House Church Talk - Re: Two or three gathered

[Glenn Frank]

Hi Bruce...

I guess your illustration sort of gets to what I am saying...
But I am just not sure that you can say when there are two or three
believers in God's will together... That you are getting Jesus' presence in
'surround sound'... Or something like that.

I think that Jesus' presence is just more noticeable to us because we are
agreed together and there is no disunity. We are together in Jesus' presence
and there is no division. I think that get more at the context of the
passage in light of the forgiveness and resolution that is talked about
prior to this verse.

In other words... Jesus is always there with us... But when unity and
forgiveness is there among believers... We notice Jesus' presence more.

Glenn




On 5/11/04 3:33 PM, "Bruce Woodford" <bwood4d at hotmail.com> wrote:

> Hi Glenn,
> 
> You wrote:"Ok... Well approval may not be the best description of it... And
> I agree that Jesus stands in our Midst when we are gathered together doing
> His will... I guess what I was getting at was that when we are in unity and
> have resolved our conflict we are standing with Him.. .His spirit is there
> with us. If we were not forgiving and letting this thing go unresolved, and
> not following a godly plan to do His will then by definition we would not be
> in his presence. "
> 
> Dear brother, the presence of the Lord Jesus is a reality whether we
> appreciate it, apprehend it, enjoy it or not!  I have often wondered though,
> if our appreciation, apprehension and enjoyment of His presence does not
> depend on our obedience to Him!  I believe that scripture bears this out.
> For example, John 14: 21 says:"He that hath my commandments, and keepeth
> them, he it is that loveth me: and he that loveth me shall be loved of my
> Father, and I will love him, and WILL MANIFEST MYSELF TO HIM."
> 
> Does the following illustration help?
> Radio waves are in the air all around us... music, voices, conversations
> etc.  But if you went to a stone age tribe who knew nothing of radios, and
> told them that there was voices and music in the air all around them, they
> would probably not believe you!  If you brought them a little transister
> radio, turned it on, adjusted the dial, but the radio had no battery, they
> still wouldn't believe you!   But put in a good battery and they would
> immediately hear with their own ears music and possibly voices in their very
> own language coming to them from many many miles away!
> 
> If the radio waves in the air could be compared to God's omnipotent presence
> in the universe, if the radio was the indwelling Holy Spirit of God, the
> indwelling Christ, and the indwelling Father in the believer, every child of
> God is equipped to hear God's voice and to enjoy His presence.  But we don't
> always have that enjoyment, do we?
> 
> Now if the connected battery represented our obedience, our walking in the
> light, then as long as we are obedient and walk in the light with our God,
> we HAVE FELLOWSHIP WITH GOD. When we disobey and walk in darkness, He is
> still present, He still dwells within us, but we do NOT ENJOY fellowship
> with Him.
> 
> All this could be true of one believer in isolation from all others. But let
> us take the illustration one step further:
> Suppose, instead of showing our stone age friends a little battery powered
> single speaker transister radio, ...we bring a radio with multiple speakers,
> tuned to station broadcasting in stereo and allow him to listen to "surround
> sound"!Would this not in some sense compare to the difference between
> enjoying personal fellowship with God in solitude and enjoying fellowship
> with God as it is expressed when 2 or 3 or 20 or 30 believers (all enjoying
> fellowship with God) gather together to obey Him as they minister one to
> another?
> 
> This is how I have enjoyed the promise of Matt.18:20!  Personal fellowship
> and communion with God and hearing His voice in an individual and private
> manner is a wonderful experience. But when God manifests Himself in
> "surround sound", i.e. in a variety of ways through a variety of His
> children gathered together, there is nothing that compares  with that!
> 
> And as you say, when a relationship between brothers has been broken through
> the offence of one and the scriptural steps of Matt.18 are obeyed and
> genuine reconciliation is the end result,  the 2 or 3 are very aware that
> God in Christ has drawn near and manifested Himself to them!
> 
> Would you agree with this perspective?
> 
> Your brother in Christ,
> Bruce
> 
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