'Unity' is a hot issue in the Christian yard. For example, this year's Revival Conference went under the banner of “Together …” and the NewWine conference under the banner of “Unity”. The Pope seeks unity with the Protestants and cordially invites them. Furthermore, on November 5, we had the National Synod in Dordrecht (www.nationalesynode.nl), where one looks for the unity of Protestant churches in the Netherlands, but where the r.-k. Bishop Gerard de Korte was present.
Many divisions among Christians are truly shameful. It is a bad witness to the world and to the dishonor of God. It is therefore understandable that there is a search for ways to experience unity and to make it visible to the outside world. But what is incomprehensible is that one does not open God's Word to get advice and insight. It seems that only the text of the Lord Jesus “leave them all be one” as command. Differences in opinions apparently do not matter and are subordinate to the assignment.
Let them all be one
It is a beautiful text, which is quoted on the site of the National Synod:Let them all be one” (John 17:21 NIV). The entire text reads as follows:
“ (…) that they may all shall be one, as Your Father is in Me and I in You, that they also may be in Us be one, that the world may believe that You sent Me.” (John 17:21 KJV).
The unity of the believers is typified by the Lord Jesus with “like You Father in Me and I in You”. This is an important feature and we must ask ourselves what this means, otherwise the biblical concept of 'unity' has no meaning.
The unity of the Father and the Son
After Judas leaves the room where the Lord gathered with His disciples (John 13:30), a fascinating section begins. The Lord Jesus imparts special things to the disciples about the relationship between Him and His Father. He always refers that to the relationship of the disciples with Himself and the relationship of the disciples themselves. The section ends with the Lord Jesus' prayer with His Father (John 17).
The Lord Jesus says special things about His relationship with the Father:
- He who has seen me has seen the Father (14:19)
- Don't you believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in Me? The words that I speak to you, I speak not of Myself, but the Father who abides in Me, He does the works. Believe Me that I am in the Father and the Father is in Me (…) (14:10-11)
- In that day you will know that I am in My Father, and you in Me, and I in you (14:20)
- . . . the word which you hear is not mine, but the Father's who sent me (14:24)
- But let the world know that I love the Father, and do as the Father has commanded Me (14:31)
- (…) as I have kept My Father's commandments and abide in His love (15:10)
- He who hates Me hates My Father also (15:25)
- . . . and these things will they do to you, because they have not known the Father, nor Me (16:3)
- All that the Father has is Mine (…) (16:15)
- (…) yet I am not alone, because the Father is with Me (16:32)
- (…) all that You have given Me comes from You (17:7)
- And all that is mine is yours, and that which is yours is mine (17:10)
- . . . because You loved Me before the foundation of the world (17:24)
This makes it quite clear that the unity between God the Father and His Son is one characterized by completeness. Complete and mutual in love, in what They possess, in words and in works. And the Son who completely obeys what the Father says.
This divine unity is complete: on the one hand in love, freedom, voluntary surrender (there is no compulsion), and on the other hand in complete harmony, relatedness, like-mindedness and equality in will and action. There is nothing contradictory: they are really one! It cannot be said with less.
Well, this unity between the Father and Himself, the Lord Jesus sets as an example for the unity of the believers!
Characteristics of the unity according to the Lord Jesus
The unity of the believers, children of God, must therefore be a picture of the unity of the Father and the Son. The Lord Jesus describes in John 13:31-17:26 the essential characteristics of the fellowship of His disciples, as it would be if He were no longer with them and He had given them the Holy Spirit, the Comforter. It is His own teaching on what Paul calls “the fellowship of the Son of God, Jesus Christ our Lord” (1 Corinthians 1:9).
From John 13:31-17:26 we conclude the following[1]
- The believers personally know God the Father and His Son Jesus Christ; their hearts are full of what God has done for them in Christ—the atoning work of the Lord Jesus Christ.
- Every believer has a relationship of love with the Lord Jesus and with God the Father. Not only to love, but also to be loved; mutual love.
- Every believer loves the Word of God and has willing obedience to that Word
- So the believers have the same inner life, their hearts reach out to the same divine Persons and to His Word and
- Therefore the believers also love one another; their relationships are characterized by the love of God.
So the Church of the Lord Jesus consists of people who have accepted the Gospel, turned to God and accepted Jesus Christ as their Savior and Lord (eg Acts 20:21, 24b). In addition, they have received the Holy Spirit of God in their hearts: they are born again. This is then evident from the fact that – made possible by that Holy Spirit – they have a threefold love relationship, namely with the Lord Jesus and with God the Father, then with the Word of God and finally with their fellow believers, those who are also born of God.
Believers experience in all these aspects of their faith a mutual unity that can only be wrought by the Spirit of God.
In a picture you could represent this as follows.
What do you notice?
The believers have a 'living relationship' with the Lord Jesus. They love Him”Who loved them and gave Himself for them” (Galatians 2:20). The main consequence of this is that theyoffer spiritual sacrifices pleasing to God through Jesus Christ” (1 Peter 2:5).
