Daily Reading for May 5
So, time to ask a question. How will church unity happen? What will it take to draw us together? Answer: Jesus Christ. . . .Our only loyalty is to Jesus Christ, who died so that something new might happen in the world. We are called to follow him all the way to the cross, willing to die as denominations for God’s future. For in God’s strange ways, new life can only come by death and resurrection. There’s a great story about the artist Rodin, who one day saw a huge, carved crucifix beside a road. He arranged to have the crucifix carted back to his house. But, unfortunately, it was too big for the building. So, of all things, he knocked out the walls, raised the roof, and rebuilt his home around the cross. The calling of the American church! How can we let go of ourselves and, renewed by Jesus Christ, rebuild ourselves into the larger Church, the one Church that dares follow Jesus Christ? Bluntly, we must be willing to die as denominations so that a new, freer, braver, united Christian word may be spoken. . . .
You wonder how church unity survives, particularly nowadays when denominations are digging in. Do you know the secret? Because church unity is clearly a part of God’s future, that’s why. And you who are here, you must be brave enough to sit loose in your traditions, not holding onto yourselves too much. For in Spirit you know we are meant to be one—one in faith, with one Lord, under one holy God. Amen.
From “The Churchless Kingdom of God” by David G. Buttrick, quoted in Best Sermons 3 edited by James W. Cox (Harper & Row, 1990).