“That they all may be one; even as You, Father, are in Me and I in You.”
— John 17:21
The most wonderful thing is that the same Christ can live in an ancient Confucius type as well as in a modern-day hippie type. The more we try to look like each other outwardly, even to the extent of changing our nose or the color of our hair, the more God would frown and say, “How pitiful! Oneness cannot come from that—from you. You must have Christ living in you.”
In such a living there is a marvelous oneness. There is a kind of sweetness that comes out from all the saints regardless of their differences. Here Christ is lived out in many ways. No one should try to conform himself to others. It does not work anyway. The church life is not one of uniformity. The way some saints take care of hospitality or do various things may at times be embarrassing or uncomfortable, but that should not be the issue. The issue should only be the living out of Christ from within each of us, just as the Son lived out the Father and the Father was lived out in the Son. From this reality we can all be one, and in this reality we learn to bear the true testimony of oneness.
Adapted from Oneness and the One Accord, page 23.
Tomorrow: “One in Testimony”