Unity, it’s what Christ prayed for.  But what exactly was Jesus praying for?  In John 17, we read “That they may be one, as Thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us: that the world may believe that Thou hast sent me.”

It’s clear that the unity prayed for by Jesus, once achieved, was for the benefit of being fruitful in spreading the Gospel to the lost.  But how do we attain that unity?  How do we become like Christ and the Father and thus go about having the world believe that God sent Jesus to us and eventually the cross of Calvary?  Our lesson this past week covered several unities, but constraints here allow elaboration on only one, possibly the most important and that is unity with the personality with God. 

We often hear people say, “He is a chip off the old block,” “He’s just like his father,” or “She’s just like her mother.”  We have the tendency to demonstrate or take on the personality and characteristics of our parents, do we not?  Just as we do that in the physical realm we certainly do that in the spiritual realm.  In John 8:44 we find Jesus telling the Jews that they were of their father the devil.  This was evident to Him by their actions and their failure to love Him.  They held to traits or their spiritual father.

  Once we are born again, a new creation, have the right to be called a child of God we will begin to demonstrate characteristics of our heavenly Father.  Just to name a few, God is loving and forgiving, God cares about the spiritual well-being of others, God cares for the physical well-being of others and God is holy.  These traits are also seen in His children.  God’s children are loving and forgiving, caring about the spiritual and physical well-being of others and seeking to be holy.  With these traits in place, the unity prayed for by Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane will have begun, and so with it the ability for the world to see that Jesus is the sent one from God.

Copyright © 2003, Nolan P. Rutter