What Christians can’t learn from education alone is how to be thriving, contributing members of a Christian community with all its varied demographics and personalities. The body of Christ, with all its members, changes from year to year, but his mission to glorify himself in the world through his people does not change.
We, as God’s people, are the clearest physical representation of Christ on earth as we embody his teachings in our daily lives. We become his hands, feet, and mouth as we do his work. In a brother or sister in Christ, we find priests who can bring us before God and remind us of his love and promises. Interacting with his people and living out all the “one-anothers” of the Bible are important parts of our spiritual formation.
The books, the classes, the lectures, and the special seminars—all the concerts and Christian self-help books are great, but if we listened and never went out and acted accordingly, what good would they do? God has placed an incredible opportunity before us to put his word to good use by doing what it says!
“If I speak human or angelic tongues but do not have love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith so that I can move mountains but do not have love, I am nothing. And if I give away all my possessions, and if I give over my body in order to boast but do not have love, I gain nothing” (1 Cor 13:1-3).
I have found that many of us are afraid to step into serving in God’s kingdom because we feel we’re not smart enough, or don’t know what to say, or how to teach. This is an error of thinking that an ideas-heavy approach to Christian living and teaching can sometimes cause. For instance, a dear friend of mine from my local church lamented that she didn’t have a clue which program to use to disciple or mentor younger women.
Allow me to share with you what I shared with her. “You ultimately had all the right tools already: the love of God in your heart, his word in your mind, and the desire to take care of and encourage other believers. Even if you don’t have a home to meet in or the most eloquent Christian teaching to offer, you have time to give, ears to listen, and ultimately a body and gifts with which to embody the teachings of Christ in the church and in the world.”
Loving your neighbor, honoring one another, putting others’ interests above your own, caring for the widow and orphan, feeding the poor, being generous, serving, spreading the gospel, and making disciples are accessible to each of us in our varied contexts. You have everything you need already!
Use your hospitality to remind people of God’s hospitality. God brought you into his home, so use your encouraging voice to reassure the wayward or discouraged believer just as the Spirit does with his still, small voice. Give of whatever little or great storehouse you have in order to remind people of God’s generosity in richly providing you with everything to enjoy.
Please, by all means, read all the books. Most of them are delightfully encouraging and challenging. Go to seminary if you desire. Soak up sermons and theological podcasts and go to the seminars. Expand your ability to think well and hold onto the truth. But if you are wondering, like my friend, what it takes to help someone become more like Jesus and fall more in love with him, I’d say the missing ingredient is loving others as well as you can, with whatever gifts you have, for Christ’s sake!
Paul summarizes it so well for us: “According to the grace given to us, we have different gifts: If prophecy, use it according to the proportion of one’s faith; if service, use it in service; if teaching, in teaching; if exhorting, in exhortation; giving, with generosity; leading, with diligence; showing mercy, with cheerfulness” (Rom 12:6-8).
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