Galatians 3: 23-29
23 Now before faith came, we were imprisoned and guarded under the law until faith would be revealed. 24 Therefore the law was our disciplinarian until Christ came, so that we might be justified by faith. 25 But now that faith has come, we are no longer subject to a disciplinarian, 26 for in Christ Jesus you are all children of God through faith. 27 As many of you as were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. 28 There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male and female; for all of you are one in Christ Jesus. 29 And if you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s offspring, heirs according to the promise.
Notes from the Text
Today’s text is a personal favorite of mine, so I’d like us to look at it before we jump into its application—the Roots of Racism.
Paul says that the Law (by which he means the Torah, the Book of Moses, the first five books of the Bible) was a cage to the people of God until Christ came. He goes on to call it our “disciplinarian,” but I think that is a flat translation. The literal word is paidagogos, from which we get “pedagogue”—a schoolteacher—but to the ancients, the pedagogue was the one who walked boys safely to school from home. Like a school bus driver. Still, to say that the Law is like a school bus driver leaves much to be desired. I would translate the word to babysitter.
Like a nanny, or one who watches, guards, or otherwise helps to raise children, the Law looked over and raised the children of Israel until the Messiah should appear. The Law is Mary Poppins, a good babysitter helping to bring children to adulthood.
But Paul’s insinuation—no, his clear proclamation—is that the Law has done its job and is no longer needed. Children need babysitters only until they are adults and then they need babysitters no more, except to raise children of their own.
Are we not expected to fulfill the Law? Are we not obliged to obey the Ten Commandments and fulfill righteousness? The short answer is no. No, we are no longer obliged to fulfill the Law because it was fulfilled in entirety by Christ. It is no longer needed, for righteousness comes by faith in Christ, not by doing the works of the Law.
As such, we can think of the Law—the Old Testament covenants—as training wheels on a bike. Did you ever have training wheels on your bike as a child? What were they for? Yes, to help you learn to ride. Once you learned to ride and became proficient at pedaling, what became of the training wheels? That’s right, you took them off because they were no longer needed.
“But are you saying that the Law is bad?” By no means. The training wheels were good—they are good—but they are no longer needed. The Law is good and true nonetheless. The Law is our straight edge, a plumb line by which we learn straight from crooked, and true from warped. But we have something far better. The “faith that arrives” in Jesus Christ is the Law’s fulfillment. Jesus fulfills all righteousness, seals the covenants, and finishes them, completes them.
By faith—and faith alone—we are united with Christ in baptism. That means we are united with him in his death and resurrection, united with him in all his righteousness. The righteousness we are supposed to achieve has already been achieved by Jesus who gives us that righteousness as a free gift. Our union with him is a covering over all sin and redemption that is wholesale and complete.
That union with Christ also unifies us with all whom he saves, and the text tells us that in him we are all one despite our race, nationality, or place in life. There is no Jew or Gentile (we are all Jews—inheritors of the promise to Abraham), no rich or poor, no black, brown, yellow, red, or white, and no male or female—we are one humanity in Christ—all children of God and eternal brothers and sisters.
So no Christian can be a racist, and no racist can right call him or herself a Christian.
But let’s have a look at where it all comes from.
We Prefer Our Own
The natural animal that is a human being is motivated to self-preserve, self-protect, and self-advance. We are by nature selfish and self-serving. We take care of ourselves—make sure we have food and shelter, and then we take care of our own family and kin. We look out for our own. When grouping up, we look for our own—something to give us confidence that we will be cared for by others as much as we care for them. We group alike, and of course, when we need to add to our in-group, we interview and test carefully, making sure this new one will fit us as we are and conform to our inner code.
If a bank board of directors are all Indian women and they need to fill a vacancy, and among the four equally-qualified candidates, one is Indian woman, she will—all else being equal—most likely be chosen. I’m not saying this bad, or evil, or wrong; I’m saying it is our nature. It is also the root of all racism.
Racism is, at first, simply the preference for others who are like us, whatever our group happens to be. It isn’t even necessarily racial, as I’m sure the same is true about any group of plumbers, stamp collectors, or guitar players. Our nature is to group, to form clubs and societies, and to select for membership those who reflect the core values of that group.
These roots grow into racism given time, complexity, and politics.
Politics = Lose/Lose
As I’ve said with former issues in this series, when we only allow issues to descend to the level of politics, we all lose. Sources of conflict end up oversimplified and polarized. We are left with either/or categories that end up in a stalemate and flawed, partisan resolutions.
When racial tensions are politicized, we reduce our one humanity into win/lose categories: haves/have nots, oppressors/oppressed, perpetrators and victims—as if these things totally defined anyone.
