Which of the following statements is true about church unity?
- Church unity is commanded and urged and is a virtue commended and commanded in the New Testament.
- Church unity is wrong, judged and a cause of even severe discipline by the Lord Jesus and His apostles in the New Testament.
Now, which of the above statements is true?
Answer: Both are. Why? Because church unity can be either grounded in and in pursuit of the values of truth and obedience to the Word of the Lord, or it can be grounded in and pursuit of other values that either detract from or are opposed to truth and obedience to the Word of the Lord. And the difference is night and day as to how the Lord views the two and the church that is pursuing them.
In short, church unity is not, by itself, a virtue. It is not, by itself, commended or commanded by the Lord. In fact, the Scriptures contain many examples where church unity is a cause for censure and threats by the apostles, by the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Holy Spirit!
Cases when the church meeting does more moral or spiritual harm than good
But in giving this instruction, I do not praise you, because you come together not for the better but for the worse. 18 For, in the first place, when you come together as a church, I hear that divisions exist among you; and in part I believe it. 19 For there must also be factions among you, so that those who are approved may become evident among you. 20 Therefore when you meet together, it is not to eat the Lord’s Supper, 21 for in your eating each one takes his own supper first; and one is hungry and another is drunk. 22 What! Do you not have houses in which to eat and drink? Or do you despise the church of God and shame those who have nothing? What shall I say to you? Shall I praise you? In this I will not praise you. -- 1 Cor. 11:17-22
The Corinthian church is warned by the apostle Paul that their meeting, their coming together, does more harm than good. That is, their unity in coming together in the way they do is a net spiritual and moral negative and draws the censure of the apostle! In fact, they are informed that the thing they hold precious, the communion, the Love Feast designed to show their union together as the body of Christ, redeemed by the body and blood of Jesus, is done in such disobedience and in such utter disregard for one another that it is unrecognizable as the Lord's Supper! (v20). Their unity in this behavior is so bad, their failure to esteem one another as valued and blood-bought precious members of Christ's body, that the Holy Spirit is killing some of them and casting others onto the sickbed! See vv27-30. Their failure to esteem and adhere to apostolic doctrine, to repent of what they value and adhere to what Christ values regarding the nature of His body members is a mortal danger, demanding immediate body-wide corrective action.