We have so much impact upon each other. How much does it change your day when someone tells you something sweet, something encouraging, something loving, something just plain nice. At the far end of the spectrum, it can bring a gentle smile to our face. And at the other end, it can literally bring someone back onto a path God has set in their heart to complete. "The lips of the righteous nourish many" Proverbs 10:21 (NIV). How true is that? We don't just lack for each other in this life, we really do need each other for life to be called good by God. Remember how God said Eden wasn't right until Adam had Eve? And this isn't just about romance and love, it's friendship too. It's our love with God and our family with each other. Jesus is our Beloved and our Father. And he's the Father and Beloved of many others. We love God's children, our own brothers and sisters. "This commandment we have from him is this: those who love God must love their brothers and sisters also." 1 John 4:21 (NRSV) We need each other. When God made us as the body of Christ, he meant for it to be close. How much more close could it be when he writes that we are apart of his own body, that we are all one in him? We are suppose to know each other, celebrate each other, love each other. 1 Corinthians 12:25-27:
So that there should be no division in the body, but that its parts should have equal concern for each other. If one part suffers, every part suffers with it; if one part is honored, every part rejoices with it. Now you are the body of Christ, and each one of you is a part of it. (NIV)
Unfortunately, our own Christian world is marred by separation, infighting, loneliness, and bitterness. I used to be plagued by many of these feelings myself and still struggle today. I covered over it by saying I was resilient, a warrior for Christ, and so I had to endure it to become stronger as a soldier in God's army. Which in a way is true for most of us at some time, but we cannot give way to anything other than truthfulness when it comes to our heart's desires for others and for family, God's family. For being on the inside, instead on the outside looking in. We have to let Jesus fulfill our intimate needs and relational needs. Only then will we be able to be vulnerable enough to acknowledge our desire for others and family and love as our true heart's desires are met by our Beloved and we don't have to rely on others to come through for us since Jesus already has. Perhaps not just being vulnerable, but rejoicing in the vulnerability is a better way to put it. If you've ever given yourself over to Jesus in intimacy and worship, the surrendering part of intimacy is always extremely joyful. It's this naked, unveiled, inviting place where it's God and us and our worship of him inside us is giving him spiritual kisses all over his beautiful Spirit; somehow worshiping him with our words in private, in surrender translates into our soul kissing and embracing his Spirit. It's inviting him in to be worshiped in his temple, our own bodies, personally, alone with him. It's why Jesus said when we pray, we are to go into our bedrooms and close the door and be alone with him (Matthew 6:6). It's our intimate time with him in the divine romance we partake of in his love. We daily need to allow for him to romance us and us worship him. We need his Spirit's embrace and caresses; if not, we are too tempted to stay in a place that is either stagnant or, worse, fall away from desiring our Beloved Jesus Christ.
How often we are here:
When we really should be here:
We all have our own version of headphones. [Had to throw in some 500 Days of Summer somewhere to keep it indie :) ]
Once we have him and our worship of him fulfills our heart's desires, we are free to love others and be open to others in deep relationship. And that's we need to do. (I 100% learned from my romance with Jesus how to love my wife)
As for friendships, it is similar. We need friends. We need people we can share ourselves with. With whom we feel comfortable being vulnerable and open with. We need brothers and we need sisters. We need the family of our Father. It's why Paul writes over and over in his letters how badly he wanted to be with the people in the towns he had visited. Paul loved his brothers and sisters so much that he wanted to stay alive over being with Jesus, which is so much more, and away from his body so that he could continue to pour into the younger children of God (Philippians 1:23-26). And so we read over and over as the bride of Christ grows in the letters how badly this family wants to be together. God meant for us to be a big deal to each other if loving others in this family is enough to make one of the men God chose to write part of the Bible through desire to love and grow his younger brothers and sisters here on earth instead of being in Jesus' embrace in heaven. And of course, this can be a trap for some as people can make idols out of each other and loving, Godly fellowship just as easily as making an idol out of music or TV. We are not so much a social club as we are a family and friends, and a bride caught in the torrent of the Son of God's fiery love for us. The real point, the overall big picture, I think, the Holy Spirit is trying to make through all the writing of the letters of brotherly and sisterly love and closeness of God' family is that it is really good to be close to one another. He doesn't want us to miss that because it will make us oh so happy here and now and it's the reality of life with Jesus in the future. It is so good for us in life here and now and in forever to be together that he wrote it as the second great commandment (including loving those who do not have Jesus' saving redemption).
We all know and celebrate our relationships with others/or celebrate what we would want if the world was perfect in our daydreams. It's the whole 'iron sharpens iron' thing. It's a passing of something intangible from men to men and women to women where we are given more of something of who we are. It's a passing of spiritual matter through words, fellowship, conversation, sharing, adventure, planning for the future, _____ [input what you love here]. And it's one of the ways we image the fellowship of God with himself; like the closeness of the Son with his Father. I was reading Captivating earlier and I really liked these couple parts about sisterhood:
"I love the way women are with each other. When I gather with a group of women friends, inevitably someone begins to rub someone else's back. Hair gets played with. Merciful, tender, caressing, healing touches are given...Little girls have best friends. Grown women long for them. To have a woman friend is to relax into another soul and be welcomed in all you are and all that you are not. (p. 179-180)
For women of God, this is something that is deeply needed and desired. I know that my wife needs time with her closest sister in Christ. It's refreshing and wonderful to her in a way that only could happen through their friendship. As for men, we need a brotherhood. I love sitting around with one of my brothers in Christ over a cup of coffee and talking about God and his Word; trying to figure out Jesus and celebrate his love and passion and desire for us all while drinking the strongest cup of coffee man could possibly brew. It's not anything I'd take over hanging out with my wife or family, but it is special. And it's important. We need to use God's family, for ourselves, for our souls, and definitely for each other.
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