Team Up!

Chapter 16
TEAM UP!

Nobody becomes great on their own. With each great person there are many in the background that truly make greatness possible. Jesus himself did not go out and minister on His own, He took a company of individuals, the twelve disciples, Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Susanna and many others. Each of these had something to contribute including financial resources that made possible what Jesus did.

God has chosen to limit His ability to His body, the church. The body only functions correctly when each member does it's part. Disability is when parts of the body don't function right. The church in America is disabled because of individualism. Our inability to work together has crippled what we can do.

I have a huge vision of what I believe God wants to do but I can only go as far as the people around me. People don't like to commit to anything, there is such little follow through, so many things are started and never finished. People are so easily moved from one thing to the next. Why? Is it the way we are raised, the consumer society we live in, or are we just shallow people, it's a combination of all.

Are we more led by how we feel than by faith, driven by our emotions more than the Holy Spirit? Are we self-seeking, not willing to share what we accomplish? These are questions we need to examine ourselves with, for each of us will only go as far as the team we form around us. We need help to accomplish God's will, each member of the body has received only a portion of God's grace. We need to call people out like Jesus did, will you forsake all and follow me.

It is amazing to see in sports, players commit to one team their whole career, most players go from team to team. It is hard to build anything with people that are not committed, you give them responsibilities, great possibilities are formed and they leave before they are completed. I have been in my current job for eight years and what a difference it makes in building something great for the future. I find very few around me though willing to do the same.

How can we work together when we are all so different? Through the Holy Spirit! The Spirit unites, the flesh divides. Our flesh likes to be comfortable, it likes people around us that agree with us, that see everything the same, but this mentality keeps us isolated to just a few and incapable of expanding our understanding therefore remaining ignorant in our own ways.

We see the early church in Acts 4:32 were united in heart and mind, they even shared everything they had, this caused them to testify greatly of the resurrection of Jesus Christ and people were added to the church daily. A body cannot be alive if it is divided into many pieces, it is dead. The resurrection of Christ is only made known when He is truly seen through His body united together as one.