Ephesians 2:11-22
June 13, 2004
Sermon preached by Rev. Donald Ng at the First Chinese Baptist Church in San Francisco.
People describing dumb people used to say, “Dumb as a brick.” But we can’t compare bricks that way anymore.
There’s a Professor Chang Liu at the University of Illinois who is messing with a technology that is 6400 years old. Chang is redesigning the brick. This new brick is filled with electronic sensors that can continuously monitor the structural health of a building. Such “smart” bricks inserted throughout a building would track temperature changes and measure vibration movement. The data is transmitted to a computer using an internal antenna. The readings can then be accessed by engineers or emergency personnel by phone or a computer network.
Imagine if our church building was retrofitted with smart bricks, we would immediately know whether it has sustained any structural damages in a California earthquake. Rescue workers would know if it would be safe to enter the building to save lives inside. We may not have smart bricks throughout our church building, but we have smart people who are no longer strangers and aliens but citizens with the saints and members of the household of God.
We are smart people for Christ has broken down the dividing wall of hostility.
Breaking Down the Dividing Wall
Our text for this morning from the Letter to the Ephesians tells a story of sacred construction: God in Christ has established a new temple of faith where God’s Spirit has chosen to dwell. But before this new temple is built, there was a wall of hostility that divided God’s people: Jews and Gentiles, “circumcised” from the “uncircumcised,” poor from rich, slave from free, and those who were “far” from those who were “near.”
Before Christ, Gentiles were without the hope of Christ as the messiah of the Jews. Not being birth members, they were aliens from the commonwealth of Israel and not members of the elect nation of the Jews. The covenants of promise established with Abraham and Moses did not apply to the Gentiles. They had no hope and are without God. There was no hope of current blessings or eternal life. The Gentiles with their many gods and goddesses could not save them.
So in sharp contrast, in Christ there is no longer an ethnic and religious barrier to God. Gentiles are no longer without a messiah, strangers to the covenant, without hope and without God. Christ, by his blood, brings near the Gentiles who were far off.
Christ’s sacrifice on the cross breaks down the barriers between Gentile and Jew, making them one group. As God breaks down the wall of hostility that kept the Gentiles far away from the Jews, God is calling us to break down the wall of hostility that keep our neighbors far away from us.
Sometimes we have forgotten what it is like to be living as “aliens from God’s household.” Perhaps it’s been too many years that we have seen ourselves as no longer aliens and strangers but only as citizens with the saints that we have forgotten that there are still people in the world who have yet to know the name of Jesus on their lips.
When we installed this beautiful new awning, we expect people to come and find shelter and covering under this awning. Maybe it is to get out of the blistering sun or maybe to get under it during a heavy downpour. And even if it’s just for a moment that people are standing under it, we are extending our love and care to all aliens and strangers telling them that they are our neighbors.
It required a tremendous mobilization of volunteers to set up for our sidewalk service today. The trustees came early to sweep and wash down the street, volunteers moved and set up the chairs, Mike Wong wired the PA system, the Social Committee planned the reception—this was a daunting task. But it was all worth it.
Now and then, we need to physically come out of our comfortable church building and break down that wall that separates us from our neighbors and the world. If the world is not necessarily going to come inside, we must go outside to remove any barriers that perpetuate hostility to continue. Who knows if by our efforts today that we would reach new brothers and sisters for Christ!
We all know how to find our church. But it is for those who may still be seeking the Lord God who need to see in English letters and Chinese characters that here they can find the “First Chinese Baptist Church.” By reconciling with our neighbors, we bring about peace with others and with God.
Now in Christ Jesus who is our peace has made all of us into one.
Sacred Construction
The new temple is built on the foundation of the apostles who were the disciples sent by Jesus to share the Good News and Christian prophets who guided the community to understand the revelation of the Holy Spirit. But what makes the foundation straight and firm is the setting of the cornerstone. Christ is the cornerstone around which the foundation of the apostles and prophets is ordered. With the foundation in place ordered by Christ Jesus as the cornerstone, we are the smart bricks that are laid one by one until the whole structure is built.
In Christ as the mortar, the whole church is joined together and grows into a holy temple in the Lord. We are built together spiritually that God chooses to reside with us.
