Remember, remember...John 17:20-23

Not a very snappy title but one which expresses something that is important to remember. Division in the church is not only a domestic problem internal to the church but is a disaster for the world.

Reformation Day (31/10) and Guy Fawkes Night (5/11) come so close together, it always makes me reflect sadly on division. On the 31st October 1517, Martin Luther nailed 95 thesis to the door of Wittenburg Cathedral sparking what has come to be known as the Protestant Reformation. On the 5th November, 1605 a group of Roman Catholic dissidents wanted to kill King James and set up his daughter Elizabeth as a Catholic Queen by blowing up Parliament. Now it is clear that Luther did not want to start a separate church but the result was another split in an already divided church. The gunpowder plot was a symptom of that division and its consequences. 

We live in a world wracked by division. Racial divisions, social divisions, religious and philosophical divisions lead to violence and war all around the world. More than ever before our world needs to hear a message of reconciliation, but more than hear it they need to see it. 

When Jesus prayed for us in John 17 he linked the unity of believers to belief in him. Unity is linked with mission. If God's ultimate purpose is, as Paul expresses it in Ephesians 1:10, to bring all things in heaven and on earth under Christ, then if the church is divided then the world does not have a model of what "all things under Christ" looks like. There is a very close link between church unity and universal reconciliation. 

So, what to do about it?

Five paradoxes of Church

Since the year 2000 there seems to have been an avalanche of books on the Church. I have books on on my shelf called Emerging Church (2006), Re-Emerging Church (2008), Deep Church (2009), Gospel-Driven Church (2004), Intelligent Church (2006), Missional Church (2011) and finally a Just Church (2011). I've even got one that's simply called The Church but that's rather earlier (1968) and by Hans Küng! I was interested when John Stott, in his one of his last books, The Living Church (Nottingham: IVP, 2007, pp. 91-102), posits five paradoxes of the church. The church should be 

1. Biblical and contemporary
2. Authoritative and tentative
3. Prophetic and pastoral
4. Gifted and studied
5. Thoughtful and passionate

The first is challenging. How do we measure up?