Christianity
The Power of Unity–for Good or for Evil
Many years ago, God convinced me about the importance of unity in the Body of Christ around the world. This came out of a time of meditation on John 17–the longest prayer of Jesus in the Bible.
From that moment, I committed myself to be a unifier of God’s Church for the sake of world evangelism.
Two recent events confirmed to me the importance of unity as a means of great blessing. But there is also a devious application as well.
Unity is powerful–both for good and for evil.
In my early years as a follower of Christ, I tended to be judgmental about various parts of the Church. I was raised in a liberal setting that had thrown out Christ and the Bible for various social causes. When I gave my life to Jesus in 1968, it was convenient to look down on the white-washed religion of my younger years.
It was also easy to dislike or suspect others in the Body of Christ that I either didn’t understand or who appeared to have more of God. For example, for a while I looked skeptically at charismatics and Pentecostals who talked about the power of the Holy Spirit. Then I had an encounter with God’s Spirit that broke a bondage in my life and leveled my pride.
Still, in my first decade of discipleship, I remember looking skeptically at Christian unity and having a jaded eye toward those whom I considered weak in their message. To my shame, I even aimed this attitude at Billy Graham–thinking that some of his messages were a bit “light” and oriented toward “cheap grace” which I questioned.
The Holy Spirit spanked me pretty good on that one, convicting me of my arrogance toward a man who’d led multitudes to Christ. When I changed my attitude, and to bring forth fruit in keeping with my repentance, God led our family to begin financially supporting the Billy Graham Association.
When you make a mistake you need to make it right.
Then came the revelations from John 17. Its central theme is the importance of God’s people enjoying a powerful and Trinity-oriented form of unity.
John 17 should really be called “The Lord’s Prayer” in the New Testament. In it you hear the heart of God’s Son cry out for unity in His followers. Here are some of the verses that spoke to me out of Jesus’ prayer:
“20 “My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, 21 that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me. 22 I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one— 23 I in them and you in me—so that they may be brought to complete unity. Then the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.”
Let’s break down the central points of this powerful petition:
- Jesus prayed for all of His followers, past and present. That applies to you and I today.
- He prayed that we would have the same depth of unity that He and the Father enjoyed in Trinity love.
- Placing his “glory” in us through the Holy Spirit was key to our unity via the fruits He produces.
- He wants our unity to be complete, or some translations say, perfect. This is not a shallow level of cooperation or oneness but as deep and powerful as He shared with His Father.
- When God’s people act in loving unity, then two incredible things will happen: 1) The world will know there’s only one true Messiah (“you sent me”), and 2) The people of the world will know that they are loved (“you have loved them”).
Out of this passage I became deeply convinced that the humble, loving, heart-felt unity that God produces in believers is the key to world evangelization and combatting low self esteem. In other words, a united Church will see multitudes come to Jesus and know that they are loved.
So, I set my heart to be a true unifier of God’s people, to be very careful to not speak negatively about other parts of the Church, and do all I could do to unite it.
I really believe that the person who does the most to bring unity to the Church will make the greatest contribution to world evangelization (if Jesus’ words mean anything).
Here’s how I recently saw some glimpses of John 17.
Mongolia Gateway
I’ve been working in the nation of Mongolia for nearly twenty years helping to train and unite a first generation Church to walk in the Spirit of John 17.
I saw it on full display this July.
The Mongolian Gateway Camp brought together 320 young Mongol missionaries from all over the nation and many different churches. We didn’t care about their style, theology, or social status. Bottom line was, “Do you love Jesus and believe in the authority of God’s Word?”
The diversity of the campers evidenced this biblical truth: unity is essentials, liberty in non-essentials and love in all things.
We had a powerful week of John 17 unity:
1. World Vision provided the buses to bring the young people to the camp.
2. Cru (Campus Crusade) did most of the seminar training for the campers on how to share their faith.
3. YWAM did much of the main session teaching and financially paid for a portion of the camp.
4. The Central Asia director of Youth for Christ (a Korean who was raised in Tajikistan who now lives in Russia) was a major speaker and influence.
