He is our Peace - November 26, 2017 Sermon - Ephesians 2:11-18
Who are your personal heroes? Who do you look up to/want to be like? Or what people group do you admire?
Who do you look down on? What people group do you have less empathy for than others?
Some Canadians, I’ve noticed, really look up to the US and wish we could be more like them (perhaps not as much as they are currently, but historically).
I know many in the US look down on Mexico. Canada loves Cuba. Many in the US really dislike Cuba. And we have our reasons. For Canadians, Cuba is an awesome escape from our dreary winters. For Americans, Cuba once posed a serious nuclear threat.
Maybe it’s a beggar you pass on the street that you look down on? Maybe a murderer? Maybe a person who gay, or maybe it’s a person who is homophobic?
Maybe someone too liberal in their view. Maybe someone too conservative in their views
In the US whole people groups look down on each other. Republicans look down on Democrats. Progressives look down on conservatives and visa versa. The climate south of the border has never been as divided, as “us and them”.
Don’t we often put down other groups, or observe others putting down others? Isn’t their something about the human heart that seeks to prop itself up by putting another down. It’s a universal experience.
There’s division. There’s separation. There’s alienation and isolation.
And this is embedded in human history. It’s part of the human experience. It was part of the experience of the first followers of Jesus.
We are continuing in our series on the book of Ephesians, and In our passage today Paul is talking about a huge separation between people groups, the separation between people of his own heritage - Hebrews or Jewish people - Jews, and gentiles.
Gentiles are literally anyone on the planet who is not Jewish. Most of us in this room would likely be gentiles.
In Paul’s time in the Jewish mind there was a huge distinction between the chosen people and the rest of humanity.
There was distrust, and there was not a little hatred.
You have to understand that for Jewish people, their experience of non-Jewish people was not good.
We just have to look in the Hebrew Bible or Old Testament to see this. Are there gentiles in the OT? Sure.
To mention a few, the Assyrians, who were oppressors. The Romans who were oppressors. The Egyptians who were perhaps the lynchpin oppressors.
Much is still made of how God delivered the Hebrew people from 400 years of oppression under various Egyptian pharaohs.
So in the Bible we get a glimpse into history that helps us to hopefully understand why such division existed.
And not only was there much historical reason for hatred between people, there are also, in the Old Testament, God‘s commands for the chosen people to specifically not mingle with other nations.
They were to keep themselves separate, do not allow their religious practises and faith to be influenced and more than likely distorted by the practises of Gentile nations.
We can see the wisdom of God‘s command even as we can see that virtually every single time the Hebrews mingled with other nations, they stopped worshipping the true God and started to follow pagan practices.
By the time of the Incarnation and in the era of the early church, this division between Jew and Gentile was an impenetrable wall.
The Temple itself contained a symbol of this division. (Show image)
The court was separated from the (Jewish court) by a large curtain. Gentiles could not cross this threshold without the likelihood that they would be killed.
Non-Jews were considered so unspiritual that even being in their presence could make a person ceremonially unclean (John 18:28).
Gentiles were called “the uncircumcised”, and they were considered entirely separated from God and without the blessing of God.
So perhaps we’ve created a picture of the division that existed at the time of the early church.
The Jews and the Gentiles were 2 distinct societies that had to mingle due to living in shared space for the most part, having a shared commerce and, actually, having a shared ‘oppressor’ in the form of the Roman overlords who keep everyone in line with the threat of death if they crossed the line.
Into this divisive situation Jesus had come. Although He said he had come for the lost sheep of Israel, His actions hinted at the fact that God’s favour was about to extend beyond the Jewish people.
Jesus for example healed a Roman centurion’s servant (Luke 7:1–10).
He traveled through the Gentile region of the Gerasenes (Mark 5:1). He ministered in a Samaritan city (John 4).
After Jesus’ death and resurrection, He commissioned the disciples to “go into all the world and make disciples, baptising them in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.
