Rejoice with Those Who Rejoice and Are Part of Team Jesus
- Jack Selcher
- Sep 23
- 3 min read
It is easier to comfort people in their losses than to rejoice in their victories. Their wins can make us sad, especially if they come at our expense.
Their successes can stir up a hornet’s nest of negative emotions that repeatedly sting us. Our pride crashes head-on into a tree. We feel like failures compared to those who are celebrated.
Often, we become critical. Why was she selected for the position instead of me? It’s not fair!
Envy buzzes around in our brains. Our hearts are joyless. We are disappointed and bitter.
We are angry that our better qualifications were ignored! Now this person is our supervisor! When our reasons and excuses are peeled away, self-interest prevents us from rejoicing with those who rejoice.
There is a proper context for rejoicing. We do not rejoice with Putin when he celebrates the damage his missiles do in Ukraine.
The proper context is rejoicing with honored believers. “If one part suffers, every part suffers with it; if one part is honored, every part rejoices with it” (1 Corinthians 12:26 NIV).
Self-sacrificing love is the antidote for the relational poison of self-interest. That love is available to us when the Holy Spirit of Christ controls our lives (Galatians 5:22). The self-exalting self has been crucified with Christ (Galatians 2:20).
Now life is about Christ living in us. It is not about us or the honored person. It is about living for and exalting Jesus through the power of the Holy Spirit. When the honored person is part of Christ’s body, Jesus and His whole body are honored and rejoice. It is part of always rejoicing in the Lord.
Pastor Alex and many other pastors have used my book, “His Power for Your Weakness,” to disciple 15,636 people in three African countries in the last four years. Pastor Alex is now well known in at least one of those countries. He rejoices that he is making a difference for Christ, and I rejoice with him.
His victories are also mine. He and other pastors would not have discipled those people without my input, and I could not have influenced them without their help. None of us could be effective without Christ. We are part of Team Jesus.
Moreover, behind me is a team of people who have provided more than 11,100 Bibles in the language of those African countries as part of the discipleship process. They are as essential to the ministry as Pastor Alex, the other African pastors, and I. We all rejoice together at what God is doing to advance His kingdom through Team Jesus.
The whole ministry is carried out in Jesus’ strength—authoring the book, teaching it, and providing Bibles as resources (Philippians 4:13). Pastor Alex is getting the honor, but the whole team rejoices. We rejoice with Team Jesus, no matter who gets the applause! What is your takeaway?
See additional free spiritual growth resources for Christians.
God has empowered me to write His Power for Your Weakness—260 Steps Toward Spiritual Strength. It’s a free, evangelistic, devotional, and discipleship e-book. Pastors have used it in Malawi, Mozambique, and Zambia to lead 6,671 people to Christ and teach the basics of Christianity to 15,636 people. I invite you to explore and use it in your setting.
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