I Need You
August 10, 2020
I need you.
That phrase is one of the sweetest things to hear but one of the most difficult things to say. My 3 year old is proficient at sharing her feelings this way but I often fail miserably to properly express my needs.
If you are reading this blog, you likely know that humans have a great need to reconcile to God that could only be met by Christ’s work on the cross. If you do not know or understand that, I invite you to email the staff or elders and to read the Gospel of John with one of us. If you have accepted Christ's work on the cross and have taken your identity in Christ, Praise God first and foremost!
But let's also remember that to experience Christ more fully in everyday life and to show the world Christ's love more effectively, we need each other.
God provides believers the Holy Spirit to indwell, illuminate, guide, equip and empower believers for Christ-like living and service (link to scripture). As the Apostle Paul explains, believers are given the "same Spirit" but there are "varieties of gifts". (1 Corinthians 12:4) Paul goes on to compare believers as parts of a body, each one having a unique function and gift and not one part being more important than the other. When describing that relationship, he says the following:
The eye cannot say to the hand, "I have no need of you," nor again the head to the feet, "I have no need of you." (1 Corinthians 12:21)
I think we can interpret the corollary as true —- that the hand needs the eye and the head needs the feet. As parts of the body, we need each other.
We are terrible at admitting that to each other. When I am struggling to spend time reading the Bible or work through deep-rooted guilt, I want to figure it out alone. When I desire to provide meals to a widowed neighbor or to become a peacemaker to people of color in my community, I want to rely on myself and report back later. But that self-sufficiency undercuts the beautiful variety of giftings that comes from the body of believers working together---- and may lessen the effectiveness of our individual efforts to allow the Gospel to change our hearts and to share that good news with others.
I am going to take a page out of my daughter's book and tell each of you directly ---- I need you.
I know I don't always act like it, but I do --- desperately. And I'm so thankful to worship and serve alongside my house church, the other partners of the Bridge Montrose, and the collective Body of Christ.
Curt Kieffer is an elder at The Bridge Montrose and a part of the Galleria/Westside House Church.
If you are interested in sharing what the Lord has been teaching you as a disciple of Jesus, please EMAIL US.