Title: Full Welcome
Author: Christopher Harbin
Text: Romans 15:4-13
Who is my tribe? Whom do I include? How do I limit who belongs to my tribe? Is it a question of language, culture, ethnicity, color, socioeconomic, kinship, religion, identity, character, pastimes, music, politics, attitudes, generation, nationality, education, geography, or some other affinity? Where did my concept of tribe originate? Is it different from that of my parents or peers? How did it develop? How has it changed? Perhaps I need to look at whom I might exclude from my tribe, and why that is?
One particular term repeatedly creeps up in today's passage from Romans. We normally don't give it a whole lot of thought. Sometimes, we translate it as peoples or nations. Sometimes we translate it as Gentiles or non-Jews. Sometimes we use it to refer to ethnic groups, language groups, or some other category of humanity. At its most basic, it refers to an affinity group of some kind, much as current English vernacular uses the term tribe. My tribe is my people. My tribe is that group with whom I identify. "The tribes," on the other hand, refers to all those who are not my people.
The tribes are all the nations, all the Gentiles, all the pagans, all the non-Yahwists, all those persons or peoples who are not "us." Paul addresses his words in Romans 15 particularly to the Jewish believers in Rome in regard to all the diverse people around them. He calls on them to live in harmony with all these others such that they might speak of God's glory in one voice. That requires concerted inclusion. It requires a unity we have rarely, if ever, seen. It requires abolishing our penchant for speaking and living in us versus them mindsets. It requires seeing every individual and group as already welcomed and loved by God to the very same degree God has welcomed and loved those of my tribe.
Jews, Greeks, Romans, Babylonians, Syrians, Egyptians, people from all o ...
Author: Christopher Harbin
Text: Romans 15:4-13
Who is my tribe? Whom do I include? How do I limit who belongs to my tribe? Is it a question of language, culture, ethnicity, color, socioeconomic, kinship, religion, identity, character, pastimes, music, politics, attitudes, generation, nationality, education, geography, or some other affinity? Where did my concept of tribe originate? Is it different from that of my parents or peers? How did it develop? How has it changed? Perhaps I need to look at whom I might exclude from my tribe, and why that is?
One particular term repeatedly creeps up in today's passage from Romans. We normally don't give it a whole lot of thought. Sometimes, we translate it as peoples or nations. Sometimes we translate it as Gentiles or non-Jews. Sometimes we use it to refer to ethnic groups, language groups, or some other category of humanity. At its most basic, it refers to an affinity group of some kind, much as current English vernacular uses the term tribe. My tribe is my people. My tribe is that group with whom I identify. "The tribes," on the other hand, refers to all those who are not my people.
The tribes are all the nations, all the Gentiles, all the pagans, all the non-Yahwists, all those persons or peoples who are not "us." Paul addresses his words in Romans 15 particularly to the Jewish believers in Rome in regard to all the diverse people around them. He calls on them to live in harmony with all these others such that they might speak of God's glory in one voice. That requires concerted inclusion. It requires a unity we have rarely, if ever, seen. It requires abolishing our penchant for speaking and living in us versus them mindsets. It requires seeing every individual and group as already welcomed and loved by God to the very same degree God has welcomed and loved those of my tribe.
Jews, Greeks, Romans, Babylonians, Syrians, Egyptians, people from all o ...
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