Part 4  The Body Revelation

   Jesus I got very excited last night but couldn't get up and write down my thoughts.  Could You speak them to me again? 
   I was thinking about how we are to love each other... and the curiosity of my last lesson. Where I needed to (and You wanted me to) come to You first with my heart, well it made me wonder.  What then is the purpose of the body? (I know, extremist)  BUT... when we go to You first, and are loved so completely and perfectly by You, we are filled by not only a knowledge of who You are and what You desire but it fills us up enough that it then spills over to those around us.  Which leads me back again that the most important thing we ever do is to KNOW You.  To constantly deepen and work on our relationship.  The only real loving is when You love through us... so to constantly experience You in relationship, we then know how to respond and love those around us.  On our own we are afraid and unsure of what to say but taking You into it releases that need to perform well and we can just be real.  It isn't always to have a wise word, sometimes, it is to listen, to be trustworthy, to be faithful or to share emotion of a situation.  The 'agenda' or selfish motive is laid down in this kind of loving because it isn't out of ourselves that this powerful exchange happens.  It is only through us.
   Let me go back to one of the first thoughts... to be loved by You gives us what it is to be complete. To not have a void, to be content within.  We no longer need that love from the world around us here instead we long to spill it out onto the world. Which brings me back to Your words.. "I did not come to be served but to serve and give my life as a ransom for many"... it's true. 
   So what does the body do?  It gives us a group that is connected through Him the Head.  In this group we are safe to grow, learn and experience what He is saying to us, what He is trying to teach us, where He is trying to take us.  He sets us up as a body, that is meant to be so interconnected in order to function properly. (what a very beautiful way to express our complete dependence upon Him... this is His work and life we are living out, not our own)  When functioning properly all things are connected to the Head... when we hurt, when we struggle, we are surrounded by a people that will faithfully take us back to Jesus' presence.  Reminding us that He is the first place we must be THEN we SHARE the experience.  The diversity in which God will call us to serve that hurting member is unfathomable and unbelievably powerful YET we will not know how unless we remain so rooted and connected  to the Head so He can pour out love through us in whatever form.  While we serve, we are also being served, in the sense that, someone else is allowing us to connect again to Jesus through an experience we would never know outside of ourselves.  That is a deep loving act.  The more of these shared acts of connection with the HEAD we experience, the more willing we are to let go of ourselves.  Letting the old man fall away that calls for action that is never a failure, that calls for recognition, that calls for acceptance, that calls for a continually working up of status above others.  The more we let go of ourselves and become consumed with Jesus; loving and serving Him by loving and serving those around us, the more REAL we become the more CHRISTLIKE we become.  With that  (in the world's eyes) a definite power  (that is frighteningly undeniable) will be manifest because it is the presence of Jesus Himself.  "And they noted that they had been with Jesus"  When a body becomes alive, it has a power and displays a learning  that no individual can ever relate.  A deeply connected person, that walks with Jesus and does His will, is undeniably and incredibly used by God BUT when the world looks at him/her something can easily happen.  We put them on that, impossible to reach, pedestal that no normal mortal can ever reach.  If a whole body of Christ (filled with normal mortals) together is so full of the presence of Christ, it is something different again.  That group is never exclusive, if we are real we are constantly aware of our community and surroundings as well and are reaching out with Jesus' heart to touch them and love them and serve them.  When it's real, they are pulled in too.