Unity is essential for any kind of achievement. It’s needed in families; to have a happy family you must have unity. It’s needed in business; employees must learn to get along. Unity is needed in government if anything is to be accomplished. On any sport team, players have to be unified in order to win.
But especially in the church, there must be unity for
God to be able to work and for the church to become all
that God wants it to be. Unity is a key theme in the Bible. It
is up to each member to help safeguard the church’s unity.
Churches are made up of people, and, believe it or not,
there are no perfect people, so they get into conflict with
each other. Everyone must learn how to deal
with conflict and become united. Why is
unity so important in the church?
Jesus prayed about it. Just before
Jesus was crucified, He prayed for
His followers. In this prayer, Jesus
prayed for the unity of the church
(John 17:20-24). How would our
churches change if we joined Jesus in
His prayer for unity? What if churches
were actually operating in unity? What
if members were striving together
constantly to fulfill God’s mission?
We might see God
move in ways none of us has
ever seen.
We are commanded to
make unity the top priority.
JONAS ARRAIS
JONAS ARRAIS | General Conference Associate Ministerial Secretary
Unity was a top priority for Jesus and for His church,
and it should be our top priority as well. The Bible commands
us: “Make every effort to keep the unity of the
Spirit through the bonds of peace” (Eph. 4:3). One of
our primary jobs as Christians is to maintain unity and
promote peace—whatever it takes!
It is a witness to the world. In John 13:34, 35, Jesus
said: “By this shall all men know that you are my disciples,
if you love one another.” When church members
love each other, there is unity and harmony. Guests will
walk into the church and say, “There’s something going
on in here that I want.”
A unified church is blessed. Acts 2:46, 47 says: “Every
day they continued to meet together in the temple
courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together
with glad and sincere hearts, praising God and enjoying
the favor of all the people. And the Lord added to their
number daily those who were being saved.”
As church leaders, I challenge you to preach on
unity. I don’t mean mentioning unity on occasion or talking
about it during the Lord’s Supper. I don’t even mean
bringing it up when you know of a disagreement in the
body. I mean preach on unity regularly, emphasizing
why no church will accomplish God’s mission without
it. I also challenge you to model it. You cannot lead your
church to be unified if there are broken relationships in
your own life. What you live, people learn. People expect
the church leaders to model the behavior of a fully
mature disciple. This seems clear in Paul’s challenge to
“follow me as I follow Christ.”
