God has always desired his people to be unified. Psalm 133 extols the beauty and sanctity of unity. Jesus prayed for all those who believe in him to be unified (John 17:21–23). The apostles sought unity in the church when grumbling arose between the Hellenistic and Hebraic Jews (Acts 6:1–6) and when Gentiles became followers of Christ (Acts 15:1–31).
As important as unity is for the people of God today, it is also elusive. Especially as the culture divides around us, it is easier to articulate our differences than our similarities. As my father once remarked when leaving church one Sunday:
“They are on the same page but seem to be reading different books.”
He was relatively new to the faith and trying to understand the different expressions of Christianity. Particularly perplexing were the liberal and conservative Protestants. Both used words like “mission,” “justice,” and even “Jesus,” but it was clear their definitions were not the same. To use his metaphor, they were on the “same page” by agreeing these words were important, but the meanings they had for these words were so far apart that they seemed to be coming from “different books.”
In my role as a professor at a mainline denominational seminary, I encounter this regularly. I often have students who come from different places theologically and can easily talk past each other because of this. Worse yet, they can begin judging each other, labeling each other as unfaithful to Jesus for what they believe.
How do we strive for unity in the body of Christ when we live in a pluralistic context in which there are people who claim the same faith as we do while also disagreeing with how we understand that faith? I have found that there are two parts to answering this question: 1) Develop a common baseline. 2) Learn what questions they are asking.
Develop a Common Baseline
In my introductory evangelism course, I point out that all people who claim to be Christian agree on at least five points:
- God exists.
- God is good.
- God desires to share that goodness with others through Jesus Christ.
- God communicates that this goodness is available through Jesus Christ.
- God calls people to participate in the work of communicating this good news.
Christians differ on how to interpret these points, especially because different theologies emphasize different aspects of God’s goodness. Our instinct is often to compare the relative importance of the good gifts God gives us through Jesus. Rather, we can build on these differences by developing a more robust common baseline.
For example, God wants to feed the hungry, comfort the lonely, and offer eternal hope to the dying. God also wants to heal the sick, calm the stressed, and forgive the sinner. This is why Jesus said he came that we might have “life abundantly” (John 10:10). God’s blessing of abundant life overflows into our standard of living (physical needs) and quality of life (mental and relational needs) in this world, as well as offering us the hope of eternal life.
I have never known a conservative Christian to deny that God wants the hungry to be fed. Indeed, I know many conservative churches that are active in feeding ministries. Likewise, I have never known a liberal Christian who did not want to offer eternal hope in the face of death. Indeed, I have heard rousing sermons about the resurrection in churches adorned with rainbow flags.
Here’s the point: On the ground, when it comes to sharing a basic witness for the goodness of God through Jesus Christ, Christians across the theological and political spectra all lay claim to demonstrating the abundant life of God in very similar ways. It is worth remembering this in the midst of our disagreements and challenge ourselves to develop a more robust common baseline for describing God’s all-encompassing gift of salvation.
What Questions Are They Asking?
When we encounter different theological formulations from our own, we tend to evaluate them based on their truth claims. Do we agree with who they say God is, what God is doing in the world, and how God calls us to respond? As we have seen above, we probably can agree with them on more than we thought. Even what we disagree with, we might come to appreciate if we can focus on their questions rather than their statements.
All theological claims come from Christians trying to make sense of the world in light of their faith. They do this by asking questions. Chief among these questions is: How can I believe in the abundant life of Christ given what I am experiencing right now?
Since no two people have the same life experiences, it is not surprising that Christians frame this question differently. For example, while wealthier Western Christians ask about abundant life in terms of eternal security, many African and Latin American Christians ask about what abundant life looks like when they are enduring poverty and deprivation right now. Both questions are entirely reasonable.
Learning about the questions behind other Christians’ claims does two things for us: First, it humbles us. Rather than thinking we have everything worked out theologically, it reminds us that other Christians around the world are doing their best to honor and explain how God is at work in their contexts—just like we are. Their experiences, questions, and insights are just as valid as ours. Second, it helps us expand our own theological wisdom by giving us new questions we can wrestle with that our experiences would not have prompted us to ask. This allows us to develop a larger, more nuanced understanding of who God is and how God is offering abundant life in the world. Even if we end up disagreeing with the claims made by the other Christians, we can still be theologically richer for appreciating the insights their questions raise for us.
In the end, to modify my father’s analogy, we may find that we actually have been reading the same book but while wearing different types of glasses that have only allowed us to see certain parts of what is on the page. Some of those things—like the words we use—are the same. The definitions are not. By seeing things through each other’s glasses, we may still disagree, but we can at least appreciate why we have come to see things differently in good faith, and so work toward greater unity in the body of Christ before a watching world.