Our mission is to encourage, prepare, and connect women worldwide to impact their communities with the love of God.
Listen:
“If one member suffers, all suffer together with it; if one member is honored, all rejoice together with it. Now you are the body of Christ and individually members of it.” (1 Corinthians 12:26-27)
Reflection:
It’s truly breathtaking to behold the remarkable unity in the diversity of the body of Christ. When we lived in Switzerland, we attended Crossroads Church in Ferney, France. There were some Sundays when our pastor had us say the Lord’s Prayer in our native languages, and you could hear upwards of thirty languages spoken. There was no competition for the loudest, most frequent or even the most obscure language. We were one in Christ, praying a common prayer, in unison, in diverse languages. Different experiences, different paths to faith, different nationalities and cultures, one God over us all.
Paul’s body analogy reflects the reality of Jesus Christ’s body and our communal relationship to it. When we sin, we inflict wounds in his body, just like the day he was crucified. And because we are in Christ, we are in his body, so when one suffers, we all suffer – and Christ suffers too. Christ’s body also represents life through his Resurrection, and he has brought us to life in his body. His life brings our lives honor, dignity and integrity, so we share in one’s honor together – and Christ is honored too. Our “in-Christness” grounds us in these physical and spiritual realities of community, which at their very center, reflects God’s profound love for us as the people of God.
Prayer of Response:
Gracious God, thank you for the gift of Lifesprings’ global ministry, where we come together in our diversity of countries, cultures and experiences, in unity for our love for you and one another. Amen.
—Submitted by Libby Rutherford
Libby Rutherford has been in Lifesprings for over a decade, and attended the first Lifesprings School of Ministry in Grenoble, France. She is a wife, mom, grandma, pastor, spiritual director, gardener, and chicken farmer. She might be addicted to chocolate and coffee.
Photo above: columbiasc.momcollective.com
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