Life in the Orchard

Matthew 7:18-20
A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, and a bad tree cannot bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. Thus, by their fruit you will recognize them.

Another wise teaching from Christ, then again everything He said was wise. But listening to Christ is one thing, applying the things He says is another.

Fruit.
In the verses preceding this passage in Matthew, Christ is telling His followers to beware of false prophets and false teachings. He also reminds them that these false prophets can come bearing what seems to be Truth and Light, but they could really be harboring Death and Destruction. The way to test them, Christ says, is if they bear good fruit or not...

You might be thinking, "Yea Hackett, that's great stuff...so what?"
So, maybe we should apply it...
And I don't mean apply it to the Church as a whole; at least, not for my topic, because this should be applied to the Church. But let's apply it to ourselves for a moment...

...

Hmm...
I don't like what I'm seeing.

How much fruit do we bear?
Me, personally, my fruit comes in the form of a 10% tithing check, a couple dozen blogs and Facebook Notes, and telling somebody every now and then about the genocide in Darfur...

I should be doing so much more.
Now, take a look at yourself...how much fruit are you bearing? Hopefully more than me.

But honestly, I would say, as a whole, we Christians are like an orchard. It rains twice a week, we are rooted in good soil, the sun shines a lot, we are well taken care of by the Farmer...yet the trees look like it is the middle of winter. No leaves, no fruit, just dead limbs...now, guess who the trees are? Unfortunately, us...

I guess my point is that we really don't take Christianity seriously. We don't have the fruit to show for it, we don't have the results we want, and the world is still dying at an alarming, quickening pace.

Meanwhile, the dead trees remain in the orchard... sitting calmly even as the wildfires of hell consume the world around its walls.
I guess what sucks the most is that dead, dry wood burns the fastest...at least we have the walls of salvation protecting us. But hey, maybe it'd be better if we didn't. Then we might start bearing fruit.

You think that Christ saving us from an eventual hell would be enough to get us to bear fruit...apparently we think we need a little more though. After contemplating these thoughts over the past few days, I honestly don't understand why God still loves us; we sure as hell don't deserve it.

Maybe we aren't as "Christian" as we think we are...

Its time we take a peak over the orchard walls that protect us, it is time to look at what is really happening in the world.
Genocide, rape, theft, murder, war, disease...it is all running rampant; so much so that the 2006 Human Security Brief, done by the Human Security Report Project, listed the state of humanity as "far from positive."

It is almost scary to think that some of those outside the sphere of salvation see the dire state of the world, and we as Christians who have been eternally saved from it do not.

I think we need to take a good long look at ourselves, and look around our little orchard. The Great Farmer stands at the gate, sowing seeds around the entrance, the least we could do is help. Christ, after all, gave His life for us, and our lives should belong to Him now.

We are long overdue to step outside of the orchard...maybe it is fear of life without the wall that scares us into staying. What we need to learn is that the wall goes with us. Christ has bought us eternally; there is nothing to fear. After all, the task before us is not nearly as great as the God behind us.

Christ's command at the end of Matthew wasn't to stay in the orchard, it was "GO and MAKE disciples of all nations..."

Let's get out of the safe zone...
Let's get out of the orchard...

Because, until we do, I will dare to say that we have no right to call ourselves Christians. Christians follow Christ, and we stopped doing that a long time ago.

In Christ,
Hackett

Unity: Oneness or Sameness

"May the God who gives endurance and encouragement give you a spirit of unity among yourselves as you follow Christ Jesus, so that with one heart and mouth you may glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Accept one another then, just as Christ accepted you, in order to bring praise to God."
Romans 15:5-7

If you've read your way through Romans before, you know that it is not a book of the Bible to be taken lightly. Each word is packed and backed with loads of theology, and even today, centuries after it was written, we still can not fully grasp the meanings of it...

But there is nothing unclear about this small portion of Romans.
Paul makes it very CLEAR how the church is supposed to be:

United...

Now, a quick snapshot of the church today.
There are thousands of Christian denominations worldwide today that are centered around many different topics, ideas, and theologies. There is so much thrashing and bashing going on between these differing denominations, which I myself am guilty of, that it seems like we are all enemies.

It's almost as if Christ, who is leading us, has stopped and is looking back, shaking His head, and asking us if we will ever learn.

And that brings us to the title of our topic:

Unity: Oneness or Sameness?

Does Church Unity mean we all have to be as one, or do we all have to agree on all the same things?

Hmmm...

I can already tell you what you are probably thinking the answer is.
Most of you probably think that to be truly united we must all believe the same things.

To bad the Bible doesn't teach that...

The Bible doesn't call for sameness, in which we agree on everything. The Bible calls for oneness, in which we are to have sameness in the essentials, but grace in the nonessentials.

For example, I believe music is fine in worship. Other believers don't. Does that mean I am wrong, or they are wrong? Yes! We are both wrong, because God nowhere in Scripture says that we are to worship only one way. Scripture is clear that ALL is to be done to the glory of God.

Paul makes the concept of unity clear throughout the Book of Romans.

Romans 14:13
"Therefore let us stop passing judgement on one another. Instead, make up your mind not to put any stumbling block or obstacle in your brothers way."

Centuries of putting stumbling blocks, striving for personal gain, and unacceptance of one another have left us with what Paul feared most: disunity. We all think our theology is right, when in reality, we are probably all wrong, because our theology is exactly what it is: our theology, not God's.

So, why should we be united?
For starters, a united Church can better accomplish the Great Commission, which is the Church's ultimate goal. Unity also contributes to the building up of other believers, more effective teachings, and a lot less stress. Unity single-handedly could fix the majority of the Church's problems on its own.

So, how do we become united?
I'm not going answer that question here, and I'm not going to answer it until next year. That is something my upcoming website, www.operationbrokensilence.org will address. On a brief side note, the website will host several projects, one of the first being Project Unity, which will deal with this topic.

So, to answer the original posed question of Unity: Oneness or Sameness?

The answer is both within their correct bounds. Sameness in essentials, such as belief that Christ is God, and grace in nonessentials, such as whether or not music is okay in worship.

Only then can we accomplish the goals that we are supposed to be accomplishing.

That's all I got, keep an eye out for the new website:

www.operationbrokensilence.org

which will launch this December.
And keep an eye out for Project Unity, which will be our second project. The first one will be Project Make A Difference, which hopefully you will visit the site and find out.

In Christ,
Hackett