Frederick, Claire Davidson

English

Pepperdine Digital Commons

LeavenVolume 23Issue 4 Faith/Works Article 101-1-2015God is Up To Something (On the Other Side ofthe Wall)Claire Davidson Frederickcdfrederick@mail.lipscomb.eduFollow this and additional works at: http://digitalcommons.pepperdine.edu/leavenThis Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Religion at Pepperdine Digital Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in Leaven byan authorized administrator of Pepperdine Digital Commons. For more information, please contact paul.stenis@pepperdine.edu.Recommended CitationFrederick, Claire Davidson (2015) "God is Up To Something (On the Other Side of the Wall)," Leaven: Vol. 23: Iss. 4, Article 10.Available at: http://digitalcommons.pepperdine.edu/leaven/vol23/iss4/10This sermon was originally preached at the Doctor of Ministry Preaching Workshop at LipscombUniversity. A modified version was preached at the Pepperdine Bible Lectures in Stauffer Chapel onMay 8, 2015.At Caesarea, there was a man named Cornelius, a centurion in what was known as the ItalianRegiment. He and all his family were devout and God-fearing; he gave generously to thosein need and prayed to God regularly. One day at about three in the afternoon he had avision. He distinctly saw an angel of God, who came to him and said, Cornelius! Cornelius staredat him in fear. What is it, Lord? he asked.The angel answered, Your prayers and gifts to the poor have come up as a memorial offeringbefore God. Now send men to Joppa to bring back a man named Simon who is called Peter. He isstaying with Simon the tanner, whose house is by the sea. When the angel who spoke to him hadgone, Cornelius called two of his servants and a devout soldier who was one of his attendants. Hetold them everything that had happened and sent them to Joppa (Acts 10.18).Have you ever been invited to do cross-cultural ministry, engage a different population, or work in the marginsof a foreign environment outside of your comfort zone? Maybe youve been asked to work in Tent City with ahomeless population, and youre not really the camping type. Or you were invited to teach VBS at theorphanage in Guatemala, and youre not much of a kid person. Perhaps youre a white music minister, andyoure asked to lead singing at a predominately black and urban congregation. Which songs will you choose?Or maybe, as a woman in Churches of Christ, youre called to preach for the very first time at a preachingseminar at Lipscomb University in front of seasoned, veteran preachers. These invitations summon us to crossboundaries into the uncomfortable and the unfamiliar. But theres a big difference between an uncomfortableenvironment and an unorthodox environment.In todays text, God is going to summon his servant Peter to an unorthodox environment on the other sideof a cultural dividing wallthe living room of a Gentile named Cornelius. The town is Caesarea: CAESAR-rea . . . Caesar-ville . . . Caesar-land . . . Gentile-town! Built by Herod the Great and named for AugustusCeasar, it was the capital of the Roman province of Judea; it housed the palatial residence of governors likePontius Pilate; and was headquarters for Roman troops, the same type of troops who hung Jesus on the cross.Cornelius is in a position of authority and power within this corrupt military infrastructure of the Empire.And for a Jew like Peter, Corneliuss household is enemy territory . . . outside the boundaries of orthodoxy . . .unclean! But still, God has been up to something on the other side of the wall.Cornelius is described as a devout man, who gives alms to the poor and who prays at all times, Lukesays. This Gentile man of war is also a man of prayer. And God has been attentive to those prayers: Hey,Cornelius! You, on the wrong side of the wall, I hear you, I see you, and Im coming for youto set you freeand invite you into the true story of the whole world, the story of Jesus, who is making all things new.God is Up To Something (On the OtherSide of the Wall)Claire Davidson Frederick1Frederick: God is Up To Something (On the Other Side of the Wall)Published by Pepperdine Digital Commons, 2015FAITH/WORKS LEAVEN  215Like Hagars El Roi, this is a God who sees Cornelius, a God who affirms his gifts and offerings, a Godwhos been working in Corneliuss life long before Peter the cross-cultural missionary makes hisappearance. Gods universal reign from the promise of Abraham onward has always had the nations inview. And in Acts 10, Gods kingdom is about to do much more than simply draw near: it is about to take upresidence in Caesar-ville. Still, you can just imagine most people in Peters Jewish-only circle of Christian friends would have bettheir denarius that there was no way God would speak to that person, or work in that place, or operate inthat particular manner. Some are so entrenched in the way God has worked in the past that they cant wraptheir minds around the ways in which God might work in the future. Including those people? Speaking throughthat gender? Using a person of that reputation? But are we not also guilty of these same thoughts today? Iknow that for myself and for many in our rational Enlightenment tradition, we have a long history of puttingGod in a box. Its as if we told God: God, youre only allowed to speak to us now through the text of the Bibleand only inside the correct denominational walls and even then, only at the hours of 9:00, 11:00, and 6:00 onSunday and 7:00 p.m. on Wednesday nights, okay? And weve missed out on some movements of the Spiritand some opportunities that God may have had for us out there.Folks, God is bigger than the box. The conversion of Cornelius to Christ was going to first involve theconversion of Peter and the church to a new understanding and a new vision of the ways in which God hasworked, is working, and can work in our world today. God is not bound to our boundaries of orthodoxy. Andthough we may try and explain God or predict God with our tidy systematic theologies, the Spirit of God (like awind) is never going to be fully contained in them or by them. God is always three steps ahead of us, at workon the other side of the wall.I was recently called outside of my comfort zone into a new area of cross-cultural ministry, behind a wallof a different sort. The Tennessee Prison for Women in Nashville