Effective Ministry Comes Through Unity of Spirit--Father, Make Us and Keep Us One!

I always read John 17 in such wonder and amazement.  Christ is soon to face the most cruel, undeserved for Himself (as He is holy perfection), death due to bearing the full weight of sin for sinful mankind.  He will go through this in order to bring all those who will trust in Him eternal forgiveness and cleansing from sin.  In these last times before His death, burial, and resurrection, Jesus does not think upon Himself, but turns His attention to caring for His disciples.  He explains to them what is going to happen, though they fully don't understand it all.  He also prays not only for them, but for every believer to come from that point on to eternity.  WHAT A WONDERFUL SAVIOR. 

What does He pray?  He prays that we would believe in Him as the Son of God that He is in truth.  He prays that we would be sanctified in His Truth.  He prays that we would be in the world, but yet separate from the world, for the glory of God.  And over and over and over He prays that we would be UNITED--to be one in the body of Christ, for the cause of Christ, just as He and His Father and the Spirit are the Great Three in One in perfect unity.  WHAT A WONDERFUL PRAYER.  Thank You, Lord, for taking the time to pray for us and to pray for the things that truly matter for Your kingdom.

I do not find it a coincidence that upon my return from Hungary that my first assigned Sunday School lesson to teach to my first grade Sunday School students was about John 17.  It was timed in His control. It was a lesson of reflection and praise from my missions trip.  Isn't it amazing how God sends the right passage of Scripture to our hearts at the right moment of time for the greatest good!

If Christ's great prayer for us dealt with the importance of Christian unity, then we each need to make this a prayer for ourselves.  We need to pray for unity in the ministries in which we are involved.  We need to pray for unity within our church congregation body.  We need to pray for unity of all believers all around the world.  We all live in a sinful world.  We all are composed of human flesh.  Within all believers there is constant spiritual warfare that is ongoing.  One of the enemy's greatest methods of attack is knock the believer's goal off of productive causes of Christ, by attacking Christian unity, causing even the best and well intentioned believers to battle against one another instead of standing/working for Christ.  The enemy is not dumb.  He is a destroyer seeking whom he may devour.  Our greatest weapons of defense are what Christ did and mentioned.  What are they?  1) The truth of the Word 2) Prayer

While in Hungary and even months before, my biggest prayer was that of unity.  I prayed that the staff which came from all over the world, but had Christ within, would walk in Christian unity.  I asked in prayer calendars, conversation, and emails that others pray for the same thing.  Christian unity in the Spirit is a must in any work of the Lord that is worth being accomplished.  Anyone who has read my blog knows that there was a very small moment in time (a day and a half in week 2) where for me Christian unity was attacked.  I struggled knowing that I was part of the attack and my sinful heart gave into the attack momentarily.  However, there are two things that Christ has given me such peace about over the last week 1) In the midst of the attack, I (along with others) did what we were suppose to do.  We fought the battle of heart and action with the two most powerful weapons of all--His Word and prayer--prayer for unity and prayer for a changed heart within me 2) Praise God.  He was and always is victorious, especially when we pray for the right things for the right reasons.  The power of Christ within us is greater than anything the enemy throws our way.

With a new perspective, there are a few pictures from my trip that are now EXTRA special to me because they show and prove the victory of Almighty God.  To Him be the glory.  I would like to share the pictures and the praise. 

This activity in our English class my second week is my favorite activity out of the two weeks.  It was a human board game.  Each camper rolled a die and moved themselves along the board.  Once they got to their place on the board, they had to say in English the color of the game piece and symbol (whether number, letter, or shape).  This game was a favorite of our campers.  This game came about because of the answered prayer for Christian unity.  I found an activity online called Spin the Bottle.  No!  Not what you are thinking.  You make a circular game board with colors on one side and shapes on the other.  A person spins the bottle.  One part of the bottle will land on a color and the other will land on a shape.  The person spinning must then state the color and shape.  This seemed to be a great activity that I found, but it was too hard to accomplish making a circular board.  My teaching partner had the idea of making the board as you see pictured above with construction paper, linear, and with symbols listed on the construction paper (not only shapes, but numbers and letters too).  Praise God in Christian unity of combining two ideas together.  We created a fun lesson activity that helped with teaching English, but made for a fun time for them to open their hearts for the invitation given that night.

We called this activity, "Pass Around Alphabet."  Another lesson accomplished from prayer for Christian unity.  I thought of an activity kinda like hot potato where the students would pass a ball while stating the alphabet, but struggled at where to take it from there.  The thought lacked a true accomplished focus.  My teaching partner used my thought and came up with the idea of having the students pass the ball over and under while stating the alphabet in order.  The kids loved it.  Praise God for another activity composed in Christian unity on Wednesday morning.  Of course there are more but these stick out the most.

Father, make us one to accomplish Your divine work.  Keep us loving one another, working together, and progressing forward for the goal.  Your Spirit within us is the power to keep us united and marching to one beat--which is the beat of Your heart.