Conversations at the coalface
Unity in diversity
His purpose was to create in himself one new man out of the two, thus making peace, and in this one body to reconcile both of them to God through the cross, by which he put to death their hostility. Ephesians 2:15-16.
Even a casual look at the Cosmos tells us Lord, that you love both unity and diversity. We see this paradox right at the centre of the Godhead: Father, Son and Holy Spirit; different in function yet perfect in unity.
We also see it on all scales in your creation from the enormity of the Universe with its planets and stars to the astonishing variety of life on Earth right down to the plethora of tiny particles that hold matter together. In this majestic diversity we also see an interdependence that draws everything together in an all embracing unity.
Do you remember that article I read recently Lord, the one about research in human DNA?
It concluded that humanity originated in Africa and that three groups developed from this primeval stock. One remained in Africa and two migrated; one eastwards to become the Asiatic and Pacific Island races and the other north and westwards to become the Indo-European races. The researchers found that despite the obvious racial variations in colour and physical features, the genetic differences between the three groups are insignificant.
So again Lord, in the midst of diversity we find unity, a unity that makes us all family.
So why is it that we, your children are so intolerant of difference and capable of doing such terrible things to our own kind? Somehow, the perfect unity in diversity you planned for your creation has been damaged.
Something fundamentally bad happened at the Fall, didn’t it Lord? Adam’s sin drove a dreadful wedge between you and your creation. Intolerance and division were sown among us and their tragic effects have blighted human history from Abel’s murder to the Holocaust and the mass murders in Rwanda and Bosnia in our own time.
To us who sit in relative comfort in our western-style democracies it seems unbelievable that people can be motivated by so much hatred against others who are culturally, religiously or racially different.
But wait a minute – is this a matter of scale? Surely we see similar things happening in everyday life. They do not make headlines but they originate from the same diabolical impulses in the human heart.
We see violence, prejudice, divorce, racism, alienation between young and old, rich and poor and even in divisions in your church Lord. In your usual uncompromising way you list these impulses in Galatians 5. They are hatred, discord, jealousy, selfish ambition, dissensions and factions, all fruits of the Fall.
So how do we escape from this body of death?
In the scriptures you diagnose the problem and also provide the solution. The problem lies in our fallen nature which makes us prisoners of these destructive impulses.
You are the solution.
Scripture tells us that we were alienated from you and from our fellow men but your sacrifice on the cross reconciled us to you and to each other ending the hostility that divided us. So now 'there is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for we are all one in Christ Jesus.'
Thank you Lord, for paying the price to restore unity to a diversity fractured by Adam’s sin and please help us to live this out in our daily lives.
Mike Worthing