Creed
Jesus’ only explicit command was this: “A new command I give you: Love one another … By this all men will know that you are [Christians], if you love one another” (John 13:34-5). Jesus prayed to His Father “that all [Christians] may be one … so that the world may believe that You have sent me … May [Christians] be brought to complete unity to let the world know that You sent me and have loved them even as You have loved me.” (John 17:21,23)
The Common Creed of Christianity:
The Vast Common Faith of (Eastern and Western) Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, and (Western) Conservative/ Evangelical Protestant Christianity (and ‘Messianic Judaism’ [1]) Which is the Basis for Christian Unity in Our Diversity “So That The World May Believe”
the One God, Creator of the Universe, who is Love, exists as a Trinity of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit; the Incarnation (enfleshment) of God the Son in Jesus Christ through Mary’s Virgin Birth, making Jesus fully God and fully man, able to make Atonement for the sins of all humanity, which He did by dying on the Cross and rising from the dead so that humanity can be forgiven and saved (and find human fulfillment) through Him; we acquire this forgiveness from sin and salvation unto eternal life through, drawn and empowered by God’s Grace, our turning away from sin (anti-love), accepting what Jesus has done for us and coming into loving, saving relationship with Him (and His Father and Holy Spirit) through belief and baptism, as He taught (Mark 16:16), which makes us members of the one Body of Christ the Church; Jesus’ literal Resurrection and Ascension into Heaven; Jesus’ future return in glory and judgement and the bodily resurrection of all the dead; the tenets of traditional Christian morality (described in the 10 Commandments and the Sermon on the Mount, among other passages of Scripture) as how to be loving and so how to please the God who is Love; the inspiration and inerrancy[2] of the Holy Scriptures which testify to all these things.
This above “common creed” encapsulates the core of the Gift of Truth God gave to the world for its salvation, it encapsulates the essential or fundamental Christian teaching of all the Ecumenical (worldwide) and other major Councils of the Undivided Early Christian Church, Councils which the Catholic Church (in its Western and Eastern Rites or ‘Sister Churches’) and the Eastern Orthodox Churches consider to have established the irrevocable norms of Christian faith in the early centuries of Christianity, and it also encapsulates all the details of the early 20th Century “Fundamentals” tract series which began the Protestant Fundamentalist movement as well as the details usually included in the many conservative and Evangelical Protestant creedal “statements of faith” (the early 20th Century Protestant Fundamentalist and Evangelical movements were “doctrinally conservative,” orthodox responses to the huge “doctrinally liberal” or unorthodox trend within the earlier Protestant “mainline” churches). Those Protestant “mainline” denominations and congregations which are going increasingly “doctrinally liberal” or unorthodox may or may not still preserve with certainty all of these ancient fundamental beliefs of orthodox Christianity (orthodoxy means “right teaching,” as opposed to unorthodox or heretical teaching). The above common Christian beliefs are the wonderful, life-changing, saving truths of Christianity which “turned the world upside down” in barbaric times and transformed the ancient world with God’s Love, truths which still make Catholic, Orthodox, and Conservative/ Evangelical Protestant Christians (and ‘Messianic Jews’) brothers and sisters in Christ Jesus and most certainly instruments of God’s salvation in the world (despite our misunderstandings and disagreements over some of our different secondary doctrines, differences which each side sees in the light of the above common fundamentals we are already agreed on).
The “Doctrinally Liberal” Streams of the Protestant “Mainline” Denominations Which Do Not (Or Do Not with Certainty) Hold All of the above “Common Creed” Still Have Basis for Dialogue but Lack the Extremely Profound Basis of Unity of the above Churches
I do not wish to simply write off the huge “doctrinally liberal” portion of historical or “mainline” Protestant Christianity, especially since many self-described “liberal” Christians are not actually unorthodox or heretical but simply not as certain about the Christian fundamentals as they should be. Many “liberals” have genuine saving Christian faith in Jesus and personal loving relationship with Him; many are genuinely in touch with the above orthodox Christian Mysteries with their proven historic power to transform lives and societies for the better, despite the modern confusion of many others within their churches mostly thanks to certain unfortunate 16th to 18th Century ideas of the Protestant Reformation and Enlightenment eras. Nevertheless, the lack of absolute certainty about all the above traditional, essential, fundamental tenets of spiritually powerful, historically world-changing, orthodox Christianity even at the highest denominational level means the “liberal” mainline Protestant churches lack the solid major foundation towards re-building Christian unity which the Catholic, Orthodox, and Conservative/ Evangelical Protestant churches possess, and thus my books and materials which promote the rebuilding of Christian unity in diversity as in the Undivided Early Church are addressed primarily to these churches which are currently formally separated but which are already most profoundly united in the above common saving Christian faith (whereas Protestant “liberals” have no consistency even amongst themselves, as to which bits of historic and powerful Christianity they will accept or reject). It is my hope that as the Catholic, Orthodox, and doctrinally conservative Protestant/ Evangelical Christian churches which are confident about the above traditional Christian orthodoxy gradually unite in ever more beautiful loving expressions of Christian unity in diversity modeled after the Undivided Early Church (even while our formal divisions remain), that the “doctrinally liberal” Protestant churches which question, doubt, or outright deny fundamental aspects of traditional Christian faith will become ‘jealous’ and will consider once again embracing traditional Christian orthodoxy with certainty in order to be part of this beautiful and enriching communion Jesus intended for His Body the Church (and I hope that the many more-or-less “nominal” or “in-name-only” members of all fundamentally orthodox Christian churches, members who have been unduly influenced by the greater culture’s secularist ideas and lifestyles, will similarly become motivated to really practice their church’s orthodox Christian faith).
