A Common Connection:
One Father
7 Cords we as Believers share in Common:
- a Common Community - “one Body”
- a Common Communion - “one Spirit”
- a Common Confidence - “one Hope”
- a Common Commitment - “one Lord”
- a Common Confession - “one Faith”
- a Common Conversion - “one Baptism”
- a Common Connection - “one Father”
1 John 3:2 “Dear friends, we are God’s children now. But it has not yet been shown to us what we are going to be. We know that when He comes again, we will be like Him because we will see Him as He is.”
Deuteronomy 6:4 “Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God is one Lord.”
Mark 12:28-29 “One of the teachers of the Law of Moses came up while Jesus and the Sadducees were arguing. When he heard Jesus give a good answer, he asked him, “What is the most important commandment?” Jesus answered, “The most important one says: ‘People of Israel, you have only one Lord and God.”
Matthew 1:23 “A virgin will have a baby boy, and he will be called Immanuel, which means ‘God is with us.’”
John 1:1 “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.”
John 10:30 “I and the Father are one.”
John 14:15-18 “If you love me, obey my commandments. And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Advocate, who will never leave you. He is the Holy Spirit, who leads into all truth. The world cannot receive him, because it isn’t looking for him and doesn’t recognize him. But you know him, because he lives with you now and later will be in you. No, I will not abandon you as orphans—I will come to you.”
Acts 5:3-4 “Then Peter said, ‘Ananias, why have you let Satan fill your heart? You lied to the Holy Spirit, and you kept some of the money for yourself. The property was yours to sell or not sell, as you wished. And after selling it, the money was also yours to give away. How could you do a thing like this? You weren’t lying to us but to God!’
Matthew 28:19 "Go to the people of all nations and make them my disciples. Baptize them in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.”
Threats to Unity: Pride
John 15:5 “I am the vine, and you are the branches. If you stay joined to me, and I to you, you will produce plenty of fruit. But separated from me you won’t be able to do anything.”
Proverbs 16:18 “Pride goes before destruction, and haughtiness before a fall.
Threats to Unity: Greed
1 Timothy 6:10 “The love of money is the root of all kinds of evil. Some have wandered away from the faith and have impaled themselves with a lot of pain because they made money their goal.”
Threats to Unity: Lust
Romans 1:21 "They know God, but they do not give him the honor that belongs to him, nor do they thank him. Instead, their thoughts have become complete nonsense, and their empty minds are filled with darkness.”
Threats to Unity: Envy
Proverbs 14:30 “A peaceful heart leads to a healthy body; jealousy is like cancer in the bones.”
Proverbs 27:4 “An angry person is dangerous, but a jealous person is even worse.”
Threats to Unity: Gluttony
1 Corinthians 10:7 “So, don’t worship statues of gods, as some of them did. It is written, “The people sat down to eat and drink. Then they got up to dance wildly in front of their god.”
1 Corinthians 15:32 “As men look at it, what good has it done for me in the city of Ephesus to fight with men who act like wild animals? If the dead are not raised, we might as well be like those who say, ‘Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die.’”
Proverbs 23:21 “Drunkards and gluttons will be reduced to poverty. If all you do is eat and sleep, you will soon be wearing rags.”
Deuteronomy 21:20-21 “And they shall say unto the elders of his city, ‘This our son is stubborn and rebellious, he will not obey our voice; he is a glutton, and a drunkard.’ And all the men of his city shall stone him with stones, that he die: so shalt thou put evil away from among you; and all Israel shall hear, and fear.”
1 Corinthians 6:10 “…thieves, the greedy, drunkards, the verbally abusive, and swindlers will not inherit the kingdom of God.”
Threats to Unity: Rebellion
Romans 12:19 “My friends, do not try to punish others when they wrong you, but wait for God to punish them with his anger. It is written: ‘I will punish those who do wrong;I will repay them,’ says the Lord.”
Jeremiah 1:5 “Before I made you in your mother’s womb, I knew you. Before you were born, I chose you for a special work.”
Ecclesiastes 11:5 “Just as you do not know the path of the wind and how bones are formed in the womb of the pregnant woman, so you do not know the activity of God who makes all things.”
Trinity = “Unity (One) in Relationship (Three) through Love
Jesus' Prayer for us:
John 17:20-23 (CEV), I am not praying just for these followers. I am also praying for everyone else who will have faith because of what my followers will say about me. I want all of them to be one with each other, just as I am one with you and you are one with me. I also want them to be one with us. Then the people of this world will believe that you sent me. I have honored my followers in the same way you honored me, in order that they may be one with each other, just as we are one. I am one with them, and you are one with me, so they may become completely one. Then this world's people will know that you sent me. They will know that you love my followers as much as you love me.”
