Joined and Held Together…

The illustrations of working stronger and better together are endless. When each part of a body, each cog in a machine, each soldier in a troop performs with excellence and reliability, it makes all the difference. The comparison between a football team that has practiced together at length and one that meets for the first time on game day cannot be drawn; the latter plan is too preposterous for any sane coach to consider.

We live in an individualistic society, where primarily looking after one’s own needs is prevalent and often recommended. As followers of Christ, however, we are called to something higher: the privilege of partnership.

One of the biggest reliefs in taking the narrow path is that we don’t have to go it alone. When we devote ourselves to Jesus, we gain the devoted support of a family that is called to “bear one another’s burdens” (Gal. 6:2). We are not islands unto ourselves anymore. We are a network, an intricate ecosystem, each part dependent upon the next. In order to thrive, in order to express the likeness of Christ and define the perception of Christianity in our community, we must work well together. Your gifts and abilities have valuable purpose — both to the body of believers and to those who observe it from the outskirts.

Our God is a Shepherd who will leave ninety-nine to bring the wandering, lonely one back to His family (Luke 15:4). We want to be the ninety-nine who go searching with Him when He does. One matters. One is worth it. We must move as one to reach them.