Of First Importance - Our Unity

Unity as the Answer to Factionalism in Corinth

Our scripture this morning is 1 Corinthians 1 -9, this will be the first message in a 12 part series that Pastor Owens and I have put together in the subject of this series, and the first two chapters of 1 Corinthians is unity, we're going to share, Pastor Owens and I are going to share the preaching duties, so you're going to have both voices as we go through this, these few chapters, and God willing, you will hear the voice of God from his living word, calling his church to a unity that can only have been created by and maintained by God's power and faithfulness.

These opening verses to this first letter to the Corinthians are going to be our opening for this series as well, so read along with me, 1 Corinthians 1 -9, Paul, called by the will of God to be an apostle of Christ Jesus and our brother Sostenes, to the church of God that is in Corinth, to those sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints together with all those who in every place call upon the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, both their Lord and ours, grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

I give thanks to my God always for you because of the grace of God that was given you in Christ Jesus, that in every way you were enriched in him, in all speech and all knowledge, even as the testimony about Christ was confirmed among you, so that you are not lacking in any spiritual gift as you wait for the revealing of our Lord Jesus Christ, who will sustain you to the end, guiltless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ.

God is faithful, by whom you were called into the fellowship of his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord. May God bless the reading and now the hearing of this word. The church of God that was at Corinth was famously pregnant with problems.

Today we might say that they've got issues, or they had issues, and Corinth had so many. There were tongues, there were head coverings, there were prophecies, there were miracle workers, there were resurrections, there were false apostles.

So many things. One might wonder just what part of the Christian life they did understand. Which one rose to the front though of Paul's concerns? Which one rises to the fore of all these things going on in this famously troubled church?

Well factions, factions were his first concern. You're going to hear more about that next week as Conley Olins picks this up from this pulpit. You'll hear more about that, about factions. But today I just want you to notice that with all the stuff he had to deal with for the church of God at Corinth, all these strange things that have defied scholarship consensus for what, some 20 centuries?

With all that going on, then when Paul was there, or in the first century, he opens this letter with the only starting point for dealing with the multitude of all these issues that they had. Not just factions, all of them.

But this he deals with first, factions. And the answer, our subject for this morning, to factionalism is unity. This is where Paul begins, this is where we will begin. Without unity, you see, without unity the church has little, if any, gospel witness at all.

Absent unity, we have nothing to point to that proves that God is with us by his spirit and that we are in his son, Jesus. It is that important. Unity. I want to take a brief moment to introduce to you first century Corinth.

Corinth as a City of Temples, Diversity, and Worldly Wisdom

This place, this church that Paul founded, or this place, this city wherein lies this church that Paul founded. The city sits on an isthmus, and I challenge you to take pity for me in having to say that word even once.

You say it five times, if you can do it, teach me how. The city sits on that type of land, a strip of land that connects two greater parts of land. It connected northern and southern Greece. It was about six miles across.

Sparta was in the southern part, called Peloponnesus, Athens was in the north. It was a militarily important place, and it was commercially vital. As a Roman colony, in 146 B .C., so almost 150 years before Jesus was born, it revolted against Rome, and it met the fate that Rome was so good at meeting out to rebels.

It was destroyed. It was razed to the ground, but years later, seeing its revenue-generating machinery and its military importance, Julius Caesar, in 44 B .C., restored it and rebuilt it and made it a Roman colony.

That was just before, as a matter of fact, he was assassinated. But it prospered as a commercial center, and it soon attracted pagan temples of worship, and became a famous tourist attraction for those, much like Ephesus, which you read about in Acts chapter 19.

Aphrodite's temple was there, it was high on a hill, it was very prominent. The priestesses there engaged worshippers' desires, and were really little more than prostitutes. There was also a temple to Apollo, where men met together in what Romans 1 .26 would call dishonorable passions, with a sort of a vanity fair, if you will.

Whatever you wanted to do was readily available in Corinth. It was accepted, it was celebrated, so long as you accepted and celebrated what others also wanted. They were proud of their diversity in this city of about 600 ,000, and they valued especially eloquence and wisdom.

That's going to ring a bell with many of you familiar with 1 Corinthians. Eloquence and wisdom were especially valued by them then. They boasted about which grand teacher they followed. They hosted the Ethiopian games every two years, and these were almost as big as the Olympics, which seems to be the reason that Paul used so many athletic symbols as metaphors for the gospel, the Christian life.

