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The Hard Work of Christian Unity

The Hard Work of Christian UnityRomanticism and Idealism Hinder the Work of Unity

The Hard Work of Christian Unity

There’s an old saying that if we ever saw sausage being made, we would never eat sausage! Saying you favor Christian unity is like saying you love sausage.  Anyone can wax eloquent about the philosophical virtues of ideal sausage. The question is, do you have the stomach for the process of making sausage? Yielding to the processes of God that will actually yield John 17 Christian unity rather than cheap counterfeits is an entirely different matter than agreeing about the eternal priority of unity. How unity is defined, implemented, and embracing its cost will separate sausage lovers from sausage producers. God has called us to produce sausage, not just rhetorically extol its virtues. It is not for the faint of heart.

Too often unity is defined emotionally, psychologically, and culturally rather than biblically. There can be a mindset that if we could just recover some imagined idyllic condition of the first one hundred years of the Church, or if we were just “nicer” to each other, that we would have unity and revival. Here are a few snapshots of the “ideal” first century church:

• At the end of his life, Paul was abandoned by almost everyone. Did he/they not value unity?
• Paul confronted Peter, publicly. How does that make for unity?
• Jesus called people names and insulted them. Is that the way to build “unity?”
• The Corinthian church was divided over relational apostleship. Paul writes a letter that was read publicly, rebuking them all. Is making people uncomfortable in public good for unity?
• The Judaizers were aggrieving the Galatian churches. The Gnostics were dividing the Colossian and Ephesian churches. Doctrine just divides. Shouldn’t we just love everyone in unity?
• Paul publicly mentions people by name as causing division; he puts fornicators out of the church. That is so harsh and judgmental. That’s not conducive to unity.

There’s no place in the ekklesia for romantic notions regarding Christian unity. With romanticism out of the way, let’s take a look at sausage loving unity and then finish up with some real sausage making.

Church Culture Unity – unity based on similarity of expression, style, practices, tastes, preferences, likes and dislikes, age, economic status, etc. We are united as long as we all think, look, and act alike and value the same things. This is conformity of culture, not biblical unity.

Programmatic Unity – unity driven by doing projects and events together. We come together to “work,” but there is no spiritual substance beyond that. There is no genuine cost to this type of unity, because all the participants know that after the event is over, there is no pressure to have to relate with fellow participants. The event is the bond, rather than genuine love, the only legitimate biblical cement (Col. 3:14). The best program unity will ever produce is the context for the possibility of real unity.

Persecuted Unity – I once knew a missionary who lived in Uganda during the reign of Idi Amin. He discovered that while Amin was martyring thousands of Christians, there was a “coming together” and unity in the Church.   Unfortunately, as soon as the pressure of persecution ceased, so did the apparent unity. Everyone reverted to pre-persecution habits and patterns. Even life and death persecution cannot produce real unity.

Socio-Cultural Norm Unity – unity based on avoidance of conflict and confrontation. Individuals who have embraced this will emphasize inordinate sensitivity on not doing or saying anything that upsets anyone. The objective is that no one would feel any discomfort for any reason, at any time. It is a unity that avoids group discipline. Anything goes. There is nothing in scripture that remotely hints that avoidance of subjective discomfort is the basis for Christian unity.

Denominational Unity – is unity assumed to exist within a given denomination or group. I know many ministers who attend their denominational meetings and are heartbroken because of the absence of genuine unity and organic relationship. Wearing the same uniform does not produce unity. The uniform is supposed to be a symbol of something genuine.

Vision Unity – is similar to programmatic unity. Often times there can be an exciting “vision”’ or presentation of Gospel truth that attracts and becomes the gathering focus for unity. The problem with vision unity is that if a more exciting vision comes down the line, the unity built upon the previous vision evaporates. Vision unity is like jumping on the bandwagon for a passing fad. The latest “new thing” becomes the unifying factor.

Lowest Common Denominator Unity – is the “leave-your-distinctive baggage-at-the-door-unity, the curse of many “pastor’s prayer networks.” Of course, it is always the “other guy” who has to leave his baggage at the door because we don’t have any baggage! This unity lowers the bar for participation as low as it can possibly go, out of fear of being exclusionary or hurting someone’s feelings. Participants cannot be, do, or say who they really are for fear of offending someone else, who will then take his or her ball and go home, thus ending unity.

