Before You Ask

The following is from today's "Slice of Infinity." - J

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Helen Roseveare was an English missionary from 1953 to 1973 in what is now
the Democratic Republic of Congo (formerly Zaire). She used her skills as a
doctor to minister to the many physical needs in a politically unstable
country, founding hospitals and a medical school, while at the same time
sharing her faith with people who had known great suffering.

Throughout her ministry Roseveare found herself in need of financial support
to carry on her work. In spite of many pressing needs, early in her
ministry she established the practice of tithing (giving ten percent) of any
gift that came in, giving it back to God in faith.

One morning in her first year of clinic work, she slipped away to her house,
hoping for ten minutes of quiet. She found on her doorstep a man with his
wife and two small children. He informed her that he had been sent to her
for work. She told him that she didn't have any work for him, and that he
should inquire of the missionary down the road who might hire him. The man
adamantly insisted that he would work for her, and informed her that he had
been cooking for missionaries for eighteen years. When Roseveare asked why
he had left his previous employers, he rolled up the sleeve of his shirt.
Roseveare recognized at once that the man was infected with leprosy.

The young missionary doctor's heart sank. She felt a deep conviction that
this man's coming meant God wanted her to begin a new work for the treatment
of lepers. She was not afraid of leprosy, but the stigma the disease
carried meant they would need separate facilities, costing more money and
more of her already scarce time. Yet though she clearly could see the cost
that this work would entail, Roseveare believed that if God wanted it to go
forward, He would provide the resources. In faith, she hired the man named
Aunzo to be her cook.

They built a small mud-and-thatch building to serve as a leprosy clinic, and
sent off for medicine, bandages, and equipment. The supplies came with a
bill for 4,320 Belgian Congo francs, money that Roseveare did not have. She
prayed that God would provide the money, then slipped the bill into her
Bible.

The mission had a strict policy that all bills must be paid by the end of
the month. As the month's end drew near, Roseveare expected God to provide
the needed amount, but no funds appeared. As the first day of the next
month dawned, Roseveare went to work discouraged and confused.

At lunch time, Aunzo greeted her with a large brown envelope. It had been
delivered the previous day to a different missionary by mistake! Inside the
envelope was money that came to the sum of 4,800 francs. Roseveare quickly
subtracted the tithe in her head, which left 4,320 francs, the exact amount
needed to pay the bill for the supplies. She writes:

"The total was made up of three gifts, from an unknown couple in North
America, from two prayer partners in Northern Ireland, and from a Girl
Crusaders' Union class in southeast England. The North American gift had
been on the way some four months, transferred from our Philadelphia office
to the London office, from London to Brussels, Brussels to Leopoldville
(Kinshasa), and finally upcountry from Leopoldville to Paulis (Isiro).
Every transfer involved a certain percentage cost. At the end, the three
gifts had arrived together to make the exact sum needed, and two of the
gifts were designated: 'for your leprosy work'-and I did not have a leprosy
work when the money was actually given!"(1)

God does not always work so neatly and obviously, but extraordinary
provisions such as this one serve as a reminder that, "your Father knows
what you need before you ask him" (Matthew 6:8). God had a leprosy clinic
in mind long before Roseveare thought of it, and he put it in the hearts of
his children to give the money for that work. In the days to come, days
which would bring scarcity, hard labor, and very real danger, this was a
promise that Helen Roseveare could keep close to her heart. Even as you
read this, God is anticipating your needs and making provision for them.
You can bring them to him with joyful anticipation that He is expecting you.

Betsy Childs is associate writer at Ravi Zacharias International Ministries
in Atlanta, Georgia.

(1) Helen Roseveare, Living Faith (Minneapolis: Bethany House, 1980), 43.

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Ravi Zacharias International Ministries (RZIM).
Reprinted with permission.

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Not So Much

They overcame him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their
testimony; they did not love their lives so much as to shrink from death.
(Revelation 12:11)

I read this verse again (I've already read it numerous times) a couple weeks
ago. It's been on my mind... and bothering me. Actually, it's not the
verse that bothers me but the standard against which my life is compared.

Christians are going to be persecuted. Jesus says that (see Matthew 10).
He wasn't talking about those who call themselves Christians because they
don't associate with pagan religions. Jesus is talking about those who
follow him, those who seek to imitate him and to be like him as much as
possible, those who are staking their lives on trusting and obeying him and
what he taught.

Lately (over the past several months... maybe years...) I've begun to
question my own love for Christ, my understanding of the love he has poured
out on me, of the grace he has lavished on me. I tend to live so selfishly.
I anger easily. I despair quickly. I talk too much and pray too little.
I'm judgemental and arrogant. I tend to be manipulative and defensive. I
work towards self-comfort and flee self-sacrifice. Care for self is a high
priority. Love for others is, at best, small and fickle depending on what
it will cost me - or what I fear it may cost me. I'm calculating and
fearful.

Lord, have mercy.

How do I come to this point of being able to love as Christ loved me? To
give as Christ gave? To choose death at the hands of an accuser and
attacker for the sake of love rather than choose life through self-defense
for the sake of... well... self.

