“Beyond Barriers”

Galatians 2:23-29

A Sermon Preached by the Rev. Douglas M. Donley

Pride Sunday

June 24, 2007

University Baptist Church

Minneapolis, MN

 

            I love Pride Sunday.  I love the exuberant joy that is a part of it.  There is no apology in Pride.  It’s a time of celebration of the wondrous creativity of God.  It’s not a time to fight the good fight. It’s a time to garner the strength of the community and to envision a world where we are all judged by the content of our character, not by how we identify ourselves or how we experience our unique affectional proclivities.

I was at the festival yesterday, working the UBC booth.  After my shift was over, I did the tour of the park.  I was struck by the large number of groups.  There were the usual advocacy groups.  But there were also lots of businesses, companies, musical groups, pet lovers, artists, and dozens of churches of every stripe.   If I was more cynical, I’d say that this has turned from a counter-cultural festival of flamboyance to a mainstream festival of virtue and commerce.  Has Pride become mainstream? And if so, is that a bad thing?

Maybe, just maybe, people are getting it.  This is the way of life and the way of love. This is the kind of community for which we strive.  The mainstreaming may just be what we are experiencing.  It’s good to be in Minneapolis.

I think about this as I am preparing to go to the ABC Biennial Convention in Washington, DC this coming weekend.  The mood over the past several years from the AWAB movement has been one of gloom and doom.   We expect there to be something that will offend us.  We expect that there will be a move to silence our people. 

And yet, there is not much talk of controversy as we head into this Biennial.  Part of this is because some of the more exclusionary elements have given up on the ABC and have formed their own organizations, celebrating of all things Baptist Orthodoxy.  Without these extreme voices seeking to push churches like ours out, does that mean that all of the controversy has gone away, that we are now officially part of the mainstream?

Of course, the problem with the mainstreaming of the movement is that we might become complacent.  We might rest upon our laurels.  We might feel as though we have been there, done that and that everything is okay here in the land of Oz. 

Of course, that’s not the way it is.  There is still not hate crime protection for LGBT people.  There is still don’t ask, don’t tell.  There are still plenty of churches and schools that will not permit you to the table unless you pass the orthodoxy test on what has been called by Pat Robertson the most pressing moral issue of our time. 

How quickly folks forget the vision of Paul which we embrace in this church and in the world:   In Christ there is neither Jew nor Greek, no slave nor free, neither male nor female for we are all one in Christ Jesus. 

Paul was no fool using those categories.  His vision for the emerging church was one that was to be radically inclusive of all people, even those who we are so used to being opposed to each other.  So let’s unpack those three categories on this Pride Sunday when we celebrate the blessing and challenge of inclusion.  Paul is really talking about breaking down the barriers of race, class and gender.

Jews and Greeks were at each other’s throats.  In the early church, there was a major controversy over whether the Gospel was for Jews or Gentiles.  The issue had to do with long-held beliefs.  If the Jesus movement was to be an extension of Judaism, then shouldn’t all Greeks become Jews in order to become members of the emerging church? 

Paul spends plenty of time arguing about whether Greeks needed to be circumcised, as this was the most obvious marking of a male Jew.  Paul argued for a circumcision of heart.  But in this new movement, there would be neither Jew nor Greek.  This is the breaking down of the barrier of race. 

Think of the debate over immigration reform.  It’s framed as being about how many people we can keep out of our country.  But it’s more than keeping foreigners out.  It’s about keeping people of color out.  What never comes up in these debates is the inherent racism of it all. 

It has become okay to be bigoted as long as we’re dealing with foreigners.  But Paul said we are to be one and neither Jew or Greek.  If Paul were writing today, maybe he would say neither US citizen nor immigrant; how about legal nor illegal; Hispanic nor white; Asian or Caucasian.

So Paul starts out with nationality.  Then he moves on to class.  Slavery was one of the realities of the ancient world.  It was often to pay off family debts that people were enslaved.  So the slaves were a perpetually underclass without property and status.  Many people were just a bad crop away from debt and eventual slavery. 

But if the people see each other in those class ways as servant and served, then there is little hope of tackling the larger issues of class disparity and violence inherent in such a system of slavery.  Paul said, it can’t exist in the church.  There can be no slave and free. 

