Hello All,
(Just a general disclaimer that I must insert here at the beginning. I am but a lay person, like most of you. And these weekly “thoughts” are but my own. Not the definitive word on this or any topic. Just my own conclusions derived from my own study and faith in God. The greatest hope I have for these weekly “thoughts” is to have them be a springboard for further study on your part. Not to be a weekly treatise to be blindly accepted. So, please read them with this intent, this motive in mind).
This week’s lesson from “The Adult Sabbath School Guide” is titled “Church Organization and Unity”. This whole quarter we’ve studied different aspects of “unity”. What this looks like in real life. How and why. And as we near the end of this quarter and this year, we look this week on church unity and organization. A topic that could be charged with great passion and controversy. But it need not be so. As long as we remember Sunday’s lesson title, “Christ, the Head of the Church”.
Each of us come into the church with our own ideas of what “church” looks like. Each of us are shaped to a great extent by our past, by our lives. We are not captive to our past, our sinfulness, our brokenness, because each of us has seen God (as we are able) and have responded to His love that heals (saves) us. However, we are not healed (saved) overnight. We are turned-around overnight from our self-destructive past, but we have much to learn… and much to unlearn. True salvation (healing) realized in the life of the individual is a process. A process of cooperation. And for me, this is the key to understanding how a group of disparate sinners saved by grace can come together in church unity. The key is cooperation. And the true nature of this cooperation is not found in convincing others that I am right (and by implication, you are wrong) and must come to my understanding. It is found in the polar opposite of this idea. It is found in Christ’s character and method.
In an earlier “thought” I submitted the idea that God’s method of creating “unity” was by coming to us, not by standing imperiously and making us come to Him. The fact of “Christ” demonstrates this to us. God in Christ came to where we are, so to lead us to where He is. God took the initiative to come to us FIRST. Come to where we are. “We love Him because He first loved us” (1 John 4:19). This is God’s way and needs to be our way. Each Christian should so enter into the feelings and desires of his fellow believers as to be of one mind with them… to fully understand and come to where they are. For this is God’s method. And if we all did this, if each individual in our organization would enter into the feelings and desires of his fellow believer in order to understand, then we would have a platform for real unity.
We study about God, but will not embrace Him and His loving methods. We are desirous to appease God but refuse to trust in Him by following His selfless ways. We pay court to God as our judge, but do not love Him as our all-wise and all–loving Father. We trust God as One who is far away, not as the One who is our only home. We would receive salvation from God rather than God our salvation. We want His merits, but want not Him. Christ can go to the cross for us, but we will not follow Him there to be crucified daily with Him. The basic problem of mankind is that we want salvation AND self. And so the disunity continues. Because self still reigns in our hearts.
Self cannot be appeased. Self cannot be bargained-with. Self cannot be subdued. Self cannot be converted. Self must be crucified. AS EGW counsels us:
“There is a cause for the great weakness in our churches, and that cause is hard to remove; for it is self. Trouble does not arise because men have too much will, but because they have too much self-will. The will should be wholly sanctified to God. The professed followers of Christ need to fall on the Rock and be broken; for in every one who enters the gates of the city of God, self must be crucified. This fierce spirit which rises up in the hearts of some in the church when everything does not go to please them, must be subdued; for it is not the Spirit of Christ. It is fully time that we return to our first love, and be at peace among ourselves. We must make it manifest that we are not only Bible readers, but Bible believers. If we are united to Christ, we shall be united to one another. Jesus says, ‘A new commandment I give unto you, That ye love one another; as I have loved you, that ye also love one another. By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another’.” (R&H, 12/6/1892).
Our one hope is found in union with Christ. He is more than willing for this union. His entrance on the human scene over 2,000 years ago is proof of His desire for union. Are you willing? He will not force you. His objective salvation offered to all, must find a subjective response in you. Do you choose Him as He has chosen you?
With brotherly love,
Jim