Introduction

The final topic of this series, The Blessing of Unity, has been by far the most difficult to prepare, because it is the most demanding in terms of my personal union with God in Christ, and my actual experience of other believers. I have been for decades involved in many groups trying to bring unity to the body of Christ from a national to a local level, especially through prayer. Whilst this has led to many friendships, at the corporate level the results have been very mixed. The promises of scripture however remain compelling.

One of these has to do with a site of blessing we sought out in Israel, Mount Hermon. Its fame comes from the alluring words of Psalm 133, “Behold, how good and pleasant it is when brothers dwell in unity! 2 It is like the precious oil on the head, running down on the beard, on the beard of Aaron, running down on the collar of his robes!3 It is like the dew of Hermon, which falls on the mountains of Zion! For there the Lord has commanded the blessing, life forevermore.” (Ps 133:1-3). As the highest peak in this area of the Middle East Hermon is renowned for its copious dew and snow, here transferred symbolically to the spiritual blessings[1] poured forth from the much smaller Mt Zion. This delightful image is frequently quoted in meetings dedicated to Christian unity. Tragically though, the need for visible Christian unity remains as great as ever not only here in Perth but in the original homeland of Jesus.

If Christianity has one holy site that is more precious than others and where we should “naturally” expect to see the manifest blessing of unity it would have to be the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, the location where Jesus was crucified and raised for the dead. Sadly, there has been so much conflict, including physical violence, between the different denominations that administer various parts of the complex[2] that the main keys to the church have been held by a Moslem family since the end of the Crusades[3]. Such divisions stand in tragic contrast to the Bible’s message of the unity of the body of Christ and raise sharply the question how the answer to Jesus’ prayers for our unity can ever be met?[4] The reply that I received to this question came through almost as much struggle and prayer as the rest of this series combined. I was very slow to realise that the key insight concerning unity necessarily lay in the most difficult experience I had in the Middle East, one with another Christian.

Prophetic Unity

Prior to leaving Australia I did some research on the internet on the Coptic Orthodox monasteries at Wadi El Natrun, an oasis in the desert about an hour outside Cairo. I came across a site picturing an extraordinary work of art known as The Door of Prophecies, dating from the tenth century[5]. I found this prophetic work of art so intriguing that I was determined that we should see it when we reached Egypt. The Door of Prophecies is composed of seven inlaid wooden panels representing seven epochs which are believed to cover the history of Christianity, its past and future, highlighting its golden age, periods of major changes, hardships, and persecution (such as under Islam, a panel mixed of crosses and crescents). The sixth era, which is surely the one we inhabit, is filled with small divided crosses in different forms representing the multitude and disorder of doctrines and beliefs in the Church. The seventh and last row hints at the End Times for Christians, there is one cross with a radiating design filling the whole panel predicting the final unity of the Christian faith. That the monks who constructed this door should represent such unity in terms of a cross is no surprise when you consider the history of Christianity in Egypt.

After an incident with a particular Coptic monk in front of the Door of Prophecies, which I will come back to soon, I asked him why their church had not been reduced to the very small numbers of most of the church in the Middle East since the Islamic invasion[6]. His reply was that they were a very strong church, an apostolic church founded by the apostle Mark the author of the first Gospel, a biblical church, a liturgical church, a church that kept the ancient creeds and so on. The Copts are very conscious of the fact that Jesus and his family resided in Egypt, many of the most famous early theologians were based in Alexandria and monasticism began in Egypt. The church there has endured century after century of persecution[7]. This has included hostility from Catholic rulers in the fifth and sixth centuries, then the Islamic invasion of the seventh century which imposed financial and civil penalties for being a Christian and the prohibited the use of the native Coptic language. It is not surprising that the Coptic Church claims its greatest glory is its cross. This is a very mature and Christ – centred attitude to carry and Coptic believers have a very powerful sense of identity that is grounded in history, tradition and a spirituality of suffering. This disposition contains within it a corporate conviction of the blessings of God that Australian Christians do not seem to carry.

