From Silos to Solidarity: Why Unity Is Inevitable in the Body of Christ With Dr. Dave Witt

May 30

Description

What if unity in the Body of Christ is not optional, but inevitable?

Hosts Johan Heinrichs and Wendi Park sit down with Dr. Dave Witt to dig into what true unity requires—including the cost of indifference and the power of trust between congregations. Drawing on Dr. Witt’s experience with the TrueCity church network in Hamilton and his research on church relationships, the conversation unpacks why honest collaboration across differences is vital for our witness and worship. Listeners are challenged to move beyond silos, embracing practical steps toward reconciliation, trust, and lasting impact in their communities.

Time Stamps

[00:00] Unity: An Inevitable Calling

[05:57] "TrueCity: Churches United for Good"

[09:45] Exploring Trust in Church Collaborations

[12:35] "Choosing Trust Over Indifference"

[14:29] Process of Achieving Church Unity

[17:41] Pursuing Unity with Spiritual Humility

[21:27] Building Trust Between Congregations

[27:03] Value Inter-Congregational Connections

[29:35] Care Lingo

Guest Links

True City: https://www.facebook.com/truecityhamilton

Dr. Dave Witt [00:00:02]:
Because of the work of the spirit, we already have unity at one level. The fact that the spirit's involved in each of our lives, the fact that the spirit is present when two or three gather in Christ's name means that our congregations are connected to each other whether we like it or not.
Johan Heinrichs [00:00:20]:
What if unity isn't optional but inevitable? And what if resisting it through apathy, fear, or pride means we're missing out on God's deepest invitation for the church? Maybe the real cost of indifference is disconnection from the Spirit's work in our city. This is Journey with Care, a podcast by Care Impact where curious Canadians find inspiration to love others well through real life stories and honest conversations. It was July 1974. Over 2,700 Christian leaders from a 50 nations gathered in Lausanne, Switzerland. Picture that for a second. Pastors, missionaries, theologians, young firebrands, and old timers, all showing up in the middle of the Cold War carrying different theologies, worship styles, even different assumptions about what it meant to follow Jesus. You see, they came because Billy Graham and John Stott had called them to something deeper, not just a conference, but a kind of reckoning. Could the global church come together not by pretending to be the same, but by choosing to trust each other enough to move forward on mission together? And it wasn't easy.
Johan Heinrichs [00:01:31]:
Some wanted to focus only on evangelism. Others insisted that they had to talk about poverty, racism, and justice. The room was tense. But here's the thing. They didn't walk out. They stayed. They listened. They wrestled.
Johan Heinrichs [00:01:48]:
And they drafted what became known as the Lausanne Covenant, a beautiful, messy, spirit led agreement that said, we are committed to both proclaiming and embodying the good news. That story sticks with me because they didn't achieve unity by erasing difference. They chose trust. And that trust became a bridge to something bigger than any one denomination could carry alone. And honestly, it reminds me a lot of the conversation that we had with Dave Witt. Dave's been building those kinds of bridges in Hamilton. He helped birth TrueCity, a movement of churches that decided mission mattered more than silos. And he's not just talking theory, he's lived this in real time.
Johan Heinrichs [00:02:28]:
He's even done his doctoral work on what it actually takes for congregations to trust each other. Not just leaders meeting up, but churches learning how to lean in, show up, and stay. So today, we're asking, what does unity really require of us? What does trust cost? And how do we move beyond good intentions to something spirit led, even sacrificial? So Wendy, kick us off of this conversation. Let's get into it with doctor Dave Witt.
Wendi Park [00:03:00]:
Dave Witt, it's such an honor to have you with us here in the podcast studio, talking about a a topic that we are both passionate about, but especially you. You are a wealth of information. I can't wait to get started. But before we do so, Dave, I have to ask you a question. Just a little let's have a little fun. You are the guy that did his dissertation on trust. That's a big topic. So let me ask you.
Wendi Park [00:03:26]:
If trust were a bridge, what would it be made of?
Dr. Dave Witt [00:03:29]:
Oh, it was probably made of ice, you know, because, it's Oh.
Wendi Park [00:03:36]:
Tell me more.
Dr. Dave Witt [00:03:37]:
Well, it's strong, but it's easily broken. You know, when I think about the way that ice functions, and maybe it's just a hangover from winter for us, but, you know, I just I think about how strong ice can be and how powerful it can be, but it also is fragile and can't always be sure that it's going to kinda hold up depending on how we interact in given situations or how different entities interact with each other.
