Galatians 3:23-29 (The Message Bible)
Read this text online here »
When human beings are babies and young children, few of us would question their need for both protection and guidance. Parents want their children to be safe when they sleep so they provide cribs with high sides and protective barriers. They do not want their kids to fall out and hurt themselves. If the children’s rooms are on an upper floor in the house, they will put a gate at the top of the stairs so their child will not tumble down. Young babies sit in highchairs to eat their meals until they are old enough to sit on an ordinary chair without falling off. As they grow and enjoy running around and playing in the backyard, it will usually be fenced in. When they go to the local park, their parents will always be there watching out for their safety. And as they continue to grow up but are not yet old enough to be left alone, their parents may hire a sitter to look after them when they go out. If the children like the sitter, they will probably behave; if they don’t, they may well make his or her time with them a challenging experience.
As children become youth and develop more independence, parents still set guidelines – or rules when necessary! – to protect teens from the dangers they do not yet perceive. But, hopefully, there will come a time when youth develop into mature young women and men; then, of course, a sitter is no longer necessary. When that happens, their relationship with their parents will be different -- a direct relationship with them, even as with peers.
One of the reasons the Apostle Paul wrote to the church in Galatia was to help both the new Gentile (or non-Jewish) believers and the new Jewish believers understand the relationship of spiritual life before Christ to their new spiritual life after the death and resurrection of Jesus. For the Jewish believers, the Law -- with all of its commands and teachings -- governed their life in the past. But in the present, they had come to faith and trust in Jesus Christ. There was now something fundamentally different about their life with God. It was a mature faith -- a faith that loves and trusts God. It was not a relationship dependent upon commands and protection as from a baby sitter but a relationship that stemmed from a direct loving relationship with God – through faith in Christ.
In their former spiritual life, the Jewish believers had been like young children who needed a sitter or a nanny. In Paul’s world, this person was a slave whose role was to look after the children day by day -- taking them to school, making sure they were safe and keeping them out of trouble. Many cultures have such people. In our York Mills neighbourhood, I often see women (usually) pushing baby carriages and strollers as they walk together. In western culture, we call such people nannies or au pairs.
In their former spiritual life, the Jewish believers – in fact, all of Israel – lived by the Law. We know this Law as the teachings and commands given by God through Moses especially. Paul said that Law was for their protection and guidance – like a babysitter because they were spiritual children and needed looking after until they reached spiritual maturity. So the Law, with all its significant moral and ethical commands and teachings, was fundamentally meant to keep Israel in check -- doing the right thing for the good of each person, the community and the nation. It was also meant to show the Jewish people something else more significant – that God had standards of what is right and just and compassionate and that they were out of a right relationship with God. All too often, in their attitudes and actions, they did not live God’s way. So it was futile to think they could have any real spiritual life with God by obeying the Law. It just wasn’t going to happen because, primarily, they went in their own direction too often instead of God’s and fell short and missed God’s mark of what is good and right and just and holy. That’s part of the intent of what Paul was saying in Galatians 3 as a whole. The Good News Bible makes it clear in verses 21 and 22:
“For if human beings had received a law that could bring life, then everyone could be put right with God by obeying it. But the scripture says that the whole world is under the power of sin; and so the gift which is promised on the basis of faith in Jesus Christ is given to those who believe.”The Message Bible challenges us to think about it this way: “If any kind of rule-keeping had power to create life in us, we would certainly have gotten it by this time.”
That’s the point of it all actually. When Paul became a believer in Jesus, he began to think differently about what life with God meant. Before, Paul only thought about keeping the rules – and he often broke both the rules and the spirit of the rules. Now, as Paul listened to the Holy Spirit, he understood that his present life was meant to be centred on faith in Jesus Christ. In fact, faith in God had always been the real issue. It was Abraham’s faith and love -- not his keeping the Law -- that God wanted and delighted in. And it was Abraham’s faith and blessing that was intended from the very beginning in Genesis not only for the Jewish people but also for non-Jewish people – the Gentiles – in every tribe and nation.
