Tearing Down the Walls Ephesians 2:11-22 Dr. Christopher C. F. Chapman First Baptist Church, Raleigh July 19, 2015 I have quite a few treasures on my desk, all of which have some story attached to them. One is a small block of wood with two rocks on top and an inscription on the front. It was given to me by a teenager I baptized in Richmond, Virginia. He was the son of missionaries to Austria who lived for a year in the furlough residence of the Ginter Park Baptist Church I served as pastor. As it turned out, my mother, who had died years before, threw a baby shower when this teenager was born. Dana discovered this in a conversation with the family early on in their furlough. When the mother of the teenager mentioned that she taught at Jefferson Community College in Louisville, Kentucky in the late 70 s, Dana asked if she knew Kay Chapman who also taught there then. The mother said she did, Kay was a dear friend who threw the shower for her son, Logan. She noticed the name Chapman but couldn t imagine that there was any kinship, given that I was so soft-spoken and her memory of Kay was of an outspoken feminist who entered her classroom boldly throwing a scarf around her neck. At that point, Dana said, as only a daughter-in-law could say, That was my mother-in-law! Now, by the whims of fate or the providence of God, I had the privilege of baptizing this young man. It was an emotional experience for all of us, but the week after the baptism Logan presented me with this gift - two little rocks on a block of wood with a little inscription. No big deal, right? Well, Logan chipped away the rocks himself from a wall that had been torn down in Germany. The inscription reads BERLIN WALL, 1961-1989. It was quite a gift! It sits on my desk as a symbol of one of the most essential truths of human experience. The walls we construct as human beings - walls between individuals, groups and nations - need not stand forever. There may be a time when walls are deemed to serve a purpose, but there is also a time for tearing down the walls. 1961-1989 there was a beginning and an 1
ending to the Berlin Wall. Could it be that other walls between us may crumble as well? Could it be that some of the barriers we deem to be inevitable will one day cease to have meaning? The author of Ephesians has something to say about this. He says that in Christ all of our differences have been reconciled. The dividing wall has been broken down. The hostility has been removed. There is now one new community in Christ. All are a part of one family. He is writing to Christians of Jewish and Gentile background in the early church, people who have many differences of race and religion, culture and personal history. They have been at odds with each other, they have viewed each other as relating to God in a different way, but now they are united because of their common experience in Christ. And to be clear, the author names this as a divinely conceived reality. It is not an idea his hearers need to debate. It s not even an accomplishment they need to pursue. It s a gift they need to embrace. It is a done deal, a present reality achieved through the sacrifice of Christ. God s vision is that we live together in one community because we are all God s children and our common ground in Christ binds us together. This may seem obvious of course, we are all God s children but it is not. We tend to focus on our differences and separate ourselves from one another. For example, we lived in Winston-Salem for 11 years and loved the city but like many cities it is segregated not just by socioeconomics but by race. There are exceptions to the rule, but the majority of African-Americans live east of 52, the majority of people of European descent live west of 52, and Latinos live in the south. Apparently Asian- Americas didn t get the memo. So, they are all spread out in the city. But Winton-Salem is not unique in this regard, and it is not just a matter of people choosing to live apart from those who are different. It s a matter of people choosing to worship with those who look and think like them. Sunday morning from 11 to 12 is still the most segregated hour of the week. We have a long list of reasons for why this is O.K. but the simple fact is we do not claim our common ground in Christ. But it s not just a matter of people choosing to live and worship apart from those who are different. It s a matter of people not believing 2
that God s vision is of one community. In one setting where I served, a genuinely lovely lady pointed out that different types of birds flock together. Why not people? God doesn t really want us to be together, she claimed. In a more recent setting, a very nice man said he believed in the curse of Ham in the Genesis flood narrative. People of color really are different, he claimed, inferior, we are not meant to be together. These are not stories from my childhood. One conversation took place in the mid 1990 s, the other less than a decade ago. There are still people in the church who believe that God has created us not only different but unequal and thus wants us to live with walls between us. But scripture says we are all God s children; each of us is created in the image of God. Scripture says that we are all redeemed; whoever believes in God s son has eternal life. Scripture says that in Christ God creates one new humanity in the place