Wendi Park [00:04:10]:
Well, that is a very profound answer, actually. I I really like that. I feel like that really leads us into our conversation. So, Dave, many people, in our audience may not know you. In Ontario and in a lot of national sectors, sectors, you you are a known voice in the church sector, but I would love for, our audience to get to know who Dave Wood is. I will say that you and I connected in Hamilton. You are from Hamilton, sitting on a pier. And my first impression when we we sat down on the the shores of Hamilton there at that cafe was here's a guy that is a depth of knowledge.
Wendi Park [00:04:48]:
He's humble, but he is curious and wanting to know how do we bring church unity. But can you tell us a little bit about one of your passion projects, this is beyond passion projects because it's so many years, about TrueCity.
Dr. Dave Witt [00:05:02]:
Yeah. So I actually arrived in Hamilton in 1998. My wife's originally from here. We'd been in The Philippines. We came back to Hamilton to begin to explore what urban ministry, you know, what what it looks like to pursue God's kingdom in an urban setting in Southern Ontario might look like, and really with a passion for seeing churches engage mission to understand, well, how do churches pursue the kingdom beyond the walls of their of their church buildings. And in the process of that, you know, began to work with a group of churches in Hamilton that expressed an interest in collaborating with each other. There were a number of ways in which those churches were beginning to to get a taste of how to be involved in in Hamilton and pursuing the good of our city. And that, led to the development of this network of churches called TrueCity.
Dr. Dave Witt [00:05:57]:
And the tagline for TrueCity is churches together for the good of the city. We really had a a sense that God was calling us to pursue aspects of what was on God's heart for our city and to show the the culture of our of our city, show people in our city that that God wanted the church to be for things, and to be known for being for things more than, what we were against. You know, there's there's things we should be against. But when that's what you're known for, that doesn't always, create the kind of witness that God wants us to have. And so so how could we be for seeing, neighborhoods flourish? How could we be for refugees and newcomers coming to our city? You know, how could we be for caring for the environment and for fostering an adoption and any number of areas, frontiers, I've called them missional frontiers, that God wanted us to Yeah. To pursue. But in the process of that, we began on this journey of church unity. Not really what we
Wendi Park [00:07:00]:
Well, that's an easy topic. Right? Like, that that There you go. There's no problems or or hiccups in that. Right?
Dr. Dave Witt [00:07:05]:
Yeah. We it wasn't really the front and center on our radar when we started this. You know, we wanted to collaborate together and we had congregations from different denominations involved and suddenly kind of realized that, oh, there's all these church unity things that we need to face and dig into. Having an agenda of missional engagement really helped us to be able to to put some of those things in perspective. But, yeah, it was it was challenging and kind of ventured in without knowing the territory and all the consequences of what we were going to be up against. But it's been a real deep journey for me personally just recognizing how important unity is to God, how deeply woven into the New Testament, the desire for for church unity is, and the, you know, high agenda that that's meant to be for us as the church. But, you know, especially for my tribe of evangelical Christians, that's not always been the priority that God wants wants it to be. And so just realizing that for me growing up in evangelicalism, church unity, especially around ecumenicalism, was understood to be synonymous with compromise.
Wendi Park [00:08:24]:
Right.
Dr. Dave Witt [00:08:24]:
We had all these all this baggage that we needed to sort through when it came to how you pursue church unity. And then God kinda challenged us to go beyond just evangelical churches in our city to to include other other, churches from from different traditions. And, yeah, that's been really challenging.
Wendi Park [00:08:45]:
Yeah. And I really appreciate that because I was recently I I went to your True City conference, and what a fantastic expression of the church, the body of Christ working together. And I did see and I did observe that unity across different denominations. They weren't all just of the same stripe. Right? And yet they were pursuing things of justice. They were pursuing the heart of God. They were worshiping together and bringing organizations and churches together, and there was a lot there. But I imagine that that doesn't come without some some pain points, some a lot of learning along the way.
