Blurb 26-04-2015

I’ve been reading. In the book that I’m ploughing through, the question is posed: What is the church? Why “church”? The author then gives his short answer – ‘the Holy Spirit forms church to be a colony of heaven in the country of death. Church is the core element in the strategy of the Holy Spirit for providing human witness and physical presence to the Jesus-inaugurated kingdom of God in this world. It is not that kingdom complete, but it is that kingdom.’  Is this a good question, and is this a good answer? It makes me think of the question I posed last Sunday morning while sitting in the front row. “If the Holy Spirit in our midst moved amongst us, what would it look like?” Is this a good question to consider? What would be your answer? I’ve thought a bit about it – dumb to pose a question and then not to consider the answer. What would I like to see as the outworking of the presence of the Holy Spirit in our midst? Here’s my crack at it – To see us as people continue to grow in our love for God, for each other and for the community. See basically when we read through scripture there is an incredible emphasis on love. The way we do/should treat each other and relate to each other is through love – and that love originates from the God who loves us.  1 John 4: 7-21 sorta sums it up the best…naturally we love those we like but to love as God asks us to takes a deep work of His Spirit to transform us into the likeness of Christ. John puts it this way: In this world we are like Jesus. (1Jn4:17) Are we?