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June
6, 2004 (David Hyers) Psalm 8 O LORD, our Sovereign, how majestic is your name in all the earth! You have set your glory above the heavens. Out of the mouths of babes and infants you have founded a bulwark because of your foes, to silence the enemy and the avenger. When I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars that you have established; what are human beings that you are mindful of them, mortals that you care for them? Yet you have made them a little lower than God, and crowned them with glory and honor. You have given them dominion over the works of your hands; you have put all things under their feet, all sheep and oxen, and also the beasts of the field, the birds of the air, and the fish of the sea, whatever passes along the paths of the seas. O LORD, our Sovereign, how majestic is your name in all the earth! --------------------------------------------------------------------- Ephesians 2:10-22 For we are what he has made us, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand to be our way of life. So then, remember that at one time you Gentiles by birth, called “the uncircumcision” by those who are called “the circumcision”--a physical circumcision made in the flesh by human hands--remember that you were at that time without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. For he is our peace; in his flesh he has made both groups into one and has broken down the dividing wall, that is, the hostility between us. He has abolished the law with its commandments and ordinances, that he might create in himself one new humanity in place of the two, thus making peace, and might reconcile both groups to God in one body through the cross, thus putting to death that hostility through it. So he came and proclaimed peace to you who were far off and peace to those who were near; for through him both of us have access in one Spirit to the Father. So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are citizens with the saints and also members of the household of God, built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the cornerstone. In him the whole structure is joined together and grows into a holy temple in the Lord; in whom you also are built together spiritually into a dwelling place for God. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- The two had not spoken in over two years. It all started over the silliest thing. One of the farmers took in this stray cat, but as cats are, it would wander from porch to porch. Soon each one thought it was his cat. When they would speak about the cat, they would begin to argue, and after a while they stopped speaking altogether. When a carpenter came through looking for work, one farmer stopped him and asked: “You see that ditch over there? That’s my neighbor’s, calls it his creek, put it in last season with his plow, and then diverted the water from up there on the hill. Some creek, there is barely even a trickle! I know what it really is. If he wants to be that way, then I figure I might as well finish the job. I want you to put up a fence, about so high all along that creek line there. I don’t even want to look at him. Do you think you can do that?” “Well, I reckon I can,” the carpenter replied. “But I’m gonna need a lot more wood. You’ve got enough wood for me to start, but you’ll need to go get more.” So, the farmer climbed up into his old truck, and set off down the road to buy his wood.* All too often I find myself standing with that farmer. I’ve spent a lot of time building fences, putting up dividing walls. I have fences everywhere. It seems that you need fences to get by in the world. I have fences built around my inner self—to shield myself from an often too harsh world. I build fences of denial around those soft places in my life, those secret things that I don’t or can’t look at. I build fences put together with planks of shame and nails of fear, a walling off of those areas that I just prefer not to touch. I also have walls put up between friends, even family. Those slow and steady walls are built brick by brick, one mistrust, one misperception after another until at last the wall is complete and we are safe inside our fortress of solitude. Really, if I didn’t have all these fences, the world would run all over me. We are taught it’s dog eat dog out there. You have to look out for number one, watch out for you and yours. During a bleary-eyed, late-night devotional on a mission trip years ago, a particularly quiet young woman spoke up about this text, speaking more words than she had ever spoken before. She, who had suffered many years of abuse and neglect, shared these thoughts: “You want me to let down my walls. You want me to tear down my fences. How can I when every time I do, somebody spits in my face? No, I won’t. I can’t.” I will not try to speak to her journey through life, but even in my own life I can appreciate that feeling. Everyone knows the golden rule: Do unto others before they can do it unto you. Isn’t that how the world works, catch as catch can, understand? Everyone seems to have these rules. Fences and wall of hostility are everywhere, not just ditches and fences on a farm or personal fences we put up around ourselves. Just look around, there are big broad fences built of concrete and steel