i need you and you need me

i work at a church. it is something i feel i have been called to as a vocation.
for most of my growing up, i wanted to be a music teacher.
i knew at the core of my being, that was what i was going to be.
then something happened. in college, i had an experience that radically changed my life.
God opened my eyes and i knew i wanted to have a personal relationship the rest of my life with Him.
it changed my plans. it changed my educational direction.
it changed what i thought i wanted to be when i grew up.
i now have church as my vocation and i am grateful.

i've spent the last few weeks pondering over the unique creation of the church.
i'm not referring to organized religion or some cult, but the unique living organism created by a community of believers--people who have asked God to have a personal relationship through the living sacrifice of Jesus Christ.

church is an amazingly complex thing.
simply, it's people coming together under the main thing they have in common--
--Jesus Christ and the love we have for Him because He died for each one of us.
look deeper and you see how God crafted each church/community in infinitely complex ways.

He brought people together--flawed, imperfect people who are growing towards all that He wanted for them to become. He brought young and old, uncivilized and refined, free-spirited thinkers and organizers, creative and analytical and brought them together to change the world by loving one another and living differently than the rest of the world, to live out life as Jesus did when He was here on earth.

the thing i'm learning to appreciate in this community is how God never intended for any one of us to be able to 'do church' on our own. we need each other. God designed it that way. i can't write a sermon to help share Jesus' story with the masses to save my life, but others in my church community can. i am not gifted at making stories from the Bible come to life to the little children, but my church community has people who are passionate and able to make the stories jump right off the pages. for every need, He has brought someone with that exact gift, strength, talent. we need each other!!! in the Bible, God uses the imagry of the body. an eye can't do a hand's job and a foot better not try to do the job of the heart. (what about the appendix? is that one really necessary? i mean, it can be removed and we can survive just fine. hope i'm not the appendix :) )
each one brings a unique contribution that some other part is relying on to help the whole function.
if a part is suppressed or shut down, the whole hurts. it's maimed and not operating at its capacity.
the hand counts on the fingers. the legs need the feet to help them get places. the heart counts on those blood vessels to distribute the reoxgygenated blood to the whole body.
each little part is as important as the next.

it's just a small reminder to me how God put things in me that others need.
God put things in others that i need.
we need each other.