FATHERING.

Fred M. Mukiri. The Life Community, Thika.
We are living in a season that requires the Church of Jesus Christ to reconnect. The Church is a body; “the Body of Christ.” A disconnected Church cannot function effectively. Paul pleads for unity in his writings.
“For as the body is one and has many members, but all the members of that one body, being many, are one body, so also is Christ.” 1 Corinthians 12:12.
As in the body, the connections must be accurate. Not every bone in the body is directly connected to each other. It is bone to “its bone” as in Ezekiel 37. This season demands for divine connections. God connected Paul, Timothy and Barnabas. He also connected Peter and Cornelius. Not only is the Church a body but it also a family and a holy nation. Israel in the Old Testament operated in three distinct facets: 1. Nation.
2. Tribes (12.
3. Households with fathers.
I believe the most important thing today is the divine connection of true fathers and sons. We are not propagating a gender preference but the principle of fathering and sonship. Abigail in the Bible is a woman but her name meant: “Father of joy”. Fathering is by Grace and grace has no gender. True authentic fathering is to represent the Father - heart of God to His sons, His Church. The Last words in the Old Testament is a promise and prophecy by Malachi the Prophet: "Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the LORD. And he will turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, and the hearts of the children to their fathers, lest I come and strike the earth with a curse." Mal 4:5-6.
Malachi tells us what went wrong and what will fix the earth’s curse. The demand of the Kingdom of God is family. It is about a Father (God) and his son (the church).
“He who overcomes shall inherit all things, and I will be his God and he shall be My son.” Revelation 21:7.
When God created man, He had family and sons in mind, ruling sons, heirs. A family that will accurately manifest Him in creation. When things went wrong the only one who could restore God’s plan was A Son. When Jesus was born, He was the “…only begotten of the Father”. - John 1:14. But after His Cross and resurrection, He is the Firstborn of a family of sons, male and female. Hebrews 1. His purpose is to bring many sons to glory; “For it was fitting for Him, for whom are all things and by whom are all things, in bringing many sons to glory, to make the captain of their salvation perfect through sufferings.” Hebrews 2:10.
The new wineskin in this apostolic season is: Households of faith, where true Fathers and sons are divinely connected. God is in relationship not religion.