of two, thus making peace, tearing down the walls of hostility between us. God s vision is of one community with no walls. The question is - how do we live toward this vision? We begin by acknowledging that there are still walls. Some contend that people are all alike, we have no differences, any conflicts are in the past. But we are not all alike, we have differences and disagreements, there are walls that separate us, walls that must be acknowledged before we can move forward. This is the case with issues that arise in our families and friendship circles. If there are unresolved conflicts, movement toward health begins with an acknowledgement of this reality. This is the case with issues in churches and denominations. If there are differences of opinion and ways of dealing with them that undermine our unity, movement toward wholeness begins with an acknowledgment of the truth. This is the case with the ongoing tensions we experience in this nation. If we are divided by race, socioeconomics and political ideology, healing begins with an acknowledgement of reality. The early church acknowledges its walls. The first deacons are called to service, according to Acts 6, because Gentile Christian widows are not being cared for like Jewish Christian widows. Peter doesn t want to share his faith with Cornelius because he is a Gentile until it is 3
revealed to him in a dream that God wants him to. And the author of Ephesians talks about tearing down walls because it is still a work-inprogress. Jewish and Gentile Christians struggle to claim each other as brothers and sisters. In their heads they know they are one in Christ, but on a practical level they hold on to their past distinctions. In her novel Beloved Toni Morrison tells the story of Sethe, an escaped slave who has risked death, lost a husband and buried a child all on the journey toward freedom. Sethe is a free woman now, but she is still enslaved by her past. Every day, every moment of her new life, she must beat back the memories of her past in order to be truly free. Sethe s struggles and those of other slaves she represents are profound and distinctive, but we all have things that enslave us. And like those Jews and Gentiles in the early church, as we seek to gather as one people reconciled to God and each other by the cross, we bring our varied histories, our old animosities, our memories of a painful past of separation, injury and wrongdoing. All of these serve as barriers to our ability to relate to one another in the present day. To move forward, to build community, we must be honest about the fact that walls still exist. Once we have done this, the next step is wanting the walls to come down. It s one thing to acknowledge that this is what God wants. It s quite another thing to want it ourselves! Sometimes we do and sometimes we don t. Sometimes we have some vested interest in things remaining as they are and sometimes all we want to do is lament the same problem over and over again without doing anything to address it. To be clear, I am not just talking about national and community issues, but life in our churches, friendship circles, families. Are we interested in solutions to problems, reconciliation of differences, tearing down walls? Or are we interested in getting our way and having something to lament? Maybe you are not like me, but I have to confess there are times when my answer to these either/or questions is yes! I go back and forth between being part of the problem and helping find a solution, tearing down walls and building them back. Perhaps an early childhood experience had predictive power. I spent my most of first ten years of life in Lincolnton, North Carolina, 4
and a good bit of this time I lived with my grandparents, as my mother divorced and went back to school. My best friend lived right behind my grandparents. There was just a flimsy fence in between the yards. And we would play together in his yard and ours, in his house and ours. But lest this image become too idyllic, let me hasten to say that every other day we got along well, and every other day we had a knockdown, drag-out fight! One time we ran into each other and I nearly put Eddie s eye out. Moses killed a man. I just nearly removed an eye. But seriously, we fought and then we played, we fought and then we played. On the fighting days, our families threatened to build a brick wall where the fence stood to separate us completely. But the truth was we built the real wall; then, we tore it down; then, we built it; then, we tore it down. Such is the behavior of boys and girls men and women races, political parties, religious groups, nations. We build walls, tear them down and build them again. Sometimes it is difficult to tell what we want, but somewhere deep down, amidst all of the stuff that comes from our varied histories, since we are children of God, since we have found our peace in Christ, we know what our calling is. We know we cannot be at peace with God if we are not at peace with our brothers and sisters. We remember that irritating part of the Sermon on the Mount where Jesus tells us to leave our gift before the altar and first be reconciled to our brother or sister. We know what our calling is. The question is how do we pursue it? Once we acknowledge the existence of walls and join God in wanting them to come down, we do whatever needs to be done. Sometimes it is a simple matter, like building relationships with people we don t know. We ve done a good bit of this with members of the other half of First Baptist Church, Temple Beth Or, the Islamic Center of Raleigh and the Institute of Islamic and Turkish Studies in Cary where some of our deacons shared an Iftar meal again this year. Sometimes it is easy to transcend a difference. We get to know other human beings one at a time and in the process overcome any misunderstandings we have. Other times more is required. To live faithfully in the present, we have to deal the past. I m talking about situations where there have been 5