Reversing Satan’s Victory Against the Church’s Unity
(adapted from the Forward to So That The World May Believe)
Jesus prayed “that all [Christians] may be one. . .so that the world may believe“ (John 17:21)
In His prayer in John 17:21-23, Our Lord Jesus linked the world’s belief in Him to the unity of Christians, and indeed, the most phenomenal Christian missionary successes ever occurred in the First Millennium of the Undivided Early Church, wherein the brutal ancient pagan world was “turned upside down” and whole societies were transformed by the Love of Jesus Christ, the portions of the ancient cultures which embraced Jesus becoming the different but mutually enriching ‘Sister Churches’ which together made up the one Universal Church of Jesus Christ which thus collectively called itself the Catholic Church, Catholic being Greek for Universal (this early Catholic/ Universal Church initially was made up of members of the Jewish, Syrian, Egyptian, Roman and Greek cultures) .
Satan’s most victorious counter-attack against this one Bride and Body of Jesus Christ, the Church, was to get most Christians from all of the currently divided sides to forget that for a thousand years the Undivided Early Church was one Universal (Catholic) Communion of different orthodox Christian ‘Sister Churches,’ united in the fundamental tenets of traditional, orthodox, personally-saving and world-transforming Christian faith which the different Sister Churches had precisely clarified and defined together (against many heretical challenges to it), at the Early Ecumenical (worldwide) Councils of all the different Sister Churches which each theologized about and celebrated their common Christian faith in different ways.
The greatest monument to Satan’s greatest victory against the Christian Church is the very notion, still rampant among today’s divided Christian Churches, that other Christians’ differences in theology (the study of what God has revealed, not Divine Revelation itself) and differences in practice are “automatically” inferior or wrong, even when those other Christians still share the Undivided Early Universal (Catholic) Church’s clearly articulated fundamentals of faith in just what God has revealed in the Living Word of God, Jesus Christ, the fully Divine yet also fully human Second Person of the Holy Trinity who is Love, who lives in our hearts, and in the Written Word of God, the Bible. The vicious wound Satan has inflicted upon the Christian Church today is seen in a Christian Church which is profusely divided mostly over the kinds of things which did not divide, but mutually enriched, the Undivided Early Church’s Universal (Catholic) Communion of different orthodox Christian ‘Sister Churches.’ Today Christians typically cannot even see that the very few actually substantial misunderstandings and disagreements between most of today’s divided churches are relatively small, since most of the different sides see their distinct lesser doctrines in the light of their vast common, saving Christian faith – that essential, fundamental faith of the Undivided Early Church (listed above), which gives us an exceptionally strong basis for real, loving dialogue towards eventually finding mutually agreed-on resolutions to our current disputes, and towards the long-term reunification Jesus wishes for His Body the Church “so that the world may believe.”
Ask yourself these questions: Do I usually assume other Christian churches/ denominations/ movements/ groups than mine are inferior or wrong wherever they differ from mine, usually without bothering to find out if they affirm the same traditional essentials of saving Christian faith that I do, and usually without bothering to really try to understand their different secondary doctrines and practices and just how those other Christians see their differences as consistent with the same fundamentals of Christian faith that I hold? Do I ever consider that other Christian churches than mine might better preserve at least certain aspects or characteristics of the Undivided Early Church than mine does, such that we can learn from and enrich each other as did the Undivided Early Church’s different Sister Churches? Do I actively seek and pray for the loving Christian unity Jesus prayed for “so that the world may believe”? If the answer is “yes” to the first question and “no” to the last two, as is very common, then your attitude is part of Satan’s victory in keeping the Body of Christ divided and thus much less effective than it should be against the Kingdom of Darkness Jesus Christ our Head came to conquer with His Love.
This website hopes, by God’s Grace, to be the antidote to such attitudes. This website (particularly in its 3-Volume ‘textbook’ on Ecumenism entitled So That The World May Believe) offers real hope for the long-term resolution of the current misunderstandings and disputes between the various Catholic, Orthodox, Protestant (and even “Messianic Jewish”) churches which already share a vast treasure of the Undivided Early Church’s saving Christian faith and which already resemble the Undivided Early Church’s different but united ‘Sister Churches,’ as will be easily seen once the habits of uncharitable and divisive thinking Satan has successfully sown in the Church are finally abandoned. This website and the free books herein contain many prayerful conclusions of my scholarly research of the history of God’s People from Adam, lovingly made by the God who is Love, to Jesus Christ the “New Adam,” to His Body the Church since, from the Undivided First Millennium through to the Protestant Reformation and on to today’s Ecumenical Movement (and Vatican Council II’s exceptional but largely unknown contributions to it). Particularly in the three-volume book So That The World May Believe I offer many suggestions of how to best understand that long family history of God’s People from Adam to today, and I offer several practical suggestions towards re-instituting the lost unity in diversity of the Undivided Early Church “so that the world may believe.”
If some readers afterwards still disagree with my suggestions of just how the Christian unity Jesus prayed for might one day actually be accomplished, I will have succeeded in my main purpose if they at least have been motivated to pray for the unity Jesus prayed for and motivated to lovingly dialogue with other Christians than “their group.” I will have succeeded in my main purpose if readers are motivated to think about unity in diversity like the Undivided Early Church lived it, motivated to regularly think about re-establishing unity and motivated to talk about it with their Christian brothers and sisters in different churches, different denominations, different movements and other different groups, “so that the world may believe” according to Jesus’ prayer for us. The loving brotherly attitudes towards each other on the basis of our vast common faith are more important than immediate agreement as to just how we should proceed towards practically reuniting the Church, because full reunification will certainly take very many years however it proceeds, but living Jesus’ command to “love one another” so that the world may know we are really Christians (John 13:34-35) is something that we can start doing NOW, so that RIGHT NOW we can really start to display Jesus’ Love in the world through our unity in love as Christians, His Body. We must first master unity in love even while our formal divisions remain, before any serious attempt at formal reunification can begin, “so that the world may believe” as Jesus prayed.
