Recently I have been spending some of my free time cleaning out the garage. My wife hate’s the garage because there are a “few” spiders hanging around. She doesn’t like spiders and gets creeped out when they are around.

While we were on holidays on Vancouver Island, we saw a lot of them in and around the cabin we stayed in. Being a good husband, I did my best to take care of them.

That being said, for me I love spiders. I think they are cool… furry, creepy…and super hunters. I’m fascinated by them but the thing I like most of all about spiders is they remind me of the movie, Charlotte’s Web.

I think all of us remember to the conversation between Charlotte and Wilbur…
“Salutations.”
“Salu-what?”
“Salutations.”
“What are they? And who are you?”
“Salutations are greetings; it’s my fancy way of saying hello.”

I think all of us love that story. It’s funny and sad. There is an innocence about it and yet there is the harsh reality about the circle of life. That being said, every time I hear “salutations,” I smile and think of Charlotte and that wonderful story.

I doubt anyone these days is as formal and articulate when greeting friends. However, the opening lines that we write (or more likely text) do have significance. They are clues about who we are, the type of relationship we have to the person we are addressing, and what we are about to say.

That is why we should pay attention to Paul’s signature opening. “Grace and peace” is found in some form at the beginning of all of his epistles.

What you might not realize is that Paul coined a phrase that had never been used before. Grace might have sounded to a first-century person like a standard greeting in Greek, but it was full of deep theological meaning. Then he combined it with the Hebrew greeting Peace to create a uniquely Christian greeting.

What I love about this phrase is that Paul did not try to make the Greek believers lose their distinct cultural identity. Nor did he require Jewish believers to drop their rich heritage. In this lovely greeting, we see Paul’s brilliance and sensitivity to the Holy Spirit by using salutations (thinking of Charlotte again) that both groups would find familiar.

Paul did not compartmentalize either group by addressing them separately. Instead, he sought to lift them to a new height, a new way of relating to people from different backgrounds and different cultures. The beginning of this radical and beautiful concept was always in the heart of God, and the ground is level at the foot of the cross. The gospel should transform not only how we love and relate to God, but also how we love and relate to one another!

In Paul’s day, Jews and Greeks, slaves and free people, males and females lived in vastly different worlds and would rarely intersect without tension. But from eternity, deep in the heart of God, what once divided humanity in sin would find healing and reconciliation in our new births, our new identities as children of God.

When you look at most church congregations, you see a myriad of different people. Depending on the time of year and the community you are a part of, you may see skinny jeans and Hawaiian shirts, tank tops and polo shirts, tattoos and coiffed and oddly coloured hair. This is the beauty of diversity and unity that is on display to a broken and fractured world. This is the power of the church’s witness.

So how is the beauty of the grace and peace of God working in your life? As each of us has received this grace, peace, reconciliation, and forgiveness from God, are we willing to extend it to others? These are the vertical and horizontal implications of the gospel in our lives. Look over the landscape of your world; how are you doing crossing the great divide?

2 Cor 5:18 says, “Now all these things are from God, who reconciled us to Himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation.” We have a responsibility to be “bridge builders” because of the bridge God built for us through His Son. Diversity is a strength for us as Christians because at our foundation, our identity is Christ. Faith surpasses blood, skin colour, gender and whatever else we use to differentiate each other.

So as we go through our lives and encounter different people, I want each of us to take the opportunity to engage and work at building bridges. In doing so, we are following the example of Christ. Salutations!