Seamless Life in Christ

I have a good friend and church-mate that has worked to collect and save all sorts of things about our local church’s history. He has a great interest in the details of our past history, which goes back to 1888. He recently treated our members to some excerpts from an old church newsletter that presented information about activities of church members some eighteen years ago.

Among the excerpts was a quote from an Anglican priest named George Carey, who eventually became the Archbishop of Canterbury. As such, he was the leader of the Church of England and a provider of unity for the worldwide Anglican Communion, although he had no direct authority over it.

The quotation mentioned above, is from Carey’s 1984 book title, The Church in the Market Place. In reading the quotation, I was led to ponder on the disposition of Christ’s church in this world today. He begins, “How it must break Christ's heart that his people are so scattered and divided! Oh, for men and women of love and faith to thread together the 'seamless' robe of Christ that rigidity, arrogance and intolerance tear apart. 'The nearer we come to Christ, the nearer we come together,' once said the Theologian Moltmann. It is about time we discovered that unity in him."

In thinking about now retired Archbishop Carey’s comments back in 1984, it has led me to ponder on the many ways we Christians can let the busy work of our churches get in the way of where God is leading us to fulfill His Will in us and through us in this world. In managing our churches, we sometimes lose touch with God’s mission. While prayer, study and Christian action should be driving us, many times we let disagreements and bossiness get in the way of our outreach and internal ministries.

As practicing Christians we should always trust in God. He will always surprise us when we have doubts about our ability to do something in His name. He is always there beside us and we should look for Him to do our work together with Him.

As we all know, prayer is very important and is very powerful. Whether it is prayer for the sick and needy, prayer for a church project, prayer for church outreach ministry or our own personal prayers for self, family and friends, prayer drives all things. My personal experience in prison ministry has accented my awareness of prayer. In forming a forty person team to spend three days in a State Prison with a group of 42 inmates, prayer is the fuel. Having spiritual talks, discussions, artwork and other sharing with inmates requires prayer.

We have some fifteen talks and meditations during the three days and there is always a small group of us praying in a remote room for the speaker during his talk. The prayer team prays with each speaker before his talk and after his talk. Lunch and supper are prepared off site and brought into the prison to share together each day. Team formation and preparation for such an event takes many weeks prior to the prison retreat. An effective ministry such as this runs on continuous prayer. Local and connected people all over the world participate in prayer for and during this ministry.

All of a churches inward and outward ministry must be Spirit led. Reliance on the gifts of God’s Spirit is necessary in all things. Even with today’s sophisticated ways of communicating around the world on the internet, we must rely on the Holy Spirit as our way of discerning what God expects of us and where He is leading us. We must be so much in tune with the Spirit, that we will intuitively think and do what is right in the different aspects of our lives.