A Welcoming Community
Galatians 3:27-29
Introduction
We have been going through the Queen Street Baptist Church mission statement. I made the strange decision to go through it backwards. That seems strange because it would seem that one builds on the other, with the easier parts first and the harder parts later. So being welcoming is relatively easy but when we end with sharing God’s saving love, we are in more difficult territory.
But I am going to argue that the welcoming part is actually the most difficult step of the church’s mission. Of course that statement depends on our definition of welcoming. Many churches define welcoming as being friendly. If someone hands you a bulletin with a smile, if you are offered a gift as part of a welcome package, if people say they hope to see you again next week, that is welcoming. All of those things are very important and should be done. But welcoming is deeper.
Here is the issue. Welcoming is relatively easy when the person you are welcoming is just like you. If they look like you, act like you, have the same interests, have the same cultural background, the same sense of what is appropriate, then they are of course are welcome. But the more you shift from those things, the more difficult it is to welcome.
You might think that this is a modern challenge with our emphasis on diversity. However, this goes right back to the beginning of the church. People have always struggled to welcome those different from them. We are going to look at how the Apostle Paul dealt with this issue and then try to find out what that means for us.
No Jew, No Gentile
The passage we are looking at comes from Paul’s letter to the Galatians, which was one of his earliest letters. Paul was writing to some Christians he was very familiar with because he had introduced them to Jesus. Paul had travelled through Galatia, which is a region and not a city, and he preached the gospel. It was the same gospel he had always preached. Put your faith in Jesus and follow him. The Galatians welcomed this message and became Christians.
After Paul left and went off to his next destination, there were some more visitors. These were some Christians who, like Paul but unlike the Galatians, came from a Jewish background. Once Paul was gone, they informed the Galatians that they had missed a step. It was great that they wanted to follow Jesus but they needed to take on the Jewish Law with the sign of circumcision. Why didn’t Paul insist on this, since he was from a Jewish background as well? They were working from two different paradigms of Christianity. One focused on uniformity and the other focused on diversity. Paul was much more comfortable with different people, looking and acting differently, all held together by faith in Jesus. The others insisted that newcomers become like them before being fully welcomed into the church.
Word of this got back to Paul and he was not happy. He made some harsher comments that we will not get into here. One thing he did say was: “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.” This was a response to a contemporary Jewish prayer in which Jewish men would thank God that they were Jewish and not Gentile, male and not female, and free and not a slave. There was a sense in which certain categories were superior to others.
Paul’s argument is that none of those things really matter when we are in Christ. It is not that our identities have no value, but none of them are a source of boasting. No one group can say that they are superior to another group when it comes to our relationship with Jesus. Paul wants the Galatians to see that God accepts them as they are because of their faith in Jesus and the narrow views of some other Christians cannot change that.
What Does Welcoming Look Like?
The tension between Jew and Gentile is no longer a concern within the church. But that does not mean that the principles have lost their importance. There is still a tendency for Christians to value either uniformity or diversity. Even those who value diversity may only allow that diversity to go so far. So some people may be comfortable fully welcoming a newcomer to Canada but may be less comfortable fully welcoming a homeless person.
I want you to ask is there a certain kind of people that you would struggle with welcoming. You might not think there are any but that’s when we need to wrestle with the meaning of welcoming. We are all pretty open if all we mean by welcoming is whether we will allow someone in our building during our worship service. Everyone can attend. But what if the biblical concept of welcoming was more? How open are you to sitting with that person in church and engaging them in conversation? How about including them in the ministry of the church and allowing them to volunteer?
Where some churches stumble when it comes to welcoming is that they will tolerate a few weeks of being different but the expectation will be that they will soon conform and become like everyone else. This was the view of the troublemakers in Galatia.
I have often heard churches say “Come as you are. But don’t stay that way.” I understand the sentiment behind that being a Christian is a process of growth for all of us. But the subtle message is that newcomers need to become more like us when what the message needs to be is that we all become more like Jesus.
If you think every person in our community feels welcome coming to a church, you are wrong. I have done a lot of research in the area of disabilities. Even though 20% of the population has a disability, that percentage is not represented in church attendance. I have heard many stories of people with disabilities and their families explicitly told not to attend the church because they were considered too disruptive. And even when they are allowed to be a part of their church, they are often seen as objects of ministry rather than full participants in the work of the church.
What about the people in this community who struggle with mental illness, addictions, and extreme poverty or homelessness? How welcome are they in this church? Again, I don’t just mean if they are allowed to attend but if they are truly welcomed into the life of the church. Are they seen as objects of our charity until they clean themselves up enough to be one of us?
And then there is the group that is one everyone’s radar: the LGBTQ community. Are they truly welcome? There have been attempts within our denomination to limit the roles of LGBTQ people, including banning from membership and leadership. Those motions did not pass but these things do not happen unnoticed. Do you know I have received a number of phone calls while the pastor here from LGBTQ people asking if they would be welcome at this church. I never knew what to say. Some people would be more welcoming than others. All would probably say they are welcome to attend but some would add limited involvement and with the expectation that they would eventually change.
I understand that some may want to be welcoming but see this not so much as about diversity as about sin. I will not get into whether being gay is a sin here, but I would say that one of the reasons Jesus got into trouble with the religious people is because he spent time with the sinners. It is interesting that they are never described as ex-prostitutes or ex-tax collectors. But you might say that Jesus only ate and drank with them. Only? Eating and drinking together was the deepest kind of relationship. Joining together for a meal was the clearest example of welcoming when it comes to the ancient world. I will also state that many churches are more than ready to welcome people who gossip, slander and are greedy, things found in those same sin lists. Something to think about.
Conclusion
Would you go out for lunch after church with a trans woman? Would you invite an addict to be a part of the choir? Would you bring a person with autism to the men’s breakfast? Why or why not?
My fear is that you will hear this message as coming from someone who is so open minded that he can tell you what to do. That is not the case at all. I am preaching to myself more than anyone. There are people who make me feel uncomfortable and who I struggle to fully welcome. I remember when Amanda and I first got involved in the Saturday night service and how uncomfortable I felt. I shared meals with people who I would never normally seek out for company. It was stretching. Even in my work with disability advocacy, there are times I meet people with disabilities that make me feel uncomfortable for some mysterious reason.
None of this has been intended to condemn where any of us are at. My only goal is to ask you when you say you are a welcoming church, what do you mean. What do you mean by welcoming? How far does welcoming go? Is there anyone excluded from the welcome?
Paul wrote to the Galatians as they were being pressured to conform to the expectations of another group of Christians. The Galatians were welcome as long as they became like everyone else. Paul responded by reminding them that those differences no longer mean anything in Christ. If we are truly followers of Jesus, there is nothing that others can say that can change that.