Paul came to understand that everyone in the entire world, whether Jew or non-Jew, could find their maturity of faith in Jesus the Messiah – the Christ. The Message Bible helps us understand this meaning in verses 25 through 27:
“But now you have arrived at your destination: By faith in Christ you are in direct relationship with God. Your baptism in Christ was not just washing you up for a fresh start. It also involved dressing you in an adult faith wardrobe -- Christ’s life, the fulfillment of God’s original promise.”The problem was that the Gentile Galatians were being told by the new Jewish believers in their midst that faith in God through Jesus was not quite enough. There were some specific and important commands they should also keep. And Paul said no – nothing more was needed. Only faith in Jesus Christ. The sign that the babysitter – the Law -- was no longer needed was the coming of Jesus the Messiah to die on the cross for the sin of all humanity. He is the One who was supremely faithful and trustworthy. Jesus the Christ was the fulfilment of God’s original promise to Israel and for the entire world.
Most, if not all of us here this morning, are not Jewish believers in Jesus Christ. We are Gentiles – non-Jewish peoples – from various backgrounds and cultures. I think Paul wanted the Gentile and Jewish believers to understand clearly the implications of what their faith in Jesus and their baptism really meant – and what being clothed in a new life with Christ really meant. So Paul stated the implications this way:
“In Christ’s family there can be no division into Jew and non-Jew, slave and free, male and female. Among us you are all equal. That is, we are all in a common relationship with Jesus Christ.”
My friends, here is what maturity of faith in Jesus Christ looks like. There might be more but there is certainly nothing less than this: those who are “in Christ’s family” are those who believe in him. And those who believe in him come from all walks of life, from every nation, both men and women.
Some Jewish men in Paul’s day would pray: “Blessed be God that he did not make me a Gentile; blessed be God that he did not make me ignorant [or a slave]; blessed be God that he did not make me a woman” [Tosefta Berakoth 7:18]. But Jesus would never have prayed that – we can tell by the way he treated women, outcasts and people of other cultures. And Paul would not accept such a demeaning classification of human beings.
Those who were in Christ’s family then and people who are in Christ’s family today – who believe in Jesus -- come from every culture, every nation and every walk of life. Cultural divisions are to have no part in the church of Jesus Christ. All human beings must be treated in the light of God’s love in Christ for all peoples, not in the light of their cultural past. The early Christians had difficulty with this understanding. That is why Paul had to write this letter to the church in Galatia. It would take them time to come to grips with this cultural mandate.
Do we have trouble today with cultural distinctions? Sometimes, but the barriers are still being broken down!
Every three years, InterVarsity Christian Fellowship – part of a worldwide student movement -- sponsors the Urbana Conference, a gathering that challenges university students to become involved in world evangelization. Both Marg and I have attended conferences in the past. About 16,000 students from around the world attended the 2009 conference. After the main session each evening, students would meet in smaller groups for prayer and reflection. In one of the banquet halls, there was one small group of Chinese students, another group of Taiwanese students and still another group of students from Hong Kong. Large dividers stood between the three. Because, historically, these three peoples have “harboured bitterness and animosity toward one another,” they felt it best to pray and worship each with their own people.For those who are in Christ’s family, social status is also irrelevant. There are clear social distinctions in society even today – we know that. There are company CEOs and there are company janitors. There are those who are well-educated and there are those who are illiterate. In Paul’s time, there were those who were free and those who were slaves. And Paul said that, in Christ’s family, there was to be no such distinction in our attitudes and actions to one another.
But as the Chinese students were praying one night, they told their leader they wanted to invite the other countries to join them. When the Taiwanese students received the invitation, they prayed and sang a little while and then opened up the wall divider. It wasn't much longer before the students from Hong Kong pulled back their divider too -- and some 80 students mingled together.
“In Christ, we are all one family,” said one leader. “And [Christ] breaks down political boundaries. In Christ, we have the desire to make the first steps to connect.”
The Taiwanese students asked the students from China and Hong Kong to lead them in worship. The next night, they invited the Korean and Japanese groups to join them too -- nations that had also experienced fierce animosity. The leader told them: “We are living out what we have learned this week in John’s [Gospel] -- this is ‘God with us.’” A woman from China said: “It was a really moving time. This kind of thing would not happen in another situation.” [Corrie McKee, “Asian Students Tear Down Walls,” Urbana Today (12-31-09), p. 6]
Slavery was widespread in the ancient world among both Gentiles and Jews – as much as 33 per cent of the population in some places. And most slaves were not treated fairly or kindly. Many might wish that Paul was clearer about the abolition of slavery as an institution. But I think Paul helped create an atmosphere and an attitude that would eventually lead to the abolition of slavery throughout the world. While progress was slow, much slower than it should have been in the Church, slavery was eventually officially abolished in 1807 through the efforts of William Wilberforce, a member of Christ’s family, and others. We can only pray for courage like theirs in our day to live our lives in a way that is consistent with the equality and protection of all people in Christ. Sadly there are still slaves and cruel taskmasters, as we know, in the trafficking of children, youth and women around the world today – even in Canada. So social classes of whatever description ought to have no bearing on the Church’s work – except to galvanize us into action on behalf of those who remain excluded or as outcasts or even as slaves today.
