unity

Love…fear…change…

Posted by David Ward on 22/01/2019
Posted in: Bible, Personal thoughts, unity. Tagged: , , , . Leave a comment

Something has happened in the nations that make up the UK. It crept up on us silently and unannounced. It took most of us completely by surprise, and is causing many of us to lose sleep.

I see it in the news, I hear it on the streets and I read it on social media. It seems as if everything is changing, and many of the things we have taken for granted are being shaken.

It must have been bubbling away just beneath the surface for many years, occasionally breaking through into plain view before diving again.

Then, it seems that the events of 23rd June 2016 allowed it to burst to the surface and slowly take over our whole society.

Fear, especially of those who are different to us, now seems to dominate so much of our time. It seems that no one is immune – politicians, workers, bosses, educationalists, pensioners, students have all succumbed to it.

Our nation is deeply and dangerously divided.

At the same time, something more hopeful is also stirring.

Long ago, Jesus prayed a prayer that has largely gone unanswered…perhaps until now.


“I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message,
that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you.
May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me.
I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one— I in them and you in me—so that they may be brought to complete unity.”

John 17:20-23, New Testament

As I talk to Christian people all over the UK, as I travel around and catch up with friends who are also believers through social media, I am aware that God is at work in our land.

Churches in many places are coming together, working together in ways I have not seen in my lifetime. Denominations far apart on the theological spectrum are laying down their differences of interpretation, preference and practice and coming together out of their love for Jesus and each other and from their shared desire to see his Kingdom come “on earth as it is in heaven”.

What has prevented Christians from coming together in the past, indeed, why is our history littered with splits and divisions?


 “Perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment”

I John 4: 18, New Testament

Could it be fear that has kept us apart, the same fears we see expressed in the world round us. Why do we fear others?

  • Fear of difference
  • Fear of the unknown
  • Fear of being criticised
  • Fear of being “polluted” – “will God be angry with us if we mix with them?”

Many of us spend a lot of time working out who to exclude, based on our fears. We need to remind ourselves that Jesus always hung around with the excluded…maybe we should too if we want to know him better.


“You cannot love those you fear”

Robert Benson, “The Body Broken”

Some of us find it hard enough to love people in our own church who are different from us. How will we be able to be obedient to Jesus and love those in other parts of the church that are different to our own? Paul and the other letter writers in the NT were well aware of this tendency among us, hence the frequent warnings against gossip, criticism and sowing division.

Part of the good news, the Gospel, is that Jesus death heals divisions between people as well as healing the division between us and God. John goes as far as to say that if we can’t love our brothers and sisters who are right there in front of us, it calls our love for God into question too…if Jesus has really changed us it affects the way we love everyone.

It’s important that we ask ourselves, “Why is God bringing Christians together in new ways today?”

I believe that a more united church is demonstrating a prophetic and counter-cultural contrast, as a sign of hope to the increasingly fractured and broken culture in which we live.

I guess the question is: do we want to be part of what God is doing, or will we continue to allow old fears and prejudices keep us apart?

(Adapted from a talk given by me at Tweedmouth Parish church on 20th January 2019, at the start of the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity)

Shifting paradigms…

Posted by David Ward on 06/11/2016
Posted in: Books/Articles, Community, Personal thoughts, Relationships, Spirituality, Theology, unity. Tagged: , , , , , , . Leave a comment

Coming to terms with our natural anxiety has helped the members of my congregation develop a sense of humility about what they know to be true, and to exercise a greater degree of tolerance toward those with whom they disagreed than they had previously. Conservatives learned to ask: “Are we truly acting to protect God’s will (as if God needs our protection) or merely protecting the status quo?” Liberals learned to ask: “How do we know we are prophetically promoting God’s will (as if God needs our promotion) or merely our own innovations?” Understanding our own propensity for reactivity has tended to give us pause about attributing evil intent to those who oppose our point of view. Recognizing that the dominant paradigm has created blind spots in our vision helps us realize how much we need the insights of those who disagree with us. 

We began to realize that our paradigms are really our finite, human attempts to domesticate God…

From “Paradoxy” by Ken Howard

ONE – Small steps…

Posted by David Ward on 30/10/2016
Posted in: Community, Personal thoughts, Relationships, unity. Tagged: , , , , , , , . Leave a comment

warning-copy

For four or five months I taught unity to my congregation, which had grown to about 1, 500 people. At the end, I asked, “How many believe that the church is one?”

Many hands went up.

“Put them down. How many of you really believe the church is one?”

Even more hands were raised.

“How many of you are willing to prove it? To demonstrate this with your own lives?”

Many hands again.

“Good. Next Sunday go to the church closest to your house, whether it’s Catholic, Lutheran, or Presbyterian. Whatever money you normally spend on gas or bus fare to come here, give it to that church’s offering. Only those who live closest to this church come here.”

Silence. They didn’t want to accept the challenge. But a third of the congregation obeyed.

Eventually we gave two hundred people to the Catholic church, fifty-three to the Anglican church and others to other churches. Many good things came of this…

Juan Carlos Ortiz, “God is closer than you think”, p170-171

I felt I needed to begin this blog post with a health warning…once you decide to become part of the answer to Jesus’ prayer, “That they may be one”, it may require you to actually do something about it…and there’s no telling where it will lead.

Living as one church in a locality has certain implications, some of them costly, but ultimately, of great benefit to the Kingdom of God.

So…where do you begin? Here are suggestions of some small steps to make the prayer of Jesus a reality in your life and locality.

  1. Share the prayer

Regularly pray the prayer that Jesus prayed yourself. In many ways, there is more justification to say that this is the real Lord’s Prayerthan the one we have traditionally given that name! (The other one is maybe the Disciples Prayer…) Look for opportunities to become part of the answer to the prayer

  1. Overcome the obstacles

Be determined to accept that no difference is too big to be overcome. Structure your life and the life of your church (if you’re a leader) so you are able to respond freely to the Spirit’s prompting to worship witness and work together.

  1. Find a friend

Seek out another Christian from a different denomination or Christian background to yours. Share your stories of how you came to be a follower of Jesus and the ways you see God at work in your life and in your church.

  1. Worship their way

Get a friend to take you to a worship service at a church that’s very different to yours. Let them make a return visit. Compare notes, ask questions.

If you’re a church leader, close your building down once in a while and go and worship with another church…might be a good idea to warn them in advance. It might be possible to share in the leadership/music/preaching.

  1. Investigate their ideas

Do some research, read some books about their particular beliefs and ways of doing things. My advice would be to try to read what their own members have written about their beliefs, rather than comments and articles by other groups. Many myths about what people believe have been prolonged by passing on inaccurate understanding…this is especially true of the internet, where great care should be taken.

  1. Guard against gossip

However strong the temptation is we should make it a solemn promise that we will never speak badly of another Christian, church or denomination. Sometimes we may feel we have justification or have been sorely provokes…we need to grow in grace.

  1. Forgive each failing

I believe that justice is not about punishment or getting even…ultimately it’s about reconciliation, about trying to restore a broken relationship.

And that’s where forgiveness comes in.

We may feel that we have been hurt, marginalised and misunderstood by a particular person, church or denomination. Grace and forgiveness provide us with the only route to be reconciled…and that’s healing for us as well as for them.

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