Neal Pollard
In 1997, the Cold Harbor Road church of Christ in Mechanicsville, Virginia, where I was preaching, started a Bible lectureship. The theme selected was “The Bible Doctrine of Unity.” Such men as the now deceased Bobby Duncan, Garland Elkins, David Sain, Perry Cotham, James Watkins, Maxie Boren, along with many more, addressed Bible contexts and subjects that encouraged unity, God’s way.
I wrote the foreword (misspelled “forward”) for the lectureship book which is now out of print (some brethren have made it available digitally; the link is at the end of this article). In our age of continual division, we benefit from the powerful, persistent message of Scripture to hold unity as a precious thing. Truly, unity is pleasant (Ps. 133), to be preserved (Eph. 4:1-3), is patterned (John 17:20-21), and is prescribed (1 Cor. 1:10-13). Please consider the words I wrote back then in light of what is going on today:
Rugged individualism, alternate lifestyles, multiculturalism, and the age of tolerance are the tainted springs of the world. From such all-accepting ideologies flow streams coursing violently through the continent of our culture. The unity for which Christ prayed and died seems stranded over on the opposite bank of righteousness. At times, it is scarcely visible due to the overflow of society’s sins.
The final plea of the Christ, in thinking about disciples even yet unborn, was that “they all may be one…” (John 17:21). Pleasant and good in the sign of the Lord is unity based upon what God has taught and revealed (d. Psalm 133:1). The divine pattern has laid out the command for oneness upon the foundation of God’s word (d. Ephesians 4:1-13; 1 Corinthians 3:11). One of, if not the greatest of the scourges of, denominationalism is that it fosters and promotes the very division God hates and Christ longed for believers to· avoid. Division hurts the cause of Christ.
Disunity so hurt a congregation earlier in this century that the church, now two warring factions, would not meet together for worship. They worshipped in the same building at different times on Sunday. Because of their geographical location, coal was the fuel of choice during the winter months. But, how would they determine if the coal was being equitably distributed? With uncharacteristic cordiality, they formed separate coal piles. Each group would use only their respective pile of coal. A boy from the neighborhood, having heard of this schism, somehow got possession of the letters from the church sign and posted this message: “One Lord, One Faith, One Baptism– And Two Coal Piles!” (McCord)
From an obscure incident during the Restoration Movement comes an attitude, the courage of one man, that all Christians should desire to possess. Over petty differences, a congregation was divided on some opinion. In the heat of infighting, the leader of one faction gathered his followers to sit on the left side of the building. Another brother, likewise, gathered his cronies to the right side. There they sat, fuming and glaring at one another. One brother had lingered outside, but now entered the auditorium with a folding chair under his arm. The two divided leaders each asked him to join their side of the building. He unfolded the chair, sat, and exclaimed, “Everyone who is on the Lord’s side meet here in the middle.” A church was saved from division by a brother’s ability to know the difference between faith and opinion.
It is sinful to make God’s laws incidental in the name of compromise, as it is wrong to equate incidentals as being on par with God’s laws. Unity requires a great many things, while it prohibits a great many others. Thus, in an age where division is glorified by the world, urged by false teachers, accepted and tolerated by too many, and a cause of stumbling to precious souls, there is a dire need for renewed instruction about the Bible doctrine of unity. God sets forth His expectations for unity, but He also gives, through His word, guidelines and an outline to assure the possibility for its accomplishment.
The fine work and research done by the brethren whose written materials comprise this lectureship book, whose zeal and clarity in presentation are so appreciated, will serve the reader well in ascertaining the importance that we be one and know that oneness is acceptable to the God who sent His Son to make religious unity a reality. His death caused the end for the need of religious division (d. Ephesians 2:14). It is man that has reconstructed the faulty walls of religious division.
May we be encouraged to present the clear lines of fellowship drawn by God (d. I John 1:7, II John 9-11) and call the lost and erring to live therein. Our prayer is that this is one step, however small, in that direction.
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