Wendi Park [00:09:21]:
I know I've learned from your experiences, and we we've gone deep into how do we help the church be the church across a city, across Canada. Is this what led you into your dissertation, about trust? I would love for you actually, let me step back. Can you tell us about your dissertation? And is this part of the reason why you chose that dissertation specifically about church unity?
Dr. Dave Witt [00:09:45]:
Yeah. I I went into this doctoral program wanting to explore what had happened through TrueCity. So was, at that point, maybe sixteen, seventeen years into this journey of TrueCity and realizing that some really significant things had happened, in terms of the way that these churches were working with each other, but not having had the space to understand, well, what's happened here? How has that happened? What has God taught us through that journey? And so that's what led me into this. And then partway into the research phase or just trying to formulate what the research would be on, came across a whole discipline of trust research that's out there. Interestingly enough, it's in a number of different disciplines, academic disciplines, not so much in practical theology, which was the area that I was specifically working in. And so having to translate a lot from organizational development materials and understand how they were framing trust and to recognize the ways that that applied to, what had been happening between our churches. And so my research was looking at how congregations as collective entities come to trust each other. And, you know, most of the time when we talk about trust, we understand it more at an individual level.
Dr. Dave Witt [00:11:15]:
But one of the things about trust is that it happens at multiple levels. So it doesn't just happen between individuals, but it happens between collectives as well. And so how does one organization come to trust another? Or in the case of what I was looking at, how does one congregation come to trust another congregation? And what's that have to do with unity? Yeah. Ultimately, I came to understand unity, church unity as having this really important trust dimension to it that for us to have the kind of unity God intends for us to have, there would be trust between the entities, the the the church, the church the different ecclesial structures to to go academic Yeah. On it. Because congregations are are key structures, but there's lots of structures that make up the church in a place. And that was all part of the the learning process for me as I dug into this.
Wendi Park [00:12:14]:
Well, I've been digging into it. Thanks for sharing your dissertation because that is is lovely Sure. Reading material for for my my eyes and and for me to chew on. I should have actually introduced you as doctor Dave Witt. I could actually say that now. You defended. You passed, and you're you've graduated. Have you not?
Dr. Dave Witt [00:12:32]:
I have finished. Yes.
Wendi Park [00:12:35]:
Doctor of trust to specializing in trust. Well and and you're we invited you part of our series, the the cost of indifference. And and and part the reason I I wanted you to be a part of this series is because indifference is a choice not to build trust. And there's some intentionality required in trust building, and that's something that came through in in your work and in your presentation when I was at the city leaders collective when we had across the the country 19 different cities represented of city network leaders, and you presented this as well. And but it's indifference is a choice not to build trust, and it requires time, humility, vulnerability, intentionality. And if we avoid these things, it will cling to old wounds or old patterns or defend our way and keeps peace at the cost of real reconciliation, which is a word that comes through in your work a lot and is something that is really understood, maybe misunderstood or cliched or politicized in our nation of Canada. But in the biblical sense of reconciliation, the cost of indifference is reconciliation within amongst the body of Christ saying we'll be nice, but we're not gonna be unified. That's just maybe too much work.
Wendi Park [00:13:53]:
What's your experience?
Dr. Dave Witt [00:13:55]:
Yeah. Part of what I came to realize as as I worked on just explore church unity in in the new testament is that because of the work of the spirit, we already have unity at one level. The fact that the spirit's involved in each of our lives, the fact that the spirit is present when two or three gather in Christ's name means that our congregations are connected to each other whether we like it or not.
