Divide and conquer!

Something I remember hearing in my social studies class. Something sarcastically said in other classes but I never thought about the importance of that phrase. Divide and Conquer! I started thinking about times when this was used in my life and I found a few examples.

When I was in school and we were doing projects, we would assign specific subjects to each person to become familiar with. We would spend the evening researching a part of the project so the next day we would impart our wisdom to the rest of the group. The same thing happened when I worked for a local pet store. They gave us each a subject to look up and we all shared what we had learned with the group. That way we would learn about 15 different animals instead of 1 in the amount of time we did.

Divide and conquer. Seems legit. A great philosophy for any establishment really. If you were to try to do everything on your own, you would likely fail. You can't do everything on your own. "No man is an island." What if we used this in the wonderful world of Christianity?

 God's word tells us that we are to, "Go into the world and make disciples of all nations." (Matthew 28:19) It's a generalized statement. It doesn't have your name in it. But that doesn't mean that you are exempt from it. We are all called to, "Go into the world and make disciples." Does that mean that you alone are to go into the whole world and reach every person on this planet. That would be impossible! 7.4 Billion people. That's why God calls us ALL to divide and conquer.

Recently, I have dealt with a few circumstances that have made me change my perspective on different denominations. A conversation with a 9 year old challenged me on my foundation. She celebrates the Sabbath on Saturday, where I do it on Sunday. I asked her if I was wrong because I observed it on Saturday. She said, "kinda." I said, "Leah, do I believe that Jesus died on the cross for my sin? She replied with yes. I asked her if that was the important thing? Of course she said.

Different churches might have different doctrines but they have one thing in common. They believe that Jesus died for their sins and they enter into heaven. Personally, I think that that's the most important thing. Each denomination has different beliefs but they all believe that Jesus died for him. We are of one body but of different parts. The Methodist might be the hand, Lutheran the feet, Baptist the mouth, Pentecostal the ears.

Each denomination is for someone but not for everyone. The body of Christ is divided but for a good cause. We have to separate so we can reach the masses. If this makes sense we have to be divided so we can be united. United in the fact that we believe in Jesus, but separate to reach the un-reached. We have to use this to our benefit. We are different, we reach different people. But we all love the same Jesus.