Unity Of The Church

 *The mystery of the Unity of the church: a gift to society*

23 May 2022

By Rev Kenneth Mtata 

Today's readings: 

Psalm 19; 

Nehemiah 2:1-10; 

Romans 12:1-8

Verse of the day:

"Why should my face not look sad when the city where my ancestors are buried lies in ruins, and its gates have been destroyed by fire?” (Nehemiah 2:3b)

Among the greatest gifts given to God's people is that of unity. Unity is the opposite of the situation that Nehemiah had heard about Jerusalem. He had been told that "Those who survived the exile and are back in the province are in great trouble and disgrace. The wall of Jerusalem is broken down, and its gates have been burned with fire" (Nehemiah 1:3). This was a big tragedy and Nehemiah was deeply sad. Why? The nation lacked territorial integrity and security (represented by the walls). It lacked justice (represented by the gates). It was also in extreme poverty (represented by great trouble and disgrace). In other words, the people had lost a quality of life called INTEGRITY. Integrity comes from the same root with the word INTEGER, which means WHOLE. 

UNITY is the quality of INTEGRITY or WHOLENESS. But Christian unity is both a mystery and a gift to society in three ways.

First, unity has its origins and foundations in God, Father,  Son and Holy Spirit. In Creation, we experience the fatherhood and motherhood of God, because all life proceeds from him. True unity does not happen because we are only working hard to find common ground. True unity happens when each one of us is moving towards God’s "good, pleasing and perfect will" (Romans 12:2). The more we move to God's will for humanity,  the more we move towards each other. The more we each move to their selfish interests, the more we become fragmented. 

Second, the mystery of unity lies in the fact that "in Christ we, though many, form one body" (Romans 12:5). Paul uses the analogue of the human body to demonstrate this divine mystery: "each of us has one body with many members." (Romans 12:4). In their quest for distorted unity, families, communities,  churches,  organisations and nations try to destroy and suppress individuality. What they achieve in the process is homogeneity and sameness instead of unity. Where individuals have no freedom to be fully themselves, to express their unique gifts to society, society is impoverished.

Third, unity in diversity should not be a source of discord or generate negative conflict. As Nehemiah was seeking to restore the integrity of Jerusalem, "Sanballat the Horonite and Tobiah the Ammonite official...were very much disturbed that someone had come to promote the welfare of the Israelites"

(Nehemiah 2:10).Those benefiting from discord and chaos are afraid of unity of purpose. There is a big difference between the unity at Babel, where all speak the same language but cannot hear each other, and the unity at Pentecost in Jerusalem where they all spoke different languages but could hear each other. Unity that seeks to promote individual human glory (idolatry) is different from the unity coming from diverse voices that glorify God because of his salvation of his people. 

The world and nations are in terrible discord not because of the different languages, but because of the different visions for society.  The church and God's people can contribute to the much needed true unity of humanity, by recalling that our diversity is a gift from God, meant to meet each other's needs. 

Prayer:

God I make a choice today to be thoroughly myself so that I can contribute to true unity by meeting the needs of others.

AMEN.