The First Step to the “Complete Unity” (John 17:23) Jesus Desires for His Church Is in Fundamentally Orthodox Christians (Eastern & Western Catholic; Eastern Orthodox; Western Conservative/Evangelical Protestant; ‘Messianic Jews’) Seeking and Mastering Unity in Visible Love for Each Other on the Basis of Their Vast Common Faith Even While the Formal Divisions over Unresolved Lesser Issues Remain
From So That The World May Believe Volume III Chapter 7
To aid this first goal of loving each other for the love of our Lord and for the love of the world He loves, in the 21st Ecumenical Council (Vatican II), the Catholic Church has officially declared at its highest level of authority (cited fully in Volume III Chapter 3) that
“[non-Catholic] Christians are indeed in some real way joined to us [Catholic Christians] in the Holy Spirit,” “and the Catholic Church accepts them with respect and affection as brothers” because “it remains true that all who have been justified by faith in baptism [see Mark 16:16] are incorporated into Christ; they therefore have a right to be called Christians, and with good reason are accepted as brothers by the children of the Catholic Church.”
So, as indicated in Volume III Chapter 3, despite some Catholics unfortunately still having to “catch up” with their Church on this point, the huge Catholic Church now officially models the loving ecumenical attitude all churches need in order for Jesus’ prayer for Christian unity to ever be granted, that even though “our” Church denomination (whichever it is) believes that “other” churches which do not agree with some of our secondary doctrines and practices are missing something, those “other churches”
“have been by no means deprived of significance and importance in the mystery of salvation. For the Spirit of Christ has not refrained from using them as means of salvation,” [other Christian churches than “ours” indeed have] “access to the communion of salvation.”
And therefore harshly critical and unloving attitudes towards other Christians with whom we already share so much are not appropriate Christian attitudes, and indeed, they are attitudes which cripple the effectiveness of the one Body of Christ the Church in the world by masking the love of Jesus in us.
As we continue to seek the fullness of the Holy Spirit of love, Catholic Christians (Eastern and Western) and non-Catholic Christians (Eastern Orthodox and Western Protestant/Evangelical Christians united in the same vast common and fundamental Christian beliefs, including ‘Messianic Jews’) will gradually get better and better at truly loving and ecumenical attitudes towards each other, attitudes which will greatly aid the Christian mission to the world which will then more easily see Christian love “for one another” long before we even get close to the formal structural Church reunification which we must take to be part of Jesus’ prayer for our “complete unity” (John 17:23). We must first strive to master the unity in visible love for each other even while we remain formally divided into separate churches and church communions, which must be the first step before we ever even attempt full formal Church reunification (as different ‘Sister Churches’ in one Universal Christian Communion, following the Undivided Early Church model described in detail in So That The World May Believe Volumes I and III). The closer we fundamentally orthodox Christians, whether Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, or Protestant/Evangelical (or ‘Messianic Jewish’), get to first unity in visible love and later to full formal reunification, the world will more and more take notice of the sublime beauty of the Christian Church as we come closer together as one loving worldwide Christian family like Jesus prayed for, devoid of the hatred, ignorance and judgments of the past. Not only will the unbelieving world take notice of our beauty; those “doctrinally liberal” or unorthodox Christians (liberal Protestants and those of the “Lesser” Eastern Churches), upon seeing those Catholic, Orthodox, and Protestant/Evangelical churches which are already united in the above vast common fundamentals of traditional, orthodox Christian faith, start to really “love one another as [Christ] has loved [them]” (John 13:34) and display all the more supernaturally-life-changing power and Christian beauty in the world, the deficiencies of their unorthodoxy will become all the more apparent to them and ideally they will become jealous of the beautiful unity of the orthodox Christian churches, and seek to become more orthodox themselves so they may join this wonderful communion in Christ’s love, adopted into the Loving Family of the Trinitarian God who is Love. Large numbers of liberal Protestant Christians are not so much unorthodox as they are lacking in the certainty they should have about the fundamentals of orthodox Christian faith, so these will be the most likely to adopt Christian orthodoxy when the gradually reunifying orthodox churches lose their hatred and bigotry over lesser-order differences, stop fighting and start loving each other so as to better display to all the beauty of orthodox Christianity.
Something similar happened in the 4th Century. There were large groups of “Semi-Arian” Christians, temporarily even the majority of Christians, who were uncertain whether to believe either
1) the orthodox position of Jesus’ full Divinity, “one in being with the Father,” defined, clarified and proclaimed by the 325 AD 1st Ecumenical Council at Nicea (as a function of the Church being the living Body of Christ) and championed by Alexandrian Catholic Patriarch Saint Athanasius (who was exiled 5 times by Arian Christian rulers for his orthodoxy though sheltered by the Roman Catholic Patriarch, the Pope) or
2) the heretical position of the Arian Christians, who denied the full Divinity of Jesus, and who claimed the Council had no authority to settle the dispute since the Bible on its own did not contradict the Arian heresy (with its sophisticated and thorough use of Scripture) as the Council’s newly clarified traditional interpretation of the Bible did.
