The Church: United in Christ
I love the book of Acts, but sometimes my local church experience doesn’t seem to line up with what I read there. My church in Newark, DE is the dearest place on earth to me, but it does not always seem to echo Acts 2:42-44:
And they devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers. And awe came upon every soul, and many wonders and signs were being done through the apostles.
But 1 Corinthians? First Corinthians is different. This early letter of Paul to the messy and seemingly dysfunctional church in Corinth is exactly what I often need to read. God’s love for these messy people and their local expression of church life is powerful to consider. What we see here is that our sin aects church life. Yet, while the church might not always look like the book of Acts, it is no less a part of God’s powerful plan for this world. God is present in both the shine of revival and in the dirty mess of personal conflict, wrong priorities, prideful spiritualism, and over-realized eschatology.
Lessons from Corinth
Unity Matters
If you were to look for a main idea or thesis statement for Corinthians, a solid choice would be chapter verse where Paul says, “I appeal to you, brothers, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that all of you agree, and that there be no divisions among you...” Paul wants the Corinthian church to be united—and for good reason! They were deeply divided by loyalty to dierent leaders, disagreements about liberties, economic division while celebrating communion, one-upmanship with spiritual gifts, and many other issues. This led the church to have more discord than harmony, more conflict than communion, more division than unity.
But Paul earnestly desires them to be united. He appeals to them to be united. And what reasons does he give for them to be united? Well, there are many, but one stands out. The centrality of the cross. All of the secondary and tertiary things that divide our churches are nothing compared to the singular priority of Christ crucified. The world around us is so divided because of its many dierent priorities, but our local churches are able to remain united because the cross has taken center stage in our lives.
Our unity displays the centrality of the cross. In fact, the presence of division often means that the cross is no longer central to us. Paul says that divisions come when we live with worldly wisdom. This is because we quickly focus on ourselves. But unity comes about when we center on the cross because we see there the ultimate example of selflessness and the greatest priority in this world. The cross for Paul is a rallying point. When the cross is at the center of our lives, it draws Christians together. When the cross is displaced, division is not far away.
Joel Shorey, Lead Pastor, Redeemer Fellowship Church (Newark, DE)
Reposted from the Sovereign Grace Journal, March 2023.