An Offering from the Christian Unity and Interreligious Relationships Team
The Week of Prayer for Christian Unity takes place this year from January 18-25. The theme is “Do You Believe?” and is based on Jesus’ conversation with Martha in John 11: “I am the resurrection and the life. Those who believe in me, even though they die, will live, and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?”
The theme was chosen in recognition of the 1700th anniversary of the First Council of Nicaea (325), at which the words “I believe” were chosen to anchor the Creed as an instrument of universal Christian unity. For each day during this Week of Prayer for Christian Unity, the members of the Christian Unity and Interreligious Relationships (CUIR) committee will share a series of devotions based on the statements in the Nicene Creed.
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Day 1: We believe in one God, the Father, the Almighty….
“Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one.”
Deuteronomy 6:4
The Shema, a daily prayer and affirmation of faith for our Jewish siblings that has been shared with us, gives an important reminder in a polytheistic world. Depending on the translation you read, it may say, “The LORD is our God, the LORD alone,” or “Our God is the LORD! Only the LORD!” or as it reads above, “The LORD our God, the LORD is one.” Read one way, it seems to call for loyalty and obedience only to God. Read another way, it is a statement about God’s unique nature, God’s one-ness.
I tend to take more of a “both-and” approach, integrating all of the translations in order to understand the fuller meaning. However, as we reflect this week on the beliefs that bind us together as Christians, the first statement in the Nicene Creed (UMH 880) affirms that we believe in one God. The LORD is one. As the creed expands upon the nature of God as Trinity, we find that this one God exists eternally in divine community, bound together by the power of love.
Reuven Kimelman, a professor of rabbinic literature, says that the Shema summons God’s people to feel “an all-consuming love of God.” It’s a love that is unreserved, all-demanding, at all times, in all places and in all circumstances. Nothing is excluded. Thoughts are to be focused, words are to be spoken, and deeds are to be done.
As those created in the image of the One God revealed to us in the Trinity, we are also called to this unique one-ness, which is made possible by this “all-consuming love of God.”
Prayer: O God, our God, forgive us when we focus on those things that make us different rather than focusing on you and your one-ness. May your all-consuming love bind us together in unity with all our siblings in Christ. Amen.
Shawn Blackwelder is the Lead Pastor of Genesis UMC in Cary and the Chair of CUIR.
Photo by Albin Hillert, 4 October 2019, Geneva, Switzerland: Ecumenical Centre, Geneva.