The Precious Gift of Unity

Last week I was thinking about Richard Rogers the Puritans book holy helps for a godly life and he uses he talks about what people today call means of grace certain things in the that provisions that God has for us that are rich and a blessing and and that leads us to salvation or is an important part of our salvation. Last week we talked about revelation and the word of God and these are the analogy I used last week. These are like gifts and so you know using a Christmas metaphor I mean you could picture these as Christmas gifts that you open up that you receive that you value or maybe not value so much should value perhaps certainly and maybe don’t always value.

I was thinking about that every now and then I I know when I was a kid I got gifts that I learned to appreciate after I received them and not so much on the morning I receive them. I mean if you if Can you imagine a a little kid who was so excited this Christmas because he heard that his very very rich uncle had decided to give him a present that year. And so he kept imagining what he would get. Maybe a bicycle or something like that. But what he really is hoping for is a new computer game machine. Something really special. Maybe because he’s so rich maybe even an Apple vision type thing or something like that.

And Christmas morning comes and he gets a card and the card is a Christmas card that informs him that his uncle has deposited an amount of money into a Roth IRA for him. Well, not exactly what he is wanting. A few years later, many years later perhaps when he really needs that money to start a business or to establish a home and b pay and and make the down payment. That gift would be the most precious thing that he has at the moment. You know, his mo one of his most valuable possessions. Sometimes God gives us great, wonderful, precious gifts and we may not Certainly, I would say we never are appreciating them to the value that that we should. That’s certainly true with the word of God we were talking about last week. The revelation of God, the fact that God has revealed himself to us in his word and in the person of Jesus Christ, that’s more than just a means of grace. It’s salvation itself. It’s, you know, we can’t minimize that.

The Church in Modern Society

Well, this morning I’m going to talk about another one of these and it is life from the body of Christ. It is the church. You know, the church is one of those things that’s often not valued that so much, particularly in today’s society. It’s been true in centuries past from time to time. And we’re living through one of those times when it is particularly a problem. Church for a lot of people seems irrelevant. You know, they’re caught up in their own individualism and they don’t want anyone, you know, they don’t want any distractions from what they want to do. and then there is a growing sense of independence and self-directed spirituality.

And so a lot of people think that they don’t really need the church for spirituality. There’s that and where they have they can they can they can find you know God on their own. They can experience God in nature. They can certainly find podcasts and all sorts of communications online to to satisfy what they need. And so they they you know they have no real need. They don’t think they have a need. And Then there is the rest of us who recognize the value of church but probably still in the most fundamental ways fail to appreciate it the way we should. Many of us see church as a nothing more than what than a means to grow spiritually a tool that we can use for our good.

Now you think You know, how many parents think, you know, I think I’m I’m going to I’m going to take my kids to to church and Sunday school and they can experience these things and it probably do them a little good. It’ll change their character. It’ll affect them in some way. If that’s the kind if if it’s that direction that our understanding of the church is, then we we don’t understand its value. And yet all of us having experienced church here do recognize I think to a great degree the preciousness of what we have here. It’s it’s unusual. It’s particularly precious.

The Blessing of Unity in Psalm 133

You know, when we when this when our church merged, I was expecting a lot of difficulties. I really was. When our church merged, usually what happens is you have two churches with very differing understandings and expectations and you get tensions between the two groups within within two weeks. It was like we were one family. I mean it was amazing to me how the unity that we experienced here from the from the very beginning. That is a gift of God. That is a gift of God.

In fact, Psalm 133 is is talking about unity and fellowship and really the focus here is corporate worship though you may not just catch that immediately. This is a song with a scent however. So that’s exactly what this is talking about and the point of this psalm. I’m just going to give you the end right now. I probably shouldn’t do that. It should be more inductive and keep it mysterious for a while. But basically it’s saying that The kind of fellowship that we enjoy as a church that that’s described in this psalm comes from God. It’s the very blessing of God. It flows out from God as a great blessing from God. So that’s that’s the point of the song.

and it’s a it’s a it’s an you know this is a crucial topic for us. I mean the first idea that we come to in this psalm is that the interdependence of God’s people is necessary and it’s good. The interdependence of the people of God is necessary and good. In that very first probably the reason that I chose this psalm to to express it would probably be easier for me to make this argument from the New Testament because it’s everywhere in the New Testament. It’s it’s in the Old Testament, too. But I chose the Psalm in particular because these the this phrase in the first verse, you know, there’s you know how certain words tend to couple themselves together.

