Alleluia, Christ is Risen!
The Lord is Risen indeed, Alleluia!
The Paschal acclamation should ring along with the bells of Easter during this Eastertide. We have further news to celebrate as GAFCON IV ends with the Kigali Commitment – a statement issued by one of the largest (if not the largest) gatherings of Anglicans from across the globe. The commitment is clear and succinct: Anglicans must be disciples of Jesus Christ and we find His teachings and are bound by His Spirit-inspired Word – the Holy Scriptures.
But now the work begins.
The response from the Archbishop of Canterbury’s office demonstrates precisely why we are called to unite under the Word of God. The last sentence from Canterbury’s statement is clear. Clear as mud: “it is also how the world will know that Jesus Christ is sent from the Father who calls us to love one another, even as we disagree.”
The Scriptures wisely remind us, “Can two walk together, except they be agreed?” and our own Lord notes “And if a kingdom be divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand. And if a house be divided against itself, that house cannot stand.” No sir, “we ought to obey God rather than men.” Should the Archbishop of Canterbury desire true unity, it must be a unity based upon “one body and one Spirit […] one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all” and not a false unity ignoring faithfully following the Word of God. As the Kigali Commitment puts it, “The Bible is God’s Word written, breathed out by God as it was written by his faithful messengers (2 Timothy 3:16). It carries God’s own authority, is its own interpreter, and it does not need to be supplemented, nor can it ever be overturned by human wisdom.” The unity that our Lord Jesus invites us into involves faithfully walking in His Word, which will always separate us from the world. As our Lord Jesus prayed in John 17:14, “I have given them your word, and the world has hated them because they are not of the world, just as I am not of the world.”
Read the rest at The North American Anglican.
We see through a mirror darkly 