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The Church Worships

Posted: 24 Sep 2018 10:01 PM PDT

Today’s Reflection

CHRISTIAN LIFE is thoroughly communal, for being in Christ means that we are in it together unto death and beyond. Thus at the heart of each church is a core of persons vowed to a countercultural lifestyle at odds with an individualistic society. As organically both divine and human, the church has used a beautiful image to express this — the Holy Mother church.
Certainly the church is human, with a goodly collection of hypocrites and sinners. Yet just as essentially is she divine — consecrated by Christ as his body on earth so that “the gates of Hades will not prevail against it” (Matt. 16:18). Gregory of Nyssa deepends this analogy with the idea of the church as nurse, its teachings being our milk, its sacraments our food.
Worship is at the center of the church’s communal life. While it may not always be clear what the shabby little church across town is all about, be assured that it is an invitation touching our deepest yearning — to be embraced in an organic belonging that God intends for the church to provide.

– W. Paul Jones
Becoming Who God Wants You to Be

From page 43 of Becoming Who God Wants You to Be: 60 Meditations for Personal Spiritual Direction by W. Paul Jones. Copyright © 2013 by W. Paul Jones. All rights reserved. Used by permission of Upper Room Books. http://bookstore.upperroom.org/ Learn more about or purchase this book.

Today’s