Given all this, what happened when we were actually able to view The Door of Prophecies came as a great shock to me. I asked the English speaking priest about the panel and he made a brief comment about the nature of its interpretation, which was very different from what I had read on the internet. Being excited by the possibilities of insight I sensed in what he said I innocently passed some comments to our group about the interpretation of symbolism in the book of Revelation. At which point he said something in Arabic to our interpreter and walked away. When I inquired of our guide what he said I received a very muted response that the monk had made comments about Western ways of thinking. I really felt hurt, rejected and misunderstood by this, alienated and treated somehow as a lesser Christian from a lesser part of the church. I could have simply wallowed there in my pain, but I prayed for the determined strength to follow after this man and find a way of honouring him before we left the monastery. Anything less than this would have been to deny the victory of the great cross before which I stood.

This incident in front of a visual prophecy of the End Times representing the final unity of the church in terms of a cross conveys the key to The Blessing of Unity Jesus is seeking to restore today. We must return to Jesus’ prayer for our unity in John 17 which he uttered in the shadow of his impending death.

The Unity of Christ

““I do not ask for these only, but also for those who will believe in me through their word, 21 that they may all be one, just as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me. 22 The glory that you have given me I have given to them, that they may be one even as we are one, 23 I in them and you in me, that they may become perfectly one, so that the world may know that you sent me and loved them even as you loved me.” (John 17:21-23)

This passage teaches that glory brings unity, not any glory but “the glory that” Jesus had with the Father “before the foundation of the world” (John 17:5). This glory brings entry into a sphere of blessing we have discussed before. Jesus says in his parable of the sheep and the goats, “Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.” (Matt 25:34). The ultimate blessing of unity is to share the glory that Jesus had with the Father before the world was made[8]. This is certainly a glory of infinite bliss and joy, the sort of paradisaical heavenly world that people of all faiths love to imagine. Yet there is something much deeper than this in the story between Jesus and the Father, it has to do with the defining element of Christ’s life, the cross.

Peter says of Jesus, “you were redeemed from the empty way of life handed down to you from your ancestors… ¹⁹…with the precious blood of Christ, a lamb without blemish or defect. ²⁰ He was chosen before the foundation of the world, but was revealed in these last times for your sake.” (1 Pet 1:18-20). The glory that the Son had with the Father in eternity includes the knowledge of his sacrificial suffering and death[9].

In John’s Gospel, which is the context for the prayer of Jesus for our unity, the glory of the Son is to die for the Father, “Jesus answered them, “The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. 24 Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit. 27 “Now is my soul troubled. And what shall I say? ‘Father, save me from this hour’? But for this purpose I have come to this hour. 28 Father, glorify your name.” Then a voice came from heaven: “I have glorified it, and I will glorify it again.” ” (John 12:23-28).

In the light of this eternal perspective on suffering, my experience in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre of the beauty of Christ’s submission to the Father begins to make greater sense. Jesus honours/glorifies his Father by giving his life over to death, that he might not be alone in experiencing the Father’s glory, but “bring… many sons to glory … through suffering” (Heb 2:10). The glory of Jesus’ dying for the Father brings the unity between the Father and the embodied Son to a new level of love. Through death, resurrection and ascension into heaven the weak, mortal and temptable humanity of Jesus[10] becomes completely one with God. It is the revelation of this glory that unifies the members of the Church with the Father, Jesus and each other at the deepest possible level.

Whilst the world’s religions are full of attempts to fill in the gap between humanity and God –the visibility of the reconciliation between God and humanity achieved by Jesus[11] is to be expressed in a unique way in his body. Paul teaches, “For there is one God, and there is one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, 6 who gave himself as a ransom for all, which is the testimony given at the proper time… 8 I desire then that in every place the men should pray, lifting holy hands without anger or quarrelling” (1 Tim 2:5,7-8) The unity between God the humanity of Jesus is imaged through the prayers of a Church that refuses to be angry with other human beings who misunderstand and persecute us. Jesus taught, “bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you” (Luke 6:28)[12]; and this is exactly what he did on the cross (Luke 23:34). The perfection mediation of Jesus on behalf of humankind is reflected in the anger-less prayer of the church for its enemies. This is not an easy thing to live. Yet in terms of what Jesus prophesied for us it is indispensable  “you will be hated by all nations for my name’s sake” (Matt 24:9). The theme of united witness in the midst of suffering is closely tied to some other events that happened when we were in the Middle East; these point to what I will call a “Rainbow of Witness”.

