Who are we, but part of you?!
This past Sunday at our church, WEAG, we were commissioned for this work in Papua New Guinea. When some prayer warriors were invited to join us on stage our Spiritual family SHOWED UP! Pennie and Solomon were also commissioned in kids church and they were able to share testimony about how we will be serving God in the mission field.
CO-missioned = our SHARED mission! What mission have WE been called to? Rachel and I have been called to bring the Light of Jesus Christ to every soul we encounter, here in Richmond Virginia …AND to the ends of the earth (specifically the Western Highlands of PNG). We do not live, but Christ lives in us, to deliver His healing, hope, freedom, and eternal life. And if this is our calling, our mission, then it is yours as well! :-)
Just as each of us has one body with many members,
and these members do not all have the same function,
so in Christ we, though many, form one body,
and each member belongs to all the others. (Romans 12:4-5)
Every one of us is called by God, but not everyone is called to travel halfway around the world for three months. But as one Body, the church of Christ, is there anything that one does, which the rest are not part of? NO! We are all one in Christ and whatever one of us does in obedience to God is empowered by our unified community of brothers and sisters. Rachel and I could NOT answer this call to serve in PNG without your support and prayer power! And the same goes for you - whatever mission God is calling you to, you are not alone! The Spiritual Family of God is a jigsaw puzzle picture of Jesus and we all need one another present, connected, and co-involved for the World to properly see the face of Jesus and receive His message of salvation. May we ALL be missionaries wherever the Lord plants and sends us.
As a prisoner for the Lord, then, I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling you have received. Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love. Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace. There is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called to one hope when you were called; one Lord, one faith, one baptism; one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.
But to each one of us grace has been given as Christ apportioned it. ...So Christ Himself gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the pastors and teachers, to equip His people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ.
Then we will no longer be infants, tossed back and forth by the waves, and blown here and there by every wind of teaching and by the cunning and craftiness of people in their deceitful scheming. Instead, speaking the truth in love, we will grow to become in every respect the mature body of Him who is the head, that is, Christ. From Him the whole body, joined and held together by every supporting ligament, grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work.
Ephesians 4:1-6, 11-16