Well, let me invite your attention to the book of Romans and chapter 15. While you're attending there, you may not appreciate this because of the fact that you've been missing from this auditorium for two months. But I do need to say to you that sitting here, rather standing here, listening to the singing almost brought tears to my eyes because it's been a long, long time since I've been in this place and hearing all these voices almost lifting the ceiling of the building. So as people have been saying, I think we can say even now, let's not take this for granted. the gathered church seeking the praises of God. Romans chapter 15, and I will read for you the first eight verses. The Bible says, we who are strong have an obligation to bear with the failings of the weak and not to please ourselves. Let each of us please his neighbor for his good, to build him up. For Christ did not please himself, but as it is written, the reproaches of those who reproach you fell on me. For whatever was written in former days was written for our instruction. that through endurance and through the encouragement of the scriptures, we might have hope. May the God of endurance and encouragement grant you to live in such harmony with one another, in accord with Christ Jesus, that together you may with one voice glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, welcome one another as Christ has welcomed you for the glory of God. Well brethren, you will recognize that we are going through Romans chapter 14 and 15, which deal with the subject of Christian unity, and especially unity within the context of the local church. The Apostle Paul began Romans 14 and verse 1 with the words, as for the one who is weak in faith, Welcome him, and then comes this caution, but not to quarrel over opinions, not to quarrel over scruples, not to quarrel over quowns. In other words, let's not have a situation in the church of disunity because of your personal opinions over so many things that obviously relate to individual lives, but even so, as people come together as one body to worship. Now, we've already made our way through chapter 14. We won't spend time there. The only thing I want to repeat is that the Apostle Paul, first of all, begins with the weak, and he really carpets them, so to speak. He rebukes them. that they should learn not to condemn others who have got greater freedom in terms of the way they carry out their lives and their worship compared to themselves. That's what he deals with from verse 1 to verse 12. From verse 13 onwards to the end of the chapter, he deals with the strong. He also carpets them. He rebukes them. And basically he is saying that they need to be sensitive to the qualms and scruples of the weak instead of being arrogant, wanting to have their own way. After all, why should my freedom be limited by someone else's difficulties, opinions, background, and so on? And Paul rebukes them as well. As we've entered into chapter 15, it's fairly evident that the Apostle Paul is now summarizing all of this, and he still has primarily in mind those who are strong, as he says there in verse 1 of chapter 15, we who are strong have an obligation to bear with the failings of the weak. However, he is summarizing, he is concluding, and you can't miss the fact that in his conclusions, he is also in mind thinking about the weak, learning to apply themselves to this general principle of unity in the local church. We saw last time how our number one model The Lord Jesus Christ should be one we ought to emulate. And the Apostle Paul quotes the statement, the reproaches of those who reproached you fell on me. And that's actually a statement about God himself, the Lord Jesus Christ, through an Old Testament author speaking to God. and basically saying that I have been so obedient to you and to your will that indeed, those who hate you, I'm ending up paying for that on your behalf. And what we saw, therefore, from this is this willingness for the sake of God to suffer, the willingness for the sake of God to be inconvenienced, And in this particular case, the application is in the realm of these issues of qualms and scruples. That I should be willing to forgo things in life. After all, it's not them that bring me closer to God. So forgo them for the sake of the greater good. Jesus could do it indeed for his life on earth. Who am I? to fail to emulate him as well. So that's what we saw last time. Today, the Apostle Paul gives a benediction. It is a prayer. But a benediction is a prayer whereby you are praying to God, but you are speaking to the people for whom you are praying. That's what a benediction really amounts to. So it's a bit of a strange phenomenon, because our understanding is that prayer is vertical. But with a benediction, it is vertical, except that it is addressed to the people who are actually listening. And so here is his benediction, his prayer. May the God of endurance and encouragement grant you to live in such harmony with one another in accord with Christ Jesus, that together you may with one voice glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. What we are seeing in this benediction or this prayer of the Apostle Paul is really the primary purpose for which the whole argument for unity is being carried out. And it's not so much so that we might enjoy ourselves, that we may no longer feel negative feelings towards one another. There's a higher reason than that. And the reason is this, that it might secure the authentic worship of God. That it might secure the authentic worship of God. And friends, ultimately, that is what matters. A church that is united is a church that is able to truly worship God. Let's put it a little differently. A church that is disunited cannot worship God authentically. And I want to prove it to you as we proceed in this message. First of all, as we seek unity, we must truly seek the God of endurance and encouragement. That's where we need to begin. And notice that this is why this is not a doctrinal statement. It is a prayer. Paul is praying in this benediction. May the God of endurance and encouragement. Now, this is not God's name. It's not even his primary attribute. In fact, when we go up to verse 13, when Paul gives another benediction, You