Rainbows[13] of Witness

As I was out walking and praying one misty morning in Jerusalem I came across a wall poster with a 7 branched candlestick (menorah) made up of all the colours of the rainbow[14]. The top of each branch on the candle stick was a distinct colour, but the base and stem of each was the same hue and they all shared the same oil supply[15]. I sensed that the spiritual meaning of this candlestick was The Lamp of Witness. A few days later at the House of Blessing in Galilee we spotted this postcard of a lamp which has essentially the same message and contains a scripture, Yeshua, “a light for revelation to the Gentiles, and the glory of God’s people Israel.”” (Luke 2:32). The glory of God is to reveal through Jesus and his unified followers (Jew and Gentile) that he is the Saviour of the world. If glory means witness, witness is the key to practical unity.

The image of a lamp of witness appears in Zechariah chapter 4 at a time where the temple lies in ruins and the LORD is proclaiming restoration through the prophets. Zechariah has a vision of a golden lampstand with seven lamps with two olive trees on each side of the lamps providing oil. The divine explanation of these symbols is, ““Not by might, nor by power, but by my Spirit, says the Lord of hosts.” and the two olive trees “are the two anointed ones[16] who stand by the Lord of the whole earth.” The message is that the anointing of these two witnesses by the Holy Spirit will achieve God’s purposes of restoring his broken house in Jerusalem.

These images find completion in the End Time visions that the apostle John receives from the glorified Jesus recorded in the book of Revelation, “Then I turned to see the voice that was speaking to me, and on turning I saw seven golden lampstands, and in the midst of the lampstands one like a son of man…. As for the mystery… of the seven golden lampstands…the seven lampstands are the seven churches.” (Rev 1:12, 20). Within the framework of Revelation the purpose of the lampstands is to give light, to witness to the glory of Christ. Later, in the eleventh chapter of the book, Zechariah’s picture of the two olive trees is completed in a vision where two witnesses are identified with two olive trees and two lampstands. These witnesses are prophets who testify to Jesus with mighty signs until they are killed by the beast, and like Jesus lay dead for three days until they are raised back to life and ascend into heaven. What follows on the earth appears to be a mass turning to God (Rev 11:1-13). This is a picture of the End Time Church, it is about us.

Symbolically, the two witnesses stand for the Church moving in the prophetic anointing of Moses and Elijah, with power to strike the earth with plagues, bring drought and punish their adversaries with fire (11:5-6). This dramatic imagery signifies the fullness of the prophetic witness that God will send on his united people in the last days. As Moses and Elijah shared in the cloud of glory with Jesus on the Mount of Transfiguration[17] (Luke 9:28-36), and the apostles were eyewitnesses of Christ’s majesty (2 Pet 1:16-17), this same glorious presence will fill the End Time Church. This is the glory which Jesus promised will make the Church one with him and his Father. It is the glory of suffering love. As Jesus bore witness to the Father and received his blessing, the church receives the blessing of Christ as it testifies to him[18]. True Christian unity comes when each church is a lampstand burning so brightly with the light of Christ that every branch cannot fail to identity that all others are shining with the one and the same light. Whether that lampstand calls itself Catholic, Orthodox, Protestant, Pentecostal, Evangelical … by spiritual discernment we can see that the light burns with the glory of God, it is a rainbow light, it is a propitiating/atoning light. Such a light is necessarily a light whose fuel is suffering that others may be saved. The revelation of this mystery is an integral part of why I was called to travel to the Middle East.

Blessing the World Through Persecution

In Hebrews we read this exhortation, “Remember those who are in prison, as though in prison with them, and those who are mistreated, since you also are in the body.” (13:3). When the writer tells us to “remember” he is speaking the language of God, who when he “remembers” doesn’t simply recall something intellectually, he acts with power to deliver his people from distress[19]. All over the world there are brothers and sisters being imprisoned, tortured, beaten, and killed for their faith. By intercession and identification with them in the Spirit we enter into the action of which Jesus prophesied, “‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. 35 For….I was in prison and you came to me.’” (Matt 25:34-36). In the mystery of identificatory suffering we enter into Jesus anguish on the cross and the intense oneness with the Father and lost humanity which is his glory.

