Jesus saves individuals and connects them to community…

“Jesus saves individuals and connects them to community to be the people of God, not the individuals of God” @pastormark

 

This was a tweet by Mark O’Driscoll two weeks ago which spurred me on to write this post about self needs as christians and how much unity is there withing our fellowships and communities.

 

Fellowships and communities are within themselves an interacting group of  people, refers to a group that shares some common values. Though many christian fellowships/communites share the latter, it seems to me in some cases the interacting group of people can fail due to the need of selfish gain within fellowships.

 

For a group of people to act as a community in a christian church is being interested in daily lives of those people, having a relationship with those people outside of “church” activities and sacraficing yourself to others in helping and doing what needs to be done by serving. Church from the greek never appears in the New Testement but rather Ecclesia, which is better translated to being assembly or gathering. Further to this, the root word of Ecclesia is “call out” but seems modern church is doing the opposite and seems to be looking inward by assembling in big buildings with many christians gaining as much from it rather than giving away or looking outward.

 

Fellowshiping is great on the day that your service is held and other meetings during the week but if you think that worshiping for the half hour or so, taking in the sermons and giving your offerings makes you a good christian by getting in all that you can, you are mistaken. We as christians need to be in unity with each other and not become selfish individuals but give up yourself to serve and be united so that we can become people of God.

 

It seems to me that christians are liking the word of fellowshipping rather than acting as a community. Many churches act as fellowships where it is a sign of friendliness rather than being a community. Simple church has been brining this notion of Christ-centered community established primarily on relationship both to God and to the other members of the group. In doing so it discards many aspects of conventional expressions of church, which is considered beneficial by some, and problematic by others. This gives those in the movement the opportunity to focus on what it considers to be the core practices of Christian spirituality.

 

Though many don’t agree with simple church with critics worry that the simple church movement could encourage people to leave more traditional forms of church, which could lead to further collapse or decline of Christendom. However, with many churches having small groups, cell groups or net groups that meet weekly outside of the traditional “Sunday service”, each of these are simple church as these groups build their relationships more than those individuals that meet on a Sunday.

 

Though this highlights being in unity with each other and pushing for a strong sense of community, it does not mean for unity between churches/fellowships. Many will push the fact that if these simple churches are for unity, it does not push for wider fellowship unity but that the person saved it connected to a community of believers.

 

How times have changed…

It is pretty strange how the last 3 years have changed and shaped me. I posted the video below 3 years ago because for some reason made something resonance inside me because I was feeling lonely. However, I will not be lonely no more as I am engaged to be married next year.

Where do you think God is?

“Okay, first of all, you do not need the law, or a priest, or your mother to make your wedding real (or any type of relationship) . And the church can be anywhere you want it to be: in a field, on a fountain, right here in this room, anywhere. Because where do you think God is? C’mon now! He’s in you, he’s in me, he’s right here between us. Now your (catholic) church hasn’t caught up to God yet. Your mother (People) hasn’t caught up to God yet. And, by the way, they may not ever catch up.”

I heard this from Grey’ Anatomy White Wedding episode and changed a few words (in brackets) around to make it like what I was thinking after I head it. That it isn’t that God hasn’t caught up with what people are doing and living, it is that people haven’t caught up with God.

I also like that God is in the relationship between each other where ever you are and not in a certain building.

Life For Others

Looking at the page in front of me, is a white blank canvas, waiting to express my words, thoughts, meanings, attitudes of life to inspire, encourage and grow others around me. However, the page is all these things when left blank allowing others to express these towards their others around them. How then can I express mine when I really want others to express theirs?

A dilemma forms when we want to be heard but should firstly listen. Would we be destined then for a vacuum of silence if we all listened and no one spoke? But there is always something to be listened too. It is the silent witness of life that sees us all and speaks to us but decide to ignore and reject its being as what may come would hurt preventing us from the life we live and the decisions directions and path we want to live.

Our life has never been our own. We never would be without out it being given to us by our parents. We never could be without them. How much more then can we live our lives when it is never own? We can never live life without others, for without others life is not living. Furthermore, we can never give our life away. We never wish to give our lives away for we want to live and never die. Life is given to us and can be taken away from us. It is important that what we do in life with others because without people, life would be nothing. People allow you to live life.

Windows Mist

So I will again start this blog post giving my utmost apologies for the lack of postings…Very Deja Vu of me ^_^ It seems however, that though getting ideas of titles but no content (pity blog posts don’t work like that lol)

Though I have a thought of what to post about, a mist has covered what to write about, with only getting glimpses of what to blog….Despite this mist I will power on and produce adequate ramblings from a Panda ^_^

What does it take to see the trees from the forest??

