(Ephesians 2: 11-22)
One of my favorite movies is the 1984 Academy Award winning movie Places in the Heart, starring Sally Fields and Danny Glover. If you haven’t seen it, or if it has been a while since you watched it, it would be well-worth your time. I won’t spoil the plot, but the end of the movie is especially gripping and open to different interpretations. The movie, set in 1935 Waxahachie, Texas, ends with a Sunday morning church service where communion was being observed. Included in the congregation were people both dead and alive. The deceased Sheriff, the young man who killed him, members of a traveling band, the banker who tried to foreclose on Sally’s house, a woman killed in a tornado, and adulterer, children, and maybe some of the town’s unidentified Klansmen. What struck me was that as they observed the sacrament of Holy Communion in God’s house, passing the peace of God, you got the message that all are welcome in God’s house, children, adults, sinners, the unchurched or not-so-often churched, white and black, those raised from the dead and those still alive. They all had a place in the heart of God, no questions asked, and no strings attached.
And having a place in God’s heart, no questions asked, and no strings attached is what the Apostle Paul is talking about in our Scripture reading for this morning. He’s writing to the church in Ephesus which is primarily a church made up of Gentile converts, people Paul was charged by Jesus with reaching in God’s name. He starts out by saying: So then, remember that at one time you Gentiles by birth, called “the uncircumcision” by those who are called “the circumcision” a physical circumcision made in the flesh by human hands, remember that you were at that time without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. You see, this was one of the challenges Paul faced in his ministry as the Apostle to the Gentiles. The very pious Jews considered all non-Jews unclean. They thought of themselves as pure and clean because of their national heritage and religious ceremonies. Before Christ’s coming, Gentiles and Jews kept apart from one another. The Jews considered Gentiles beyond God’s saving power and therefore without hope, and the Gentiles resented the Jewish claim of a favored relationship with God, a god they did not know, but wanted to. The Pharisees and teachers of the law were the “holy rollers” of the day and were really not any different than all the “holier-than-thous” who have followed in the name of Christianity doing all they can to give organized religion a bad name. Telling you that their way is the only way. Paul points out that Jews and Gentiles alike were unclean before God and needed to be cleansed by Christ. He was preaching a message that revealed the total sinfulness of both Jews and Gentiles, and that Christ offers his salvation to both, no questions asked, no strings attached. This had to have been a bitter pill to swallow for those devout Jews who were still awaiting the coming of the Jewish messiah and that their way was the only way. And to have Paul, formerly one of their own, tell them this had to have rubbed some of them the wrong way. What they needed to hear was that only Christ breaks down the walls of prejudice, reconciles all believers to God, and unifies us in one body.
My Wesley Commentary states that it is hard to overstate the radical nature of the inclusion of the Gentiles into the people of God through the blood of Christ. The Jews had expected redemption to come because the God of the Jews made a covenant to save them through a Jewish messiah. But when Christ came, he clarified the definition of the people of God. Paul says: But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. For he is our peace; in his flesh he has made both groups into one and has broken down the dividing wall, that is, the hostility between us. What Paul is saying it that what truly brings people into a right relationship with God is faith in Christ, not ethnicity and strict obedience to the law. He continues by stating: He has abolished the law with its commandments and ordinances, that he might create in himself one new humanity in place of the two, thus making peace, and might reconcile both groups to God in one body through the cross thus putting to death that hostility through it. Paul is telling us that those who trust Christ are no longer estranged from God because of their ethnicity or religious past. Regarding the Messiah he says: So he came and proclaimed peace to you who were far off and peace to those who were near; for through him both of us have access in one Spirit to the Father. No longer are there two separate groups; now there is one body of believers with Christ accomplishing this reconciliation through his death on the cross. The new body is the church and Gentiles are not simply being incorporated into the Jewish way of life, but rather both Gentile and Jew are formed into a new, unique community.
Paul makes his point when he says: So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are citizens with the saints and also members of the household of God, built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the cornerstone. In him the whole structure is joined together and grows into a holy temple in the Lord, in whom you also are built together spiritually into a dwelling place for God. A place in your heart. Christ has destroyed the barriers people build between themselves, and because these walls have been removed, we can have real unity with people who are not like us. This is true reconciliation. Because of Christ’s death, we are all one, our hostility against each other has been put to death; we can all have access to the Father by the Holy Spirit; we are no longer foreigners or aliens to God; and we are all being built into a holy temple with Christ as our chief cornerstone. Paul is now describing believers, rather than physical buildings, as the temple in which the Spirit of God resides. God’s household is not a building, but a group of people. He lives in us and shows himself to a watching world through us. People can see that God is love and that Christ is Lord as we live in harmony with each other and in accordance with what God says in his Word.
As I wrote that last statement I paused and reflected upon whether or not that message of love and harmony is what we’re really portraying. I know we are doing our best here at Community to portray that message and those who have been watching us have picked up on it based upon the feedback I’ve been receiving. But what about the message we are sending out as a collective community of faith, all lumped together under one tent? The people that tell me, without hesitation, that they had a bad experience with organized religion aren’t saying they don’t believe in God. They’re saying they don’t believe in our message or our approach. I believe there is a somewhat false narrative out there where Christians who wear their feelings on their sleeves believe that the secular world hates them because of their Christian beliefs, that it’s an us versus them battle. They don’t hate us or disapprove of us because we profess to be Followers of the Way of Jesus Christ, the Prince of Peace. They disapprove of us because we aren’t following the way of Jesus in how we interact in the world. In fact, recently it appears as if the battle is us versus us. The infighting among Christians is so palpable it’s scary. What they see and hear are churches, pastors, theologians, and denominational leaders with the biggest megaphones proclaiming that they know the will of God and will do whatever it takes to see that that will is accomplished. They are our modern-day Pharisees who loudly proclaim that if you aren’t “circumcised” according to their interpretation of God’s law, you are not a part of the body of Christ. What they’re preaching or spewing certainly doesn’t sound like The Sermon on the Mount. Now that’s a touchy one because we too here at Community United Methodist also feel we know what the will of God is for us. We know because we have been relying on and listening to the guidance of the Holy Spirit to help us understand what God’s will is for us as we serve our community and beyond. The Holy Spirit is leading us in love as we strive to love God, love others, and serve others. A task best accomplished by our loving actions towards God’s beloved children and not through erecting barriers that divide us as a people brought together through the sacrifice of Jesus Christ.
So it goes without saying, there are many barriers that can divide us from other Christians. Barriers such as age, appearance, intelligence, political persuasion, economic status, race, and theological perspectives to name a few. One of the best ways to stifle Christ’s love is to be friendly and accepting of only those people we like and have things in common. The gift of the Holy Spirit helps us look beyond the barriers to the unity and purpose we are all called to enjoy and live out, to live out in those places with God in our hearts.
Let us pray.
Blest be the tie that binds our hearts in Christian love; the fellowship of kindred minds is like to that above. Gracious and merciful God, how we praise you for the unifying sacrifice of your Son, Jesus Christ, our brother and Savior. We praise you for the new covenant that brings us into a close and personal relationship with you and moves us to love others as we would want to be loved. How grateful we are for your boundless and all-forgiving love that has created for us a special place, a place in your heart. In Jesus’ name, we pray, Amen.