Quote:
Originally Posted by kisstheson
Yes, our dear and precious Lord Jesus Christ is the One who satisfies us completely. Yes, He is the only One for me as well.
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As I said earlier, as christians, by definition, we are those for whom the search has ended. Jesus is our Answer from God, unequivocal and irreplaceable. My analogy is when I fell in love, and shortly thereafter one of my friends came up and told me "aron, I've got a girl for you. She's this and that, and such and so forth, etc", and I simply replied "No, thanks". Maybe this one was all that was being described, and more. But I was already taken. I was off the market. I simply wasn't interested in looking away, not for an instant. It was an emotional decision, to love. And by definition it precluded other courses of action previously open to me. Well, Jesus was like this for many of us. We came down from the mountain, "having beheld His glory and majesty (cf 2 Pet 1:16-18)", and we simply could not think of any other reality than with This One in the most prominent place; this Name is now above every name both on earth and in heaven, both now and forevermore amen. Game over, as they say. Peter and John both say this. "We beheld His glory(John 1:14)". Clearly, for us believers, as Jesus said on the cross, "It is finished." He has gained the victory over sin and death and we happily join his victory parade.
But where this "victory parade" may lead us while we yet are in this earthly tabernacle is still a mystery. There is actually no earthly headquarters issuing directives on "God's latest move". No, it's a little voice within, one day at a time, that we follow. Of course, we have the Bible, and we have the fellowship, but ultimately it is a mysterious voice that calls us so unexpectedly.
Secondly, I have come to realize that the "Christ and the church" rubric of the LC's is in error. No, for the christian it is Christ alone. We are the church, and yes, Christ loves the church, but our job
as the church is to love Christ alone. Yes, we love our fellows as well, clearly, but to love "the church" is the province of the bridegroom; only His love is vast enough for the job. Our job is to love God and our neighbor. Let God take the "universal church" on. If we presume to do so we overstep our bounds: we fail miserably at best (being weak and partly blind), and at worst(if we are the "strong" type) we create an organizational monstrosity that we call "the church", and we are as pleased with ourselves as little Jack Horner in his corner with his christmas pie. We are, as
djohnson points out, merely "little children playing church in our sandbox". The inevitable fights and name-calling and "turf wars" I think bear out this conclusion.
So -- love God and love the person next to you and let God worry about the "feeling in the Body", and "God's latest move", and so forth (of course,
kts, you may know and live all this better than I; I just felt like appropriating your thread for a moment). Peace & grace to all.