is where Ive been teaching on Wednesdaynights for the past six weeks. As part of Lipscomb Universitys LIFE Program, Im facilitating a songwritingworkshop; and were providing the women with new tools, methods, and insights for telling their storiesredemptively. I want my students to know that they are made in Gods image, created to create, that theirstories and voices matter, and that with Gods help, they can bring beauty and creativity from the ashes andbrokenness of their lives.After only one night, I quickly realized that despite my missional efforts, I was not taking God to thesewomen. God had already been at work on the other side of the wall for a long time before I arrived. One ofmy students Sweetiea lesbian inmate, whos a former drug user and drug dealeris a devout believer;and every single song or rap that she has written has been in praise of Jesus. The love, joy, and peace that sheradiates are contagious.In the Lipscomb Program the terms insider and outsider get mixed up and turned on their heads, so thatthe women who are incarcerated are actually referred to as the inside students; and we who are joiningthem from the Lipscomb community are the outside students. We go behind the prison walls to becomeoutsiders. And the women, who for the most part have been labeled outsiders all their lives, now have aninside line to the kingdom.Categorical shifts are just as difficult for us today as they were for Peter and Cornelius in the first century.We prefer the old order of categoriesfixed and immovable. We like to be able to readily identify people andclassify people and predict behavior. Those old-order categories carry certain expectations that certainhumans are to fulfill. And if we can squeeze people into the molds of clean/unclean, redeemed/unredeemed,Jew/Greek, prisoner/free, male/female, then we can feel safe, because we can know who Gods going tospeak through and who Gods going to use, and maybe then we can feel in control. And this worked really wellfor us until the kingdom of God came along breaking down walls and going behind barriers and busting upcategories so that there remains but one identifier that eternally mattersand that is child of God, newcreation in Christ.The funny thing about this though is that were still so surprised by it all. Because if anyone reading theBible for just a minute is paying any attention at all, they would notice that God has a compulsive habit2Leaven, Vol. 23 [2015], Iss. 4, Art. 10http://digitalcommons.pepperdine.edu/leaven/vol23/iss4/10216  LEAVEN Fourth Quarter 2015throughout Scripture of crossing boundaries, doing the unexpected, and being flat-out unorthodox. I mean,using Moses (a murderer) to lead Gods people to freedom?! Using Rahab (a prostitute), Ruth (a foreigner tothe covenant), and King David (a murderer and an adulterer) to be part of the family lineage of Jesus Christ?!Using Paul (a murderer) to be Gods chosen instrument?! Seriously!Another one of my students at the prison is a young woman in her late 20s named Bethany. She iscurrently serving a fifty-one-year sentence for the double homicide of her two newborn babies. I will neverunderstand the darkness and the madness that took over her life and her situation on that tragic and awful day.But I do know this: God has been at work in dramatic fashion on the other side of the wall, andBethany is a child of God, new creation in Christ. Bethany knows the Lord. And because of this her life isnot a waste. She still has something to offer the kingdom.I recently began bringing in professional songwriters from the Nashville music industry to co-write withinsiders like Bethany and Sweetie. One of the first people who visited a couple of weeks ago is a friend ofmine named Hannah; she was widowed last year at the age of forty when her husband died of a heart attackin the middle of their kitchen, leaving behind Hannah and their four-year-old son. Hannah has been mad atGod; and her faith, which was weak to begin with, waned after this tragedy. But two weeks ago on the otherside of the wall, I watched some profound cross-cultural ministry taking place, as Sweetie and Bethanyministered to Hannah in her grief and anger.The song they wrote that night was called I Believe, a testament to faith through some really hard times.And whether or not Hannah fully believes the words she co-wrote with the two insiders, the bottom line is thatshes still singing them today on the outside. And maybe those words will become truth for her. I have to trustthat God is also at work in her processstirring her spirit, drawing her near, and speaking to her behind theemotional walls that she has erected.In the case of Peter and Cornelius, God was not stopped by a wall nor by the ways in which church hadalways looked. Where are the walls in our community today behind which God may already be at workKatie Hayss living room?1 The millennial coffeehouse? The gay bar? The laundromat? These spaces, likeCorneliuss household, have the potential to become Next Church. It is our job to pay attention to themovement of Gods Spirit into these unique locations and join God there.Perhaps the greatest example of all of Gods unorthodox methods and radical boundary crossing is theIncarnation itself, in which Jesus broached the wall between human and divine, slipping on some skin torescue humanity in our sin. And that, my friends, is good news.[The following lyric was written at the Tennessee Prison for Women:]I have love, hope, and peace this world cant understandI have love, hope, and peace because He holds my handI have what the world cannot offerHe offers what the world cannot seeAnd because He holds my handI am free.CLAIRE DAVIDSON FREDERICK IS CURRENTLY COMPLETING HER MDIV AT LIPSCOMB UNIVERSITY IN NASHVILLE,TENNESSEE, AND IS TEACHING SONGWRITING CLASSES TO WOMEN AT THE TENNESSEE PRISON FOR WOMEN(CDFREDERICK@MAIL.LIPSCOMB.EDU).1. See Joel A. Brown and Katie Hays, Galileo Church: A Disciples of Christ Experiment in Next Church, Leaven 23, no. 2(2015): 107111.3Frederick: God is Up To Something (On the Other Side of the Wall)Published by Pepperdine Digital Commons, 2015

God is Up To Something (On the Other Side of the Wall)

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God is Up To Something (On the Other Side of the Wall)

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