Let me put this social distinction in another way: a person’s social status is irrelevant for acceptance by God and for life in the church. There is a little book in the New Testament titled Philemon. Philemon was a prominent believer in the church at Colossae. He was the owner of a slave named Onesimus who ran away from him and happened to meet Paul, probably in prison. Onesimus then became a Christian. Paul knew Philemon and wrote him a letter. Paul asked him to accept Onesimus back -- and as a brother in Christ. “In Christ,” Paul said, the slave becomes our “brother” (Philemon 16). Both those who are free and those who are slaves have the Holy Spirit and are members in the Body of Christ (1 Corinthians 7:21–24). Think about this: it is indeed likely that, in the Early Church, slaves were leaders and their owners submitted to them in the life of the church! In Christ’s family, social class must be irrelevant.
Those who are in Christ’s family ought to observe no division between male and female. In Paul’s time, there was a widespread conviction that women were inferior to men. And so girls were not educated formally as boys were. The Jewish historian Josephus wrote, for example: “The woman, says the law, is in all things inferior to the man” (Against Apion, 2.201). However, in Christ’s family, no one is inferior to another, especially female to male. And when we read the Gospels, we can certainly notice this in Jesus’ attitude and response to women. In the same way that there were to be no cultural or racial distinctions and no social status prejudices, there was to be no gender prejudice. For those who are in Christ’s family, all antagonisms, abuse, criticisms, snide remarks, restrictions, overt prejudices and power trips based on gender must end for, in Jesus Christ, male and female are one. But as is the case with slavery, so with women, though Paul helped to create an atmosphere and an attitude that would raise the status of women, it would take years – even centuries -- for the Church and society to implement equality of men and women honorably before God – and more progress is still needed today.
There is one more thing about those who are in Christ’s family. All are in a common relationship with Jesus Christ. All are equal in Jesus Christ.
It has been a while since I watched the film My Big Fat Greek Wedding. It is a romantic comedy about culture, family and acceptance. Toula Portokalos is the awkward middle child of a proud Greek family. Her father, Gus, often embarrasses her because he always lectures people on Greek history. “Give me a word,” he says, “any word, and I'll show you how the root of that word is Greek.” Toula has ambitions to go to college and find a good job. Her father just wants her to marry a nice Greek boy and give him Greek grandchildren.In Christ’s family – the Church – we are all different. Today, there are members from every culture and nation in the world. There are members from every possible class distinction. There are obviously members of both sexes. But, in the end, there are no divisions. In Christ’s family, we are all connected because we are in a common relationship with Jesus Christ. Someone has truly said, the ground is even at the foot of the cross of Christ.
When Toula meets Ian Miller, a long-haired English teacher who comes from a reserved and proper-mannered family, they fall in love and begin a complicated and secret courtship. Her family eventually finds out, and her father is unhappy she is dating a non-Greek man. When the couple decides to marry, the two families must come together, making for a number of misunderstandings and uncomfortable moments.
Toula’s father is devastated that she's marrying outside of her heritage. He is against the wedding from the beginning. He simply does not understand the Millers’ way of life. Eventually, however, he begins to realize how important Ian is to his daughter and how in love they are. Seeking a way to reconcile their differences, he turns to the Greek language. At the wedding reception, he gives the following speech in broken English:
“Welcome to the Portokalos family, and welcome to the Miller family. I was thinking last night, the night before my daughter is going to marry Ian Miller, that—you know—the root of the word Miller is a Greek word. Miller comes from the Greek word milo, which means ‘apple.’ So there you go. As many of you know, our name, Portokalos, comes from the Greek word portokali, which mean ‘orange.’ So, here tonight, we have apples and oranges. We are all different. But, in the end, we are all fruit.”
May each of us find ourselves there at the foot of the Cross -- loved by the One who gave his life that each of us would learn to know and trust the God who is utterly trustworthy and faithful.
May this be so for you and for me.
Rev. Chris Miller
June 20, 2010
OYM Oriole-York Mills United Church, Toronto - website »
No comments:
Post a Comment