Pastor Symps closes out our semester series on "Uncommon Unity" with a glowing and exciting description of our final destination to the Church's uncommon unity. Working with Revelation 7:9,10 and 21:1-8, Pastor Symps expounds on the promise from our Lord of what this wonderful oneness with Him will look like in His now-perfected Kingdom. Hallelujah! Come quickly, Lord Jesus!

We start with Ephesians 2:1-10, a glorious proclamation of God's eternal intent to call us into service and conformity of our Lord Jesus, this by the power of the Holy Spirit. Pastor Ryan expounds on the wonderful paradox of how unique, even individual, our callings from the Lord are, yet He has the power to make us and declare us one in the Spirit, united in Christ! Pastor Ryan instructs us in discerning between those callings that are universal to the Body of Christ, and those that the Lord has uniquely prepared us for, since the foundation of the world!

We look soberly at Acts Chapter 15. We see a significant divergence in the this stage of the Apostle Paul's life, where at chapter's beginning we see him working diligently for that uncommon unity befitting the Body of Christ. Yet at chapter's end, a dispute cancels his missionary relationship with brother Barnabas. How can we discern between dispute and genuine conflict if seemingly Paul could not? Pastor Ryan helps us to delve into this concern, reminding us that Jesus, and only Jesus, trail-blazed the plan to uncommon unity - for Paul, AND for us!

Pastor Ryan concentrates on Romans 14, where the Apostle Paul exhorts for the Body of Christ to not mistake our wonderful diversity as something to foment disputations - we learn that our God-given differences are to model every opportunity to be lead by the Spirit to delight in acceptance, forbearance, and uniqueness. Do not let disagreeing in opinions become THE important thing! It is always God Who is to be our Head, not our opinion.

We explore the Gifts of the Spirit, as described and defined in I Corinthians chap. 12:1-11. Here, Pastor Ryan explains, the Apostle Paul declares emphatically the intent of the gifts: as diverse and unique as they are, they are truly the Lord's working to build and unite the Body. Every gift is needed, every good for the common good of the Body of Christ and the glory of God!

Pastor Symps shares a bounty of Scripture dealing with the Lord's command to forgive, and to reconcile, and their roles in exercising our uncommon unity in the Body. Pastor Symps examines the differences between forgiveness and reconciliation, looking at God's Word for definition and the unique properties that are necessary to execute in order for us to aim for, achieve and maintain the peace of Christ in His Church.

Romans 12:17-18 and Matthew 18:15-35, among others, are our Scripture passages for today.

Pastor Ryan explains the Biblical vision for this uncommon unity found in the Body of Christ, and how diversity can demonstrate the miraculous vision of our innate uniqueness in creation yet profoundly united in the Holy Spirit. Pastor Ryan explains, using Gen. 1 and Ephesians 2, the Biblical vision for diversity, and the worldly barriers to experiencing its resulting uncommon unity.

Our unity in God is blessed with His intentional expression of diversity, found from His inception of our creation to now. The world attempts to imitate His unity with a contrived expression of uniformity, but we can only celebrate how different we are when we acknowledge and live His divine creative reality of "one in the Spirit", an essence of His character from our beginning. Galations 3:26-29 is our Scripture passage for today.

The Indwelling Holy Spirit, the very Spirit of the Godhead, inhabits every one of God's children, uniting us with each other through spiritual gifting from Him, and through common understandings of our hope for now and for the future, for the obedient desire for the Church, and to see God's will be done on this earth as well as Heaven. we see how it will be, and how much it's not on earth, and we "groan", and the Spirit groans with us. By humbling ourselves to His will we "go low' in our submission and we "grow" in HIM-united!

Scripture passages include verses from Ephesians 4, Romans 8 and Galatians 5.

Pastor Symps leads us through a deep look into John 15. Here our Lord shares one of the more intimate and expressive titles bestowed upon us: "I call you friends". Our unity with Christ is declared by such a familial identity! And not only this, our Lord instructs us to spread such deep and personal connection with one another, that our abiding friendship demonstrates our faithful belief that we are truly "one in the Lord".