Unity is the sole path to overcoming a divided world. Our world is unstable, divided, and confused. The lack of truth on the lips of many has sustained the division amongst folks today. What is the role of a Christian in this world?
1) All Christians must uphold the truth.
Live a truthful life. When you start with the truth, you save time, fights, and arguments. Truth does not sustain debate. Truth is the root of peace and unity. The desire of every nation is to be one nation under God’s leadership. But every nation has quickly become divided instead of united. Everywhere you look, division is occurring on the macro level. Presidential candidates talk about uniting the nation while they fight all the time.
We are all aware of the ongoing racial divide in our nations. The division between police and citizens and the divisions within our own homes and families skyrocket day after day. And the divisions keep growing no matter the effort at hand to heal them. Jesus Christ prayed a prayer, the longest recorded prayer in the Bible. He has unveiled the secret of the church and a life-transforming concept of our pilgrimage.
John 17:21-23: “That all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me. I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one: I in them and you in me. May they be brought to complete unity to let the world know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.”
2) Emulate the oneness that Jesus has with his father
In light of all the divides that we are facing today, all the schisms and the fishers that are separating us, this scripture discloses the solution to our universal divisions.
In verse 21: He begins by saying, “That they may be one.”
In verse 22: He ends by saying, “That they may be one.”
In verse 23: He begins, “That they may be perfect in unity.”
It is mandatory for every believer to emulate the oneness that Jesus possesses with his own Father. Everybody defines the word “unity” in their own way. But Jesus did want us to follow his own clearly defined definition of unity. Our unity must be a perfect replica of the unity that Jesus himself has with his Father.
3) Let’s walk in same purpose
Unity is oneness in purpose. The purpose of the world is divided, and therefore, unity is scares to see. The church has experienced division in the past decade due to scattered purposes amongst believers.
Unity is not sameness, where everybody is the same. Everybody cannot be the same, but everybody can have the same purpose—one vision but different missions. It is distinctiveness going in the same direction in order to achieve a common purpose. Unity is purpose-driven, not person-driven. When the Cowboys line up, there are different positions by different people with different backgrounds, but there’s only one goal line. Our differences in persons or position should point to the same goal line. Our differences are designed to achieve the same purpose.
So, unity is purposeful. Unity is not sameness because the Father is not the Son, and the Son is not the Holy Spirit. There are three distinct persons, but they operate on the same page because they are going after the same purpose.
4) Everybody does not have same personality
Unity is like a pretzel. The first hole is not the second hole. The second hole is not the third hole, but they are all tied together by the same dough. Apart from sin, it is okay for folk to be different than you. God does not expect men to be like women or women to be like men. Away with 21st-century culture that says otherwise. Men and women are different by design.
God does not expect everybody to have the same personality, be the same race, and have the same interests. Apart from sin, differences are absolutely critical, essential, and eternally determined. When you try to change people apart from sin, you are being more God in their lives than God is. God created the differences, whether gender, race, or culture. All of those differences were intended. People are not supposed to be the same.
One of the conflicts that regularly happens today is people trying to change people. If there are any changes that you are trying to impose on people that are not related to change from sin, then you are making an error.
But the issue of unity is not in the changing of the person but in the clarifying of the purpose. So, if you clarify that purpose and get all the persons to achieve the legitimate purpose, then you will have unity of function while still having the distinction of personalities.
The unity of heaven has been filtered down on earth to us by Jesus. The church must be one in purpose but diversified in personality.
The performance of the orchestra is a perfect example of unity. Everyone warms up his instrument individually. When the conductor walks out, holds up the baton, and stretches it out, everyone focuses on him. All of a sudden, these individual discourses are harmonized by the conductor. They all played one song following the lead of one person. All the sounds of the instruments are synchronized to produce a defined output—a single song.
5) Let’s Stop fighting our Differences
What is missing in family unity, Church unity, and societal unity is the common purpose. When everybody starts creating their own purposes and moving towards them, there are bound to be conflicts. There are thousands of goal lines in the world, and as such, our world cannot experience the bloom of unity.
We are headed toward different places. We fight over our differences instead of our sins. We fight over positions instead of fighting for that goal line. Jesus says, “Our unity is tied to the fact that I have completed the work you have called me to do.”
In order to achieve this unity, there had to be submission to legitimate authority. Even though the father equals the son, they had an arrangement where the son would submit to the will of the father in order to accomplish the goal of the kingdom.
Unity involves submission to legitimate authority as long as there’s clarity of the goal. Unity cannot exist if there is no clarity of what we’re unified about. If it’s unclear where you’re going, you will get there every time, or you will never get there. In this unity of purpose, there is a key element in order for the unity of purpose to occur.
John 17: 17: Sanctify them in the truth.
John 17: 19: For their sake, I sanctify myself that they themselves also may be sanctified in truth.
