Recently an article came out in the local papers about unity of faith in one village. The argument was that in order to do God’s Mission, different denominations should not be allowed to make it weaker. He had asserted for uniformity to preach the gospel to the lost souls.
I am sure, many readers may label me as a liberal. However, I am a staunch Baptist but not because I came out of Baptist ancestors. I am Baptist because I believe that Baptist doctrine is the nearest to the Word of God. This does not make me think that other denominations are false. Mushrooming of countless denominations in Nagaland is merely because of the gospel of prosperity. I do not like to delve into it but try to confine myself only on the unity of the Church.
Unity of the Church is a theme which runs through the Bible “that they may be one” (Jn.17:21) The unity of the Church is given to us by God and inherent in her very nature. In the Old Testament, we see that the people of God came into being through the call and Covenant of God. It was one people bound to God by His Covenant and to one another by His laws. Rehoboam, the son of Solomon broke away to form the Northern kingdom from the Southern kingdom, Judah. The fruit of this schism was that of idolatry. As a result weakness and strife which culminated in the exile of the Northern kingdom to Assyria. The Northern kingdom had ten out of twelve Tribes of Israel but the right of majority could not prevent its destruction.
In the New Testament, believers are called the New Israel, called into one by the call of Jesus Christ and welded into one by the Holy Spirit at Pentecost. All those who believe in Jesus Christ had their lives regenerated by His love in their fellowship in the Holy Spirit in the Church. But each has a different role to play in the exercise of that love. Each person is different from others but the old distinction has been abolished and a new one was created, enriching and building of the whole body. It is this unity in diversity which Jesus prayed for, has now been fulfilled. St. Paul expressed it “we though many, are one body in Christ and individually members of one another”(Rom.12:5) “For by one Spirit we were all baptized into one body” (1 Cor.12:13). For that purpose Christ died “to gather into one, the children of God who are scattered abroad” (Jn.11:32). “And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all men to Myself” (Jn.12:52). All the images in the New Testament for the Church- the Body of Christ, the Bride of Christ, the New Israel, the vine with its branches indicate visible and corporate unity. “The company of those who believed were of one heart and soul and no one said that any of the things which he possessed was his own but they had everything in common.(Acts 4:32).
Our Church Fathers put high value upon Christian unity. Ignatius, the bishop of Antioch on his way to martyrdom in Rome admonished the believers to unity. He wrote to them “Shun division, which is the beginning of evils. So also Cyprian, the bishop of Carthage regarded the Church as the one visible community of Christians.
For Centuries, Christians have professed their belief in “one, holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church” without knowing quite how to relate that faith in a tragically divided Christiandom. The Donadist separated from the Church in North Africa in the fourth Century in the name of purity. It began from animosity between native Africans and the Latin Colonist. In the fifth Century, the same conflict arose in the East between the Greeks and the Copts. National rivalry resulted division in the Christian East which continue till this day. It weakened the Christians, making easy victory and conquest of Syria, Palestine, and Egypt by Islam.
A serious split took place over the appointment of Photeus as Patriach of Constantinople. Another second split took place by the ex-communication of Michael Celularius by the Papal Legate in 1054 AD. But the real schism between Christian East and West came only with the 4th Crusade. The Latin Crusaders, who hated the Christians of Constantinople and the Venician merchants in whose ships they traveled, afraid of their commercial power, connived together and attacked Constantinople instead of Cairo, their original destination. “All the accumulated treasures of thousands of years were to be had for the taking” “Nothing was spared, the Churches and the Convents were plundered as systematically as the palaces of the Emperor”. Pp149 (Hughes, A History of the Church under Imprimatus of Rome) This was the day of the end of fellowship between the Eastern and Western Christians. (N. Zernov, The History of the E. Christians. Pp13) But God can still make the Wrath of men to praise Him. (Ps.76:10) This can come only if we are willing to repent and bring to His feet the positive contributions of our various confessions. He can heal our brokenness if we come to Him in humble repentance, seeking unity and wholeness in the Body of Christ.
Human schemes, even the ablest and the best executed, will never be able to restore the unity of the Church and to heal the wounds already inflicted on the Body of Christ by the sins, ignorance and stupidity of Christians. Only through Divine Grace, can we cure the wounds and restore the Church to health and wholeness. We cannot earn the supreme gift of unity but we can accept it by renouncing prejudice, ignorance and by purifying our hearts of pride, envy and suspicions.
We are living in a crucial moment of history. God alone can restore the unity of the Church but all of us must show our willingness to receive the gift of unity.
Dr. L.M. Murry, Chairman,
Okotsoe Mission Society