So that's the very quickest thumbnail sketch of Corinth, the place where the Church of God in Corinth resided. And you can right away see the many connections we have with our own day. And we're not going to go into them in any detail.

I'll just let that rest with you. How close they were, how there's nothing new under the sun, how similar they were to what we deal with here today. Paul arrived there in about the year 50. You can read about that in Acts chapter 18.

Well, in a city like that, to promote the gospel in a place of that nature, it would be no wonder that in Acts chapter 18 we also have Jesus coming to Paul in a vision during his first ministry there, saying, do not be afraid, but go on speaking and do not be silent for I am with you.

And no one will attack you to harm you, for I have many in this city who are my people. And small wonder also that the issues that we read about in 1 Corinthians came up in that city, or in a church founded in that city.

For Paul's letter unwraps their problems, beginning with the cure to that thing that comes up first, factionalism. Unity with one another by way of unity with Christ is the answer to that. Our unity as believers in Christ is among the most precious gifts that God has given His church.

It is a gift to be guarded at every point. Your participation in the body of Christ says everything about your regard for the unity of the body, which then circles back and says what you believe about your union with Christ Himself.

Is that important? Unity is God's definition for His church. Now, if we had started a social club of some sort, we'd be able to write our own charter and say, this is what this club is about, this is what we're going to meet for, these are the activities and these are the rules, and we're going to make them up, and you're going to read them and sign them and agree to follow them.

But this is not a social club. This is the church of God, founded on the blood and the sacrifice of His Son, Jesus Christ. And so, who gets to define what this organization, what this unit, if you will, is about?

Its founder, who is God. Unity is God's definition for His church. It's His church, it's founded on the redeeming work of His Son. Let me read verses 1 -3 again. And here's where God defines His church, through the Apostle Paul's pen, but it is God's word that gives us this definition.

Paul, called by the will of God to be an Apostle of Christ Jesus and our brother's sostener, to the church of God that is in Corinth, to those sanctified in Christ Jesus, and here's the important part, called to be saints together with all those who in every place call upon the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, both their Lord and ours, raised to you in peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

See, the church of God that was in Corinth was God's church. He makes clear whose church it is because in that city there are so many choices. The two I named, Aphrodite and Apollo, were just two of the very many choices that could be made.

And this fact alone must help us lose some of our own opinions of what a church should be like. It's not for you or for me to decide. While we have documents that describe us here at Silicon Valley Reformed Baptist Church, for example, our Constitution, if it or any other document such as our 1689 London Baptist Confession of the Faith falls out of line with God's constituting document, out of line with God's definition for what this is about, this church is to be, well, which takes precedence?

Well, God's Word, of course, is God's Word because God defines the church because it is His church to define. Well, the document we rely on, of course, is the Bible. And where our Constitution does not meet with the Bible or contradicts anything in the Bible, that has to be changed.

Not the Bible, of course. The 1689 Confession has held up very well since it was written in 1689. Yet, where it ever contradicts anything in the Bible, we need to go with the Bible. It is God's definition for the church.

What the Bible says, we do. Where it doesn't say, we look for its principles. Where we have freedom, we proceed carefully. Where our freedom is to obey the Bible's clear instruction, we do so gladly, we do so faithfully, we do so confidently.

So this is first. We have to understand this very well, that it is not my church, it is not your church, it is not the state's church, it is God's church. Second thing is it's a holy place. This is how God defines it.

His church, and because it is His, we stand on holy ground. It is a holy place. This letter is written to, and the church is defined here, in that verse I read, as those sanctified in Christ Jesus. Sanctified is from the same word where we get holiness.

So the church is populated by those who have been made holy, a status conferred, not earned. I'll point out to you that the word here, those sanctified in Christ Jesus, sanctified is in the passive. It's in the passive, which means the subject, which is you or me, or anybody else who believes in the Lord Jesus Christ, the subject has been acted upon.

The subject didn't go out and actively grab hold of this thing and say, I'll take some of this and by my taking of it be holy. No. We discussed what it means a few moments ago to be given trespass and sin and so forth.

No. You're acted upon. You are a passive recipient of this holiness, those sanctified in Christ Jesus. And the word here is also what we call perfect. It doesn't mean it's a perfect word in a divine sense.

It just means that it is the action performed upon it has continuing effect. That's all perfect means, is that when the action occurred sometime in the past, the effect of that action continues in us.

