Day 16 of the 40 Days of Purpose

“What Matters Most”

The fact that the Lord said the world would know we are his disciples by our love for one another (John 13:35), has always intrigued me. Of all the things the Lord could have said was the identifying mark of discipleship, he said it was our love for one another. Not our inspiring worship services, not the great facilities we would build, not the great sermons we would preach, not even the evangelistic efforts all over the world, but our love for one another. How are we doing? Based on the picture of all who profess to be Christians all over the world, not that great, for we are splintered and divided over various doctrines and practices with such hostility that it has started wars and now it seems impossible to be brought back together again. Historically, and in the present world politics, religious division among Christians does not testify to an unbelieving world that our belief is worthy of consideration. Someone might say that you cannot use the picture of world wide denominations, look at the unity of the restoration plea to come back together on the basis of the Bible, and the Bible alone. But this picture is disappointing as well, for even among the Churches of Christ you have the glaring reality of our division through the last century over our separation from our brothers in this fellowship over instrumental music and the list has continued through a number of petty quarrels resulting in churches starting down the road from one another because they could not get along. And even within the local congregations, there are so many that are caldrons of brewing resentments and hurts just waiting to spill out and run in every direction. What kind of testimony does this make to the world about the Lord we serve.

Discipleship means the student imitates the master teacher. If disputes and division imitate the teacher, then our Lord did not love us and taught against unity. We know this is not true (see John chapters 15-17). No one could have taught love and unity more than Jesus and he demonstrated it with the ultimate sacrifice of love for the unity of believers in one Church. Jesus taught that the greatest commandments were to love God and to love our fellow man (Mat. 22:34-40). The world is watching to see if we will follow our teacher. If we cannot start to demonstrate his basic teaching of the greatest commandments, how are we going to get them to listen to the rest of our Teacher’s instruction? The world doesn’t understand the distinctions we make between Christians, all they know is that the followers of Christ can’t get along with one another. If we don’t find a way to demonstrate our love for all Christians, in the general sense of the word, even the ones with whom we disagree, we will not find a way to share with the world the Teacher of whom we are disciples.