Ephesians 2 v 14 thru 22

Transcript

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He's already taken us from death to life in the first 10 verses and from being alienated to reconciled in verses 11 through 13. And now we're gonna finish this chapter. Fear not, we won't be here till 2 o'clock, I promise. Uh but I I do have some rollover minutes left from last week as I was not feeling well. I preached a uh 18-minute and 41-second sermon is what the timer showed on on the recording app that I use. And I've never preached an 18-minute sermon here, so uh I've I've preached 48-minute sermons here, but never 18. So uh but uh the the reality of the passage this morning is that um Paul is unfolding for us here one of the the most glorious realities in the gospel of Christ: that not only are we as sinners reconciled to God, but we are also reconciled to each other in Christ. And the dividing walls that once separated humanity, that of us to God and that of Jew and Gentile, has been torn down by the sacrifice of Christ. And this passage is not merely about some sort of social harmony, but it's about the redemptive reconciliation accomplished by Christ and applied by the Holy Spirit, and so it forms one redeemed people for the glory of God. There are not divisions in the body of Christ, there are not classes of Christians. Said before, I heard an old preacher say one time, either you is or you ain't. And that's the reality. You're either born again in Christ or you are not. And so let's look this morning at beginning in verse 14 down through the end of chapter two. It says, For he himself is our peace, who has made us both one and has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility, by abolishing the law of commandments expressed in ordinances, that he might create in himself one new man in place of the two, so making peace, and might reconcile us both to God in one body through the cross, thereby killing the hostility. And he came and preached peace to you who were far off, and peace to those who were near. For through him we both have access in one spirit to the Father. So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus Himself being the cornerstone, in whom the whole structure being joined together grows into a holy temple in the Lord. In him you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit. Let's pray. Father, we thank you for your word today. God, we thank you for my brother Brandon and his family who've come to minister to us today. God, we pray grace and peace upon them and strength through the trial that they're currently going through. Lord, we know they're leaning on you and trusting in you. Father, I ask that you would pour out your blessings upon them in ways that will just blow their minds. God, that they would continue to give you the glory for all that you do and all that you are. Father, have your way in this service today, I pray in Jesus' name. Amen. So Paul begins this section here by saying that Christ himself is our peace. And he says, He himself is our peace who has made us both one and broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility. Paul does not merely say that Christ just brings peace, but he says, He himself is our peace. He's the person of peace. The Greek phrase that is used there, and I'm not going to try to say it because I'll butcher it and just know that it emphasizes identity, that Christ does not merely mediate our peace externally to himself, but that he embodies our peace. The peace that he's speaking of is the peace with God, that we have peace with God. He also, based on the position of the word that is used there, autos, with meaning he and himself, is the only one who alone is our peace. Hence the English translation says he himself, meaning in himself, that he is our peace. Colossians 1 tells us that for in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross. Christ is our peace. Isaiah 9:6 even says one of the names for Christ, Prince of Peace. It's one of the titles given to him. John Calvin wrote that he is called our peace because he has reconciled us to the Father, and because he has united us among ourselves. So we have peace with God and we have peace with one another. He not only provides our peace, he is our peace. And remember, over a hundred times in this short letter, Paul uses the phrases in him, in Christ, and in the beloved. All of this happens because our peace is only possible because of Christ's atoning death and shed blood on the cross. The finished work of Christ makes this possible. And without it, we would still be lost and we would still be at war with God. And then he talks about breaking down the wall. He has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility. So really two uses of this concept here in this passage are applicable. You have the ceremonial law that separates the Jews and the Gentiles. That is broken away. That is done away with. And then the literal barrier in the courts in the temple