Churching: Bay Area California

The Blending Together of the Members-1 Corinthians 12:23-27And those members of the body which we consider to be less honorable, these we clothe with more abundant honor; and our uncomely members come to have more abundant comeliness, but our comely members have no need. But God has blended the body together, giving more abundant honor to the member that lacked, that there would be no division in the body, but that the members would have the same care for one another. And whether one member suffers, all the members suffer with it; or one member is glorified, all the members rejoice with it. Now you are the Body of Christ, and members individually.

Churching and Blending

After attending the live summer training in Anaheim, California, a brother and I went for churching to the bay area of California. Though the initial plan was a visit to a brother's relative for introducing the ministry, in fellowship, it turned out to be an extensive churching to the main churches in the bay area.

A brother who used to visit India took the lead to drive us around to different churches. Therefore, we visit the following localities:

1. San Jose
2. Santa Clara
3. Palo Alto
4. Morgan Hills
5. Fremont
6. Hillsborough
7. Berkeley
8. San Francisco

Besides, we also visited the city of Los Angeles, Millbrae, Mountain View, Campbell, and Cupertino. There are local churches in all these cities too and many more in California and in all the states of USA, we did not have enough time to visit all of them. Even in our short visit to a few local churches, we learned a lot. 

One important lesson I learned practically which the ministry has been trumpeting is, "Blending is the reality of the Body of Christ." I even mentioned a couple of times in our fellowship with the brothers, the importance of blending. Indeed, there is a need to pay the price to go churching for blending; it's definitely worth it. Otherwise, I even warned, we might end up like any other Christian groups that have been established for centuries, but due to the lack of the vision of the Body of Christ, and the blending and building up, they all ended up to be dead organizations. And we, in the Lord’s recovery must not repeat the hose of Christianity. 

The blessings in this churching are manifold. Our hearts have been enlarged and our views broadened in relation to God's eternal purpose on the earth. To my knowledge, no other Christian group has such a view, vision, blending, fellowship, oneness and reality of the Body of Christ. The Lord has been merciful to us and we must consecrate ourselves to the Lord again and again for the fulfillment of His eternal purpose on the earth.

In all these localities we visited, the Lord had arranged for the brothers for fellowship over breakfast, lunch, and dinner. In every fellowship, we just felt that we were meeting our own brothers though we met for the first time. The life of God that we all received and the ministry of the word that supplies us, have all indeed kept us in the one Body and in one accord. We all spoke the same thing, had the same vision and goal. Our churching confirmed it all, that we are indeed in the ministry of the age. 

My conclusion to all these visit is: May the Lord bless us all for His Body to be His matured Bride to bring Him back, by our fellowship, blending and building up with one another in oneness and one accord.