December 2006-January 2007

Christmas Unity Extending Beyond the Season

It’s the time of year when we think about getting a Christmas tree in place.  A few years ago a columnist wrote about a man who sold Christmas trees.  He remembered “one couple on the hunt for a tree.  The guy was slim with a small chin, and she was kind of pretty. But both wore clothes from the bottom of the bin at the Salvation Army store.  After finding only trees that were too expensive, they found a scotch pine that was okay on one side, but bare on the other.  Then they picked up another tree that was not much better - full on one side, scraggly on the other.  She whispered something, and he asked if $3 would be okay.  The salesman figured neither tree would be sold so he agreed.

A few days later the Christmas tree man was walking down the street and saw a beautiful tree in the couples’ apartment.  It was thick and well rounded.  He knocked on their door and they told him how they worked the two trees close together where the branches were thin,  Then they tied the trunks together.  The branches overlapped and formed a tree so thick you couldn’t see the wire.  It was like a “tiny forest of its own.”

“So that’s the secret,” he exclaimed.  “You take two trees that aren't perfect, that have flaws, that might even be homely, that maybe nobody else would want.  If you put them together just right, you can come up with something really beautiful.”

Are you seeing the picture I’m seeing?  It’s a picture of friendship.  Even better, it’s a picture of marriage.  Best of all, it’s a picture of the church!  It’s a picture of me doing the little I can do,  flawed and scraggly though it may be, and you doing what you can do, and the result of that together is better than any of us could do alone!  I recall a Sunday morning, as I was visiting one of our churches, a lady was on stage practicing a musical instrument.  When she came to the back where I was standing, I thanked her for her ministry in music.  She commented, “I’m just doing what I can do.”  I responded, “You’re doing what I cannot do!”  We do need each other.

We need each church across our Great Lakes Conference.  Each congregation is special and ministers in the context of their community in a unique way.  Together we are enriched!  We need every person, and more, across our five-state conference.  Each person has unique strengths, abilities, gifts, and callings.  Together we accomplish so much more than we could individually or congregationally.

Christmas is about Jesus coming to be our peace, to make both one, breaking down the middle wall of partition (Ephesians 1:14).  One with God in Christ and one in unity together in His church.  “For all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed  yourselves with Christ.  There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.” (Galatians 3: 27 & 28)  What a beautiful picture! 

So then, scraggly though we may be, at Christmas time and throughout the new year, let us “make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace.”  (Ephesians 4:3)

With Christmas joy and peace in Christ,

John Zuck, Bishop

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