Seven Lessons I Have Learned: Lesson #4 – Stay together
None of us can do it on our own. We need each other. We need as many of us as possible.
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In any survival situation or emergency, this is always a rule. Stay together. Don’t get separated. Don’t leave anyone behind. Don’t go wandering off on your own.
So, too, as an ecclesia. Don’t let anything divide you.
The worldwide ecclesia is a great gift from God to help, support, comfort, instruct, and encourage, each other. None of us can do it on our own. We need each other. We need as many of us as possible.
Don’t let it be divided. It has been divided. Do everything you can to put it back together.
Unity does not require uniformity. Demands for uniformity are inherently divisive. We are all different. We each think differently about everything, including about God. There is strength in our differences, as one is strong on one thing, someone else is strong on something else. We are not all teachers, or Bible students, or tradesmen, or accountants, or cooks, or engineers, or musicians. In the same way, we each are different in our faith, and how we believe. But there are many forces that threaten to divide us. DO NOT LET THEM!
I do not know what to do about ongoing division, and even if I thought I did, this is not the time to talk about that. But to hear brethren say: “We have no differences in belief, but still can’t reconcile our practices to allow union,” was shocking. We need each other. We are far too small a body to stand division. We truly are “a house divided against itself.”
For many ecclesias, it may be a choice between unity and death to their ecclesia. Without unity, we may not last another generation, should Christ remain away. Do we want him to come back and find us still quarreling obstinately with our brothers and sisters? Many far better brethren than I have struggled long and hard for many years over these problems. I do not know the solution. I can only say we should keep trying.
In the past several years, it has become obvious that, although Christadelphians try to stay out of worldly politics, we all have our opinions, and those opinions reflect the divided world around us. We might think our common religious belief would result in common political views, but that is obviously not the case. It would be sad indeed if we allowed the politics of the kingdoms of men, in which we claim not to be involved, to divide us, as it has divided the nation around us. Do not let worldly politics divide the ecclesia, as it could so easily do. Maybe it is time for us to turn off the news, wherever we may be seeing it. A time to quit following those brothers and sisters who preach politics under the guise of “Signs of the Times,” or prophetic fulfillment.
In I Corinthians 3, we read about ecclesial party politics in the First Century, with the parties of Paul, Apollos and Peter etc., each with their followers. Sadly, it is no different today. Different teachers, or publishers, have their following, each with a different emphasis or prophetic interpretation. Many of them warn of the evils of the other ecclesial political parties. Maybe some of them have their points about the errors of others. Maybe. Even so, be warned, but don’t be divided. Be at least as skeptical of those who teach division as of the teachings against which they warn.
Take care not to let politics, either worldly politics, or ecclesial politics, divide us. Think of it this way. Those of us in error are most in need of unity, to be able to get the gentle, patient correction of those of us who may have it totally right (whoever they are).
Don’t be put off or offended by the misbehavior of other brothers and sisters. We all have so many flaws. Those who have the most problems are most in need of brotherly love.
We need the fellowship of the flawed, because we are all so flawed. We should be united by our flaws, not divided by them.
As we meet to remember how God reconciled us to Himself, let us also be reconciled to one another.
Our late brother, John MacDougall,
Portage Ecclesia, IN,
2021