Equality and unity is found only one way.

Ephesians 3 from the daily reading in the One Year Bible

For this reason I, Paul, the prisoner of Christ Jesus for the sake of you Gentiles— ² if indeed you have heard of the stewardship of God’s grace which was given to me for you; ³ that by revelation there was made known to me the mystery, as I wrote before in brief. ⁴ By referring to this, when you read you can understand my insight into the mystery of Christ, ⁵ which in other generations was not made known to the sons of men, as it has now been revealed to His holy apostles and prophets in the Spirit; ⁶ to be specific, that the Gentiles are fellow heirs and fellow members of the body, and fellow partakers of the promise in Christ Jesus through the gospel, ⁷ of which I was made a minister, according to the gift of God’s grace which was given to me according to the working of His power. ⁸ To me, the very least of all saints, this grace was given, to preach to the Gentiles the unfathomable riches of Christ, ⁹ and to bring to light what is the administration of the mystery which for ages has been hidden in God who created all things; ¹⁰ so that the manifold wisdom of God might now be made known through the church to the rulers and the authorities in the heavenly places. ¹¹ This was in accordance with the eternal purpose which He carried out in Christ Jesus our Lord, ¹² in whom we have boldness and confident access through faith in Him. ¹³ Therefore I ask you not to lose heart at my tribulations on your behalf, for they are your glory.

¹⁴ For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, ¹⁵ from whom every family in heaven and on earth derives its name, ¹⁶ that He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with power through His Spirit in the inner man, ¹⁷ so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; and that you, being rooted and grounded in love, ¹⁸ may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, ¹⁹ and to know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled up to all the fullness of God.

²⁰ Now to Him who is able to do far more abundantly beyond all that we ask or think, according to the power that works within us, ²¹ to Him be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations forever and ever. Amen.

Paul ends today’s text with a prayer, saying:   I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth derives its name, that He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with power through His Spirit in the inner man, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; and that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled up to all the fullness of God. Now to Him who is able to do far more abundantly beyond all that we ask or think, according to the power that works within us, to Him be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations forever and ever. Amen.    Every family in heaven and on earth derives its name from the same God. He is creator of all. Those of us who know and believe in the Father in heaven need to acknowledge that those who do not, those who do not know Him and those who reject Him are still His creation. He has named them. We too should pray that they would be strengthened by the Spirit of God in their inner man; that Christ would dwell in their hearts through faith. Romans 12:21 says:  Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.   What better way is there for us to overcome those who are against us than that they would be overcome by the goodness of God; that they would come to know the love of God demonstrated in Christ’s sacrifice for them.

We are the ones who are to be:   rooted and grounded in love and able to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge and be filled up to all the fullness of God. It is the fullness of God that should fill us.  Love should be our foundation. It should be love that is our motivation and our method for interacting with others. The fullness of God also though includes His holiness and His righteousness. The fullness of God means that along with love for the world, we are to be light to the world. God is Light, and in Him there is no darkness at all. (1 John 1:5) That we love the world does not mean that they will also love us. If we love them with the fullness of God, if we love them as we ourselves have been loved, if we demonstrate the love of God in the same way He demonstrated it:  God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us, (Romans 5:8) many will reject us and even hate us. In John 15:18-25 Jesus says: “If the world hates you, you know that it has hated Me before it hated you. If you were of the world, the world would love its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, because of this the world hates you. Remember the word that I said to you, ‘A slave is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted Me, they will also persecute you; if they kept My word, they will keep yours also. But all these things they will do to you for My name’s sake, because they do not know the One who sent Me. If I had not come and spoken to them, they would not have sin, but now they have no excuse for their sin. He who hates Me hates My Father also. If I had not done among them the works which no one else did, they would not have sin; but now they have both seen and hated Me and My Father as well. But they have done this to fulfill the word that is written in their Law, ‘They hated Me without a cause.’”     If the world would hate and reject us, may it be for the cause of Christ.

Many people in the world speak of a philosophy of unity and equality, yet they reject and despise the one who could truly grant unity and equality. They reject the equality in and of Christ because of the one other thing that makes us all equal. Isaiah 53:6 says:  All of us like sheep have gone astray, Each of us has turned to his own way; But the Lord has caused the iniquity of us all To fall on Him.  Romans 6:22-23 says:  There is no distinction; for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.  There are two things which make us all equal; we all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God, and:  Christ also died for sins once for all, the just for the unjust, so that He might bring us to God, having been put to death in the flesh, but made alive in the spirit. (1 Peter 3:18)  That is Paul’s prayer, that all would be:   strengthened with power through His Spirit in the inner man, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith.

All the works, the philosophies, the laws and the regulations of man cannot bring about equality and unity. Many have tried and failed. The truth is we are not the same, but rather are each created uniquely by God. We don’t become equal by conforming to the standards, philosophies or regulations of man. We can only become equal in Christ. It seems impossible that there would be equality and unity on earth. Jesus says:  "The things that are impossible with people are possible with God." (Luke 18:27)

Now to Him who is able to do far more abundantly beyond all that we ask or think, according to the power that works within us, to Him be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations forever and ever. Amen. Amen.