That they all may be one; as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us: that the world may believe that thou hast sent me.
John 17:21 KJV

This is a necessary theme to start 2018. It is almost a year since I started to meet with God on a new level. It took me to places geographically that I never would have thought. It has shattered my own “Word-view” as I saw it forever. My own theology was erased and replaced with a theology which embraces realities long forgotten through a faulty perspective on Church history.

Our focus is the final prayer of Yeshua before His Crucifixion. The question I ask today is; is it possible that this prayer of Yeshua find manifestation in our day?

Could it be that Yeshua was looking down the centuries to see schism and the Reformation and the proliferation? I merely speculate here but what I can conclude with certainty is that Yeshua placed oneness on the highest place in His Dialogue with the Father. And if He placed Oneness on such a high priority then we can only surmise that He saw great challenges ahead to shake this concept, this lifestyle, this example.

We get right from the outset in the first century a great discussion and proliferation of error concerning the measure and identity of Yeshua. We see many struggle with the concept that He was fully human and fully divine. The Gnostics appeared and many false teachers appeared.

And down the centuries this Oneness has been difficult to attain. More and more denominations appear contradicting and overemphasising Biblical truth in one way or another.

Did God desire all these denominations and independent churches?

I can say with a certainty No. The reason why is that what is nurtured in these movements is a sense of holding revealed truth with arrogance and pride offending those who have yet to see it. Many movements came out of others and were rejected in the process. God does not inspire division but inspires unity and harmony. So Christendom is wounded by centuries of attack and division.

Some teachings are so incomplete that anything before the Reformation belongs to the Roman Church and is all heretical. I have heard Pentecostal preachers affirm that the Catholic Church is the harlot of Revelation. Whilst there have been false doctrines taught in the Roman Church, that dogma had been lifted above the revealed Word we cannot affirm these things without judgment and offence in our hearts.

In 1967 a great move of the Spirit occurred in the USA among Catholics. In the 70s and 80s great moves of the Spirit occurred in the Anglican and Episcopalian churches.

So as we progress more and more, down the years, do new movements spring up. Some were once just ministries of worship becoming churches and franchising out the Gospel in favour of what sounds modern worship to new music styles and preaching that appeals.

There is also a school of thought that looks at this panorama and affirms that the Church as we know it has lost it. They no longer congregate. This is not a correct view either.

So how do we make sense of all this?

Yeshua in dialoging with the Father shows us that the Oneness that He sought resides in the example of God Himself.

We see manifest 3 separate personalities yet United in nature and being that in detailed study and reading of the Bible will show us where Oneness exists and how it operates.

I think to try to change the current situation through ecumenical efforts is a mistake as we can never unite various incompatible structures, forms of worship, forms of preaching, forms of prayer through a human effort of unity.

Unity must come from God Himself. We must pray that He manifests in all and brings us into spiritual Oneness. Only He can bring it.

In our next post we shall look at the Oneness of God.

Shalom.