Make Every Effort

Speaker 1 (00:02):

Hi, I'm Brian Mosley, our team here at RightNow Media loves serving the church. We believe the mission of the church matters and that unity in the church matters. Whether you're watching this message alone or with your leadership team, we hope it's an encouragement to you. In this session, pastor Kyle Idleman challenges us to lay aside what the Apostle Paul calls disputable matters and prioritize our unity in Christ.

Speaker 2 (00:28):

Hey, I love this gathering and one of the reasons I do is it feels like part of what's happening here is an answer to the prayer of Jesus in John 17, that we would be one, that we would be united. And he didn't just pray that we would be one, but that we would be one as he and the Father are one, that we would have complete unity. And so I want to spend a few minutes just challenging us, what it looks like culturally these days to have that kind of complete unity. Because as you know, I just can't remember a time where so many people had so many different opinions about so many things. We don't seem to agree on anything. And maybe you hear that and you're like, well, I don't really agree with that. I'm not surprised because we don't even agree on our disagreeableness. I want to start off by talking about a time where I learned that I was making assumptions and forming opinions, and it wasn't really fair. I had for a long time been incredibly judgmental towards a certain group of people. I would look at them and what they were a part of. And in my mind I just thought that is completely unacceptable. I could never be a part of that community. And I'm talking of course about people who put pineapple on their pizza.

Speaker 2 (01:58):

I just had a problem with it. To me, it's like putting pepperoni on your ice cream or squirting ketchup in your cereal, like dipping your Oreos and ranch dressing. It feels like culinary blasphemy, this unholy union of pineapple and pizza. And I was so anti pineapple and pizza that I would just secretly judge people in my mind. If I saw somebody partaking, I would think to myself, remind me not to ask that person for their opinion on anything ever. If you're doing that, I'm not going to. Why would I ask you for parenting advice if you put pineapple on your pizza? But then one night I was at a friend's house and I grabbed what I thought was just an innocent slice of ham pizza. I took a big confident bite and my taste buds were assaulted, or should I say serenaded by the unexpected symphony of flavors, savory ham, harmonized perfectly with the sweet tropical notes of the pineapple. It was a beautiful collision, a paradoxical pairing that somehow worked in perfect culinary harmony. I finally had seen the light and it was a golden pineapple chunk on a bed of mozzarella.

Speaker 2 (03:17):

And I thought, how could I have been so wrong for so long? I'd made these assumptions. Now the question became, would I admit it? Would I tell people I was wrong? I didn't feel like I could. I'd become known in my circle of friends as an anti P nle on pizza apologist. I was a crusader against these tropical toppings. And so I thought, I'm just going to keep it to myself and I'm going to let this become my forbidden fruit. But then I was at a Super Bowl party, 2007 bears were playing the cults, and on the island there were all kinds of pizzas. And right there in the middle of the island, my Hawaiian temptress was calling out to me and I grabbed a few slices. I thought nobody will notice, but people noticed. And I took a few bites and finally admitted it.

Speaker 2 (04:11):

And I found myself a part of a new community. And I'm wondering if even in this room, I have some brothers and sisters with me here who share the bonds of pineapple on pizza, even in this room, right? We can find different things that we're pretty passionate about, areas that have divided us. We have opinions on everything from pizza toppings to global politics to the latest celebrity scandal. And every opinion out there is asking us throughout the day in ways that have not been asked to this extent ever, questions like, where do you stand on this issue? What tribe do you belong to? What community are you a part of? What's your opinion? And we're just surrounded by hot takes and viral threads and trending topics and lots of disagreement. And it's caused division not just among friends and family, but division in our churches.

Speaker 2 (05:14):

And one of the shifts I've experienced as a pastor, I imagine a lot of you can probably relate to this, is it used to be that when people disagreed with you on a subject, they could be disagreeable about that issue. But now it just feels more personal. They don't just think I'm wrong about an issue, they think I'm wrong as a person. And more than ever, I feel like when there's a conflict or disagreement over something, that my motives are questioned, my intentions are questioned. And I see how this is creating division within not just the church, but in our relationships and nothing new, right? Like Paul wrote to the church in Rome about this, he challenged them to stay together, to not be divided over disagreements. And after the first 11 chapters where he talks about the essentials of the faith and the core doctrines of the gospel, he refers in chapter 14 to these disputable matters.