So those sanctified in Christ Jesus, sanctified passively acted upon, and yet that action that was acted upon you, that holiness that was given to you by the grace of God, still is in you and active. You are still, if you are Jesus Christ, from that day declared to be holy by faith, the faith given to you, you are still, quote, a passive perfect.

So with that, I want to give you, as we delve into this, a working definition of unity. Because unity comes up very much, very quickly in the apostles writing here. Unity is the expression of the validity of God's work in the hearts of men, bringing them into fellowship with himself and therefore with each other.

Unity is that outward expression among ourselves that God has actually worked in each of us and all of us together is the validity of God's work in your heart, bringing us into fellowship with God himself first and therefore, because of that, with each other.

So Paul goes on now. With that working definition in mind, Paul goes on and says, in Christ Jesus. This is still the definition of the church. Those sanctified together in Christ Jesus. The apostle Peter taught, and there is salvation in no one else, for there is no other under heaven given among them by which they must be saved.

The church of God is the redeemed of the Lord. Those who are won by the cross work of Jesus Christ, those who by grace have been saved, Christ alone is our salvation and in him alone is our sanctification.

This is all in Christ Jesus. This is all acted upon and the action that was acted upon you is still active and it is in Christ Jesus because of Christ Jesus that this action even occurred. To be in Christ that needs to be sanctified, to be made holy, to be set apart for God's purposes.

Again, back to Peter, 1 Peter 2 .9. But you are a chosen race. You the church, you are a chosen race. We are from all different races here, are we not? A quick survey, we divide up about 50 -50 between Caucasian and others, but you are a chosen race.

We together, one race, one chosen race by God. You are a chosen race. A royal priesthood, not a priesthood that derives from the divine like the priests of old. A royal priesthood, a kingly priesthood.

Why is it kingly? I would argue it is kingly because our priesthood derives from our great high priest who comes from the kingly line of Judah, our great king, our God and Savior Jesus Christ. So a chosen race, all of us together, made new into one race together, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, the people of God.

So what does all this have to do with? Unity. Unity with which the apostle begins this very lengthy letter. Unity, the beginning point to unravel such difficult problems, things that still make us scratch our heads and go, what is this even about?

Much less, how did he solve it? Unity. The church of God has been called out of the world to be God's own special possession. In the world, you and I had no bearing on each other. Most of us, if not all of us, met one another here.

And so we're brothers and sisters in the Lord, and beyond that, there are even friendships here. Friendships in the traditional sense, but where did you meet? Here, at the church. Most of us, anyway, met here at this church.

See, God called us to be here. God called you to be here. Together, a body of believers united by a common faith. Unified. Together in Christ Jesus. Remember, this is God's definition of the church. Ephesians chapter 4 verses 4 through 6 puts it this way.

There's one body and one spirit, just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call, Jesus Christ, who is over all and through all and in all. Called together to be together in Christ Jesus.

One body, one spirit. Now, can you see, can you begin to understand why Paul was so alarmed over the Corinthians dividing into factions? Abandoning the unity that God, by His Son Jesus Christ and the sending of His Spirit, worked in that church and has worked in this church here today.

Can you see why Paul was so alarmed? The rest of verse 2 says, Called to be saints together with all those who in every place call upon the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. Saints together with all. We can say that again.

I need you to read it again. Called to be saints together with all. All those who in every place call upon the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. Now, saints is from the same word we've already met. It means sanctified, made holy.

A saint is not someone who is morally perfect or even really morally superb. A saint is a sinner transformed by grace and recategorized by that grace and called by God a saint. Called by God, again, a passive reception of an action by God.

Called by God to be saints, to be holy, to be set apart in Christ Jesus our Lord. Paul writes to Timothy that Jesus Christ redeemed a people to be his own special possession, zealous for good works. Saints together, redeemed, special possession, the apple of his eye.

Now, nothing could be more opposing to all this, to God's definition for the church. Nothing can more oppose it than for God's people to divide into factions, to lack unity, to not have the same mind together that was also in Christ Jesus as we read in Philippians 2.

Unity as God’s Gift in Grace, Gifts, and Spiritual Wealth

So let me ask you, how do you think of the church? What is your definition for the church? God willing, it's God's definition of the church. God willing, as we go through this, you're thinking that I am called to be together with, together with all the saints, with all who call upon the name of the Lord Jesus Christ.