Prayer Unity – centers around prayer and fellowship only. Not only does it normally not go much beyond that, but sometimes it is also forbidden to go beyond that because any thing approaching authenticity in relationship would be considered bad for unity. Prayer may be a good place to start, but too often it is the place we settle for because the cost of going deeper toward reality in authenticity as human beings and brothers is simply more than most are willing to pay. You don’t have to trust someone to pray with them. Prayer unity is, again at best, a starting point as a context for the potential for real unity.

Political Unity – is the shallow, glad-handing spirit that prevails in many pastors’ networks. The unity meeting is a means of personal advancement and self–realization and the self-promotion of the minister, the minister’s organization, and personal agenda. Transparency and honesty are avoided because they hinder the path of self-esteem, peer-esteem, and ministerial advancement. I have had more than one pastor tell me explicitly: if they got real in relationship, it would cost them everything “they have built” and they are unwilling lose that. That attitude is unworkable unity material.

What Does Genuine Christian Unity Look Like?

Psalm 133 is the Old Testament classic on the subject: the tribes in Jerusalem were gathered to worship Yahweh at feast time.

The first thing we need to remember is their diversity. Other than their worship, they did not share values and priorities. A landlocked Israelite would not have the same values or priorities as a covenant brother living on the Mediterranean coastline. Their unity could contain those differences. Secondly, the Psalmist uses a Hebrew literary device—the metaphorical couplet—to convey a unified thought: the oil on Aaron’s beard and the dew of Hermon.

The oil was poured on Aaron’s head and ran down to his collar, not his feet as is commonly believed (The KJV ‘skirt’ is a most unfortunate rendering). The priestly anointing oil was held in very small quantities in a cruse or horn. The reason for the small quantity was because of its costly preciousness. The oil was obtained by crushing different costly spices and the oil together.

Genuine Christian unity that commands the blessing is not some cheap sing-along where we all get together, smile at one another, sing a few non-controversial hymns and go home. God’s unity begins with crushing and cost. God’s unity starts with Calvary: Calvary for us, and Calvary in us. Only those who walk in the spirit of Calvary who themselves have allowed the crushing experiences orchestrated by the Holy Spirit in their lives to have full effect, will ever be workable material for the unity that commands the blessing.

Mt. Hermon was on the northern border of the Amorites at the full geographical extent of Joshua’s victory. Hermon’s dew was carried by winds and settled or watered Mt. Zion and was known for being refreshing.

Both poetic metaphors are analogies of descent, (something starting from above, downward) and transference. The psalmist’s point is that commanded blessing unity:

1. Does not have its source in us.
2. It comes from above/the Head
3. It must be transferred.
4. It is refreshing and sweet.

Transference is a download: one source has it; another doesn’t, but needs it. Biblical Christian unity is transferred from the heavenlies to earth. It doesn’t start with us. It must descend and be transferred upon us. It cannot be organized and legislated from below. It can be received and entered into. The commanded unity blessing will only occur when individuals who themselves have been “touched from on high” and who have experienced the inner healing of identity and the outer healing of relationships, gather together in determinate love one for another. A collection of Cross-dodging self-centered people will never produce biblical Christian unity.

If our lives are broken, marriages fragmented, families shattered, and local churches relationally inauthentic, merely gathering the aforementioned in one place under one purpose will never produce biblical Christian unity. It is just an agglomeration of dysfunction trying in the power of the Adamic nature to fulfill John 17. The only thing worse than dysfunction is thinking that if we just gather more of it in unified purpose under unified government, something wonderful will happen!

So is John 17 a pipe dream? Was Paul an idealist? Not at all.

Unity is not difficult. It’s just costly. Our unity must be in Christ, and Christ alone. Unity must begin and be sustained by our revelation of our union with Him and one another. It is the logical overflow of superabundant love. No vision, no organization, no plan, nor dream will ever realize that which is only possible in response to a gracious heavenly outpouring that transforms hearts causing us to fall irrevocably in love with one another. We simply must become necessities for each other, in the deepest and most genuine way.

If my American rights to independence and privacy in time, personal space, and money are more important to me than you, your pain, and your needs, we can forget romantic ideals of Christian unity, on any scale. Any model of unity that is based upon mere cooperation or group conformity is doomed to fail because that kind of unity must be maintained by external pressure rather than internal empowerment from transformation. Unity that is maintained by external constraint betrays the Spirit of Christ in the process of pursuing the unity in Christ.

As long as pastors, ministers, and other types of leaders view people, money, property and assets as “theirs” there will never be Christian unity. As long as leaders insist on the primacy of their own parochial self-interest masquerading as the “mandate and vision God has given me,” John 17 unity will remain a philosophical platitude.

