COMMENTARY
Don Atkin
ALIGNMENT
I
would like to briefly comment on the hot-button issue of alignment.
There
are two opposing extremes that should be avoided. Some view alignment to be something that
is negative, binding, and to be avoided at all costs. Others initiate alignments based merely
upon their own human judgments.
Perhaps
“placement” would be a more acceptable term. Jesus said,
I go to prepare a place for you (in
My Father’s house).
But now God has set the members, each
one of them, in the body just as He pleased.
And God has appointed these in the
church: first apostles, second prophets, third teachers, after that miracles,
then gifts of healings, helps, administrations, various kinds of tongues.
And He Himself gave some to be apostles,
some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers . . . that we should
no longer be children . . . but, speaking the truth in love, may grow up in all
things into Him who is the head—Christ—from whom the whole body, joined and knit
together by what every joint supplies, according to the effective working by which
every part does its share.
For this reason I left you in Crete,
that you should set in order the things that are lacking, and appoint elders (overseers)
in every city as I commanded you.
We
can safely draw these conclusions:
- We
cannot please God while avoiding placement and alignment.
- Placement
and alignment are the work of God the Holy Spirit.
- God
uses men to establish and maintain His order.
- Righteous
placement and alignment lead to functional and fruitful expressions.
I
am praying that we can gain a level of love and maturity that will grant us the
grace to rightly discern, and move us beyond straining gnats and swallowing camels.