It is not right for one to economically control another.  Now that’s getting really radical.  It could also mean that no one would be coerced into prostitution, especially knowing that many of those in prostitution are people of low means, immigrants, abused.  Think about the conditions that make them that way or make them susceptible to such a life.  Part of our work ought to be to make the world safe for all people. 

There was a raid a few months ago, uncovering a sexual trafficking ring.  The reporters said that two women serviced 50 men each.  An astute writer wrote a letter to the editor of the Star Tribune challenging the framing of the issue. 

She suggested that the article would have read very differently if it said, “Two women were raped by 50 men.”  There should be no slaves or free in God’s economy. 

There needs to be equality of race, of class and finally of gender.  It was standard practice for men and women do be separate and unequal in the ancient world.  Jesus embraced women as his closest followers.  In fact the canonical record shows them as the most faithful of all the disciples.  We know that women of means supported the early church. 

Paul and Jesus rightly recognized that if the Gospel is really to be taken seriously, then there needs to be equality between men and women.  There is neither male nor female in Christ Jesus.  We need the balance of all perspectives if we are to make sense of the world.  I’m outnumbered at my house three to one.  They keep me honest.  We need to continue to support women in ministry and women in leadership.  Think about how this world would be different if women had the same number of leadership positions as men. 

It should be noted that Paul has been labeled as anti-women because there are passages attributed to Paul in Colossians, Ephesians and the letters to Timothy that women should keep silent, cover their heads and be graciously submissive to their husbands.  But this is a simplistic reading of scripture and it does not recognize Paul’s true feelings.  Most scholars believe that Paul did not write the letters of Ephesians, Colossians, Timothy or Titus.  The ethic of Paul is the ethic of Galatians.  Those passages used to subjugate women were likely a reaction to women’s emerging power, proclaimed by Jesus and Paul.  The scriptural voices for exclusion of women shows how deep seated was the fear of women’s leadership—how it threatened patriarchy.  Paul and Jesus advocated for equality among all people.  There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female for we are all one in Christ Jesus. 

This is a radical and refreshing perspective on the world.  It may well have contributed to Paul’s own execution.  But it was good news indeed.

Paul’s worldview was one that envisioned a world beyond barriers.  It was one where there was inclusion, equality, and balance.  That’s how we ought to see the world, don’t you think?

In the world there are divisions, distinctions and barriers aplenty.  But in God’s economy, there is no slave or free, there is no Jew or Greek, there is no male or female, for we are all one in Christ Jesus.  Those are radical words. 

It means that there ought to be no distinctions among us. 

It means that we should welcome and affirm all people. 

It means that we are not to be defined by the barriers that we are so good at creating in this world—that within the congregation, all are welcome, all are equal and all have a place at the table. 

            Of course on a day like today, we are tempted to add to Paul’s list. 

We might add that there is neither red nor blue. 

There is neither mainstream nor off-beat. 

There is neither tattooed nor monochrome.

There is neither pierced nor plain-skinned. 

There is neither straight nor queer. 

For we are all one. 

            We are called to follow a higher law. 

Maybe the most radical thing we can do is to remember who we are.

Remember what brought us here.

Remember that God is the one in charge of our lives.

Remember that we were put here to do justice, love mercy and walk humbly with God.

Remember that we don’t have all of the answers, but we can commit together to seek those answers out.

Remember that while we are not alone, we are called to leave no one else alone.

Remember that we are to minister to and with the outcasts until all have a place at the table.

Remember that from time to time we will have to remind ourselves of who we are and who we seek to be.

Remember that we are children of an outcast movement because we follow an outcast artisan named Jesus who was executed by ruling authorities because he had the audacity and the jutspah to say, “This ain’t right.”

This same Jesus taught us to be radical and to never settle for business as usual as long as some of our sisters and brothers are being abused.

So let us joyfully recommit ourselves to be a radically inclusive movement.

Let us recommit ourselves to trying to see the world through God’s eyes.

Let us set ourselves apart from the world, so that we can redeem the world.

Let us not be defined by the barriers of this world, but by our ability to look and live beyond the barriers we are so good at creating.

Let us celebrate in the streets the inclusive love of God—a gift from God to a people in desperate need. 
            When we do that, we are truly living the radical Gospel of Jesus Christ.  Take that radical Gospel with audacious Pride and celebrate a snapshot of God’s inclusive, life-giving and inspiring movement.