Speaker 2 (06:15):

And every one of us in this room understands that more often than not, what tends to divide us as believers in what can cause so much disunity in our community would be something that would fall under the category of a disputable matter. So Romans chapter 14 verse one, Paul writes to these believers in Rome and he says, accept the one whose faith is weak without quarreling over disputable matters. The word accept here is an open armed embrace. When we hear the word accept, at least if you're like me, you think of this reluctant tolerance or this forced acknowledgement. It's not necessarily open armed, it's more crossed arms. It's not an open armed embrace. It's just this tolerant acceptance. But that's not what we're challenged with here as a church, we're to accept one another even when we disagree on these disputable matters. And Paul gives two examples here that at first don't seem very relevant to us, but more so than we realize.

Speaker 2 (07:17):

He writes in verse two, one person's faith allows them to eat anything but another whose faith is weak, eats only vegetable. So as you know, and that city of Rome, there were a lot of idols. Everybody was an idol worshiper. And what would happen is people would take meat that had been sacrificed to the idols and then sell it in the market. And some of the believers had such a problem with that, that they decided we're just going to be vegetarians. We don't want to risk it. Now, ask yourself, why would there be so much meat in the market leftover from the idols? It's because idols rarely have much of an appetite. They never ate any of it. And so it would end up in the market so much so that most of the meat in the market had been sacrificed to idols. And so there were a segment of believers that had a conscience about this.

Speaker 2 (08:18):

And then there were other believers who were like, Hey, look, the idols aren't even real and meat is just meat. I'll have my bacon crispy the way God intended. This doesn't need to be a deal. And this issue apparently was creating this division. Second issue is in verse five, one person considers one day more sacred than another. Another considers everyday alike. Again, Jewish Christians in the church believed that the Sabbath or Saturday was the holy day, the day that they should worship, and it became a huge deal, right? And their defense is something that they had honored for 1500 years and they just couldn't let go of it. Other believers, they didn't grow up with that tradition, so they didn't feel the same way about it. So you have these disputable matters. What Paul doesn't do here is he doesn't try to talk them out of having opinions about these things.

Speaker 2 (09:15):

What I think most of us would have a tendency to do in leadership is if we saw disunity over certain areas, what we would attempt is to explain either one side that we landed strongly on or to explain both sides hoping to reach some kind of compromise, some land of agreement. But what Paul doesn't do is he doesn't really unpack either perspective. Now, later on, he mentions that he doesn't personally have a problem with eating meat sacrificed to idols or eating this meat, but even then he doesn't make a case for it. So it's as if he's saying, Hey, you can believe what you want to believe about these things. You can have your personal convictions. That's okay. We don't have to agree on these things. And he gives two examples, but he could have given a dozen more. So what I want you to do in your own minds here is just see if you can identify what might be a disputable matter.

Speaker 2 (10:09):

Maybe it's in your church, maybe it's with other churches in your community. Maybe it's something you're dealing with with some of your leaders, but just think of what might be a disputable matter. I'm going to give you some categories to help spur your thinking. Here. There are disputable matters that would fall under matters of opinion. These are our personal views that we have formed often based on how we grew up or life experiences we've had. These are things that are not directly addressed in scripture, but we feel passionate about them. Another category here would be matters of preference. These are the personal likes and dislikes that again are subjective. They're based on things like personality type or individual tastes. Again, not directly addressed in scripture. Now, I would just say that probably most of you in this room when it comes to matters of opinion and matters of preference, you could come up with scriptures, you can make your case, you can defend your position using scriptures.

Speaker 2 (11:13):

But here's what we do when it comes to matters of opinion and matters of preference. When we use scriptures, we tend to pull out a principle from scripture and then we apply that principle with the same force as a biblical command. We give our application of the principle the same force as a biblical command, and that causes a lot of division. Another category would be matters of interpretation, and these are our different understandings and explanations of biblical text. Maybe someplace where the Bible isn't explicit or maybe it seems to say one thing to this church over here and allow for something different to this church over here, it matters of interpretation, matters of opinion, matters of preference, matters of interpretation, can be a threat to the community, to the togetherness that God wants us to have in the church. So when Paul is addressing these things, he doesn't try to lead them to a place of agreement. We would assume that the way you would have unity is agreement. We've got to agree to some degree on these different issues, but he doesn't do that. Instead, what he does is he drives them not to agreement but to acceptance. The key is not agreement. The key is acceptance.

