And the cornerstone is Christ Jesus himself. Eph 2:20 (NLT)
Part 2 – Jesus is Diversity
Go to PART 1
Jesus gives all of humanity common union.
We don’t all look the same, talk the same, even BELIEVE exactly the same in terms of nuances, dogma, style, methodology, doctrine… it’s not in those things that we find common ground with one another – Jesus is our common ground. And I think he is big enough, expansive enough, to handle it all.
Our communities of faith are built for belonging. And not just our church structures, but the church in terms of hearts and lives ignited by faith and on a journey down a new way of living. A way that's about forgiveness and reconciliation and grace and healing and wholeness. The redemptive way of love.
You don’t belong because you conform; because you wear the right clothes, say and do all the right things… You belong because you do. Because in Jesus, EVERY ONE belongs. Scattered throughout our community but gathered together by faith, we are the Kingdom of God in the world. Not a Kingdom that is built up, but one that is built through and in. Diverse, colourful, magnificent, transcendent, miraculous.
Diversity should not be a threat to our communities of faith… Comparison, judgement and exclusivity does the job of dividing quite well.
Maya Angelou said,
“We all should know that diversity makes for a rich tapestry, and we must understand that all the threads of the tapestry are equal in value no matter what their colour.” and “It is time for parents to teach young people early on that in diversity there is beauty, and there is strength.”
Practically speaking, this is challenging; easy to write, hard to live out. There are people in my life who I would have a really hard time sharing communion with. I recently heard Rachel Held Evens speak beautifully about who is welcome at the communion table. How would we feel taking communion with certain people? People who had committed grave crimes, or had slandered us, or hurt us, or we think are weird and awkward, or who we don’t brand as Christian but part of some other faith? But then Rachel said something amazing, she said (paraphrased) that the table isn’t about worthiness, it's about hunger.
And I don’t know about you, but I see hunger everywhere I go. The world is starving on so many different levels a million times over.
While we do need to be careful and make sure people are safe from abuse, we should work hard to make sure that differences are not a dividing factor in our lives, hopes and conversations of faith, God and the Bible.
Our hunger unites us. We all have different appetites, different allergies, different tastes, but sustenance is what we crave. The bread of life. Jesus. Our cornerstone. And in his house there’s room enough for us all.
“That’s plain enough, isn’t it? You’re no longer wandering exiles. This kingdom of faith is now your home country. You’re no longer strangers or outsiders. You belong here, with as much right to the name Christian as anyone. God is building a home. He’s using us all—irrespective of how we got here—in what he is building. He used the apostles and prophets for the foundation. Now he’s using you, fitting you in brick by brick, stone by stone, with Christ Jesus as the cornerstone that holds all the parts together. We see it taking shape day after day—a holy temple built by God, all of us built into it, a temple in which God is quite at home.”
Ephesians 2:19 – 22 (MSG)
