So what are we meeting for? (2/5) | To give Jesus his rightful place
‘…so that he might come to have first place in everything.’ COLOSSIANS 1:18, NRSVue Since NASA first began releasing them in 2022, the pictures coming bac...
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So what are we meeting for? (3/5) | To present everyone mature in Christ
‘It is he whom we proclaim, warning everyone and teaching everyone in all wisdom, so that we may present everyone mature in Christ.’
COLOSSIANS 1:28
I’ve got a five-year-old who’s currently football mad. He’s making lists of the most important pieces of kit to buy, asking, ‘Is this good food for footballers?’ before every meal, reading football encyclopaedias (yes, they do exist!), and training every morning before school with his mates. He’s making sure that his time alone in the garden kicking his ball (AKA destroying my plants) and his time playing on a team are helping to achieve his goal – becoming a mature footballer.
I could learn a lot from his drive and focus, be that making the most of my time alone with God, in conversations with neighbours and school parents, and gathered with fellow Christians, treasuring what I learn from others, or sharing with others what I’ve learnt.
Paul is a man with his eyes on Jesus. His short letters convey passion, priority, and purpose. In the greetings at the start of each of his letters, he locates his identity in relation to Jesus – and that’s one of the key things he’s persuading the churches to do through his letters.
In Colossians 1:28, Paul writes, ‘It is he whom we proclaim, warning everyone and teaching everyone in all wisdom, so that we may present everyone mature in Christ.’ What a great summary of Paul’s life. It’s also a great challenge to us as the church! Paul’s love for Jesus drives him to worship and spurs him on to witness to others through the most challenging of times.
Paul exhorts the church in Colossae, and by extension us, to grow together in maturity. We are to be both teachers and those being taught, learning together as we seek to follow Jesus in all we do. When we gather as a church, it’s with a call to glorify God and to edify one another. In a perfect world, we’d be coming out of church gatherings inspired for the days ahead.
When we meet on Sundays and midweek, do we, like Paul, have our eyes fixed firmly on Jesus? Do we seek to build up everyone in the church, whatever age or stage they’re at, so that we all grow more like Jesus? Or do we leave that to the ‘professional Christians’, turning up purely to be fed and leave? Do we keep our attention on Jesus with the focus of a five-year old determined to become a professional footballer? Because that’s worth gathering for!
Jo Trickey
Church Advocate, LICC
Who are the people you are helping to grow in maturity? Who helps you grow?
Absolutely what should be occurring. As a home group leader I struggle to enable mature hoist centred conversations in the group. Either those present view it as ” my job description” to initiate and present such, or conversation doesn’t occur. We seem to be the inheritors of a view of passive reception of a presentation from “the leadership”. This results in an ethos that neither teaches, challenges nor elevates the level of engagement. It has the unfortunate effect of diminishing both the engagement with outreach and with the support within the congregation for change. Is there anyone else in this invidious position?
Our home group has been using a series of books ‘Life Builder Study’, and the present one is the ‘I Am’ Sayings of Christ. Using these studies gets everyone involved in discussion, and we have certainly found them helpful. Each member has their own booklet.
Just puts it all in context, doesn’t it?
It was St Irenaeus who observed that ‘the glory of God is a human being fully alive.’ The description of your son’s enthusiasm and joy for football sounds very much like a human being fully alive realising his potential and engaging with real life. Surely we see God alive here in and through him. Why do we tend to seek to glorify God through our churchy or religious observance when his glory is right here under our nose? Thank you for giving such a clear illustration of life in all its abundance which is after all Jesus’ promise to each and everyone.