These uncertain Christians had often adopted a compromise “middle position” between the two and thus were called “Semi-Arians” by those who were firmly orthodox. The uncertain or in-between majority of “Semi-Arians” were eventually converted to orthodox Christianity, particularly through the ministry of Patriarch Saint Athanasius (who also first put together the New Testament Canon as we know it in 367 AD) and the later ministry of the “Cappodocian Fathers” (Saints Basil the Great, Gregory of Nanzianzen, and Gregory of Nyssa), who were able to articulate and explain and demonstrate the beauty of the orthodox position. Today’s “mainline” Protestant denominations (including the one I was raised in) have plenty of modern-day Arians who deny Jesus is God and even more modern-day “Semi-Arians” who are unsure if Jesus is God (the Catholic and Orthodox Churches do not have this problem, though as all churches in our highly secularized society they do suffer from “nominalism,” having many more or less “in name only” members). We must remember the victory of the Early Church over both paganism and over the Arian heresy (both of which have been revived in our day). Showing unorthodox, uncertain, or nominal Christians, and the whole unbelieving world, the beauty of essential Christian orthodoxy through our Christian “love for one another” because of it should become our goal as Christians, “so that the world may believe” (John 17:21).
© 2009 Peter William John Baptiste, SFO
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[1]This is a significant and important movement of Jewish Christianity, Jews who accept Jesus as Israel’s promised Messiah, which combines the Jewish and Protestant Christian traditions, including all the common Christian fundamentals, in an attempt to restore the lost Jewish cultural expression of Christianity which was practiced by all the first Christians, who were Jews. Within the Catholic Church there is a similar Association of Hebrew Catholics. Although the original “Jewish Rite” of Christianity died out after the destruction of Jerusalem and the scattering of the Jews by the Pagan Romans, it was not at all (as many Gentile Christian readers mistakenly assume) ended earlier by the Acts 15 Council of Jerusalem which simply stated that Gentiles did not need to become Jews in order to be Christians. Acts 16:1-5 and Acts 21:17-26 prove that Jewish Christians remained culturally Jewish Christians after the Acts 15 Council just as Gentile Christians started developing their own distinct legitimate cultural expressions of Christianity (which became the Roman, Greek, Syrian, and Egyptian Gentile Christian culturally-based ‘Sister’ Churches which together with the Jerusalem Church were known as the “Pentarchy” of Early Church Patriarchates or Provinces which together (at the Early Ecumenical Councils) clearly articulated and established the common fundamentals of traditional orthodox Christianity amid the turmoil of the early Christian controversies with heretics. Much more on the place of the Jewish Rite Christianity which is being newly re-established in our time will be found in various books published on this website (notably in The Bible’s ‘Big Picture’ and So That The World May Believe Volume I: Rediscovering the Early Church’s Unity in Diversity).
[2]Liberal Protestant Christianity questioned whether the Bible was wholly inspired by God and incapable of error (or inerrant), as traditionally affirmed, on the basis of some seeming contradictions between the Bible and science or history. Some late 19th Century Catholic “modernist” scholars took up these Liberal Protestant objections to the Bible’s inerrancy and so Biblical inerrancy was soundly reaffirmed for all Catholic Christians by Pope Leo XIII in 1893. A helpful ancient Christian principle is that Scripture is without error in all it intentionally affirms. Some critics of the Bible accuse the Bible of making errors in science. Though Scripture may occasionally incidentally use “scientific” terms common to the period in which it was written which were necessary for the original readers’ comprehension, in such cases the Scripture, a religious text, no more intends to affirm a scientific truth than a newspaper which declares what time the sunrise will be intends to affirm that the sun moves around the Earth and is therefore said to “rise.” The pre-Copernican terms of sunrise and sunset remain in common usage because they usefully describe the appearance of things relative to our Earth-bound position, even though they do not describe the now well-known scientific reality that the Earth moves around the sun and the sun is technically not “rising” at all. Making use of common terms is not an error. Other seeming problems with the Bible’s inerrancy disappear once one recognizes the literary form or genre a particular Bible passage was written in, and in many instances, later historical or archeological finds have proven the Bible historically accurate in places where critics had previously accused the Bible of being historically inaccurate.
By brotherunity 11:52 pm
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Tuesday, September 21, 2010
Monday, September 20, 2010
Another Individual's Proposal for Unity among Christians.
A Proposal For Unity: Introduction
August 4, 2007 One hundred and ninety-eight years ago this month, Thomas Campbell wrote the most influential man-made document in Restoration Movement history, known as the Declaration and Address of the Christian Association of Washington. In that document he appealed to all believers in Christ to drop their sectarian differences and to come together on the basis of the scriptures. The centerpiece of the document was a set of thirteen propositions on which he believed unity could be built. (I wrote a fifteen-article series of comments on these propositions in the early days of this blog.)
For the subsequent few decades, great progress was being made toward the vision of the elder Campbell. But by the time of the American Civil War, the movement had strayed from the unifying heart of the thirteen propositions. From that point forward, the movement fractured again and again over many issues. Not only did the Restoration Movement fail to unify all believers in Christ, but the movement could not even remain unified within itself.
I do not believe the fracturing of the movement had to happen. There was a lot of wisdom in those thirteen propositions (after all, they were drawn directly from Scripture!) which could have prevented the divisions.
I also believe we can still learn from the past and correct the course. The last chapter of this story has not yet been written. I hope that we can discern how to worship and to serve God according to our own consciences, while accepting others whose consciences perceive things differently from ours. And I hope we can discern how to treat one another with the respect that is appropriate toward one for whom Christ shed his blood.
Maybe I am excessively optimistic, but I believe I see early signs that many in the Restoration Movement are becoming ready for a more informed effort towards unity. At many centennial events, sincere men from different fragments of the movement met together to talk about what is needed for unity. In many of these cases, animosity has been left behind. One can see the beginning stages of respect. People are weary of the division.
So perhaps the time is right to make a modest proposal–or rather, a series of proposals. I intend to spend the next few weeks posting a series of articles proposing how we might move forward together toward unity. I want to frame these proposals loosely around the original thirteen propositions of Thomas Campbell. But I want to connect them to current realities in the various segments of the Restoration Movement. Perhaps, by studying these topics with the benefit of history, we can better understand what God would have us to do from this point forward.
