Date : Seventh Sunday of Easter, May 16, 2010

Text : John 17:20-26

Title : One in Christ

Praying for all who would believe in Him, the Lord Jesus petitioned His Father for all Christians, "that they may all be one . . . so that the world may believe that you have sent me."

You know all of the big arguments of the day: homosexuality and gay marriage, a woman’s right to choose, end of life issues, whether or not we should be fighting in the Middle East. But, here’s the thing: as I mention these arguments, I can confine the quarrel to Christians.

Christians are far from united when it comes to every dispute under the sun. The people of the Christian Church argue with each other over all the same things that everyone in the world argues with each other, and the people of the Christian Church argue with each other over things that are specific to the Christian Church.

Take a group of Christians, any group of Christians, and you can easily wind up in a heated discussion if you take a stand on how Baptism works, or what is actually going on in the bread and wine of Holy Communion. You can really get the fireworks going if you mention the rapture, the millennium, and how the world will end. You won’t find much agreement in the most basic thing of Christianity: how a person comes to have faith in Jesus Christ.

All of these arguments among people who believe in the same Jesus Christ, from the same Bible, yet, in today’s Gospel lesson, we heard the Lord Jesus pray that we might be one? Are we one? Have we ever been one? Will be ever be one?

In a nifty case of serendipity, this morning, I just happen to be starting a Bible class on the history of the Christian Church. As the class will begin, we will see that the Christian Church was one, in the beginning. But, it didn’t take long for it to fracture. Over the last two thousand years, it has fractured so much that, if I were to name all of the church bodies of Christianity which exist, today, you would be stuck in those pews . . . perhaps until the Lord Jesus returns in glory.

Today’s Gospel gives us part of the prayer that the Lord offered to His Father on the night of His Last Supper. Jesus was soon to be arrested, tried, convicted, and crucified. At His Last Supper, He left no prayer unturned. He knew how hard it would be for His Church, because Christians would be doing constant battle with the devil, the world, and their own sinful nature—especially, with their own sinful nature.

So, the Lord prayed. He prayed for all who would believe in the testimony that would be given by the very disciples, who were hearing His prayer. He prayed that all those, who would believe the Gospel of the apostles—that includes us, and every generation—that we would be united in His life, death, and resurrection. He prayed that we would abide in Him—that all Christians would find themselves where Jesus has promised to be: in His Word and Sacraments, which are proclaimed and dispensed only in church. Finally, He vowed His faithfulness to His Church, that He would continue to make His Father known to the world by continuing to make Himself known to the world through the continuing proclamation of the Gospel and the distribution of the Sacraments of Baptism and Communion.

Looking at the state of the Christian Church, today, a skeptic might declare that the Father completely ignored Jesus’ prayer, or that the mess we are in proves that Jesus had no more power than the next guy. A skeptic can easily assert that Christianity is no more of a religion than any other, simply by pointing to the widespread disagreement among Christians, along with the constant bickering and, perhaps, worst of all, that when looking at the statistics of crimes, divorce, alcohol and drug abuse, unwed mothers and people living together outside of marriage, physical and emotional abuse, and every wrongdoing under the sun, Christians are just as guilty as everyone of every other religion, or of no religion, at all.

So that we don’t find ourselves guilty of pointing the fickle finger of fault at others, let’s spend a moment talking about a few of the things that harm the unity of our congregation and, at times, even bite big chunks out of our own oneness.

This church believes, teaches, and confesses that only Christians have eternal life; that all others will suffer eternal damnation in hell. This pastor has preached the biblical truth, plenty of times. Yet, if our members were not afraid to speak their minds, plenty would show that they do not agree, that they cannot accept this.

Some don’t even believe in hell. Some listen to TV preachers, or read the popular Christian books, and get the notions that God will give them material goods if they live in obedience to Him, or that there will be a rapture of Christians before the seven-year Great Tribulation, or that the Hindu doctrines of karma and reincarnation are true and really occur.

Wait a minute! Why am I bothering with these heavy doctrines? All I need to point at is the Golden Rule and the most basic Christian thing: forgiving the sins of others in the total and loving manner by which God forgives us for Christ’s sake. Whether we are electing church officers, or voting on a new hymnal, or have anything in this church or community that even hints of a controversy, one will find the members of this Christian church behaving badly.

And, we are supposed to be one—one in Christ, one in God the Father, one through the work of the Holy Spirit in the Gospel of Jesus Christ and His Sacraments of Baptism and Communion?

It’s a wonder that the Christian Church still exists. It’s a wonder that congregations, including ours, can look back at histories of over one hundred years. It’s a wonder that anyone, who is not a Christian, would want to become a Christian.

And, it is precisely in those three statements that the answer lies. After two thousand years, the Christian Church does, indeed, still exist. Congregation after congregation, just like ours—in Lutheran church bodies, and Roman Catholic, and Baptist, and Methodist, and I could name the names of church bodies until Christ returns in glory—still exist to be able to count histories that go back decades and centuries. And, people—some of whom have been extremely skeptical about Christianity because of all of the disputes with which I opened this sermon, and because Christians don’t act any better than anyone else—people are still being brought to faith in Jesus Christ and placing their eternal lives upon His eternal life.

Jesus’ prayer, that we would be one, just as He is one with His Father, is, indeed, being answered, all of the time. Despite us—despite the very people, whom He gathers from the world of unbelievers into His Church of believers—despite us, the Holy Spirit brings unity.

We are united in Jesus Christ.

We Christians, of St. John Lutheran Church, are united in Jesus Christ, despite ourselves—despite our personal opinions, and despite our sins against each other. Despite how we break God’s commandments—sinning against our Creator and Savior, and sinning against each other. Despite how we are so slow to forgive, how we so easily treat worship as if its no more important than fill-in-the-blank, despite how we treat the Word of God as if it is a restaurant menu from which we can pick and choose whatever we want to believe, as if something is true because we believe it and not because God says it.

We Christians, of every Christian church body that exists, today—of which there are so many that we could name them until the day that Christ returns in glory—all of us, who call on the name of Jesus Christ, are united in the one true faith. All of us are able to confess the Apostles’ Creed, and the Nicene Creed, and the Athanasian Creed, and declare: "That’s what I believe."

The Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit are one—one Holy Trinity: God in three persons, yet still one God.

The Christian Church is one—one Holy Church in thousands of church bodies, in millions of disagreeing believers—yet, still one Church because we have one Holy Spirit, who calls us by the one Gospel of Jesus Christ, who has revealed the one love of God the Father.

This grand truth does not excuse or dismiss any of your sins, any of the errors of Christians in every church body, any of the wrongs we commit against each other, any of the false doctrines that any Christian holds.

No, in every way, you, and I, and everyone who calls on the one name of Jesus Christ, shall humble ourselves before the one true God. In doing so, you are privileged to rise from your humility to stand before your Creator and Savior, cleansed of your sins, holy in God the Father’s sight, and eternally alive, for Jesus Christ went to your sinful death and has saved you from the one you deserve.

You are one, indeed—one in Jesus Christ—one in the Gospel of His love, one in the Baptism into His name, and one in the Communion of His body and blood.

He will continue to pray for you, and for His Church, until the day that He returns in glory—the day when we will finally be one big happy family, in Paradise. Amen.