Page:Scriptural Basis of Christian Unity.pdf/6

 The most extended discussion of the subject is in 1 Corinthians.

1 Cor. 1:10 has this rule: "Now I beseech you, brethren, through the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that ye all speak the same thing, and that there be no divisions among you, but that ye be perfected together in the same mind and the same judgment."

What did Paul mean by all speaking the same thing? Not that uniformity was to he insisted on in everything. He himself recognized spheres where Christians may differ, when he says with reference to keeping certain days: "Let each man be fully assured in his own mind."

They could have the same mind and judgment, and speak the same thing only by all obtaining their facts from the same teachers.

The teaching of the apostles and practice of the early church were uniform in the following particulars:

First, the church had the same creed. It was the divine one, first stated by Peter at Cæsarea Philippi, with the help of God:

"Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God."

This was a simple, plain declaration of the fact of the deity of Jesus. That it was fundamental to unity appears from what John says in 1 John 4: 2: "Every spirit that confesseth that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh, is of God." Verse 15, same chapter: "Whosoever shall confess that Jesus is the Son of God, God abideth in him, and he in God."

This teaching from an apostle in the last part of the ﬁrst century demands that open confession of the deity of Jesus was 6