You Belong
Pastor Jim Luthy
Ephesians 2:11-22
Let me introduce you to Dain. It’s not hard to tell that Dain is a Christian. He accepted Christ as his Lord and Savior when he was a child and grew up in the church. He went to Sunday School every week, winning perfect attendance pins more often than not. He is somewhat of a scholar of the Bible with a PhD in Instructional Systems and two Master’s degrees, one in Science and one in Divinity. He has used that knowledge to develop curriculum, both for Christian Education and for secular college education. He is currently working on a biblical curriculum with a Native American pastor to be presented as a seminar on tribal reservations. He reads his Bible every day and has read through the Bible a number of times. He spends a lot of time reading other books and magazines too. He subscribes to Leadership and Alliance Life Magazine. You have to look hard to see Dain "mess up." His talk is clean. He has, over time, trained himself to be moral and good. If you didn’t know Dain all that well, you might just be intimidated by his knowledge of the Bible and the relationship he has developed with God.
Meet also Curran. Curran is a brand new believer. He just asked Christ to make him a new creation this week. He struggles with that decision though because he realizes just how much he displeases God. If you spend some time with him, he might accidentally swear around you. If you examined his life, there might be a number of things you would disapprove of, perhaps some things Dain has learned not to do. Curran has recently started reading the Bible, but not regularly, partly because he doesn’t understand much of what he reads. He asks questions that seem simple to many of us. Sometimes he might just sit in a small group and nod his head like he understands when he really doesn’t get it at all. When the group prays, he’s not likely to pray out loud. He’s just not comfortable with that yet. You wouldn’t easily be intimidated by Curran’s walk of faith, no more than you would be concerned about a little toddler trampling over you in the street. It’s certain that Curran will walk a bit wobbly. His faith is new and appropriately simple.
Yet both Dain and Curran are God’s workmanship. They are the moral of the story throughout Ephesians.
Ephesians 2:11-22 is the climactic turning point of this letter. Paul has laid a foundation of truth by which all believers can stand. We’ve learned that Dain is blessed in the heavenly realms. So is Curran. The only true prize for either of these men is Christ alone. It’s not more educational degrees or the development of an effective seminar, nor is it to clean up their language or stop living as they once did, according to the sinful nature. God’s glory is to be their goal. Curran is a new creature in Christ—God’s workmanship. So is Dain. Both are created anew in Christ to do good works, which God prepared in advance for them to do.
That’s the foundation Paul has laid when he writes verse 11. He transitions with the word "therefore." Another way to understand him would be to say, "Since you are blessed and Jesus is your only goal and you are new creations, remember…"
Keep in mind that this book was written for an audience more like Curran than Dain. The Ephesians were primarily Gentile believers. To the Jews, they were second-class citizens. When they were called "the uncircumcised" by the Jewish believers, it was meant to be derogatory. Now I’m certain that nobody has been so calloused as to call Curran names, but you can understand how he might have felt second-rate in his spiritual seeking if he heard us refer to him as "the lost", or an "unbeliever," or worse yet, the "heathen." Now even if he never heard these terms, or if he heard them and was able to realize that those were not meant to be derogatory, he still has this battle that comes by the recognizable differences between his life and Dain’s and others who have followed Christ for a long time.
It’s hard to be new to the church and not feel like you don’t measure up.
So Paul draws on a theme to point out that there is no kingdom difference between Dain and Curran. He started the theme in verse 3 of chapter 2, saying that all of us lived to gratify the cravings of our sinful nature—that is, the flesh. What he will demonstrate is that it is not what we see in the flesh that makes us his. Our visible accomplishments are not what set us apart.
After all, the flesh is our humanity. It is in the flesh where our sinful nature is passed on from generation to generation. It is what we all have in common and that’s not good news.
In the Old Testament, we learned that the Jews were instructed to cut their flesh—to circumcise themselves—to set themselves apart as the people of God’s promise. Throughout history, man has tried to differentiate himself from others according to the flesh—either by how we look or how we behave. The Jews were no different. They had this mark on their body that declared whose they were. Those who didn’t have the mark, didn’t measure up.
Every war and every atrocity ever committed against man has come out of this insatiable urge to find differences between us. Slavery, racism, the holocaust, and even religious crusades have all been birthed in our flesh in an effort to find superiority in our differences. Paul wants to make it clear that in Jesus’ kingdom there is no such difference.
He says to the non-Jewish believers, "you used to live by the flesh. 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."
Curran can relate to that. Dain might easily forget.
But he also points something out about those who were Jewish and identified themselves as such by being circumcised. Many of them had an air of superiority in their derogatory remarks, claiming to be God’s alone because they wore this mark of the covenant. But Paul was quick to point out, "Hey, the evidence of their superiority may be nothing more than ‘that done in the body by the hands of men."
What you see in the flesh may not be what is real in the heart. The absence of flesh down below did not mean the presence of God in the heart. The denial of the flesh in fasting may not be a commitment of the heart to God. The exercise of the flesh of our lips might cry out, "Lord, Lord!" but he may reply, "I never knew you." He has to have our hearts.
Dain has to beware of that. Curran might easily forget.
Enter Jesus…in the flesh…
But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far away have been brought near through the blood of Christ. For he himself is our peace, who has made the two one and has destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility, by abolishing in his flesh the law with its commandments and regulations. His purpose was to create in himself one new man out of the two, thus making peace, and in this one body to reconcile both of them to God through the cross, by which he put to death their hostility. He came and preached peace to those who were far away and peace to those who were near. For through him we both have access to the Father by one Spirit. – Ephesians 2:13-18
Jesus, in his flesh, reconciled what we destroyed with our flesh. Man has already tried pleasing God by living according to the flesh, but we have proven incapable of keeping the commandments and regulations of the law. In our flesh we tried and failed and will continue to do so.
But Curran can no longer say "I don’t belong because of the struggles with my flesh." Nor can Dain say only he belongs because the things he does in his body are a more appropriate mark of God.
In our flesh we see a difference between the two. But God has destroyed that barrier and made them one. They both have access to the Father by one Spirit.
Consequently, Curran is no longer a foreigner and alien, but a fellow citizen of God’s kingdom with Dain. Both are members of God’s household. The foundation of that is not anything these men do in the flesh. The foundation is not about seminars and swear words or a distinction between who prays aloud and who doesn’t. The foundation is what the apostles and prophets have made clear about Jesus. What these men have in common is that Jesus is the cornerstone on which they build their lives.
God’s desire, then, is to grow these two men up together to become a dwelling place for God. That has nothing to do with the differences between them in their humanity, and everything to do with the similarities in what God has made of them.
That is peace. That is why Jesus is our peace and is the Prince of Peace. There is no moral superiority. There is no spiritual inferiority. There is afforded to both, on an equal basis, the grace to come to the Father through the sacrifice of Jesus on their behalf. The blood of Christ is sufficient to make both men equally pure. So they are one in Christ.
Later in the letter to the Ephesians, Paul would write, "Our battle is not against flesh and blood." Our battle is not against each other. Our battle is not about demonstrating our differences to see who is most superior. Our battle is not about trying to make other people to be like us. Our battle is one we share. It is "against the rulers, against the authorities, and against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms." Dain and Curran are equally in that battle as they are being built into the church of God in Christ Jesus. So are all of us who have put our trust in him.
When Jesus was crucified in the flesh, we lost our capacity to distinguish ourselves from one another based on what we can see. We are God’s household—his dwelling place. I belong. Dain belongs. Curran belongs. We belong because we belong to him.
