Inviting Others In Dr. Ritch Boerckel
Senior Pastor
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By this all people will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.” John 13:35 I have been thinking much lately about the essential quality of genuine love among believers in the church. In John 13, Jesus did not say that all people would know we are His disciples by the way we love them. He said that all people would know we are His disciples by the way we love one another as disciples of Jesus. Of course, it is right to love the people of this world too, but Jesus places priority upon our giving love to others in the body of Christ. Paul echoes Jesus’ remarks to the church in Corinth who seemed to be full of conflict and division: “If I could speak all the languages of earth and of angels, but didn’t love others, I would only be a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. If I had the gift of prophecy, and if I understood all of God’s secret plans and possessed all knowledge, and if I had such faith that I could move mountains, but didn’t love others, I would be nothing. If I gave everything I have to the poor and even sacrificed my body, I could boast about it; but if I didn’t love others, I would have gained nothing” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3 NLT). Paul is saying that nothing good can happen in a church where members are distant from each other and not moving closer in deep relationship with each other. A church that gathers together for instruction, mission and service, but not for loving fellowship, is a church that cannot glorify God. If this is true (and it is!), each one of us carries a great responsibility to both give love to and receive love from others in Jesus’ church. For the glory of God, we must move toward one another in loving friendship. For the glory of God, we cannot allow ourselves to simply be smiling acquaintances with one another. The world will not recognize us as unique disciples of Jesus if we become content with superficial relationships in our local church. What keeps us from deep friendships within the church? A library of books could be written on this subject. But one hindrance to deep relationships has become a recent conviction for me: I am hesitant about opening my life to truly reveal myself to others. I like to listen to others relate the inner workings of their life, but I am not very keen on Continued on page 2