WE HAVE SEEN that no special mode of baptism and no special laying on of hands of bishops has any backing of Jesus. Neither of these can or does go back to Him for authority. If they begin, they must begin with the apostles. The gap between the apostles and Jesus in this matter is fixed. Therefore they can, in reference to bishops, talk only of apostolic succession. I’m not interested in apostolic succession, for the terminus of my faith is not the apostles, but Jesus Christ. Ours is not an apostolic church, but a Christian church. The apostles were men like ourselves, partly Christian, but no center of a faith. That faith can rest only in the Divine—the Divine Son of God. If our faith terminates in men, then it rests this side of the divine and cannot be a divine faith.
So our faith, and therefore our unity, are not in bishops, and not in baptism, but in Christ. The only place where we can be united is in Christ, for in Him we are one. We do not have to seek for unity; we have it in Him. All we have to do is to express what we already have. The Christians are the most united body on earth, and the most divided—united at the Center, and divided at the place of the “whats.” Not what I believe, but Whom! If I say to any audience, “What do you believe?” they will automatically divide, no two believing exactly alike. But if I ask, “Whom do you trust?” then automatically they come together, one name upon their lips—Christ.
So this verse is profoundly right: “so we, though many, are one body in Christ” (Rom. 12:5). We are not, and cannot be, one body in bishops, in baptism, in church government, but we are one body in Christ. Not we ought to be one body, but we are, inherently and intrinsically so.
O blessed Lord, we are grateful that we have a center of unity. We are grateful that that center is a divine center. Were it less than the divine we could not rejoice in it. We do rejoice in our living unity in Thee. We thank Thee, thank Thee. Amen.
AFFIRMATION FOR THE DAY: Not “what” but “Whom” shall be my emphasis.
