A Mark of Distinction

Galatians 3:28

Robert M Watkins

October 7, 2007

World Communion Sunday

The easiest statement for anyone to make within the Church is to acknowledge that all human beings are created by God. There is no other option. God fashioned the world and human beings within it. It affords human beings with a mark of distinction. We are the image of God, the crown of creation, and the recipients of God’s own blessing as having dominion over all creation.

Well and good, but in actual practice, some other idea seems to be at work.

I can hear folks rustling in the pews, fearing the onslaught of the dreaded “topical sermon”--a series of social dictums disguised as “proclamation.”

Fear not.

The Bible is plenty frightening all on its own without adding to it a single word of social commentary. For instance, take Paul’s statement in his letter to the Galatians that we read this morning. Paul asserts that in Christ, all distinctions between people within that congregation are null and void. All are the same in the eyes of God as they gather in the presence of Christ. No matter how they regard one another, God does not agree with their assessment.

Most often, one will hear this text as a great affirmation of Christian unity, the oneness we are to strive to achieve within the church. The truth is that Paul has something else in mind. This is confusing to us, but we have to consider the situation in Galatia when Paul wrote his epistle. That particular congregation was about to fall apart because two rival factions were vying for control. Whoever won the argument was not only to be in charge, but the losers were going to be thrown out of the church altogether if they did not conform to the winners. On one side were those who believed that all Christians should first become Jews since Jesus was the fulfillment of Jewish hopes and faith; on the other were those who had never been Jews and saw no reason to become such since Christ was a new thing, a new act of God’s creative will. Neither was willing to tolerate the presence of the other. Paul intervenes. As he outlines his argument, it becomes clear that he believes there is a mistaken matter of focus. All the combatants are seeing only through their own eyes. They have elevated human decisions, structures, and opinions to the level of the absolute. Paul angrily (read the letter) denounces such thinking. The faith, in the end, is not about us. It is about God--always has been and always will be.

What makes that frightening is that so much of what we say and do in the church is reflection of the human beings within it. Our structures, our form of worship, our traditions, our style, all of it, it seems, is a reflection of who and what we are. The personality of the church is the amalgam of the personalities of its members.

But the church in its truest form has nothing to do with our personality, beliefs, practices, and so on. It is God’s own community and should be reflective of God alone.

Karl Barth wrote one of the longest sections of his massive Church Dogmatics on why any theology that begins with human experience and human action is doomed to failure. Theology is not about human beings, it is about God, therefore, its only focus can be on the action of God. God acted in Jesus Christ. That’s all anyone need think about.

This is where Paul is going with his statement in Galatians 3:28. All distinctions we make within the church are ours not God’s. We are in the hands of God and we are God’s audience. We are to do nothing but revel in the presence of God and ponder the meaning of what we find in Christ’s revelation. That is all that matters.

That is so difficult to do. Human beings are preternaturally judgmental. We make distinctions and form opinions about one another all the time. It is how we function within the world. To some degree, we have to make judgments and relate to one another based on those judgments. For example, on a dark street at night alone, one had better be discerning about whom to meet and whom to hide from. We apply the same approach in many areas of our lives. We make judgments to make good choices.

But Paul is demanding that we do something different. Within the church, we need to turn our eyes from one another and fix them solely on God. Our distinctions vanish because in the presence of God we are all the same--creatures in need of salvation and in need of God. God offers us what we cannot provide for ourselves--a way out of the mess we make in sin--but the only way to find that way out is to be still and focus solely on God.

On this Sunday, we gather to celebrate the feast of God found at the Lord’s table. We gather with all the saints who ever have professed faith. We could spend ages finding all the things that make us different. We could spend ages dividing ourselves up. Paul cuts us off before we can even begin. In Christ, we are all the same. We are in need of grace and we are in need of healing. Christ alone holds those things within his power. No one else does. No one else even comes close. So, be still and listen. Christ is speaking this day. Christ alone.

May we have ears to listen.

Amen.