“Quit fighting! You’re on the same team!”
No, that was not a motion at the Southern Baptist Convention. However, I said this quite frequently as my two young boys were locked up while attempting to do something together.
When my boys were younger, I would purposely get them to work together to try to accomplish a few chores like cleaning the playroom. It never failed. They would get 10 minutes into the task, and then for a variety of reasons, they would begin to fight and get distracted from the mission at hand.
Sometimes I wonder if the Lord looks down at His children and is thinking the same thing. Jesus knew that if the church had internal quarrels, it would never accomplish the mission of external love.
Of all the things Jesus could have prayed the night He was arrested, He prayed in John 17 that we all be one.
The enemy wants nothing more than to divide us. He wants to divide us at national conventions, divide us at our local churches, and divide our homes. When the world was in desperate need of hope, they longed to see unity and love. But some of the church started fighting about masks, who’s in charge, social distancing, and service cancellations. When the world needed expressions of external love, instead they saw internal quarreling.
We must not let this be our narrative. The vast majority of our churches made the pandemic shift from internal quarrels to external love. They sought ways to love their neighbors in times of need. They looked for ways to honor and bless health workers who were overworked. Some churches opened up the walls of their buildings to let local public school students do online learning.
The lost world is watching. What will they think about the stories they read about us? Will it confirm what they have witnessed at your church during the pandemic, or will they read in disbelief? Will they say to themselves, “This doesn’t sound like that church. They love each other, they help my kid at school, they serve in times of disaster, they care for the abused, and there are no orphans to adopt in this town because of them.”
Make the shift. “Stop fighting! You’re on the same team.” We’ve got a mission to complete. Let’s finish it together.