What might it be like?
A call to worship.
Themes
Unity • All things hold together • Shared relationship with Christ • Hidden with Christ • Forgiveness • Love • The peace of Christ • The word of Christ
What might it be like if we were more perfectly united, more perfectly held together, more perfectly engaged with one another?
Scripture reading
Colossians 1:15–20 Colossians 3:3–15
This call to worship1 comes from the Apostle Paul’s attempt to help the Colossian Christ-followers understand what Christ’s cosmic reconciliation means, especially concerning our new life.
All things have been created through Him and for Him. He is before all things, and in Him, all things hold together. And He is the head of the body, the church… and God was pleased to have all His fullness dwell in Him, and through Him to reconcile to Himself all things… by making peace through His blood, shed on the cross. You have died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God. Rid yourselves of all such things as these: anger, rage, malice… Do not lie to each other, since you have taken off your old self with its practices and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge in the image of its Creator. Here, there is no Gentile or Jew, circumcised or uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave or free, but Christ is all, and is in all. Therefore, as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience. Bear with each other and forgive one another if any of you has a grievance against someone. Forgive as the Lord forgave you. And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity. Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, since as members of one body, you were called to peace. Let the message of Christ dwell among you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom through psalms, hymns, and songs from the Spirit, singing to God with gratitude in your hearts.
Prayer
Abundantly merciful, profoundly peaceful, deeply forgiving, lovingly compassionate Father in heaven, what might it be like if we were more perfectly united, more perfectly held together, more perfectly engaged with one another? It might be like having our personal differences and our social status and our backgrounds and so many other distinctive characteristics we lay claim to… it might be like having all of that replaced by the truth that we all have a perfectly shared relationship with Christ and we all have a shared membership in the body of Christ. It might be like putting to death our anger and our malice and our rage… because we ourselves have already died, and we ourselves are already now hidden with Christ in You, Father. Meaning that we all have a life so perfectly intertwined with Yours that all our identities are now inseparable from Christ and we are all now defined, instead, by compassion, and by kindness, and by humility, and by gentleness, and by patience. It might be like us forgiving each other just as You have forgiven us… because we now are able to see each other through the lens of Christ’s forgiveness, and we now are able to extend grace to others, and we now are able to bear with one another in their imperfections, and we now are able to support each other through weaknesses and failings, and we now are able to be a community that is patient and gracious and modeled after Christ’s own love. It might be like putting on love— putting on a deep, self-giving commitment to the well-being of others— which binds everything together in perfect harmony. It might be like letting the peace of Christ actually, rule in our hearts, and letting the peace of Christ become the guiding principle for every interaction we have with each other, and letting the peace of Christ direct us always toward reconciliation, and friendship, and unity. It might be like having the word of Christ dwell in us so richly that we can’t help but teach and admonish and encourage each other with wisdom and with love and with truth. It might be like its about to be in a minute— the singing of psalms, and hymns, and spiritual songs together in such a way that what is cultivated in us is a shared focus on You, Father, shaping our hearts and minds in ways that others in this community need. Father in heaven, what might it be like if we were perfectly united, perfectly held together, perfectly engaged with one another? It would be like all that and more. Help us to be like all of that and more. In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.
1
This call to worship was given to the small assembly of Christians that gathered in Pathway Church, Beaverdam, Michigan, on November 3, 2024.