Unity involves submission to legitimate authority as long as there’s clarity of the goal. Unity cannot exist if there is no clarity of what we are unified about. If it is unclear where you are going, you will get there every time, or you will never get there. In this unity of purpose, there is a key element in order for the unity of purpose to occur.
6) Follow the definition of Biblical truth and stop living a lie
We live in a world today of probabilities, potentialities, and preferences. We live in a world where everybody’s got an idea about everything. We base our decisions on our own ideologies and ideas. Everyone talks about his own truth. If everyone has their own truth, then everyone will tilt towards their own direction. Since everyone has their own direction, unity would never be achieved. When we do not have unity, we do not have God.
The biblical definition of truth is an absolute standard by which reality is measured. Truth lives outside of you. We call it objective truth. We live in a world today where people operate on what they believe to be true. Because you believe it doesn’t make it true. It just means you believe it.
Unless truth sits outside of you or comes from an objective standard, you could be believing a lie thinking it is truth. If you believe a lie thinking it is true and you operate on your belief, that is not the truth. A lot of us are living our lives on a lie. Things do not work out, and our lives continue to be a nightmare, shrouded in confusion and depression because we believe in a lie.
7) We cannot live our lives guessing all the time
Truth is an objective standard by which reality is measured. Jesus wants us to be sanctified with the truth. Sanctified means to be set apart for a purpose. Jesus set us apart based on the word to the truth to fulfill the purpose that God has for us. As Jesus is sanctified, so is the church of God.
What would you say to an unsure pilot who says, “I think this is the button I ought to push to get this plane off the ground?” Would you want a pilot guessing your life on a flight?
Suppose you had a doctor who said, “Well, I think this is the place I ought to cut.” I think you would love to change the doctor because you want some certainty if they are going to split your tummy open.
Imagine you go to a pharmacist, and he says, “There is a lot of medicine in here. I do not know the exact cure for your disease.” Then he comes up with his best guess about your medicine. I think you would love to talk to another pharmacist because your life is at stake. You do not want to go guessing about your life.
God does not want you guessing with your life. Truth takes the guesswork out of life. Because you are operating on an absolute standard that sits outside of you.
8) Everyone of us must come to the knowledge of the truth
John 8:31-32: To the Jews who had believed him, Jesus said, “If you hold to my teaching, you are really my disciples. Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”
Truth exists, and that is why the Bible says, “And you shall know it.” You have to know the truth before it can set you free. Everyone is ignorant of the truth. Simply because the truth exists does not mean you have it. You must come to the knowledge of it. Truth already exists, but you shall know it. If you do not know the truth, you cannot be freed by it. If you have been duped by a lie, you will continually be a slave. If you are not liberated, it is either you do not know the truth or you are not operating with the truth.
A lot of us are in bondage because we are living a lie, believing it is the truth. If you are being held hostage, illegitimately, the truth has not penetrated yet. Either because you don’t know what it is or you are not operating by it. Some people are held hostage by chains that they should have been liberated from years ago. Truth has liberating power. The highest threat to the devil is when Christians embark on truth-finding trips. Truth is God’s view on any subject matter.
Romans 3:4: “Not at all! Let God be true, and every human being a liar. As it is written: “So that you may be proved right when you speak and prevail when you judge.”
If you disagree with God, guess what God just calls you? He calls you a liar. If the Government disagrees with God, guess what God says? Lying Government.
It does not matter how many people believe it and how many people vote for it. It does not matter how many people feel it and how many people think about it. Once it disagrees with God, He calls all of them liars.
The Bible says, “Folks are ever learning and never coming into the knowledge of the truth”
9) The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom
The knowledge of God is the foundation of wisdom. The fear of God is the beginning of knowledge. That is the problem with our system of education. Education about God has ceased to exist in many institutions around the world. They teach facts and do not get around to the truth. About 70% of the world’s population is educated, yet we are swimming daily in confusion, terrorism, war, and crime. The absolute knowledge of the Divine God has taken the back seat in many communities, while in some, it has been completely bound.
If you start with God, you start with the truth. Truth is the only basis to interpret the facts of life. It is God’s view on the matter that matters.
Bill Clem was a big Husky umpire for the integration in baseball. Time was running out, and his team was one score down. He threw a baseball to a catcher, the guy slid, and dust flew everywhere because it was ever dusty, and dust flew everywhere that you would hardly see him.
One team came out and said, “He is safe! He is safe!”
The other team came out and said, “He is out! He is out!”
So, both teams strained in chorus saying ‘He is safe, out, safe, out safe, safe, out….’
Bill Clem took off his mask and threw it down, and said, “Everybody shut up. Because it ain’t nothing till I call it.”
The world makes a lot of noise on the truth. Nations speak about the truth. All races and tribes talk of the truth. But God is saying that those truths are nonsense. God says, “It ain’t truth till I call it.” We must wait till God speaks it out. He is the foundation of the truth, and any truth we utter out of God’s name is all nonsense.
