The Body and the Individual

By Jeremiah Smith

A boat doesn’t go forward if each one is rowing their own way

~ Swahili proverb

This past week God has been highlighting the crucial necessity to see ourselves not as Christians isolated, but as part of a greater expression; which is the body of Christ.  As Christians we are called to think less about ourselves, and more about the greater body.  Do we believe that?  Are we willing to lay down our own stuff for the sake of others?  We often throw around the term WWJD (what would Jesus do?) to deal with the easy things and not the hard things.  What did Jesus do?

He laid down everything.  He was the Truth, but did not seek his own.  He touched the despised, the sinner, the leper.  He was judged wrongly, but made no attempt to justify himself.  He was royalty but washed the feet of common men.  He died for you and I.

What are we possibly left with?  How can we say, “what about me”?  It’s not about you, or I.  It’s about Christ and your Brother’s and Sisters in Him.  One person can only do so much, even if they’re incredibly talented.  However what one individual can accomplish is tiny in comparison to what a team can accomplish.  It’s like the Swahili proverb; one can only row so fast for so long before being exhausted.  Jesus said in John 14:12, ^“I tell you the truth, anyone who has faith in me will do what I have been doing. He will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father.” I believe the greater things are those accomplished by the body, not as individuals.  We individually cannot be greater than Christ, but through involvement in His body my little part becomes the momentum for something far greater.

NHOP as Community

by Richard Long,

   We are in the middle of our first two weeks of “Boot Camp” for our new Nazarites and Prayer Missionaries.  It’s an intense time where they are brought up to speed with all our teaching, philosophy and practice of prayer, and the dynamics of being a ministry that hosts guests every week.

   One of the most important topics we cover is the fact that they have come to live in a prayer ”community” for 12 weeks.  The hothouse environment of living in a busy, intense environment causes all of us to be challenged and to grow in the area of relationships.

Here’s what one experienced writer has to say about the value of living in community …

Creating Communities of Caring
Elizabeth O’Connor

The primary purpose of the disciplines, structures of accountability and mission of the Church is to build life together, to create liberating communities of caring. To each of us is given a gift for the building of a community of caring, a community in which we can learn to embrace our pain and to overcome all those oppressive inner structures that would keep us in bondage and make us protective and anxious for our own futures.

Source: The New Community

Vancouver 614 Community

We continue to encourage you to check out the 24-7 Prayer movement.  They are growing all over the world and also here in Canada.  They have also totally redesigned their website recently.

The Vancouver 614 group that lives, ministers and prays in the Downtown Eastside is an inspiration.

Here’s part of their introduction to themselves from the official website …

“In our five years, we’ve learnt that the purpose of prayer is not intercession or petition (though these are parts of prayer, whether we know how they work or not), but rather intimacy and obedience. Prayer takes our attention off of ourselves, refixing our gaze on the only one worth looking at (Colossians 3). He receives our prayerful attention, and then teaches us to see the people around us, often for the first time. As we grow in this discipline of intimate attention, we see with Kingdom eyes, seeing evidence of life and beauty where others see only death and ruin. We become aware of the seeds of the Kingdom that Jesus has sown around us already, in unlikely places and among unlikely people, and we get to witness its growth. The Kingdom, Jesus tells us, starts small, invisible and even buried, but it grows and eventually covers the whole garden. We’ve seen the Kingdom growing, bringing release from captivity, freedom from oppression and hope for change. We’ve seen some of these people inspired to become re-builders, restorers, re-newers. When prayerful community is formed along these lines, with people from all kinds of differing backgrounds and experience, the Kingdom seed sprouts and spreads branches in surprising places.

Prayer is the main thing. Honouring the father was the primary passion in Jesus’ life. It must be ours as well. Prayer is no add on, nor something we use to make our programs more effective. Coming before God in thanksgiving, humility and praise, desperate for intimacy, is the greatest pursuit of our lives. When we’re in the busy places of ministry, despair and obvious need, we can easily sideline prayer. We trust that God knows and cares for these things more deeply than ourselves. In an intimate encounter with Jesus, we learn to be obedient to his commands, capture something of his plan of renewal for the forgotten places.”

Read the full description of the Vancouver 614 community’s vision for prayer here.

For the official Vancouver 614 website go here.