Question #3(What practical form does Christian unity take for us now?)
                                         PART B
   I began to answer this by saying practical expressions of Christian
unity are only limited by one's creative imagination and adventuresome
spirit.
   Though I've often wanted to hear God's voice audibly directing me,
that has never been my experience.  However, there are a number of
times when I was intently seeking the Lord's direction or wisdom for
necessary decisions, when in direct response to my imploring plea,
I sensed, as it were the other side of my brain talking back, all the
while knowing it definitely was not just my own mind. (Please don't
ask me to explain how one knows that.  When it happens to you, you'll
know what I mean!)  On one of these occasions, while stressing to the
Lord how important it was for me to know HIS will for what HE wanted
me to do, that clear response came, "Tom, what do you really want to
do?"  I immediately began to argue how that didn't matter (sorta like
Peter on the rooftop-Acts 10), but was caught dead in my tracks with
"Delight yourself in the Lord, and He will give you the desires of your
heart." (Psalm 37:4) And this meaning began to dawn on my awareness:  I
said, "Lord, do you mean if my first delight is in You and
Your will, that the desires of my heart are the kinds of things you will
want to bring to pass?"  The sense of a kind, fatherly face smiling on
me seemed to communicate, "You're starting to get the idea, kid!"
   I told you all that, to ask you what YOU think in your sanctified
heart, is the shape Christian unity should take in your life and in the
part of the Body of Christ where you find yourself?  If fear of man
were of no consequence to that decision, and the heart of God was
your focal point what would you do and how would you act differently
to express the unity we have in Christ?
   A young preacher working with Youth for Christ believed the Gospel
of Jesus Christ was not owned by any one church or denomination. He
began to look for ways to help Christians join hands in the task of
winning their neighbors to Christ.  Perhaps no one man in the second
half of the 20th century has been used more by God to impact this nation
and the world for Christ by encouraging believers to give
expression to our unity in the common priority assigned to disciples
of Jesus than Billy Graham.  Is this not one of the practical forms of
expression of Christian unity?
   In this decade a coach caught a vision of Christian unity reaching
across denominational and racial divisions bringing healing and 
wholeness to the Body of Christ, especially those who seem to be
in the shortest supply in the average church - men.  Could anyone
watch the 'Stand in the Gap' Prayer Meeting on the Mall in our
nation's capitol, and see men from all across this country gathered
together from virtually every denomination and non-denomination of
the Christian faith, on their knees and on their faces before the Lord,
and not marvel at this form of expression of Christian unity?
   Also in this decade, Christians have gathered together like never
before to pray and plan how to identify, evangelize and disciple the
remaining half of this world's population who have been culturally
hidden away and cut off from typical Christian missions - the
Unreached Peoples, largely concentrated in "the 10-40 Window".
I've been reading post after post this summer about phenomenal
meetings of believers who didn't used to work together, who are
now praying together for the the completion of the Great Commission.
They want to be a part of bringing to pass what God's Word has
indicated for nearly 2000 years (4000, if you read between the lines
of what God promised Abraham), that there will be standing before 
the throne, dressed in white robes, "a great multitude which no man
could number, of ALL nations (ethnos), and kindreds, and people,
and tongues..." (Rev. 7:9)  What an expression of Christian unity!
(If you want to read what I've been reading go to: AD2000@... )
   Space fails me to tell of "little" things in my own city and county of
Ohio, like hundreds of Christians from dozens of churches, Catholic
and Protestant, non-charismatic and charismatic, mainline and evangel-
ical, walking together on the third Sunday of October to raise hunger
awareness and funds for the hungry at home and abroad in the annual
CROP Walk For the Hungry. (Shades of Acts!)  Or the ministers'
fellowship I visited last year in a nearby small town, where these
various ministers did more that "chew the fat", they PRAYED FOR
ONE ANOTHER... a Baptist, a Methodist, a Presbyterian, a Church
of Christ, and a Roman Catholic!... asking God to minister His Word
and the life of His Spirit to lift up Christ Jesus before His people and
meet their spiritual needs, so they in turn may reach out in Jesus'
name to the lost of their community.
   Don't get me wrong.  I'm not saying we've arrived. Far from it. But
since I've stopped complaining that  the glass is only half-full, and 
begun to praise God for every mercy-drop and drip, my eyes are open
to see expressions and forms of Christian unity all around me that I
otherwise might have missed.  And MORE IS COMING AS THE
FOLLOWERS OF JESUS BEGIN TO TAKE SERIOUSLY HIS
PRAYER IN JOHN 17... Pray it... Live it... Share it!  (Don't you think
that if it was important enough for Jesus to pray this in "the crunch
time" when all things insignificant fade into obscurity, then it surely
must become important to us who have responded to His call, "Come,
follow me!")  No telling what new shape and form and expression of
Christian unity will be birthed out of God's response to that prayer
and our faith response to Him!
                     (Question #4 on next post)
Yours because we're HIS,
Tom
temackey.jn17.21@...
   

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