5. The Mongolian leader of the camp is a local church pastor and also the national director of Youth for Christ (YFC).
Do you see the power of various groups leaving their egos at the door and doing their part–in unity–to multiply the Church in Mongolia?
It was a beautiful to watch. At the current time, I’m following up on this wonderful experience by trying to help the Mongolian YFC leader purchase his first apartment in Ulaanbaatar so that his ministry can be strengthened and multiplied.
A YWAMer is raising money for YFC!
I believe the heavens rejoice over this Mongolian answer to Jesus’ prayer.
YWAM Together 2016
I just returned from a global gathering of the YWAM family in Kansas City where four thousand YWAMers from over one hundred nations came together to celebrate Jesus and lift Him up in the nations. One day we opened up the KC Municipal Auditorium to the larger Body of Christ and brought 8,000 believers together for God’s purposes.
The power of John 17 unity was seen in manifold ways at YWAM Together:
1. The International House of Prayer partnered with us by housing missionaries and opening their university campus to afternoon workshops. Mike Bickle, the founder of IHOP-KC, spoke to our gathering and committed to bring the global prayer groups fully behind global missions. This is like uniting a rifle with gun powder–for fulfilling the Great Commission.
2. Loren Cunningham shared his passion for “Ending Bible Poverty Now” by taking the next four years to give Jesus a “Christmas present” in December of 2020 by getting a portion of the Bible into the remaining 1776 languages remaining to be translated. Both the heads of the American Bible Society and the Jesus Film Project joined hearts and arms in commitment to complete this milestone. We can only do it together.
3. The week also focused on empowering people called to the seven leadership spheres of society–the domains of the family, religion (church & mission), education, celebration (arts, entertainment and sports), public communication (media), economics (including business, science and technology), and government (law). Uniting believers in all these spheres can lead to the discipling of entire nations.
Both of these events are expressions of how God is uniting His Church around the world to bring God’s will to earth as it is in heaven (Matthew 6:10).
The key to the cause is biblical unity.
The devil is trying to do the same thing. In the Islamic jihadist realm, the enemy of people’s souls is trying to build a world-wide (united) Caliphate and force all people to convert to Islam. In the Western World, the the United Nations and many aspects of progressive politics desire to see a one world government that will force secular unity on the globe.
Building a form of oneness is key to their plans also. Unity can be used for both evil and good. So what are we to do?
Resist the evil forms of union and throw our hearts into answering Jesus’ prayer!
We can do it through the power of biblical unity (John 17:21-23).
Mormons Show Evangelicals the Way
For two hundred years, Christians in the United States have viewed the Mormons (LDS) as a cult.
The reasons for this are many, including the suspect life and practices of the its founder, Joseph Smith, the acceptance of extra-biblical revelation (the Book of Moromon), many questionable doctrines and edicts of the LDS Church, and especially a “works” orientation toward salvation.
I agree that the church’s origins and some practices are cultish.
However, after seeing the results of the Republican caucuses in Utah, it may be time to re-evaluate whether the Mormons are more Christian than Christians.
In their voting, Mormons are showing evangelicals the way.
First a few thoughts on the Mormon Church and religion in general.
I met my first Latter Day Saints when I was a teenager. They seemed like normal people who shared my values but didn’t demonstrate a personal relationship with Christ. They had “religion”–but it didn’t appear to go deep.
They were easy to understand because I was also raised in a religious home–without the power, conviction, and intimate knowledge of Christ. When I became born again in 1968, that experience changed my view of religion and what people need to do to get right with God.
The Bible was clear on the subject: We must be born again through repentance and faith by the work of the Holy Spirit. Salvation is a gift of God based on grace, not works.
In fact, during Jesus’ day there were two groups of religious folks who also failed the salvation test. One was the Saduccees. They were the religious liberals of the day, and didn’t believe in spirits, angels, or life after death. The other was the Pharisees. These were the religious work-a-holics that Jesus condemned at many points. They were the fundamentalists of the time.
