Here we have a very simple subject which is very easy to understand. It is not beyond the scope of any believer to grasp, for it is something which is given by the Holy Spirit when we come out of darkness and are born again. It is so simple in fact that the natural understanding of man has great problems with it, questioning its sufficiency. It concerns a passage of scripture which you have perhaps never heard being ministered by anyone in your years as a believer.

Even though we understand it so readily we are very far from the fulfillment of that which it speaks of. Surely this is the mark by which we are measured as the church of the living God. How can anything else be right if this is not put right first, and if we refuse to address this particular problem of unity in our midst ,then surely we must be just boxing the air concerning all other problems we may have. A great part of our problem here is that there are multitudes of believers who refuse to acknowledge that we do not have the unity of the spirit of which Paul speaks in Eph.4. They say that the unity of the Spirit is already present among all true believers because the Bible states that we are all one in Christ. Certainly to be one in the Spirit is a position we all have by faith in Christ, glory to God, but this is not the unity of the Spirit which Paul speaks about in Eph.4:1-6 Let us read it together.

I, therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, beseech you to walk worthy of the calling with which you were called, with all lowliness and gentleness, with longsuffering, bearing with one another in love, endeavouring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. [There is] one body and one Spirit, just as you were called in one hope of your calling; one Lord, one faith, one baptism; one God and Father of all, who [is] above all, and through all, and in you [a] all. (Eph.4:1-6)

"Endeavouring to keep the unity of the Spirit" is a passage that has thrown many into a wrong understanding of what Paul was saying in these opening verses of chapt. 4. The suggestion which is presented to us is that we do not have to establish unity, we just have to maintain it, because we, like the Ephesians, already possess it. When this letter was written the unity of the Spirit was still present among the brethren. There was only one assembly of believers in the city and there was only one expression of the body of Christ. This does not mean of course that they did not assemble in one another's homes, it just means that when they assembled, it was as part of the whole, and each gathering represented the whole assembly. Each home gathering did not have its own elders or Pastor or its own doctrinal statement or anything else that would violate the unity of the Spirit in the entire assembly in the city. These home gatherings had not fallen from grace to such an extent that they needed to establish their own independence from every other home gathering. Their standing was evidence of the risen Christ and His Headship that is absent in our churches today.

The Headship of Christ

The believer whose eyes are open to see this will know immediately that the Headship of Christ is simply not present today in all denominational churches, and the very spirit in which they were founded is the spirit of antichrist. (please don’t be upset at the use of this word here, it just means that the church system in which they function is of the world and not of Christ and is actually opposed to His ways of doing things.) The very existence of these independent denominations no matter whether they be small or universal, is contrary to the will of God and so He is calling His people everywhere to come out of them. They are standing in the way of Christ being manifested in His body in oneness. When Paul wrote to the Ephesian believers he was telling them to maintain the unity of the Spirit which they already possessed in outward expression. This is a unity which must be walked in, in order to be maintained. This is a telling point which needs to be understood because the spiritual oneness we have in Christ is a position we have by faith which has no visible reality unless it is walked out in practice. All true believers in Christ are one in the Spirit by faith but the Ephesians and the other churches of Paul’s day also had the outward expression of their inward oneness which is made visible by the way we walk toward one another. It is this outward expression which Paul calls the unity of the Spirit. The way to maintain it is through self denial of the fleshly passions by walking in gentleness, longsuffering, lowliness and bearing with one another in love. We lose it by following the passions and desires of our natural minds. This is our condition today and it would be a great blessing for us to see the place which we have fallen from and return in repentance.

Nevertheless I have [this] against you, that you have left your first love. Remember therefore from where you have fallen; repent and do the first works, or else I will come to you quickly and remove your lampstand from its place--unless you repent. (Rev. 2:45)

It was not for nothing that Paul warned believers to do nothing from vainglory, selfish ambition or self conceit. He was very much aware of the schemes of the devil upon the church to destroy her testimony in the world which happens when her lampstand is removed.

Fulfill my joy by being like minded, having the same love, [being] of one accord, of one mind. [Let] nothing [be done] through selfish ambition or conceit, but in lowliness of mind let each esteem others better than himself. (Phil. 2: 2-3)

A Peculiar People

At the moment the church has little or no testimony before the world, for even if the church itself thinks that she is united, the world is simply not convinced. Why should it be? The evidence is simply not there that the church can put her own house in order. At the present time we are conformed to the world as we adopt many of its practices and systems and have given up our call to be a peculiar people and priesthood who are united in love. We have this foolish idea that we are moving in the power of the Holy Spirit and doing mighty things but somehow it has a hollow ring about it. How can our external works be mighty when our internal character is violated by disunity ? The early church in the book of Acts turned the world upside down with its united testimony and stood against the corrupting influence of the world. Its power was evidenced in the expression of its unity in the risen Christ. If we refuse to repent and return to our first love and do His works then surely God will raise up new living stones which will accomplish all His will.

