Here we are on Good Friday. Are we ready to be caught up together? I ask this because in reading 1 Thessalonians 4:17, we find Paul speaking of the glorious moment in the future when we meet Jesus in the air as He comes to claim His bride! And Paul finishes this verse by proclaiming that we will then be with Jesus forever. How will He find us when He comes? Will He find us together?
Or…when Jesus comes, will He find His church, His beloved bride fractured, disconnected, disjointed, and fragmented? On this Easter weekend, on this Good Friday, will we remember that Jesus died so that we could be reconciled to God and in being reconciled to God we are born into God’s family! We long to be embraced by God. Are we also longing to be embraced by one another? Do we long for the togetherness that God has envisioned for His family?
On Easter morning, Jesus rose from the dead. Forty days later we see Him in Acts 1 ascending to Heaven. Angels then declared to the crowd that Jesus would come again in “like manner.” How unified they all were in that moment! Have you ever considered that the phrase “like manner” didn’t just apply to the supernatural manner in which Christ ascended? Could “like manner” also be referring to the state in which the crowd gathered…together at the feet of Jesus? I believe it does.
In Proverbs 6:16-19, God tells us the seven things He hates. In fact, the context of the text is intended to convey His hatred for the seventh thing as being that which He despises most. And that seventh thing is a person who sows discord among people who should otherwise see themselves as family. Do we really think this doesn’t apply to God’s family? Is the fruit of your rhetoric leading God’s people toward a “like manner” or are you putting togetherness at risk?
So let me ask you plainly. Are you allowing your political perspectives, your party affiliations, your social agenda platforms (as moral as they may be) to draw you away from your brothers and sisters in Christ? Is “like manner” at risk because of you? On this Easter weekend, remembering that when Jesus stood before Pilate on trial for treason, Jesus said that His Kingdom was not of this world! Are you aligning with an earthly kingdom and an earthly ruler more than you are aligning with your Heavenly Kingdom and your Heavenly King?
If when you look around your church this weekend and most everyone you see looks like you, votes like you, thinks like you, complains like you…ask yourself this question, “What am I doing to move Christianity toward a togetherness?” Or worse, if you left a church recently because you were uncomfortable or even disgruntled because you were being asked to make room for the preferences of others, the laments of others, the dreams of others…ask yourself that same question. That crowd at the day of Jesus’ ascension was not described as “like manner” because of their sameness nor because of their homogeneity. Togetherness is the harmonization of diversity. And Jesus will always be the ultimate harmonizer!
Celebrate Easter this weekend by thanking Jesus for our glorious salvation! He is risen! But never forget the Maranatha cry that is supposed to be in the heart of us all…looking expectedly for our soon coming King so that we may be caught up together!
Pastor Fred