UNITY IN THE TRUTH

UNITY IN THE TRUTH

Ephesians 4:1-16

Dr. Wm. J. Maxwell

First Presbyterian Church, Newport, RI

June 18, 2006

I faced temptation this week and, of course, didn’t we all in one way or another! For me, it was the temptation to preach a sermon on the subject of fatherhood. And you might think this to be rather strange. “Why not, pastor? Why not preach a sermon on the family on Father’s Day?”

I didn’t give in to the temptation of preaching on the very significant and worthwhile subject of fatherhood and the family for the reason that the Lord has laid another family on my heart – and that is the family of God.

A few weeks ago, I prayed for guidance as to what to preach during the summer season.

I had a strong sense of the Holy Spirit’s leading that I am to preach on the subject of the Church, the Bride of Christ. There are other topics that are very important, including the importance of individual family life, and thus the temptation to preach on that very subject this morning. But this, I believe, I’m not to do. In obedience to what I believe is the leading of the Lord, our summer series will be: “The Bride of Christ: Taking a Closer Look at the Church.”

It’s a critical time in the life of many a “mainline denomination.” Such denominations as the Episcopalians, the United Methodists, some Lutherans, the United Church of Christ, the Disciples of Christ, and the Presbyterian Church (USA) are all losing members and income as denominations, though not necessarily in terms of individual churches.

In our denomination, the loss of members and income have produced a number of consequences, from the national office in Louisville to mission fields and missionaries in far-away places. Although most are not comfortable looking at the statistics, it is sheer foolishness to turn the other way and avoid the issues that are clearly before us. This, again, is why we ought to look more closely at what the Bible has to say about the Church.

Two Sundays ago, we actually began this series with the sermon, “The Oneness of the Church.” We saw from Jesus’ High Priestly prayer in the Upper Room, that true unity in the Church is not to be found in mere organization, as important as that may be. True unity and the oneness of the Church is instead found in a relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ.

Unity is not something we attain or achieve by mere effort or by organizing ourselves. It is rather a gift given to us by the Lord Jesus Himself. It is as composer John Oxenham stated in the hymn we will sing as our closing hymn:

In Christ there is no East or West,

in Him no South or North;

But one great fellowship of love

Throughout the whole wide earth.

In Him shall true hearts ev’rywhere

Their high communion find;

His service is the golden cord

Close binding all mankind.

In Christ now meet both East and West;

In Him meet South and North.

All Christly souls are one in Him

Throughout the whole wide earth.[i]

Not surprisingly, the Apostle Paul makes this same point in his great letter to the Ephesian Christians. Most prominently, we find this in chapter 2, where Paul explains how Jesus Christ has brought both Jew and Gentile together. “For He Himself is our peace, who has made the two one and has destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility.” [ii] He then concludes this section by speaking of the Church as a spiritual building, with Christ “as the chief cornerstone.” [iii]

In chapter 4, Paul states this once again. In addressing the subject of unity in the Body of Christ, Paul speaks of the building up of the Body, “until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ.” True unity is found in Jesus Christ as our bond, as we grow together toward maturity in our relationship with Him.

But please note what Paul is also saying here. If we are united together in our relationship in Christ, it will be a path to maturity based upon a knowledge and grasp of the truth of God as we find it in Christ.

Then we will no longer be infants, tossed back and forth by the waves, and blown here and there by every wind of teaching and by the cunning and craftiness of men in their deceitful scheming. Instead, speaking the truth in love, we will in all things grow up into Him who is the Head, that is, Christ.

Our unity will run deep so long as it is found in Christ, and in the Bible that so faithfully teaches us about Him. In other words, our unity will never be found in a superficial relationship with an ambiguous Christ, or in a Christ you and I might choose to imagine. If we are truly to be united as God’s people, growing and maturing together, it will be because we take the Bible seriously as the Word of God, guiding us “in the knowledge of the Son of God.” Out of that knowledge, we can then be a people who speak the truth in love to a world so desperately needing the good news of the Gospel.

Historically, the Church has always had to deal with the distinction between truth and falsehood, and between what is significant and what is less significant. While most Christians believe there are some nonessentials that do not affect the very nature of the Church, all Christians should believe in certain essentials of the Faith that are non-negotiable. These are the core essentials of the Christian faith that define the Christian, and that define the Church.

But in this era in which you and I now live, we often see movements toward unity, at the cost and expense of doctrines that are essential to the very nature and being of the Church. When these are jettisoned merely for the sake of unity, the very life of the Church is threatened.

One example we might look at is the doctrine of the Virgin Birth. This doctrine is taught in Scripture and is included in the classic Creeds of the Church, such as the Apostles’ and Nicene Creeds. Nevertheless, there are some who cannot believe in this doctrine. It is a biological miracle that their “modern minds” simply cannot grasp or accept. So, for the sake of getting along in a false sense of unity, belief in the Virgin Birth is cast aside as a nonessential.

In practically every church library in the country, including ours, you will find a set of commentaries authored by Dr. William Barclay, a now deceased Church of Scotland professor. In many ways, it is a fine set, and I have one in my own personal library. In fact, it was the very first set of commentaries on the New Testament I ever purchased. I consult this set often.

But listen carefully to what Dr. Barclay has to say regarding the Virgin Birth:

It may well be that the New Testament stories of the Birth of Jesus are lovely, poetical ways of saying that, even if He had a human father, the Holy Spirit of God was operative in His Birth in the most unique and special way. In this matter we may make our own decision. It may be that we will desire to cling to the literal doctrine of the Virgin Birth; it may be that we will prefer to think of it as a beautiful way of stressing the presence of the Spirit of God in family life. [iv]

According to Dr. Barclay, for the sake of unity in the Church, this is not a doctrine worth quibbling over. For the sake of our getting along together, it becomes a “nonessential.”

But we have to ask ourselves, if the oneness of the Church is found in a relationship with God through Jesus Christ, doesn’t it in fact make a difference if Jesus is God-incarnate, born of Mary and the Holy Spirit, rather than of two human parents, and thus a sinful human being just like the rest of us? If the Virgin Birth is not true, then Jesus was not sinless before the Father, and if that is so, He could not have died for my sin or for yours; He would have had to deal with His own.

Furthermore, none of His teachings could be trusted by any one of us; in fact, Jesus Himself could not be trusted. That classic statement of C.S. Lewis in Mere Christianity, a book on the essentials of the Christian Faith, bears repeating at this point:

I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him: ‘I’m ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don’t accept His claim to be God.’ That is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic – on a level with the man who says he is a poached egg – or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God: or else a madman or something worse. You can shut him up for a fool, you can spit at Him and kill him as a demon; or you can fall at His feet and call Him Lord and God. But let us not come up with any patronizing nonsense about His being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to. [v]

Dear friends, beware the voices offering a false unity based upon that which “really doesn’t matter.” There are in fact some non-negotiables, some core essentials of the Christian faith. It behooves us then

to note them carefully,

to believe in them completely,

and to stand upon them courageously.

For if the Church is ever to find true Unity, it will be found in Jesus, and in all of the truth that we so gloriously find in Him!