Jesus told one prominent Pharisee named Nicodemus that people needed to “re-start” their spiritual lives by turning way from self (repentance) and put their faith in Him. The most famous Bible verse ever was given to this seeking Pharisee: “God so loved the loved that He gave his only Son that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life” (John 3:16).
I learned early on that religion–going through the right motions–is not enough. Salvation is about heart change that comes through our yieldedness and the work of God’s Spirit.
Which brings us back to the Mormons. Not only were they similar to my religious background and that of the Saduccees and Pharisees, but they also believed some pretty strange things that put them outside the bounds of mainstream biblical faith.
On the other hand, many Mormons displayed solid Christian virtues including strong and supportive families (with many children), a powerful sense of community, great work ethic and business principles, and a giving, generous spirit.
Thus, many Mormons may not be born again (heart), but they practiced many Christian principles they understood (mind).
I wrote my first book in 1976 on the reverse of that phenomenon–that a person can be Christian in heart but not in mind. The subject was former Georgia Governor Jimmy Carter who was running for president. I know that in his heart he said and appeared to be born again. But in his policies, his “mind” didn’t line up with Scripture.
He was pro-abortion, pro-Big Government and weak on national defense.
Jimmy Carter was the opposite of the LDS Church–biblical in heart but weak in practice. The Mormons were weak in heart, but strong in principles.
Which brings us to 2016 and the Republican presidential race.
I personally believe that as goes the Church, so does the American nation. In the past few political cycles. we have elected a number of poor national leaders and allowed massive disintegration in our culture because many evangelical Christians–even though they have born again hearts–do not have born again minds.
It’s a failure of discipleship. The Evangelical Church has led millions to Christ (heart faith) but have not taught and discipled them into a Christian worldview about government, economics, and the issues of the day.
Evangelicals either don’t vote, or they don’t vote for biblically principled people.
In this presidential election cycle, I am grieved by the ignorance of many evangelical leaders. I don’t need to mention their names. You know who they are. They have bought into the power and charisma of Donald Trump and have provided him the cover to attain victory in a number of states.
Donald Trump is extremely questionable of both heart and mind. He is essentially a billionaire opportunist who is riding the ignorance of Christians to victories in numerous states where the evangelical vote should have gone to the principled Christian conservatives in the race like Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio, or others.
Instead, a mind-less Church has put Donald Trump in the driver’s seat toward becoming the Republican nominee.
It’s such a wasted opportunity that one is almost led to weep.
Gary Randall reports that The Christian Post says that while 78% of evangelicals characterize the outcome of this year’s presidential election as “extremely important to the future of the United States,” only 20% of evangelicals are paying close attention to the election process.
Among non-Christian faiths—including Islam, Buddhism and Judaism— 41% are closely following the election campaigns.
Even religious skeptics, which includes atheists and agnostics are more engaged, with 38% paying attention to the elections. Also 38% of Catholics are engaged compared to 26% of Protestants. This is a reversal of the last four presidential elections.
Shame, shame, shame on us.
George Barna shares this concern about unengaged and ignorant evangelicals. About 38% of Americans are self-declared evangelicals, but Barna used the term only to identify persons who are evangelical in their fundamental biblical beliefs–what I call being Christian “in mind.”
By his criteria, only 8% of Americans are truly evangelical.
Not surprisingly, self-declared evangelicals are all over the map politically, some Democrats, some Republicans, but how many are voting biblically? Very few. The sad news is that just 8 percent of the people most capable of influencing America for righteousness are paying attention to the elections as compared to others. (Barna Report; Who Qualifies as an Evangelical?).
To sum up, God’s people in this nation are asleep and ignorant as the United States faces its greatest challenges.
But the Mormons seem to get it.
Glenn Beck (a prominent Mormon broadcaster and author) recently suggested that GOP presidential front-runner Donald Trump is incompatible with Christians who take their faith seriously.
“No Christian, no real Christian – I don’t mean a judgmental Christian, I mean somebody who is living their faith – no real Christian says, ‘I want that guy, that guy is for me,’” he said during a broadcast of his radio show. “Nobody, nobody.”
Beck also argued America is moving away from its Christian underpinnings, causing myriads of moral and social problems nationwide.