Wendi Park [00:14:21]:
We're related regardless. It's like that that weird uncle
Johan Heinrichs [00:14:24]:
Yes.
Wendi Park [00:14:25]:
That comes to our gatherings. Right? Like, he's related whether you like it or
Dr. Dave Witt [00:14:29]:
not. Yeah. So that's a that's an important starting point for for, I think, the conversation about church unity. But it's also meant to be a process, and that comes through really clearly as well. You know, I think of that passage in Ephesians four in particular, where it starts off by telling us to to maintain the unity of the spirit early in the chapter, but then goes on to talk about how we'll have full unity of the faith, when we get to that that time when when Christ returns and and all is set right and and the recognition that there's a kind of unity that we have now, but it's not the full unity that that God intends for us to have. In my mind, it's parallel to what we experience as individuals that, you know, we're saved by grace and we're already saved. But eventually, you know, when Christ comes again, we will be fully made new to the to people God intends for us to be. And there's a process that's happening, sanctification process, where God's taking us deeper with him as individuals.
Dr. Dave Witt [00:15:29]:
I think the same thing's happening for us as the church, that unity is the process of sanctification lived out in the church. So we're on that journey. Again, whether we like it or not, we're on that journey. But, yeah, we can resist it and do damage to what God intends to have happen by actively resisting or by, yeah, the indifference that you're talking about.
Wendi Park [00:15:53]:
Yeah. I guess the question that it raises for for me and begs the the the question is, so what? Why do we need to pursue unity? Why do we need to be reconciled across people with all these differences even though we are the part of the the body of Christ, we're different denominations, it's more comfortable. It's easier if I I sit within my pew circle, with like minded people. So what? What is the cost of indifference if I don't pursue trust building and connection and love for the greater body of Christ even within my own city? So what?
Dr. Dave Witt [00:16:30]:
Yeah. I think that that passage in John 17, Jesus' prayer for us as the church gives kind of two answers to that question. The first is that our witness is damaged because the world will know of our love for Christ by our love for each other. That, you know, Jesus specifically recognizes that in his prayer for us, that as he and the father are one, so we're to be one, and that when we're one like that, then the world will come to recognize that he is Lord. And so when we resist that, when we don't pursue it, we diminish the power of our witness. And we can do all the other things that we talk about to to witness to the world, but this is a key thing, you know, maybe the key thing that Jesus talks about. Mhmm. And I'd say the other thing is that that we diminish our worship.
Dr. Dave Witt [00:17:24]:
You know, God is glorified by us being one. And so when we don't pursue that, we take away from the glory that's due who God is. You know? And and so I think it disempowers our worship and disempowers our witness when when we don't pursue this.
Wendi Park [00:17:41]:
And pursuing it would also cloak us all. We have to, in order to build trust and unity, cloak us with some spiritual humility too, that our corner on religion, our our dogma on doctrine isn't the the thing that binds us together. We don't need consensus. It's it's a matter of centralizing on the cross, and maybe it's above our pay grade to align everybody's doctrine. But can we pursue love? Can we can we do it in humility? And I wonder maybe this is cloaked in with it, but, I wonder what your thoughts are. And for me, something that also comes to mind, the cost of indifference is also directly on the care of community. So so when we are simply self serving in our congregations, and we may we may grow spiritually, individually, and corporately, but together, we can be a force for good in what you were talking about, serving refugees, helping homelessness, doing some some greater initiatives together because we come with such strengths, in numbers, when we can we can grow together in that vision. Because that god's heart is for the marginalized.
Wendi Park [00:18:56]:
God's heart is for the vulnerable. No matter what denomination or church we come from, imagine when we can build trust and unity, the impact. Like, when did we see you hungry? When did we see you collectively, we've got more eyes on where Jesus is.
Dr. Dave Witt [00:19:16]:
