Being United with Christ Jesus!

“Therefore if you have any encouragement from being united with Christ, if any comfort from his love, if any common sharing in the Spirit, if any tenderness and compassion, then make my joy complete by being like-minded, having the same love, being one in spirit and of one mind. Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves, not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of the others.” – Philippians 2:1-4 NIV

All of us have to be united with Christ through the Spirit of God since each one of us are members of His body (1 Corinthians 12:27) In fact, Jesus Christ earnestly prayed before His Father that we become one—just as God and Jesus Christ are one (John 17:20-26). Therefore, we ought to become one, especially if we belong to Christ Jesus and share the same Spirit (1 Corinthians 12:12-13). “For just as each of us has one body with many members, and these members do not all have the same function, so in Christ we, though many, form one body, and each member belongs to all the others.” (Romans 12:4-5) This means that we have to love each other (1 John 4:7-8), care for each other (Philippians 2:3-4), encourage each other up (1 Thessalonians 5:9-11), pray for each other (James 5:16), etc.

I appeal to you, brothers and sisters, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that all of you agree with one another in what you say and that there be no divisions among you, but that you be perfectly united in mind and thought. (1 Corinthians 1:10)

Before the coming of this faith, we were held in custody under the law, locked up until the faith that was to come would be revealed. So the law was our guardian until Christ came that we might be justified by faith. Now that this faith has come, we are no longer under a guardian.

So in Christ Jesus you are all children of God through faith, for all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. (Galatians 3:23-28)

Although churches are places and hospitals for spiritually broken and poor   people (Matthew 5:3), and who want the word of God to meditate on their lives throughout weeks, the important part of churches are to make us one with other believers in Christ since “… he is the head of the body, the church…” (Colossians 1:18) In fact, each one of us are church if we belong to Christ Jesus, due to the fact that each followers and disciples of Jesus are parts of the temple of the Holy Spirit (1 Corinthians 3:16-17). This means that we ought to keep fellowshipping with our fellow believers in Christ other than just meeting each other in churches—just like what the early believers did (Acts 2:42-47).

Consequently, you are no longer foreigners and strangers, but fellow citizens with God’s people and also members of his household, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the chief cornerstone. In him the whole building is joined together and rises to become a holy temple in the Lord. And in him you too are being built together to become a dwelling in which God lives by his Spirit. (Ephesians 2:19-22)

Therefore, brothers and sisters, since we have confidence to enter the Most Holy Place by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way opened for us through the curtain, that is, his body, and since we have a great priest over the house of God, let us draw near to God with a sincere heart and with the full assurance that faith brings, having our hearts sprinkled to cleanse us from a guilty conscience and having our bodies washed with pure water. Let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess, for he who promised is faithful. And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds, not giving up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but encouraging one another—and all the more as you see the Day approaching. (Hebrews 10:19-25)