You know, you you hear the two words over and over again together like for example, coffee and donuts or bread and butter or milk and cookies, bacon and eggs. I don’t know why all these things or food. Maybe it’s the fragrance downstairs. I mean, I suppose I could be doing things like hammer and nails and law and order, but but certain words are a pattern and they go together. And that’s what you have is you find that with with two words in verse one, good and pleasant. Now, they often are found in the in the Bible together. the idea of of shared unity that that the phrase is repeated throughout the Psalms and you see it multiple times in Genesis. And so it’s a beautiful thing to see here. It’s the ver verse says, let me just read it. In fact, let me read the psalm and then pray and go back and read verse one again so we can have the whole thing in context.

Scripture Reading and Prayer

This is a song of a sense of David. It is the excellency of brotherly unity. Psalm 133. This is God’s holy word.

“Behold, how good and how pleasant it is for brothers to dwell together in unity. It’s like the precious oil upon the head coming down upon the beard. Even Aaron’s beard coming down upon the edges of his robes. It’s like the dew of Herman. coming down upon the mountains of Zion. For there the Lord commanded the blessing life forever.” —Psalm 133

We ask God to bless his word to our hearts. Father, I recognize how inadequate I am to talk about your word really. And Father, apart from the filling of your spirit and the blessing that you give through the study of your scripture and just the encouragement that you have given me through the teaching of others I’m able to say something this morning. But Lord, unless you speak to us through your word, there’s nothing to be said. We ask, Father, that you give us ears to hear and a heart to respond to the truth of your word this morning. Bless us this way in Christ’s name. Amen.

The Church as the Goal of Salvation

Well, the idea here is behold how good and how pleasant it is for brothers to dwell together in unity. And the idea of dwelling together is more than just being together in peace. It’s more than that idea. The that idea is the idea of working together. fit in a fitted way the a unity and everything working for the life of the of the of the of the group together. It’s the it has to the idea of shared responsibility and common interests and basically an extended family. That’s the picture that this begins with. And this is what God’s design is for his peoples. It’s God’s design for his church. We are to work together in unity. The church is is more precious than we tend to to think. It’s precious because it’s Christ’s design.

It was Jesus himself who instituted the church who said, “I will build my church.” When when in Matthew chapter 16 when Jesus asked his disciples, “Who do you say that I am?” And Peter said, “You’re the Christ, the son of the living God.” Jesus said, “I will upon this rock, I will build my church.” And he not only is building the church, but Jesus himself laid down his life for the church. He purchased the church with his own blood. He He sacrificed himself for it. is so valuable to him and I don’t have my notes in in any good order but and somewhere in my notes I point you know I said last week we were talking about scripture and scripture as a means of grace for our spiritual growth it is all that it’s wonderful but it but the revelation of God is more than that the revelation of God is salvation itself. The Lord Jesus prayer in John chapter 17 verse three the Lord Jesus said this is life eternal that they may know you knowing God and Jesus Christ whom you’ve sent the knowledge of God the revelation of God the received knowledge of God is salvation it’s the it’s an end

And we think of church in a similar way. We think of church as if it’s a means for our to being built up in the body. But the church is an end in itself as well. When when we look to the church, it is the purpose and goal of our salvation. You know Jesus the Christmas, you know, one of the Christmas verses in Matthew 121, I think. you shall call his name Jesus. Jesus means savior. Why are you calling your son savior? Because he will save his people from their sins. His people from their sins. And that phrase his people repeats and those Christmas stories in Luke’s account as well.

