’ve been around his people for 28 years, and I have seen and felt his love through them. God’s Spirit and love are made tangible to us through his people.
I see the love of God when I see Patrick handing out the cards he has made for people that week
I hear the love that is God when I hear the musicians who practice to play for us
I taste the love that is God when I eat the morning tea that is prepared with love
I touch the love that is God when I shake the hands of seventy people who got out of bed on a Sunday morning to encourage my faith.
The Spiritual health of a church then, is how it’s members love each other. Not the size of a church, not it’s programs, not it’s budgets or plans.
In the close and regular contact of church we learn to serve and forgive, to be humble and to be loved, to laugh and to cry for each other, to welcome stangers and to deal with weakness. By the Spirit we learn to be like the Son who is our life. We remind ourselves of who God is, what he has done for us and how he is living in and through us
This humble little meeting IS where the true spiritual action is at.
God is love. We know and rely on the love God has for us. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in him. Dear friends, let us love one another.
Bob Goudzwaard (1934-2024)
17 hours ago
2 comments:
Amen.
Thanks for posting mate. That passage was one of the reasons I was very sad to be leaving. I've been thinking about it a lot over the last year or so and this sermon was great. Thanks for sharing it. I've experienced God's love through you. Woohoo!
And I think I forgot to tick the box on this one too!
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