By Dr. Jimmy Braswell
Chaplain, Home Hospice of Odessa
Conflict has been a given since the beginning of time.
My brother shared a comical book called “It All Started With Rocks and Clubs” a satire on warfare and conflict throughout time.
It seems to have always been a distant dream, but still a desired one, that mankind, or at least the body of Christ, the church, would find unity.
I have lived long enough to go through debates of unity of Midland/Odessa, Democrat and Republican, Black and White, unity of Odessa High/Permian High, Unity of eastside/westside and for those debates to continually end in stand offs with all kinds of excuses.
Perhaps true unity will never be, especially of the world in anything. The Bible actually tells us that there is a unity to be found but no where else. That unity is in a leader and fellowship of Him – Jesus Christ.
In fact, it’s the sole unity the Bible encourages us to have according to John chapter 17. We are not called as a necessity to be unified in customs, habits, even worship patterns, however, we are called to be united in Him – simple belief and trust in the person of Jesus Christ — we don’t ever have to be unified in exactly all he said or what he looked like – that is, unless you have an autographed picture – we are simply asked to be unified in looking to Him. Put your eyes on Jesus and you’ll never go wrong. The one thing we can all be thankful for.
