Anyone who has ever played or watched sports knows that there is more to a successful team than talent. Now, obviously talent is important. I mean, no matter how hard they try, a team of high school kids isn’t going to a game against any major league baseball team. Though, with the way my White Sox have played this year, they might not want to risk it. But when you have a number of teams all comprised of people more skilled at what they do than over 99% of the population, the team with the most talent doesn’t always win. This fact is what allows sports movies to keep getting made. From The Longest Yard to Major League to Hoosiers, the halls of sports cinema are full of films about scrappy underdogs defeating bigger, faster, stronger, more talented opponents.
In most of these movies, an initial lack of talent and cohesiveness is overcome through the course of a long season. Usually, some big event serves as the turning point for their season, after which the team gels into a tight-knit, fun-loving group who learn to play together and maximize their respective skills. In the end, it’s the unity and all-for-one and one-for-all mentality that helps them win the day. Rick Vaughan comes out of the bullpen to strike out Clue Haywood. Paul Crewe decides he doesn’t care what the dishonest warden threatens to do to him. Jimmy Chitwood hits the shot that wins the state title for tiny Hickory High.
What rarely gets shown though, is what happens next. Few sports movies get sequels. There’s a reason for that. There’s a saying in sports that winning the first championship is easy; it’s the second one that’s hard. After winning for the first time, many teams experience a “post-championship lull.” What happens is that after winning a title or championship, many players and coaches begin to take their success for granted. They start to buy into their press clippings. They get caught up in the accolades and fame, and focus on themselves rather than the team. The chemistry, the unity that was there the year before disappears. Sometimes it can be recaptured. Often, it can’t.
It seems so obviously self-defeating. From the outside, as a fan, it’s easy to criticize. It’s easy to question how they could forget about what worked the year before so quickly and so easily. It’s so easy to think that you wouldn’t fall into the same trap if you were in their shoes.
Problem is, everyone says that. No politician promises that if you elect him, he’ll go to Washington and be as divisive and partisan as he can possibly be. Nobody tells a new girlfriend or boyfriend that they’re going to put their own wants and desires above the other persons. No one tells the person interviewing them for a new job that they’re going to back-stab and scheme their way to the interviewer’s position.
Everyone says that they want unity. Everyone says they want harmony. Everyone says they want to be a part of the team. And yet the workplace is full of resentment. The republicans and democrats in congress always seem more intent on deriding the other party’s plans than working together to find the best solutions. Families feud and rotate between hurling insults at each other and not speaking at all. Even the church of God is split into numerous denominations, to say nothing of the divisions within individual congregations.
In thermodynamics, scientists study and deal with the concept of entropy. Simplified down to the point that I can understand it, the idea behind entropy is that when left to itself, anything will decay into disorder. To see entropy in action, look at my desk a couple days after I clean it. Or your child’s room a couple hours after their last toy has been put away.
Intellectually, everyone wants unity. In our heads we know it makes sense. We know it makes life easier. We know it makes life happier. And yet we can’t help ourselves. Because of our sinful natures, because we live in a broken and sinful world…discord reigns. As much as we want unity, we can’t help ourselves. We get selfish. We put our own desires first. We put our own careers first. We resent others who are more popular or more successful. We want what they have. While we want unity and team-work, we end up with division and resentment.
All of this makes Jesus’ prayer here at the end of John 17 all the more imposing. In our gospel reading for this morning, we find ourselves again in the upper room on the night of the Last Supper. Chapter 17 of John is commonly known as Jesus’ High Priestly prayer. In the course of it, he prayed for himself, he prayed for the 12, and he prayed for those who would know him through them. That is, he prayed for us. And his prayer for those of us who would call on and believe in his name is that we might be united as he and the Father are united.
Think about that means. Jesus’ prayer is that we, flawed and sinful as we are, might be as united as he and his Father. The Father and the Son have been united since the before the beginning of time. Jesus himself says in verse 24, “You loved me since before the creation of the world.” Not only did the Father and the Son love one another, but as we confess in the Nicene Creed, they were and are of the same substance. Meaning, both are equally true God, the first two persons of the Trinity. Two distinct persons, yet one God. The level to which the Father and the Son are one, are united, goes beyond what our human minds can fully comprehend. And yet it is that level of unity that Jesus prays his followers might have.
It seems impossible. As mentioned, you probably don’t have to look far to find signs of division in your life. Even in happy, loving relationships the level of unity and oneness pales in comparison to that of the Father and the Son. And no constructs we might create, no rules we might put in place are capable of creating that level of unity.
Thankfully, we are not expected to create this unity on our own. Instead, it has already been given to us. Jesus says in verse 22, “the glory that you have given to me I have given to the, that they may be one even as we are one.” The glory that Jesus has given to us was himself. Though it didn’t look like it to the world, Christ’s glory was fulfilled and our glory was won as he hung on the cross and died. And this glory which was won through his death and resurrection has been made sure for us through the waters of Holy Baptism. Paul writes in Romans chapter 6, “Or don't you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life. If we have been united with him like this in his death, we will certainly also be united with him in his resurrection.”
Because the Son is one with the Father, and because the Son has made himself one with us through the shedding of his body and blood, we have been united both to the Father and to one another. By the grace of God the whole church of God is united through Christ and His Word. As Ephesians 4 says, “There is one body and one Spirit—just as you were called to one hope when you were called— one Lord, one faith, one baptism; one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.” What Christ won through his death and resurrection was won for all believers throughout all ages.
Jesus’ desire and prayer was that his people would be united in all times, and in all places. But because of sin, that unity is not always evident. We have been given the Word of God to be the one truth around our lives and faith our built. It has been given to us to be the one truth by which the church is united and God is glorified, and yet many alter or reject it in order to suit their own desires. Of these people Paul writes in Romans, “"They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator, who is forever praised." And in 2 Timothy he writes that “the time will come when men will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear. They will turn their ears away from the truth and turn aside to myths.”
So what are we to do when we see these false teachings make their way into the church? Paul’s instruction to Timothy, to other pastors, and to other believers in the church is “devote yourself to the public reading of Scripture, to preaching and to teaching. Do not neglect your gift, which was given you through a prophetic message when the body of elders laid their hands on you. Be diligent in these matters; give yourself wholly to them, so that everyone may see your progress. Watch your life and doctrine closely. Persevere in them, because if you do, you will save both yourself and your hearers.”
We in our lives and in our church must seek to not “agree to disagree”, but rather to always speak the truth in love. We must always seek to remain firm and trust in the saving power and grace of God, and pray that His will be done.
When we see division in our lives, when we see division in God’s church, our response should always be to return to God’s Word. To pray to God that he may continue to dwell in us and make his love known to us. To pray that we might have and see the unity that he desires for us. When we fail to live with the unity that Christ desires, we fall at the feet of the one who saves us, thankful that God’s grace and truth are bigger and more powerful than our imperfections. And we look forward to the day that Christ returns, when our unity with one another and with our heavenly Father will be made complete. Amen.
