"Receive Him in the Lord"

In his devotional book In Christ E. Stanley Jones shows how our unity is centered in the Lord Jesus Christ, not in the opinions of men:

"This verse has important implications: 'So receive him in the Lord with all joy; and honor such men, for he nearly died for the work of Christ, risking his life to complete your service to me.' (Phil. 2:29-30.) 'So receive him in the Lord with all joy'--we are to receive our fellow Christians in the Lord. The center of our unity is the Lord--the Lord Jesus. Anyone who is in Christ must be in my heart, or Christ isn't there. To exclude the brother in Christ is to exclude Christ!

"A Pentecostal leader came to India to try to unify the Pentecostals. In one city there were eleven different Pentecostal groups. He couldn't get them together, not even for prayer and fellowship. Why? Because the center of all the groups was Pentecost, and you can't get together around Pentecost. You can get together only around the Lord--the Lord of Pentecost and very much more. They differed on what happened at Pentecost, and therefore they couldn't have fellowship. In Jesus they were one--if only they had known it! If you say, 'What do you believe?' you are divided. If you say, 'Whom do you trust?' you are one--one Name upon your lips, one loyalty in your heart. If the emphasis is upon the 'whats' it will be divisive; if upon the 'Whom' it will be uniting.

"When a little girl was asked by another little girl to go to a meeting she replied, 'I'm sorry I can't go with you for I belong to another abomination.' Sometimes denominations are abominations, if they separate us from fellow Christians. Christians are at once the most divided and the most united body on earth--united at the center--Christ--and divided at the margin in marginal things. Such minute differences divide us! The ironic thing is that we all belong to each other, for we all belong to Christ. 'Receive him in the Lord' would settle everything. It would be 'with all joy.' Outside the Lord it is all controversy and all scowls. In Christ is our one meeting place."