Speaker 2 (12:37):

If you've been married very long, chances are you've figured this out. If you haven't, then you really ought to. It's not necessarily about agreeing with one another, it's about accepting one another. In fact, you've probably read some research by Dr. John Gottman where he talks about the fact that 69% of disagreements in marriage are what he calls non resolvable about 69%. Maybe that seems a little low to some view, but they're issues that you're not going to resolve like their personality issues. Or maybe there's certain pressures like financial pressure or pressure with in-laws, things that are not going to change. You're going to continue to have these challenges. They're non resolvable. And in those areas it's not about acceptance or it's not about agreement, it's about acceptance. For nearly 30 years, my wife and I have disagreed over the appropriate temperature for our thermostat. Are there any other couples that have this issue?

Speaker 2 (13:41):

Yeah, I prefer a very reasonable and practical 70 degrees. She likes it a very balmy and blistering 73 degrees. And in the early years of marriage, we would debate this and each of us would make our case and we felt like the way we were going to get along with each other living in this house together is that one of us was going to have to agree with the other one at some point. And so we would fight about it and she'd turn it up to 73 and I'd complain about it and she'd tell me, take some clothes off. You weren't too many clothes. Take some clothes off. And then I'd turn it down to 70. And when she'd complain about being too cold, I'd say, why don't you put some clothes on? Why don't you add some layers? How about that? And something is broken in your marriage when as a young husband, you think the solution is for your wife to put on more clothes.

Speaker 2 (14:36):

But that's in my mind. I was more concerned about getting things my way. And then we took this more passive aggressive approach to disagreement. She'd turn it up, I'd turn it down, she'd turn it up, I'd it down. Finally, we end up sitting on separate sides of the couch. I'm wearing shorts, she's wearing a parka. We're not talking to each other. But a few years ago I read the book, never split the Difference, and I decided that I needed to change the strategy and I started turning it down to 67 degrees and then she turned it up to 73 and I turned it down to 67 and she turned up to 73 and I turned it down to 67. And then after a while I'm like, can we just meet in the middle? Can we just agree? And it did not, it didn't work. It didn't work at all.

Speaker 2 (15:26):

What we need is acceptance. We think the solution is trying to get the other person to agree with us, and that's how we have community. But instead, what we find in Romans here is it's an open armed embrace. But I'm going to guess that's hard for you for the same reason it's hard for me, and that is because I know I'm right. Isn't that the challenge for most of us when we know we're right, it's really difficult to accept someone and have this relationship with someone who we know we're right, we know that they're wrong. We want to make sure things are done our way, and we think the solution is that they need to agree with our opinion. Acceptance sounds nice until you start putting your area with it, until it's your conviction, your matter of preference and your matter of opinion or your matter of interpretation, and then you think like I do. Well, that's different.

Speaker 2 (16:36):

And Paul recognizes that this isn't easy. So he says in verse 19, he says, let us therefore make every effort to do what leads to peace and to mutual edification, let's make every effort within the church do everything you can as far as it depends on you. He says, make every effort to do what leads to peace and mutual edification. The phrase make every effort in the Greek is even more intense. It's not, Hey, we're going to try our best to get along. It is this pursuing, it's this relentless chasing after. It implies this active and passionate and intentional pursuit of unity. And that means that togetherness is not something we just sit around and we wait passively for. We hope the other person starts to see things our way. It's something that we sacrifice for making every effort is an intentional decision. And the reason that's so hard for us is because when it comes to disagreement and people who are having trouble, getting along with our reaction is almost always emotional.

Speaker 2 (17:45):

We tend to have an emotional reaction rather than this intentional, intentional effort to ask questions of ourselves, like, how can I make an effort to do what will lead to peace and mutual edification? So just again, just ask yourself how that looks in your life and in your ministry. This is what Jesus prayed for in John 17. Paul says here, we need to make an effort. We don't just let it happen, but we pursue unity. And yet our response is almost immediately emotional. It's a reaction. So I just wanted to give you a few questions to think through in your own mind. I'll give you some categories and then to pay attention to and then some questions to ask yourself just to see how you're doing here. The first category would be defensiveness. When it comes to this area or when it comes to my relationship with these people, do I quickly try to justify myself and counter attack instead of listening, honestly, am I just making a case for them in my mind as they try to explain their position?

