It turns out that Heaven seemed to have declared June 2010 as a kind of Global Church Unity month. And, this so-called church unity activist, set to resume the publishing of a magazine in pursuit of the vision, was totally oblivious of it. Like Jacob at Bethel, all I can say is “and I knew it not” (see Genesis 28:16).
First, as the month opened, God by His Spirit rescued me from the grievous error of trying to resuscitate KINGDOMPeople magazine as an indirect, rather than a direct church unity tool. It was subtle: He did by simply introducing me to the ministry of Bro Cyprian Agbazue and the International Foundation for Church Unity (IFCU). But it worked! It got me scolding myself: “what were you thinking?”
Next he exposed me to the “One Prayer” initiative of Pastor Craig Groeschel and his team at LifeChurch.tv, in the United States – a June-long programme involving 1,300 churches in 25 countries. Already in its third year, the initiative had led to the planting of over 1,600 new churches in India, Cambodia, China and Sudan. And “One Prayer 2010”, which ends this weekend, is expected to help in planting additional 500 new churches in those countries with funds from a special offering collected from the participating churches, including two in Nigeria.
Earlier, Edinburgh 2010, a four-day conference had held in Scotland. Formally opened on June 2, it was a momentous and historic event marking the 100th anniversary of the World Missionary Conference held in the Scottish capital in 1910.
Speaker after speaker, at the conference, attended by about 1,000 leaders from across the denominations, reiterated the need for the Church to unite.
Dr. Geoff Tunnicliffe, international director of the World Evangelical Alliance, at the opening session, drew attention to the theme of the conference and posited that witnessing to Christ was a potent church-unifying force. His words: “This conference’s theme is ‘witnessing to Christ today.’ We are … talking about …bearing glad witness to Jesus Christ, the second person of the Trinity…There is no authentic Christian mission that does not bear witness to him in word, deed and character, both individually and corporately. And there is no authentic church that does not have a passionate commitment to mission, reflecting the heart of Father, Son and Holy Spirit.”
Another notable speaker was Dr Olav Tveit, General Secretary of the World Council of Churches. He said the prayer of those who gathered in 1910 – the prayer of Jesus in John 17 “that the church may be one” – was the same prayer for leaders gathered in Edinburgh 2010. He said, “One hundred years after the Edinburgh conference in 1910 we are challenged to launch together a new beginning for common mission in the 21st century. We need to discern together what the call to carry the cross of Christ means for us today; as we witness together and find different ways to make it visible that we are called to be one.”
The Anglican Archbishop of York, Dr John Sentamu., told the closing audience to “be, see, think and do mission” and quit just “re-arranging the furniture.” In his opinion, “reorganizing the structures; arguing over words and phrases while humanity as a whole plunges suicidally into obscurity and meaningless and despair … (are) totally irrelevant to the needs of the world today.”
He warned that Jesus was being judged negatively as a result of the words and deeds of believers, and called upon Christians “to put love where there is none” by turning away from “self-absorbed individualism
.
A nine-point “Common Call” issued on the final day of the conference reads in part: “… We are challenged to welcome one another in our diversity, affirm our membership through baptism in the One Body of Christ, and recognize our need for mutuality, partnership, collaboration and networking in mission, so that the world might believe..”
As if to climax this special month of unity, another historic gathering ends tomorrow in Grand Rapids, Michigan, USA. The two largest bodies of churches in the Reformed tradition, World Alliance of Reformed Churches, WARC (75 million members), and the 12million-member Reformed Ecumenical Council, REC arrived the meeting with their individual identity intact. But they are leaving as one, having on Friday, June 18 signed a new constitution and bylaws to become World Communion of Reformed Churches, WCRC. It was the culmination of a unity move begun in 2006.
Richard van Houten, general secretary, REC, captured the essence of the event, when he told the hundreds of delegates from around the world gathered for the Uniting General Council: “In these times of division and dissension in so many areas of our lives – including church life – it is highly significant that two global groups of churches … should be willing to come together in a higher level of union than ever before."
On his part, WARC president, Clifton Kirkpatrick said, “I do believe it is God's intention that we live together in unity and I thank God for this momentous day in which we are not just called to be more cooperative, but to be one in Jesus Christ."
The move has been widely hailed across the globe with, among others, the World Council of Churches describing it as a "new expression of the visible unity of God's church."
I find Kirkpatrick’s assertion, above, very instructive; The Reformed Churches began by being more cooperative and have now progressed to “be one in Jesus Christ." It seems to me that being more cooperative is where the journey to becoming “one in Christ” must begin. That, I believe, is what God has instituted KINGDOMPeople to do - join others to help birth cooperation on the irreversible journey to unity. That, unfortunately, was one task we were on the verge of placing on the back-burner. But thanks be to God, that is one task to which we have now rededicated ourselves, as the magazine prepares to come back – to stay. So help me, God. CONCLUDED
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