MUTUAL SUBMISSION

There are some who disagree with my advice regarding how to conduct ourselves when the ekklesia gathers together. Even those who are avid house church participants still believe that arguing over different doctrines is essential for Christian assembly.

Part of that viewpoint is based on their philosophy of ekklesia, I suppose. See, our fellowship is intentionally seeking to take hold of Christ whenever we gather together. That means we don’t want to waste our time talking about doctrines, or arguing over differences in opinion, or even focusing too much on our own struggles and needs. Instead, we work together to allow Jesus to speak to us and to lead us corporately. This isn’t easy. But, if we are all focused on this one thing, and if we are all sincerely surrendered to Christ, then we can experience the presence of Jesus in our midst. When that happens, Jesus encourages us. He heals us. He speaks to us. He teaches us. He rebukes us. He inspires us. He comforts us.

How exactly does Jesus do this? Often it is through one of our own members. As we each are surrendered to Christ, one of us might sense that the Lord is prompting us to share a specific verse of scripture. We might not even understand why, but in obedience to Him we read that scripture. Then another person might confess that they are struggling with something that exact verse was speaking about. Then another person might feel the Lord prompting them to lay hands on that person, or another person, and to pray something specific over them; a blessing, an encouragement, or yet another verse of scripture.

Sometimes a member in our group might sense the Lord wants us to sing a particular song together. Another person might feel that the Lord is asking us to sit in silence for a moment. Then another person might realize that they need to ask forgiveness of someone else in the Body for something that was said or done. And so on.

As wonderful as this experience might be, we don’t always enjoy this kind of thing. At least, not as often as I would like, anyway. Sometimes we start off in this direction and then someone might derail the process, or we get distracted by something else and then we cease to wait on the Lord and to respond to His voice. It happens. And when it does we all have to have grace for one another and recognize our own weaknesses, and even confess that we’ve done the same thing many times ourselves. These are opportunities for more grace and another chance to love one another in spirit and in truth.

But if our group spent most of our time debating points of doctrine, or engaging in “sword fights” over what scripture teaches about this or that, we would never – and I mean never – allow Jesus to lead us and to speak to us in the way I just described.

In our individual walk with Jesus, we are commanded to surrender ourselves to Christ and take up our cross daily. Jesus says that we cannot be His disciples (followers) if we don’t do this. In the same way, whenever those same cross-bearing disciples get together in the same room, the need to remain surrendered and crucified doesn’t change. If anything, our need to die to ourselves and to let go of our agendas is probably even more necessary whenever we enter a room with other Christians.

Jesus must be our Head. He must be submitted to at all times, and especially in the gathering of the ekklesia. Without this complete and total surrender we cannot follow Jesus, and we cannot “be the Church” that Jesus desires.

-kg

“He (Jesus) is before all things, and in him all things hold together. And he is the head of the body, the church; he is the beginning and the firstborn from among the dead, so that in everything he might have the supremacy.” (Colossians 1:17-18)