Right now, we provide a dwelling place for God on earth, just as God will provide a dwelling place in heaven for us in the future.
While we are still on earth, our church building symbolizes both physically as well as spiritually our relationship with God. Sometimes it needs repairs. It hasn’t gotten the attention it needs to stay structurally sound or physically attractive. Our faith needs some sacred reconstruction.
Once when Francis of Assisi was struggling with the claim of God’s love upon his life and work, he withdrew to a little church in San Damiano, a village not too far from where he lived. The walls of the church were crumbling with age and neglect and its old foundation cracked and unstable. Still, Francis found there a quiet place to pray and listen for direction.
He looked up above the altar and into the face of the figure of Jesus on a cross and there held his gaze for a long time. Then he heard Jesus’ voice: “Francis, go and repair my church.” Francis immediately got up and with the zeal of youth began to do just that: he set about raising money to purchase stones to rebuild the little church. He begged in the streets, he knocked on doors of the village, and he even illicitly sold his wealthy father’s cloth to get the materials he needed for his mission. This little friar carefully placed one stone upon another to rebuild the church.
What God was up to was to teach us to repair our lives and our relationships with each other. Francis set out to repair a particular structure but God was out to repair the church. Through Francis’ obedience, the Spirit of the Living Christ was able to build a new village church—a new community in the name of God. In the process of repairing and rebuilding the church by placing stone upon stone, Francis was a “stone” too. He became a smart brick. Like Jesus, Francis became a “cornerstone” around which others in the village of San Damiano gathered and became a dwelling place for God.
Maybe you are struggling like Francis of Assisi with the claim of God’s love on your life and work today. Perhaps you have stopped paying attention to your relationship with Christ and now it needs some work to repair it. It’s like the old display cases we used to have—neglected and unattractive. And what you need is for Christ to repair your relationship with God by obediently listening to God’s plan for your life.
The Cathedral Within
I was reading Gordon Chin’s message in the recent Chinatown Community Development Center newsletter where he mentioned a book by Bill Shore called, The Cathedral Within. The book compares community leaders with ancient cathedral builders in Europe, who build cathedrals which ultimately took decades and even centuries to complete. Although thousands of workers worked over whole lifetimes, they knew that they may never see the final product. But what kept them working was instilled in them this perspective, spirit, and knowledge that they were a part of something bigger and something more enduring then their individual lives.
Someone asked workers who were laying stones for a cathedral what they were doing. One stone layer after another was miffed to have his work interrupted to reply to such a stupid question. Each was obviously laying stones. But the answer of the last stone layer gave the greater perspective, “I’m building a great cathedral.”
Our church building has been located on this same spot since 1888. After the devastating 1906 earthquake and fire that totally destroyed our building, it was rebuilt by donations from American Baptists across the country on 1908. You are sitting in front of a building that has withstood decades of ministries and we can say that “We are still building a great cathedral!”
We are still ministering on this same location because we believe that God’s mission is still bigger than us as long as there are still people who do not know Christ Jesus in their hearts. We are still here because this church has a foundation of apostles and prophets, pastors and teachers, youth leaders and Deacons who have ordered their lives to Jesus as the cornerstone. We are still here because every new generation of children needs to hear the stories, values, and faith of those who have dedicated and given their lives to Christ. We are here because we have seen the Lord and believe that even when we may never see God’s kingdom fully established on earth, we will never diminish the quality of our discipleship and service.
Within all of us is God’s cathedral where God dwells in our hearts. Within our church is God’s cathedral where he chose to reside.
We really don’t need those “smart” bricks when we have smart people like you. Be solid citizens of God committed to building up, not breaking down. Be constructive and not destructive. Stand together and work together, instead of splitting apart and tearing down. And in the end, God will join us together and we will grow into a holy temple in the Lord, in whom God dwells.
Let us pray.
Gracious Lord God, we give you our hands and our feet; we give you our hearts and our minds; we give you our gifts and our lives to the work of your kingdom on earth. Use us to break down any walls that may keep others from knowing the precious love of Jesus Christ. Teach us to build up your church, one brick at a time, so that everyone near and far would be able to see your glorious power in our world through the witness and faithfulness that your children at this church proclaim. In the name of Christ, let us rise up as saints of God, we pray. Amen.