Good morning, brothers and sisters, may the grace and peace of our Lord be with you!<\/p>\n
God created man as a living soul or spiritual being (Gen 2:7).\u00a0 God, in his very nature, is Spirit.\u00a0 He shared his spiritual nature with man, so that man may also be a spiritual being.\u00a0 If a person wants to live like the \u00a0human being he was created to be, his body must be alive, and his spirit must also be alive.\u00a0 Keeping the body alive requires sustenance from material substance.\u00a0 God gave to mankind plants and fruits as food (Gen 1:29).\u00a0 After the fall of man, God provided \u201ceverything that lives and move\u201d as food, in addition to the green plants (Gen 9:3).\u00a0 God sustains human life by providing plants and animals as food.\u00a0 The spirit is different, because the spirit is born from God\u2019s own nature.\u00a0 The sustenance for the spirit comes directly from God.\u00a0 To keep the spirit alive, one must have fellowship with God (koinonia<\/em>).\u00a0 God loves us so much that he gave us the privilege of drawing near to him to fellowship with him.\u00a0 In this way, God provides life for the spirit.\u00a0 If a person has life in his flesh, and fellowship with God in his spirit, then he will truly be alive and will experience abundant life.<\/p>\n The Bible says \u201cYou have made them a little lower than the angels\u00a0<\/sup>(or \u201cGod\u201d, original\u00a0Elohim<\/em>) Jesus Christ the Son of God, Word become flesh, gave himself to die on the cross, in order to pay the penalty for the sins of mankind and thus destroy the barrier that prevents fellowship between God and man.\u00a0 If anyone believes in Jesus, God gives his righteousness (the basis of restoring the relationship between God and man) to all who believe, for there is no distinction (Rom 3:22).\u00a0 God brings these people into the body of Christ, without distinction.\u00a0 Jesus is the head, and they are his body, which is the church.\u00a0 The church is spiritual, because Jesus is the head.\u00a0 The Triune God, who is in very essence Spirit, is now the head of the church through the person of Jesus Christ the Lord.\u00a0 This spiritual church is one body.\u00a0 This body has physical substance, but this physical substance is one entity.\u00a0 It is not made up of many individuals being in the same building, but rather, it is the integration of many individuals into one body.\u00a0 In this way, God, by the redemption through salvation in Jesus Christ, restores mankind to its original design, with both a spirit and a body.\u00a0 The spirit has fellowship with God, and the body is one.<\/p>\n The restoration of humanity is in Christ, or to be more precise, is in Christ\u2019s church.\u00a0 When we are connected and united with Christ, and through Christ we are connected to the other members of the body, this will restore our humanity and reveal God\u2019s glory.\u00a0 It is the church that displays God\u2019s glory, not individuals.\u00a0 It is the body with Christ as the head that reflects God\u2019s glory, not you or any other individual.\u00a0 Jesus said \u201cLet your (plural) light shine before men in such a way that they may\u00a0see your (plural) good works, and\u00a0glorify your (plural) Father who is in heaven.\u201d (Mt 5:16)\u00a0 This \u201cyou (plural)\u201d refers to many people, not one individual.\u00a0 If you are prone to \u201chero worship\u201d and tend to exalt certain Christians, or you delude yourself into thinking that you have achieved a superior spiritual status, you will face bitter consequences.\u00a0 Brothers and sisters, God\u2019s glory is in the church, and is in Jesus Christ.\u00a0 Only when the whole body is connected to Christ and to each other, walking humbly with the Lord and walking as one with each other, then will there be glory.<\/p>\n To Him\u00a0be\u00a0the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations\u00a0forever and ever. Amen. (Eph 3:21)<\/em><\/p>\n The church as described in the Bible is a beautiful church united in Christ.\u00a0 We are justified by faith, redeemed by Jesus, and there is no distinction.<\/p>\n Even\u00a0the\u00a0righteousness of God through\u00a0faith\u00a0in Jesus Christ for\u00a0all those\u00a0who believe;\u00a0for\u00a0there is no distinction\u00a0<\/u>(Rom 3:22) The following is a fictional dialogue, which highlights a common problem:\u00a0 in reality, the church is not united.\u00a0 Some brothers and sisters come from a certain country\/city A, while others come from country\/city B.\u00a0 A brother who is from country A often made some discriminatory remarks about people from country B, and this caught the attention of the pastor.<\/p>\n \u201cI heard that you often make discriminatory remarks about people from country B, is that right?\u201d the pastor asks. Perhaps this dialogue is a bit dramatic, but it gives a real portrayal of how the church is influenced by secular culture.\u00a0 In a real-life church, the truth of \u201cone body\u201d is often impossible to realize, because just as in society, there are many divisions within the church.\u00a0 People differentiate among each other based on where a person is born or where he is raised, as well as on a person\u2019s race, nationality, wealth, societal status, or even gender.\u00a0 There will always be those people who feel superior and consider others inferior.