We get surrounded by a lot of clutter in life, options to take and paths to walk and in many cases we tend to split ourselves in all ways to conquer the ground, to gain much but in many cases lose direction, never being on a sole journey or purpose. This is difficult in life when we are told, ushered to take all options just in case we don’t like a specific avenue. We should begin to not open our ears but open our brains and hearts, to think of what is best and not what makes things better.

As we move on through our lives, it is time to focus ourselves on what is life long and worth holding onto that gives us the greatest reward and happiness. Everyday is a weighting game…worth doing versus worth giving up….Yes, it can be hurtful but as long as you begin to see the trees in the forest, you see which ones are full of life and not draining.

 

I hope to have stronger and less rambling posts up again, bear with me ^_^

 

Come for a walk

I see him there, walking ahead. Strolling down the road lined with trees. Dead brown leaves on the ground, being trampled on the ground. Fresh leaves, strong, dark green growing on the trees as he walks by them. The bright sun on the horizon provinding the source of life to these leaves. He walks with purpose, determination.

Behind him I see a young boy running toward him, catching up with the man. The boy reaches the man and takes hold of the man’s hand. The man does not look down at the boy but takes a strong grasp of the boy’s hand and walks with him. The old leaves begin to be swept away and the leaves on the tree begin to grow larger with the trees beginning to bear fruit.

Hard Knock Life

In our youth we come through it with many scrapes, bruises, knocks and bumps but the thing is, is that we come though it and out the otherside. We may have thought that it would be our last day, last hour, last minute, never to see another day.

We do see another day dawning but as we grow older we unfortunately don’t get the bumps, bruises and knocks anymore but come into a life of blows, knock-downs as aspects of life are squashed and squeezed which will never see the light of day and not making it to the future. We then wish and remember that all we did get was a bruise or even a bump which we now have forgotten. Yes life comes with all the hard moments of being winded, brought down a peg or two. We must have been doing something right if we are making head way which forces a step back.

I feel I need to cover myself and say that this is not true for all but these are random thoughts that spring up within me which leads me to blog about.

Life is but a breath

Life can be snuffed out by taking ones breath away but life is a lot deeper than that. Life should not be summed up as a breath of two oxygen molecules that are bonded together that float in a see of Nitrogen and other gaseous molecules but should be of what you as a person compose it to be of.

 

We all accumulate material goods but we also accumulate parts of a jig-saw which join together to make a picture of life. In some cases, we pick up some parts and try to force them into place in the jig-saw which sticks out like a sore thumb only to not only you but to others also. It is when we leave that jig-saw piece in place that it begins to hurt an this piece knocks off others.

 

Some people however notice that the piece does not fit in correctly and remove to find the correct piece that suits in the picture of life. What can be further destructive in life is that as you complete your jig-saw of life, you can begin to complete two parts of the jig-saw before compiling the both together which can result in two focuses of life building one quicker than the other, in the hope of achieving one life that will succeed quicker then pulling the two together and keeping your life the way it was in the bigger jig-saw part created.

 

What is Love?

L-O-V-E: I have been asked: What is Love? The simple answer to say is that it is a 4 letter word, made up of two vowels and two constants. Another easy answer to give is that it is 1 Corinthians 13. But neither of these really sums up Love.

To try and question What is Love? leaves an opening to Why Love? How do you Love? Where does Love come from? When was Love thought of? To capture Love is to begin a chain of an unending list of questions.

From these questions there are plenty of answers covering so many levels of love. In order to be specific on Love for another person and to answer it in that context I will give my opinion.

Love is being devoted;

Love is cherishing every moment;

Love is liking the little things;

Love is being close;

Love is more than hormones;

Love is living;

Love is a flurry of the heart;

Love is bringing a smile;

Love is yearning;

Love is never wanting to say goodbye;

Love is more than a fuzzy feeling;

Love is wanting to be;

Love is not fearing the future;

Love is never ending;

Love is what I have for you;

Love is never letting go;

Love is knowing;

Love is.

And always will be.

On Starter’s Orders

We hear the starter’s gun go-off and with it the ringing in our ears as we jump unknowningly into the waters below. Life starts and so does the race, to swim, as fast, as long as possible in the aim to get there first.

We keep our head under the water in effort to get there quicker. At times we struggle to keep the pace and must come up for air and by doing so we fall behind.

We struggle with the waves, the current, the cold and the fear of not getting there. Someone shouts ahead and is not heard, not waited for, feared that they will hold them up in the race.

But where is there? We all set out together but seem to swim in circles not knowing where to go. We look out on the horizon and not a thing is seen. Someone sets the pace for us to keep but do we let one person decide or go into it together.

We need to be united together, aiming for the one thing, help each other along, when one falls back we all wait till they are ready. We all begin to swim in our own directions in life but we need to swim closely together as we all aim to get there.