So in Christ Jesus you are all children of God through faith, for all of you who were baptised into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.
Galatians 3:26-28 NIVUK
Here there is no Gentile or Jew, circumcised or uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave or free, but Christ is all, and is in all.
Colossians 3:11 NIVUK
A number of years ago, I had an encounter with someone in my church that I’ve never forgotten.
Our church had outreach in a poor neighbourhood at the time. The decision had been held to hold a Kid’s Club in the church building and the kids from the poor neighbourhood were given transport so they could join.
And join they certainly did. They were competitive, enthusiastic, loud, boisterous. They were a lot of fun. I was in a group with many of them. There was never a dull moment.
When they finished as the top team, you should have heard the cheers. You’d have thought they’d won a major sports competition. I was delighted for them. I was proud of them. They deserved it.
The Sunday following the club, the parents were all invited to the service, and many of them came. It was terrific.
I spoke to the parents of the kids in my group and told them how proud I was of them. As I went through to the back hall to get some refreshments, I encouraged one of our church elders to speak to these families from the poorer neighbourhood.
‘But what will I talk to them about? We have nothing in common.’ he moaned.
Really?
You breathe. You eat. You drink. You work. You sleep. You've just seen their kids participate in a church service. Yet you have nothing to talk about?
I couldn’t believe what I was hearing.
Yet sometimes Christians are guilty of the same thing – of making pathetic and thoroughly unnecessary excuses for not speaking to Christians from a different background or doctrinal position.
Let me tell you right now: it’s nonsense. And hopelessly immature.
You see, the Bible is clear about what God’s end game is in sending Jesus to redeem us:
For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood, shed on the cross.
Colossians 1:19-20 NIVUK
So God’s master plan is to reconcile all things to Himself through the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross.
It’s because of this that we see Jesus praying these words for us:
‘My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, 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 – so that they may be brought to complete unity. Then the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.
John 17:20-23 NIVUK
You see, when we are in Christ, there is a gravitational force that pulls us closer to Him. That force also exerts irresistible pressure on us and pulls us towards our brothers and sisters in Christ. As John tells us:
Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. This is how God showed his love among us: he sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No-one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us. We love because he first loved us. Whoever claims to love God yet hates a brother or sister is a liar. For whoever does not love their brother and sister, whom they have seen, cannot love God, whom they have not seen. And he has given us this command: anyone who loves God must also love their brother and sister.
1 John 4:7-12, 19-21
It’s simply not possible to say that we love God but do not love our brother and sister.
The greatest commandment is to love God. The second greatest commandment is to love our neighbour as ourselves (Matthew 22:37-39). Love is in three dimensions. You cannot have one without the other. You cannot grow in love in one dimension without growing in love in the others.
If we claim to be close to God, then we must also be close to our brothers and sisters in Christ.
But there is more to it than that. As we are unified with our brothers and sisters, our fundamental identity changes. We no longer need to identify ourselves by what makes us different or unique. We identify ourselves by who we are in Christ.
That doesn’t mean that we stop being who we are. What it does mean is that our identity as a Christian – a follower of Christ – is more important.
Let me give you a good example from the world of team competitive sport.
Scotland is sport crazy – especially about football (what Americans call soccer). Let’s say it’s 3pm on a Saturday afternoon. Your team is playing their rivals. You support your team, so you’re there, at the stadium, shouting and singing and doing your part.
Wednesday comes. It's 7.45pm. This time you’re back at a match. Only this time it’s not your team. No, this time it's your country. And you’re there – at the national stadium, standing shoulder to shoulder with supporters of your rival team, cheering on players from your team and theirs, because you want the national team to do well.
This is a picture of what Paul is talking about. We might have rivals. We might have enemies. We might have some disagreements. Some of them may even be painful. But these things pale into irrelevance and insignificance when it comes to the spread of the Gospel and the increase of the Kingdom of God.
So for the greater good we set them aside and cease to be defined by them.
We stop seeing ourselves in ways that made us stand out, that set the stage for us, that drew the attention to us. We are not defined that way anymore.
Instead, we are defined and identify ourselves by the same thing that millions of people define and identify ourselves by first and foremost.
We are Christians. We are followers of Jesus Christ.
And nothing else matters.
Maybe you think it’s strange that I’ve began a study in 1 Corinthians by referring to multiple other books in the Bible, but not it. But there is method in my madness.
You see, the first part of our study will concentrate on several things that we all have in common as Christians. You might be tempted to believe that this subject is exclusively mentioned in 1 Corinthians – or, at most, in Ephesians too – and that it's not really a core or essential teaching of the whole Bible.
Nothing could be further from the truth.
This is linked to the Greatest Commandment.
It’s linked to Christ’s prayer for us as He approached Gethsemane and the cross.
It’s part of God’s fundamental purpose in His plan to save us.
This is not some minor teaching. This is part of the essential message of the Gospel.
And that deserves our full and undivided attention.
Questions
1. How much do you believe you have in common with a Christian who is not in your normal social group? Would such a Christian be able to see this in the way you treat them?
2. Do you feel the ‘irresistible pull’ to be reconciled and enjoy fellowship with other believers?
3. Other than the Gospel itself, what are you willing to set aside to have close fellowship with other Christians?
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