You know the the idea of Jesus coming to this world for the purpose of securing a people for his own name. That’s the church. And it it’s an end in itself. It’s it’s more it’s more than just it’s more than just a means of grace. If it’s just a means of grace, then maybe we can do okay on our own. Probably can’t, but we’d like to think so. But you see how that think makes that so much more superficial in a way. It’s if it’s if it’s just something to build me up. But what if it’s the end? What if it’s the purpose? What is the purpose of all salvation? I’m going to leave that for the moment and hopefully come back to it in a in a few minutes. But, you know, it is Well, maybe I can’t do that. Maybe I better just keep talking.

No, God’s plan in bringing into existence a new covenant people through this work of salvation through Jesus Christ bringing the church, producing the church. We should never think of it as a means of an end. It’s it is the end. I mean it’s God is being glorified and ultimately will be glorified through his church. Ephesians 3:21 to him be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations forever and ever. The God saves people and when he saves them in 1 Corinthians 12 they are immersed into his body which is the church. You were saved into a church. and to the church. And when we say church, we’re talking about a calledout body, a pe a people of God called out.

A Called-Out Body: Universal and Local

He saves you and makes you part of his church. Church and we use that word in the New Testament. It’s used ecclesia means called out body. It means a group of people. This when we talk about the church here, we’re talking about the people you know we we have in English we’ve lost that a little bit because the word church in English based on the word kirk kirk and church means the building the root idea is the building and so we when we think of the church we think of a building but in the New Testament when you think of the church you think of people and it’s the local congregation and it’s the church universal. And if you look at any of those confessional statements, the apostles creed or or any of those when it talks about the holy catholic church, it’s talking about the universal church of God. And the New Testament uses the church to talk about all the saints who live and about the local saints who live. both ways. He uses it for either one because but when you see one, you’re really seeing the church.

We right here in this this little congregation that we are this morning, we are the church of God. We are the church. Even though we’re, you know, we’re just you only see a fragment of it. Well, at night when you look up at the stars and the moon a few days ago, you could see a bright full moon and it’s waning. So you see a little fragment of that moon. Whether you see the whole moon or you see a little tiny sliver, when you look up there, you say, “Oh, there’s the moon.” Well, this is the church. This is the church. You may be just a little part of it, but we are the church. And this is where the church finds its truest expression for us together. It’s important that we we recognize that we are together.

The idea of brothers dwelling together in unity is the functionality work working perfectly, working beautifully together, supporting each other. The way a church is supposed a group is supposed to function. And that’s the way a church is supposed to function. Do you remember in 1 Corinthians 12 when the apostle Paul says the spirit gives you know gifts to his people as he chooses severally as he will and then it describes the gifts of a of the spiritual gifts that’s given to a congregation and it describes all of that as the body of Christ and it gives a powerful analogy there because each person. Each person is a functioning member of that body who works necessary part of that body to without without that person the body wouldn’t be complete.

You know the his analogy is eyes and ears and feet. You know that those analogies work far better for a local congregation than they do for the church universal. I mean because we are arms and legs and ears. after all of man and the church universal were probably like you know molecules or little we’re down in the cellular level. So but but the analogy is functioning being able to work together to the necessity and the foolishness of thinking you can do without it that that’s basically what he says. And there he says, you know, the one person in the in that group in 1 Corinthians 12:21, he says, “I have no need of you. I’m an independent guy. I can take care of myself. I I’m I don’t need anybody else.” Good old American independence. We have lots of that. We are we we’re we don’t understand the blessings of the unity of the congregation and the necessity for it.

Images of Blessing and Life

But it’s the end. It’s the goal of our salvation. The the church is the bride of Christ. And the bride of Christ is the culmination, you know, the cul ation of salvation when the the whole whole saving process. Where do you see that in the in the Bible? It’s it’s when the day comes for the bridal feast of the lamb. You see, that’s the church. That’s the union of the church and Jesus Christ. And it’s the culmination of salvation. This is the end of all of church is far more important than you think. It’s it’s incredibly important and it’s important for us in the New Testament. The the emphasis is always plural when we get commands or exhortations or blessings. I don’t know if you realize it’s almost always plural. Hardly ever do you see something singular You don’t have you don’t have you know lone ranger saints in the Bible.