The second characteristic is that the believers have a 'living relationship' with the Word of God. They love it, feed on it, want to get to know God's thoughts more, thereby get to know the Lord Jesus and God the Father more and obey the Word. By this 'word of truth' they are sanctified (John 17:17-19), more separated and consecrated to their Lord and Savior.
Finally, the last feature is that the believers love one another. But in a special way, it is with the same love with which God the Father loved His Son (John 17:26). It is a Love that goes to the extreme.
A born again Christian
These are the fundamental characteristics of one who is born again. By nature a man cannot produce these fruits. That is why the Lord Jesus has sent the Holy Spirit (John 14:16; 15:26) who has “poured out the love of God in our hearts” (Romans 5:5) through which a believer will produce these fruits.
Every Christian can test himself on this: all three characteristics must be found in my life. Do I show, so to speak, the love of God in all these relationships? If not, then something isn't right.
It may mean that I have not been born again, because I have not really converted to God. You can be 'believer' without being born again and having the Holy Spirit (eg Acts 19:1-2). “Examine yourselves whether you are in the faith,” Paul tells the Corinthians (2 Corinthians 13:5). Then there is only one way left: to the cross of Golgotha and recognize that with all your religion you fall short of God's holiness and are lost. Take refuge in the Lord Jesus and accept Him if your Savior and Lord still can!
It may also be that I have been born again and have actually accepted the Lord Jesus as my Saviour. But in time the spiritual life is extinguished. God's Spirit no longer works what He just came into my heart for; I don't notice it anymore and it doesn't tell me much anymore. A believer can grieve the indwelling Spirit (Ephesians 4:30) or quench the activity of the Spirit himself (1 Thessalonians 5:19).
Desire for recovery
When I long for a restoration of my relationship with the Lord and a new work of God's Spirit in my heart, there is a great promise. In the portion from John 13:31 (to the end of the 16th chapter) a special expression occurs several times
– “And whatever you ask in My Name, I will do it (…)” (14:13)
– “(…) ask whatever you want and it will be yours” (15:7)
– “(…) whatever you ask of the Father in My Name, He will give it to you(15:16)
– “(…) Whatever you ask the Father in My Name, He will give you. Hitherto you have prayed nothing in My Name; ask, and you will receivethat your joy may be made full” (16:23-24).
These are texts that we don't really know how to deal with. In any case, it doesn't mean that I can ask God for all kinds of 'nice things', which He would give me. It does not work that way in practice and we also feel that the Lord Jesus could not have intended it that way. But then what?
The promise of answer is given five times, and given the context of these chapters, it can only refer to the loving relationships from the heart of a born-again man, as we have discovered before.
That means the Lord Jesus promises that He and the Father will answer any prayer related to this! And that's fantastic news!
If you long for 'more of the Lord' in your heart and life then you can pray for it and God will give it. That doesn't mean you can sit back and it will come naturally. No, you'll have to start doing what God most desires[2]: your thanks and praise for the gift of His Son and for the work of the Lord Jesus on the cross of Calvary! So that the love for the Lord Jesus becomes reality again. By the way, that this includes confessing infidelity and sin so that we are cleansed (1 John 1:9) is self-evident. And you will have to read the Bible again, even if it is not always easy.
But there is the promise of the Lord that He will hear your prayer of desire and that you will find God's Spirit working in your heart! The Spirit is not used for nothing in these chapters'the Comforter'[3] called, which means that He is the One 'Who assists'. In this way He gives growth again and we remain connected to Himself, the true vine, and we bear fruit to the Father (John 15:1-8).
“abide in Me and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself unless it abide in the vine, neither can you unless you abide in me. I am the Vine, you the branches; He who abides in Me, and I in him, bears much fruit, for without Me you can do nothing.” (John 15:4-5)
Unit recovery
After the Lord Jesus said all this to His disciples, He prayed to His Father. He has asked Him for them. Whether He would keep them so that “they may be one as We” (John 17:11, 21).
There is probably still much to be said about the lack of unity and its recovery. We will get there, if the Lord wills. But for now let us draw a first lesson from these chapters in the Gospel of John and from the words of the Lord Jesus Himself.
All believers who have received the Spirit of God, who put the Lord Jesus at the center of their hearts and lives, and who love and want to obey God's Word from the heart, experience a unity as the Lord Jesus intended. Where that 'unity of the Spirit' is threatened or needs to be restored, they have the unconditional promise of the Lord Jesus that their prayers for unity will be answered.
Shall we start with that prayer then?
[1] We do not include the text references here because there are many. Read these chapters carefully yourself and try to discover what it is about.
[2] We have already written elsewhere about the offering of praise and thanksgiving to God the Father. It is the highest we can do for God: “(…) the Father seeks those who so worship Him (…) in spirit and truth' (John 4:23,24)
[3] Four times in John 14:16, 26; 15:26; 16:7.
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