Acts
16: 16–34; Psalm 97; Revelation 22: 12–14, 16–17, 20–21; John 17: 20–26
This
is the homily given at St. John’s, Huntingdon, Pennsylvania, by Fr. Gene Tucker
on Sunday, June 2, 2019.
“WHAT DOES IT MEAN THAT
‘WE MAY ALL BE ONE’?”
(Homily
text: John 17: 20–26)
Jesus
prayed for His disciples, saying, “…that they may all be one. As you, Father,
are in me and I am in you, may they also be in us.”
These
words come to us from what has come to be known as the Lord’s “High Priestly
Prayer”. This prayer, given by the Lord during the Last Supper, fills up
chapter seventeen of John’s Gospel account.
What
does it mean for the Lord’s followers – His disciples – to be one?
And,
while we are asking questions, it would do well for us to ask if there was ever
a time when the Lord’s disciples were one, completely one. And if the answer to
this question is “yes”, then we also might ask if the Lord’s disciples were one
at some point following the Lord’s ascension into heaven and following the
giving of the Holy Spirit at the Feast of Pentecost, then in what form were the
Lord’s disciples one.
These
are questions we might put before ourselves this morning.
Of
course, when we talk about the Lord’s followers, the Lord’s disciples, we are
talking about the Church. For the Church was born on the Feast of Pentecost,
when the Holy Spirit empowered those who had gathered to go out into the world,
proclaiming the Good News of God’s great and good work in the sending of Jesus
Christ into the world.
Having
established an agenda for our inquiry into the one-ness of the Church, let’s
explore some of the Church’s history in this regard.
We
should begin with the Church’s very early days of its existence.
A
common theme which has resonated with Christians down through the years, and
which continues to resonate today, is the idea that – in its very earliest days
– the Church was completely unified.
Certainly,
in Luke’s portrayal of the early Church in Acts 2: 42 – 47, such an ideal view
is set before us. Luke says that the believers were united in prayer, in the
breaking of the bread (communion) and in fellowship with one another. They were
so unified, Luke suggests, that they even held all their goods in common with
one another. (Today, we’d call such an arrangement a commune.)
It
is, perhaps, to this very early period that many Christian groups appeal to
today as they seek to recapture the one-ness and the idyllic shape of the
Church. The appeal of this very early chapter in the Church’s life is quite
strong, and it has a significant liveliness in its ability to capture the
imagination of many Christians, even today.
But
such a unified body of Christians didn’t last long, apparently.
That
very early Church was made up of Jews who’d come to faith in Jesus. There
wasn’t – most likely – much ethnic variety in that very early time.
But
soon, the Church spread beyond Jerusalem and Judea, into Samaria and then into
the Gentile world, thanks to the work of Paul, Barnabas and others. At that
point, the Church began to take on various different forms. The wonderful Roman
Catholic priest and scholar, Raymond Brown, in his book The Churches the Apostles
Left Behind, suggests that there were no less than seven different types of
Christian churches in the New Testament period.
Brown
suggests that these seven different types of churches had differing theological
emphases, they had different methods of organization, and so forth. (His book,
which is still available today, is well worth reading.) For example, Brown
suggests that the Church that Matthew was situated in didn’t seem to have any
type of ordained leadership at all. Theirs, apparently, was a congregational
polity. On the other hand, the churches to whom Paul was writing in I Timothy,
II Timothy and Titus had Bishops who were appointed to carry on the mantle of
the Apostles. Brown also suggests that the churches that John was involved with
had a very individualistic approach to the believer’s relationship to Christ.
Such an emphasis on the individual would seem to be at odds with the Matthean
Church’s method of operation, where the congregation’s group identity prevailed.
Brown
suggests that the seven models that he discerned are to be found in the pages
of the New Testament are still to be found today. For example, many churches
continue to have a congregational model of organization, while others continue
to have Bishops. In addition, some churches still emphasize the individual’s
relationship to the Lord, like the Johannine communities did.
But
for the variety of churches that seemed to exist during the time the Apostles
were still alive, there also seemed to be a unity of purpose among the
churches. The Apostles, apparently, were quite able to move from one type of
church to another, being accepted among all. That was the case with Peter and
with Paul, apparently.
As
time went along, outright divisions in the Body of Christ took place. The Great
Schism between the western and eastern churches came about in 1054 AD. Then,
the Protestant Reformation took place in the 16th century, further
splintering the western church. Today, one estimate is that there about 34,000
different Christian bodies.
In
recent years, there’ve been some attempts at reunifying the Church. One thinks
of the unification of the Reformed and the Congregational Churches into the
United Church of Christ in the 1950s, or the merger of the Methodist and the
Evangelical United Brethren Churches into the United Methodist Church in 1968.
Back in the 1960s, there was a movement called the Consultation on Church Union
(COCU), which attempted to bring together several different bodies, including
the Episcopal Church. That attempt didn’t come to fruition.
For
a long time, for too long a time, there has been estrangement between different
Christian groups. Some of you who are hearing this homily or who are reading it
can remember a time when there was almost no contact or cooperation between the
Roman Catholic Church and Protestant Churches. In some quarters, there was even
outright hatred of one group for another. (I grew up with just such a mindset.)
Fortunately,
those days are gone, or are at least partly so. Today, it’s common for Roman
Catholics and Protestants to work together, even if there isn’t full communion
yet between those groups. It’s rare to hear someone speak disdainfully of
another church’s character and work.
That’s a fortunate development. May there be more of the same as the
years roll along.
What
can we pray for, what can we hope for, in terms of the one-ness of the Body of
Christ? I think, perhaps, the answer is this:
We should pray for unity of purpose, unity of witness to Christ, and a
willingness to respect others and to work alongside them in common witness to
Jesus Christ. (If we are able to achieve this, we’d be emulating the early Church’s
pattern of unity within diversity.)
Perhaps
that’s the best solution to the current state of the Church. Though our
divisions make it more difficult to come to a common consensus on matters of
faith, yet there is a strength to be found in diversity, as well.
May
the Holy Spirit guide us into further one-ness in Christ, that our divisions
may fade into the background as our witness to the Lord increases.
AMEN.
