A Mosaic - Believers Intertwined

12/30/2006

Could you describe what you mean by believers being intertwined? It would be easy for the mindset in this generation to interpret that as: Bible class teachers, sermons, programs, home church meetings. What do you mean when you say, “My life is intertwined with other brothers”? I ask, because that is the mosaic. Anybody can say, “Yes, our church is this mosaic of Jesus.” But that is not true if you are a bunch of individual shells thrown all over the place. Jesus does love you and you may be saved, but He wants us all together as One to look like Jesus to the world.

If we are single scattered shells and pieces of glass, we have beauty, but that is not the picture of which God spoke: “This is how all men will know you’re My disciples. By the love you have one for another.” If it is God’s mosaic, with lives intertwined, then the world will actually see how you love each other. If you don’t have that in your locale, then the world is not seeing Jesus through you as clearly as it could be. Just because I talk about Him doesn’t mean anything. But if they see me loving my brother, then they see Him, and they don’t just hear His words. They see His form.

So when you say “intertwined,” what do you mean by that?

I mean a lot by it. I can give my daughter’s life as an example. When I come home from work, I’ll ask, “Where’s Rachel?” Many times the answer may be, “She’s over at this sister’s house. They are cooking together because she asked Rachel to come help.” So my daughter is learning to cook, but she is also spending the time with this dear sister. And they are able to talk about what is happening during the day. If my daughter has struggles or worries or fears, she is able to talk with a much more mature Christian lady as they are cooking. And later we’ll get to eat the food they prepared. That’s just one small way that their lives overlap.

It may be that some ladies will go to the market together to buy food and they’re sharing life together. If everyone is doing that in many ways, then lives are joined together.

At my workplace, I don’t have the good fortune of working with other brothers at this point in my life. But I will perhaps have lunch with another brother who works downtown. We can meet somewhere and have lunch. Or maybe I will take a break and although I can’t see any brother that particular day, I will call on the phone and talk with them about what’s going on, “I have something today that has been a struggle. I got angry at a co-worker because they messed something up. Can you pray for me? I know I need to go back to him and apologize.” Something like that might happen when I call that brother on the phone and ask him to pray for me. That’s our lives intertwining together.

Or maybe at his home, his house needs some repairs. You are so close to sea level that you probably don’t have basements. But where we live, in order to build efficiently on a small piece of land, the dirt is sometimes dug out and part of the house is built below ground level. Well, this brother had water coming in the wall of his basement and the wall started to fall down. So a number of brothers went in and cleaned up all the mess. They took down parts of the structure that needed to be thrown away and repaired that house. My son and some of the other men who are a part of the church were involved in that. The man didn’t just do it by himself.

Again, that’s one way that lives can intertwine. And the men and boys can learn things together as they work. If one of them gets a little bit lazy someone could talk to them about that later. Or if one of them gets impatient, someone could talk with them about that. Their lives are intertwined in that way and they care about each other—not just about their house, but about their lives. When you build that way with a group of people who are all living for Jesus and loving Jesus, then the picture of Jesus can emerge. They all have Jesus living inside, and the picture of Him can emerge because all the different pieces are joined together as one.

•  A Mosaic - Believers Intertwined