will notice that he changes the way he is referring to God. He now calls him, may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing. Why is the Apostle Paul referring to God in this case as the God of endurance and encouragement? The reason is quite simple. You just have to read the previous verse. In verse 4, this is what the Apostle Paul says. For whatever was written in former days was written for our instruction, listen to this, that through endurance and through the encouragement of the scriptures, we might have hope. So he's already speaking about the means by which we might be enabled to achieve unity. It is through endurance and through the encouragement of the scriptures. So what Paul is doing now in the fifth verse is basically drawing our attention to the real and ultimate source of that endurance and encouragement. It's not really the scriptures, it is God through the scriptures and hence calling him the God of endurance and encouragement. You see, let's face it, the scriptures in and of themselves are not effectual unless God uses them in our hearts and our lives. There are many times you come to church and perhaps you've come with a friend and you sit, you listen to a sermon and God speaks to you. Even while you're still in the pew, you repent of some activity in your life. But as soon as you go outside, perhaps in the car park, You're still with a friend you came with, and the friend is saying to you, oh, you know, he thinks, you know, I can change because of that. It's very stupid. And so on. And you think, ah, but we were listening to the same sermon, the same Bible. My friend is coming out angry, rejecting what has been said. I have been cut to the very depth of my being. I've turned from my sin. God spoke to me. So the bottom line is, that is, it's the scriptures that God uses. But remember, it's the scriptures that God uses by the power of his spirit. Without God, our sinful ego will keep us fighting whenever we are hearing God's word. And especially, friends, when you are being asked to set aside your qualms, your egos, to set aside your scruples, to set aside your long-held opinion. That's something that we tend to fight against. We want to still hold on to our comfort zone until God himself breaks. And as the apostle Paul here is praying to God, may the God of endurance, may the God of encouragement be the one to gift you, to grant you, by his own will and mercy that he might be the one to enable you to do that. So if your church, despite all the teaching that is taking place, if your church is still full of infighting, the best thing to do is to pray. That's the best thing to do. It's to simply go to God. and say, God, help us. Because if you don't help us, this church will be split into splinters. And when other people come to hear why the church was split into such splinters, they will look at us and think we were mad. But the reason is because in that moment, The ego was in control. We were refusing to listen to anybody else. We must win. And in the church, in the process, the church caved in. Or as they say, it imploded. So before you get there, simply say, brethren, let us pray. Let us seek the face of God. Because this God is one who is able to give both endurance and encouragement. Well, in a moment, we're coming to see why this is so important, the aspect of endurance and encouragement. Let's go on. Because we've just seen that we need to cry to God. And the advantage with the ability that God has is that he can give to us unity in diversity. Unity in diversity. This is what Paul is praying for here. Let's quickly go back to our text. He says there, may the God of endurance and encouragement grant you, and it says, to live in such harmony with one another in accord with Christ Jesus. In such harmony with one another. And who are these with one another? It is the weak and the strong. It is those who are saying, let's go to chapter 14 verse 2, one person believes he may eat anything, while the weak person eats only vegetables. Verse 5, one person esteems one day as better than another, while another esteems all days alike. In other words, within this church are different opinions over the way in which they are to live, even as New Testament believers. And yet, this God is able to make these people who have such different opinions to live in such harmony. with one another, with such harmony with one another. In other words, the strong will be enabled to put aside their arrogance. This business of saying, but why should I limit my freedom? Why? Because of him? Why? Let him just go to another church. Why should I limit my freedom? Is God of endurance and encouragement is able to break through, to break down that arrogance, so that there is a fresh love for the brethren that enables this person to say, yes, I will leave my family for the sake of my brother, for the sake of my sister, that we may be united. Similarly, the weak will learn to live with their stumbling. In other words, I'm still convinced that a person should not do this if they are truly saved. To go back into the New Testament, they should not eat food that has been sacrificed to idols if they are saved. They shouldn't. And yet, I still learn to live with that and worship the brother or a sister who has consumed that sin. Yes, I'm finding it difficult. But we live together. We have fellowship together. We worship together. the Spirit of God enabling me. And the way he does it is by enabling us to endure being wrapped away. In other words, when that thought crosses my mind that this brother or this sister does this, which my own background cannot process, The Lord gives me the endurance, the ability to say, I don't like it, but I have to live with it. I don't like it, but I have to live with it. That endurance. But not just the endurance, but also the encouragement. May the God of endurance and encouragement grant you to live in such harmony. In other words, I find it in me to want to love that brother, to love that sister, to accept that person as we shall be seeing next time from verse 7. Therefore, welcome one another as Christ has welcomed you for the glory of God. I'm encouraged to do this. I find myself doing so. What are we learning from this then? Well, brethren, it's