The "Ah-Ha" Moment continued

This is continued from my sermon on March 2:

Let me make this painfully clear: causing or being a part of a division in a church is a sin. In reading the letters Paul wrote to several churches, one of the major issues in churches was separation or the causing of division (1 Corinthians 3:1-5, Galatians 5: 20, “discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions”, Titus 3:10 “Warn divisive people once, and then warn them a second time. After that, haven nothing to do with them. You may be sure that such people are warped and sinful; they are self-condemned.”). It is a sinfully natural thing for people to seek to separate others, being attracted only to people who think like you, or to rally others to a cause that pits one group against another. Division and separation, dwelling on an “us and them” mentality, is normal, easy and WRONG. It is the opposite of the heart of Jesus Christ and the building of the Kingdom of God. Jesus said, “I pray that they be one even as we are one.”