Monday's Meditation: Seven Thoughts on Unity
Monday, May 2, 2011 at 10:15AM 
How good and pleasant it is when God’s people live together in unity!
It is like precious oil poured on the head,
running down on the beard,
running down on Aaron’s beard,
down on the collar of his robe.
It is as if the dew of Hermon
were falling on Mount Zion.
For there the LORD bestows his blessing,
even life forevermore. (Psalm 133)
running down on the beard,
running down on Aaron’s beard,
down on the collar of his robe.
It is as if the dew of Hermon
were falling on Mount Zion.
For there the LORD bestows his blessing,
even life forevermore. (Psalm 133)
With understated simplicity God reveals something of his nature in just sixty-two words. He loves unity and bestows his blessing wherever he finds it.
His very existence models unity before creation, unity before knowledge, and unity forevermore. Tim Keller calls it the “dance of reality:” the Creator of the universe is somehow three and also One. Unity is simply another way of saying “God is love.”
We have trouble with this. We mistake uniformity for unity. We mistake intellectual agreement for unity. But there is no mistaking the oil of anointing in life lived together. There’s no mistaking the refreshment of a saturated mountain-morning when God’s kids learn how to play nice together.
In accord with Rachel Held Evans’ initiative, this week’s meditation invites us to muse on the nature of unity and God’s heart for his children. Here are seven starters, all from Paul’s letter to healthy church in a place called Ephesus. I will not give chapter-and-verse references because to do so would be to reduce the call for unity to mere Biblical argument.
- We are--all of us--adopted into God’s family. This means we must learn a new way to live. We are called to take on a family identity that was previously alien to our way of thinking and acting. To carry our old ways into the new family of God is refuse the new identity he gives us.
- The eyes of our heart must be enlightened, not the thoughts of our intellect. More than knowledge, we need the Spirit of wisdom and revelation.
- He wants to show us the “incomparable riches of his grace,” but we frequently mistake the moment of adoption as the beginning and end of his grace. Having breathed the air of grace the first time, we think we received all there is. There is more grace to discover: it starts within the family of God and migrates outward.
- There is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called to one hope when you were called; one Lord, one faith, one baptism; one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all. ~ If you’re keeping score, that’s seven “ones” and three “alls.” Did you notice that the phrase “one creed” does not appear?
- We grieve the Holy Spirit not by what we teach or advocate, but by how we treat one another.
- If we revere Jesus we will submit to one another.
- “Peace to the brothers and sisters, and love with faith from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Grace to all who love our Lord Jesus Christ with an undying love.” The greatest intellect of Christendom opened and closed his love-letter with the words grace and peace.
Blessings abundant for the week ahead!
Reader Comments (13)
One faith = One creed
Hi Caleb: Thanks for dropping by. I suppose "One Faith" might equal "One Creed," but I'm not certain about it. When the gospel broke through to the Gentiles the Apostles met in Jerusalem to discuss what should be required of Gentiles, and their conclusions don't read like a creed to me. Perhaps Paul's words in 1 Corinthians 15 come closer to sounding like a creed, but still it seems loose and experiential. Who do you think?
1 Corinthians 15, yes, and also 1 Timothy 3:16 also has the feel of a creed, which, once again, focuses on the resurrection/ascension/glorification: In short, the victory of Christ as Lord. But, as one who is strongly in favor of creeds, perhaps the passages that most simply convey the heart of the Catholic Creeds are Philippians 2:9-11 and Romans 10:9. Looking at the simplicity of the confession that "Jesus is Lord" and looking to the length of the Nicene Creed, there may seem to be a disparity, but ultimately they both exist to answer the same question: "Who?" The Nicene Creed simply seeks to do this as comprehensively yet concisely as possible.
While the Creeds are often cast by critics as measurements of abstract beliefs, I think that we have to remember that ultimately their purpose (like all of the passages cited above) was to answer the question "who," including reference to defining acts of God such as creation and redemption. For those of us who hold the first four ecumenical councils in very high esteem, I think the key (both for us and for our critics) is to remember that, even when they seemed at their most abstract, their central goal was still to be clear about the one whom we have come to know, whom we worship, and in whom we have faith. In creedal churches I wish that we were often more clear about that, because ultimately what's important about the Creeds is WHO we are saying we believe in by being clear about who he is and what he has done in Trinitarian language. Ultimately it is about declaring our allegiance to the one true God.
