I’m glad to hear this. I’m in the same boat. If I recall, you may have commented at Jesus Creed in my post there on this. I don’t know that there’s a silver bullet on this, even acting like the body, though that couldn’t hurt. (I frankly have more ‘I don’t knows’ than ‘knows’ when I think about how to move forward.)

But I tend to think that allowing our thinking about the gospel to become more of an open-ended concept that concerns all the good things that God has in mind to do through Jesus will help. At least for me, as I’ve started to look at the scriptures, particularly the gospels and the rest of the NT, as revelations of the “good news” in this sense, I find myself more motivated to pursue gifts from God to give to/serve others, more convinced that God wants to give such things as part of his love, his “gospel” about Jesus, his renewal of the world. At any rate, that kind of ruminating about what the gospel really is, and having it get bigger than my previous idea, has helped me get more motivation to be an instrument for such things and start practicing more (again) and looking for better ideas and practices as I go.

So good to hear of the encouragement you received on your trip to NY.

In a book I read a month ago (When Heaven Opens), the author shared how he experienced a vision with the Lord of what God was wanting to do in Brazil (where he was at the current time). The Lord showed him a ball of fire, suspended by a net above the city of Sao Paolo. Just a bit of the fireball was seeping through the holes in the net and it was evident that the fire represented the power and presence of God. When he asked the Lord why the whole ball of fire was not being released, he saw two words written on the cords of the net– “unforgiveness” and “broken relationships”. He sensed that that dynamic was indicative of the greater church at large, not just the church in Sao Paolo. I’m not usually into keeping up with any types of prophetic musings, but this really struck me as powerful.

Just wanted to pass that along–it came to mind as I read your thoughts concerning unity of the church.

Give our love to your family.