The Unity of Diversity (Reading Romans 12:3-8)
The Western Church lives in paradox. On one end of the compendium there is a feeling that we must take it upon ourselves to unify the church. In doing so there is a feeling that somehow we must deal with diversity while at the same time creating it. Such ideas have literally caused the church to stand on its head. In Romans 12 Paul teaches that the reality of the church is that it IS a diverse unity. No one needs to create unity, or diversity, and so on and so on. God has created the church as is. God has not given us the ideal of unity and made it our duty to hasten toward it. God has created unity. Unity is not the ideal of the church it is the reality of the church. Learning to deal with the church “as is” will cause us to return the body of Christ from standing on its head to standing on its feet. If we apply the principle of Paul here in Romans 12, that the church is a paradox, a “diverse unity”, it may cause us to see things quite differently. “For as in one body we have many