Robert Louis Stevenson, in his non-fiction travel book Edinburgh: Picturesque Notes (1878), wrote about two unmarried sisters who shared a single room. Sadly, the sisters had a falling out, which Stevenson said was “on some point of controversial divinity” – so much so that they never spoke to each other again! There were no words, either kind or spiteful. Just stone-cold silence.
You would think that they would have separated, but nothing of the sort happened. Perhaps it was because of a lack of financial means, or of an innate Scottish fear of scandal, that they continued to keep house together in a single room. A chalk line was drawn across the floor, which separated the two domains. It divided the doorway and the fireplace so that each could go in and out and do her own cooking, without invading the territory of the other.
For years, they coexisted in hateful silence. Their meals, their baths, even their family visitors were exposed to the other’s unfriendly silence. And at night, each went to bed listening to the heavy breathing of her enemy. Thus, the two sisters (ostensibly daughters of the same church) continued the rest of their miserable lives. (From “Discover the Word,” February 8, 2013).
I guess you could chalk up this story to any number of things. Pride would probably top the list. Each sister was proud of her theological understanding on whatever the point of difference was. The church in Corinth was divided over meat offered to idols. Paul wrote, “No about food sacrificed to idols: We know that ‘we all possess knowledge.’ But knowledge puffs up while love builds up” (1 Cor. 8:1). Pride of knowledge on some issue can cause us to reach for the chalk and draw a line down the very center of the church.
Selfishness would have to be added to the “chalk it up” list. A man named Diotrephes was selfish to the core. John warned about him, saying, “he loves to be first” (3 John 9). Everything had to go his way, or out came the chalk. Not only did he “gossip maliciously” about the apostle John, but he refused to welcome other Christian brothers. “He also stops those who want to do so and puts them out of the church” (v. 10). Some “chalk artists” do the same today. “It’s my way or the highway for you!” Is there a Diotrephes in the house?
Personal preferences in matters of opinion can also make the chalk talk. Churches have divided for years because some prefer this and others prefer that, from music to meals to ministers. In the church in Rome, a chalk line threatened to separate the bellicose broccoli brothers from the militant ministers of meat. Paul told folks on both sides to erase the chalk line. “One person’s faith allows them to eat anything, but another, whose faith is weak, eats only vegetables. The one who eats everything must not treat with contempt the one who does not, and the one who does not eat everything must not judge the one who does, for God has accepted them” (Rom. 14:2-3). Who am I (and who are you) to reject someone whom God has received?
There were actually two surly sisters in Scripture who could not seem to agree with each other. Their names were Euodia and Syntyche, and they were living on opposite sides of their chalk line. (Someone nicknamed them “Odious” and “Soon Touchy.”) We do not even know what it was that they could not agree upon! This sad situation existed in the church in Philippi. Paul was extremely distressed over this sorry situation and found it necessary to include their names in a church letter. “I plead with Euodia and I plead with Syntyche to agree with each other in the Lord” (Phil. 4:2). How would you feel if your name were read aloud in a church letter for being a problem in the congregation? Embarrassed? Ashamed? I would think so. Paul even had to ask one of his yokefellows (some say his name was Szygus) to “help these women who have contended at my side in the cause of the gospel” (v. 3). What amazing irony! At one time, these two sisters in Christ had “contended for the faith” right alongside the great apostle Paul, but now they were kicking up the chalk dust, reduced to being contentious with each other over who knows what!
I hope good old Szygus took their piece of chalk away. I surely hope the two sisters in Philippi made peace, got down on their knees, and scrubbed away the chalk line. I hope they started loving each other once again and began “contending for the faith” instead of being contentious with each other and drawing childish chalk lines over who knows what. Friends, when we decide to agree with each other in the Lord, there is no need for any more chalk talk, chalk walk, or chalk lines in the church. Chalk one up for the Lord Jesus when you can divest yourself of pride, selfishness, and personal preferences; gladly accept those whom God has accepted; and plunge into the great work of contending for the faith! In essentials, unity; in opinions, liberty; in all things, love.
