Challenging the Gatekeepers

John 15: 9-12 & Acts 10: 44-48

Roger Lynn

May 7, 2017

(click here for the audio for this sermon)

According to John’s Gospel, Jesus said, “This is my commandment – that you love one another.” And we’ve been struggling to live up to that challenge ever since. It’s not always easy and there’s usually lots of room for improvement. There is a sign on my office door which asks the question, “Which part of ‘love one another’ don’t we understand?” It is, however, a challenge worthy of our very best ongoing efforts. Now, more than ever, our world stands in need of the healing balm of such all-encompassing, welcoming, accepting love.

It seems as if there are always those who want to act as gate-keepers – deciding who is acceptable and who is not, who is worthy of love and who is not. Sometimes such gate-keepers are outside the Church, and sometimes they are inside. Sometimes they are acting in an official capacity and sometimes they are self-appointed. Sometimes “they” are “us.” But regardless of who such gate-keepers are, or where we find them, those of us who claim to be followers of the one who said, “Love one another!” have a clear mandate to stand up and challenge narrow, exclusive attitudes whenever, wherever, however they present themselves.

For Peter, in the early days of the Church, the issue was whether or not you had to be a Jew in order to be a Christian. All of the first Christians had spent their whole lives being Jews, so that was “normal” and provided the framework for what was considered acceptable. It took a vision from God to shake Peter loose and provide him with a different perspective. “I truly understand that God shows no partiality...” (Acts 10:34) Only then was he in a position to see reality more clearly and challenge the gate-keepers with a new level of understanding. “Can anyone withhold the water for baptizing these people who have received the Holy Spirit just as we have?” (Acts 10:47) And the circle of love grows larger and more inclusive. 

Of course this process needs to be repeated over and over again, because every time we push past one barrier to inclusivity, it paves the way for us to discover a new barrier we didn’t even know to look for. Peter realizes that God’s love is open to all, but then has to come to terms with just how radical that notion is. Paul tells the church in Galatia that “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) But then he falls back into old patterns of seeing the world and tells the church in Corinth that a woman is only acceptable if she has her head covered. Challenging the gate-keepers is tricky business because it is so easy to fall into the trap of being a gate-keeper without even realizing it. Again and again we have to come face to face with what it means (what it really means, in practical, down-to-earth, real-life terms) for God to show no partiality. And we have to find the courage to stand up to those who would say otherwise (even when it means standing up to ourselves) and say, “Can anyone withhold the water for baptizing these people who have received the Holy Spirit just as we have?” Can anyone deny that these, too, are children of God? Can anyone deny that these, too, are accepted by God and welcomed by God and loved by God?

In the history of my own faith tradition there is an example of this kind of courage. In the early 1800s, in the Presbyterian Church in Scotland, there was a practice known as “fencing the table.” In order to participate in communion, you first had to be “approved” by the leaders of the church. You then received a token which you presented at the table in order to receive the bread and cup. Alexander Campbell, who later become one of the founders of the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ), was standing in line with his token in his hand, when it became clear to him that there was something seriously wrong with this system. The good news of God’s welcoming love had become distorted. There were literally gate-keepers standing guard at the table, deciding who was acceptable and who wasn’t. So he put his token on the table and walked out. He would no longer be part of such a practice. 

In Germany in the 1940s, when the Nazis were in power, a  minister named Martin Niemoller penned these words about what it means when we fail to challenge the gate-keepers.

First they came for the Communists,

  and I didn’t speak up,

    because I wasn’t a Communist.

Then they came for the Jews,

  and I didn’t speak up,

    because I wasn’t a Jew.

Then they came for the Catholics,

  and I didn’t speak up,

    because I was a Protestant.

Then they came for me,

  and by that time there was no one

    left to speak up for me.

~ Rev. Martin Niemoller, 1945

The truth is that there is no such thing as “us” and “them.” There is only “us.” We are all in this life together. We are all connected. We are all created, loved and accepted by God. And living into that truth is a full-time, all-the-time, lifetime job. We dare not be silent. There is simply too much at stake.

Who are the gate-keepers in our world today? Who are they trying to keep out? Which part of “love one another” don’t we yet understand? May we continue to have the wisdom and the courage to speak the truth to power. May we continue to have the wisdom and the courage to speak the truth to ourselves.