Pie in the Sky? No

Eph 4:16 "from whom the whole body, joined and knit together by what every joint supplies, according to the effective working by which every part does its share, causes growth of the body for the edifying of itself in love."

Equipped, edified, unified mature, stable, growing. That would be an amazing church. How does it happen? Through apostles, and prophets, and evangelists and pastors and teachers...but get this, through everyone. We all play a part. The whole body, joined and knit together. This is a cool picture. It is a picture of a building that is perfectly framed. It is picture of a group of people that fit, that are close, that are connected...compacted together. Now, many times when people are this close in proximity, the thing that happens is not unity but strife. We start to get on each other's nerves. We want some space. But not the church. What happens when we live in proximity to one another is that we supply for one another. Where I am weak someone else is strong. Where someone else lacks, someone else picks up. When there is a need, someone else helps. We work together because every part does its share. No one is over-burdened. No one burns out. It isn't the 20 percent who do 80 percent of the work. The church is where every joint supplies and every part does what it is gifted to do with the end result that we edify each other, we promote the growth of each other in wisdom, godliness, happiness and holiness. And it is done because we care for one another and love each other.

Ideal? Pie in the sky? Never can be a reality? Not true. If the apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, teachers and all others are doing their part, we will see an unbelievably growing, encouraging, stable church.

Why don't we see that more often? Why is this the exception and not the rule? Now Lake Ridge is not there, but I am thankful that we are trying to get there. People who walk into what God is doing there have said that they are thankful that they found our church. They have actually said that they are experiencing something new there. This is not tooting our own horn because we have many faults, problems, issues, room to grow. I just pray that we would eventually see the encouraging, edifying, unifying, maturing, stable, growing community that God intended for His body to be. It is possible.

The key? Solid and effective communication of the Word. This is a huge responsibility for those that God has placed in positions of leadership. God help us.