“I honestly don’t know what else to do,” he said. “We have got to be a people of principles. We are a Christian nation.”
“Are we really?” Beck asked. “Then why are we in so much trouble? Why do we have the same kind of problems that non-Christian nations do with pornography and drugs and everything else?
“We should be setting an example if we’re actually living our Christian faith. The problem is we all say we’re living our Christian faith [and] we’re not living our Christian faith.”
Beck additionally vowed he would challenge any religion or denomination he believes is ignoring its own guiding principles.
“I’ll take on the Jews, and I’ll take on the Lutherans, and I’ll take on the Catholics, and I’ll take on the Mormons,” he said. “I’ll take them all on. You’re damn right. Where are you? You’re not living your principles.”
Where have you heard that prophetic call in the evangelical churches?
Meanwhile, the Republican presidential sweepstakes arrived in Utah–a Mormon bastion–on March 22 after giving Donald Trump ten-to-fifteen victories in the Bible heart-land of America. How did the Mormons vote? The way evangelicals should have:
- Ted Cruz, a principled Christian conservative – 69%
- John Kasich, an evangelical governor – 17%.
- Donald Trump – 14%.
If evangelicals had been as wise as Mormon voters in Utah, then right now Ted Cruz would be well on his way to wrapping up the Republican nomination and going against a weak Hillary Clinton or Socialist Bernie Sanders in November.
Many people believe that Ted Cruz is the closest thing to Ronald Reagan in a generation. Yet, an unengaged, mindless, unprincipled Church is not practicing its faith in the voting booth.
Mormons are showing evangelicals the way. Maybe we need to be born again more than they do.
And show our faith by our works.
Is God Using the Catholic Church to Awaken America?
One of the biggest stories in the U.S. this past week has been the uproar over the Obamacare provisions being handed down by the Department of Health and Human Services. The new mandates force religiously-affiliated organizations to dispense contraceptives against their consciences in violation of long-held religious freedom.
All week national Christian leaders decried the action. On Friday, radio commentator Sean Hannity held a “Crisis Forum” on the issue. The nation’s most watched cable network trumpeted the danger against religious liberty almost every hour. And yesterdy, I attended a private gathering of Washington State leaders to hear a major Republican presidential candidate speak to the issue.
Do you know what these national leaders, Sean Hannity, the cable news network and presidential candidate all have in common?
They are Catholics.
Is God using the Catholic Church to awaken America?
If He is, it would be quite ironic.
The first three spiritual awakenings in America history were led by fervent Protestants whose Bible-based convictions called the nation to repentance, faith and active involvement in the moral issues of their day. During America’s first two hundred years, it was the Protestant side of the Church that promoted strong families, railed against the excesses of alcoholism, and led the charge against the evil of slavery.
There was a reason for this. At the time of the American Revolution, Catholics formed only 1.6% of the population of the thirteen colonies.
But by 1850, Catholics had become the country’s largest single denomination. Between 1860 and 1890, their population in the United States tripled through immigration. By the end of the decade it reached seven million. This influx would eventually bring increased scrutiny for the Catholic Church and a greater cultural presence which led to a growing fear of the Catholic “problem” among America’s Protestants.
In fact, it was quite common in the 18th and early 19th centuries for Catholics to be marginalized in American society as heretics, Papists, and condescendingly described as “anti-Christ.” Some anti-Catholic political movements like the Know Nothings, and organizations like the Orange Institution, American Protective Association, and the Ku Klux Klan, actively persecuted Catholic believers.
In fact, for most of the history of the United States, Catholics were victims of discrimination and persecution. It was not until the presidency of John F. Kennedy in 1960 that Catholics were broadly accepted in the US.
The Philadelphia Nativist Riot, Bloody Monday, the Orange Riots in New York City in 1871 and 1872, and The Ku Klux Klan-ridden South discriminated against Catholics (as they did the Jews and African Americans) for their Irish, Italian, Polish, German, or Spanish ethnicity. Many Protestants in the Midwest and the North labeled Catholics as “anti-American Papists,” “incapable of free thought without the approval of the Pope.”
