Quote:
Originally Posted by finallyprettyokay
Matt:
Christ and the church. I think we thought they were the same. 
fpo |
Honestly, I thought I already belonged to Christ. When I said I was consecrating myself to Christ and the Church, my thought was that I was consecrating myself to Christ for the vision of the true "Church," the true practical oneness, that I had become convinced He wanted to have. Our consecration meant we were willing to pay the price to give Him such a church.
I think that the reason we thought of them as the same was because we believed that just as He gave Himself for her, so should we. We read the verse "Husbands love your wives, as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself for her" as if it said, "Love the church as Christ also loved the Church and gave Himself for her."
Interestingly, it was a number of years later in April 1975 (I wrote my dated consecration to Him in my Bible), that I actually had a sit down time in which I gave myself to Christ. I ended my consecration with "save me into Yourself." This time I had no thought that I was giving myself to Him for something else, just to Him only. This happened during a period of time when the Lord had begun to freshly visit me and show me how wonderful He was.
Two years later (1977) I found myself in an ejection seat with a top dog elder's hand on the button, as God began painfully to rescue me from my earlier consecration to "the Church." It took him about 10 more years, to extract me/us completely. (Then began the really hard part--extracting all the "true church" teaching from me.)
Thankful Jane