as might have been expected under other circumstances. From a normal worldly viewpoint one would not have been surprised to hear the Greeks make objections, calling attention to their proud traditions of the past. After all, were not the world’s leading historians, poets, mathematicians and architects Greeks? Was not everything by the name of culture even in all the Roman Empire actually Greek? Or the Romans, the self-assured citizens of the world’s capital, why should they listen to despised Judeans, who, at times, were not even permitted to live at Rome? The world domination of the Semitic race, had it not passed from the Semitic to the Aryan race with the fall of Babylon? Why, then, should Aryan Romans and Greeks take orders from Semitic, Aramaic-speaking Jews in Jerusalem? Could they not think for themselves? There is nothing in the records to indicate any such worldly nationalistic or racial thinking gnawing away like termites on the roots of the Christian unity. Evidently everybody looked at it the same way as Paul did: “There is no distinction between Jew and Greek, for there is the same Lord over all.” Far from its causing dissension, the record says: “Now as they traveled on through the cities they would deliver to those there for observance the decrees that had been decided upon by the apostles and older men who were in Jerusalem. Therefore, indeed, the congregations continued to be made firm in the faith and to increase in number from day to day.”—Acts 15:2, 41; 16:4, 5; Rom. 10:12.

19. In which respect was the early Christian church something never seen before?

¹⁹ Indeed the church was a wonder and an outstanding exception in the history of mankind; an international organization, yet characterized by “one heart and soul,” “same mind,” and “same line of thought,” ‘one body, one spirit, one hope, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father.’ (Acts 4:32; 1 Cor. 1:10; Eph. 4:4-6) Something never seen before. A true product of God’s spirit. Certainly, Jehovah had fulfilled Jesus’ prayer for unity of the Christian church.—John 17:20-23.

The Mark of the Spirit

“I am giving you a new commandment, that you love one another; just as I have loved you, that you also love one another. By this all will know that you are my disciples, if you have love among yourselves.”—John 13:34, 35.

 1. (a) Why is it only logical to expect Christian unity to be seen in the world today? (b) Of what use would it be to us to find that unity?

TO Jesus the unity and love among his true followers was something unique, something that would set them apart from everybody else, something that should be a special sign to the whole world to prove that he had been sent by the Father and that they had been sent by him. Because Jesus prayed for his future followers to be part of the Christian unity and promised that “Hades will not overpower” his congregation and that he is with it “all the days until the consummation of the system of things,” it is only logical to expect that particular sign should be visible to the world today, and that it can serve as one of the means of identifying his congregation or