There are times, Jesus, I feel so far from your kingdom of light and life
and love. O grant me your Holy Spirit that my way of thinking and the
desires of my heart would more closely resemble your own.

Christ, have mercy.

To overcome the sting of death, to defeat the enemy and destroy the works of
the devil, my Lord entered into the very bowels of death, marching directly
into enemy territory and destroyed death and the devil from the inside out.
And he gained eternal life - for himself and for all. And now I must follow
him... despite my fear of pain and loss. For what good is it for a man to
gain the whole world and lose his soul. I must lose my life for the sake of
Christ and his kingdom if I am to have life.

Lord, have mercy.

"...they did not love their lives so much as to shrink from death." O Lord,
may I love my life not so much. Help me to love you with all my heart,
soul, mind and strength... and to love others as I love myself... as you
have loved me, Jesus.

Camels With No Necks

Camels With No Necks

Great article about why Christians are not free to redefine Jesus Christ other than the way the orthodox Church doctrine has understood and defined him.

The Body of Christ (part 1 of 4)

1. What is “the Body of Christ?” There are four statements that define “body of Christ” quite clearly for us in the New Testament.

a. And God placed all things under his feet and appointed him to be head over everything for the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills everything in every way. (Eph 1:22-23 – “Hhis” and “him” are references to Christ.)

b. The husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body, of which he is the Savior. (Eph 5:23)

c. He is the head of the body, the church; he is the beginning and the firstborn from among the dead, so that in everything he might have the supremacy. (Col 1:18 – Again, “he” references Christ.)

d. Now I rejoice in what was suffered for you, and I fill up in my flesh what is still lacking in regard to Christ’s afflictions, for the sake of his body, which is the church. (Col 1:24)

e. There may be other verses we could reference but these are sufficient to make the point. The apostle Paul states quite clearly that the Church is the Body of Christ. Amazingly though, Paul then goes on to say that the Body is “the fullness of him who fills all in all. This hearkens to Paul’s declaration that in Christ all the fullness of Deity dwells in bodily form. (Col 2:9 ) As Christ possesses all the fullness of Deity so the Church possesses all the fullness of Christ. And so each Christian is “complete” (or full) as part of and within the Body of Christ since it is in his Body that the Spirit of Christ dwells. We must be very clear that no individual Christian is complete in him- or herself. It is within the context of the Body of Christ, the Church, that the individual Christian finds completeness.

f. In discussing the relationship God intended between a husband and wife, St. Paul draws the parallel to the relationship between Christ and “the Church, his body, of which he is the Savior.” (Ephesians 5:23) Paul begins this comparison between the marriage relationship and the spiritual relationship, however, by identifying that “Christ is the head of the Church…” In the context of the letter, Paul seems to be making the point that while the husband is one with his wife, just as Christ is one with his Church, that there is still a hierarchy that must be observed. The relationship between the Church as the Body and Christ as the Head must be understood that, though there is a deep and abiding intimacy, they cannot be separated; the Head is the one who controls the Body and not the other way around.

i. A similar but shorter statement is made by the apostle to the Colossian Church that Christ is the head of the body, the church. (Colossians 1:18) In the opening of Colossians, Paul is attempting to establish the nature of Christ as having superiority over all created things. It is because of who Christ is (and not just what he’s done) that makes him head of the Church. After all, He is the image of the invisible God. That virtue alone would qualify him to be head of the Church since he possesses supremacy over all that exists but the rest of the godhead. Again, this passage makes it quite clear that while the “Body of Christ” holds a relationship with Christ that is like no other relationship between God and creation, personal and intimate, it is still under the authority of Christ just as the physical body is under the authority of the physical head despite their obviously intimate relationship.

ii. Additionally, there is this statement Paul makes to the Colossian Church that reiterates the same statement within the previous two passages: Now I rejoice in what was suffered for you, and I fill up in my flesh what is still lacking in regard to Christ’s afflictions, for the sake of his body, which is the church. (Col 1:24)

g. The phrase and the point of these three verses we should notice, is that the Body of Christ is the Church and the Church is the Body of Christ. The Church, at this point meaning the universal or catholic Church, constitutes the Body of Christ. There is no part of the Church that is not also part of the Body of Christ and, conversely, there is no part of the Body of Christ that is not also part of the Church. But this begs another question.

h. As well, no Christian can be a Christian without being part of the Body of Christ, the Church. People who claim to be Christian but refuse to have anything to do with the Church are saying, in essence, “I’m part of the Body of Christ but I want nothing to do with the Body of Christ.” They may mean that they don’t like the way the Body of Christ sometimes seems to act. They may despise the brokenness and fracturing of the Church. There may be lots of things they don’t like about the Church or about specific Christians. Refusal to associate with the Body of Christ, however, is like a finger saying that it refuses to associate with the rest of the body of which it is, by nature, a part. To “cut itself off” from the rest of the body is death for that part. As it is for the physical body, so it is for the Body of Christ.

i. But all this begs another question. Who, specifically, qualify as members of Christ’s Body? What “defines” the Body of Christ? We shall consider that question in a post to follow.