Speaker 2 (18:53):

The second category is sensitivity. Am I interpreting disagreement over ideas and opinions as attacks against me that if you disagree with me about something, then I'm going to take that personally? That's going to be something that I am personally sensitive about. Number three is rumination. Am I playing the disagreement over in my mind again and again, having these imaginary arguments driving in the car? Am I standing in the shower saying you can't handle the truth, trying to make my case against the person who disagrees with me. Number four, it's all or nothing thinking where I look at a disagreement in extreme terms. Either we agree on this or we're done or we can't have this kind of relationship together, or am I keeping perspective and am I understanding the nuance? Number five is personalizing. Am I assuming negative intentions behind the other person's perspective? And then number six, I'll just call it ping.

Speaker 2 (19:53):

Am I stubbornly holding on to an opinion? I refusing to be open to some new idea? Why do you believe it? Well, because I've always believed it. Why do you have such a strong opinion about this? Well, because my parents had such a strong opinion about it, and we've not ever really allowed for something different. And so we tend to think of togetherness being accomplished by determining who's right and who's wrong. But Paul says it's instead something that's accomplished when we think about what do we need to do so that this leads to peace and mutual edification. And then in chapter 15, actually he points to Jesus as an example of this kind of humility. He says in chapter 15 verse five, to have the same attitude as Jesus towards one another. That's his prayer is that our attitude of humility towards one another would allow us to be what he in verse five people of one mind and one voice that this kind of togetherness doesn't happen without humility.

Speaker 2 (20:56):

And I just would tell you, I have been really convicted about this. I've been looking at the gospels with this in mind, and I've just become more aware of my own pride, my own sensitivity, and how I can be easily offended. And when people disagree with me, I take it personally. I always feel like I need to make my case. And if you send me an email telling me why I was wrong, I'll send you an email back telling you why you're wrong about me being wrong. And if you look through the gospels, Jesus just didn't do this. He had every right to defend himself because he was always right. When they call him a glutton and a drunkard, you would think that he would come out strong, that he would say, Hey, I put together this food in drink log to prove to you here's what I've eaten. Here's what I haven't. And by the way, I fasted 40 days and 40 nights. You feel like you're doing okay compared to that, you would think he would immediately get a little passive aggressive and make a case. I mean calling Jesus a glutton and a drunkard seems like somebody should say something about that when they accuse him of being demon possessed. I can't think of something that would be more offensive to the son of God than to have this accusation made against him.

Speaker 2 (22:34):

But he doesn't launch a PR campaign to protect his reputation. He doesn't start posting on social media so people would think better of him trying to control the perception. He doesn't defend himself when they mock him and they say, can anything good come out of Nazareth? Again? He doesn't say, I'll tell you what, why don't you come to the Miracle and Healing show tonight and you'll see if something good comes out of Nazareth? How about that? He doesn't have that kind of spirit at all in his darkest moments when he is betrayed by Judas and denied by Peter and abandoned by his disciples, he never seems, he never seems to take it personally. He never made it about himself. He's not passive aggressive. He doesn't play the victim. He doesn't fire off an angry text when he rose from the dead. He didn't go up to Judas and say, how you like me now, Judas, is this real enough for you?

Speaker 2 (23:33):

That's not the spirit that he has. He's gentle and he's humble and he welcomes them back and he restores them. And this is the kind of humility that's going to be required if we want togetherness, if we want unity to be real and not just something that we talk about. It's the ability to stay focused on a mission instead of being obsessed over our matters of opinion and matters of perspective. It's the humility to put, it's the mission first, even if it means that you're not going to get your way, and Jesus just showed this over and over again. What you see in the gospels is that Jesus didn't just lay down his rightness, he laid down his reputation. He was willing to sacrifice what other people thought of him for the sake of the kingdom. Peter denies Jesus and mocks him behind his back, and pride would've ghosted.

Speaker 2 (24:31):

Peter Pride would've called him a fake friend and gone around to the other disciples and been like, Hey, can you believe what he did? We probably just need to need to let Peter go. Let's leave him to his fishing business. But Jesus doesn't do that. He pursues him. He makes every effort, he restores him. And that's the kind of unity that it's going to humility that's going to take for us to have this unity. Verse 20 twos a pretty interesting verse in Romans 14 just says, so, whatever you believe about these things, keep between yourself and God. We're not very good at that.

