I’ve got three questions for you:

1. What best brings people together, gets them close and talking? Is it weddings, funerals, holidays, graduations, elections, great causes, sex, war? Great competitions, fine sporting events and big rivalry showdowns better make the list too!
   
   I say good food and good music may be the best answer.
   
   
2. What best brings people together with God? He says it's blood: real red stuff, atoning blood, Christ's blood, the only blood that fully satisfies God's righteous requirements. Blood is God's way of bringing people back to Himself.
   
   "Without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness of sins" is what the Bible clearly teaches (See Hebrews 9:11-10:25, especially 9:22, for brilliant commentary on blood, forgiveness, sacrifice, atonement and nearness!).
   
   If there is no blood applied, there is no forgiveness; if no forgiveness, no relationship; if no relationship, no togetherness; if no togetherness, no hope for life or in death.
   
   
3. So why didn't “going to church” make the first list of the best things that bring people together? Maybe it's because we don't often realize just how dead, lost and without hope we all are in this world apart from Jesus.
   
   Church can and must be one of the great “better together” blood-brother gatherings on earth to remind us of eternal truths like these. There we take stock together in how much we all need His blood and receive the encouragement of each other in our faith and hope journeys. We come near like He does.
   

Thank God that He brings those of us who are far off, near. Christ's blood sees to it. Selfless sacrifice, written in red. So let's be drawn in, upward and toward others who otherwise are lost, dead and without hope too.

Reflect: What do YOU think? Have you been brought near? Are you bringing others with you?