Divine unity

“ Whereas, then, all unity in the Body of Christ, the Church, is derived ultimately from the person of its Head, the Word Incarnate, that unity is yet four-fold in its operation, and the efficient principle of one sort is not to be confounded with that of another. There is the mystical unity, which consists in the perpetual divine influx from the great invisible Head to His members; there is the moral or spiritual unity of charity, consisting in the presence of the Holy Spirit in the hearts of believers, and these two are internal, and in closest correspondence. ”

“ The divine Prophets came to establish the unity of the Kingdom in human hearts. All of them proclaimed the glad tidings of the divine bestowals to the world of mankind. All brought the same message of divine love to the world. Jesus Christ gave His life upon the cross for the unity of mankind. Those who believed in Him likewise sacrificed life, honor, possessions, family, everything, that this human world might be released from the hell of discord, enmity and strife. His foundation was the oneness of humanity. ”

“ Therefore, hold to these heavenly agencies which God has provided so that through the love of God this soul-bond may be established, this heart-attachment realized and the light of the reality of unity be reflected from you throughout the universe. If we do not hold fast to these divine agencies and means, no result will be possible. Let us pray to God that He will exhilarate our spirits so we may behold the descent of His bounties, illumine our eyes to witness His great guidance and attune our ears to enjoy the celestial melodies of the heavenly Word. ”

“ It supplies in its unity also the way to define, in harmonious fashion, the ideal of what your individual experience seeks in its need, of what your social world, groaning and travailing in pain together, longs for as our common salvation, of what the reason conceives as the divine unity of the world's meaning, of what the rational will requires you to serve as God's will. Through loyalty, then, not only the absolute moral insight, but the absolute religious insight, as you grow in grace and persist in service, may be and will be gradually and truthfully revealed to you. ”

“ Unity of Spirit, conformity to an universal Will, peace with power--this is our need.
It remains for the individual experience to show to us, if it can, the presence of our Deliverer, the coming of that which we shall recognise as divine, just because it truly and authoritatively reveals to the Self the fulfilment that we need, by bringing us into touch with the real nature of things. We need to find the presence that can give this unity and self-possession to the soul. ”

“ And why should not our present century, which is now hastening to its close, by a reversion of circumstances bequeath to mankind the pledges of concord, with the prospects of the great benefits which are bound up in the unity of the Christian faith?
May God, who is rich in mercy, and in whose power are the times and moments, grant Our wishes and desires, and in His great goodness, hasten the fulfilment of that divine promise of Jesus Christ: There will be one Fold and one Shepherd. ”

“ Whatever be the imperfections of human agents, is there not enough in all this to make us behold the working of a Divine and supernatural power? Should we not each, in our several spheres, labour and pray for reconciliation and unity—the adjustment of differences—the mutual understanding of Christendom? ”

“ With the multitude of national and local gods, and even tribal or family divinities, which prevailed in the classic world, the minds of men were constantly diverted from that unity that is the scarlet thread in every royal cable of science. But monotheism, establishing unity in the divine realm, gave unity also to the order of Nature. ”

“ The same Divine Spirit acts at once externally and internally—externally in the church, which it commissions, instructs, and keeps one; internally in the individual mind, which it kindles, illuminates, attracts, and (dissolving the tyranny of self-love) lifts up into freedom and power. The Holy Spirit, then, is at once the root of faith in the individual, and of unity in the church. ”

“ And, in addition, any instrumentalities we may employ in order to bring about the conversion of the world must be ineffectual, or, at least, greatly shorn of their influence, until there exists in the Christian world a unity which finds its example and the source of its power in the divine nature. ”

“ I say Divine Intelligences have attained unto the excellence of oneness that Jesus prayed his disciples might possess, and since they have attained unto it, and all govern their worlds and systems of worlds by the same spirit, and by the same principles, there is a unity in their government that makes it one even as they are one. ”

“ And as the personal unity appears in the symbol of the Divine Love to man expressed in her Maternity, so it appears also in the figure of the Church through the ages in which that Divine Love executes His work. A divided creed means a marred gospel and an incredulous world. ”

“ Nor will we, in reliance upon the promised and continued supplies of the Spirit of Jesus Christ, permit ourselves to be divided from this our covenanted unity and uniformity by the promises, threats, or solicitations of surrounding communities. Through divine grace we will endeavor, by practical manifestation of the truth, to commend ourselves to every man's conscience in the sight of God, as the most effectual means of healing Zion's breaches, that are great like the sea. ”

“ I adjure you, beloved, although unknown to you by face, yet as one devoted in God to your salvation, love one another, stand fast in unity, and suffer no dissensions among yourselves. For it is the unity that comes of a true faith which will preserve you safe unto God. May God in His turn mercifully grant unto you a successful issue that you may overcome the world, the flesh, and the devil! ”

“ In the Church of Christ he saw men with different views, and he said So far from that variety destroying unity, it was the only ground of unity. There are many doctrines, all of them different, but let those varieties be blended together—in other words, let there be the peace of love, and then you will have unity. ”

“ If God has his way all Christians will be led out of sects, all justified believers will be led into sanctification, the church will be perfectly organized and governed by the Holy Spirit, the whole truth will be preached uncompromisingly, full salvation will be held out to the world, and all will be led to cooperate and do their part. This is the full measure of Christianity today, and is God's design with his people. Here is true Christian unity. Such unity can come only by absolute abandonment to God, for he must be the one-making agent. ”

“ You have heard what need there is of unity in Christian life and Christian work. And where is the bond of unity between the life of the Church, the life of the individual believer and the work to be done among the heathen? ”