Therefore bear fruits worthy of repentance, and do not begin to say to yourselves, 'We have Abraham as [our] father.' For I say to you that God is able to raise up children to Abraham from these stones. And even now the axe is laid to the root of the trees. Therefore every tree which does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire." (Luke 3:8-9)

In these days God is dealing once again with the root. He is not satisfied with a church which is divided and is seeking to be united while retaining its own denominational independence. This will never do. Unity is a question of nature and is not something which can be tacked on in order have the proper appearance. Abraham knew that God had promised him a son so he set out to bring it about himself not knowing the way of God. God does not use natural means to accomplish spiritual ends. With God both the means used and the end accomplished must be spiritual. Abraham went ahead and had his son by the slave girl but the son was not accepted by God. Likewise, any so called unity of the spirit which does not come from within and is organic but is rather something which is worked at from without, by agreement and organization, will be rejected by God just like Ishmael was. We cannot preserve our independent status as churches and still have unity. On the contrary, unity of the spirit can only be maintained on the death of these things.

The Bond of Peace

Endeavoring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.

In these scriptures the apostle Paul admonishes us to maintain the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace. He mentions three points in particular, namely: lowliness gentleness and forbearance in love. It is through their means that we endeavour to keep the unity, and it is only by walking in these that the unity can be maintained provided it is already present, and restored if it has been lost. The bond of Peace is revealed to us as having 7 points and these are, One body, One Spirit, One hope, One Lord, One faith, One baptism, One God. So we can see that oneness is the basis of this bond of peace. While many may claim to be walking in unity and endeavouring to maintain it, the sad truth is that they are not and all their efforts are futile being founded in vain imagination rather than on the word of God. Other means are being employed instead of the ones which Paul mentions in Eph. chapter 4. The unity which Paul has in view here of course is the visible expression of our unity in the spirit because this is the only unity which can be lost if it is not maintained by the believers in any local area.

Furthermore we one told that these attributes of unity are to be walked in, if they are to be maintained which again highlights the type of unity which Paul is speaking about. We must grasp the truth that unity of the Spirit is something which God wants displayed to the world and is not just to be a mystical unity which unbelievers are asked to accept. The reason for this unity to be displayed of course is for the victory of Christ over the Devils works to be manifested to the world so that the world will see and know that Jesus is God. Consider the following scripture

And to make all see what [is] the fellowship [a] of the mystery, which from the beginning of the ages has been hidden in God (Eph.3:9 )

Unbelievers are simply not convinced when we tell them that we are one in the Spirit and that everything is fine. Everything we have at present they can imitate, and do, and they can see nothing supernatural about us. It is the very same as when Moses was demonstrating the power of God and Pharaoh's magicians imitated it (Exod.7 ) Phaorah was not impressed ,and so he hardened his heart. It is very easy for us to say that we are one in the Spirit and then carry on with the concerns of our own fellowships in the same locality. Surely you can see that we do not need grace to do this, and that there is no cross in loving those that love us and who see things our way. All these things are possible and can be accomplished apart from Christ. We need to be seeking to walk in unity with those who see things differently. This we cannot do apart from the grace of Christ, and this is what the Gospel requires of us through faith. This is something which only Christ can accomplish in us by His power. Isaac was the supernatural son of Abraham and lshmael was the son which he had naturally, or in his own strength. Which son do you want to have? God's son of promise, which only He can bring forth, or the one which you can bring forth yourself. Have you ever noticed that the Jehovah's Witnesses display a greater unity than we Christians? They only have one assembly in any one town. Perhaps God uses these people to allow us to see our shortcomings in this particular area even though they have not yet come to Christ.

According to the above scripture the unity of the Spirit is maintained through the bond of peace and it is this bond of peace which needs to be understood and restored if unity is to be seen among us. There can be no true oneness or spiritual unity if this bond is broken between believers and it is the maintenance of this bond which requires lowliness and gentleness with forbearance in love. This bond of peace which Paul mentions is the bond which holds all members together under the Headship of Christ. but which must first be present between each member and God.

Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, (Rom .5:1)

A believer ( especially those who claim or take the position of belonging to the five fold ministry ) must first be at peace with God and His ways before he can be at peace with the rest of the body of Christ, and this peace is only available by faith to those who have yielded all control and possessions into the hands of their Heavenly Father. Believers who are still at odds with God and His ways and whose selfish ambitions are still alive, can only bring division and strife instead of oneness and unity. If a believer and once again especially one of the five fold ministry, is trying to serve two masters, namely himself and God at the same time, then peace will always be far away. Until a believer finds the place of surrender and submission to the ways of God, he will always be sowing the wrong kind of seed.(Jam.4:1-7)

But the wisdom that is from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, willing to yield, full of mercy and good fruits, without partiality and without hypocrisy. Now the fruit of righteousness is sown in peace by those who make peace. (Jam. 3:17-18)

For to be carnally minded [is] death, but to be spiritually minded [is] life and peace.( Rom.8:6)

Here we can see that those who are being led by the Spirit have two distinguishing features. They have life and peace. They are living in the life of the Holy Spirit and are at peace with God. Having found submission to God they no longer seek their own will and way, but are content with God's way knowing that it is the only way, and that nothing can be accomplished any other way. This again is the bond of peace which God has established with every believer in Christ and every member of His body.

And let the peace of God rule in your hearts, to which also you were called in one body; and be thankful. (Col. 3:15)

Here we can see that peace in our hearts is related to belonging to one body and when we give our allegiance to men and ministries we must forsake our peace with God, because we are moving contrary to the will of God in His body. In this case we can see that the bond of peace is corporate and needs to be maintained by all the brethren.The apostle Paul mentions the seven points of unity in the spirit which we are to walk in if we are to maintain, or even restore the visible unity which we possess in the Spirit. You must understand that the means of restoration of unity must be the same as the means of maintenance of unity, assuming you accept that the expression of unity has indeed been lost. Before we look at these points it is very important to notice that there are not more than seven, or less than seven, but just seven. This is important because we cannot take the liberty to add our own or subtract some we deem unnecessary. We must realize that if there were more or less points as the basis of our unity, then Paul would have told us. The most noticeable feature of these seven unities is their astounding simplicity and lack of complex theology. So obvious is this lack that one is inclined to say "is that all" on seeing them.

The truth of course is that many have acted upon this seeming lack of spiritual content and added their own extra unities, to try to keep impurities out of the church. Weak and all as these seven unities might seem to the natural mind, they are sufficient and complete in themselves and need no additional help from us in order to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace, throughout the body of Christ. All that these seven unities ever required of us was our acceptance and obedience, something indeed that God is still waiting for.

Here are the seven unities which Paul stresses for all the churches of Christ.

1. One Body .

2. One Spirit

3. One Hope of our Calling

4. One Lord

5. One Faith

6. One Baptism

7. One God and Father of all .

It is best if we look at these points one at a time

1. One Body

For as the body is one and has many members, but all the members of that one body, being many, are one body, so also [is] Christ. For by one Spirit we are baptised into one body.(I Cor.12:12-13) The nature of the church is that of a body. This means of course that it is not an organization but an organism and must be treated and cared for as such. Failure to remember and do this will only bring death to its members. Because the church is a body and not an organization it cannot be divided and it is for this reason that Paul asks the Corinthian believers ''Is Christ divided"? An organization can be divided and still function without any apparent loss, but if a body is divided, it dies and its testimony is lost. The one body spoken of here can only be the universal body of Christ which includes both the dead and the living believers in Christ. While this is true, is there not something deeper here which we ought to notice?. Can it not be said that in any given locality that there can only be one body also? If the person of Christ is one in a locality and cannot be divided, then surely His body also in the same locality is one, and cannot be divided without the life being lost. This can be nothing else but a shame upon Christ himself and upon those who believe in Him. Wherever we see this then we know for certain that believers are not content to have Christ alone as their righteousness, they need their own pet likes and dislikes also. This is indeed a Christ without a cross, which really is no Christ at all. Let all those who hear the words of Paul come out and be separate from their own works and seek first the Kingdom of God, in the oneness of the body of Christ,

2. One Spirit

For by one Spirit we are baptised into one body.(I Cor. 12:12)

There is only one Spirit, the Holy Spirit and it is He who is the life of the body of Christ. Because there is only one Holy Spirit energizing the body of Christ then we can say with confidence that there ought to be harmony and oneness in all the actions of that same body. The Holy Spirit only bears testimony to Christ. We know from the scripture that He will only exalt and glorify Christ and show us the things of Christ. This is a great comfort to us because we can now discern false spirits which are operating in our midst whenever someone or something is being given the preeminence instead of Christ.