The original thirteen propositions make a compelling case for a particular kind of unity. It is not unity based on perfect agreement on all topics, but rather a unity based on a common relationship with our Father in heaven, through our common Lord and Savior. It is a unity based on being adopted into the same divine family, on our mutually being sons of God by faith (Gal 3:26-27). It is a unity based on our common commitment to Jesus. It is a kind of unity that I think, today, many of us are ready to try. I think it is the unity for which Jesus prayed. Let’s see if we can find it together.
•Purpose
John 17: 21a May they all be one, as You, Father, are in Me and I am in You. (HCSB)
I write this blog in the hopes that it will contribute in some way to unity among Christians -- the kind of unity Jesus prayed for on the night he was betrayed.
Author: Alan Rouse
•Copyright
All works on this site are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution2.5 License
You are free to quote or "remix" this material as long as you tell where you got it. Attribution should include a link or url to the original article on this site, along with the author's name.
http://christianunityblog.net/2007/08/04/a-proposal-for-unity-introduction/
Basically ALL articles are covered by the fair use clause in the United States Copyright Act.
August 4, 2007 One hundred and ninety-eight years ago this month, Thomas Campbell wrote the most influential man-made document in Restoration Movement history, known as the Declaration and Address of the Christian Association of Washington. In that document he appealed to all believers in Christ to drop their sectarian differences and to come together on the basis of the scriptures. The centerpiece of the document was a set of thirteen propositions on which he believed unity could be built. (I wrote a fifteen-article series of comments on these propositions in the early days of this blog.)
For the subsequent few decades, great progress was being made toward the vision of the elder Campbell. But by the time of the American Civil War, the movement had strayed from the unifying heart of the thirteen propositions. From that point forward, the movement fractured again and again over many issues. Not only did the Restoration Movement fail to unify all believers in Christ, but the movement could not even remain unified within itself.
I do not believe the fracturing of the movement had to happen. There was a lot of wisdom in those thirteen propositions (after all, they were drawn directly from Scripture!) which could have prevented the divisions.
I also believe we can still learn from the past and correct the course. The last chapter of this story has not yet been written. I hope that we can discern how to worship and to serve God according to our own consciences, while accepting others whose consciences perceive things differently from ours. And I hope we can discern how to treat one another with the respect that is appropriate toward one for whom Christ shed his blood.
Maybe I am excessively optimistic, but I believe I see early signs that many in the Restoration Movement are becoming ready for a more informed effort towards unity. At many centennial events, sincere men from different fragments of the movement met together to talk about what is needed for unity. In many of these cases, animosity has been left behind. One can see the beginning stages of respect. People are weary of the division.
So perhaps the time is right to make a modest proposal–or rather, a series of proposals. I intend to spend the next few weeks posting a series of articles proposing how we might move forward together toward unity. I want to frame these proposals loosely around the original thirteen propositions of Thomas Campbell. But I want to connect them to current realities in the various segments of the Restoration Movement. Perhaps, by studying these topics with the benefit of history, we can better understand what God would have us to do from this point forward.
The original thirteen propositions make a compelling case for a particular kind of unity. It is not unity based on perfect agreement on all topics, but rather a unity based on a common relationship with our Father in heaven, through our common Lord and Savior. It is a unity based on being adopted into the same divine family, on our mutually being sons of God by faith (Gal 3:26-27). It is a unity based on our common commitment to Jesus. It is a kind of unity that I think, today, many of us are ready to try. I think it is the unity for which Jesus prayed. Let’s see if we can find it together.
•Purpose
John 17: 21a May they all be one, as You, Father, are in Me and I am in You. (HCSB)
I write this blog in the hopes that it will contribute in some way to unity among Christians -- the kind of unity Jesus prayed for on the night he was betrayed.
Author: Alan Rouse
•Copyright
All works on this site are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution2.5 License
You are free to quote or "remix" this material as long as you tell where you got it. Attribution should include a link or url to the original article on this site, along with the author's name.
http://christianunityblog.net/2007/08/04/a-proposal-for-unity-introduction/
Basically ALL articles are covered by the fair use clause in the United States Copyright Act.
Christian Unity Movement. Christian Unity Prayer Part 3 of 3.
Dear Sisters and Brothers in Christ, below is an excerpt from a Christian unity prayer. Please give it prayerful consideration and, if the Spirit leads, please pray this yourself and let us agree together in it, in prayer before the Lord.
CHRISTIAN UNITY PRAYER, PART 2 OF 25: "We Pray Together in the Name of Jesus, Who is the Full Measure of God’s Love Forever, to Whosoever Believeth, Regardless of Denomination"
In the precious name of our Lord Jesus Christ of Nazareth, our spirits unite in prayer to praise you, God, for Jesus is one with the one Spirit of God and with the one God of all power of whom the Bible says, “For there are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost: and these three are one” (1 John 5:7). When we say the name of Jesus, we speak the name of the glorious Son of God who is our only Christ and Savior. Heavenly Father, we seek by uniting in the name of Jesus, to do your will to declare to the world what is, as we understand it, everything in the name of Jesus (Note: the person, the cause, everything which the name covers, everything the thought or feeling of which is aroused in the mind by mentioning, hearing, remembering, knowing His rank, authority, interests, pleasure, command, excellences, unequaled gifts, and marvelous, miraculous deeds for the world to see. Refer to “name”, #3686, Strong’s Concordance).
