Shorts

Ephesians 2:14-18

“For Christ himself has made peace between Jews and you Gentiles by making us all one people.  He has broken down the walls of hostility that used to separate us by his death.  He ended the whole system of Jewish law that excluded the Gentiles.  His purpose was to make peace between Jews and Gentiles by creating in himself one new person from the two groups.  Together as one body, Christ reconciled both groups to God by means of his death and our hostility toward each other was put to death.  He has brought this Good News of peace to you Gentiles who were far away from him, and to us Jews who were near.  Now all of us, both Jews and Gentiles may come to the Father through the same Holy Spirit because of what Christ has done for us.”

What is a barrier?  Webster’s defines a barrier as “a structure, as a fence or wall, built to bar passage.  Something that hinders or restricts.”  It’s easy to think of a fence or wall as a barrier.  We build fences around our property to keep our children safe or our pets from wandering.  Walls dividerooms, hold back water, earthen dams, even whole cities.  Barriers are necessary in these and many other instances.

Life has many walls and fences that divide, separate and compartmentalize.  Not made of wood or stone, they are personal obstructions, blocking people from each other and from God.  But Christ came as the great wall remover, tearing down the sin partition that separates us from God and blasting the barriers that keep us from each other.  His death and resurrection opened the way to eternal life to bring all who believe into the family of God.

Roman, Greek and Jewish cultures were littered with barriers, as society assigned people to classes and expected them to stay in their place – men and women, slave and free, rich and poor, Jews and Gentiles, Greeks and barbarians, pious and pagan.  But with the message of Christ, the walls came down and Paul could declare, “In this new life, it doesn’t matter if you are a Jew or a Gentile, circumcised or uncircumcised, barbaric, uncivilized, slave or free.  Christ is all that matters, and he lives in all of us.”  (Colossians 3:11.)

Slavery was widespread in the Roman empire, but no one is lost to God or beyond his love.  Slavery was a barrier between people, but Christian love and fellowship are to overcome such barriers.

From prison Paul sent a letter to his friend, Philemon, pleading on behalf of  Onesimus, a runaway slave.  Paul urged Philemon to be reconciled to his slave, receiving him as a brother and fellow member of God’s family.  Reconciliation means reestablishing.  Christ has reconciled us to God and to others.  Many barriers come between people – race, social status, sex, personality differences; but Christ can break down those barriers.  Jesus Christ changed Onesimus’s relationship to Philemon from slave to brother.  Paul’s intercession for him illustrates what Christ has done for us.  As Paul interceded for a slave, so Christ intercedes for us, slaves to sin. 

In Christ we are one family.  No walls of racial, economic or political difference should separate us.  Jesus works through us to remove barriers between us and others who may be different from us.

I want to relate to you a story told on Chuck Swindoll’s program last week.  You probably know the story-line of the movie “Saving Private Ryan,” in which a group of soldiers are ordered to locate a young soldier, Private Ryan – who is the only surviving son of a family who has lost 3 others in the war.  The men endure much along the way in search of Private Ryan and do finally find him after a lot of struggles and bonding.  But what if – after all that they went through to get there - after the death, the destruction, the torment, the indecision and pain – what if when they found Private Ryan – he had been a black man? Or a Jew?  That group of all-white men had risked their lives and some had lost their lives – to save someone of a different race or religion? 

          He goes on to tell a true story of another group of soldiers in battle.  The war is ebbing and their buddy is killed in battle.  Rather than leave his body to decay where it was, they carried him to a nearby cemetery.  One of the men knocked on the door of a small building and a priest came to the door.  They asked if they could bury their buddy in the cemetery.  “Is he a Catholic?” the priest asked.  Not knowing, the men looked at his dog tags and saw that their friend was a Protestant.  “I’m sorry, then, but no, your friend can’t be buried here because this is a Catholic cemetery.” 

Dejected and disillusioned, the men carried their fallen comrade outside the cemetery and dug a grave for him just outside the fence.  Night was falling so they made their way into a nearby wooded area to bed down for the night.  The next morning they got up and went to pay their last respects but they couldn’t find the grave.  They looked everywhere but simply couldn’t find it.  They went back to the priest’s door and knocked.  He came to the door looking tired and disheveled.  “Do you know about our friend’s grave?” the men asked Father.  “Yes,” he replied with a sigh.  “I spent the first part of the night feeling bad about what I had told you.  (PAUSE)  And I spend the rest of the night…….moving the fence.

That’s what Jesus did for you and I…………….He moved the fence.