6 degrees

Ever heard of that six degrees of separation rule? Sure you have, you probably heard about it from your husband, who heard about it from his boss, who heard about it from their best friend, who heard about it from their mother-in-law who heard about it from their choir leader who heard about it from their barber, the same one who cuts (insert famous person) hair. Its the rule that says everyone is connected to everyone else by six people. You are only six people away from the Pope, the President, the CEO of Microsoft, and Billy Graham. Isn't that amazing?
Now think what that means for us as Christians. We as a body of Christ are all only six people away from each other. What a great design plan by God. Now factor in the Holy Spirit and be awed at how connected we are. In fact, instead of six degrees of separation, I'll call it the six degrees of God connection. I know that I've experienced this connectedness, in fact, I was inspired to write this blog because of something that happened to me today. Just yesterday I was on my myspace page where one of my friends is Jesus. Now I know some people think that someone is being really irreverent to make a myspace page in Jesus's name, but the author of it in no way involves himself as an entity or pretends to be Jesus. As he explains in his blog on his page, he just wanted to give a space to Jesus for evangelistic purposes and to be able to give people, like me, the chance to have Jesus in their friends list. And I love having Jesus in my number one friend spot.
Anyway, I saw that Jesus had updated his page and went to go look at what he had done. I clicked over to his page and saw a video called just stop and think, which turned out to be just about the best evangelistic video I've ever seen, done by Pastor Francis Chan of Cornerstone Church in Simi Valley, California. I wondered if he'd done any other videos and watched some sermons of his on youtube. Just fantastic stuff. I loved his lukewarm and loving it sermon. The way he described how when we are lukewarm and love the things of this world more than God it makes Jesus want to gag will stick with me the next time I think something material can ever compare to the things of God. I wanted to hear more of his sermons so I went to the website of his church, found their sermons page and started listening to his Intimacy with God series that he did back in 2005. It's just an amazing series, especially since it echoes alot of where the Spirit has been leading my studies these past few months. It's a call to love God intensly, to be in love with God. In my own life, I've felt so led to learn more and more about His nature, His Son, His Sacrifice, and His Spirit and to live as he commands. To see a Pastor have such an obvious love relationship with our creator and to have him communicate it so well is a blessing to his church and to the body of believers. So what does this have to do with the rule of six degrees? I'll get there.
I spent the morning listening to Pastor Chan's stuff. In the evening I went to one of my favorite websites, Holy Experience, Ann Voskamps blog. And guess what is on her blog, published there as of today? A clip of one of Pastor Chans sermons from youtube! Ok, so a skeptic could say "So? Its possible that she's known about Pastor Chan for a long time, that doesnt have to be from the some sorta intra-body connectedness thing." It's not just a coincidence. Because she linked two clips from Pastor Chan. The other clip she linked is from his Intimacy with God series done all the way back in 2005! The clip was used on her A Childs Geography Website and guess what, it also was posted just today. I was blown away. How cool is that?! That screams God to me, about how interconnected the body is, and how He designed it to be that way. Because of a Christian I found the pastor. A fellow Christian and I both watched the Pastor on the same day. The Sister in Christ lives in Canada and I live in Massachusetts and the Pastor is in Southern California. I love the internet. And I really love what God does through the internet.
And I love it when God talks to me or does nifty stuff in my life. And then I was thinking on the 'coincidence' and how cool it was when I remembered about the six degrees of separation. And I realized that God had pointed out the connections that can happen to me for a reason. He was pointing out to me how I'm a member of the body of Christ, even when I'm seperate from having an actual place of worship. The story of why my husband and I dont have a chuch to call our own is long and will probably be another blog. Or a book. But I've been praying and asking God to make me a part of the larger body again. To give us a place to worship with other believers and a way to get there. And God went and showed me how I'm connected to the body in a spiritual sense. The six degrees of God connection works through the internet too!
Another really cool aspect of being six people away from everyone is that it means that unbelievers are only six people away from a Christian. I think thats comforting and proves to me that if a person desires to know God, then God can easily open the door for knowledge to get to him. All some unbeliever in Laos or China or Algeria has to do is acknowledge the great and awesome Creator that made nature and desire to know more. God is then faithful to get that knowledge to them, He says that His voice goes to the ends of the earth.
So what am I saying. I'm saying that the world is really small. And everyone on it is connected to each other. But unlike the Hippies and communications experts, I'm saying that our connections are designed and fostered by God. Thanks God for showing me how awesome your plan is and how we are all interconnected for your glory.