Parading floats

Every year there are multiple parades that seem to be on TV, some with the really large ballon-like human figures. Have you seen those before? There are all sorts of people holding them up by strings and you really never see one that looks as perfect as it should be. There are large ballon floats where the arm of the character might totally be wrapped around its back...or the float is crashing into people...you never really know.

Do you see the picture that I am trying to paint here?

When it comes to the body of Christ, I feel like we are that parading float. Not the perfect version, the version you see you TV where people are struggling to make that character look as good as possible. It's usually a mess, because those floats are usually pretty large!

What we lack is speaking truth out of love. If everyone spoke truth out of love then there would never be an issue with the imperfect float I was talking about before.

"Instead, speaking the truth in love, we will grow to become in every respect the mature body of him who is the head, that is, Christ. From him the whole body, joined and held together by every supporting ligament, grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work."
(Ephesians 4:15-16) 

Each and every single one of you is part of the body. We aren't a bunch of arms, we are the whole body of Christ. We too often don't really understand this. I think sometimes we try to blaze our own path and we think that we make up the entire body ourselves. WE are all one body, not just you, not just me.

My challenge for you is to remember unity. Remember that we all make up Christ's body. Every, individual body part. Until we are speaking and doing everything out of love, we are like that awkward float that we see on TV every Thanksgiving.

Strive to be full and whole body of Christ as one!