We tend to use a lot of Iwords, don't we? I believe this and God please help me. We understand seeking apersonal relationship with God - finding out where I stand with God. That partwe can work towards. It's when we start looking at the rest of the world, thatit becomes difficult. Working out a relationship between God and me is a loteasier than figuring out God and us.

That's where we trip up,isn't it? It’s the awkward silence after someone speaks up in the middle of adiscussion and says, “I don’t see it that way at all.” It’s the person in thepew behind you who seemingly disagrees with everything you say. There are otherpeople out there with different backgrounds, histories, and experiences, peoplewho are bound to see the Bible, the church, and everything else differentlythan the person sitting next to them. There are other denominations out therewho do things in a wildly different fashion, which makes you wonder if they’veread the same Bible you have. There are other Christians out there living invastly different cultures and social settings who practice their faith in waysthat look alien to you. How do we live together? How do we get from “I” and“you” to “we”?

This is, after all, whatJesus prays for. This whole chapter in John is Jesus praying for us before hisarrest. The passage I just read is the end of the prayer. This is what Christasks of God before the beginning of his trial and crucifixion. It seems to methen that these are words to pay attention to.

And yet rather than seekingunity, we seem to seek out more and more ways to separate ourselves. Weseparate ourselves from each other according to theology or geography. Weseparate ourselves from each other according to race or social standing. Weseparate ourselves from each other according to gender, appearance, age,politics, etc. The list goes on and on. With so much out there dividing us, howare we ever to achieve the kind of unity for which Jesus asks?

It helps, I think, to understand that the unity for which Jesus asks is notbased on who we are, but on who God is. Jesus here does not pray for unitywithout also acknowledging the fundamental character of God: first, that God isone with Jesus Christ, and second, that God loves God’s people in the same waythat God loves Jesus. There are two relationships being dealt with in thispassage.

The first one is the relationship between God the Father and Jesus. “…just asyou are in me and I am in you.” It is this relationship that is crucial tounderstanding the second relationship that Jesus asks of us. Because Jesus goeson to say “that they also may be in us…; I in them and you in me…” We arecalled to be united together as Christ and the Father are united.

What Jesus asks of God in his prayer for us is that we will be unified in muchthe same way that the persons of the Trinity are unified. The Trinityillustrates the different ways that God works with us and the world.

God the Creator made theworld and all things in it. And God the Creator made the world good. But sinand death came into the world as a resutl of humanity's choices. Because ofthose choices, the redemptive power of God was necessary so that humanity couldlearn how to work on the side of God and so that the walls that divide us fromGod and one another could be torn down, the walls made by sin. The power isseen perfectly in Jesus.

And when Jesus left this world the sustaining power of God took over in theSpirit who came, encouraging us and guiding us to be God's hands and feet andlips in the world.

Three persons in one God. Allwith different purposes, but united in one God. It is that relationship weseek. That is how we are to be one, because we don't individually have all thatit takes to do God's work in the world.

Some of us are good at some things and others are good at other things. Some ofus are the eyes and ears and some are the hands and feet. It is only as we workwe work together, when we are one, that we can accomplish all of what'snecessary to be God's people in the world.

It is through the God who is One that we are united. Did you notice how oftenthis passage uses the words “one” and “in”? That is a kind of marker, so thatwe notice how important they are. In God, we are one. It is God’s glory thatcomes through when we are united in God’s love.

It is the love of God thatwhen given away freely, draws us into a community, uniting us as one. This isthe love that makes us a serving community united in one accord and mission.This is what showed through in Paul and Silas to the community in Philippi. Thejailor locked Paul and Silas in prison and yet they welcomed him as a brotherin faith. Paul and Silas didn't point out all of the differences between themor focus on the wrongs done to them. They simply welcomed him and his family. Howmany of us could do the same?

This is the unity Jesus praysfor in our Gospel today. This is the unity that celebrates the diversity of allcreation. Jesus did not come into the world so that we would end up beingindistinguishable from people who have lost the ability to be civil and humanwith one another. Whenever that happens, it is a travesty of everything Jesusstood for.

Jesus' prayer was that we would be in the world in a different way - withhearts that are truly open to every last one of our brothers and sisters sothat we might have joy in ourselves and so that the world would see what it ismissing.

The world is after all, stillvery divided. But it is not divided because of its diversity - rather it isdivided because of its sin.

Sin causes us to be separated from one another and from God, sin in the form ofjealousy, sin in the form of resentment and pride. Sin in the form of selfseeking and in the form of caring too much about too little. It is this thatdivides us all.

Yet the unity for which Jesusprays is not dependent upon our ability to overcome division, but on God’sconstant love for us in spite of it. There is a “we” of faith precisely becauseof the way in which God relates to each and every believer, not just because ofthe way in which we relate to each other. Jesus is not praying for somemonolithic expression of faith in which all believers believe the same thingswithout variance. The “unity” here is not the absence of our disagreements. Itis loving others in spite of them.

This isn’t to say that weshould simply be content with our division, however. Wherever there isdivision, discord, or disunity, the all-encompassing love of God is foreverwearing away the walls that separate us, like waves ceaselessly wearing away therocks out on the beach. The longer we spend in the environment of Christiancommunity, the clearer it becomes to us that God loves us all with the samepersistent love. Slowly, with God’s help, we come to see others through theeyes of Jesus Christ. “So that the love with which you have loved me may bein them, and I in them,” Jesus said.This is Jesus’ prayer for us, and it never ceases. Jesus prays for us eventoday.

During worship one morning at the Annual Recreation Workshop I attended twoweeks ago, we sang the hymn "Blessed Assurance." After the secondverse our worship leader paused to tell us why this was her favorite hymn."I just left a church where I didn't feel welcomed and joined a new churchwhere I wasn't sure how welcomed I was. I was starting to feel like therewasn't a place in the church for me. Then one Sunday we sang this song. and Irealized that this is my story. And that this is my song. And that no person,no church can take that away from me." The congregation gathered for ARW allcalled out love and acceptance to her before singing the third verse of thehymn with more passion than I have ever heard.

We are one in Christ. We are united in that fact and no matter what we do, wecan't take that away from anyone. And no one can take it away from us. Jesushas prayed for it - and it is happening.

We need to pray for our unity rather than focusing on the things that divideus, Pray that each one here today may have God dwell richly in them - and thatthey may dwell richly in God, Pray that our love for each other - our unity -may be shown not only to each member of the family of God that walks throughthese doors - but to those outside these doors as well - so that all might beone. Amen.