The Apostle Paul, who wrote the book of Ephesians that we are studying, had been, in his own words: “...Of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; in regard to the law, a Pharisee”. Philippians 3:4-6
But Paul himself had encountered Jesus on his way to persecute the early church. His life was turned around completely.
Though he started out as the main threat to the early church, he became its greatest ally. No one understood the irreconcilable division between the Jews and Gentiles better than Paul.
But he wrote this: 11 Therefore, remember that formerly you who are Gentiles by birth and called “uncircumcised” by those who call themselves “the circumcision” (which is done in the body by human hands)—12 remember that at that time you were separate from Christ, excluded from citizenship in Israel and foreigners to the covenants of the promise, without hope and without God in the world”.
Paul is writing to Gentile believers in Ephesus, reminding them that before they had come to Jesus they were “excluded from citizenship in Israel and foreigners to the covenants of the promise, without hope and without God in the world”.
Before Jesus, there was no hope and no promise for Gentiles. There was no sacrifice for them.
The Jews had the sacrificial system by which they could make temporary atonement for their sins. The gentiles had nothing.
13 But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far away have been brought near by the blood of Christ.
Through the sacrifice of Jesus, those who at one time were very far off from God, now they are brought very near to God, as near as Jewish believers. There was to be no difference now between them.
14 For he himself is our peace, who has made the two groups one and has destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility, 15 by setting aside in his flesh the law with its commands and regulations.His purpose was to create in himself one new humanity out of the two, thus making peace, 16 and in one body to reconcile both of them to God through the cross, by which he put to death their hostility.
Jesus has healed the division between these groups that were once completely irreconcilable.
He has made former enemies friends. He has evened out the terrain.
All are the same before the living God, and everyone has access to the promise of salvation through the blood of Jesus.
17 He came and preached peace to you who were far away and peace to those who were near. 18 For through him we both have access to the Father by one Spirit.
The same message was delivered to the Jews and to the gentiles. The same relationship with God is available to all.
The peace of Jesus would belong to every human who would put their trust in the blood of Jesus.
This was a revolutionary idea and reality. This means that there are no meaningful differences between you and me, between people.
There is no inherent reason to not be brought together. There is no reason for anyone of us to look down on any other person.
There are no meaningful differences between people. And we are all alike in being people for Whom God proved His love for us when Jesus laid down His life.
We are all alike in that Jesus calls us His beloved, and He preached peach to those who were far away and those who were near so that together we would live lives in which we experience the peace of God.
What does it mean to have peace with God?
An important step to having peace with God is simply recognizing that God is God and we are not. That God is holy, and perfect and without fault, and we are not.
The Bible uses the word “sin” to describe humanity. The word “sin” means to miss the mark.
All of humanity has missed the mark.
Every one of us. This is something else that we share in common. All people have the same need for God.
If we get that, the effect should be to make us humble. To want to come before God and admit our sinfulness. To admit that we’ve been living without Him in our lives.
But it can be tough to admit this.
1. We make excuses for ourselves ("that’s just the way I am")
2. We point at others and cry that they were guilty too... (like the child who cries: "but he hit me first")
3. Or we compare ourselves with someone else: "I’m just as good as..." (Paul wrote that when compare ourselves with others, we prove that we are not wise)
4. Or we break out the scale. You know the one I mean. The one where we weigh our sins against our good actions and hope that the good outweighs the bad.
The good news is that we don’t have to make excuses. We don’t have to compare, we don’t have to blindly hope that our good will outweigh our bad and maybe just maybe God will accept us in the end.
Romans 5:9-11 says this: “And since we have been made right in God’s sight by the blood of Christ, he will certainly save us from God’s condemnation”.
Sin brings condemnation. When it’s not dealt with, when it’s not confessed, The blood of Christ makes you right in God’s eyes.