Well said, Jesse! In truth I'm certainly not "anti-creed!" I love the simplicity of your explanation, the creeds exist to answer the question, "who?"
Sadly, so much of the disunity we see revolves not around "who?" but around secondary questions, but we are quick to point fingers at one another and apply labels.
The passages you cite may well have been creeds--I also like to think of them as worship choruses. Better still would be the thought that these first believers sang their creeds!
There was no necessity for a creed in Biblical times because there was no heresy then.
Hi Caleb: the problem with "because there was no heresy then," is that they actually had to deal with *more* heresy. Consider these examples:
The entire letter to the Galatians is about those who said in order to follow Jesus you first had to convert to Judaism: Paul had strong words for them! In Acts 19 we discover there was a whole community of believers who did not even know the Holy Spirit existed (!). And apparently, the writer of the Hebrews letter felt the need to deal with the identity of Jesus in great detail, presumably because there was so much confusion about the Lord.
For me the real question behind this is how the earliest Christians dealt with heresy. It appeared to be relationship first, and teaching second, as far as I can tell. Peace to you!
I'm a little skeptical about saying that there were no creeds in biblical times. We have to remember that we have about 1/3 of the early church's conversation at most. Think of this: If 1 Corinthians had been lost, we wouldn't have ANY certain references to the Lord's Supper in all of the writings of Paul. Not one. We still have no 100% certain references in any Johannine literature. In addition, if references to creedal formulas are absent in letters and accounts it is to be expected because the local churches, while linked to each other, were often separated by distance and persecution, and issues of heresy were often linked to local false teachers. Any "creeds" would have probably been local in scope until they gradually spread or coalesced. In any case, Ray, I'm not sure what you mean by "relationship," but the emphasis in responding to local debates in the NT seems an awful lot like reasserting core teachings to me.
Caleb and Jesse: It seems as if this word "creed" has indeed caused you to miss all of the amazing truth in the above bullet points. Truths of grace, peace, hope, adoption, relationship with Jesus and one another in love, and revelation and wisdom from the Spirit. Why must the word "creed" be the stumbling block and the source of conversation when there is so much more to look at here? I think the above comments prove the point Ray is trying to make when he refers to "secondary questions" and how the eyes of our hearts indeed need to be opened, without mere reliance on our own intellect.
"The church would be one with itself if it were one with the truth" - C.H. Spurgeon. However, the content of this truth needs to be elucidated. This elucidation is our belief, Faith or Creed.
Both of you (Ray & Jesse) are right in saying that "the emphasis in responding to local debates in the NT seems an awful lot like reasserting core teachings to me."
Yes, indeed! There was so much heresy during Biblical times that the epistles were themselves long forms of creedal statements on various aspects of our Faith. But in these last days with the rise of false prophets and false teachers we need to develop a core of the core creedal statement to distinguish ourselves from the current heresy. In that regard, a Creed today would tell what that one faith, one Lord, one baptism, one, one... of Ephesians 4 is. I too have taken some pains to come out with my own. The Creed at http://churchofagapelove.org/ is my contribution to #RestoreUnity.
Thank you thank you thank you. I really needed this meditation (and wish I would have read it before I struggled with my own rally for unity post!).
Somehow I'm able to clearly see what *isn't* unity—and I can even see through the false unity shams that often trick us—but having a picture of unity is much harder. This really helped.
Thank you thank you thank you. I really needed this meditation (and wish I would have read it before I struggled with my own rally for unity post!).
Somehow I'm able to clearly see what *isn't* unity—and I can even see through the false unity shams that often trick us—but having a picture of unity is much harder. This really helped.
There was no necessity for a creed in Biblical times because there was no heresy then.
"The church would be one with itself if it were one with the truth" - C.H. Spurgeon. However, the content of this truth needs to be elucidated. This elucidation is our belief, Faith or Creed.
Both of you (Ray & Jesse) are right in saying that "the emphasis in responding to local debates in the NT seems an awful lot like reasserting core teachings to me."
Yes, indeed! There was so much heresy during Biblical times that the epistles were themselves long forms of creedal statements on various aspects of our Faith. But in these last days with the rise of false prophets and false teachers we need to develop a core of the core creedal statement to distinguish ourselves from the current heresy. In that regard, a Creed today would tell what that one faith, one Lord, one baptism, one, one... of Ephesians 4 is. I too have taken some pains to come out with my own. The Creed at http://churchofagapelove.org/ is my contribution to #RestoreUnity.