Everybody works together in a unity and and and community. In fact, the word saint, I think it’s used 64 times in the New Testament in the plural saints. One time it’s used singular. And that’s as a command to the in a command to the congregation to greet each saint. You see the idea of unity and working together and the in the in the way the body is to work together. It’s fitting. It’s beautiful. It works in in such an appropriate way and it’s necessary and it’s necessary for us because we think that we’re strong and we’re spiritual and we can get off on our own and do as we please and still be honoring to God. But the reality is probably far different than that. In fact, we live in an incredibly hostile world. We live in a world that is is pretty hostile.

Well, The psalm says it’s like the precious oil upon the head coming down upon the beard. This is what this functioning in the body is like. The unity working together. It’s like the precious oil. The picture is the first high priest Aaron being anointed with the oil that that special oil that the recipe is given in Leviticus. And I think it’s a little bit and and it’s fragrant spicy oil that’s used just for this purpose and for the anointing of the priest and it’s poured out lavishly on Aaron’s head and it flows down over Aaron over his beard over his collar down over his his robe lavish rich frag. wonderful his anointing. The emphasis is on Aaron the priest. The picture is of the anointed one looking forward to the one who is the anointed one. You know Christ means anointed. It’s a blessing. What an incredible blessing if you were there and to feel the fragrance of that oil as it was poured out. It’d be unique. It’d be unusual. It’d be wonderful. And to and see the blessing of the institution of a priesthood which means salvation for his people ultimately provision for salvation. That’s a blessing. It’s rich. It’s wonderful. Produces the harmony, the the the working together.

It’s like the dew of Herman coming down upon the mountains of Zion. It’s a beautiful picture. Mount Herman in the north part of the kingdom was a mountain that’s 9,000 that’s more than 9,000 ft high. And around the cap there’s always clouds. There’s always a lot of moisture coming down from the mountain. The the valley below is desert or would be desert except the moisture coming down makes it a a rich garden. Beautiful picture of blessing. The outpouring of such of of of all this moisture, all this life. It’s bless. It’s a picture of blessing poured out. That’s what this fellowship is like. You see, It’s like that desert. It’s harsh. It’s hard to comprehend how wicked this world is. We get caught up in it and enjoy the wickedness. That’s how how awful it is. You can be it can pull you away. It’s a harsh place for Christians to live. They don’t survive in this wilderness.

Surviving in a Harsh World

I a I read had a beautiful illustration this this past week. It was had to do with the the the the Antarctica, this polar ice cap in Antarctica and the conditions there. You know, six months out of the year it’s total darkness and the winds get up to sometimes 100 miles an hour real often. 65 mph wind. That would be comfortable, wouldn’t it? The the temperature in the wintertime regularly drops to 70° below zero. How’d you like to live there? Pretty harsh. Can Can you imagine anything living there? Well, that’s where emperor penguins make their home. They live there. You take one emperor or penguin and send him out on his own, not going to survive. Know they group together by the hundreds and thousands and they they form a tight group and that those harsh winds blow and the temperature is incredible.

But together there’s warmth. In the center of those groups of penguins, the temperature gets up to as much as 100 degrees. you know, they’re warm on the inside there and the in and the inside of that group. Now, these guys are on the periphery. So, something interesting happens with the group and they they rotate. They move in. And so, some the warmest ones move to the outside, the coldest ones move to the inside. And a slow, very beautiful dance. It’s like it’s choreographed. If you can look up this sometime on I’m sure you can find it on YouTube where they do a time lapse of watching that group. It’s it’s beautiful to watch the group together is the protection.

