The Middle Wall

; “*He is our peace, who hath broken down the middle wall of partition between us.” — Epn. ii. 14.

Our Master was always breaking down the middle walls of partition. When we turn to the Scriptural records, and move along the highways of His life, there is a constant sound of falling walls. And they are venerable walls which are falling, walls which have stood for ages, and which have gathered to themselves the sacredness of the sanctuary. It may be helpful to turn for a moment and watch one or two places where the walls are falling. Here, then, is one instance.

The Lord is sitting by Jacob’s well. He is in conversation with a woman of Sychar. The disciples returned from a visit to a neighbouring village and “they marvelled that he talked with the woman, for the Jews have no dealings with the Samaritans.”’ Jesus went right up to that wall, and touched it, and it fell into dust, and He opened communion with the presumed alien who had dwelt on the other side.

Here is another instance: ‘‘ He is gone to be guest with a man that isasinner.’”’ The man was a customs officer, in the unenviable service of the foreigner, and such men were ringed about by walls of most rigid exclusiveness, and religious folk would have no fellowship with them. Jesus Christ went up to the wall, and He touched it, and it vanished like a veil of mist, and He sat at meat with publicans and sinners. When this middle wall went down the onlookers were staggered at the Lord’s transgression.

The disciples were frequently seeking to build new middle walls of partition. But the Lord would have none of them and He

hurled them into dust. Here is one wall being built: “‘ Master, we saw one casting out devils in Thy name, and we forbade him because he followeth not with us.” It was a wall of exclusion, and the Master immediately broke it down. ‘‘ He that is not against us is for us.”” And so all through the wonderful story the Lord is breaking the things which break the circle of human communion, and He is enlarging human kinships and correspondences on every side.

Now these middle walls are very strongly built. I saw a church the other day whose members are wishing to enlarge it. But they are almost afraid of the task. The walls are built of stone, dressed from the lava of Vesuvius! The circumstance presents an almost fierce piece of symbolism. In human life there are volcanic eruptions of burning passion and hatred, and the issues of the eruptions are afterwards found in lava walls of cold and rigid alienation. Racial eruption and racial walls! Ecclesiastical eruption and ecclesiastical walls! And these lava-built walls seem invincible.

Some walls are already built, and they are so hoary as the great walls of China. For instance, there is the caste wall in India. There are grim ecclesiastical walls in Britain, one middle wall separating Roman Catholics from Anglicans, and another middle wall separating Anglicans from Nonconformists. These walls are of great age, and they have become almost a natural part of the religious landscape. Other middle walls are even now being built. I think I see such a wall rising between the American people and the Japanese. And I think I see such a wall rising between Germany and Britain.

It is only in Christ Jesus that these lava walls find their solvent. When Christ is fully and deeply received the walls go down. If the middle walls remain in bristling antagonism it is full proof that the reception of Christ has been lukewarm and reluctant, and He can do there no mighty works because of their unbelief. Christ is the only hope for the world. Christ can break down the — grim middle walls in the world of industry.

1 November, 1920. — Ep.

He can break down the partition walls among the classes. He can break down the dividing walls in the Church. We knock timidly at the walls, and when we hear one another’s rappings we are filled with joyful hope of a new day. But the walls must go down, and they will go down when Christ is vitally in our midst.

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