by T. Austin-Sparks
"Giving diligence to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace." Ephesians 4:3.
This unity is that which is resultant from the indwelling and dominating control of the Holy Spirit.
The illustration is that of the head and the body. Every limb or member, every faculty of the body is controlled by the nervous system, and this nervous system works from and to the head where it has its base.
In the Body of Christ the Holy Spirit is the great nervous system, and only as there is an immediate response to every intimation of the will of the Head, and the life unbrokenly in correspondence with His mind, can there be an expression of the unity of which the New Testament speaks.
Three things must be clearly noticed.
1. We cannot "keep" what does not exist. The admonition presupposes our having received the Holy Spirit into our lives in a vital way and having surrendered ourselves entirely to His control and direction.
2. We cannot create this unity. It is essentially spiritual. Creeds, organizations, the social spirit, compromise on matters of interpretation and practice can never achieve it.
3. There is the paradox of unity. "Peace" in the scriptures means harmony. But while Christ is called "the Prince of peace" and while that harmony has been created in many lives and spheres where He has been enthroned, He clearly said that one result of His coming would be not peace but a sword.
It is clear that wherever His Cross has been fully presented, there has been trouble and upheaval. All the things against which His Cross stands have at once created a state of war. The world, the flesh, in all their forms and expressions, make spiritual unity impossible; and in so far as even Christians are influenced in their judgments, their standards of reckoning, their conceptions, as well as in their motives, methods and means, by the world-spirit or the Adam nature, these things likewise make spiritual oneness impossible.
