The term unity has been going around and around my head, these past few months. As the church, we are called to represent the Triune God and reveal Him to the world. We are to be one just as the Trinity are one. Paul describes the church as a body and the congregation make up many parts of it, with Christ at the head, We are to be one in mind, body and spirit. One with God and His mission and will for His creation.
1 Corinthians 12:12-27 and Ephesians 3:6, and other verses support the church being unified. What unifies us, is the promise we have in Christ and through Him alone are we saved.
This is far from what we experience within the wider church. Different theological views and diverse doctrinal beliefs separate the church, with such labels as conservative and liberal, revealing this massive division within the church. In the Church Times on the 21st January 2021, this disunity has become the thorn in the flesh and is far from the reconciliation which the Church promotes.
Therefore there is a voice that is calling out for reconciliation and unity within the church, to accept and accommodate everyone's feelings and beliefs. Compromise, meet in the middle so we can show the world a united church. Yet our compromise of doctrine will result in a belief in a false gospel a false god and therefore affect our salvation.
We can compromise on things, such as what tea we should drink or what we should wear on Sundays, those do not affect our faith and belief in the true God. When we do start to comprise the gospel and what Christ taught, then we create the wrong doctrine and a false god who cannot save as this god is man-made and is created in the image of humankind.
In Alistair Begg's book Brave By Faith, he focuses on the book of Daniel. Daniel was an exile, a stranger in a world of false gods and prophets, as society tried to get him to compromise his faith which would result in Daniel then turning his back upon the one true God where we can receive salvation and worshipping man-made idols.
Alistair says "his book is not about turning us into Daniels but believing in Daniels God". The God of the exile has not changed, God was the hero of their story and he is the hero of ours as we live as strangers in this world longing for our true home. As we grow in confidence in our God, we will know and trust that our God is powerful, supreme and sovereign overall circumstances.
It is this God who should be central to our lives and faith and it is in Christ and Scripture we need to be unified within, as it is only through Christ we are saved and it is only through Scripture Christ is revealed.
So let's stand united in the protection and security of God, His truth, His Gospel and His will.
The Ramblings of the Curate!
Unity.
The term unity has been going around and around my head, these past few months. As the church, we are called to represent the Triune God and reveal Him to the world. We are to be one just as the Trinity are one. Paul describes the church as a body and the congregation make up many parts of it, with Christ at the head, We are to be one in mind, body and spirit. One with God and His mission and will for His creation.
1 Corinthians 12:12-27 and Ephesians 3:6, and other verses support the church being unified. What unifies us, is the promise we have in Christ and through Him alone are we saved.
This is far from what we experience within the wider church. Different theological views and diverse doctrinal beliefs separate the church, with such labels as conservative and liberal, revealing this massive division within the church. In the Church Times on the 21st January 2021, this disunity has become the thorn in the flesh and is far from the reconciliation which the Church promotes.
Therefore there is a voice that is calling out for reconciliation and unity within the church, to accept and accommodate everyone's feelings and beliefs. Compromise, meet in the middle so we can show the world a united church. Yet our compromise of doctrine will result in a belief in a false gospel a false god and therefore affect our salvation.
We can compromise on things, such as what tea we should drink or what we should wear on Sundays, those do not affect our faith and belief in the true God. When we do start to comprise the gospel and what Christ taught, then we create the wrong doctrine and a false god who cannot save as this god is man-made and is created in the image of humankind.
In Alistair Begg's book Brave By Faith, he focuses on the book of Daniel. Daniel was an exile, a stranger in a world of false gods and prophets, as society tried to get him to compromise his faith which would result in Daniel then turning his back upon the one true God where we can receive salvation and worshipping man-made idols.
Alistair says "his book is not about turning us into Daniels but believing in Daniels God". The God of the exile has not changed, God was the hero of their story and he is the hero of ours as we live as strangers in this world longing for our true home. As we grow in confidence in our God, we will know and trust that our God is powerful, supreme and sovereign overall circumstances.
It is this God who should be central to our lives and faith and it is in Christ and Scripture we need to be unified within, as it is only through Christ we are saved and it is only through Scripture Christ is revealed.
So let's stand united in the protection and security of God, His truth, His Gospel and His will.
Rev. Darren
St Andrew's Church Kinson