Jesus Made "One" Anything But "The Loneliest Number" (Part 7)

What Did Jesus Do?

What I mean is that each one of you says, “I follow Paul,” or
“I follow Apollos,” or “I follow Cephas,” or “I follow Chirst.”
Is Christ divided?
1 Corinthians 1:12-13

Is Christ divided? Oh my gosh, yes, almost beyond all recognition! Which is perhaps the chief reason why the lost don’t have much of a chance of seeing Jesus in what passes for the Church these days. Of course, the odds weren’t in the favor of the lost back in the day, when Paul learned of what was going on in the congregation he had established in Corinth. Today, after nearly two thousand years, we don’t seem to have learned the lesson Paul was earnestly trying to get through to the Corinthians.

At a time when it is certainly as important as ever, and arguably even more important since time does grow shorter every day, for the Body of Christ to seek and save the lost, much of the Church busies itself with emptying the cross of Christ of its power by insisting on dividing Jesus up into pieces so small that it’s not surprising the lost have so much trouble finding him. (1 Corinthians 1:17) We are all supposed to be in this, actually in Him, together as one.

I am not sure, but my suspicion is that too many of us are too full of ourselves, which means there is little room to be filled with Him by the Holy Spirit. And, being so full of ourselves, we have little hunger or longing for, much less a sense of how much we truly need, intimate and ongoing fellowship with other believers. Individually this either isolates us, or keeps our relationships with other believers shallow. Corporately it turns sanctuaries where there should be open and easy intercourse between congregations, into strongholds where we grimly hold out against “them,” except for the occasional and, again, typically shallow, “community service” for Thanksgiving and perhaps Good Friday.

There seems no solution to this problem other than for pewsitters and pulpiteers alike to confess our sin, ask forgiveness of the Lord and one another, and submit to the Holy Spirit, who, we can be assured, will always bring believes together. In case you didn’t catch my drift, I just implied that very different spirits are at work when congregations divide Christ. If you are a pewsitter I believe you (and I) need to get closer to the pewsitter next to you, and together you need to get your congregation closer to other congregations. If you are a pulpiteer you (and I) need to get closer to others who share the same vocation, and you need to prayerfully and through the Word lead your congregation to discover that it was the clear and strong desire of Jesus to make “one” anything but “the loneliest number.”

S.D.G.

Jim
www.jimwilkenministries.org
Marion, NC
PS 37.4