From my point of view, the greatest problem facing the church is lack of unity. When Jesus Christ was getting ready to leave this earth, He prayed for His disciples and asked especially that they would be united (see John 17:20-21).
He said that whenever His followers acted in unity, the world would know that the Father had sent Him (see John 17:23). However, it is extremely difficult in this world to achieve the kind of unity, love, and concern for one another that Jesus Christ shared with His disciples.
I am not advocating unity at the expense of purity or at the expense of doctrinal truth. We cannot throw out the Bible in order to have unity. We cannot embrace any strange doctrine just to have superficial unity. But we must have unity where those who truly love Jesus Christ will love each other and try to work together.
Even though they may differ over techniques and other superficial things, Christians must work together and emphasize areas of agreement. When this happens, the church will become a supernaturally powerful force.
According to the book of Genesis, upon the occasion of the building of the tower of Babel, God saw that the people had one language and were of one accord. Because of this, He said that nothing they wanted to do would have been impossible for them (see Genesis 11:6). If the church could achieve unity, it could change the political and social structure of society with no trouble at all. The world would be a beautiful place to live in if the church would get together.
Regrettably, we do not. We have a divisive party spirit…we have jealousy…we fight…we are suspicious of one another. I am not talking about those who do not really believe in God. I am talking about the ones who are believers, who have been born again. If people will truly follow after the Spirit of God, they can operate in unity, because the Spirit of God will give them unity.
Unity begins to break down when man’s selfishness enters the picture. For unity we have to have mutual respect and a mutual willingness to give and to surrender, not to the other person so much, but to Jesus. We can truly have unity when we all want God’s will to be done.
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Excerpt from Answers to 200 of Life’s Most Probing Questions by Pat Robertson.
