| Romans 15:25-27 "Now, however, I am on my way to Jerusalem in the service of the saints there. For Macedonia and Achaia were pleased to make a contribution for the poor among the saints in Jerusalem. They were pleased to do it, and indeed they owe it to them. For if the Gentiles have shared in the Jews' spiritual blessings, they owe it to the Jews to share with them their material blessings." In this passage, Paul talked about brothers and sisters supplementing for each other's needs, which is actually a precious asset in our faith. Christians are not supposed only seek our own good; since the Lord was a great example of supplementing for us, we ought to supplement for the needs of one another in our daily life. When the Lord was in the world, He turned water into wine in Cana when He saw that the wedding banquet was running out of wine, and He used five loaves of bread and two fish to feed five thousand when He saw that the crowd listening to His sermon had nothing to eat. In another part of the Bible also describes how He fed four thousand people with seven loaves. He ultimately died on the cross for us, sacrificed His life so that we can gain life. Corinthians 8:9 says that "for you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sakes he became poor, so that you through his poverty might become rich." Since we have received all types of grace, we ought to follow the example of the Lord to supplement one another. Paul mentioned one example in this passage, which was between the churches of Jerusalem and the gentiles. The church of Jerusalem was rich spiritually and they sent coworkers to gentile lands to preach the gospel. The gentile church gained spiritually from the church of Jerusalem, so when Jerusalem had famine and people became poor, the gentile church was willing to make contribution to help resolving the crisis at the church of Jerusalem. Brothers and sisters, do you ever think about the needs of people around you in your daily life? The main reason why we don't supplement for each other's needs is that we don't know where the needs are. We need to come before God and let the Holy Spirit help us. First, we ask God to reveal the needs of brothers and sisters or friends around us. When we pray, let the Holy Spirit guide our thought and mind; when the Holy Spirit prompts you to have burden for someone, we must keep on praying for them. Second, when you find out who you ought to be helping, ask the Holy Spirit how you should be helping them. Holy Spirit clearly knows the needs of every brother and sister among us and He will prompt others to meet their needs. In the church today, the reason there would be anyone with unfulfilled needs is because someone in the church is not following the prompting by the Holy Spirit. May the Holy Spirit freely move among us today, help us to supplement each other's needs like back in the early church so that everyone's needs will be fulfilled. Starting today, may God help us to become more sensitive to the needs of brothers and sisters around us. Pray with Pastor Tong Liu 
Lord, I thank you because you are our God who supplements our needs. May the Spirit of the Lord give us wisdom and insight to follow your example in our daily life in order to supplement each other's needs. |
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