Speaker 2 (25:13):

So Paul brings up these areas that would have created quite a bit of tension in the church, and he doesn't make an argument for either side, and I'm sure as they're reading it, each side is thinking, well, explain it Paul. Tell them how they're wrong. Help them see how we're right about this. And instead, Paul says in verse 22, whatever you believe about these things, keep between yourself and God. You don't have to post your opinion about everything. You don't have to leave a comment giving your perspective on every issue. When you do that, you're not only creating division, but you're going to wear yourself out. A number of months ago, I got a phone call from a younger pastor telling me that he was done. He was exhausted. He felt like all he did was disappoint people and he was tired of not meeting people's expectations.

Speaker 2 (26:08):

I prayed for him, talked to him, but later I was thinking I had watched him some on social media and noticed that he was always making statements and taking positions in real time, and I think probably like a lot of us, he took a lot of heat for what he said or maybe what he didn't say. But here's what I texted him back. I said, Hey, I know you feel a lot of pressure that every time something happens or comes up in the news, that you have to say something or post something in a world with 24 hour news channels and the constant social media posts, people want pastors to be commentators, but we're not called to join the crowd of commentators and give our opinion on every political and social issue. You are not a pundit, you're a preacher. People may want your hot take, but what they need is the hope of Jesus.

Speaker 2 (27:04):

Let go of the pressure to constantly comment on all the news and give your heart to pastoring and preaching. Don't be a pundit. Be a pastor for six months and see if you feel different. And that's hard for us to do these days. I think most of us just feel a pressure to constantly give our perspective, to always have an opinion. And sometimes the best thing that you can do and that I can do and that we can challenge our churches to do is, Hey, keep this between yourself and God. Don't let this be a distraction to the mission. There's something wrong when these disputable matters become our primary platform. It's what we talk about. It's what we have conversations about. Last year, I was in the Middle East and I was getting ready to preach. When the host came up and casually mentioned to me, he said, Hey, by the way, don't use this gesture.

Speaker 2 (28:04):

Don't use the thumbs up gesture because here it's considered vulgar and offensive In 20 plus years of preaching, I don't think I've ever done this in a sermon. I don't think I've ever just given the thumbs up, but suddenly it's all I could think about. I felt like my thumbs were just fighting. They just wanted to pop up and say hello. They were determined. And as I was preaching, I just kept picturing myself accidentally giving a thumbs up in the middle of the sermon and ending up in a Middle Eastern prison for inappropriate use of thumbs, which would probably be not good. By the end of the sermon, I was so focused on thumb suppression that I hadn't focused that much on my words, and my hands were just balled up in my pockets like an angry toddler for the entire message. I was just so focused on not offending anyone.

Speaker 2 (29:13):

Two very different cultures. Now, I just want you to imagine if I would have decided, Hey, this isn't okay, these people need to be freed. They need to channel their inner fawns and recognize the beauty of giving people a thumbs up. And if I would've instead delivered my messages about my apologetic for giving a thumbs up and why this is affirming and that the thumb is in an upward position, well done. If I would've broken it down trying to argue my case and win them over. And at the end of my trip to the mission trip to the Middle East, I converted some people to the thumbs up side of the argument. And yet I think it's just as ridiculous as what we will divide over and what we'll spend our time on and how we'll give so much attention to these disputable matters. Meanwhile, we miss the work of God.

Speaker 2 (30:08):

Meanwhile, we miss out on the mission. Lemme give you an example of this from Luke 13 where Jesus is preaching on the Sabbath and the crowd had gathered around him and he noticed there was a woman in the crowd. The Bible says that she'd been crippled for 18 years. I'm not sure what her condition was, but it caused her to bend over at the waist and she was unable to straighten up for two decades nearly of her life, this had been her physical condition, no doubt, incredibly painful, affecting every part of her life. And Jesus, when he sees her, he sees daughter, right? He wants to heal her, but it's the Sabbath. And the religious leaders who were there had already given their interpretation that this type of production producing something like this would've been considered work on the Sabbath. So what does Jesus do in that situation?

