“Be devoted to one another in brotherly love.  Honor one another above yourselves.”  (Romans 12:10)

This one has been in the “cooker” for a few weeks…I wrote this as I watched many stabbing one another and drawing lines in the sand during the election season for our President!  I let it marinate in my own heart for a while before hitting the “Publish” button!

I have been often asked what the greatest asset or resource there is while on the mission field.  A strong and seasoned team?  A great amount of financial resources?  A strategic agenda being met?  My answer is absolute; brotherly love!

We have had some of the most incredibly manned teams, full of veteran missionary workers, so gifted and talented it’s intimidating.  We have had total servant minded people and sold out Believers on teams.  We have had people that stepped on a plane for the first time in their lives, let alone leaving their home city for the first time for a 13 hour flight to foreign soil with no idea of what they are headed into.  What causes a team to be eternally effective is not talent nor even innocents…it’s their unity with each other that cause a VIOLENCE against evil that is almost indescribable.  Spiritually, it’s one of the bloodiest events there is!  Why?  Because it ignites, illuminates and compels the Gospel message more than any other form of communication.  Whenever there is kingdom advancement, rest assured there is a bloody fight in the heavenly against the evil one.

We see churches doing some things that seem to “defy gravity”.  I’m not talking about attracting a huge crowd because of some easy belief-isms or book sales…I’m talking about world changing churches that never seem to cease in their ministry to their community and to the nations….with kingdom advancing, life changing results.  The very core of these churches is brotherly love…it is for certain.  Brotherly love is the fruit of the core desire to love others as Christ loves us.  While many churches have fighting from within or even pick on the churches that are “defying gravity”, the faithful church keeps plowing onward…illuminating the Gospel message by way of Jesus’ prayer in John 17:23 “May they be brought into complete unity to let the world know you have sent me and have loved them…”.

In John 17:23, Jesus describes that unity between Believers will reveal the Gospel message as being proof that it is true.  Paul calls us to a devoted and sincere love for each other in Romans 12:9-10.  In 1 Corinthians 13:1, he describes we are just a clanging noise with our “ministry” when it is pushed without love.  John tells us we are liars if we profess to love God yet hate our brothers in 1 John 4:20.  BUT, we need to remember we are able to love only because God first loved us!  This is why brotherly love creates such a VIOLENT reaction in the heavenly realm…the chain reaction to brotherly love confirms and bears witness to the Gospel being true and reliable.  This renders Satan and all of his schemes useless in the war for souls all over the world.

As I prepare myself and our teams to deploy into the nations, we spend most of our precious time developing a fellowship within our team that causes unity, likemindedness and a compelling desire to serve each other.  Why can’t we do that here?  What causes us to become violent among ourselves and block the Gospel message at the joy of the enemy?  It’s pride and selfish ambition.  I should know…I fight against it in my own heart all the time.  The most difficult call there is on this side of heaven is loving others with a sincere love…regardless of what they think or do to me.  We spend way too much time fighting for rights and forget about the privilege of bearing witness by way of our love.

When our teams function in “brotherly love”, much is advanced for the glory of God and very little occurs in the flesh!  Remember, change only comes by way of the Gospel message, not an agenda of our own passions.

Rb