that separated the outer court where Gentiles were allowed to go and the inner court where only Jews were allowed to go. He's torn that down. We know that. He's the one who granted us access. As he gave up his life on the cross, we know the temple veil was torn in two, symbolizing that now everyone through Christ has access to the Father. And so he breaks down that wall and it signifies the word that is used there, it's Mesotoikon, and it means middle wall, and it it signifies a real, entrenched, established division. In Christ, that is gone. That's why Paul writes in Christ there is no Jew or Greek, free or slave, male or female. At the foot of the cross, the ground is level. There is nothing that makes anyone more worthy of Christ than any other because all of us are unworthy. We have nothing, my favorite quote by Jonathan Edwards, we have nothing to bring to our salvation except the sin that makes it necessary. That's all we bring. We don't bring anything to our salvation except the need for it. I don't bring any goodness to God to make him say, oh, well, look at Daryl. I should save him. Because before the foundation of the world, right? Chapter 1 told us, he chose us in him from before the foundation of the world. Revelation confirms that and says that those whose names were written in the Lamb's book of life from before the foundation of the world. It's not rooted in me. It's not rooted in anything I've done. It's rooted in God's choice of me. Why? I don't know. I can't tell you why. All I can tell you is it's true. Because I'm not the man I used to be. I'm not the person I used to be. Brother, I love that song about coming back to your first love. That's wow. What a message in that song. Read the letters in chapters three, four of Revelation. Philippi. You left your first love. What a tremendous message that our first love is Christ. And always should be. For a believer in Christ, we have nowhere else to go but to Christ. This division that exists that Paul is addressing, part of that is, I mean, Acts 10.28 gives us a clear picture about Jews not associating with Gentiles. And then Colossians 2.14, how Jesus dealt with that, it says that Christ canceled the record of debt, nailing it to the cross. He canceled our debt. Imagine every debt you've ever had in your entire life, and someone walks into your house and says, These are all paid in full. Even that doesn't compare. Because Christ canceling our debt of sin and giving us his righteousness. Have you all ever heard anybody mention 2 Corinthians 5 21? Only uh just about every week, right? In him we become the righteousness of God. Why? Because God, on our behalf, made him who knew no sin to be sin. He took our sin upon us, so that in him we get his righteousness. Why is that necessary? Because God's standard is perfection. Be perfect as I am perfect. Go and sin no more. We can't do that in and of ourselves. So we need a righteousness that is from outside of us, and Christ provides that. He gives that to us, and when we come to faith in Christ, that great exchange happens. Our sin is placed on Christ on the cross, and we receive his righteousness. I'm reminded of the old hymn, one of my favorites ever. It is well with my soul. The third verse in most hymnals, it's the third verse, says, My sin. Oh, the bliss of this glorious thought, my sin, not in part, but the whole is nailed to his cross and I bear it no more. Praise the Lord, praise the Lord, oh my soul. If God does nothing else that you think is positive in your life, if that's true in your life, you have every reason to praise him for the rest of your days and for the rest of eternity. What a message. John Chrysostom wrote this. He said that he did not merely lessen the enmity. That means our warring, our striving. He didn't just lessen it, he said he destroyed it utterly. Our striving, our warring, our fighting against God and his will, Christ destroyed it completely. So when we come to faith in him, then we have this verses, last part of verse 15 and the beginning of verse 16, we have this abolishing of the hostility that is in Christ. Says he abolished the law of commandments expressed in ordinances. Why? That he might create in himself one new man in place of the two, so making peace. He abolished the law of commandments. Am I saying he did away with the law? No, we understand Matthew 5 tells us that he came and he fulfilled the law. Okay, so this word abolished means he rendered it inoperative. All of the ceremonies, all the rituals, all those sacrifices that had to be done over and over and over and over for the sins of the people are now no longer necessary. He didn't destroy God's moral law, but he fulfilled it and set aside the ceremonial distinctions that separated Jew and Gentile. We don't need to rely on those things anymore. Do not think I've come to abolish the law or the prophets. I have not come to abolish them, but to fulfill them, Matthew 5, 17. He came to fulfill the law. What the law