Now some say, “That’s too easy. If I don’t have to work for it, if it’s not me paying for my sins myself, I just can’t appreciate it. “It’s cheap”. It may be relatively easy for us, but it’s not cheap.
An American business man enjoyed the famous Passion Play at Eureka Springs, Arkansas. After the play, the man went backstage to meet the actor who portrayed Jesus.
As they talked, the man saw the cross that the actor carried in the play.
Before the actor had a chance to stop him, the business man handed over his camera and said, "Hey, take a picture of me carrying the cross." He bent over and tried in vain to lift the huge cross to his shoulders.
With sweat rolling down his face, he turned in frustration to the actor and said, "I thought it would be hollow; why is it so heavy?"
With a smile of compassion the actor answered, "If I could not feel the weight of it, it would be impossible to play the part."
When Jesus went to Calvary, He carried our sins with Him. Perhaps this reality alone caused the cross to weigh so heavy upon the strong shoulders of the carpenter from Nazareth.
Unless we feel this weight He bore, we will never fully understand the meaning of being in debt to Jesus. Of how much He has done for you. For me.
Jesus died a RECONCILING death. You’ve heard the scripture, “The wages of sin is death”. Well ,once there was no peace between us and God because of sin. Because of Jesus death, we are made friends with God. Friends with God.
So a key step toward peace with God is always repentance. We take an honest inventory of ourselves and we see we’re going down the wrong path.
We make the choice to turn away from sin and toward God.
The next step toward peace with God is what today’s passage is all about. And it is the key thing that unites all people.
It involves faith, it involves believing that God has made peace with you by Christ’s blood on the cross. Jesus said: “This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins”. Mt 26:28
It was important that Jesus shed his blood. “Without the shedding of blood there is no remission of sin” (Heb.9:22). They could have choked Him to death. They could have poisoned Him.
But, Jesus needed to shed his blood. Crucifixion was a bloody form of death. John said about Jesus, “Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world” (John 1:29). Jesus was the ultimate sin sacrifice.
Jesus died a reconciling death.
But once you and I are reconciled, what do we do? Is it about just being saved or is there more to it. Of course there is.
2 Cor 5:18 And all of this is a gift from God, who brought us back to himself through Christ. And God has given us this task of reconciling people to him. 19 For God was in Christ, reconciling the world to himself, no longer counting people’s sins against them.
And he gave us this wonderful message of reconciliation.
We become reconcilers. We receive the gift of salvation, of life that comes from the hand of God, and we live that gift. We become that gift to others. As the scripture says: “God has given us this task of reconciling people to him”.
Today we started out thinking about the division in the world, but now we see that reconciliation, healing of relationships, has come into the world through Jesus Christ.
Again, most of us are gentiles and, but for Jesus, would have been excluded from the promises of God.
And we see that we not only have benefitted from this personally by being included through the sacrifice of Jesus in the promises of God, we have been made, and are called to behave as reconcilers.
What an amazing privilege. What an honour that you have been chosen by God to lead people to peace through a relationship with Jesus Christ.
God wants us to pass along the blessings we have received from Him. He wants those blessings to go through our lives to others.
Every gift God gives you he gives you to bless you and he gives it to you to pass through your life to others.
Does He give you his kindness and patience? Absolutely. He gives it to you for you and he wants it to pass through you to others.
Does He give you his love and demonstrate his love to you in tangible ways? Absolutely. He gives it to you for you and he wants it to pass through your life to others.
Does He give you his grace? His unmerited favor. Unearned, undeserved.
Does He give you His peace? Absolutely He gives it to you for you, and he wants it to pass through you to others.
So may we be bearers of good news. In our conduct may we be used by God to demonstrate His loveliness, His goodness and His beauty.
May we live at peace with others, doing, as the Scripture tells us, all that depends on us to be at peace with others.
I close with a passage from Galatians that sums up today’s message very nicely.
“In Christ Jesus you are all children of God through faith, for all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. If you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise. Galatians 3:26-29
