These past few weeks we took a look at what 8:08 would look like if everyone bought into the practicality and faithfulness of God’s love. An amazing part of the Gospel is that Jesus pours his love into us so that we may be able to love like he does. We too can be practical and faithful in our love for each other. However, God’s love is not a science experiment studied at a distance; we are the experiment of God’s love and it requires every one of us to be ALL IN. To be ALL IN, we have to start with seeing what the Church looks like. The Church simply means an assembly of people, and the Old Testament equivalent to the word “Church” stresses the action of assembling together more than the actual individuals assembling. This has huge implications because the Church is not a stagnant building or people who hold to a certain set of creeds, but rather it is people who do something. The New Testament confirms very quickly that this something is living out the Gospel. The Gospel says that God came as a man in Jesus to save the world from sin by dying on a cross and rising from the dead. We are called to believe in this by faith, and to be like Jesus by giving our rights over to God and loving like he does. This is a message of hope that we are entrusted to spread and let transform the way we live. We are to BE THE CHURCH and at the heart of it we have a purpose in actually speaking about the hope we have in Jesus and loving people practically and faithfully. How do we love faithfully and practically? We are not left alone to the power of our own love, but instead we are given the very Spirit of God to live in us. If we believe in Jesus then we have received the Spirit who not only teaches us to love like Jesus but also gives us the power to actually do it. Part of the way he teaches us to love is by giving us gifts to serve each other. We are all gifted by the same gift and that is the Holy Spirit. He also gives us unique gifts to serve each other. We know best what our gifts are by just jumping into actions of service. Part of being the Church is realizing WE ARE GIFTED TO GIVE. However, at the heart of our gifts and giving should be humility. If the Gospel is the heart of the Church then part of the heartbeat is people considering others more important than themselves. I think we all have those people we are wishing wouldn’t talk to us or those people we are just wishing would fall flat on their faces. At the heart of this is sinful pride, and in order to be the Church we need to shed this pride for grace and humility with each other. We must CHOOSE TO LOSE. That means putting aside our competitive nature to win and outdo the guy or gal next to us in order that we may increase in humility and overflow in love. We must choose to lose so that we might win humility, which is part of the character of Jesus. What does this concept of being ALL IN look like? It starts with being the Church, realizing we are gifted to give, and choosing to lose.
Check out Ephesians 4, 1st Corinthians 12, & Philippians 2