could not accomplish, Christ accomplished. What was the purpose of the law? The purpose of the law, Scripture tells us, was to show us our sin. So that we might know where we were failing. And so then the ceremonies came in order to cover sin for a while, but it didn't abolish it, it didn't take it away, it didn't remove the sin. It just covered it over. And those things had to be done over and over and over and over again. In fact, Hebrews 10:1 tells us that for since the law was but a shadow of the good things to come instead of the true form of these realities, it can never, by the same sacrifices that are continually offered every year, make perfect those who draw near. The law can't do that. Why? Because we can't perfectly obey the law. We can't perfectly obey the law. What the law could not accomplish, what the sacrifices could not accomplish, Christ has accomplished. He has accomplished. Augustine wrote, the law was given that grace might be sought, and grace was given that the law might be fulfilled. I don't think you heard me. The law was given that grace might be sought. Grace was given that the law might be fulfilled. What the law could not accomplish, grace accomplished in the person of Jesus Christ. We can't overlook that. And then he says that he created creates in himself one new man. This is not a cooperation, us working with God. This is that 2 Corinthians 5.17, new creation. And he would be in Christ, he's a new creation, old things are passed away, behold, all things become new. And chainos is new in kind, not just new in time. And that word means we are created as something different than we used to be. We're a different species than we were before. Why? Because we were sinners lost without Christ, but now in Christ we are new creations. We are recreated and adopted into the family of God as children of God. Not just in the sense of God's the Father of all because he's the creator, but as children of God by his choice and adoption in Christ. Not Jew plus Gentile coexistence, but this is a new humanity in Christ. And those new creations are united in Christ. Galatians 3.28 says, You are all one in Christ Jesus. You are one in Christ Jesus. Great Scottish reformer John Knox, he emphasized the unity of the church. He said, In Christ Jesus there is neither division nor distinction that can divide the body, which he has redeemed. When Christ has redeemed you, I wish I had about three hours. But when we think about the fact that Christ has redeemed us, and he has made us new, and he has made us one, and we're not our own anymore because we were bought at a price, and you begin to put all these things together and to really understand what Christ has done, it gives us zero reason to be prideful and puffed up. It drives us further down to the dirt on our faces before God to say, thank you, God. Thank you, God. Because we understand more and more, I have nothing to do with it. It wasn't because I chose Christ, it wasn't because I did anything. I I love, I mentioned before, every time I see this on social media, I reshare it on Facebook. It's it's where Alistair Begg is talking about the thief on the cross. And he said, he said, I can't wait to talk to that guy when I get to heaven and ask him, How did that all shake out for you? Because one minute you're hanging on the cross and you're cussing the guy with your friend over there. And the next minute he says, Today you'll be with me in paradise, and here you are. And the angel at the gate says, What are you doing here? And he's I don't know. He says, What do you mean I don't know? He says, Well, I don't know. And he kind of fumbles around and he says, Well, let me get the supervisor angel. So he goes and gets the supervisor angel and he comes up and he says, What let's just start. Are you clear on the doctrine of justification by faith? And the guy goes, I never heard of it. Well, let's just go straight to the doctrine of scripture, and the guy just looks at him. And he says, On what basis are you here? And the man's response is the man on the middle cross said, I can come. The only correct answer we have for why we go to heaven is in the third person. Because Christ. Because he is the one who created in himself one new man, one new person. He is the one who has done that. And because of that, we are reconciled through the cross. One new man in the place of two, so making peace, and might reconcile us both to God in one body through the cross, thereby killing the hostility. We are reconciled to God. This is a full restoration here. This is completely being restored, made new. We have vertical restoration and reconciliation to God, which then produces a horizontal restoration and reconciliation with one another. When we're in Christ, we love fellow believers. Romans 5.10, for while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his son. Much more, how now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by his life? And Colossians 1.22 says he is now reconciled in his body of flesh by his death in order to present you holy and blameless and above reproach before him. Who's the active person in all of that? Christ. Christ has done, he has accomplished. Charles Spurgeon said the cross kills enmity at its root. It slays hatred, pride, and division. Now, sadly, throughout the centuries, there have been lots of people who have used Scripture as a means of hating people, by twisting it out of context, by using it as a cudgel to beat people over the head with. Speaking the truth, absent love, absent compassion. That's not what we are called to do. In fact, especially when it comes to the body of Christ, we need to remember Jesus' words in John 13, 35. By this, all people will know that you are my disciples if you have love for one another. If you lack love for other believers, you better check your heart. You better check your heart. And this is serious because we are no longer our own. We are new creations, cre recreated in the image of Christ, and we are called. To we are commanded to love one another. Then Christ proclaims peace, verse 17. He came and preached peace to you who were far off, and peace to you who were near. There's a universal scope in that. Far off? Clearly, that is speaking of Gentiles. Near, those are Jews. So who does that cover? Well, that covers it all. Because you're either a Jew or you're a Gentile. There is no third door, Monty. That's it. We don't have another option. And so Christ preaches rather peace through his earthly ministry, through his apostles, and through his word today. Isaiah 57, 19 says, peace, peace to the far and to the near, says the Lord, and I will heal him. Peace. That's what we need. We need peace with God, and that only comes through Christ. And the means of that is the proclaiming of the gospel. Paul uses a word here, preach the good news. That's all one word. UN Ghisto. And it means it highlights the gospel as the instrument of peace. It ties right in with Romans 1:16. I mentioned in Sunday school, I'm not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God unto salvation for everyone who believes to the Jew first and also to the Greek. So we have nothing to claim except for the peace of God that is only found in Christ.

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R.

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C. Sproul said that peace with God is not negotiated, is proclaimed in the gospel, and it is received by faith. We just we get it as a gift. Peace with God. And then verse 18, he says we have access to the Father, for through him we both have access in one spirit to the Father. Notice there's a Trinitarian structure there. Through the Son, by the Spirit, to the Father. Father, Son, and Spirit working together. The word access there is it's the word prosagoge. Don't you feel blessed for hearing that? But the reality is it refers to being brought into the presence of a king. And Romans 5, 2, we've obtained access by faith. Hebrews 4.16, we can boldly approach the throne. John MacArthur said that believers do not stand at a distance, they are ushered into the very presence of God. That's only possible in Christ. The clear implication here is that without Christ and his atonement, we don't have access to the Father. This only serves to verify the Lord's claim about Himself in John 14, 6, I am the way, the truth, and the life, and no one comes to the Father but by me. It bolsters the statement of Peter in Acts 4.12 when he says, Neither is there salvation in any other, for there's no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved. And there is no door to, there's no option B, there's no other way to the Father except by grace through faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. It's the only hope we have. Verses 19 and 20, then he talks about a new identity that we are citizens and we are family. You are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God. We are one people. All who are in Christ, we are one church. Now there may be different buildings around town, but the church of Jesus Christ, the true church, we are one. We are one in Him. The reality is then He goes on and says that that household of God is built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus Himself being the cornerstone. Remember that old song? Cornerstone? Jesus is the cornerstone. Man, it's I don't know, 70s, at least that old. What a great song. Though rejected by his own, he became the cornerstone. Till the breaking of the dawn. The picture of Christ as the cornerstone, and here's the thing we have to bear in mind: in this is once you set the cornerstone and you build the foundation according to the trueness of that cornerstone, you don't build the foundation again. It's laid, it's there, it's not going anywhere. So when we veer from what Christ and his apostles told us, we're in error. There's a lot of that in the world today. It's a lot of, well, follow your heart. No, don't do