Psalm 133

Psalm 133
Theme: Revival Comes When the Church is Unified
Or, Dividing the Church is Killing Revival


Read Psalm 133
One thing is clear from scripture is that the will of God is for the unity of his people. In fact, revival will not come to this or any church if it is divided. Church unity, like repentance and holiness, is not optional. I’m going to argue though, that there is only one way to unify a church and every other means of unity is a counterfeit and a fraud.

The “Behold” in the psalm is a command from the Psalmist look upon the goodness and pleasantness of brethren who dwell together in unity as though a visible example of brethren dwelling in unity exists to be beheld. And we must assume that it exists, or it would not be so frequently commanded in scripture. And if it exists, then it is possible for this church too and there is hope for true and lasting revival.

The unity of the brethren is good; it’s good to God, it’s good to the brethren and it’s good to the world. Good means something more than just ethically positive or esthetically pleasing or feeling happy in Hebrew. It has more of a practical implication related to prosperity and merriment. The consequence of unity is that the church will prosper, flourish and thrive in all of its other endeavors and activities. Our fellowship will be sweeter, our worship will be more intense, our stewardship will increase, our preaching will be more powerful and our evangelism will be more fruitful. We will be sending missionaries to the farthest corners of the earth to bring the gospel to obscure people groups who have never heard the gospel in their own tongue. God will be glorified and our enjoyment of Him will by intensely satisfying.

The unity of the brethren is good because it will result in merriment and joy in the church; we will look forward to escaping the loneliness and the despondency of the world for the joy of sweet fellowship. The goodness of unity means there is a joy and a pleasure, even a festivity in the unity of the church (a different kind of party spirit). JC Ryle describes the goodness of unity this way:
Who, indeed, can describe the pleasure with which the members of Christ’s flock do meet each other face to face? They may have been strangers before; they may have lived apart, and never been in company—but it is wonderful to observe how soon they seem to understand each other, there seems a thorough oneness of opinion, and taste and judgment, so that a man would think they had known each other for years; they seem, indeed, to feel they are servants of one and the same Master, members of the same family, and have been converted by one and the same Spirit; they have one Lord, one faith, one baptism; they have the same trials, the same fears, the same doubts, the same temptations, the same faintings of heart, the same dread of sin, the same sense of unworthiness, the same love of their Savior. Oh—but there is a mystical union between true believers, which they only know who have experienced it….
Indeed, unity in the church is a foretaste of heaven! Why would anyone want to sully it? What Christian would ever want to rob a church of it?

The psalms also tells us that this unity is pleasant. It means that it is sweet for brethren to be unity. This sweetness is not just for the brethren either; it’s like a sweet smelling incense for God- a pleasant sacrifice of obedience to God.
Jesus said,
A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another; as I have loved you, that you also love one another. 35By this all will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.” (John 13:34-35)

Jesus means that the evidence of true followers of Christ is that they share in Christ’s affections by having the same love as Christ for his people (warts and all). Spurgeon commented on this command saying,
We are to love our neighbour as ourselves, but we are to love our fellow-Christians as Christ loved us. That is far more than we love ourselves. Christ loved us better than He loved himself. He loved us so much that he gave himself for us…

Indeed, to be truly Christ-like is to be one who sacrifices all of his rights, all of his opinions, all of his ambitions, all of his justice… for the unity of the church, even unto death! But getting my own way, getting justice, proving myself to be right, vindicating my reputation, stating my opinion, proving my brother’s faults- those are antithetical Christ-likeness- they are anti-Christ!

Jesus calls it a new commandment. The command to love one another though is not a new command, it’s found in the Old Testament; Leviticus 19:18
You shall not take vengeance, nor bear any grudge against the children of your people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself: I am the LORD.

When Christians strive for unity in the church the love of Christ will “take fuller possession of you [and you will be] more manifestly under its constraining power” (Spurgeon). You will be ruled by Christlike power.
Paul told the Corinthians that his motive for enduring so much suffering for the sake of the church was because,
14 …the love of Christ compels [him], because we judge thus: that if One died for all, then all died; 15 and He died for all, that those who live should live no longer for themselves… (2 Cor 5:14-15).

People for whom you would never have given the time of day (outside of Christ); people of such low intellect or high; people with so many rude little habits; people with odors or overpowering perfumes- these are now the people who bring you such comfort and joy in this life because they’re bond with you is closer than the bond of natural siblings. Why, because Christ commands it and his love compels us, obliges us and forces us. “By the love of friendship, the soul of Jonathan was knit to the soul of David (1 Sam 18:1)” (Nathaniel Vincent). And the soul that is in union with God is knit with his church!

Jesus says that the command to love one another is a new command. What makes it new is that we to love one another as Christ has loved us. How has Christ loved us? By getting his own way? By lording it over us? By withholding forgiveness? By believing every bad report about us? By spreading lies and slander about us? By rebelling against the leadership of godly men? No, he loved us by giving his life for us when we were still his enemies.

