Barth: quest for unity

Tuesday, September 4, 2018
    Commemoration of Birinus, Bishop of Dorchester (Oxon), Apostle of Wessex, 650
Meditation:
    Nevertheless, God’s solid foundation stands firm, sealed with this inscription: “The Lord knows those who are his,” and, “Everyone who confesses the name of the Lord must turn away from wickedness.”
    —2 Timothy 2:19 (NIV)
Quotation:
    “Homesickness for the [One True Church]” is genuine and legitimate only in so far as it is a disquietude at the fact that we have lost and forgotten Christ and with Him have lost the unity of the Church.
    Thus we must be on our guard, all along the line, lest the motives which stir us today lead us to a quest that looks past Him. Indeed, however rightful and urgent those motives are, we could well leave them out of our reckoning. We shall do well to realize that in themselves they are well-meaning but merely human desires, and that we can have no final certainty that they are rightful, no unanswerable claim for their fulfillment. Unless we regard them with a measure of holy indifference we are ill placed for a quest after the unity of the Church.
    ... Karl Barth (1886-1968), The Church and the Churches [1936], Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing, 2005, p. 15-16 (see the book)
    See also 2 Tim. 2:19; Pr. 10:25; Isa. 28:16; 1 Cor. 3:10-11; Eph. 2:19-20; Heb. 11:10
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, You have not lost even one of Your sheep. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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