“ The second unity consists in the Holy Spirit of the Head communicated to the soul and body of the faithful people, both being restored by that grace of which truth and charity, unity and sanctity, are the tokens, the full virtue being planted in the cross of the Head, and from the cross diffusing itself to His Body. ”

“ His light, life and spirit is at Unity with itself in all. What comes from the light, life or spirit is one, it is the same in truth and unity with the rest. This is seen in our assemblies every day and will be throughout all generations in the church of God, among those that live in the lowly truth.
“God is not a God of Confusion, but order.” Everyone in his order hath unity and true fellowship with whatever comes from the life of God in another, for this precious life reacheth throughout the heritage of God. ”

“ In the light which is undying.
'Thus we complete the Trinity of our religion, Humanity, the World, and Space. So completed we recognise power to {243} give unity and definiteness to our thoughts, purity and warmth to our affections, scope and vigour to our activity. We recognise its powers to regulate our whole being, to give us that which it has so long been the aim of all religion to give—internal union. We recognise its power to raise us above ourselves and by intensifying the action of our unselfish instincts to bear down unto their due subordination our selfishness. ”

“ Bring truth that sways the hearts of men?” Unity is the essence of the Godhead and the animating principle of God’s church; and wherever her spirit penetrates, there the natural desire for unity implanted in the human heart is intensified and universalized, and man seeks to give to it an adequate embodiment in every sphere of his activity. It was this natural instinct for unity guided by the genius of Catholicity that formed the scattered tribes of Europe of former days into nations, uniting them in a grand universal republic which was properly called Christendom. ”

“ Thus salvation not only requires the action of the whole man, but is in and of his entire nature. It presents a unity primarily because of its agreement with the will of God, and then because of its unqualified and universal insistence that it, salvation, life eternal, be set absolutely first in man’s endeavour. What indeed could be more irrational, and more loveless and faithless, than that any desire should prevail over the entire good of man and the will of God as well? Oneness and peace consist in singleness of purpose and endeavour for salvation. ”

“ And all religion will ever, in proportion as it is vigorous and pure, thirst after an ever-increasing Unification, will long to be one and to give itself to the One,—to follow naked the naked Jesus. Yet all the history of human thought and all the actual experience of each one of us prove that this Unity can be apprehended and developed, by and within our poor human selves, only in proportion as we carefully persist in stopping at the point where it can most thoroughly organize and harmonize the largest possible multiplicity of various facts and forces. ”

“ Again it is not only dogma but history, not only that which was always to be but that which already was, which he set forth as it were with his dying voice: the one Body, and the one Spirit, the one Lord, one Faith, and one Baptism, as there is one God. That Body in which Apostles, Prophets, Evangelists, Pastors and Teachers were fixed, that the visible structure might grow up to its final stature, in whose accordant unity was the perpetual safeguard against error. ”

“ Unity with God, as a character of human spirit, involves, it is plain, unity with man. And here again many questions offer themselves. What forms does this unity imply, historical, terrestrial, beyond the grave? Is there to be a millennium, a reign of peace and happiness on earth? What, in truth and reality, is the communion of saints? That spirits in unity with God must in the end be in unity with one another seems guaranteed by the very essence of religion. ”

“ Hence it is clear that we believe only through the word which the Heavenly Father speaks in our hearts, by which he enlightens us so that we see, and draws us so that we follow. . . . For God is not a God of strife and quarrel, but of unity and peace. Where there is true faith, there the Holy Spirit is present; but where the Holy Spirit is, there is certainly effort for unity and peace. ”

“ When, then, I am asked, why we Christians must unite into a visible body or society, I answer, first, that the very earnestness with which Scripture insists upon a spiritual unseen unity at present, and a future unity in heaven, of itself directs a pious mind to the imitation of that unity visible on earth ”

“ I do not desire that social harmony and fraternal peace shall be purchased by the sacrifice of free personality and spiritual originality. What I require of you, my apostles, is spirit unity—and that you can experience in the joy of your united dedication to the wholehearted doing of the will of my Father in heaven. You do not have to see alike or feel alike or even think alike in order spiritually to be alike. Spiritual unity is derived from the consciousness that each of you is indwelt, and increasingly dominated, by the spirit gift of the heavenly Father. ”

“ And here I stand in the color of this offering, to unite it in complete unity, so that each and every one sees from that offering that the power of unity exists in evil, and may it be in the song of all as one song, that in each chamber there is a spirit, and the spirits will be connected in its places, and its branches will be connected to it to form a complete unity, as is appropriate. And here, when everything is united as one, the upper and lower will bless each other, and all the upper and lower entities will be blessed. ”

“ The tie which binds us to Christ is more important in our eyes than that which binds us to those of the same faith and order. We live in hope that the Spirit of Christ in us, and in all other Christian bodies, may induce such growth of mind and heart that the sense of unity may not only overtop and hide the fences of division, but may ultimately do away with these fences altogether. ”

“ We worship unity in trinity, and trinity in unity; neither confounding the person nor dividing the substance. There is one person of the Father, another of the Son, and another of the Holy Ghost; but the Godhead of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, is all one; the glory equal, the majesty co-eternal. ”

“ Opposed to this grand principle of Church unity, that finds its resting place in Heaven, its centre in Jesus, and its life in the indwelling Spirit, is the notion of an earthly external oneness, guarded by an array of articles and creeds, and canons, which seeks to manifest union in a uniformity maintained, rather than in a life enjoyed. ”