a simple fact, but let me give it to you. It is not necessary to think alike in order to live in Christian unity. It's not necessary. We can have unity in diversity, real diversity, where genuinely, I don't agree with you. But I recognize that as uncomfortable as I might be over this issue, it is not a salvation issue. It's not a gospel issue. You are still my brother. You are still my sister in Christ. I genuinely don't agree with you. And I don't think I'm going to agree with you for the next 30 years. But we belong to the same church. And therefore, I can, by the grace of God, endure this reality of this difference and be still encouraged to love you, to love you. That's what Paul is telling us here. It is not necessary. And he particularly underlines it with a phrase, in accord with Christ Jesus. In other words, it is in line with his will, his will being that within this diversity of backgrounds that has caused us to have these different strong opinions, we should still have unity. That's his will. We should still be willing to be, in that sense, inconvenienced. We should still be willing to suffer emotionally. But because of love, my brother and my sister are still with us. And consequently, together, we still fulfill the cause of God. It was his example, Jesus' example in verse 3, for Christ did not please himself. It's there in the example. And therefore, it must be according to his will. Why should I then be in his church and then be seeking to please myself? Why? It's not my church. It's his. So I follow his will. I follow his teaching. I follow his example in accord with Christ Jesus. We will also come to see later this example, when we are told in verse 7, therefore welcome one another as Christ has welcomed you, in accord with Christ. How did Jesus welcome us? Well, I'll tell you how he did. He forgave us of all our sins. And then he began to deal with a lot of our shortcomings. a lot of issues in our lives. And up to today, some of us have been saved for 40 years. We're still dealing with some issues. They've been not preempted itself. But I hope you already see his example, his example. And that's what we're being told, that that's the way we should be in accordance or in accord with the Lord Jesus Christ. Now, the main thrust of Paul's prayer is not simply unity in and of itself. It is unity that produces authentic worship. Unity that produces authentic worship. Look at the way he puts it in verse 6. I begin again with verse 5. May the God of endurance and encouragement grant you to live in such harmony with one another, in accord with Christ Jesus, that together you may with one voice glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. The reason he is praying is not primarily for them or for their reputation. The people should come and visit. And when they go back to their churches or wherever it is they come from, they should say, you know those people, they really love one another. They enjoy a wonderful time together. The harmony among them is just out of this world, and so on. And therefore, the church is enjoying the praises of the world. That's not the main reason. It's not for them. It is for God. It says there, that together you may with one voice glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Some versions, instead of saying together, it uses the word with the phrase with one heart, with one heart. So it is with one heart and with one voice, you may glorify. And the one heart is referring to the inner attitude. And that's what this together is supposed to capture, the inner attitude. And then the voice, with one voice, is now speaking about the outward expression. Anybody can see that the worship here is indeed both inward and also outward in terms of being God-focused. Now, whereas human beings can't see the inside, they often can see a lot in terms of what is happening on the outside. And Paul is concerned that we have paused if there's going to be true, authentic worship. that it must be with one heart and one voice. It must be together as we are lisping his presence. Now, the worship of God is not just in terms of what human beings see. It is also what the angelic beings see. But more than that, it is what God himself says. And friends, unfortunately, in a church where there is quarreling over opinions, as the Apostle Paul puts it here in chapter 14 and verse 1, quarreling over opinion, that worship must be a stench in the nostrils of God. Because what's really happening is, for instance, the person who is needing worship, perhaps there's something you don't like about him. Maybe the way he dresses so nicely, I don't know. You are sitting there, and I'm not really worshiping. You're just saying, no, no, no. You know, last time it was this kind of sweetness. Next time it will be, you know, silver, glittering silver. You're not even listening to the brothers leading you in worship. Why? Because there's something about you and your background that's not appreciating the brother who is there. Or it might be while you're singing together. And the person who's next to you sings with heart and soul and voice and everything. And where you come from, everybody sings like that. So while you are there, you are not really worshiping. You're sort of looking, you know, there's a church over there. That's where you should be. And so on. That's really what's going on in your soul. And God is processing all that because He hears our thoughts. And He can see that there's no real unity, there's no real harmony, there's no real concentrating on Him in order to worship Him. Because what you want is the kind of atmosphere that is 100% what you are comfortable with. That's what you want. And therefore, if there's just something that's different, you must quarrel. You must fight. And therefore, you are not really worshipping. You are not fighting. That's what you're doing. You're fighting. There's a sword or a knife in your hand. That's what's going on. And you are stabbing away. And you are stabbing away. And you are stabbing away. And God just shakes his head and says, shut the door. This is not worship. Now friends, I'm not suggesting that unity must be at the expense of everything. Remember what I said earlier, if it's a gospel issue, In