Tag: Unity series

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Where Division Comes To Die

It was the summer before Matthew’s senior year of high school when Peggy and I took him on a college visit to the University of Chicago. Together with other prospective students and their parents, we gathered in an auditorium for a Q&A session with a panel of UChicago undergrads. At one point in the open, positive exchange, a young guest asked, “Why should I not come here?” One of the panelists answered perhaps a bit too quickly, “We sometimes call this ‘the place where fun comes to die,’” he replied, adding, “The library is full on Friday night.” That’s all Matthew needed to hear. He enrolled at Washington University in St. Louis.

Had the young panelist paused momentarily, he might have made his point more palatably, e.g., “The hard work you put in at a university of this caliber will position you to excel in your professional career.” That said, let’s apply his more earthy approach in our study of Christian unity. For our overflowing life in Christ, our eternal oneness in Him, must be the place where division comes to die. What might this look like? The Scriptures show us.

Regarding our persecutors. “Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.”2 Be the place where division comes to die.

Regarding our oppressors. “If anyone forces you to go one mile, go with him two miles.”3 Be the place where division comes to die.

Regarding our offenders. “Do not repay anyone evil for evil. . . If it is possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone.”4 Be the place where division comes to die.

Regarding our relationships. “If you are offering your gift [to God] and there remember that your brother has something against you, leave your gift . . . and go. First be reconciled to your brother.”5 Be the place where division comes to die.

Regarding situational differences. “Live in harmony with one another. Do not be proud, but be willing to associate with people of low position.”6 Be the place where division comes to die.

Regarding earthly government. “I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for all people, for kings and all who are in high positions, that we may lead a peaceful and quiet life, godly and dignified in every way.”7 Be the place where division comes to die.

Regarding others’ flaws. “Make allowance for each other’s faults, and forgive anyone who offends you. Remember, the Lord forgave you, so you must forgive others.”8 Be the place where division comes to die.

Father, when we were separated from You, You brought us near to You by the blood of Christ.9 May we, in Him, be vessels of unity and overcomers of division today. In Christ we pray. Amen.

1 Today’s post augments our “unity series,” which ran weekly from February 26 through June 13.
2 Matthew 5:44-45 ESV
3 Matthew 5:41 ESV
4 Romans 12:17-18 NIV
5 Matthew 5:23-24 ESV
6 Romans 12:16 NIV
7 1 Timothy 2:1-2 ESV
8 Colossians 3:13 NLT
9 Ephesians 2:12-13

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The “U” in Unity

Middle-borns are often peacemakers: they tend to mediate, negotiate, and even manipulate in pursuit of common ground. Born a middle child, I have lived all these things. My taste for manipulation vanished early in my faith life, fortunately, and while I still have a proclivity to pursue commonality among the divided, I have more recently come to realize that I alone cannot bring about unity in anything. The restoration of oneness requires a change of heart among all those mired in division, and no one can change another’s heart, except the Holy Spirit of God. Yet Jesus said, “Blessed are the peacemakers,”1 so there must be something we can do to foster peace and unity around us. But what?

I think a healthy premise in pursing oneness is to understand that we are already one with each other in Christ through same the Holy Spirit who lives in all believers. Writes Paul, “We, though many, are one body in Christ, and individually members one of another.”2 This is identity, this is foundational; this is us. Then how do we live into this oneness? We choose to. If we can decide to entrust our soul to the person and saving work of Jesus Christ, we can just as well choose to obey His commands. Yet even this is God’s grace, for through Ezekiel He promised, “I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. . . I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules.”3 And so, in Christ, He has.

Then ours is to appropriate this grace as the body of Christ, each of us beginning with ourselves. Regarding judgmentalism and accusation — which reduce oneness into splinters — Jesus exhorts each of us to “first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother’s eye!”4 For when the Holy Spirit lovingly reveals our own shortcomings and gently redirects us away from them, we experience His kindness and savor His grace. Then through the corrective lenses of freedom and joy, we may see each other’s faults — and their struggle against them — differently. Compassion triumphs over condemnation. Blame gives way to balm. Separation fades amid support. Only in the love of God are we free to live the imperatives of peace: “Aim for restoration, comfort one another, agree with one another, live in peace; and the God of love and peace will be with you.”5

Unity among us begins with each of us; unity begins with “U.”

Father, You are the God of restoration. As You have made us one with Yourself through the redemptive work of Your Son, lead us as one through the transformational work of Your Spirit. In Christ we pray. Amen.

1 Matthew 5:9
2 Romans 12:4-5 ESV
3 Ezekiel 36:26-27 ESV
4 Matthew 7:3-5 NASB
5 2 Corinthians 13:11)

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Couch Dynamics

One evening a couple weeks into our marriage, Peggy and I had just finished cleaning up the dinner dishes when she said, “Let’s sit on the couch.” “Ok,” I replied, and so we sat. “What do we do now?” I asked. “We talk,” she replied. “Oh. About what?” echoed my response from a chasm of cluelessness. “Anything. Our days, maybe,” she said. And so we did. We’ve since come to call this “couch dynamics” — purposefully carving out time to share and hear what’s on our minds. We can, and often do, accomplish the same on our walks together; either way, we regularly and intentionally take time to relate to our “other half.”

Believers are fond of saying, “Christianity is not a religion; it’s a relationship.” Actually, it is both. Have you ever noticed, though, that even as we tout “relationship” with God theologically, we too often feel distant from Him experientially? We wonder why, yet the answer is close at hand, for when asked about daily time in prayer and the Word, we mumble our confession, “Not so much.” But if Christianity is a relationship, doesn’t it follow that we regularly and intentionally relate with Him who has made us one with Himself? Then how?

We purposefully carve out time with God to share and hear what’s on each other’s minds. Think of it as celestial “couch dynamics.” Then to hear Him, where better to go than to His Word? It is life itself,1 and it is truth.2 The Word is “breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that [we] may be complete, equipped for every good work.”3 His Word is “alive and powerful. . . .It exposes our innermost thoughts and desires”4 when we cannot understand them ourselves. It is “a lamp to [our] feet and a light to [our] path.”5 Yes, God speaks.

Yet the Father also listens; we are heard. Through Jeremiah He promises, “You will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will hear you.”6 John, too, assures us, “this is the confidence that we have toward him, that if we ask anything according to his will he hears us.”7 No wonder Jesus himself “would often slip away to the wilderness and pray.”8 He was relational, intentional; He still is. Then let us likewise take time to relate with Him.

You know, like couch dynamics.

Father, grace me to “[store] up your word in my heart, that I might not sin against you.”9 And “Let my prayer be counted as incense before you, and the lifting up of my hands as the evening sacrifice!”10 Amen.

1 Matthew 4:4; Deuteronomy 8:3
2 John 17:17
3 2 Timothy 3:16-17 ESV
4 Hebrews 4:12 NLT
5 Psalm 119:105
6 Jeremiah 29:12 ESV
7 1 John 5:14 ESV
8 Luke 5:16 NASB
9 Psalm 119:11 ESV
10 Psalm 141:2 ESV