Ephesians chapter 6, when you see the armor of the saints, we look at that passage and we think of this as individual things for us. But you look at the passage again today and you’ll see all the we it’s our armor. It’s our armor. We pray for the saints. The look at it’s it’s corporate. And the point of using all that Roman armor, the picture of that isn’t so that we go off armored singlehanded. The Roman soldiers never did that. If they did, they didn’t survive. They came together exactly in a failax. They came together and they had their patterns to make their all their shields. into a tortoise shell that covered them over so that they could they could take on that reign of countless arrows and not and not feel the point of them. It’s it’s powerful picture but you don’t do that. It’s not separate.

Moving from Independence to Interdependence

We we get confused about things like you know we don’t want to be dependent, we want to be independent. But we we fall short of the whole picture. See, when you think about that, you have a baby and we know something about babies in our family. You know, you have a baby and you pro provide it milk and you spoon feed them and you change their diapers and they’re dependent on everything and they grow up and as they get a little older they become slightly more independent and then as they get into their young adult years they grow into some significant independence and that’s a good thing. We want those that to happen don’t we? And who wants to be dependent? Nobody. You don’t want to be like a baby. You want to be independent. But we don’t want to stop with adolescence. No, there’s something more. more mature than independence and that is interdependence.

Interdependence is higher and better than independence. It’s where you are using your giftedness and and the blessings that God gives you to strengthen other people and at the same time you benefit from them. You’re far far stronger far stronger than any than you could ever be in any other way. Now, that’s a higher level. That’s what God calls us to. God calls us to community. A community where we come in as sinners who need grace, find love in community, and we find other things because we’re with other sinners. The church is a hospital after all. And yet, here is the spirit of God and the giftedness of God and And when it works, and it does work, it’s incredible. It’s it’s strengthening. It’s empowering. And it gives us all all that we need to serve God to worship him and bring glory to him. We strengthen one another. It’s a beautiful, beautiful, beautiful thing. We can’t live Christians really without it. We need it. It’s precious to us.

Well, there’s an awful lot of points that I’m not going to say today, but I do want us to think about this. I want us to unwrap this little present and appreciate it. If we appreciate it, we will value it and protect it you know one of the bicycle companies Van Moof you familiar with the Dutch bicycle company Van Mouth I don’t know he knows all the bicycle companies of honey they were they were shipping out their bicycles and they got most so many of them were damaged in shipping that it got it got to be a real problem and they noticed that their Their bicycle case was about the same size as a flat screen TV case. And so what they did is they printed a picture of a flat screen TV on the box and the damage fell by 80%. Because if you think something is valuable, you’ll protect it, you’ll look after it.

Valuing and Protecting the Church

See the church of Jesus Christ. It’s precious. It’s precious to Christ. We should value it because Christ does. The church of Jesus Christ is wonderful because it protects us in the body. It protects us. We need it. It is a means of grace for us. Yes. For our spiritual growth, but it is what we’re saved into. It is an end of our salvation as well. It is precious. to us. Let’s value it and let’s make the most of it. And since we are such a community, let’s learn to live and within the responsibilities of this community. I’m going to stop here and and begin celebrate the Lord’s table this morning. It’s a little over. I’m sorry. But I think we can we still have time to do that and we’re going downstairs to share a fellowship time together which is part of the church. Let’s ask God’s blessing on his word today and on the elements and this time of sharing that we have…

Father we thank you for the preciousness of your word. We thank you for the work of salvation that you’ve done for us. We thank you for making us part of your family, the family of God. Your holy temple, precious stones building up the edifice of your house. The body of Christ, the limbs, the organs, the parts of the body. You you take us and make us into that. You you take us and make us part of your very family. the the bride of Christ, Father, it’s more than we can comprehend. It is so precious to us and we don’t even know the half of it. We ask Lord that you grow us in our understanding of our salvation and the community that you’re calling us into or have called us into and help us, Father, to live up to all the all the all the blood live up to the to the full blessing of interdependence in Jesus Christ. Help us with this, Lord. Bless us, I pray. Thank you for your mercies and bless us, we pray in Christ’s name. Amen.