It is World Communion Sunday, annually observed on the first Sunday in October to celebrate the unity of the world-wide Church. As a symbol of unity, Christians from all over the world come together this day to confess “Jesus is Lord” and to participate in the Lord’s Supper.
In the 19th century, our Disciples of Christ forebears Barton Stone, Thomas and Alexander Campbell were great proponents of such unity. They believed that, despite of our different nationalities, languages, cultures, races and creeds, this table, the bread and the cup, and the great confession of faith “Jesus is Lord,” unites us all.
So as a Christian minister, especially as a Disciples of Christ minister, I am supposed to stand behind this pulpit on this day and confidently announce that because we will participate in the Lord’s Supper this morning, and because we confess with our mouths that Jesus Christ is Lord, we are united. We are in one accord with Christians from all over the world who are sharing in the same supper and making the same confession.
I suppose it is great, sentimental thought. It is a gushy, romantic concept. And it sounds like the responsibly religious thing to say on this World Communion Sunday. But, if I am to be honest this morning, I am not so certain I am buying it. Or I am at least struggling to believe it.
For example: are we really in one accord with the person or persons who, with obvious malice, continues to strip the flag from our church sign?
Or are we really in solidarity with the racist Christians who belong to the German National Democratic Party that is seeking to revive Nazism?
Are we on the same page with Christians in Russia, Uganda and Nigeria who are supporting laws that are brutally repressive to LGBTQ people?
Do we really want to brag about being on common ground with Christians in Jordan, Iran and Syria who have murderous hatred for the nation of Israel?
And are we unified with Christians, here in our own country, who harbor the same hate for Palestinians? Or believe that it is not only okay to discriminate on the basis of race, gender or sexuality, but out of fear and hate, believe it is their duty to God to do so? Do we stand untied with the Christians who marched in Charlottesville carrying tiki torches shouting, “Jews will not replace us,” or with the Christians who stormed the Capitol on January 6 carrying crosses or banners that read “Jesus Is Lord” while shouting, “hang Mike Pence!”
Are we really at one with the Christian TV evangelists who live in mansions they bought with money donated by the people they swindled, many of them poor?
Sometimes, I look at the actions of Christians around the world and think that I may have more in common those who do not profess any faith at all.
Like us, these Christians confess “Jesus is Lord.” Like us, they partake in the Lord’s Supper. And like us, they may even be partaking today on this World Communion Sunday, this very hour. But they are nothing at all like us. When they eat the bread today, it appears to be from a much different loaf. When they drink the juice or wine today, it seems to be from a totally different cup.
The truth is that there are many people in this world who erroneously only confess or claim to be Christian. In chapter seven of Matthew’s gospel we read Jesus’ words: “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?’ [I think we could add here: “Did we not take the Lord’s Supper together in your name?] And then will I declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.’” (Matthew 7:21-23).
So, I must honestly confess that I really don’t want to united with some who confess Jesus to be Lord, and who share in the Lord’s Supper.
So, maybe our unity needs to come from another place.
In the newsletter, this week I made the suggestion that love of our neighbors can unite us.
For Jesus said:
I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another (John 13).
In John’s epistle we read:
Beloved, let us love one another, because love is from God; everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, for God is love. Those who say, ‘I love God’, and hate their brothers or sisters, are liars; for those who do not love a brother or sister whom they have seen, cannot love God whom they have not seen. The commandment we have from him is this: those who love God must love their brothers and sisters also. God is love, and those who abide in love abide in God, and God abides in them.
I believe God wants Christians around the world to unite today, not merely around a table or with a confession of faith, but by the Christ-like love we have for others every day. We are to love as God loves us, selflessly, sacrificially, unreservedly and unconditionally. As the song goes, “What this world needs today more than anything else is love, sweet love.”
But here’s the problem with this “all-we-need-is-love” theology. It makes great gushy music, and it might inspire an inspirational sermon; however, the truth is: the love we have for others will never be enough to truly unite all Christians. Because, as much as we try to love one another, we will always fall short.
Our ego, our pride, and our is always getting in the way.
For example, “It is nearly impossible for me to stand up here this morning and preach “love one another” and not have some disdain in my heart for those Christians who do not love one another. Wasn’t the judgmental pride in my voice obvious a moment ago when I arrogantly suggested we were not united with, were better than, “other” Christians?
I sounded like the self-righteous Pharisee in one of Jesus’ parables who arrogantly boasted, thanking and praising God that he was not like the Tax Collector (Luke 18).
The truth is, when it comes to genuinely loving one another as God loves us, as hard as we might try, we all fall short.
So, what is it that truly unites us as Christians? In 1 John we read:
God’s love was revealed among us in this way: God sent his only Son into the world so that we might live through him. In this is love, not that we loved God, BUT THAT GOD LOVED US…Beloved, since God loved us so much, we also ought to love one another.
It is not our love that unites us. It is God’s love that unites us. Christians all over the world are united by the truth that:
Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God, as something to be exploited, but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness. And being found in human form, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death—even death on a cross.
All Christians are united by the great truth that “God proves his love for us in that while we still were sinners Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8).
The good news is that THIS is what unites us as Christians. God loves us despite our egotistical love and our judgmental love. God loves despite our arrogance and self-righteousness, and God loves us despite our hate.
Thus, the truth is that we do indeed have something in common with the malicious folks who keep stripping our flag of extravagant welcome. We have something in common with the racist, Neo-Nazi, German Christians, with homophobic Russian, Ugandan, and Nigerian Christians, with anti-Semitic Christians around the world, with hateful and fearful American Christians, and with those TV evangelists living their mansions who oppress the poor. And with our Christian neighbors who believe it is their God-given duty to discriminate against those who live and love differently than they do.
And 200 years ago, Barton Stone, Thomas and Alexander Campbell were exactly right. This table and our confession of faith “Jesus is Lord” unite us all.
We are united by this meal, representing the body and the blood of Christ, representing the very life of God lovingly broken and graciously poured out for all. Christians all over the world, with all our sin and shortcomings, share the same bread and the same cup and receive the same grace.
We are made one by the great confession that our Lord is Jesus, who was sent to save us, not because of our love for God, or for others, but because of God’s love for us.
The good news is that this not some great, sentimental thought or some gushy, romantic concept, and this is not just the responsibly religious thing to say on this World Communion Sunday. This is the gospel.
Just Love 