Unity that is Spirit-born, touched with Calvary, descending from heaven, transforming us inwardly so we can unite outwardly, is in indeed precious. It is circumstantially indissoluble because its quality is eternal. No offense of humanity or attack of the devil can dislodge the Calvary-saturated, commanded blessing unity.

Christian unity is relational and covenantal. It is based on His cross: revealed, appropriated, and applied. It is covenantal love that is maintained in the presence of conflict and differences at great emotional, spiritual, psychological, time, and financial cost. So are you and I sausage lovers or sausage makers? Are we serious about the hard work of Christian unity? Are we ready to give ourselves to the real thing, or are we going to settle for the less costly counterfeits? Jesus is for us, and in us, to accomplish through us, what our flesh and ego will allow.

Copyright 2014,  Dr. Stephen R. Crosby, www.stevecrosby.org. Permission is granted to copy, forward, or distribute this article for non-commercial use only, as long as this copyright byline, in totality, is maintained in all duplications, copies, and link references.  For reprint permission for any commercial use, in any form of media, please contact stephrcrosby@gmail.com.

A Night in Jail in the Presence of God

Power and Presence Where Jesus Said He Would Be

A Night in Jail in the Presence of God

Recently, I had the privilege of spending an hour and a half in the manifest presence of God. What made the experience so unique is all the things that many of those reading this have been conditioned to believe are necessary for such a thing to occur in a meeting (a good crowd, prolonged praise and worship, sermon/ministry of the “word,” prayer, altar call, heart wrenching repentance, whatever,  were all absent. How can that be possible?

I was ministering at a jail with another brother. We were responsible for a “Bible study” at the facility. When the correction officers made the call to the units for “Bible study” time, our hearts sank somewhat when only one inmate came into our room. We had no history with this person.  We determined to go where the Spirit would go, and if He wasn’t going anywhere that night we would shut’er down and go get a coffee with no guilt!  My friend started the time with a profound and deeply theological statement addressed to the inmate in attendance:

“Hi, we are glad you are here. What is your story?”

An hour and a half later, my friend and I left weeping and in awe, as we had been privileged to be in the presence of vibrant, pulsating, throbbing, supernaturally empowered, transformative new life in a follower of Christ, 21 months old in the faith. My friend and I had not said a word for ninety minutes. We sat and listened as the brother simply talked of Jesus and what Jesus had done, and was doing, for him since coming to faith. 

I have decades of prison ministry experience. I am alert to jailhouse conversion stories that are sketchy. This was the real deal: radiant, humility, gentleness, miracles of provision, miracles of providence, evangelism without Bible thumping, transformed behavior, over-coming faith in a hostile environment, and more.

After that evening, both of us realized how rare genuine new creation new life can be, sadly so. It was encouraging and at the same time saddening to realize that we had to come to a jail to experience what should be normative in our so-called churches, but is in reality, often as rare as cats flying. 

We also realized how, in our best and misguided efforts “to minister for Jesus,” we are often the biggest obstacle in a room to the very things we beg Jesus to do in our meetings. He would do them more often if we would get out of the way and let go of our religious fetishes, addictions, and traditions that we erroneously believe are essentials of what should occur in a “meeting.”

What is the lesson?

Both of us are “highly qualified” to “minister.” I have a Doctorate and my friend a Masters in Divinity. We both have literally decades of ministry experience. We faced a choice of pressing forward with a “class of one,” or cancelling the “Bible study” because there were not enough in attendance to listen to us “masterfully exegete and expound from the scriptures.” I was so thankful that both of us have been delivered from a compulsive need to be listened to.We ended up being the recipients of ministry, throbbing with the vitality of heaven.

Those of us with teaching gifts must learn that sometimes the best teaching we can do is none at all.

We can be so addicted to the phenomenon of the sermon/lesson/teaching that it becomes an idol. We can be so addicted to the sound of our own voice, and our own need to be needed, and our own need to be heard, that in spite of lip service to Jesus being the Head of the church, we give Him no real opportunity to practically be so. We can be so enculturated to “sing, announcements, offering, preach, invitation, go home in time for the buffet and the game,” that we are the biggest impediment to the cause of Christ on the planet.

We can be so conditioned to the “ministry of the word” (as in scripture) that we never allow the Word (as in Jesus) to minister.

Insecurity in professional clergy is epidemic. Ego is epidemic. It masquerades under “people need to be taught sound doctrine,” when in reality it is nothing other than an unresolved need in the one doing the talking to be needed, validated, and depended upon in an unhealthy way. No real “equipping” for works of service occurs under the “ministry of preaching and teaching,” but rather eternal dependency and infancy. After all, a paycheck is usually hinging on being listened to.