And brethren, if not here, in this distinct fellowship, here in this place, how? If not here, where? If it's not shown in this place, where would it be? You see, unity is not just God's definition of the church.

But God supplies what we need. Unity is God's gift to the church. Unity is God's gift to the church. I say it this way, first of all, because that's what the Apostle Paul says in verse 4, and I'll read that in a moment.

But also because it doesn't come any more naturally to us than repentance, does it? Because I want to be me, and I want you to be you. And I want there to be a difference. We normally don't make boundaries between.

Unity is the gift of God. Verse 4, I give thanks to my God always for you, because of the grace of God that was given you in Christ Jesus, that in every way you were enriched in Him, in all speech and all knowledge, even as the testimony about Christ was confirmed among you, so that you are not lacking in any spiritual gift.

He thanks God for the very things that cause the problems that he's going to address as this letter unfolds. The gifts of God. The gifts of God were given to the church and yet caused a problem in the church that Paul is addressing here at the beginning of this letter.

As one had one gift, another had another gift. They would divide in those areas. As one was of one socioeconomic class, you can read about this in 1 Corinthians 10 -11, they would be different from those who were lesser than them in that sense.

So Paul is here thanking God for the very things, the gifts of God to them, that they're enriched in all speech, they're not lacking in any spiritual gift, and yet that's exactly what caused the troubles.

He sees the grace of God in them anyway. Misused, yes. Misunderstood, yes. Yet Paul sees a God who has not withheld His good spirit from them. And we today here in this place can see a place where God has not withheld His good spirit as He has given us the gifts that we need in order to accomplish His will here as a body.

Even in a church as bewilderingly messed up as the Corinthian church was, Paul is assured and assures them that the grace of God is working in them. Sometimes we read 1 Corinthians and we pray with the Pharisees something like, God I thank you that my church is not like other churches.

Tongue waggers, prophesying, all out of order. They don't even know when to cover their heads in that place. Thank you for not making me like those Corinthians. But you know if God withdrew His grace from every church that erred in some way, how many churches would be left?

How long ago in this place here in Sunnyvale would His grace have been withdrawn from us if every time we messed up, He left us? It would have been a long time ago folks. And it would have been a long time ago for the Corinthians.

If God's grace is dependent upon our perfection, then God's grace would be nowhere. Because our imperfection is our constant stumbling and fumbling as I like to put it, that makes God's grace so necessary to us and such a blessing for us.

Thank God that this is not the case that He would withdraw His grace from problematic churches. Thank God He is long suffering with us. God's grace is meant for something. I give thanks to my God always because of the grace of God that was given you in Christ Jesus.

What is the grace of God meant to do? It is meant to unify the church. The gifts He gives are apportioned according to His will and they are wisely tailored to the specific needs of a specific discreet assembly.

The gifts of grace that we have here just here in this short passage, they are given to us. They are given to us again by sanctification. A passive receipt that we have. They are enriching. You've been enriched by these, He says.

Enriched is the word plutito. And it's where we get our word plutocrat. And a plutocrat is a very wealthy person. Now I don't know how many millions and millions of dollars in this family you have to have before you're considered very wealthy.

It's a lot more than it was back in my day, whatever day that was a long time ago. But millions of dollars don't get you into that realm. You have to have billions, I think, before you're really a plutocrat.

Very wealthy in relation to others. But this, 20 centuries ago, relates to us just as much. That God has enriched, God has plutocrated us, if you will. And made us extremely wealthy with every spiritual gift.

Holding back nothing. Wealthy people usually have a fixed purpose. They have a way of attaining what they want, which is often more wealth. In our case it is different. Our wealth is not in silver or in gold.

Not in our salaries or our savings. We are plutocrats, we are wealthy beyond all measure, in the shower of spiritual blessings from God. They've been enriched in all speech and knowledge. Those very abilities that so impress the people of Corinth.

God's gift outshines them all. We've been enriched in all speech and knowledge. Not in eloquence or in wisdom. As we'll come up later into preaching. But Christ crucified. This simple message. That we are bound together by a crucified Lord.

A crucified, resurrected Lord. Not an eloquent, not a wise sounding message. As we declare it here, Sunday after Sunday. Lord willing, in the way Paul declared it, day after day there, 20 centuries ago.

All speech and knowledge. Here's a speech. Jesus Christ came to save sinners, of whom I am the chief. Is that wise? It's the wisdom of God. Is that wise to the world around us? To the world around them, way back then?

