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Distinctions

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.
Galatians 3:28, NRSV

Sometimes, I think we don’t recognize how radical this verse truly is. It definitely was when it was written. The stakes were high, for it was written by Paul during the conflict in the early church over whether Gentile Christians would need to convert to Judaism to join the church. That would mean keeping the Jewish law, including the need to be circumcised. With Hellenized Jews doing all they could to hide the fact they were circumcised, circumcision, a major component of the law for many Jews, was a deal-breaker for many Gentiles due to social conventions of their culture in that era.

Paul carefully crafted his defense of his mission to the Gentiles by pointing toward the ritual to which all Christians were subjected when desirous of becoming a part of the community of those who followed Jesus. Baptism allowed all who underwent the ritual to become adopted as children of God. And baptism was blind; it did not see the distinctions we humans are so readily willing to identify. Paul lists all the key social distinctions of his age–Jew versus Greek/Gentile, slaves versus freemen, male versus female–claiming there were no longer such distinctions among Christ’s family through baptism. As one theologian writes, “Christ causes a ‘re-unification of humankind’…[f]or the first Christians, water was thicker than blood!”[1]

I think this verse is as radical for us as it was for Paul’s first readers. While this baptismal argument was effective in the 1st century, it seems to have failed in the subsequent centuries to convince Christians we are one despite our different social class, gender or country of origins. Despite our common baptism, we continue to find ways to separate and divide ourselves. One of the results of this is, as our Rector reported in the Basic Bible Study class on June 6[2], that the number of Christian denominations across the globe today numbers 41,000. Another result is that we fail to be the light we are called to be for the benefit of the world (Matthew 5:14).

Jesus said, “I ask not only on behalf of these, but also on behalf of those who will believe in me through their word, that they may all be one. As you, Father, are in me and I am in you, may they also be in us…” (John 17:20-21a) This is our challenge.

[1] Thomas J. Norris, The Trinity: Life of God, Hope for Humanity (Hyde Park, NR: New York City Press, 2009), 56.
[2] Basic Bible Study, “Being the Body,” Lesson One – Unity, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N6VLSTSAoMU.
The Rev. Sharron L. Cox
Associate for Outreach, Pastoral Care and Women's Ministries
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