forged from hatred and fear. As we mourn the passing of Ronald Reagan, I am reminded that the Berlin wall hasn’t been down that long. What about the Great Wall of China? Even now the news brings tales of wall and steel, barbed-wire moats in the desert, walling off the Holy Land. What about those unseen barriers, those fences we can’t always point to or touch? We can easily rattle off a litany of isms—classism, ageism, sexism, racism—a chorus of collective phobias. They are everywhere, sometimes hard to see and far stronger and taller than any wooden or steel fence. Walls of hostility, fences of fear are here among us. Like many proud Americans of my generation I grew up thinking that the wall of racism was torn down with the Civil Rights movement. We thought that with equal rights legislation racism was gone. Yet despite all the progress our society has made beneath the wide and wonderful freedoms we enjoy, I have heard and seen story upon story of injustice: disproportionate numbers of black men living of the streets or our cities and towns, great numbers of folk, not housed, not fed, battered and broken, abused and addicted. During the day after day visits from my African American brothers and sisters while I was serving in a homeless shelter in Atlanta, my heart began to feel out the edges of the institutionalized walls of racism in our midst. In my daily walk from my truck to the back doors of the church, I would catch glimpses through the walls of addiction, slat by slat, fix by fix, fencing in our neighbors across the street. I must admit the world is full of fences—hostility, violence, abuse, walls that divide Black from White, man from woman, parent from child, brother from sister, created from creator. As the farmer came driving back up the rutted old road, he looked out on the hillside to see his new fence, but instead of a fence, he saw a bridge built with his wood on his land. To make matters worse, he saw his neighbor walking across his bridge and onto his land with a big stupid grin on his face! “You’re a brave man,” the neighbor says. “I didn’t think you’d ever want to hear the sound of my voice again. I feel like such a fool for digging that creek.” Walls were melting. The farmer grinned, “Ah heck. I always knew it was your cat.” Looking over to the carpenter, the farmer asked the carpenter, “How can I thank you? I’ve got more work for you.” The carpenter replied, “I must be going. You’ll be fine. I’m needed elsewhere.”* I do need my own fences to get by in the world if I play by the world’s rules, but the gospel of graces changes all rules. Here’s what Paul has to say: “But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. For he is our peace; in his flesh he has made both groups into one and has broken down the dividing wall, that is, the hostility between us. So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are citizens with the saints and also members of the household of God.” God has torn down the dividing wall, and from its rubble God has built a bridge. It is a wide, tall bridge that reaches over every ditch ever dug and any fence ever made. This bridge reaches my hidden places. It spans the gap between class and race. We can never build any thing that bridge hasn’t already spanned. This isn’t easy work though. Living into the reality of a bridge-building God will occupy the length of our days and threaten to consume our very lives. The walls of denial, anger, and shame stand high around my heart, and my habits of hiding are not easily broken. Bridge building can be dangerous, uncomfortable work. When we reach out, we risk. We risk being hurt. We risk being changed. We risk being spit on. Still God’s call to us is there. As people of faith we are called to reach out, to reach in, to slowly but surely seek out our walls and begin to turn walls into bridges, comforted in the knowledge that Christ walks with us and God’s Grace supports us. I have often looked and prayed for those great shakes that tumble walls and break down the hostility. And I still pray for them. I also pray prayers of thanksgiving for the daily grace of God, the slow movement of the spirit that rattles boards and shakes nails loose. The walls may be high, and yet on that night Amber did speak, more than she had ever shared. She dared to trust just enough to share why she had fences. The walls shook, and the beginnings of a bridge were formed. There is great power in the small, simple day-to-day reaching out, the daring, bold “hellos” that tear down years of fence mending. There is great power in the smile and out stretched hand, the daily grace of God that can shake the very walls of hostility that hem us all in. So, perhaps our day-to-day calling is to shake our fences and loosen the nails to look for gaps and cracks, to extend a hand, to risk a hello, to embrace God’s reality of grace. Oh, we still do a great job of pretending that fences and ditches are the final word. We constantly try to mend them and spend lots of time and energy going to town to get more wood to build yet another fence. But thankfully, when we get back, God is there, showing us a bridge, inviting us to live in love, to shake hands with our neighbor, and be divided no more. *Adapted from David Wilcox East Asheville Hardware |
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