We can say no. And yet, that is eloquent and that is wise. Because it is short, it is simple, it is easy to understand. And more importantly, from God's Word. God's gracious, God's unifying Word. We have been enriched, made wealthy in all speech and knowledge.

We have it in the Scripture. And we don't know what to say. We can simply find it and just read it verbatim. I heard a preacher once say, when he was told he didn't have time to preach his whole message.

Because all the other things had gotten in the way and went longer than he was supposed to. And he said, well I told the man then, well I won't read my sermon then. I'll simply read the chapter from the Scripture and I'll read it word for word.

And that way I'll be sure I made no mistake. I always remembered that. This is the enrichment in all wisdom and knowledge. God's wisdom. The knowledge that we have in the Word of God. Notice that in verse 7, our inventory of heavenly gifts is complete.

So that you're not lacking in any spiritual gift. We can ask for more. We can seek to expand our reach. We can ask for God to supply what we still lack in order to do more for the Kingdom. But at no point can we ever say that God has withheld anything needful for us to accomplish His purposes in His Son Jesus Christ.

Ephesians 4, it says, When Jesus ascended on high, He led a host of captives and He gave gifts to them. It says much the same thing here. Not lacking in any spiritual gift. The gifts are varied. Chapter 12, Chapter 14 make that very clear.

The world around us extols diversity almost to the point of idolatry. But the way diversity is framed out there, it accomplishes really the opposite of what the purveyors of it claim to be the goal. They claim to be behaving the way of unity, but in fact, they do the opposite.

Some call it identity politics or the politics of identity. You're one of these, I'm one of the other. And because you're one of those, you must be this way just as I'm one of these, so I'm that way. Well, that's very simple or simplistic, I do confess.

But the church couldn't be more different than that. The church must be different from that. Now, the Warriors in their recent heyday had a motto, Strength in Numbers. The five guys on the court had different strengths, but they all played as a unit with a single goal, which was to win the game.

Get the ball to the guy who was then in the best position to make his particular strength used in order to accomplish the one goal that the team had together. Get more baskets than the other team. But that's just an analogy, because we're not competing against another church for anything.

We're working towards the same goal, to glorify Christ in our worship and in our lives. We're all growing together, becoming more like Him as we pull each other along. One of us is tall and strong and able to block shots.

The other is light and quick and able to take advantage of small cracks in the defense. Another man's hand, another one's hand is able to do just what his eye sees and can swish through the hoop from the next county.

In a word, like that team, we're unified. Different strengths together, different talents together, different spiritual gifts that God has given to us. And yet, using them all together as a body, moving in one direction towards the goal, which is to glorify God by growing ever more like His Son.

See, whatever your gift, it needs to be put in play for the common goal. We need to be unified. Look at verse 6. Even as the testimony about Christ was confirmed among you, even there in this confused church that couldn't see its way out of their old worldly ways, the Apostle had seen the fruit of the Spirit flowing into them and flowing out of them.

For a place where Paul spent so much time, and a church that generated at least two lengthy letters, and there's scholarly opinions that there was probably four letters, three of which we know about, that's another lecture for another day, one of which we don't have at all.

But this place where he spent so much time, that generated these lengthy letters that we do have, we have surprisingly little record. Acts chapter 18, verses 1 -17 is really about it. In verse 8, in Paul's first visit there, we read, Crispus, ruler of the synagogue, believed in the Lord, together with his entire household, and many of the Corinthians, hearing Paul, believed and were baptized.

And the Lord strengthened him to keep at it, for he had many people in that city who were his. Paul saw the grace of God bring a Jewish ruler to Jesus. He saw the grace of God bring Corinthian pagans to Jesus.

Acts chapter 18, verse 11 tells us they stayed there for a year and a half, teaching the word of God among them. And it was sure that he was out in the marketplaces, he was evangelizing the people out there.

But the text says that he taught among them. They were probably spread out among various homes. Yet by the cement of the gospel they were bound to each other. Now think of the chronology here for a minute.

As we think of the unity that he must have. He got there about the year 50. He left 18 months later, so 51 -52, somewhere in there. And in about 55, he heard from Chloe's household about the problems that prompted this letter, that were beginning this morning.

You see, it took only a year or two for the Jews to encamp in one place, and for the Gentiles to encamp in another, to return to the old animosities. A year or two for the gospel of Jesus Christ to become less than sufficient to keep them unified.

