As I began this post, the assassination attempt on former President Trump was just hours old. The country was reeling in shock, and the gravity of what had happened was just beginning to sink in. Now the 2024 Republican National Convention in Milwaukee is over, and the struggle to process the implications of this historical episode continues non-stop. From the moment President Trump grabbed his ear and went down, every news feed in the country immediately shifted their attention and trained their cameras toward that small field in rural Butler, Pennsylvania. Since then, it seems that virtually every imaginable perspective on the event has been dissected, scrutinized, analyzed, digitized and distributed on every communication platform that exists. Yet with all that information, questions without answers persist at every level, including our own. Whether we’re politically involved or not, there’s an area that comes to light in the aftermath of this awful episode that affects us personally, and we must not ignore it.

Calls for Unity Begin ~
It isn’t surprising that calls for cooling down the violent and divisive personal and political rhetoric began almost immediately. Within hours, comments decrying how awful the attack was and how close it was to being lethal began to be joined by calls for unity. It sounded as though the rationale was that if we could just keep our mouths and our internet platforms under control, we’d be able to transform the respective campaigns into an exercise in civility and niceness and have a harmonious election regardless of who wins. It’ll be interesting to see what impact any of that will have, but at the moment, I, for one, am skeptical at best. But regardless, all that is beyond our control, and as followers of Jesus, our attention should be directed toward what He expects of us in the midst of these crucial and historic times. And one of the obvious issues confronting us directly is the matter of ‘unity’.   

It would be impossible to overstate the importance that God places on the concept of unity. In the Shema, that great prayer of recognition and allegiance that Jews have prayed on a daily basis ever since Moses delivered it, God describes Himself as One. He said,

Hear O Israel. The Lord is our God; the Lord is ONE… (Deuteronomy 6:4) NKJV

Unity was in God’s mind when He designed the foundational core principles for human relationships. It’s absolutely fascinating how God introduced the value of unity by creating diversity. Out of the one creature that God created in His own singular image, He fashioned a second one that was dramatically and wonderfully distinctive. Then He brought these distinctively different examples of Himself together – and the love He built into them made them uniquely one again. The genius of the living God is beyond incredible.

A Blessing in the Beginning ~
Diversity wasn’t a problem until sin entered. Diversity filled the garden and its inhabitants with more joy and beauty than they could have ever had without it – until sin entered. Diversity redefined oneness in ways that were glorious – until sin entered. Once sin entered, diversity opened the doors for fomenting rebellion, unleashing fear, embracing untruth, and fueling envy. Diversity ensnared in sin led to isolation, suffering, and death. It wasn’t long before all the marvelous diversity that emerged from Adam and Eve drew this conclusion from the God who had created them:

Then the Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. (Genesis 6:5) NKJV

That all-consuming quest faced judgmental, relational, geographical, chronological, and theological obstacles that seemed insurmountable until the day when God’s righteous judgment intersected with His love and grace in another singular body that was nailed to a cross just outside Jerusalem. In that one body, God revealed to the world that His love could not only bring law into harmony with grace, but He proved that love could also restore to a wildly distinctive and diverse world all the joy and fulfillment that unity offers. That’s the unity that hearts in this violent, hate-filled world are really crying out for. While legislative policies and procedures are important, and the men and women who enact them should never be chosen impulsively, they can never achieve the unity we need. There’s only one place to find that. The Apostle Paul made the source of that unity crystal clear in declarations like this:

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 were all baptized into one body — whether Jews or Greeks, whether slaves or free—and have all been made to drink into one Spirit. For in fact the body is not one member but many. (1 Corinthians 12:12–14) NKJV

To the believers in Galatia, He affirmed it like this:

For you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus. For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus. (Galatians 3:26–28) NKJV

And to the Colossians, he said it this way:

…where there is neither Greek nor Jew, circumcised nor uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave nor free, but Christ is all and in all. (Colossians 3:11) NKJV

A Promise Made to All ~
The night Jesus was born, the angels declared that the Good News He was bringing was not just for the Jewish people, or some specially sanctified group of them. It was going to be for all people. This child was going to be the fulfillment of God’s plan to restore the shalom He had lost in Eden, but He would bring more than that. God’s grand plan for restoration included bringing people together in a new kind of unity never before possible. Unlike the first Adam, this frail child did not just bear the image of the living God. He embodied His nature, His attributes, His power, and His incredible love. This frail child would one day establish a Kingdom where people from every background and condition and from all over the world could be forgiven, redeemed, delivered, perfected, and bound together in love as a family forever. And even more incredible was the News that God’s grand plan for unity would not be put on hold until some far off day at the culmination of human history. Jesus would be bringing that Kingdom to earth here and now.

At a time when our nation has just witnessed a graphic, public reminder of how divisive, combative, and deadly this world can be, it appears that that diversity so celebrated among us can be a dangerous thing. Our differences seem to generate fear and lead to conflict, violence, hate, destruction, and death. We cannot help but ask what happened to all that unity God made possible? Is that Kingdom real, and can that promised unity actually be found in the midst of the dangerous diversity surrounding us?  

Addressing the Real Problem ~
But as we mentioned earlier, diversity isn’t the problem. Sin is. The Kingdom Jesus brought is internal at this point and the promised unity begins there. The benefits must flow out from inside us and sin’s corrupting influence will always work to make our diversity destructive. That’s why we’re admonished to push back against it with directives like these: 

Now I plead with you, brethren, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you all speak the same thing, and that there be no divisions among you, but that you be perfectly joined together in the same mind and in the same judgment. (1 Corinthians 1:10–11) NKJV

Finally, all of you be of one mind, having compassion for one another; love as brothers, be tenderhearted, be courteous; not returning evil for evil or reviling for reviling, but on the contrary blessing, knowing that you were called to this, that you may inherit a blessing. (1 Peter 3:8-9) NKJV

We’ll have more to say about this vital issue in upcoming posts, but until then, may God help us to practice those principles He’s given that make us one. That alone can make the unity Jesus makes possible a very real and powerful force, capable of counteracting the dangerous diversity threatening us today.

“TWEETABLES” ~ Click to tweet and share from the pull quotes below.  Each one links directly back to this article through Twitter . . .

• • “It’s absolutely fascinating how God introduced the value of unity by creating diversity. Out of the one creature that God created in His own singular image, He fashioned a second one that was dramatically and wonderfully distinctive.” @GallaghersPen (Click here to Tweet)  
  • “Diversity redefined oneness in ways that were glorious – until sin entered. Diversity then opened doors for fomenting rebellion, unleashing fear, embracing untruth and fueling envy. When ensnared in sin, it led to isolation, suffering and death.” @GallaghersPen (Click here to Tweet)  
  • “In Jesus’ singular body, God revealed to the world that His love could not only bring law into harmony with grace, He proved that love could also restore to a wildly distinctive and diverse world all the joy and fulfillment that unity offers.”  @GallaghersPen (Click here to Tweet)  
  • “This frail Christ child would one day establish a Kingdom where people from every background and condition, from all over the world, could be forgiven, redeemed, delivered, perfected, and bound together in love as a family forever.” @GallaghersPen (Click here to Tweet)  
  • “Diversity isn’t the problem. Sin is. The Kingdom Jesus brought us is internal at this point and the promised unity begins there. The benefits must flow out from inside us. Sin’s corrupting influence always works to make our diversity destructive.” @GallaghersPen (Click here to Tweet)

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