Yeah. Yeah. And I I think that's been a key experience for us in Hamilton has been when we've focused on, those on the margins. But in in any number of of ways, when we've lived out our calling to care for the least of these, that's empowered our pursuit of unity and helped us to connect across differences. Then in the midst of that recognized, oh, clearly these people, these other people that we're working with, have a passion for for Jesus. Yeah. And they may not practice that the same way that we do. They may have some different beliefs than we do, but we can feel their heart, and we can we can see the the ways that they're they're pursuing that, living that out.
Dr. Dave Witt [00:20:01]:
And that humbles us, you know, in in a way and we recognize that we have things to learn from each other. And I think all of that empowers that pursuit, of unity.
Wendi Park [00:20:12]:
Well, it's like anything. When we do we're in the trenches with each other, maybe somebody we wouldn't otherwise associate, but we've experienced life together. We've even done hardship or we've had to even laugh at each other. We have these in you know, you build that trust because you do life together. You're you're able to appreciate somebody that you would otherwise not necessarily have thought of as a friend, as kin? I'd love to get get us really practical here. So so we go beyond, yes, unity is good, trust is good, from conceptual to it's surely more than a group hug. It's surely more than kumbaya together, and and I've seen it demonstrated with Tru City and and the things you are pursuing even at the conference and and some intentionality there. I'm gonna give a quote actually from your dissertation, if if I may.
Wendi Park [00:21:01]:
Sure. You wisely said, we naively expected resistance to diminish as the fruit of collaboration became more obvious, but have eventually come to recognize the need to develop specific practices to address the brokenness to which this resistance points. I'm wondering if you can give me I know we can't go through it all, but a few highlights of practical things that Tru City has embraced and chosen to do to put some practice to this.
Dr. Dave Witt [00:21:27]:
Yeah. So kinda core to the research was recognizing that there's this process by which trust forms between congregations that starts with representative leaders. So people who are recognized within their congregation as leaders who can speak on behalf of a congregation. So pastors, you know, always function that way, but there's a number of people who are in that role as well in a congregation. And for those people to, make a point of of building relationship with people, other representative leaders from other congregations to to intentionally seek after that, to to recognize, well, which of the other churches in the neighborhood that our church is part of, and can we reach out to them in some way to at least have connection between our congregations? Or which of the other churches that have a similar passion for outreach that we have? Whatever that that might be, whether whether that's caring for refugees or or neighborhood involvement with a local school or indigenous justice or whatever sense of of calling our congregation has to to connect with other congregations from different denominations that share that calling, you know, to be intentional about those things, because those that doesn't just happen naturally. The way that, especially for us, among evangelical churches, there's congregations that are very similar to our congregation that we would generally have more of an opportunity to connect with, same denomination or other circles like that. But to connect with a congregation that's, you know, from a different tradition than us, take some intentionality. So that's a really key practice, expressing vulnerability as you're building that relationship so that you're not just telling those people all the good things you're doing, but you acknowledge that there's challenges for your congregation.
Dr. Dave Witt [00:23:25]:
That's been a really important, important practice that people talk about when when leaders from these churches get together and we share some of the things we're struggling with, it sucks the competition air out of the room, was one of the quotes that came out, which I feel like is really important.
Wendi Park [00:23:43]:
It's not like a political campaign where we have to say, oh, ours like, vote for this party or that party. We are one party. We just we might need to come around so that we have a unified mandate together on certain things, and and we can celebrate the differences at the same time. But we are one one body and not, different political stripes.
Dr. Dave Witt [00:24:04]:
Yeah. So those representative leaders getting to know each other and building trust at an individual level is really important, but that's not sufficient for our congregations to come to trust each other. Those leaders have to do work within their congregations to point their congregations to these other churches to say, hey. We're learning from this church. We value what they're doing. They're different than us, but but they have a really important part to play in the kingdom. Yeah. There's there's ways that we signal to our congregations that we should be in relationship with these other congregations, whether that's praying for them actively in our worship services, whether that's, noting to other leaders within the congregation what we're learning from that congregation.
Dr. Dave Witt [00:24:52]:
There's just those kinds of practices that that signal the importance of that relationship, that connection to that that other church. And then, eventually, there's just finding ways to get groups from the different congregations in the room together to be pursuing a common project and to have a a sense of camaraderie, develop. So those are some of the concrete, practices that I'd say we've explored and learned from.
Wendi Park [00:25:21]:
That's beautiful. And that's one of the things I would I would affirm that, in in our experience with Care Impact, and we have the the care sharing platform, care portal. And some people say, well, how can you get all these diverse denominations working together? We would normally not do that. And, actually, that has been a nonissue when the eye is on the child or the the refugee family or there's a project and there's actually solidarity. And I'm like, this isn't just about caring for your neighbor. That is, utmost what we're trying to accomplish here. But, actually, the other piece is building up the unity of the body of Christ. We can work together, but sometimes we need the mechanics.
Wendi Park [00:26:00]:
We need the how to. We need the stepping stone, because even churches live in silos and individualism. Yes. And so there needs to be some intentionality around that.
Dr. Dave Witt [00:26:11]:
Yeah. Absolutely. And, yeah, that's that's certainly been our experience here that you need to have a sense of joining God in something bigger that he's doing. And then you maybe with surprise look around and realize that these aren't the same people that you expected to be here with. But because of what you're pursuing, like you said, you know, you're in the trenches together and that wouldn't have been the person that you would have guessed you'd be there with or that you would even choose to be there with, but it's who's there and you're learning to trust by working together.
Wendi Park [00:26:50]:
That's beautiful. Do you have anything to, challenge our listeners, something that we could put into practice possibly this week, after hearing this topic that they could put into practice on building trust?
Dr. Dave Witt [00:27:03]:
One of the things that I I think we don't do enough of is to recognize the congregational connections of of other Christians that we know. We have friends who are Christians, we know they're Christians, but we don't recognize, which church they're a part of and we don't specifically pray for that congregation or, you know, even find ways to value that congregation. And so I think just even to make a point of recognizing people that you already have some trust with to recognize that they're part of congregations that are different from your own and to pray for that congregation and to to speak well of that congregation and maybe to learn a little bit more about that congregation, I think those are all valuable things we can do within the body of Christ that builds the the network, the trust between within the network that is the body of Christ and the places where we live.
Wendi Park [00:27:58]:
I love that. And and if I may add, for those that really wanna be ambitious and supersize that challenge, think of the ones, the the congregations that your church specifically would not want to sit with, would particularly have something challenging with, and let's start there. Pray, reach out, have a cup of coffee, not to align things up. It's it might be over a hundred thousand cups of coffee, but to take steps of learning in that posture of listening, what could go wrong?
Dr. Dave Witt [00:28:28]:
Mhmm.
Wendi Park [00:28:29]:
By having humility. Right? Yeah. Absolutely. It's easier than we often think. It's it just takes some courage. Well, thank you so much, Dave. There's so much more I would love to dig into, and maybe we'll have to have you back. I'd love to have you back.
Wendi Park [00:28:42]:
But is there any last, item that you would like to, say before we go into a segment? I wanna invite you to our CareLingo.
Dr. Dave Witt [00:28:51]:
Sure. Yeah. I just I one of the convictions I came through to hold through this is that the spirit's always working to connect the church more deeply in any and every place where the church exists, you know, where there's more than one congregation in a place. I think it's always the work of the spirit to be trying to catalyze connection, between the various streams of the church in that place. And so it's not something we have to, engineer ourselves. I think we just need to be in stuff with the spirit and to be open to the people that the spirit brings along to us to be part of what the spirit's doing on on this front.