In Jesus, we mean to speak the name of God’s precious, perfect, chosen vessel for sending the full measure of His love to the world, so that instead of perishing, any who choose to believe in Him, have eternal life as children of God forever, for the Bible says, “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life” (John 3:16). We are complete, Father, in worshipping the one Spirit of God in your Son, Jesus, for the Bible says, “For in him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily” (Col 2:9).
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Love in Jesus to All!
We cordially invite any interested Christian to read and pray the rest of this prayer, or just to come and talk with Christians of all backgrounds, on a Christian unity email discussion mailing list. We’d love to hear from you about any Christian topic at all, and especially to discuss any topic related to unity of all Christians, of all Christian denominations and groups. (Btw, non-Christian visitors are welcome too!) You can find info on the email discussion mailing list, which is called the “Christian Unity Conference” (CUC), or info about a combined effort on a larger prayer for Christian unity, part of which is shown above, called the “Christian Unity Prayer Project” (CUPP), by going to the following URL:
http://www.superior.net/~pjrcmr/prayerparts.html
As I have already said this prayer can be found in its entirety at the website mentioned above this sentence as well as finding more information at http://unitedchristianministry.com/index.html and http://home.swbell.net/twarlick/christianunityprophecy/cup_toc.htm as well as
www.spiritualchristianunity.org .
I originally intended on posting the whole prayer here yet I found it better to get on to the next topics concerning christian unity.
CHRISTIAN UNITY PRAYER, PART 2 OF 25: "We Pray Together in the Name of Jesus, Who is the Full Measure of God’s Love Forever, to Whosoever Believeth, Regardless of Denomination"
In the precious name of our Lord Jesus Christ of Nazareth, our spirits unite in prayer to praise you, God, for Jesus is one with the one Spirit of God and with the one God of all power of whom the Bible says, “For there are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost: and these three are one” (1 John 5:7). When we say the name of Jesus, we speak the name of the glorious Son of God who is our only Christ and Savior. Heavenly Father, we seek by uniting in the name of Jesus, to do your will to declare to the world what is, as we understand it, everything in the name of Jesus (Note: the person, the cause, everything which the name covers, everything the thought or feeling of which is aroused in the mind by mentioning, hearing, remembering, knowing His rank, authority, interests, pleasure, command, excellences, unequaled gifts, and marvelous, miraculous deeds for the world to see. Refer to “name”, #3686, Strong’s Concordance).
In Jesus, we mean to speak the name of God’s precious, perfect, chosen vessel for sending the full measure of His love to the world, so that instead of perishing, any who choose to believe in Him, have eternal life as children of God forever, for the Bible says, “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life” (John 3:16). We are complete, Father, in worshipping the one Spirit of God in your Son, Jesus, for the Bible says, “For in him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily” (Col 2:9).
***********************************************************
Love in Jesus to All!
We cordially invite any interested Christian to read and pray the rest of this prayer, or just to come and talk with Christians of all backgrounds, on a Christian unity email discussion mailing list. We’d love to hear from you about any Christian topic at all, and especially to discuss any topic related to unity of all Christians, of all Christian denominations and groups. (Btw, non-Christian visitors are welcome too!) You can find info on the email discussion mailing list, which is called the “Christian Unity Conference” (CUC), or info about a combined effort on a larger prayer for Christian unity, part of which is shown above, called the “Christian Unity Prayer Project” (CUPP), by going to the following URL:
http://www.superior.net/~pjrcmr/prayerparts.html
As I have already said this prayer can be found in its entirety at the website mentioned above this sentence as well as finding more information at http://unitedchristianministry.com/index.html and http://home.swbell.net/twarlick/christianunityprophecy/cup_toc.htm as well as
www.spiritualchristianunity.org .
I originally intended on posting the whole prayer here yet I found it better to get on to the next topics concerning christian unity.
Christian Unity Movement. Christian Unity Prayer Part 2 of 3.
Dear Sisters and Brothers in Christ, below is an excerpt from a Christian unity prayer. Please give it prayerful consideration and, if the Spirit leads, please pray this yourself and let us agree together in it, in prayer before the Lord.
CHRISTIAN UNITY PRAYER, PART 2 OF 25: "We Pray Together in the Name of Jesus, Who is the Full Measure of God’s Love Forever, to Whosoever Believeth, Regardless of Denomination"
In the precious name of our Lord Jesus Christ of Nazareth, our spirits unite in prayer to praise you, God, for Jesus is one with the one Spirit of God and with the one God of all power of whom the Bible says, “For there are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost: and these three are one” (1 John 5:7). When we say the name of Jesus, we speak the name of the glorious Son of God who is our only Christ and Savior. Heavenly Father, we seek by uniting in the name of Jesus, to do your will to declare to the world what is, as we understand it, everything in the name of Jesus (Note: the person, the cause, everything which the name covers, everything the thought or feeling of which is aroused in the mind by mentioning, hearing, remembering, knowing His rank, authority, interests, pleasure, command, excellences, unequaled gifts, and marvelous, miraculous deeds for the world to see. Refer to “name”, #3686, Strong’s Concordance).
In Jesus, we mean to speak the name of God’s precious, perfect, chosen vessel for sending the full measure of His love to the world, so that instead of perishing, any who choose to believe in Him, have eternal life as children of God forever, for the Bible says, “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life” (John 3:16). We are complete, Father, in worshipping the one Spirit of God in your Son, Jesus, for the Bible says, “For in him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily” (Col 2:9).
***********************************************************
Love in Jesus to All!