In so short a time, God's plenteous gifts were used like weapons to accomplish exactly what they were intended to prevent. Factions. Think of how quick this happened. Think of how near the surface lies our pride.

Our desire to be an individual. Our desire to be just me. Think of how near the surface that kind of sin is there, ready to burst out. How anxious we can be to just have our own way. To turn the church into a world where diversity is held high, and boundaries are broadened.

I don't speak against diversity here. The Bible commends and teaches that we are diverse. And we can celebrate diversity. The diversity that God has given us. The diversity of us who God called together into one group.

To be one without losing our identity. We can agree with all that. We can extol all that, because that's what God's Word teaches us. We can also warn ourselves by how fast the Corinthians went from this wonderful place where the truth of the Spirit was bringing them together, where Jewish believers left the synagogue and believed in Jesus, where pagans left their temples and their idols and believed in Jesus, and how quickly Paul had to write this letter.

You must guard against this. We all must guard against this. It's your responsibility as much as it is mine. It's our responsibility together. Think about it this way. When we evangelize, we might use something like Romans chapter 5, verse 1.

Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Come to Christ, come with us, and be at peace with God. Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. Call out to the men at Pentecost and say, Brothers, what shall we do?

And we say, Repent and come to our church and hear the Word of God. Come to Christ and know this peace with God. Come here to this place and see what it looks like. Too often it looks like people claiming peace with God and then going to war with each other.

It's as if we're saying that Christ did somehow manage to tear down the dividing wall that kept people from God and the dividing wall that kept people from people in Ephesians chapter 2. That wall of division kept Jew and Gentile apart and Christ demolished that wall.

And we'd agree with it and we'd say, Come here and see how we managed to build it up again. We have a wall. We like having that wall between us and God gone. So we'll keep that one gone. But no, we'll resurrect it between us for this or that reason.

Because you're that and I'm this. And you believe this and I believe that. Oh, may it never be in the church of God. How against the definition that God gives for His church that is. What a misuse of God's gifts meant to bring us together that that would be.

The gospel is big enough for God. Looking down upon the cross upon which His Son suffered for our sin to be at peace with us. Think of how big a gospel that is. That God is at peace with us. That God is at peace with you, a sinner, a rebel.

Born by nature a child of wrath. Following your father the devil. And God turned you around. Gave you grace to repent. Gave you a new heart to believe. This is a big gospel, brethren. This is a big gospel.

That would make peace between me and God. Or you and God. Big enough for that. Big enough for God. Looking at us. And then looking upon His Son to make peace with us. But more than at peace with us. He is one with us.

He is one with you if you are in Christ Jesus. Listen to John chapter 17 verse 22. This Jesus in His final prayer before His crucifixion. He prays this to His Father. The glory that you have given me I have given to them.

That they may become one. I don't pray for just these alone. But for those who will believe in the word that these will preach. That's you. That's us. That they here in this place. Looking forward to that.

Jesus Christ says that this place. Silicon Valley Reformed Baptist Church. May become one. Even as we are one. I in them and you in me. That they may become perfectly one. So that the world may know that you sent me.

And love them. Even as you loved me. You see the gospel is big enough. For us to be at peace with God. The gospel is big enough. For God to have us be in His Son. Who is in His Father. Now stay with me a second here.

In order for this. That they. You and me. That they may be perfectly one. We can by faith. Be one with God. Not become as God. Or anything like that. Not become perfect in this life. One with God. But what about each other?

If the gospel is big enough. To remove the enmity. Between you and God. Will God remove the enmity? We didn't do anything to do that. We did everything we could to increase it. But if the gospel is big enough.

For God to remove the enmity. Between Him and us because of our sin. What about each other? Is it not big enough for that? If God is at peace with us. Because of the gospel. Should we not be at peace.

With one another in all things? What agenda needs to be left behind? Now here is a challenge for us. You are not told to give up. Your individuality. We have people here of various ethnicities. Various religious backgrounds.

Various political views. We might even have a democrat or two in this place. The question is. Is that difference too big a difference. For the gospel? Is that difference too big. For the gospel of Jesus Christ.

By which you at peace with God Himself. To overcome. If Christ's death was sufficient. For you and me to have unity with God above. How can it not be sufficient. For each other? We don't have to agree on everything.

We cannot agree on everything. It would be impossible. Is that thing over which we disagree. Is it worth risking. This key definition of the church. Whatever that position is. Is it worth risking. This key definition.