The Binding Ties of Our Unity
The bible provides several images of the church, including a family, a body, a temple, and a bride. But there is one word that captures the essence of unity best, and that is the word “one”, which you could add before every name given to the church (ex. One body, one bride etc). If I could choose only one section of scripture that best defines unity, I would choose Ephesians 4:1-6, which tells us to:
“Walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. There is one body and one Spirit—just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call— one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.”
Notice the repetition here- the binding ties of our unity is found in one body, one Spirit, one hope, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father. He is reigning over all of us, working through all of us, and living in all of us.
We are not knit together clumsily, although sometimes it appears like we are. As individuals, we are diverse in meaningful, strange, and perhaps baffling ways. But before considering our diversity, I want us to consider our unity, and how it is that we are one in Christ. Did you know that we have a unity as immovable as our God is? The church is built on a solid rock that cannot be shaken. We need only to behold it rightly and value it above our own selves.
How are You Accepted into the Church?
Joining an exclusive club may be as easy as signing up for a membership card, or as difficult as knowing the right celebrity. Churches however aren’t clubs; we aren’t there to receive perks, pump weights, or experience the nightlife.
We don’t become Christians by showing up at a building on Sunday mornings either. You or I can be freely and warmly welcomed into the sanctuary, but our hearts might be locked out.
How could this be? It is because we can’t truly be a member of Christ’s church without first belonging to God.
On our own, we are alienated from God, gone astray, and worse than that- we are enemies at war, “children of wrath, like the rest of mankind” (Col 1:21, Is 53:6, Rom 5:10, Eph 2:3).
No amount of warming the pew, or tithing, or rallying behind societal causes, is going to remove our hearts of stone and deliver us hearts of flesh. We might be recognized and liked at the place we call church, but to be a member in God’s eyes is to belong to his own body. God needs to grant us access to Himself- the very God who cannot accept us on our own merit. His acceptance is the only acceptance that can truly make us a member of Christ’s church.
Jesus Is the Only Way
For the Christian, Jesus Christ became our everything. He was our intercessor, bringing us in prayer before the Father before we ever knew his name. He became the atoning sacrifice for our sins, laying his perfect life down, bearing the rod of God’s wrath in the place of sinners.
Christians have been saved by Jesus’ death and resurrection, and through faith in him we’ve been granted access to God (Romans 5:1-2).
We were sinful through and through, but when we repented of our sin and placed our trust in Christ’s blood to cleanse us, we were not only forgiven, but were also given “the right to become children of God” (John 1:12). As children of God, we are adopted, or accepted, into the family- the church.
Brothers Through Blood
There’s something not quite right with the saying that “If you were the only one on earth, Jesus would have died just for you.”
Because the fact is, Jesus didn’t die just for you. To say so is demeaning to the great scope of his death. He died to create “a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession” (Ephesians 2:9). He died to save people from every tribe, and people, and language (Revelation 7:9), so as to make many one in Christ.
Jesus did not shed his blood for you alone, and God did not adopt you alone- he adopted you into his own family, as children, brothers and sisters, so that together we would be “heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ” (Romans 8:17).
No Longer Strangers
To be saved then, is to be brought safely into the loving embrace of God, as well as into the body of Christ, the church. The church therefore, should be a place of refuge and the building up of each others faith.
Did you know Christ died to tear down hostile walls that divide us? Whether those walls exist through our previous religions, our race, or our past offenses against each other, Jesus death can unite us in peace.
This section of scripture is specifically about Christ’s atoning work in bringing Jews and Gentiles together, but I have no doubt it applies to any other divide that exists between brothers before Christ:
Ephesians 2:13-21 “But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. For he himself is our peace, who has made us both one and has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility by abolishing the law of commandments expressed in ordinances, that he might create in himself one new man in place of the two, so making peace, and might reconcile us both to God in one body through the cross, thereby killing the hostility. And he came and preached peace to you who were far off and peace to those who were near. For through him we both have access in one Spirit to the Father. So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone, in whom the whole structure, being joined together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord. In him you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit.”
Loving or Despising Sacred Ties
We are knit together, “joined and held together” (Ephesians 4:15), by the most skillful hands with “cords of kindness, with bands of love” (Hosea 11:4). The body and blood of our Lord Jesus Christ, broken for us, became our shared sustenance, our very life.
We are irrevocably joined together as one in Christ’s body. Whether or not we act like it then, becomes a matter of sobering importance. Paul rebukes and warns the Corinthian church for taking communion in an unworthy manner, saying:
“When you come together it is not for the better but for the worse. For, in the first place, when you come together as a church, I hear that there are divisions among you… Do you despise the church of God and humiliate those who have nothing?” (1 Corinthians 11:17-18, 22)
We ought to make sure there is no action or word in us that reeks of despising the people in God’s church. The simple fact ought to be that if we love God, we will love the people of God.
1 John 4:20 “If anyone says, “I love God,” and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen.”
Biblical love is not merely tolerating each other, or loving in word only. By nature, the love we are supposed to have for the church is a demanding love. It costs you something; It is a sacrificial. The weight of our love is that Christ died for our brother, and so we cannot ignore or cast him off. No, we would die for our brother!
1 John 3:16 “By this we know love, that he laid down his life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers.”
One Source
I hope that you rejoice in the union we possess in Christ, and have come to understand that Jesus himself is the one who unites us as one. Factions and divisions are bound to come, but we all must return to the chief cornerstone “eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace” (Ephesians 4:3).
I leave you with a stunning proclamation about Jesus: “He who sanctifies and those who are sanctified all have one source. That is why he is not ashamed to call them brothers” (Hebrews 2:11).
If the Holy One is willing to call us his brothers, what wicked pride it must be to view ourselves as superior to another. Love so amazing, so divine, demands my soul, my life, my all.
Previous Parts of the Church Unity Series:
Beyond Disputes and Divisions
Church Unity: Not Found in Options
