Agreeing with each other may not be easy, but here’s why it’s vital

By Dean Collins

Agreeing with each other is harder than it sounds!

Paul opened 1 Corinthians and ended 2 Corinthians with a consistent message: Get on the same page with the mission. Paul experienced what many of us have experienced: The more people involved and the more distance from the original intent or message, the more the organization will experience confusion and disunity.

A common problem

You’ve noticed it in business, I’m sure. The founder’s vision can easily get lost in all the new ideas of employees and consultants. New ways of doing business can certainly help as we navigate an ever-changing culture. But remembering why we exist and the mission of the organization actually brings clarity. Without a common mission, there will be no way to resolve the numerous opinions and factions that arise.

At the beginning of his first letter to the Corinthians, Paul wrote, “I appeal to you…by the name of Jesus, that you all agree…”

And in the very last chapter of his second letter to them, he exhorted, “Finally…aim for restoration…agree with one another.“

I don’t know how it is in your family or where you live, but I’ve noticed in Georgia it’s often a pretty big challenge to get people to agree even on what to serve for dinner! We are a polite bunch in the South—everybody’s always asking, “But what would you all prefer?” So getting agreement on anything substantive is a lot of work. In fact, I spent about a decade of my career trying to help companies agree on what they already had agreed to in their signed contracts with each other!

The main thing

Paul wasn’t trying to get the believers in Corinth to agree on everything. That would be both silly and impossible. But getting unity on the main thing was critical. The church at Corinth seemed to have some of our current challenges when it comes to focusing on the main thing. Regardless of whether you are confused about your mission as a believer or you are a part of a business or nonprofit rooted in Jesus, we must remember the main mission we’ve been given.

Jesus gave us our mission at the time of his ascension. The Holy Spirit initiated the mission on Pentecost. And Paul repeated it in his letters to Corinth and acted on it throughout his ministry and in his writing. I’ll put it together here and you can read the separate verses later. According to Paul here is the thing we must agree on and focus our lives on: “Christ and him crucified.” Paul later made sure he wasn’t misunderstood or misquoted: “… I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures.”

We all have different gifts, abilities, and ideas that can be used in accomplishing the mission. But what we must not do is spend lots of time and energy debating different opinions, arguing the latest new interpretation of some ancient text, or getting lost on modality over mission. The mission is Jesus. When we focus on our resurrected Lord and what he has asked us to do, we will get closer to what Paul described in other letters where he encouraged us to have the “mind of Christ.”

The right focus

Paul wrapped his final letter with a checklist. It’s as if he knew a cheat sheet would help us maintain the mission focus of Jesus. Here it is:

1. Rejoice. It’s hard to fight when you have a joyful heart.
2. Aim for restoration. There will be moments you realize you are not only not on the same page with each other, but you are also at war with each other. When that happens, forgiveness and restoration are required.
3. Comfort one another. Disagreements and life in general can create brokenness and loss. When that happens, we are to help each other with encouragement.
4. Agree with each other. Again, not about everything, but always about the main thing. (In case you forgot, it’s Jesus.)
5. Live in peace. Peace is best defined by right relationships, and the primary relationship to get right is the one with God. When we take care of that, then we can establish right relationships with each other.

When we follow this simple list, we will stay on mission, and according to Paul, the God of love and peace will be with us!

Your time with God’s Word
‭‭1 Corinthians‬ ‭1:10‬; 2 Corinthians‬ ‭13:11‬; 1 Corinthians‬ ‭2:2; 1 Corinthians‬ ‭15:1-4‬ ‭ESV

Photo by Liza Summer from Pexels

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