We cordially invite any interested Christian to read and pray the rest of this prayer, or just to come and talk with Christians of all backgrounds, on a Christian unity email discussion mailing list. We’d love to hear from you about any Christian topic at all, and especially to discuss any topic related to unity of all Christians, of all Christian denominations and groups. (Btw, non-Christian visitors are welcome too!) You can find info on the email discussion mailing list, which is called the “Christian Unity Conference” (CUC), or info about a combined effort on a larger prayer for Christian unity, part of which is shown above, called the “Christian Unity Prayer Project” (CUPP), by going to the following URL:
http://www.superior.net/~pjrcmr/prayerparts.html
By the way even IF you DON'T agree with the Christian Unity Prayer & other similar prayer petitions you are still asking for this each time that you pray the OUR FATHER;
Our Father, Who art in Heaven
Hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come,
thy will be done ON EARTH AS IT IS IN HEAVEN,
give us this day our daily bread,
and forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors,
and lead us not into temptation yet deliver us from evil,
for the kingdom, the power, and the glory are yours now and forever
Amen.
(Emphasis Added to state a point).
CHRISTIAN UNITY PRAYER, PART 2 OF 25: "We Pray Together in the Name of Jesus, Who is the Full Measure of God’s Love Forever, to Whosoever Believeth, Regardless of Denomination"
In the precious name of our Lord Jesus Christ of Nazareth, our spirits unite in prayer to praise you, God, for Jesus is one with the one Spirit of God and with the one God of all power of whom the Bible says, “For there are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost: and these three are one” (1 John 5:7). When we say the name of Jesus, we speak the name of the glorious Son of God who is our only Christ and Savior. Heavenly Father, we seek by uniting in the name of Jesus, to do your will to declare to the world what is, as we understand it, everything in the name of Jesus (Note: the person, the cause, everything which the name covers, everything the thought or feeling of which is aroused in the mind by mentioning, hearing, remembering, knowing His rank, authority, interests, pleasure, command, excellences, unequaled gifts, and marvelous, miraculous deeds for the world to see. Refer to “name”, #3686, Strong’s Concordance).
In Jesus, we mean to speak the name of God’s precious, perfect, chosen vessel for sending the full measure of His love to the world, so that instead of perishing, any who choose to believe in Him, have eternal life as children of God forever, for the Bible says, “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life” (John 3:16). We are complete, Father, in worshipping the one Spirit of God in your Son, Jesus, for the Bible says, “For in him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily” (Col 2:9).
***********************************************************
Love in Jesus to All!
We cordially invite any interested Christian to read and pray the rest of this prayer, or just to come and talk with Christians of all backgrounds, on a Christian unity email discussion mailing list. We’d love to hear from you about any Christian topic at all, and especially to discuss any topic related to unity of all Christians, of all Christian denominations and groups. (Btw, non-Christian visitors are welcome too!) You can find info on the email discussion mailing list, which is called the “Christian Unity Conference” (CUC), or info about a combined effort on a larger prayer for Christian unity, part of which is shown above, called the “Christian Unity Prayer Project” (CUPP), by going to the following URL:
http://www.superior.net/~pjrcmr/prayerparts.html
By the way even IF you DON'T agree with the Christian Unity Prayer & other similar prayer petitions you are still asking for this each time that you pray the OUR FATHER;
Our Father, Who art in Heaven
Hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come,
thy will be done ON EARTH AS IT IS IN HEAVEN,
give us this day our daily bread,
and forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors,
and lead us not into temptation yet deliver us from evil,
for the kingdom, the power, and the glory are yours now and forever
Amen.
(Emphasis Added to state a point).
Christian Unity Movement. Christian Unity Prayer Part 1 of 3.
Dear Sisters and Brothers in Christ, below is an excerpt from a Christian unity prayer. Please give it prayerful consideration and, if the Spirit leads, please pray this yourself and let us agree together in it, in prayer before the Lord.
CHRISTIAN UNITY PRAYER, PART 1 of 25: "Heavenly Father, Together in Prayer With All Our Sisters and Brothers in Christ, Of All Christian Denominations and Groups, We Enter Your Gates With Thanksgiving and Your Courts With Praise"
Heavenly Father, we unite here in prayer together with all our sisters and brothers in Christ, of all Christian churches, of all Christian denominations and groups, who will join with us in prayer because the Spirit of Jesus Christ is in us all, and the Bible says, “…Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his” (Romans 8:9). Together, Father, in your love for all your children in Christ, we lay these words upon the altar before the throne of God, which is in the hearts of all of us who know Jesus to be there.
Father, we enter into your “…gates with thanksgiving…” and into your “…courts with praise…” (Psalms 100:4); we are so thankful to you and bless your name. We pray to you who are the great, one, good God and Master of the universe and beyond, Giver of all good things, by whom was created the heavens and the earth, and all that in them is; beyond the laws of nature, beyond the understanding of the rules of man’s science that seem to relate things physical, one to another; beyond time itself, who always was, is now, and forever shall be the one Truth, Word, Way, Light and Life for the world.
The one Life, which is more than the body; which begins in Christ Jesus and continues through this life and into the next. The one life in which we fear no future and bear no burden of the past.
The one Light, which is given to man in Jesus alone, “to guide our feet into the way of peace” (Luke 1:79), “for it is not in man that walketh to direct his steps” (Jeremiah 10:23).
The one Way, which is right and the end of which is life without end, because for each of us there is some way, not it Jesus, that seems right to the fleshly mind, and “the end thereof are the ways of death” (Proverbs 16:25).
The one Word, which was with God in the beginning, and the Word which was God, in whom the three are one: God in heaven and God who walked the earth among men bringing the words of God with Him. Whose Spirit is with us still; who enters a willing heart in the name of Jesus, in the Father’s love for all His children, and seeks to show that person the loving Father’s gentle hand of guidance, correction, and blessings in love to His children, through His word in the Bible and in every day of each Christian’s life.
