Let's continue looking at church unity today. Let's be reminded of
three important cautions regarding unity:
1
Unity must
never be at the expense of truth. We
are NOT all headed in the same direction. We do NOT all serve the same God.
Only those who look to Christ as Savior are really our brothers and sisters in
the faith.
2
Unity does not
mean ignoring controversial issues.
We must not ignore those areas on which we disagree. The matters we disagree on
are important to our growth and development. However, the attitude in which we
carry on our debate must be one of love: first for God, second for each other.
The process of discussion and debate is what sharpens and deepens us . . . even
if we never convince each other to change positions.
3
Unity is not
the same as Uniformity. We are not
called to be "the same" we are called to be one. Variety is valuable.
In many cases the issue does not boil down to who is "right" and who
is "wrong". Many issues are simply a matter of personality and
preference. Different means "Different". It doesn't mean "better
than" or "worse than", it just means "different".
It is time that we
were clear on what we are about. We are about glorifying Christ, not our
particular gathering of followers. We will have different approaches, different
points of emphasis, but agree that there is one Lord, one faith, and one
Baptism.
It's time we worked
together rather than against each other. Time to encourage rather than divide.
Time to work together so our friends and neighbors might be kept from perishing
apart from Christ. It's time to stop making it easy for the Devil. AMEN?