Just Church (15)

Chapter 5: A Higher Vision

“… we are no longer to be children, tossed here and there by waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of people, by craftiness in deceitful scheming; but speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in all aspects into him who is the head, that is, Christ, from whom the whole body, being fitted and held together by what every joint supplies, according to the proper working of each individual part, causes the growth of the body for the building up of itself in love.”

Ephesians gives us a picture of a congregation unified by a single reality: the dynamic attachment of the entire body to Christ, who is the Head of the Church, through whom life flows to the Body. All members “abide” in the same “Vine”, in constant connection with him; and for that reason, all in connection with each other, too. As you can see, all are growing, becoming mature, walking in the truth, using their gifts and helping one another. This also fortifies them against all winds of bad doctrine, so their unity is not only dynamic but durable as well. This is church unity as God intended it to be.

But as we look around scripture, we also discover that this unity is characterized by diversity. The members of the Body are not clones or copies of one another. It’s not a homogeneous group: people have different roles, places, options, gifts, responsibilities, challenges and so forth, and in no way does scripture ever diminish the value of these unique elements. Rather, the diversity is affirmed and emphasized.

We see this in 1 Corinthians 12, for example:

“For the body is not one part, but many. If the foot says, ‘Because I am not a hand, I am not a part of the body,’ it is not for this reason any less a part of the body. And if the ear says, ‘Because I am not an eye, I am not a part of the body,’ it is not for this reason any less a part of the body. If the whole body were an eye, where would the hearing be? If the whole body were hearing, where would the sense of smell be?”

An Anecdote

When I was in high school, we had a senior history textbook proudly titled Unity in Diversity. It came out at the height of the multiculturalism craze in Canada (1967), so of course it reflected the secular political agenda at the time. It wasn’t until years afterward that I was to think back on just how problematic that title was: the truth is that diversity is a major, major problem for unity. In human affairs, the more profoundly people are different or unique, the harder it is to get them together on anything. Things like nationalism are simply not strong enough to keep everybody together or to create durable sympathy and co-working.

We can see this in current sociology, as well. As mass migrations have increased far beyond anything my high school text book imagined, and as the secular ambition to globalize everyone has become greater, more and more states are becoming (either officially or unofficially) what we used to call “multicultural”. But they are definitely not becoming more unified; not yet, anyway. In fact, the problem of the postmodern, multicultural state has become a thing academics refer to as “incommensurable pluralism”, meaning that nations are now composed of people so different that there’s significant doubt they can ever be unified at all.

Changing the Game

But “incommensurable pluralism” is not a problem to God; for Christ is such an overwhelming good that no differences among people are sufficient to keep them from unifying and loving one another — provided each member retains his or her commitment and dynamic dependence on Christ. Nothing compares to knowing and loving Christ; so that no degree of class, race, gender, age, physical, mental, ability or other sources of diversity is able to keep genuine Christians from uniting:

“But now God has arranged the parts, each one of them in the body, just as he desired. If they were all one part, where would the body be? But now there are many parts, but one body. And the eye cannot say to the hand, ‘I have no need of you’; or again, the head to the feet, ‘I have no need of you.’ ”

In fact, our unity in Christ is already a fait accompli, a thing already achieved. When we have been saved, we have already been brought into the Body of Christ by his power. All that is left is for us to “grow up into” that reality. The game has been won. The struggle is over. All we need to do is embrace that fact and live it out:

“On the contrary, it is much truer that the parts of the body which seem to be weaker are necessary; and those parts of the body which we consider less honorable, on these we bestow greater honor, and our less presentable parts become much more presentable, whereas our more presentable parts have no need of it. But God has so composed the body, giving more abundant honor to that part which lacked, so that there may be no division in the body, but that the parts may have the same care for one another. And if one part of the body suffers, all the parts suffer with it; if a part is honored, all the parts rejoice with it. Now you are Christ’s body, and individually parts of it.”

We need each other: good thing we already have each other. The unity achieved in our union with Christ is unbreakable and eternal. We have only to begin now to put that into actuality.

Here and Now

“But,” we might ask, “what about things that still divide us in practice? What about the fact that we have such different identities, cultures, languages, and so forth? These are not easy to overcome; if they were, the world would have beaten them long ago. So how can we get past these things to reach the kind of unity that Christ intends us to have?”

That’s a fair question. But we also have answers to that from scripture. Take the barrier of race that existed between Jew and Gentile, a barrier reinforced not just by culture, language and so on, but even fortified by covenant. Could there be a more complicated barrier than that? Yet in Christ, it has been overcome. As Paul encourages:

“Therefore remember that previously you, the Gentiles … that you were at that time separate from Christ, excluded from the people of Israel, and strangers to the covenants of the promise, having no hope and without God in the world.”

That’s a pretty hopeless situation, one would think. In fact, it’s much worse than the kinds of multiculturalism problems with which the world routinely struggles. It’s even a division of eternal destiny. That’s a pretty ugly rift. But look what Paul makes of it:

“But now in Christ Jesus you who previously were far away have been brought near by the blood of Christ. For he himself is our peace, who made both groups into one and broke down the barrier of the dividing wall, by abolishing in his flesh the hostility, which is the Law composed of commandments expressed in ordinances, so that in himself he might make the two one new person, in this way establishing peace; and that he might reconcile them both in one body to God through the cross, by it having put to death the hostility. And he came and preached peace to you who were far away, and peace to those who were near; for through him we both have our access in one Spirit to the Father.”

It takes nothing less than salvation by Christ himself to produce the reality of spiritual unity. It takes nothing less than our living connectedness to him in order to enable us to actualize it. But the great news is that it is not only possible but already achieved. The problem of unity has been solved, once and for all, by the power of God.

Practical Unity

The practice of this unification is not to be put off until the final age. The Lord’s people are commanded to begin modeling it right now, in faith beginning the transformation that will only be fully complete when Christ returns:

“So then you are no longer strangers and foreigners, but you are fellow citizens with the saints, and are of God’s household, having been built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone, in whom the whole building, being fitted together, is growing into a holy temple in the Lord, in whom you also are being built together into a dwelling of God in the Spirit.”

“No longer strangers and foreigners.” “You are.” Now. The instruction here is for us to start living in defiance of the divisions inherent in the world now, as if every believer is of ultimate value, all equally citizens of eternity, all “fitted together” into a unified structure in which Christ dwells by the Spirit.

Even as Christians, the truth is that we may still struggle with the reality of that. But we are not alone, and we are guaranteed a win. Nothing can illustrate this more clearly than a look ahead to the eternal state promised to us, when God will finally achieve the perfect unity he is aiming to achieve. Here is what it will look like:

“After these things I looked, and behold, a great multitude which no one could count, from every nation and all the tribes, peoples, and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, and palm branches were in their hands; and they cried out with a loud voice, saying, ‘Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb.’ ”

This is, of course, all those saints worldwide from the Tribulation. This picture of “a great multitude” has many “tribes, peoples and languages”; but none of that makes any difference. The fact of their diversity is recognized, because it shows there are no barriers to salvation in Christ; but no division is made out of it, and the unity of the congregation is made complete. They have but one thought, one cry, and one joy: that they belong to the Lamb who has saved them all. They are all in total sympathy, regardless of any differences.

Now that’s unity in diversity.