Unity

Now may the God who gives perseverance and encouragement grant you to be of the same mind with one another according to Christ Jesus, so that with one accord you may with one voice glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, accept one another, just as Christ also accepted us to the glory of God. (Romans 15:5-7)

What is the true purpose for which anyone should become a Christian? And how do we even come up with that answer? Is it because it has been drilled into us by someone else or some organization? How difficult is it for us to even get to the bottom of our own real motives?

I think it is very important for each person to strive to become more honest with their own heart about their true motives for everything they do. Of course, one of the greatest obstacles to doing so is the fear and shame that might get stirred up in the process. We live around people who have many expectations about how we should act and what we should believe, so we attempt to at least somewhat comply with their opinions to keep their respect. We also live with the insistent voices from our own past by many who still maintain a strong influence over our reactions and beliefs even though many of them may no longer even be alive. We can still hear their warnings, threats or intonations whenever we find ourselves in certain situations and we have to deal with those voices both from the past and the present in some way. Even if we live in violent rejection of those voices our attitudes and behaviors are still largely being shaped by them.

So what does this all have to do with being a Christian? I believe it has a great deal to do with it. For it seems to me that the vast majority of people claiming to be Christians have very little real transformation evident in their lives that resonate with what is described in the New Testament. Most Christianity is based much more on traditions handed down to us by the people around us than by any other influence. Oh, some of us are very vocal about beliefs that we claim makes us qualified to profess the name “little Christs” which is what the word Christian really means. But how many people professing to be His followers really emanate the spirit of humility, compassion, acceptance, forgiveness, kindness and selfless love that marked the life of Jesus, the original Christ?

The teachings of Paul and all the rest of the apostles in the New Testament are all focused on trying to train people and mentor them into what it really means to be a true follower of the Messiah and Savior of the world. What I see in these verses here in Romans 15 reminds me very strongly of a similar description that I read in Acts about the very first group of believers that were filled with the genuine animation of being sincere and devoted followers of their Lord and Friend, Jesus Christ. Take a look at the similarities between these two passages.

They were continually devoting themselves to the apostles' teaching and to fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer. Everyone kept feeling a sense of awe; and many wonders and signs were taking place through the apostles. And all those who had believed were together and had all things in common; and they began selling their property and possessions and were sharing them with all, as anyone might have need. Day by day continuing with one mind in the temple, and breaking bread from house to house, they were taking their meals together with gladness and sincerity of heart, praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord was adding to their number day by day those who were being saved. (Acts 2:42-47)

People back in those days were just as confused and disappointed with religion as most people are today. They had tried all sorts of formulas and rituals to achieve a meaningful connection with God in one way or another, but none of them had brought real satisfaction to the heart or joy into the life. Even the disciples who had literally spent over three years walking and interacting with God in the flesh still did not get it. They simply were too confused about reality to understand or relate to either Jesus or each other in the ways that God desired for them to do. It was not until some time after Jesus left this earth and all the believers spent considerable time together in self-examination to get in touch with the reality of their own condition that they were ready to be filled with the true revelation of the presence of God. It was not until they had experienced what Paul is describing here in Romans and had chosen to lay aside their differences, their fears, their pain that blocked their ability to truly accept each other and allowed God to heal them from the inside that they could experience the outpouring of the Holy Ghost that Jesus had promised to send.

Paul knew that this was not supposed to be just a one time event at the beginning of the Christian church. This was supposed to be the dynamic experience of every Christian believer who should ever join the community of faith which is the body of Christ on earth. The signs and wonders that took place in the book of Acts was not supposed to be unique only to fade away into just exciting stories repeated by future generations. These experiences were to be ongoing as powerful testimonies throughout all time as a witness to the kind of life genuine Christianity could produce in the life of a true believer.

So what has happened? Why is it that we see so little of the power of God in our world today? Why is it that nearly all supernatural demonstrations end up being a means of leading people into counterfeit belief systems that purport to be the real thing but are infiltrated with deceptive notions about God that distort the real truth about His character? And why do most attempts today at achieving unity in the body of Christ revolve around means other than that described in the New Testament? Why do we believe we can induce God to send His Spirit by compromising with false teachers or whipping up emotions in an attempt to feel unnatural excitement or any number of other methods we dream up?

We are living in an intense time of famine as predicted in the Old Testament. We are living in a parched land where the Word of God has been nearly lost and no longer is desired or sought after to receive life. We think it is good enough to let others do our studying for us. We have transferred our attentions to anything and everything that is offered to try to find life and answers and satisfaction. But when we finally slow down enough, we hear the pain of our own hearts and we know that it just isn't working out for us. Our entertainment, our addictions to all sorts of placebo's that we hope will give us the spark of life that we crave, our attempts at relationships to make us feel better – all will fail us. Even our religion has become so superficial and intellectual or maybe emotional that we cannot sense our heart thriving as it so much needs to do.

Only God can give us perseverance and encouragement. Without these things we find ourselves withering away at the heart level even while our outward experience may appear to be doing very well. Many of us can't even hardly feel our hearts anymore because we have keep it so suppressed and hidden for so many years. We cannot even remember the joy of freedom that our spirit once relished when we were little children. But that is exactly why Jesus said we must become as a little child or we can never enter the kingdom of heaven. It is too often only the little children who still know how to be really honest and live from their hearts.

Verse four here in Romans tells us that the Scriptures are the source from which we can receive the needed perseverance and encouragement that verse five tells us comes from God. I believe that if anyone is serious and hungry enough and tired enough of looking for life and love in all the other places, that they will find real hope and life by coming back to receiving these things from God in an earnest and honest exposure to the Word of God. If a person wants to find the true motivation for living and is willing to challenge all their assumptions about reality, God will meet them in a fresh and dynamic way when they choose to immerse themselves in a sincere study of the Bible carried out by listening to their heart at least as much as their head.

I know that when I began to ask the tough questions of the heart and began to challenge my own beliefs and assumptions that my lifelong habit of daily study was transformed from acquiring a lot of religious information to a dynamic dialog between my soul and my God. I have been repeatedly forced to give up deep-seated opinions and beliefs and even doctrines that I had embraced all of my life as God met me and challenged me to reconsider what I thought was really true. And I am overjoyed to testify that the more I have perceived the real truth about God and about reality that the big picture just keeps getting better and clearer and my heart thrills sometimes through encounters with a love I could never before imagine even existed.

But here in this passage I am challenged again by perceiving my own attitudes and experience and my relationship with other believers in contrast with those described in this passage. I am not in harmony with what I am reading here and I am praying earnestly for God to transform my life and experience and especially my spirit to reflect what is being taught to me here. I want to be a part of another encounter with the Holy Ghost in unity with fellow seekers just as the early believers did. But I must be willing to be prepared at the heart level just as they were or it will never happen for me.

God, continue Your work in my heart. Draw me deeper into Your will and fill me with Your disposition. Teach me Your ways of thinking and feeling and perceiving. Show me Your character and Your face much more clearly so that my life and spirit will more accurately reflect Your glory and attract others to You just as the early believers experienced. Make me a channel of Your love and beauty and grace for Your reputation's sake.

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