The one Truth who is all truth, though as we look about us in this world there appear to be many things true. But we know that all truth, both physical and spiritual, has but one source. All truth comes from you, Lord. Any knowledge of the truth, which we mere mortals may possess, is a gift. And we do thank you, Father, for the greatest gift of knowledge, which is the sure and certain knowledge of Jesus, the one Truth over the many.
***********************************************************
Love in Jesus to All!
We cordially invite any interested Christian to read and pray the rest of this prayer, or just to come and talk with Christians of all backgrounds, on a Christian unity email discussion mailing list. We’d love to hear from you about any Christian topic at all, and especially to discuss any topic related to unity of all Christians, of all Christian denominations and groups. (Btw, non-Christian visitors are welcome too!) You can find info on the email discussion mailing list, which is called the “Christian Unity Conference” (CUC), or info about a combined effort on a larger prayer for Christian unity, part of which is shown above, called the “Christian Unity Prayer Project” (CUPP), by going to the following URL:
This prayer can be found in its entirety at the following website;
http://www.superior.net/~pjrcmr/prayerparts.html
CHRISTIAN UNITY PRAYER, PART 1 of 25: "Heavenly Father, Together in Prayer With All Our Sisters and Brothers in Christ, Of All Christian Denominations and Groups, We Enter Your Gates With Thanksgiving and Your Courts With Praise"
Heavenly Father, we unite here in prayer together with all our sisters and brothers in Christ, of all Christian churches, of all Christian denominations and groups, who will join with us in prayer because the Spirit of Jesus Christ is in us all, and the Bible says, “…Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his” (Romans 8:9). Together, Father, in your love for all your children in Christ, we lay these words upon the altar before the throne of God, which is in the hearts of all of us who know Jesus to be there.
Father, we enter into your “…gates with thanksgiving…” and into your “…courts with praise…” (Psalms 100:4); we are so thankful to you and bless your name. We pray to you who are the great, one, good God and Master of the universe and beyond, Giver of all good things, by whom was created the heavens and the earth, and all that in them is; beyond the laws of nature, beyond the understanding of the rules of man’s science that seem to relate things physical, one to another; beyond time itself, who always was, is now, and forever shall be the one Truth, Word, Way, Light and Life for the world.
The one Life, which is more than the body; which begins in Christ Jesus and continues through this life and into the next. The one life in which we fear no future and bear no burden of the past.
The one Light, which is given to man in Jesus alone, “to guide our feet into the way of peace” (Luke 1:79), “for it is not in man that walketh to direct his steps” (Jeremiah 10:23).
The one Way, which is right and the end of which is life without end, because for each of us there is some way, not it Jesus, that seems right to the fleshly mind, and “the end thereof are the ways of death” (Proverbs 16:25).
The one Word, which was with God in the beginning, and the Word which was God, in whom the three are one: God in heaven and God who walked the earth among men bringing the words of God with Him. Whose Spirit is with us still; who enters a willing heart in the name of Jesus, in the Father’s love for all His children, and seeks to show that person the loving Father’s gentle hand of guidance, correction, and blessings in love to His children, through His word in the Bible and in every day of each Christian’s life.
The one Truth who is all truth, though as we look about us in this world there appear to be many things true. But we know that all truth, both physical and spiritual, has but one source. All truth comes from you, Lord. Any knowledge of the truth, which we mere mortals may possess, is a gift. And we do thank you, Father, for the greatest gift of knowledge, which is the sure and certain knowledge of Jesus, the one Truth over the many.
***********************************************************
Love in Jesus to All!
We cordially invite any interested Christian to read and pray the rest of this prayer, or just to come and talk with Christians of all backgrounds, on a Christian unity email discussion mailing list. We’d love to hear from you about any Christian topic at all, and especially to discuss any topic related to unity of all Christians, of all Christian denominations and groups. (Btw, non-Christian visitors are welcome too!) You can find info on the email discussion mailing list, which is called the “Christian Unity Conference” (CUC), or info about a combined effort on a larger prayer for Christian unity, part of which is shown above, called the “Christian Unity Prayer Project” (CUPP), by going to the following URL:
This prayer can be found in its entirety at the following website;
http://www.superior.net/~pjrcmr/prayerparts.html
Introductory post For Christian Unity Movement
Okay so first things first I am NOT a priest nor am I any other sort of pastor, deacon or any one with any other position in ANY Christian denomination which is to say that I am just an average individual whom feels that it is necessary to try to do something to help to restore unity among ALL Christians. Of course there are ALREADY websites and forums which have prayers for unity among Christians and one of them which I recently found is www.spiritualchristianunity.org . As of right now I have NOT found anything wrong with ANY of what they have posted, basically it gets 5 stars as a rating of the content on it much like the website entitled www.unitedchristianministry.com because those websites have NOT made ANY claims against ANY Christian denominations nor have they established conditions to being united with them. By the way the ONLY reason why I am starting this is because I strongly believe that it is WAY PAST time for the WHOLE CHURCH to RE-UNIFY. I am already aware that this will NOT be EASY however I feel that I must help to bring about a restoration of unity within the Church because Christians have been divided for WAY TOO LONG.
Christian Unity Movement.
Although there are ALREADY various websites which promote UNITY among CHRISTIANS I feel that I should at LEAST attempt to start a whole movement of people praying for CHRISTIAN UNITY while I will continue to make posts on this blog and I will be starting a new thread of posts which will focus on unity among CHRISTIANS of ALL denominations and it is rather likely to be my PRIMARY FOCUS for quite a while because I hope to start a whole movement of people praying for a restoration of unity among CHRISTIANS and I would like to emphasize the fact that this is ONLY a movement for unity among CHRISTIANS and not any sort of Inter-Religious movement or anything even remotely similar to that because Christianity is the ONLY TRUE FAITH.
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