Church Killers: “I Don’t Want Them Here” Ezekiel 47: 13-23; Gal. 3:23-29
A friend of mine tells of a story at a church he worked for. One of the members said, “We need to get ‘Tommy’ [whose name was changed] out of here.” My friend, utterly confused, asked why? Well, the member said, he wears socks with bright patterns. You know what that means. My friend asks if it means he shops at Kohl’s? “No!” the guy replied. “He’s probably kind of a free thinker, free spirit. Those socks don’t always match the rest of his outfit (or each other). It’s loud. It's distracting. It means he won’t handle hierarchy or authority well. And it could mean…well…you know… that he’s kind of ‘funny.’” And I’m still at a complete loss how all of this information was gleaned from sock patterns, but the point was the same, “We don’t want him here.”
A church which says, “I don’t want them here,” will earn a reputation as a place where everyone in the community says, “We don’t wanna be there.” The mindset doesn’t reflect Jesus’s teaching, Paul’s teaching, or faith at all. A bit of history may be important here. When God gave the law and instructions to the Israelite people, there were several places, including in Leviticus 19:34, Deuteronomy 28, and even here, where God says that those who are foreigners and strangers should be treated like the native-born Israelites, for they live alongside them and raise their families among them. It’s another instance where God is the God of doing things the opposite way: love your enemies, bless those who curse you. And here, even if you are rejected and unwanted, as the Hebrew people often found themselves in history, live the opposite. Welcome strangers and foreigners among you warmly and with hospitality as your own.
We see Jesus carry that mindset forward as well. He dined with the tax collector, Zacchaeus. He offered grace the Samaritan woman at the well. He spoke of the Good Samaritan upending the correctness of social order and the place of religious leaders. He touched and healed those considered unclean including lepers, the woman with the issue of blood, the accused adulteress, and those possessed by demonic and evil forces. It is but for this grace of Jesus that we too are included in the family of God. If we were to live in Jesus’s day, the religious authorities would take one look at us, who are Gentiles, and say, “We don’t want them here.”
Paul, the Apostle, lived this struggle throughout his missionary journeys. He believed that the grace and redeeming love of God cast a wide net over all the people. He told the Jewish leaders how he had seen the Holy Spirit descend on the Gentiles including Greeks, those in Asia Minor, Macedonia, and even when he got to Rome. The Jewish leaders believed that these people could not be a part of the faith. They ridiculed and persecuted Paul for this belief. If you did not first become Jewish, they said, “We don’t want you here.”
Look at how Paul addresses that small-minded outlook. He tells them that until Christ they lived under the law. It was like their guardian or the one who kept them in protective custody. In Roman tradition, there was a slave who kept and guarded the children until they were old enough to manage themselves. The word for this person derives from the same word as pedagogy—a teacher, protector, or guardian. And the crux of Paul’s argument is that fear inspired by the law and the rigid guardianship that the law brings is no longer needed. He’s telling them, give up this fear and protectiveness and let yourselves be found alive in Christ, united with Christ, and guided by the Holy Spirit.
Paul’s teaching was wildly radical to them. He upended things and challenged the leaders just as much as Jesus did before him. He said to the religious leaders—until Christ you lived under the law. But Christ has fulfilled the law, and (quoting verse 25) “now that the way of faith has come, we no longer need the law as our guardian.” For Paul, it was impossible to both live under the law and have the Holy Spirit. He practiced the law because it was expected. If pushed, however, he would say the law is no longer needed and is not a part of God’s salvation.
That means the grace of Christ now has a wide welcome to all—for the Jewish people who practiced the law, for those who lived a hybrid of tradition and faith, for those Jews who essentially stopped following the law, like Paul, and for those Gentiles who had never practiced the law of the Old Testament. The grace of Christ was open to all, and the evidence of the Holy Spirit was seen in all, so long as they believed in Christ.
Too many churches and too many Christians are caught in the sinful trap of thinking too small. Churches say, “We don’t want them here,” until nobody is actually left there. What if we flung open the doors of our churches and called on everyone to come in, no matter what. Just come in, just for a moment come and hear of a faith and a Christ who loves you. Or, what if we go out and tell people, “Hey, I know of a place where you’ll be loved.” You can live with a disability, but we’ll get you in. You might have mental health struggles, but we’ll embrace you and love you no matter what, don’t worry. You might “have a past,” but God forgives, and we can all move forward together. You might love differently, look differently, be filled with doubts, anger, trauma. But here, we don’t live like the rest of the world. We live like Christ, who healed, loved, challenged, welcomed, redeemed, restored, and yes, still now makes all things new.
You’re even welcomed if you wear wild socks , and socks that are plain, dark, and traditional. It’s all okay, because when you come here, you’re here to focus on Christ and grow in your faith. And from there, we take that same message to the people and neighbors around us. As Paul said, there’s neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for we are all one in Christ Jesus. It’s not some political rhetoric. It’s the mission Christ gave us. Jesus saves wholly, completely, and in every way. And we, as the church, are to tell that grace-filled message about the love of Jesus and his welcome to all, no matter what kind of socks they wear.
Worship Video: https://www.facebook.com/fccmacon/videos/1200479687391289