other words, if somebody does not believe this, they are going to go to hell. Then yes, we must fight. Because the souls of men and women are at stake. We must put up a gallant fight. Because those who do not believe as we believe are a mission field. They're not fellow worshippers. No, no, no, no, no, no. We need to convert them so that they can also come. But friends, often, that's not what we are fighting about. It's about days, and about diets. It's about words. That's what we're fighting about, words. So that when a person afterwards comes to here, and you're now explaining what the fight was all about, the person is sort of saying, are you sure? Are you sure? Because it's quarrels. It's group wars. And we need to learn that this is about me being uncomfortable. This is about my opinion. This is a brother. This is a sister in the Lord. We're going to heaven together. We better learn to worship now, because we're not Get to heaven and then just discover the guy's dead. So make sure your squabbles are about gospel issues and not so much what I put in my notes here as the color of the pulpit curtains. Color of the pulpit curtains. What I'm saying there is just issues that are about you. and your background, that brown curtains, it has to do with the spirits of the ancestors from Lake Mwenhu. And I know because that's where I grew up. It was brown, brown. So when you bring brown in now and put it in church, I can't worship properly. And therefore, let's get rid of brown. Let's put gray. Come on. Get used to it. In the midst of being uncomfortable, pray to the God of endurance to give you endurance. Don't implode the whole church because your grandfather told you that brown was for Spirits will never come. God is truly glorified when his worship is so important, so important that we're willing to overlook anything. It's so important. If you're willing to pray, Lord, help me. to accept my brother and my sister as they are. As they are. So that together, in heart and voice, we can worship you. The angels look at that. They say, wow, these sinners have changed. That their own egos have become secondary. to the glory of the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. This can only be an act of God. And God himself is pleased to accept that. Well, brethren, we see here Paul's prayer for unity. And we see that it's primarily to secure authentic worship. And ultimately, that's what church is about. That's why we have covenanted together to become Kabwatha Baptist Church. It's not about you or me. No, it's about the worship of God. That's why we have struggled to try and get to meet together collectively in the midst of COVID-19. about the glory of God in the gathered church. And the sooner we learn this, the better, because it's going to make us learn to cry to the God of endurance and encouragement in the midst of the diversity that we will find ourselves in. Just remember, the church is not It's not even mine. It's not. It's Christ's. And he is the one who determines whom he brings in. And some of the guys and girls he brings in, yeah, you wish he kept out. And it's not your church. It's his. He's opened the door. He's welcomed such an individual who seems to have thorns and thistles all over. And you're supposed to let. It's his church. And he is saying, I want this. brother of mine, this sister of mine, this child of mine, to be here together with you in my household. I want them to be together to ascribe worship to me. No, but I'm comfortable. I'm uncomfortable. So what? No, but based on my background, yes. Also based on his background. No, but it's going to be difficult, yes. Pray to me. I'm the God. Open to me. Pray to me. I will enable you to die to save you. That you might give me true healing. When the Lord Jesus answers that prayer, It doesn't matter what the backgrounds are, whether you belong to the weak or the strong. You will say to all the brethren, as Isaac once taught the congregations to say, come we that love the Lord. Come we that love the Lord. Let our joys be known, and everybody see the joy that Come join in a song with one accord, with harmony in our hearts. Let's together surround God's name. That's what you do. You know, when you've been in a church like KBZ for a long time, it's fairly easy for this to begin to be rather, what's the word, hypothetical. But I remember when I was at the University of Zambia and we had the Christian Fellowship there. Yeah, it's similar. It was necessary. Because we're in there from Pentecostals, Baptists, UCZ, Methodists, Brethren in Christ, Christian Brethren, you know, everywhere. And oh, how we needed to learn. When you've got the wrong song leader, you know what I mean by wrong song leader? You're sitting there thinking, yeah, you know, this meeting, yeah. But we needed to learn this kind of endurance, to learn to love that brother with all his intersyncrasies, to love him. And to go through all that, saying, Our soul must feel for the Lord. He's the one who has brought this great, awkward crowd together. Let's worship him. Amen. Let's pray. Our Father in heaven, sadly, even as a church, with all the history of unity that we might have, we too can easily deteriorate into individual qualms and scruples that then become barriers to fellowship. To the point where we go around with ill feelings towards one another. and indeed wishing that the other might find another church rather than being here. Lord, forgive us. Forgive us that in such situations, even our own hearts tend to reject you when your word comes this way. And we pray that you, the God, of endurance, the God of encouragement, might, through the scriptures, help us to die to self, to recognize that this church is not ours, it is yours, and welcome even those who are most uncomfortable. Oh, Father, grant that those of us who are the strong might learn to bear with the weak, not to please ourselves, but indeed to live for the good of others. May we also, who are the weak, learn, O God, to put aside our own scruples, to learn to live with stambi, knowing that it is you who has brought the strong, Oh, Lord, by your power to visit us, that true worship, authentic worship, might rise out of these pews to heaven itself. We ask this in Jesus' name.