Johan Heinrichs [00:29:35]:
Alright. Thank you so much for your insights, Dave. We gotta have you back on the podcast. There's so much more we could talk about. But now it's time for Care lingo. So this is the part of the podcast where we take those care impacts terms, the ones we use in the caring space, the social services space, the church space, and we take the mystery out of it, with a little bit of humor too of what people might think if they first heard some of these terms. So we wanna make sure that people understand them as they hear them on the podcast and those following the work that we do. So today's word, well, this is fitting and we've already talked about a little bit.
Johan Heinrichs [00:30:15]:
So it is reconciliation. Mhmm. Okay. Reconciliation. This is a word that I mean, it's been a buzzword for a while here in Canada. But if you're if you're new to hearing it, what might people think if you're talking about it in the space of church and caring space? So to me, you know, I'm a worship leader. I'm a guy that does music and working with leadership. You know, sometimes they want you to lead certain bands or certain genres of music, and churches are sometimes divided.
Johan Heinrichs [00:30:48]:
And you know what? My wife is Mennonite. I took a while for them to get out of those hymns. So for me, like, this is when worship bands form that truce with with the leadership, and they agree to alternate between, you know, Hillsong and those hymns. So this is true reconciliation as a worship leader. Wendy
Wendi Park [00:31:07]:
I don't think that's so true, but that's that's our practice. Yes. Yes. Well, I I had a little bit of fun with that, thinking more of it as ciliation, reconciliation, within the church. I I would define it as a sacred ministry of sweeping everything under a rug with a nervous laugh and an awkward group hug. Reconciliation.
Johan Heinrichs [00:31:27]:
Reconciliation. So those are the wrong definitions. I'm sure there's many more tangents we can go on because we've heard a lot of weird
Wendi Park [00:31:34]:
Oh, I have more if you want.
Johan Heinrichs [00:31:36]:
No. No. Okay. No. I I I think, you know, once we started talking about reconciliation in that first season, we heard a lot of weird people's definitions, and there are so many out there.
Wendi Park [00:31:48]:
Right? Yeah.
Johan Heinrichs [00:31:48]:
Their thought of what reconciliation actually means.
Wendi Park [00:31:51]:
I think we should ask Dave what it actually means because from his perspective, he's a wealth I know this isn't enough time to do justice, but, yeah, what would you say reconciliation actually is? Not the silly one.
Dr. Dave Witt [00:32:04]:
Yeah. I mean, reconciliation is, restoring the the relationship that God intends, has always intended for us to have this deep, giving community that god god has has created us to be part of, that's been broken by by sin and death and that god wants to to see, come back to to life in the way that that he's always intended for it to to be there. And so I realized for my in the work that I was doing, unity is kind of a static term, but reconciliation is the active pursuit of the kind of relationship that that God is is intending for us to have. Mhmm.
Johan Heinrichs [00:32:49]:
That sounds beautiful to me. Thank you so much, Dave, for giving us that wonderful definition of what reconciliation actually means. And listeners, if you wanna know more about reconciliation, head over to your podcast feed. Go to that first season. We got a ton of interviews, which we had I wasn't I wasn't really involved in that season, but
Wendi Park [00:33:09]:
There's a lot of different voices, some very powerful voices Yeah. Beyond myself. I just came as a Mennonite settler, perspective. But, yeah, there's a lot to unpack, but I do love what you said, Dave. It is an action Mhmm. Word. It is something that we pursue. It's not something we arrive at or something we just wave a virtue signal flag about.
Wendi Park [00:33:30]:
It's not political so much as it is a real theological positioning of our heart of where we're pursuing unity and trust. Yeah.
Johan Heinrichs [00:33:40]:
Alright. Until next time, always remember to stay curious. Thank you for joining us on Journey with Care. To get more information on weekly episodes, upcoming opportunities, or to connect with our community, visit journeywithcare.ca, or find Care Impact on Facebook and Instagram, or just check the show notes for these links and all the links related to this episode. Share your thoughts, leave us a message, and be part of a network of individuals journeying in faith and purpose. Together, let's discover how we can make a meaningful impact.