conflicts, where wrong has been done and forgiveness is needed. And this applies to personal relationships and national struggles. We may not be able to unscramble the egg, as someone has put it, but we can sort through what has happened, take responsibility for any wrong we have done and offer forgiveness to those who have done wrong to us. It takes both of these things. Someone has said there can be no forgiveness within community unless there is accountability. It is one thing to be willing to forgive one another, but if those who have done the harm are unwilling to accept responsibility for their actions, forgiveness can be misplaced. Both accountability and forgiveness are needed. The Truth and Reconciliation Commission of South Africa offers an example for how to proceed. The process involves a willingness to confront truth and share stories of woundedness which in and of itself is helpful. But the process also involves movement toward healing, forgiveness and reconciliation. Desmond Tutu says that holding each other accountable for the past is a critical prelude to reconciliation, but he also says that forgiveness is the only alternative to an endless cycle of violence. There is accountability, an acceptance of responsibility, but there is also reconciliation, a willingness to forgive and move on. On an individual level I have seen this happen in families, among friends and in churches. I recall a family where there was estrangement from the father. He was the offending party, others tried to reconcile for years, but to no avail until the last year of his life. He acknowledged his wrong and expressed a desire for forgiveness and a relationship with his family. The family was able to offer forgiveness, in part because he took responsibility for his actions, and they were reconciled. I did the man s funeral, and there was a sense of grief at the years they had lost, but also joy at the reconciliation, the walls that were torn down. On a national level we can only imagine what this might look like in a number of arenas, including race. Some argue that any wrongs done are in the past, done by people who are no longer alive to people who are no longer alive. That s just not true on a national level, racism and discrimination still exist, but it may be true for us. We may not have done wrong to anyone. But in the realm of social and systemic ills, there are lingering effects and ways we are complicit without realizing it. 6
Slavery was made illegal in 1863 with the Emancipation Proclamation and Jim Crow Laws were overturned by the Civil Rights Act of 1964, but the remnant stains of this social sin are still with us in such a way that every time there is a crisis, like the shootings in Charleston, everything comes bubbling up to the surface. There is still work to do and though it is not entirely clear what all this work involves, it includes the principles of acknowledgment and forgiveness. For example, in 1995 the Southern Baptist Convention finally apologized for its role in supporting slavery and segregation. It was on the 150 th anniversary of the founding of the SBC. Some of us will remember that the convention was formed in 1845 over the issue of slavery, whether slave owners could be missionaries. We southerners said yes and not surprisingly for the most part resisted integration. Those sins had to be acknowledged, which they were, not until 1995, but at least they were then, and words of forgiveness were offered in return. Accountability and forgiveness are required when harm has been done. This is a daunting challenge when it comes to social and systemic issues, but it is still needed. We may not be able to control what others do, but we can take responsibility for the church s role, confess our sins of commission and omission, and be part of the solution in the future. In the end, anything and everything we do in the way of tearing down walls is a way of claiming all the brothers and sisters we have in the whole family of which we are a part. I have shared with some of you the story of reconnecting with my biological father s family. There is nothing like walking into a room with people you don t recognize because you haven t seen them since you were 4 and having them pull pictures of you out of a box, share memories, express love. We had been family all along but we had been separated for reasons that don t make sense anymore. Once those issues were resolved and the walls came down, there was a joyful reunion! This is what happens when we tear down the walls that separate us from other members of the body of Christ. We are brothers and sisters. We just need to tear down the walls to know the joy of claiming our whole family. That joy is worth all we have to give. 7