When you reflect on the line about the Church in the Nicene Creed (We believe in one, holy, catholic, and apostolic Church), you might begin to feel the tension embedded in the heart of the Biblical vision for Church. The Catholicity (universal nature) of the Church is one of the greatest challenges to its one-ness (unity). Of course, you could just slide the whole thing off into a nebulous spirituality. You know the kind of thing: our unity is ‘spiritual’. It is, but if there is one thing know it is that Christian spirituality is physical. Or at least it has a physical outworking. Think about how the deepest aspects of our worship draw us into physical and tangible experiences. We baptise with water, and we eat and drink bread and wine. The physicality matters.

And so we are left with the awkward expectation that the universal nature of the Church will not fracture the physical reality of the unity of the Church. The ‘one...catholic...’ Church is the historical outworking of the Gospel. It is what the Gospel produces. As we are brought by the Spirit to Christ we are saved by Him into the one Church. All of us. Whatever our age, background, culture, ethnicity, or position on the socio-economic ladder. Whenever we have lived, wherever we have lived. Whether we are even living at all! The Church is universal. We all belong to the one Church. That’s what it means to say the Church is catholic.

We might begin to appreciate that the Creed puts this firmly within the remit of the Spirit’s work. If we are ever to achieve that sense of diversity without division, we will have to reach beyond human capacity and potential. To keep us together and in fellowship with one another in spite of all our differences... that’s a miracle in its own right! The tensions in such a Church family are almost unbearable. But we can see in Scripture how critically important it is to maintain the unity of the Church in the face of the challenges poses by such catholicity. In Acts 15, we find the Apostles even pausing on world evangelism in order to return to Jerusalem and address the question of how Christians from different cultures can remain united in one body.

Maybe this is why some say that this line of the creed, that ‘we believe in one, holy, catholic and apostolic Church’ is the most difficult to believe. Maybe it’s why – in spite of confessing it – many have given up believing it to be even possible. Today it is increasingly common for Churches to ‘aim’ at one particular culture, or even sub-culture; or perhaps one age group or demographic. However successful this might seem to be, it is a denial of the catholicity of the Church. And as such it grieves the Spirit.

Questions:

How much of Rev.7:9 do you think we can (re-)capture in our present experience of Church?

Why is it so tempting to allow our cultural or ethnic difference to drive us apart and into different congregations? How can we overcome those temptations?

In Rev.7:9-13, what are the things those in the ‘great multitude’ have in common that keep them together in spite of all their differences?

How do you think they would respond if you suggested they segregate into different groups depending on age, stage of life, ethnicity, or nationality?

How can we better lean into this vision of the catholic Church at MIE?

What is the ‘great tribulation’ that this multitude have come out of (7:14)? Why does it matter where they came from?

What is there in vv.15-17 that would be of comfort to those who have been through ‘the great tribulation’? Why does the ‘elder’ quote from Is.49:10 and Is.25:8? What is going on in those sections of Isaiah that connects with John’s vision of the Church in heaven?

Why are they (a) dressed in white robes, and (b) holding palm branches (7:9)?

What excites you about this vision of the Church?