During the Mexican-American War, Mexicans were portrayed as “backward” because of their “Papist superstition.” In reaction to this attitude, some hundred American Catholics, mostly recent Irish immigrants, fought on the Mexican side. However, the majority of Catholic soldiers (primarily the Irish), along with their chaplains like John McElroy (Jesuit), who later founded Boston College, proved loyal to the American cause.
In 1850, Franklin Pierce, the US Attorney for the District of New Hampshire, presented resolutions for the removal of restrictions on Catholics from holding office in that state, as well as the removal of property qualifications for voting. But these pro-Catholic measures were soundly defeated by the Protestant population.
If you were a Catholic back then, you couldn’t even run for office!
As the 19th century progressed, animosity between Protestants and Catholics began to cool off. Many Protestant Americans came to understand that, despite anti-Catholic rhetoric, Catholics were also people of faith and were on their side of the issues. Another reason was that many Irish-Catholic immigrants fought alongside their Protestant compatriots in the American Civil War.
In the 20th century, and culminating in JFK’s election, Catholic believers moved into the mainstream in American society.
Today, according to a new 2011 study by the Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate at Georgetown University, the US Catholic population is currently 77.7 million. The United States has the fourth largest Catholic population in the world, after Brazil, Mexico, and the Philippines. In fact, in 2011, there are more than four times as many Catholics as Southern Baptists and more than eight times as many as United Methodists.
I understand some of the past suspicion over the Catholic Church. Hundreds of years of European Church corruption and persecution had fueled a Post-Reformation hatred of the Holy See. The church’s focus on rituals, perceived idolatry of the Virgin Mary and other patron saints didn’t sit well with Protestants. In the 20th century, evangelicals insisted that followers of Christ needed to be born again and follow the teachings of the Bible–not a fallible Pope.
But today, the tables have turned. It’s the Protestants who are asleep and the Catholics that are living out their faith.
I noticed the change in the 1980s while living in Washington, D.C. After the infamous Roe v. Wade decision legalizing abortion, my young family attended many of the large pro-life rallies that marched against abortion. I expected to find my fellow evangelicals leading the procession.
Didn’t happen. What we did find was a passionate and powerful Catholic Church that was leading the way. In the early days, the Protestants and evangelicals were AWOL. Today they are more involved, but the Catholic Church is still the champion against abortion in this nation.
And when the brouhaha broke out this week over the Obamacare mandates, it was the Catholic Church that rose to speak for religious liberty. New York Archbishop Timothy Dolan said that he felt betrayed by President Obama and vowed that the Catholic Church would fight the new regulations even if they had to do it “in the streets.”
After President Obama blinked and modified (but didn’t really change) the rules, Archbishop Charles Chaput had even harsher words for the insurance-company-as-middleman approach. “Many Catholics are confused and angry. They should be… The HHS mandate, including its latest variant, is belligerent, unnecessary, and deeply offensive… We cannot afford to be fooled–yet again.”
Protestants and evangelicals are now joining the issue, but it is the Catholics who are really taking up the prophetic mantle. It’s as if the evangelical church–pre-occupied and neutralized by trying to be seeker-sensitive in the modern world–has abandoned its prophetic call and commitment to be salt and light in the culture.
So the Catholics have arisen to awaken the nation and Church.
- The national leaders I mentioned at the beginning are primarily Catholics. Many read a letter in their parishes last week calling the people and nation to fight for freedom of conscience.
- Sean Hannity is a Catholic believer. He hosted a leader’s summit on prime-time television that was primarily manned by Catholic clergy.
- Fox News was founded by Roger Ailes, a Roman Catholic, and many of its commentators including Sean Hannity, Bill O’Reilly, and Megan Kelly, are Catholics.
- And Rick Santorum is a rising Catholic Republican presidential contender.
C’mon my Protestant and Evangelical friends! The Catholic Church is putting us to shame while we twiddle our thumbs and tip toe around the great moral issues of our day.
Maybe Penny Young Vance is right: We’re all Catholics Now. Or maybe we better be.
Because God seems to be using the Catholic Church to awaken America.