He opens his letter with, “I thank my God in all my remembrance of you, always in every prayer of mine for you all making my prayer with joy” (Phil 1:3–4). Paul models one unifying tool that is always available to us: the work of the Spirit through prayer. 1:5, 7).Ĭonsidering the numerous divisions that exist in the Church today-from denominational lines and worship preferences to the boundaries of neighborhoods and overfilled schedules-how do we begin to cultivate intimacy with one another? He affectionately calls them partners in the Gospel and says he holds them in his heart, as they are all partakers of God’s grace (Phil. But a central theme of the letter to the Philippians is the believers’ unity, their integration, their oneness of heart and mind. Paul has much to say about that in 1 Corinthians 12:12–31. In our highly individualized culture, it’s easy to privatize my relationship with the Lord and sit next to brothers and sisters in the faith while believing the falsehood that I don’t really need them-and they don’t really need me. In the book’s first chapter, the Holy Spirit gently confronted me with what I already knew but struggled to practice: discipleship is a side-by-side-with-other-believers kind of endeavor. ![]() ![]() In the few years prior, I had spent little time in the Word alongside others for the purpose of in-depth study, and I was hungry to learn from their insights and questions. I sat around a table with several women from my church-some of whom I knew only their name-who had all committed to meeting for a handful of early Saturday mornings to study the book of Philippians. “Only let your manner of life be worthy of the gospel of Christ, so that whether I come and see you or am absent, I may hear of you that you are standing firm in one spirit, with one mind striving side by side for the faith of the gospel.” (Phil.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |