For you are all sons [and daughters] of God through faith in Christ Jesus. For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus. And if you are Christ’s, then you are Abraham’s seed and heirs according to the promise. Galatians 3: 26-29, NKJV.
Heavenly Father, as we enter the study of Your Word, we ask that Your Holy Spirit will reveal to us the truth, that “in [You]” we are truly “one.” We ask this in the blessed name of Jesus! Amen.
It is wonderful to contemplate what Christ has done for us by coming into this world. With His life and death, He has broken down every wall of separation, and has made of all of God’s creatures, one. That is why slavery is so offensive, and racism is so defiling; they go against God’s plans for His creatures. Any time we hear people using Scripture to justify these practices, we can be sure that they are not interpreting it according to the spirit in which the Word was given.
Christ, who is the express image of the Father, lived the true spirit of the Word while He walked among human beings. He accepted people of all walks of life into His circle of friends. He was accused of “eating with publicans and sinners” (Matthew 9: 11; Luke 7: 34). Can you imagine how shocked the Pharisees and the other teachers of the law were, when they heard Jesus invite Himself to Zacchaeus’ house? After all, table fellowship was practiced among family and friends; among equals. It was a special moment. And then, He allowed Mary, a woman, to sit at His feet, as he would a male disciple. That was unheard of! But He went further, He took children, the expendables of society, upon His knees, and blessed them! These, who were the least on earth, were made the model citizens of the kingdom of heaven. What a Savior!
The reason He could live this way was because He, who “was in the beginning with God,” and by whom “all things were made,” knew what was the Fathers plan, from the beginning; because He and the father are one! In the body of Christ there should be no divisions. This is in total disagreement with the divine will. Nevertheless, one of the most fragmented segment of society, is God’s church. We are divided by styles of worship, by culture, by the color of our skin, by ethnicity, and by anything that we disagree on.
Strangely enough, we Christians have plans of living forever, in an earth made new; and yet we find it so hard to live together in the here and now! I am of the opinion that what we are experiencing now, is a dress-rehearsal for life in that better land. If we are serious about living together, forever, this is the time to be getting a feel for what it will be like. One of the most bewildering, and painful, tragedies, of our modern times, was when Hutu Christians participated in the massacre of Tutsi Christians, in Rwanda. The blood of Christ was not significant enough in their experience, to keep them from shedding each other’s blood!
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, just in case you are wondering: these messages were written to the church, they are first for our admonition; before we can share them with the world. Anytime we allow anything to separate us from each other, just remember that we are ultimately separating ourselves from Jesus; for “in Christ Jesus, we are one.”