“But God has put the body together,
giving greater honor to the part with less honor so that there won’t be
division in the body and so the parts might have mutual concern for each other. If one part suffers, all the parts suffer
with it; if one part gets the glory, all the parts celebrate with it. You are the body of Christ and parts of each
other.” (1
Corinthians 12:24-27, CEB)
As we approach the time
on June 28 when we will re-open our facilities for Sunday morning worship, there
are some important topics and concepts that I believe we as a church need not only to consider and be aware of, but to practice even
more intentionally than before. I talked
about one of them in my previous blog article from last week titled “LOVE, not
FEAR” (read it HERE if you haven’t yet).
But late last week, Sue Haupert-Johnson,
the Bishop of our North Georgia United Methodist Conference (aka “Bishop Sue”) shared
a video plea for another concept that I believe is equally essential for our future as
God’s church. If you have not already
watched/seen it, I want to invite, encourage, and in fact urge you do so.
In her video, she addresses not only
issues related to the regathering/re-opening of our churches for in-person
worship, but about the vital work that we must do as God’s people to end the
scourge of racism. She does this by
calling attention to the important practice and understanding of the concept of “WE,”
not only by the early church, but also by early Methodism, and by the church in
America during the “Spanish Flu” pandemic of the early twentieth-century.
When we resist the cultural urge to
think (and live) in terms of “I, me, and my,” it radically changes our perspective
not only on life, but on the issues and relationships around us. My prayer is that all of us can increasingly learn together to be a people that practice more “WE,” and less of a people who
insist on “I, Me, and My” – to put the needs, cares and concerns of the those among
us who are most vulnerable and who are hurting before our own.
While it's 24 minutes long, I urge you
please to take time to watch the entire video, and then let the Holy Spirit
speak to you about what she says. As you do so, please also remember
that God loves you and I do, as well!
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