Are you following Christ’s command to love his people as he loves them or are you flippant with the will of him whom you claim as your Lord and saviour?! This is crucial because 1 John 4:7-8 says,
7 Beloved, let us love one another, for love is of God; and everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. 8 He who does not love does not know God, for God is love. [verse 11] Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.


I believe that love, not doctrine is the ultimate test of conversion. That does not mean that doctrine is not essential, but someone whose doctrine is impeccable and yet they are unloving towards the brethren is an infidel and a heathen. Perhaps their version of the New Testament does not contain 1 Corinthians 13; or their cessationism extends to love!

If you are not loving the brethren, there is only one other option, you are hating them. I want to list three things that are hateful towards the body of Christ and bring disunity: Ambition, unforgiveness and unconversion (false conversion).

1. Ambition is pride. It says, “I should be number one here because I will do a better job.” Ambition wants control and it will stop at nothing to get it. When the false brethren came into the church at Corinth, their strategy to gain control was to slander Paul; they accused him of being fickle, not keeping his promises, being a bad preacher, not bearing the marks of true apostleship, and mishandling funds.
Love is very tender of others’ names and reputations. It detests all manner of lying as that which is an abomination to God (Pro 6:17) and exposes the liar himself to the burning lake (Rev 21:8). But a slanderous and malicious lie, which wounds the name and murders the reputation of another hates exceedingly.... The name of a [Christian] ought to be very dear [to other Christians] because God, Christ and the Gospel are concerned in it (Nathaniel Vincent).

Slander a Christian and you slander Christ and bring the gospel into disrepute and denies the power of the Holy Spirit to sanctify and to preserve His elect. When you hear another Christian being maligned and slandered, especially when it is a leader in the church, you can bet there is probably some ambition behind it.

The builders of the tower of Babel wanted to make a name for themselves and it resulted in the scattering of the nations upon the earth; Korah and his men led a rebellion against Moses and the Lord, it resulted in the earth opening up and fire consumed them; Absalom wanted to take the throne from his father and it resulted in a bloody civil and his eventual death; Haman (the Agagite) wanted to rule Persia so he conspired against the Jews- it resulted in Haman’s humiliating death along with all his family; and a day is coming when the antichrist will set himself up above all that is called God and lead the nations to Armageddon. Ambition does not belong in the church- except maybe the ambition to be least!

2. Unforgiveness is another cause for division in the church. I need to be honest with you- Christians (who above all people know the extent of the need for being forgiven) are sometimes the most unforgiving people I have ever met. They know that the cost to redeem them from an infinite gulf of sin was the bloody violence of the cross and yet they withhold forgiveness from their brother or sister because they hurt their feelings, or because they got their way in the church or because they said something flippantly and it offended them. How many times must we forgive one another? Seventy times seven! It means we must never cease to forgive.

Let’s not violate the will of God at this most fundamental point! Let’s not so lightly dismiss his commands and divide his church that He loves just because we are sp loath to think better of others than ourselves. Gouge out my eyes if I ever fail to forgive anyone who has hurt me.

3. Finally, false conversion results in a lack of love that brings divisions because the unconverted know nothing of the love of Christ and so how could they ever show it to anyone else? Love that is easily withheld is usually done so by someone who is spiritually dead in trespasses and sins!

There are two types of false converts: the first are the sincere seekers of religion and truth whose eyes have not yet (and may never be) opened to the truth of the gospel. They want a religion to fill the spiritual component of their lives. The other kind of false convert are more sinister; they’re the undercover agents of Satan sent to breed disunity in the church. They are more difficult to spot because they are more able to counterfeit a true believer.

We must rigorously guard our membership from false converts coming in and taking positions of leadership.

Conclusion
God’s will is for the unity of His Church- that’s true, but not unity at any cost. God will not send revival to a divided church, nor will He send revival to a church that is impure because it sacrifices truth and holiness and love for an artificial man-made unity. True unity is a spiritual reality!

We are not to be unevenly yoked. The church maintains its unity and purity through church discipline. Church discipline includes discipleship. It also compels us to guard against false doctrine and preventing false converts from coming into membership and places of influence. We must diligently guard against wolves who are ambitious for power and remove those questionable believers who are hot tempered, divisive and the rebellious. Otherwise, we have a false unity and an impotent and emasculated church.

So what one thing will restore love and bring unity to the church? Here it is: Its not about you, it’s about the gospel. The Gospel and the gospel alone will unify the church and bring revival- the gospel, the gospel, the gospel.

So here’s the new Mission statement for the church: “It’s not about us, it’s about the Gospel” and new Vision is this: “We envision a church where the number of true disciples is constantly increasing and where every member of the church is an evangelist.” Any opposed?!

If we want to be a powerful, growing, revived and unified church, then the gospel must be restored to the throne. Then our fellowship will be good and pleasant; our love for the brethren will be like precious oil flowing down Aaron’s beard filling the temple with the fragrance of purity and worship; our unity will be like the dew on Mount Hermon that comes after the sun has scorched the grass and the leaves bringing refreshing that flows down into the valley and waters the grape vines and the fig trees and the grains bringing refreshment to the city of God and all His people!