It would take too long to recount here all the details of the amazing evening, but I will relay just one story. In this particular facility, the inmates are inundated with Bible studies of every color and stripe, virtually every night of the week. The brother had been attending all of them due to his hunger, including almost two years at a Jehovah’s Witness Bible study. During our time together he said:

“The Spirit of God has been telling me that something is wrong in that Bible study and I won’t be attending any more.”

My friend and I made eye contact and restrained ourselves from laughing out loud. Here is a new convert, 21 months old in the Lord, who, with no “doctrine classes,” no long theology debates, no dependence on a “minister to teach him the truth,” no sermons and teachings on the Trinity and Arianism,  no arguments, etc., has been led into Truth by the One who said He would do so if we would let Him.

It works. Jesus really is alive from the dead and the Holy Spirit has not gone into retirement because we now “have the Bible to lead and guide us” . . . sigh. 

It is doubly disheartening to consider large segments of Christianity who venerate the Bible in an idolatrous way, would in their theology and belief systems, deny and disallow this very dynamic as legitimate. For so many Christianity has been reduced to nothing more than teach, teach, teach, teach, teach, teach, teach, teach, teach, teach, teach, teach, teach, teach, teach, teach, teach, teach, teach, teach, teach from a book – an informed and enlightened class of professionals (clergy) whose job it is to illumine the passive unwashed masses (laity). This is pagan at its roots even though it derives from the halls of the academy of 16th century Reformation Protestantism, or the  soaring rhetoric of John Chrysostom in the fourth century.

Of course there is a time and place for disciplined and formal instruction!

However, sermon/lecture/classroom/sanctuary/passive audience is an overdone cultural assumption motif, not a biblical mandate of what that should look like. The point is, for 500 years within Protestantism, that motif has been given disproportionate place and disproportionate emphasis because those who control things in mainline Evangelical Protestantism are for the most part, pastor-teachers. There is more to the kingdom and experiencing the presence of God than the singular expression of that gift ad nauseum, as our experience in a jail with a new convert so ably demonstrated.

So, perhaps some of our straining and begging prayers for revival and more of the presence of God would be realized if we simply would stop what we are so used to doing and let Jesus really be the Head of His church. A friend of mine has succinctly defined “revival” as no more complicated than: “Hear Jesus, do what He says.” Simple and challenging at the same time.

Perhaps the “more of God,” and “more of you Jesus,” “send us fire, send us rain, let the river flow, let the fire fall, come down, come up, come in, come out, put your right foot in and turn it all about, do the hokey-pokey” nonsense that we beg for in endless modern worship choruses in painfully long and dead “worship services,” would be realized if we quit singing about it.

Maybe the most effective spiritual technique, the most powerful method, the most key element for an encounter with the manifest presence of God, isn’t “doing spiritual warfare in the heavenlies,” but rather to simply shut up long enough to allow Jesus to speak. Try it every now and then. I am confident you will experience what we did that glorious night in jail.

