I know you’ve heard the terms, “lost in a crowd,” or “alone in a crowd.”  Those sound kind of funny in a way because how can you really be lost in a crowd or alone in a crowd?  But they are also very true.  If you don’t know anyone in the crowd then in reality you are lost and alone.  Crowds can be threatening in a way; in a crowd we are no more than one of a sea of faces unless we happen to be well known or a star of some kind.  I think we are the most lost when we are lost in a crowd and also the most alone when we are alone in a crowd.

Living in small towns all my life I remember being in a large crowd one time.  I’ve been in big crowds before as we all have, but this time it was my son and I.  We had been to a ball game in Cincinnati.  The game had ended and Jeremy and I were trying to get to our car.  The crowd flowing out of that stadium was overwhelming.  I remember hanging on tightly to my young son’s hand to keep us from getting separated with my other hand tightly over my wallet.  I had read about pick-pockets and heard some bad things.  I’m sure I looked a sight trying to make my way through that crowd holding on to an eight year old with one hand and my hand on my hip, elbow stuck out with the other one.  But no one was going to get my wallet!

In John 14:19-21 Jesus was speaking to His disciples.  First He told them that He wasn’t going to be with them much longer.  He was predicting His death, burial, resurrection and ascension all in one simple sentence.  He also made them a great and wonderful promise that He would live and because He was alive they would be too.  I’m sure this seemed like a mystery to those disciples.  The ministry was going great.  Throngs of people were everywhere they went.  Crowds gathered all the time.  How could He even think He was going to go away?

But Jesus told them something else that probably seemed pretty mysterious too.  He told them that the day was coming when they would know that He was in the Father, they would be in Him and He would also be in them.  To complicate this a bit more Jesus was speaking not only of the twelve disciples but of all His followers.  That folks includes us.  What a crowd!

This is a crowd in which we should never feel alone or lost.  This is the best crowd that we could ever hope to be in.  There’s a lot of theology dumped into that statement but let’s just look at it simply.  Jesus is in God.  God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit all make up our God.  We’ve got to be careful here to not interpret this in error.  I was talking about this once as a guest speaker and got accused of being “Jesus Only.”  I want to go on record as saying that I firmly believe that there is one God but that He exists eternally in three forms that can all be active and can appear together all at once.  I’m not sure if that makes me a Trinitarian or what but I know it’s what the Bible says.  Jesus is the Son of God because He was begotten of God.  But He is also Immanuel – God in the Flesh.  He is in God by His own confession.  I’m glad He is.  That tells us that our Lord Jesus Christ is in complete unity and sync with God.

Jesus also said that we would be in Him and He would be in us.  That’s even more comforting.  Just think about it for a moment.  Jesus is in each and every believer.  He’s there by way of the Holy Spirit, the third member of the Godhead.  He promised elsewhere in scripture that He’d come to us.  I could come up with some kind of explanation but it’s best that we just bask in the awe of that miracle:  That God the Son by way of the Holy Spirit is in each and every one who believes in Him all at the same time.  He gives us personal contact in way of helping us to know what’s right and wrong, what we should and shouldn’t do, and in knowing what the word says, because He’s in us.  That explains why He could promise that He’d never leave us or forsake us.  He has become part of us.

He also said that we are in Him.  We are His body; His flesh on this earth.  We are united as the Church.  With all this in mind there’s really never a reason to feel alone or lost in a crowd.  I’d say that none of us has ever been in a crowd as big as the entire Church in God and God in us.  What a crowd!

Welcome to Spirit Bread
Spiritual Bread for the Spirit Bred
"To him who overcomes I will give some of the hidden manna to eat."  (Revelation 2:17 NKJV)
The Scribe
PART ONE
"The Whole Crowd"
by Jerry D. Ousley
For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life." (John 3:16 NKJV)