\u00a0 Some will be vocal about this gap, while others may not say anything, but once you get to know them, you will feel their subtle superiority.\u00a0 Brothers and sisters, a true born-again believer will always have a humble attitude\u2014the Son of God died for even a sinner like me!\u00a0 The cross has demolished all my pride, and I must walk humbly with the Lord on this new path.\u00a0 Dear brothers and sisters, division is a consequence of pride, and will only disappear when we humble ourselves.\u00a0 Jesus was the utmost example of humility, he lowered himself from an incomparable height.\u00a0 Paul tells us that we must have the same attitude as Christ Jesus.<\/p>\n Have this attitude\u00a0in yourselves which was also in\u00a0Christ Jesus,\u00a0who, although He\u00a0existed in the\u00a0form of God,\u00a0did not regard equality with God a thing to be\u00a0grasped,\u00a0but\u00a0emptied Himself, taking the form of a\u00a0bond-servant,\u00a0and\u00a0being made in the likeness of men.\u00a0\u00a0<\/sup><\/strong>Being found in appearance as a man,\u00a0He humbled Himself by becoming\u00a0obedient to the point of death, even\u00a0death\u00a0on a cross. (Php 2:5-8)<\/em><\/p>\n Thanks be to God, for even though the church is not perfect, as long as its members are born again with new lives in Christ, and are connected to Christ the head, we can look to Jesus and align ourselves with his will, gradually growing into maturity, and reflecting the glory of God.\u00a0 Amen!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Good morning, brothers and sisters, may the grace and peace of our Lord be with you! Spirit and Body God created man as a living soul or spiritual being (Gen…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1352,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[16,57,50],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1367","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-devotionals","category-koinonia","category-pastor-warren-wang"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cbcwla.org\/home\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1367","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cbcwla.org\/home\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cbcwla.org\/home\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cbcwla.org\/home\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cbcwla.org\/home\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1367"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/cbcwla.org\/home\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1367\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1957,"href":"https:\/\/cbcwla.org\/home\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1367\/revisions\/1957"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cbcwla.org\/home\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1352"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cbcwla.org\/home\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1367"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cbcwla.org\/home\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1367"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cbcwla.org\/home\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1367"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nand crowned them\u00a0<\/sup>with glory and honor.\u201d (Ps 8:5)\u00a0 Mankind\u2019s glory and honor comes from his spirit.\u00a0 If the spirit deteriorates, man will lose his glory and honor.\u00a0 Is there anything that can cause a spirit to deteriorate?\u00a0 Yes, there is.\u00a0 It is sin.\u00a0 Sin separates man from God, and this is why the Bible says \u201call have sinned and fall short of the glory of God\u201d (Rom 3:23)\u00a0 Where sin abounds, the spirit grows weak and eventually dies.\u00a0 Man fall short of the glory of God when his spirit stops working as it should.<\/p>\nHumanity Restored<\/strong><\/h3>\n
There is No Distinction<\/strong><\/h3>\n
\n<\/em>For you are all\u00a0sons of God through faith in\u00a0Christ Jesus.\u00a0For all of you who were\u00a0baptized into Christ have\u00a0clothed yourselves with Christ.\u00a0<\/sup><\/strong>\u00a0\u00a0There is\u00a0neithe<\/u>r Jew nor Greek, there is\u00a0neither<\/u>\u00a0slave nor free man, there is\u00a0neither<\/u>\u00a0male nor female; for\u00a0you are all one in\u00a0Christ Jesus. (Gal 3:26-28)<\/em><\/p>\n
\n\u201cWell, \u2026, perhaps I do that sometimes, but it\u2019s not just me!\u201d
\n\u201cDo you think this is what the Bible teaches, to discriminate or belittle others?\u201d
\n\u201cOf\u2026of course not, it\u2019s my own choice, but this is commonplace in the society now.\u201d
\n\u201cDo you think it is right to bring secular worldviews into God\u2019s house, and destroy the fellowship of believers?\u201d
\n\u201cThis\u2026, well, maybe it is a little wrong, but really, there are many others who do this.\u201d
\n\u201cWe are all sinners, saved by the grace of Jesus Christ, there is no distinction.\u00a0 Jesus didn\u2019t discriminate, and yet you are being divisive within the church, spreading discriminatory and inflammatory language.\u00a0 Our church does not need a \u201cChristian\u201d like you, please leave!\u201d
\n\u201cWhat?\u00a0 What type of church would ask a person to leave?\u201d
\n\u201cOur church is one such church.\u00a0 Please leave!\u201d<\/p>\n