"A Revolution at the Table"--October 16, 2019

"A Revolution at the Table"--October 16, 2019

"But when Cephas came to Antioch, I opposed him to his face, because he stood self-condemned; for until certain people came from James, he used to eat with the Gentiles. But after they came, he drew back and kept himself separate for fear of the circumcision faction. And the other Jews joined him in this hypocrisy, so that even Barnabas was led astray by their hypocrisy. But when I saw that they were not acting consistently with the truth of the gospel, I said to Cephas before them all, ‘If you, though a Jew, live like a Gentile and not like a Jew, how can you compel the Gentiles to live like Jews?’" [Gal. 2:11-14]

Be warned: thinking through this lesser-known passage from a short-ish letter in the New Testament is dangerous stuff.  If we take it seriously, it might bring a radical change into our lives, even down to the ordinary activities like sharing a table.

Now, at first, this passage might seem harmless to us, because it's about an issue that Christianity has gotten over.  We no longer fuss over whether we have to keep kosher, right?  So, after two thousand years, it is easy for us to side with Paul on this whole Jewish-Gentile controversy. There is no more controversy to it anymore--after all, most of us are in fact of Gentile background--that is, most of us Christians today come from non-Jewish backgrounds. So it's easy for us to say that Paul was right to include "those Gentiles" in the community of Jesus' followers without the conditions of having to follow the Jewish laws of purity or eating or ritual. It's easy for us--or at least it doesn't raise red flags for us--to insist that God can embrace even "those Gentiles" who would have been regarded as dirty, undeserving, inherently sinful godless pagans in Paul's former circles.  It's easy because--<gulp!> chances are, we are "those Gentiles" who have come to believe in Jesus. 

But now, the water gets more than a little hotter for us, though, if we dare to ask a similar question today. Who are those with whom we do not think it respectable to eat? Who are the members of the church who we would be afraid of being seen with in public? Who are the visitors that might not be welcome everywhere... and who are the people that have been so discouraged and burned on religion that they would never dare to darken the door of a church right now? Who are the people we would attach the word those in front of--as in those people, those sinners, those who speak a different language, those who are regarded as inherently sinful, those who are unfashionably poor, those whose lives still wear scars from past woundedness? When are we Cephas (Peter), able to love all in the abstract, but afraid to be seen in public sharing bread with the ones regarded with less respect? 

See, that's it: Peter the apostle knew the right abstract language of "Christians are supposed to love all people," but when it came to actually living that out in the ordinary moments of  sharing a table and breaking bread with the ones labeled "other" and "unacceptable" and "unworthy," all of a sudden, that's too far for the apostle to go.  And that's why Paul has to call him out on it: it's not enough--it is simply not enough--to use the generic language of loving "all people" in the abstract wording we print on our church bulletins if we can't live it out all the way down to the routines of our day and the ordinary details of our lives. Beyond platitudes, love is made real in the people whom we befriend, whom we will listen to in ordinary conversation, and whom we will share a meal with.

And that's where this demands courage from us--courage, and love, and grace, and a willingness to move beyond familiar fears.  This takes a certain amount of daring, grace-ful vision to ask--what one pastor I know calls "faithful imagination"--to see ourselves in Peter and Paul's places and not merely fighting old battles that have lost their controversy, but looking for where we have become "led astray by hypocrisy," too, in all new ways. It can be uncomfortable to even dare to look at ourselves in this way, but of course the hope held out for us is the same hope held out for all God's people--we are received by God despite our sinfulness and even despite our hypocrisy. If God's grace is open to even "those people" (however we identify "those people"), then, yes, it is given even to us who have a hard time recognizing that it is given to those people. And we find that all of us are transformed by such a graceful welcome.

Every Sunday, we share a meal already with everyone who is gathered for worship--the whole baptized people of God. Dare we recognize how bold a move that is--and can we bring ourselves to share a meal with all outside of the ritualized space and time of Sunday morning? Who is Jesus leading us to eat with today? And could we dare to let love move us beyond nice talk about love to allow Christ to lead us to ordinary action embodying love in our ordinary moments like meals and honest conversations?

O Christ Jesus, our faithful Companion--who literally shares bread with us--teach us your own grace-ful vision, so that we can see ourselves truthfully and see others as you see them. Bless our eyes today for such vision, and bless our hands today for the breaking of bread with all.