“Now I beseech you, brethren, by the
name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that ye all speak the same thing, and that there
be no divisions among you; but that ye be perfectly joined together in the same
mind and in the same judgment.” – 1 Corinthians 1:10
Harmful segregation and division is the devil’s business. These
divisions can define us, drag us down, entertain us and categorizes us (I
believe Mark Zuckerberg was quoted saying “the smartest thing I ever did was
put “relationship status” on the profile page”). In all this we must
remember that as Christian’s what is true for the world cannot be true for
us. When it comes to ungodly segregation and division, from this we must
remain separate.
Paul the Christian, now converted,
writing back to the new Corinthian sanctified is saying to them: I am hearing
that there is division among you. I hear
that some of you are saying you are of Paul or Peter or Apollos. What is this?
Is Christ divided? His point was/is, why are we picking
sides? There is one team, one Lord, one
Captain, and we all march under his banner and follow his instruction. Jesus Christ is our chief executive and we
follow his order. Who cares if you were
baptized under Apollos or heard the gospel from Peter? This is circumstantial and irrelevant. Do not so love your heritage that you forget
who saved you. Do not so love your
social group that you forget that you were once an outcast. Love Jesus, preach Jesus and worship Him alone. Paul was well aware of the dangers of harmful
division and was trying to cut it out.
Like a cancer, division can harm from within the body and kill off that
which is healthy being disguised as that which is healthy. Christ is the head and we are the body, and there
are times when the brain will instruct the body to divide but only to preserve
both. So it is in the body of Christ;
there are times when we must exhort in the Spirit, to preserve the body. However, if you spend all your time cutting
new folks down that come into your church because they don’t have the right
dress, or the right theology, or the right family, you’re not preserving the
body; you’re without faith in the head of the body. Jesus Christ came into the world to save
sinners. You cannot win your neighbor to
God without first loving them. When we
get to the place where we genuinely believe that sanctification can save
ANYONE, ANYWHERE and that Jesus Christ is Lord enough to instruct. When we have that kind of faith, it takes the
pressure off you and me to be the preserving police, and gives us the liberty
to live, preach, and teach holiness.
When we look to Jesus, and have faith that he will diligently and
dutifully instruct the body, this perfects the joining and ensure the
preservation of the body. Love toward
Christ and God is the answer to is all.
We are instructed to love God with all we got and love our neighbor as
ourselves. To quote a sister in Christ I
deeply respect: “think of a person in
your life that you are close to who is lost.
A person you love and care for very much. It could be your brother, cousin, son,
someone special to you. Think of that
person’s face and put it in the front of your mind. Now put that person’s face on every stranger
you come in contact with, and treat that stranger like you would that person
you love so much.”
God wants us to segregate ourselves from
harmful segregation. He wants us to divide ourselves from unholy
division. Within the body, we look to
Christ, we love and serve Him the most.
Sometimes the most difficult thing to part with is YOUR idea of how YOU
think things should be. If we look to
Christ, he will join us together and help us to bring others into the
fellowship. We cannot love our past so
much it paralyzes our future. We cannot
love our folks more than other folks.
Division within creates division without, and this gospel is too
important; this charge Christ has given us, too great. God loved you and he loved me, when we were
unlovable. Lord help us to never forget
that we were once without, until someone, somewhere, reached out.