As the glory of the Father and Son was to suffer together for the establishment of the kingdom of God, so we suffer together today as sons of God in the process of being glorified through affliction to be fit heirs of this kingdom[20]. Suffering affliction for Christ’s kingdom is the highest possible gift (Phil 1:29) for it is the gift of being able to share in his own suffering (Phil 3:10; Col 1:24; 1 Pet 4:13). This was a gift bestowed upon us when “God and Father blessed us in Christ … in the heavenly places, 4 even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world (Eph 1:3-4). To have been chosen “before the foundation of the world” means to share the glory Jesus had in eternity (John 17:5), the honour of being predestined to suffer for the Father[21].

Jesus promised that when we would be beaten by governing authorities, betrayed to death by father, mother, sister and brother, and “hated by all nations for my name’s sake.” (Matt 10:16-23; 24:9), “the Spirit of (y)our Father” would witness through us (Matt 10:20). When this happens, every member of the body of Christ, whatever their colour, gender or denominational affiliation, will know they are part of the one family of God sharing allegiance to the same King. This is The Blessing of Unity

Conclusion

Suffering love is the only thing in this world that produces eternal fruit. The final blessing of the Bible, “Blessed are those who wash their robes, so that they may have the right to the tree of life and that they may enter the city by the gates.” (Rev 22:14) is in a book addressed to saints and martyrs (5:8; 8:3-4; 11:18; 13:7, 10; 14:12; 16:6; 17:6; 18:20, 24; 19:8; 20:9), for these are the only people whom Jesus acknowledges as belonging to him. Revelation is of course a book which prophesies great suffering for the End Time people of God throughout the world. Seen in this light, the Door of Prophecies is a true testimony of Jesus to the nature of the End Time Church. In our day we must expect to see a single cross radiating into the world, for only in this way can the glory of God radiate across the globe.

Remember my message on Peter the broken rock and foundation of the church? The last recorded words of our Lord to Peter were this, “Truly, truly, I say to you, when you were young, you used to dress yourself and walk wherever you wanted, but when you are old, you will stretch out your hands, and another will dress you and carry you where you do not want to go.” 19 (This he said to show by what kind of death he was to glorify God.)[22] And after saying this he said to him, “Follow me.”” (John 21:18-19) To share in the blessing of being a disciple and leading others in discipleship, involves a willingness to suffer with Christ to bring others to glory (Luke 24:26). This sort of reality is beyond words, and in a place like the Middle East there are constant reminders of such sacrifice; let me close with one final prophetic application.

In Old Cairo is found the Church of St George, and within it the Shrine of the Chains of Saint George. George was a Roman soldier who died under orders from the Emperor Diocletian in the 4^th century because he refused to sacrifice to the gods. Behind a glass case in the Shrine are found imitation instruments of torture, including a wheel of swords like that used to run over George’s body multiple times before his decapitation. Devotees who enter the shrine seeking the exceptional grace that was on the martyr’s life allow themselves to have an iron halter placed on their neck and chains wound around their body, thus symbolising a willingness to die for Christ. In Australia, our churches know no such tradition of martyrdom[23] and the dignity it imparts, but by the grace of God we will.

Years ago I awoke one morning to see multicoloured streams flowing out from Perth into the world. I knew immediately that this symbolised multicultural and multiracial teams of Christians pouring out into the nations to witness for Jesus. This vision is incorporated into the radiating cross of The Door of Prophecies. As Spirit empowered brothers and sisters go out from amongst us into a world where hostile ideologies are on the rise – Islam, secularism, Hinduism, they form a rainbow of witness whose power to save will be communicated by a Christ-filled love that suffers unto death. God has not forgotten Australia; with the other nations that have suffered so long for our Lord we too will bring glory into the kingdom of heaven (Rev 21:24), there will be Australian blood shed abroad before the End comes.

““Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.” (Matt 5:10), “And I heard a voice from heaven saying, “Write this: Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord from now on.” “Blessed indeed,” says the Spirit, “that they may rest from their labours, for their deeds follow them!”” “He who testifies to these things says, “Surely I am coming soon.” Amen. Come, Lord Jesus!” (Rev 14:13; 22:20).