that because it's deceitfully wicked above all other things. Follow Christ. Follow his word. Well, live your truth. There's only truth. We don't get to choose our own. It's the truth or falsehood. It's not rocket science. Facts change, truth is eternal. Okay? So we have this move from alienation to citizenship. Strangers, sojourners, now fellow citizens. Philippians 3.20 tells us our citizenship is not here. It's in heaven. It's in heaven. We're members of God's household, not just a legal status, but this is speaking of a familial intimacy, that closeness that families have. Some families don't have that. Some people don't understand that concept because they weren't raised in a great home environment. And they haven't grown up with that example. I was raised by parents who I'm the youngest of seven. And until the day my mom died when I was 17 years old, I can still remember my mom standing at the stove and cooking dinner, and my dad would walk past and yes, gentlemen, what do you think he did? Pat her right on the beehind. I was raised with a healthy picture of what a loving relationship looks like. And more importantly than that, what a loving relationship rooted and grounded in Christ looks like. And if you weren't raised with that, that's okay. You can be that example, right, brother? You can be that example. You can be the example that says, no matter what comes, Christ is first, then husbands, wife is second. Children come after that. That's biblical. You're her covering, you're their covering, but she is your help need. Wives? He's second after God. God first, then your husband. We have that familial relationship that exists there. I mean, Romans 8, Galatians 4. Talk about that adoption. We become family members. Romans 8 says we we receive the spirit of adoption. John Calvin says God not only receives us into favor, but adopts us as his children. He adopts us as his children. Then it's built on an apostolic foundation. Built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets. Christ Jesus Himself being the cornerstone. Foundation is the apostolic teaching, scripture. Cornerstone, Christ Himself. Why? Because He is perfectly aligned, perfectly rooted, will not move. Isaiah 28, 16 says, Behold, I am the one who has laid as a foundation in Zion a stone, a tested stone, a precious cornerstone of a sure foundation. Whoever believes will not be in haste. 1 Corinthians 3.11, for one can lay a can for one can lay a foundation other than that which is laid. For no one can lay a foundation other than that which is laid, which is Christ Jesus. Then we are a living temple in the last two verses. In whom the whole structure being joined together grows into a holy temple in the Lord. A growing temple. This idea of grows is it's speaking of ongoing sanctification. That we become more and more like Christ, more holy, more righteous in our actions. Until one day when we are in the presence of God, we will in our actions match the position that we have in Christ. Perfect holiness. A dwelling place for God by the Spirit. This is a permanent dwelling. The word that is used there, it's about 14 letters long, and I'm not going to try to say it, but it means a permanent dwelling. Permanent dwelling. We're in Christ, we stay in Christ. If we're truly in Christ. Ezekiel chapter 37 says, My dwelling place shall be with them. Revelation 21:3. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man, he will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God. The dwelling place is in the heart and life of every truly born-again believer. So, what do we do with all this? What do we do with this information? Well, first, rest in Christ as your peace. Rest in Christ as your peace. Stop seeking peace in circumstances, in people, in earthly relationships. Peace is found in Christ alone. So you want peace of mind? Turn to Christ. You want peace in your heart? Turn to Christ. You want peace in your relationships? Turn to Christ. You want peace with God? Turn to Christ. Then pursue unity in the church. Division contradicts the gospel that Christ died to secure. John 17, 21, Christ prayed for unity and he prays that we would be one just as he and the Father are one. That's one. No separation, no division. Charles Spurgeon warned that to divide the church is to wound the body of Christ. Then we need to live as citizens of heaven because our identity is no longer earthly, it is eternal and heavenly. Worship is God's temple because God dwells among his people. Christ is our peace. He has destroyed hostility. He has created a new humanity. He has reconciled us to God, and he has made us his dwelling place. Augustine wrote, Our hearts are restless until they rest in thee. And in Christ, that rest, that peace has finally come. Let's pray. Father, thank you for your word. Lord, we thank you for your grace that is found only in Christ. Thank you for his sacrifice, his willingness to go to the cross, to suffer and to endure our pain, our joy.