REDISCOVERING THE NEW TESTAMENT PATTERN

“Their Bonds of Unity”

Wayne E. Wicker, Administrative Bishop

The churches of the New Testament display a remarkable vital unity. As we review them, we discover certain obvious bonds that bound them together:

The unity of a regenerating experience. These first Christians were united by a life-changing experience. The coming of Christ into their lives had made them new creatures, and they shared this new life with each other. In this experience, they had been brought from darkness to light, from despair to hope, from defeat to victory, from sin to righteousness, from conflict to peace, from death to life. Here, then, is the first essential to a Christian unity-generating experience in Jesus Christ.

The unity of a common faith. These early Christians possessed a transforming faith that they held in common. They believed in God as revealed to them through Jesus Christ. They believed in Jesus Christ as their only Savior, perfect God and perfect man, whose death had made atonement for sin, and whose resurrection was the guarantee of their immortality. They believed that salvation was by grace through faith, wholly apart from good works or human merit. They believed that the Scriptures were the inspired Word of God and constituted a sufficient, final, and authoritative guide to faith and practice. They believed in the church as the divine agency of Jesus Christ for the carrying out of His purposes. They believed that the church was an institution of the saved, and not a saving institution. They believed in the missionary program of Christ, and that He was to be obeyed in his command to go into all the world to preach the gospel to every creature. Bound to the Lord Jesus Christ by this common faith, these Christians were, of course, united together. This fact of a common faith remains the ground of true Christian unity.

The unity of a conquering purpose. Consider the opposition that confronted these New Testament Christians as they undertook to obey Christ. The Jews opposed them with bitter hatred. The Romans sought to crush them by force. The Greeks laughed at them and held them in contempt. To these foes, united in their opposition of Christianity, the churches were constrained to present a common front. They knew the purposes of Christ and were determined to carry them out at any cost. Without singleness of purpose, churches may be united in name, but they will not be united in reality.

The unity of a sustaining hope. The New Testament makes much of hope. The word “hope” carries with it the idea of expectation, confidence, and trust. Paul tells us that it is our hope in the gospel that will make us unashamed of the gospel of Christ. Of the three things that Paul says will forever abide; faith, hope, and love; hope is at the center. Not the complete and immediate realization, but the hope of righteousness, entices the Christian onward (Galatians 5:5). It is expressly declared that Christian unity is maintained through the fact that “there is one body, and one spirit, even as ye are called in one hope of your calling” (Ephesians 4:4). Paul speaks of the “hope of eternal life, which God, that cannot lie, promised before the world began” (Titus 1:2). Again, he points out that the great motive of the Christian life consists in “looking for that blessed hope, and glorious appearing of the great God and our Savior Jesus Christ; who gave Himself for us, that He might redeem us from all iniquity and purify unto Himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works” (Titus 2:13-14). To these first churches, the vivid hope of the coming again of the Lord Jesus Christ served as an encouragement to faithful endurance and unfaltering loyalty. Churches work best when they are united and sustained by the confidence and hope of victory through Christ.

The unity of a great love. Christ made love the supreme Christian commandment. Paul accepted this thought of Jesus and urged the Ephesian Christians to “walk in love, as Christ also hath loved us” (Ephesians 5:2). Peter sums up his ideal for the churches when he wrote, “…seeing ye have purified your souls in obeying the truth through the Sprit unto unfeigned love of the brethren, see that ye love one another with a pure heart fervently” (I Peter 1:22). True Christian unity is impossible without the love for which Christ and the apostles plead. The truth is that if we do not love one another we cannot work together, pray together, worship together, serve together or win together. These New Testament churches make it clear that the love of Christ and the love of one another alone can bind Christians together in true unity and send them out to win over the selfishness and lovelessness of an unregenerate world.