The Difference Our Faith Makes
The town used to be large and prosperous, bursting with life and energy, but a change in the road structure led to its decline. There were new believers, new to this kind of faith anyway so it wasn’t all that surprising that they were shaken up a bit. It was a bitter controversy and one that threatened to undue the community. We pick up the letter at a time when the Colossian Christians had come under a Jewish mystical influence, which meant a belief in a sort of “hierarchy of angels, powers and spiritual rulers who stood between them and God.” In such a system it was necessary to win the approval of the cosmic powers with particular worship practices and ascetic disciplines. The author, writing in the name of Paul, is clearly disturbed by this move from traditional Pauline doctrine and urges them to act according to what he sees are essential in the life of a Christian disciple. The debate was a matter so important that some believed that the spiritual welfare of the community was at stake and it needed to be settled. One group insisted that baptism into the life of Christ was enough, that Christ was in all. The other group argued there was more to do- more to live into as believers- that Christ was in all and yet being in Christ requires much. The faithful group prayed for God to guide their next steps, wondering what God had in mind for them. They were arguing over nothing less than what was required in the life of discipleship, what it meant to follow Christ, what was required of them- what difference it made to be a Christian.
We might find ourselves twitching in our seats at such clear finger wagging. For the author finds much to quarrel with in this community, he claims has gotten off track. He writes, “If you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above…Put to death, therefore whatever in you is earthly…But now you must get rid of all such things- anger, wrath, malice, slander and abusive language…” We see a description of a Christian reality moving to a wild list of what not to do. Yet despite such a long laundry list of behavior dos and don’ts, there is little about the difference following Christ makes for the Christian community. I find myself wanting to ask, so what does that mean for us, the Christian Church?
It is not uncommon to find this kind of rant in our sacred text. New Christian communities were figuring things out just as we continue to today. But what I love about this letter is that it invites people of faith to step it up. It is one way of saying, so you want to follow Christ…then here is what it really means. It makes me wonder, so what difference does it really make to be a part of a Christian church? What is required of me as a fellow Christian in this community? If we were to compile our own list of dos and don’ts for the Cotuit Federated Church, we might be a bit more gracious. Perhaps we would include some of the same items from Colossians, like getting rid of wrath, malice and slander, but maybe we would add some things like “thank the volunteers” and “sing to your hearts’ content.” What difference does it make for us to be a part of this community of faith?
Living in Berkeley, California for four years, you might imagine the tremendous number of bumper stickers I encountered. Bumper stickers in Berkeley are almost a requirement. There were quite a few of them that stayed with me. One was: “Jesus save me from your followers.” The other, “There is nothing wrong with Christianity, it has rarely been tried.” Of course such proclamations are exaggerated and dismissive of all the beauty shared and created by Christians. But they do make me think about the space between who we are and where God calls us to be as Christians. Certainly we know that being a Christian invites us to live and love in ways that demand far more of us then we would ever achieve on our own. While God blesses our full humanity, there is something peculiar about being a Christian that requires us to extend ourselves beyond our human nature. If you are anything like me, there is much in the Christian faith that feels just a tad out of reach or somewhat superhuman. Just to name a few: Who among us can say that we have mastered the art of loving our enemies? Or that we have faithfully and fully honored our fathers and mothers? Or that we have been able to love God with all our heart, all our soul and all our minds? Surely there is a lot about being a Christian that calls us beyond where we are naturally inclined to be.
It seems being Christian demands that we continue to strive for the will of God even when there is no where to go but through the valley. Being a Christian means offering grace and forgiveness when all we can muster is indifference. Being a Christian means daring to look for God in one another. Yet, somehow our call is so grand that it requires a bit of growing room. If we had to wait to call ourselves Christian until we could genuinely love our neighbors as ourselves, most of us would still be waiting in line to be baptized. Maybe being Christian is like putting on something new- something that doesn’t quite fit yet, something that is a bit too big and leaves us space to grow. When reflecting on how being a pastor makes him a better Christian, my colleague Martin Copenhaver wrote, “Perhaps (it) is a lot like what Paul had in mind when he urged the members of his church in Rome to ‘put on Christ’. He was asking his listeners to assume some of the qualities of Christ, to wear them as they would a new and perhaps ill-fitting set of clothes, in order that some day they might fit, and be fitting expressions of who they had become…” And yet, as people of faith, at some point we try on Christ and Christ-like behavior enough times that it begins to fit. And we are required to put on Christ even when it is awkward or inconvenient, when it is embarrassing or irritating and even when it hurts. It seems that the difference for us as Christians in this community is that we are made better together as fellow disciples on the journey than we could ever be on our own.
In his classic work, Life Together, Dietrich Bonhoeffer writes of the Christian community as a place that simply doesn’t make sense in worldly terms. He writes of the kind of wild love required. He says, “Human love can never understand spiritual love, for spiritual love is from above, it is something completely strange, new and incomprehensible to all earthly love.” The way we behave as Christians is often incomprehensible to the world around us. It is simply too wild, too peculiar, too radical. As Christians in this community we are called to a kind of love we could only achieve together as a community of faith.
As you might imagine, many of my peers speak more frequently of hypocrisy than grace when waxing philosophical about the institutional church. More often than not, I have found that my conversations at social gatherings revolve around defending communities of faith and what difference it really makes to be a Christian. Many times, I hear things about how God is found outdoors, on the golf course, in the fishing boat or alone in the woods. But who can disagree with divine encounters in places outside the Christian community? The hard work is daring to find God right here in the real stuff of human life. Again, Martin Copenhaver writes, “The affirmation that God can be found outside the church has never seemed like much of a claim. The true wonder is that God can be found inside the church, among quirky, flawed and broken people who may have little in common and yet are bound to one another.” And for us, maybe that is the difference our faith makes, by following Christ we are committed to looking for him right here, among people we don’t always understand, yet those whom we seek to love anyway. It seems that the difference for us as Christians in this community is that we are made better together as fellow disciples on the journey, than we could ever be on our own.
As we begin this new ministry together, I celebrate that I will be made a better Christian with you. I celebrate that right in this place we will “put on Christ” together, that we will grow into what God longs for us to be. It is here that we practice grace, forgiveness, unceasing prayer and radical love. It is peculiar and wonderful that we are bound together simply because we seek to love and serve the God we know in Jesus our Christ. And being bound in Christ is enough to make all the difference. Amen.
P.T. O’Brien, “Colossians, Letter to the,” in Dictionary of Paul and His Letters, ed. Gerald F. Hawthorne, Ralph P. Martin, and Daniel G. Reid (Downers Grover, IL: Intervarsity, 1993), 147l.
E. Elizabeth Johnson, “Colossians” Women’s Bible Commentary: Expanded Edition with Apocrypha. Eds. Newsom, Carol A. and Ringe, Sharon H. (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 1998) 437.
One reason scholars doubt that Paul wrote this letter is that it asserts that believers already share Christ’s resurrection. Yet, we know from Paul’s authentic letters, like Romans and 1 and 2 Corinthians that Paul believed that while we have died with Christ, we have not yet been raised with him. Perhaps for Paul, we must grow into Christ or “put on Christ” as he preaches in his Letter to the Romans.
Harper Collins Study Bible. “The Letter of Paul to the Colossians” Introduction by J. Paul Sampley.
Bonhoeffer, Dietrich. Life Together: The Classic Exploration of Faith in Community. (New York: Harper San Francisco, 1954), 35.