Happy Christmas (War is Over)

For He Himself is our peace, who has made us both one and has broken down in His flesh the dividing wall of hostility by abolishing the law of commandments expressed in ordinances, that He might create in Himself one new man in place of the two, so making peace, and might reconcile us both to God in one body through the cross, thereby killing the hostility.

Ephesians 2:14-16

I don’t normally consider John Lennon to be a sound theological source. But as I read and reflected on this week’s text, the lyrics of “Happy Xmas” started playing in my head. And while I don’t think Lennon had in mind Ephesians 2 when he wrote this anti-war anthem, his words echo a deeper spiritual truth: 

And so this is Christmas (War is over)  
For weak and for strong (If you want it)  
The rich and the poor ones (War is over)  
The road is so long (Now)  
And so happy Christmas (War is over)  
For black and for white (If you want it)  
For yellow and red ones (War is over)  
Let's stop all the fight (Now)  

It’s hard to miss the hostility permeating our current cultural moment. Divisions along political, socio-economic, ethnic, cultural, and theological/religious lines feel especially heightened. And the Church has not remained unscathed, as these divisions creep into the pews, causing us to distance ourselves (perhaps subconsciously) from those who do not look or think like us.

This isn’t a new story. Indeed, the more and more I study Scripture, the more I am struck by just how much time was spent trying to work out disagreements and divisions between Jews and Gentiles. In a way, it’s oddly comforting to know that the early Church also had problems with infighting. 

But Paul in Ephesians 2 points us to something that is more true than the perpetual divisions that have plagued humanity since the garden. Paul tells us that, because of Jesus, war is over. This is Christmas. Jesus, in His birth, life, death, and resurrection, has ended the hostility between us and God and the hostility between Jew and Gentile. Where there were once Jew and Gentile, Christ has made a new humanity, a new people united to Christ and to one another. 

What does this mean, practically? It means that you and I have more in common with a poor Maasai woman who knows Jesus than with our next-door neighbor who does not. It means that we are called to move towards brothers and sisters in Christ who don’t look like us or think like us…brothers and sisters who we may not even like very much. Perhaps even people who our culture tells us we should not love and should not associate with. 

This is why I love the Church. The Church is not always easy—she is full of broken, messy sinners. Hurting people who hurt others. And yet. The Church puts the reconciling power of the gospel on full display. The Church defies the wisdom of the world, as people who were once strangers and enemies become family. 

Sometimes, I want to give up on this family. It’s hard to embrace people who are different than me. But if Christ has torn down the dividing wall of hostility, if He has ended the war between God and man, if He has made peace with me, who am I to put the wall up again? Brothers and sisters, my prayer is that we all lay our weapons down and open our hands towards one another. Let’s stop all the fight.