Standing With

  Sit, walk, build, imitate, love, submit.  What is next in Paul's exhortation to the church in Ephesus?  Stand.  Yet we cannot move into the standing position if we do not progress through the earlier ones.  And whereas walking comes out of sitting in the heavenly realms with Christ, so does standing.  Sitting is our place of rest and nourishment.  Sitting is our grounding.  We must be grounded and rooted in Christ and what he has done for us before we endeavor to do anything with him.  We cannot do anything for Christ, but we can do many things with him who strengthens us and enables us to fulfill our calling, our destiny to help establish the kingdom of God on earth.
  It is sitting and then walking, imitating, loving and submitting that enable us to be "strong in the Lord" and to "put on the full armor of God" (Ephesians 6:10-11) so that we can stand.  We construct our own set of armor while sitting and walking.  We each have our own belt of truth, breastplate of righteousness, shoes of the gospel of peace, shield of faith, helmet of salvation and sword of the Spirit, the Word of God.  Our belt of truth may be stronger than someone else's, but their shield of faith may be stronger than ours.  Together we are one body of Christ equipped with the strongest armor to stand against the enemy.  It is important not to stand alone, but to stand as one with the body of Christ.

  For Reflection:  Am I sitting with Christ?  Am I walking with him?  Am I standing with Christ and with his body, or am I standing alone?

  Let us pray.   God, you are my refuge and strength.  I sit with you, I walk with you, I stand with you.

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