3. One Hope of our Calling.

God has given each one of us a living hope through His Spirit of being conformed to the likeness of His Son and it is to this hope that he have being predestined. Paul tells as that the mystery of the Gospel is "Christ in us the hope of Glory" and in his prayers for the Galatian believers his primary prayer was that Christ would be formed in them. While there are many other hopes which we have through the Gospel the chief calling of God is that Jesus would be the first born among many sons.

4. One Lord

Is Christ divided? (1 Cor.1:13)

If there were more than one Lord then we could easily justify our divisions by saying that we are doing what we were told by the Lord that we know. As it is of course there is only one Lord and He is not contradicting himself in what he is doing, which means that we have no excuse for our sin of division. Division is not just a question of ignorance between believers, because where longsuffering, lowliness, gentleness and bearing with one another in love exists then lack of knowledge will not be the problem.

5. One Faith

This can be nothing else but our faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. It is not so much a question of how great our faith is or how much of it we have. It is more a question of whom or faith is in. Christ is the one we have turned to and decided to follow and imitate. He is the one who died for us and took away our sins and is also the one who promised to return again as the King of kings and Lord of lords. Our faith is not in men or in faith itself or in natural laws, or other forces, doctrines, or in any other thing, but in the person of Jesus. Remember it is no longer we who live, it is Christ who lives in us. The apostle Peter describes this faith as more precious than gold and through which we are kept by God's Power.

6.One Baptism

When Paul wrote to the Corinthians about the divisions which were among them he brought up the subject of baptism. He did not ask about the mode of baptism which they underwent, but rather in whose name they were baptised. The most important thing about our baptism is that we are baptised into Christ as believers and followers and not in the name of any other. Concerning this particular baptism there is only one.

7. One God and Father of all.

Yet for us [there is] one God, the Father, of whom [are] all things, and we for Him; and one Lord Jesus Christ, through whom [are] all things, and through whom we [live.] (1 Cor.8:6)

This is the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ and we recognize none other. His God is our God, and His Father is our Father, and it is He who so loved the world that He gave His only begotten son, so that whosoever would believe on Him would not perish but have everlasting life. It is by truly acknowledging that we have one father, that it becomes natural for as to call one another brothers and sisters. yet without this acknowledgement how hard it becomes to receive one another as brethren. We begin to exalt fellow believers as father figures and give them special titles, and in doing this we give birth to another distinct "family" within the kingdom of God, which we then proceed to call a Church. It follows that we can now easily pass our brothers and sisters on she street, seeing them as belonging to a different ''father"(Matt 23:8-11) We now no longer see other believers as our brethren and it can only be a matter of time, if we persist in this division, that we shall end up biting and devouring one another, in defending our so called churches . (Gal 5:14-15) A little bit of leaven, leavens the whole lump.(l Cor.5:6)

A Call to Unity

For us to walk in this bond of peace is to keep each of the seven unities contained therein. This means not only not violating them ourselves, but refusing to be drawn away by others who think that these unities can be changed to suit the occasion, or their own particular church vision. Do not think that some day you will walk in them when God brings them into effect in His church .The Lord desires for you to see these realities by His Spirit and to enter into them, by walking in them now. We can only enter into these invisible things of God by faith in Christ and in His word.

Wherever you go these days unity is being emphasised. It has become a central focus of many ministries and movements, yet on closer examination much of what passes for unity is not unity at all, but an attempt among groups of believers to be united, while at the same time holding fast to what causes their division: namely an unwillingness to obey God by refusing to accept man made divisions in the Body of Christ.

With each passing day it is becoming more and more clear that we are indeed living in the last days of this age. These are the days in which the Lord is gathering together in one, all things in Christ. His purpose is clearly to manifest this through His Church, not in the confusion of many separate churches. While all who are in Christ are by faith part of the undivided body of Christ, yet in their walk many believers have taken up ground which is actually in opposition to their so called faith position. Are you satisfied to continue as you are? Are you willing to wait a little while longer and see what God may do in the future, hoping that somehow He will overlook these "details". If you do then you will certainly suffer loss. While you may now have the assurance of a clerically approved ministry, the polish of well planned church services or the comfort of knowing that someone else is responsible for the care of the church.Nevertheless, what you are turning from is the opportunity of joining with the Lord, in being a living expression of what He prayed for in John 17:21, "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."

In sharing this message we can testify of the wonderful blessing that awaits all who heed this call. You do not have to wait for God to move in power, as so many of our songs say, because God has already done so, and is now waiting for you to move, and believe His word. Amen.