Speaker 2 (31:00):

Does he say to her, Hey, why don't you come back here tomorrow? We're going to open at 9:00 AM Come back tomorrow. I'll see you now. Verse 12 says, when Jesus saw her, he called her forward and said to her Woman, you are set free from your infirmity. And then he put his hands on her and immediately she straightened up and she praised God. Now, you would think that everyone there would be thrilled for her no matter what their interpretation was of the Sabbath, no matter what their understanding or opinion might have been about healing on the Sabbath, you would think everyone there would just be like, that's incredible. And now this woman is free from her pain. But verse 14 says that the spiritual leaders there were the word is indignant because Jesus had worked on the Sabbath, so focused on their interpretation being correct that they were unable to celebrate with this person who had just been healed by Jesus. Imagine being so focused on an issue that you barely even notice people around you being saved.

Speaker 2 (32:02):

Verse 20, Paul drives home things with the believers in Rome and he says, do not destroy the work of God for the sake of food. Don't destroy the work of God for the sake of food. Whatever that issue is that came to your mind, whatever that issue is that's creating division and separation, I understand that you might have some strong personal convictions and maybe you're really passionate about it, and that's all fine and good, but if it falls under that category of disputable matters, do not destroy the work of God for the sake of your opinion, your perspective and your interpretation. About 15 years ago, remember preaching a sermon where I took a pretty strong stand on a disputable matter and I preached it with a lot of conviction and passion, and even now, I'm not telling you what it is. That would kind of defeat the point.

Speaker 2 (32:51):

Some of you would be like, well, yeah, of course you did that you should have. And others of you would be like, well, you shouldn't even have brought that up in church. So I won't even tell you what it was, but it was a disputable matter and I was expecting to get a lot of positive feedback. I knew I was preaching to people who were going to mostly land on my side of things. Later in that week, I ran into a guy from church who I was expecting to affirm me. I knew where he stood on this issue. I thought he would encourage me, and he did. He said, Hey, I agreed with what you said. But then he told me about a friend that he'd invited to church that weekend, and he was a little concerned that he wasn't going to, his friend wasn't going to give Jesus a chance because I had taken such a strong stance on this debatable matter. And he said to me, I'll never forget this. He said, ultimately, I don't really care if he agrees with you and me on this issue. I just want to make sure he knows Jesus. And then he said, don't get me wrong. I think what you said is right, but there is a way to be right and still be wrong.

Speaker 2 (33:59):

There's a way to be right and still be wrong. 15 verse seven, Paul comes back to the word accept and he says, accept one another. Then just as Christ has accepted you, in order to bring praise to God, and this time he gets personal with it, accept one another as you have been accepted. When you do this, it brings praise to God when you respond to criticism with humility instead of defensiveness. When you absorb insults without retaliation, when we're restored in relationships with the very people who have gossiped about us and rejected us or betrayed us, when people who have been hurt lash out and hurt us, and we respond with compassion and understanding when we're patient and gentle with people who disagree with us, when we're willing to sacrifice our rightness, we bring praise to God. And so Paul says, accept one another, verse one, and then here again in verse seven of chapter 15, and it's not a suggestion, it is a command. It doesn't come with a bunch of conditions where you say, accept one another once that person agrees with you, or when they meet you halfway or when you've made them pay for the attitude they've had about this issue over the years. Accept as you have been accepted. If we want unity, if we want togetherness, remember how Christ has accepted you. Remember when you were the one, remember, when you were the one with different views and questionable choices? Remember when you were the one that had incomplete understanding?

Speaker 2 (35:42):

He didn't make you get cleaned up first. He didn't make you have it all figured out. He didn't make you pass a theological terminology test. He accepted you. And the question then becomes comes, what if Christ had treated me the way I'm treating others right now? Let's pray. God, we thank you that you have met us with an opened armed embrace. And when we feel upset and discouraged, when we feel offended, I pray that you would let us remember how you have accepted us, and would you give us that same kind of grace for one another? I pray, God, that these next few days would be a time of togetherness, would be a time of great unity based upon our love for you, based upon the gospel and your grace towards us, through Jesus. I pray that you would free us from some of the tribalism, the angst, the division that we feel in our world right now, and that as leaders, we would set a different tone, that we would model your humility. We would do it for the sake of the mission and for the glory of you, God. It's in Jesus' name we pray, amen.

Speaker 1 (37:06):

Kyle's reminder that unity is found in Jesus alone is such a timely word for us as his disciples. And as you lead this session, consider what it looks like for you to follow Jesus' example and prioritize unity in your local church.

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