The Fatal Compromise

By Rick Furmanek. Is Following Hard Really Worth All the Opposition? If you follow Jesus for any length of time… and you pursue that relationship seriously… the Lord will eventually confront you will a choice… a choice of obedience… a choice of loyalty. This is part and parcel of what the Bible describes as counting the cost of following him. Yes, there is a cost involved… on both sides of the fence. Don’t let anyone try to convince you otherwise… and sometimes the cost is quite heavy. Being confronted with a choice to unswervingly obey, or ignore the opportunity for obedience and simply compromise, is not an easy place to find yourself in… for, if we choose to compromise… eventually we must make our way back to the Lord’s throne and openly confess our wrongdoing. It is no simple matter to approach him with hat in hand knowing you must tell him why you did what you did in your moment of disobedience (not to mention carrying the Spirit of Christ that resides in you right into your disobedience)…realizing you have no plausible defense nor excuse for your actions/decisions as you stand before His perfection. God is merciful to the nth degree… but He will not be toyed with nor His grace taken advantage of nor presumed upon. Mind you, it’s quite easy to compromise at first . . . and can even be seen as a little fun . . . as long as the price tag for the compromise can be removed for the moment. Remember what the writer of Hebrews says . . . “By faith Moses, when he was grown up, refused to be called the son of Pharaoh’s daughter, */choosing rather to be mistreated with the people of God than to enjoy the fleeting pleasures of sin/*. He considered the reproach of Christ greater wealth than the treasures of Egypt, for he was looking to the reward.” Compromise is serious business. It happens all the time… but it shouldn’t. Whether we disobey with the cost hidden or the price tag in full view, the consequences will be very real… and very experienced. But note here also, as clearly described in the story of Moses, there is another side to this cost thing… not only is there a cost for compromise… that you must eventually do right by your God… but there is also a price tag for obedience. Moses chose to be abused, misunderstood, and ill thought of, opting to identify with the suffering people of God, rather than go the easy road of self-serving pleasure. He left riches, education and a long family heritage in order to follow God… for he had an understanding of the big picture and what mattered most. From this example of Moses, we see that there is a cost involved in following. Jesus’ own words affirm this again and again. In fact, he challenged, and even expected us to count the cost before we bend a knee to him. If the hearer didn’t think the cost is worth it… Jesus was willing to let them go their own way. And while he is always willing to receive them back… he doesn’t expect a person to do it blindly or without understanding what is involved and what is required in following him. Remember the Disciples who left behind family, friends, jobs and homes for the sake of the Kingdom? I’m sure that was not easy to do… but they counted the cost and did it anyway… and most likely made the hard choice in the face of some pretty serious opposition. I’m going to step out and make an assumption here… I’m going to assume that you have understood to some degree what I’ve tried to communicate up to this point… and I’m going to assume you understand at least the concept that there is a price tag attached to following Christ. That said, what might the cost of following hard after Jesus in today’s world look like? First off, if we take our responsibility seriously and approach life with a desire to live a life for Christ without compromise… we can rest assured that, as the Bible promises, we will encounter opposition. To encounter no opposition and at the same time call ourselves a Christian should be cause for concern, for something is not right. Note that opposition will come in many shapes and forms… some we won’t expect… catching us completely off guard, thus testing our obedience… and other opposition we will plainly see gathering on the horizon, thus testing our loyalty. No matter where it comes from, we mustn’t forget this truth, following Jesus Christ wholeheartedly will produce opposition from those around us… at times even from those we love the most. In recollecting this afternoon from some recent experiences, I’ve come up with… what I think are key areas from which you can pretty much expect opposition for carrying the name of Jesus with you in an uncompromising way. Here they are: -* Your mere presence may make others uncomfortable. * Therefore, because of this, some are likely to try to avoid you. The Truth shown forth in the Light is something that this world would prefer not to experience. Light reveals those secrets we have spent tireless years trying to keep tucked away in a dark corner. Expect that your desire to walk in the Light… to be open and transparent… to lead a no-compromise sort of life… will make others uncomfortable… not intentionally, but as a natural by-product of your taking the name of Christ with you into places where He’s not necessarily welcome… at least not the Lordship side of Him. -*You as a person may be seen as unkind. * No doubt about it… we are to love… we are commanded to love… we are told that without love our message is meaningless and worthless… we are told that our love is the telltale sign of our following Jesus… but how love is defined and fleshed out today is so different from the biblical description of love. We mustn’t let that important point… the change in the connotation of the word, love, trip us up in our Christian expression of love. What you will find today is that those who watch you, listen to you and interact with you as you follow Christ… are likely to conclude that you are quite intolerant and inconsiderate of others. People today… even a lot of religious folk… really do have a problem with Jesus being the only way and the necessity of dying to self and forsaking all in order to have real life. Fellow-follower, I don’t care how you package it, you can drape love all over it… but try rebuking, correcting, admonishing… again in love… and the likely reaction you’ll get from the 21st century man… and lots of religious folk… is that you are just not a very nice person. Again, with the concept of love being so misunderstood today and often defined as absolute toleration of everyone and every belief surrounding you… we must be patient and make a concerted effort to attach a proper definition to the word love for our listeners and observers to grasp and hold on to, and then demonstrate it before them as a witness for our Lord. That in itself might be the greatest act of kindness we can show them. And that act of kindness is not random… no, it’s very intentional. This week has been tough. I’ve experienced a few of these very things in my own life. Is it rewarding being misunderstood? Definitely not. Am I glad I was rejected? Not on your life. Would I prefer not to travel this route? You bet. But it really does come down to this simple statement that as a follower of Jesus I must confess again and again… … yet not my will, but Yours be done. Stay strong in Him… take courage… our redemption is drawing near. … “Dear friends, I urge you, as aliens and strangers in the world, to abstain from sinful desires, which war against your soul. Live such good lives among the pagans that, though they accuse you of doing wrong, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day he visits us.” http://www.sermonindex.net/modules/newbb/viewtopic.php?topic_id=44919&forum=34