The other day I was pondering what it means to "have a relationship with Jesus". I was watching this video a church made about their history and growth and someone in it was talking about how they never had "a relationship with Jesus" before, but rather church was just religion. Now before I get ahead of myself I agree that we are created to be relational creatures modeled after God (the Triune God). I agree that it is imperative that we have a relationship with Jesus. But since Jesus is in heaven with God the Father, how do we have that relationship? The easy answer is through the Holy Spirit, through the Word of God (the Bible), and through prayer/meditation. This doesn't quite satisfy me though. So I started to ponder it and think through some of the practical issues with that. Here are my results:
1. We are relational creatures made in God's image and therefore must have relationships in order to operate as we are designed.
2. The church is the literal physical body of Christ. Jesus is the head, we are the body. We must operate as a body and be unified in our local churches.
3. In order to have that relationship with Jesus, we must work it out through the body of Christ. It is through living in the church community that we have the opportunity to flush out the intricacies of being a Christian.
This is not to say that it is only through community that we can have a relationship with Jesus, but rather to say that through community we are able to have a complete relationship with Jesus. We must still be spending time in the Word on our own, in prayer on our own, and relying on the Holy Spirit daily. So the bottom line is that you better be involved in a community of believers where you can serve, love, rejoice, mourn, celebrate, pray, meditate, worship, and live relational lives which will reflect who our Creator is.