Our current political climate favors victimhood and rewards the victimized with moral authority. Hence we have political groups that actually aspire to victimhood to gain upper political ground.
At the other end of the spectrum are those who are privileged, sitting pretty, and desperately wanting nobody disrupting their scene. One universal aspect of privilege is that the privileged can’t quite seem to see it for themselves. They, like most people, tend to take their privileges for granted, especially as they see others with even more privileges enjoying their lives and prosperity more than they.
We are geared to take our privileges for granted. You might not like to hear that and think of yourself as immune to having special privileges in this country, but I would challenge you to consider the question: In what ways might I enjoy unfair privilege?
Surely, asking the question can’t hurt.
The easiest way to identify privilege may be through considering the times and instances wherein you were not privileged. Maybe you were next in line at the butcher counter at Staters, but someone else was served first. Annoying? Make your blood boil? But if you who were served first—unfairly perhaps—you might just quietly go forward and secretly love it.
The opposite feeling of privilege is exclusion, the feeling that you don’t belong.
Most of us here do not know what it’s like to be pulled over for no reason whatsoever and questioned as though we had committed a crime. Most of us here, when entering a department store, are not eagle-eyed at every step, enduring someone looking over our shoulder wherever we go, but if and when it happens, I’m sure we would all dislike it and feel belittled by it.
HUMILITY FORWARD
So where do we find solutions? How ought Christians to act?
As to major racial tensions that grip so much of the media and are raised to feature status by Spike Lee, we are in a fairly volatile time. Again, it is hard to speak of things without them becoming immediately politicized. Perhaps Christians can take a different tack; namely, saying less—much less.
Don’t say, “I don’t see race” or “I don’t see color” —which may be your best shot at self-evaluation, but it isn’t helpful to say. In that case, it is best to say nothing. How about that? Just. Say. Nothing. Some things don’t need to be said. If you’re part of the majority race, the less said the better, because more than likely, when the mouth goes open, the foot goes in.
Better to say nothing, and simply to stay focused on loving everyone equally and treating everyone the same. This is the true source of all justice.
We would do well to practice a couple of key virtues: humility and patience. Not everything we think we need to say is of ultimate importance. Better that we should listen more. A key aspect of humility is simply this: open ears. Think: I'm willing to listen to others - I don't have to speak. I can simply listen.
We've been working out the racial problem in America and through the world for 200-300 years and yeah, we've made some progress. But it's not for us to say so. It's simply something we still work on. And I think it's one thing to say in the secular world we can expect bad things to happen. We can expect tension. We expect stupid things to be said. We can expect volatile, insulting things to be thrown back and forth in these issues. But I would say Christian people—my brothers and sisters—we play a different game and it isn't the world's game. We are all about Love, Love - Absolute Love. Equal value in this world in God's eyes and equal treatment because—and this is our text—we are eternally brothers and sisters in Christ.
ETERNALLY UNIFIED
And before we come to the table, this is our meditation. We really don't think about it enough and I really don't think we get it. This is preparation for the table. This table, this humble table—with out little hunks of bread and grape juice—is a dress rehearsal that we all do again and again. I know: I sound like Jim Jones. But it is a dress rehearsal for a meal that we will have —a very real meal. We will not be spirits; we will be in the flesh. In fact, more solid flesh than we now know. And we will be with Jesus. And he will take the bread and the cup. And in that moment, if we still have tear ducts, we're going to be crying because we are going to realize what we did all these years on Earth was getting ready for that meal. He will break the bread. We will be together at one table. And although there will be millions and millions, I have a feeling we'll be able to see every face.
And in that place the person who is now least like you in this world—who is also in Christ—will be closer to you than your own siblings, than your own spouse. In fact, your knowledge of that person and that person's knowledge of you will be deeper than your knowledge of yourself. And that's just the beginning. That reality will last forever. Not 100 years, not a million, not a trillion-google-plex years, because after google-plex years have passed we won't be at 0.01 percent of one percent of eternity. We will live with each other in the love of Christ for eternity. That is the promise we celebrate. And that is why we, as Christians, must accept, adopt, and even feel our essential one-ness and live it out as deeply and thoroughly as we can.
Let us not accept the stupidity of American politics to define who we are. Let's let that baptismal font tell us who we are and Whose we are. Let's let this table remind us of where we're going as we look forward to that coming table is. And let’s start living like that now, inviting others to come to this table with us.
I tell you, it's going to be more glorious than we can imagine. And if, in this day, in this hour, if at this table today you get the least glimpse of that—then living it out gets easier and easier. May we all be drawn together into this eternal one-ness we have through our Lord and savior, Jesus, who prepares a place for us even now. †