United Church of America
The word unity is written into the name of our country. Yet since the very beginning we’ve been fighting with one another. We’ve owned one another, killed one another, exploited one another, and for most of our short history have been more than a little suspicious of each other. Perhaps the name United States is more aspirational than reality.
We went through a nasty divorce in 1861, only to barely get back together and see if we could try again. A lot of people still think we’d be better off divorced – you live in your house and I’ll live in mine, we simply can’t be together.
Sadly, the American church has mostly followed the tendencies of the culture around it. We split and fragment for any small reason, which is why you can throw a stone in any direction and find whatever flavor of church most fits your temperament.
The church is called to unity, it’s spelled out with crystal clarity in the parting words of Christ himself.
“I am praying not only for these disciples but also for all who will ever believe in me through their message. I pray that they will all be one, just as you and I are one—as you are in me, Father, and I am in you. And may they be in us so that the world will believe you sent me.”[a]
People won’t believe in God based on our brilliant theological arguments or our moral superiority. Rather, they’ll look at communities that love one another and be moved to know that a loving God must exist as well.
We seem to have a false assumption that everyone under a single roof must be homogenous in thought and practice. This has been a disastrous assumption and is surely one of the reasons church is becoming less and less relevant in the culture. We are like Blockbuster Video, an organization in slow decline as people move on to endeavors that resonate more deeply with their lives.
What does unity really mean and what does it look like in practice? Unity does not mean we all think the same or are the same. For me, the lived experience of a 14-year marriage is the best example of unity I can think of. My wife and I fight, we disagree all the time. I’ve been trying to change her for over a decade and have (mostly) failed. Likewise, she tries to change me and sometimes succeeds, but mostly not. We’ve learned to let things go and settled for unity instead. Unity means you share a common purpose and also choose to stick together despite all the stuff that drives you crazy.
***
Jesus said:
“You are the salt of the earth. But what good is salt if it has lost its flavor? Can you make it salty again? It will be thrown out and trampled underfoot as worthless.”[b]
The purpose of salt is to preserve something that will otherwise rot. Unified communities of faith have a preservative effect on the society around them. We are meant to be counter cultural and an example to the world. But our example is not going to be more morally sanitized lives than our unchurched neighbors. I’ve been a pastor long enough to know that we’ve got just as many struggles and blemishes as any secular community group!
But the least we can do is love one another with grace and humility. We can model forgiveness and conflict resolution in a culture hell-bent on division and revenge.
If salt loses its saltiness it is quite worthless and the Church losing its call to unity has turned it into Blockbuster Video. Especially since the pandemic, Church attendance has dropped tremendously. People used the COVID year to quietly slip away.
The bad news is nobody rents VHS tapes for a dollar a night anymore, but the good news is people still like to watch movies. The Achilles heel of American culture could turn out to be the saving grace of the American church.
Faith communities are one of the last public spaces where vastly different people can sit down and get into real conflict with one another, work through said conflict, and decide to love one another despite being completely different.
We’re like an old married couple, who sometimes drives each other crazy. Will we leave to find a younger, more compliant church? Or will we choose to stick around? When we choose to work it out we become salt in an otherwise rotting world.
References
A. Gospel of John chapter 17
B. Gospel of Matthew chapter 5