Heresy

2 Corinthians 5

Paul’s ministry among the Corinthians was one of his most painful and frustrating because the Corinthian congregation became a church the lived in conflict. It may well have been his most diverse congregation in a cosmopolitan trading city with a mix of Jew and Gentile, rich and poor, educated and illiterate, some stubborn pagans, and representatives from many corners of the Roman Empire all in attendance. Conflict was seemingly inevitable with this mash up of people. They fought over everything—which missionary was the “true” missionary (Paul or Apollos); what freedom in Christ really meant (libertinism vs. restrained freedom to be God’s servants); how to celebrate the sacraments; and so on through nearly every aspect of communal life. Paul’s letters to them were usually in direct response to the latest uproar, so we find within them beautiful and confrontational theology of reconciliation, love, forgiveness, grace, and generosity—all things sorely lacking in this community’s life. 

2 Corinthians 5 is a pinnacle moment. It is similar to 1 Corinthians 13 in that it is an explication of a theological dogma that is directly relevant to the praxis encountered in Corinth. In the former, it was a definition of love that embodied Christ—a cure for the constant bickering, battling, and frank hatred fomented within the pews. In the latter, though, it is a summation of the purpose of the Church, and within that summation comes a rebuke that we all need to hear—to exist in conflict may well be the deepest form of heresy there is. 

In Christ, Paul asserts, God reconciled the world. God south to the bridge the chasm between himself and humanity dug by our sin. In this case, sin is that which divides human beings from one another and from God by violating God’s dictum to love others as one loves oneself. The list of offenses could stretch for miles—pride, arrogance, self-righteousness, selfishness, self-centeredness, and so on. Christ ended such existence in and of himself. Christ met the world in acceptance and welcome. He met the world by taking people on their own terms. He met the world by affirming that each person met was a child of God by being a product of God’s creative will. Christ did not demand worship from those he met, ironically, he sought quite the opposite. He wanted people to see themselves as they were in the eyes of God—unique acts of God’s creative imagination. Human-imposed delineations and stratifications meant little or nothing to him. He routinely offended the religious sensibilities of the Pharisees who lived by an encoded righteousness of right behavior dictated by right obedience to the 600+ commandments of the Torah. He would openly talk with women. He would welcome Samaritans. He regularly walked and ministered to the people of the streets dubbed “sinners” by Pharisaical codes. He took such condemned sinners under wing, protecting and preserving them from the judgment of their peers. He welcomed those adamantly opposed to him. He engaged even his eventual killers. No one was beneath notice. No one was beneath contempt. God hungered for the lost among us. God longed for the communion of all humanity. Christ is the Word made flesh to make it so.

Therefore, argues Paul, any community that takes the name of Jesus must embody similar reconciliation in its very being. There is no room for schism. There is no room for judgmental statements or pronouncements about any group of human beings. There is certainly no excuse for ever taking rocks in hand to carry out sentence on one the Church declares sinful (for Paul, this thought had to strike close to home as he could not escape his own history of holding the robes of his Pharisee compatriots as they stoned Stephen to death). A church lost in argument as completely lost its way. A church willing to condemn others is lost. A church judging anyone has lost sight of Christ. The church is a hospital of grace, welcoming all patients all everywhere. For it to be anything else is a denial of Christ.

Now look at us. 

How many flavors of Christian are there? Why? How many branches of Presbyterian are there, let alone flavors of Christianity? Why?

Confessionally, we have to take responsibility for ourselves. The skeptics and critics have no loss of material from which to work as they denounce the hypocrisy of the community of Christ. Be it dealing with homosexuality, with world affairs, with the relationships between others faiths, with the dichotomy of rich and poor, with the dualism of personal faith versus faith that encompasses compassion for the whole world, with prosperity gospels arguing with self-emptying Liberationists over what God’s blessing means; we are a divided community. We cannot deny the truth. We cannot blame anyone but ourselves. For a congregation to denounce and renounce its denomination is not a statement of religious fealty to God, but a reprehensible confession of failure.

Paul refused to shy away from this truth as he worked with and among the Corinthians. He dove right in with them to begin healing, helping, and hoping for their reclamation from themselves. 

Read 2 Corinthians 5 again.

It is right there. Until we reach across the chasms to bridge the gaps that divide us, we are lost. If we say we have no choice but renunciation, we are lost. We still do not see the power of Christ, the life of Christ, or the will of Christ. He does not demand one way or a right way, he offers us help in welcoming us all however we find him, whoever we happen to be. There is only one Christ, no matter how many different communities claim his name—so none of them can be absolute or exclusive of one another. They are all, in the their best sense, different voices crying to the same God. 

Welcome one another.

Help one another.

Walk with one another.

That is Christ.