TOTHEUNTAMEDHEART.

“…Don’t think you are better than you really are. Be honest in your evaluation of yourselves, measuring yourself by the faith God has given us. Just as our bodies have many parts and each part has a special function, so it is with Christ’s body. We are many parts of one body, and we all belong to each other.”
(Romans 12:3-5 NLT)

Yesterday’s post felt a little bit like I was a three year old throwing myself to the floor in a massive tantrum. I was, and so what I thought was going to make me feel better actually made me feel worse because I didn’t feel like I did it right. So I am so sorry if you felt the same. Here is what I meant:

We belong to each other.

Now imagine the hardest person in your life to love. Imagine that person who is handed everything on a silver platter, bringing out an envy you never knew you carried.

Your sole purpose is for the same thing. You are both meant to have a connection, because after all, when I look down at my body there is no part that I would say, ‘you know what, I don’t think I really feel like my toe is connected to the rest of me. It feels so… distant.’ You are both meant to be worshippers, praising the one who put everything together and holds it together. You are meant to be for each other. Like a gift kind of thing.

If you read further into the chapter, Paul goes on to talk about the body of Christ, each one of us representing a different part of the body, each one equipped with a unique gift. So while I might be an encourager, you may be a teacher. Now, before we go on, I need to make a very, very important connection, so be sure to read this verse, and then reread over what we just talked about.

If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.
(1 Corinthians 13:1-3)

So here is what Paul is trying to say: if you don’t love, it doesn’t matter how powerful your gifting is, it won’t do a darn thing. Love is the glue.

So. Let’s say my gift is encouraging, and I choose to only encourage people I am close with. I’m cutting you short, because my gifting was meant for not just the people I choose to share my gifting with. It was meant for everyone.

Got it? That’s an easy one. On to scenario number two.

Let’s say your gift is teaching and you are all about that teaching life, completely open to share it with the whole entire world. If you want to teach me something, but you express no love in doing so nor have you ever expressed love to anyone you have ever tried to teach, what you intend to use to educate won’t work.

Here is an example, highly relatable to my explosion yesterday:

There is this girl who tried to have a teaching moment with another girl, who is a mother. The girl has a young daughter and there is this picture floating around of her daughter’s seatbelt not placed properly. So, the one girl sends the other girl a message showing her how the right way to buckle her daughter into her carseat looks. In turn, the mother deleted her off Facebook and neglected to respond kindly to her teaching.

Love makes a difference. It really does.

We belong to each other. We hold gifts in our hands that others may only experience through us. At the end of the day, we are literally all a part of the same body, all on the same team, all a part of each other.