A UW student recently asked this question for us to discuss: Why are there so many different Christian groups on campus? Aren’t we all supposed to believe the same thing? It’s a great question, but certainly not an easy one to answer.
The Goal is Unity
For those who are seeking to understand the heart of Jesus it’s important to stress how fundamental unity is for Jesus’ followers. His final prayer before his death in the gospel of John records a heartfelt plea to God the Father that all of his followers would be unified, just as Jesus himself is and was unified with God. Talk about an amazingly high bar to! But what a beautiful thought to picture all Jesus’ disciples as intimately united as a healthy family.
Parts Working as a Whole
The New Testament describes Jesus’ church as a body, where each individual part works together to make up the whole. New Testament letters such as Paul’s letter to the Romans were addressed to individual believers who met in small groups throughout Rome. These groups worked alongside each other as a unified church. A casual reading of the New Testament would lead a person to come away believing that the church should look more like a close-knit family, rather than a large scale organization.
With that said, multiple Christian groups on a campus or in a city does not necessarily imply division, though sometimes that is the case. For example, on a campus such as the University of Washington, there are over 50,000 students enrolled in school this fall. Most of these students are not followers of Jesus. When Jesus saw crowds such as this, he felt compassion toward them, noting that people are like sheep without a shepherd. He told his disciples to pray that God would raise up workers to share the life changing message that Jesus is the Good Shepherd.
It is absolutely necessary that there are multiple campus ministries available to reach out to a wider range of people. Each campus ministry brings different strengths and slightly different points of emphasis. Each group is also able to develop different spheres of influence. The question becomes: how do those groups behave toward or with one another? Since every Christian group would agree that unity is a primary goal, we strive to work toward that. It’s important that Jesus’ disciples are praying toward this end that all believers are unified under Jesus’ leadership.
Unity is an Ongoing Effort
Just as with any family, Christ’s church is not yet perfectly unified, as it will be when He returns. This is why we pray to God, “Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.” But our imperfection does not mean we don’t work toward wholeness. Only God has the ability to unify so many different people from so many different backgrounds, but we believe that he can and that he will.
Paul’s encouragement to the disciples of Jesus in Ephesus is important for those of us who profess faith in Jesus today,
“Always be humble and gentle. Be patient with each other, making allowance for each other’s faults because of your love. Make every effort to keep yourselves united in the Spirit, binding yourselves together with peace. For there is one body and one Spirit, just have you have been called to one glorious hope for your future. There is one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is over all, in all, and living through all.”
Join in the discussion in the comments, what do you think?
