Today's daily lesson comes from Colossians chapter 3 verse 11:
"Here there is not Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave, free; but Christ is all, and in all."
And Luke chapter 7 verse 9:
"When Jesus heard these things, he marveled at him, and turning to the crowd that followed him, said, 'I tell you, not even in Israel have I found such faith.'"
Yesterday I watched a video where a white man was commenting on race-related issues in America and said there is no such thing as African Americans, just as there is no such thing as Welsh Americans. The term African American is divisive he said; and we should all consider and refer to ourselves as simply Americans, without modifier.
But today's daily lessons reveal how much farther the Gospel pushes us beyond all modifying identities, including even our nationalistic ones. We are no longer to see each other in earthly ways, Paul says, but rather in heavenly ways. Therefore we are no longer to see each other through the lens of social class, gender, or even race and nationality, but now solely through the lens of what we all share which is Christ within us. And as Paul said elsewhere, "In Christ there is no Jew or Gentile, slave or free, male or female" (Galatians 3:28). What a radical concept -- far more radical even than the man's in the video.
Christians of another era used to talk about the "Universal fatherhood of God and the universal brotherhood of man." Though the language was not inclusive, the vision was expansive. Anything short of the universal brother and sisterhood of humanity falls too short. Any boundary of geography or nationality or any other identity is from earth and no of heaven. Christ is all and is in all; that is how we must learn to see and to speak of ourselves and our world.
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