The Church International

I just recently made a weekend trip out of town to attend to some family matters and to spend some time with a very dear friend.  In the process, I made some new friends, and was introduced to a dynamic in ministry, that of fatherhood.  Now this dynamic, as I have learned, and was aware of, has existed for some time now, it just did not register in me until this recent visit. 

The premise of this dynamic is that men want to be “fathers IN THE GOSPEL” to other ministers and “pastors”; a pastor to pastors.  I am not entirely certain of what is driving this, but there are those who assert that it is their ”calling” to this “office” of “leadership,” while there are those who feel as though their work is incomplete, or maybe as individuals, there is incompletion, without this “father” figure.  Now as I am writing this, I am experiencing all sorts of flashbacks to experiences where there was no fatherly connection; my disconnection from a father figure while growing up is not at all unique to myself.  Having said this, regardless of how successful or prominent some may be, there is always that latent need for many to have the oversight and approval of a “father.”

With that, too, being said, let us consider, perhaps as an antithesis, Matthew 23:9:

“And call no man your father upon the earth: for one is your Father, which is in heaven.”

Here’s a question.  What is that intrinsic relationship that the God of Heaven and Earth willed and purposed in Christ to establish.  It is a Father/son relationship between himself and us, and a brotherly relationship between each other?  Which do we dare to secure biblical success from, the aforementioned relationship that is the hallmark of many developing “fellowship of churches,” or the one established in Jesus Christ?

It is as the second man Adam, as the brother to the first Adam, that Jesus came after the manner of, to undo what the first man Adam had done, in bringing death upon all born after him.  This same Jesus, the scriptures declare, is a joint-heir with us, and us with Him, to the throne of His majesty.  The relationship that Christ perfected before the disciples was that of sonship to the Father, and brotherhood to each other.

Is it possible that in the brother-brother relationship, we stand to achieve greater accountability because it is to each other instead of to one central individual, and in so doing we are positioned to need to hear from the Father equally while exercising mutual submission to each other?  Can there ever truly be oneness among us, the brethren, if some are perpetually pursuing the subjugation of the others?  In John 17:22, there is a glory associated with the oneness that existed between the FATHER and the SON, a glory that was endowed upon the disciples - that they would be sons to the Father, and brothers, in oneness, to each other.

I have concluded that it is not a father that I need, I have one in God, it is true brothers that I find myself desiring after the most.
…Brotherhood