We struggle with a dynamic that God’s people have lived with for centuries: the interplay between unity and diversity, both of which are gifts from God.
Within the body of Christ, diversity is unity’s strength, not its weakness. When diversity becomes a problem, it’s our human problem, not God’s. The world needs what we are when we are true to each other as sisters and brothers in the body of Christ—not when one partisan faction triumphs over another.
When we move beyond our comfortable, entrenched position, we experience each other in new ways. We grow in understanding and wisdom. We are not only truer to ourselves and our own convictions; we are truer to others and our love for them. We will become what we are called to be and gifted by the Holy Spirit to be—faithful members of the body of Christ.
This message is adapted from “Unity: God’s Gift in Christ” written by former ELCA Presiding Bishop Mark S. Hanson in the September 2010 issue of Lutheran Woman Today (now Gather) magazine.
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