Sermon Tone Analysis

:* 1*  Lisa and I have been married for 27 years.

We fell in love and got married when we were very young – I was 23 and she was 20 by a few weeks.

Over the years, believe it or not!, we have had our share of disagreements, and I would be lying if I let on that we still don’t disagree about stuff from time to time.

Sometimes it’s over the “little” things - things like, “who is going to fold the laundry.”

:* 2* 

 

Both Lisa and I hate to fold laundry, but we both pretty much do it.

It’s a “whoever gets there first” kind of chore.

And sometimes I find myself figuring out ways to avoid going downstairs, just so I don’t get there first!

Now of course, I doesn’t bother me if /I / do that, but sometimes I’ll start to wonder if /she /is dong that – where I think Lisa ought to have “gotten there first” – well then I feel taken advantage of.

I still fold the laundry, but I do it with an attitude, and it is definitely NOT the attitude we talked about last week from Philippians 2!

 

We have different views of who ought to do what, and the more different your view is from mine, the more likely we are to disagree.

:* 3*  As a matter of fact, the more different you are from me, the more likely we are to disagree.

When that happens, we have moved away from “my way is better than your way,” to “me and mine is better than you and yours.”

Here in Washington D.C., we live in a very diverse culture.

The person in your office probably has a different faith, if any faith at all.

The folks sitting on the bus next to you may speak a different language.

And we find diversity in our homes.

You may have family members who are of a different denomination, or a spouse who brings a whole new set of ethnic traditions into your life.

Her “upbringing” may have been so different from yours, that you just don’t see eye to eye on a lot of things, like how to raise the kids.

Is there a way we can find unity, not uniformity but unity, with so much diversity?

Well, if turn in our text for today, in Ephesians chapter 2, what we will find out is that God is able to take people who /hate/ each other, /despise/ each other, and have done so for centuries, and unite them together.

And if He can do that, then I think anything is possible, even deciding who should fold the towels!

Our text is in Ephesians Chapter 2, where we start in verse 11.

If you are using the pew Bible, that’s page 151 in the New Testament.

:* 4*  Recall several weeks ago we saw how Paul reminded these Ephesian believers, and of course us as well, that “God made you, who were spiritually dead, alive together with Christ.”

And we saw that everything God gives us to live this Christian life, all the power, all the grace we need, comes to us by virtue of being united with Christ.

This Christian life cannot be lived apart from His power – power to become a mighty work of God, power to be used to make a real impact on a dead and dying world.

And all that for someone who was “dead in their trespasses and sins.”

:* 5*  Now we read in verse 11:  /11Therefore remember that formerly you, the Gentiles in the flesh, who are called “Uncircumcision” by the so-called “Circumcision,” which is performed in the flesh by human hands— 12remember that you were at that time separate from Christ, excluded from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world./

:* 6*  Let’s pause a minute, and think about this letter Paul is writing to the Ephesians.

If you have studied it before, you probably know that it is evenly divided between what we would call “doctrine” and “application.”

Most of the doctrine – information we *need* to know about how Christianity is supposed to work, comes to us in the first three chapters.

In the last three, we find instruction on how that doctrine – that theology - plays out in everyday life.

And by the way, never disparage theology as unimportant, as if to say, “is not practical, so you don’t need to know it.”

It is practical, and more than that, it is essential!

The practice of Christianity apart from solid theology ends up in either legalism or license.

So in the last three chapters you find many commands, “husbands, love your wives…children, obey your parents…” that sort of thing.

But in the first three chapters, there is only 1.

Only one command, and we find it here before us:  “remember.”

They are to remember away from certain things, and remember “forward” towards certain things.

:* 7*  Let’s start with what they are to remember “away from.”

Paul tells them what they were:   Spiritually dead, devil led, depraved and disobedient.

We saw that several weeks ago.

Now he reminds them that, as Gentiles, they were “separate from Christ.”

This means that, unlike the Jews, they were not looking forward to a *messiah*.

Which makes perfect sense because they were not even part of *Israel*, God’s covenant people.

They had no *promises* to be a particular nation, set apart for God’s purposes, called out and separated, as was Israel.

They did not benefit from any of God’s temporal promises to Abraham, Moses, David, or the prophets.

They could not enter the Temple, except in the outer court of the Gentiles, and even there they had to compete for space with the livestock being sold for sacrifices.

To enjoy any of that, for a Gentile had to become a Jew – he had to be circumcised, and even then, he still would not be fully accepted by the Jewish community.

Paul’s summary is well said.

The Gentiles were without hope, and /atheos:  /without God.

Not that they didn’t have “little g” gods -  they had plenty of those - but they were cut off from the one true God.

Because of this the Jews hated the Greeks, and the Greeks hated the Jews – resenting their smug “nose in the air” superiority and their religious hypocrisy.

The Jews built a wall around the worship of God that He never intended, a barrier that kept the Gentiles “far off.”

:* 8*  Verse 13:  /13//But now in Christ Jesus you who formerly were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ./

Notice the reference to the blood.

It reminds us how God brought them near, through the work of Christ on the cross.

/14For He Himself is our peace, who made both groups into one and broke down the barrier of the dividing wall,/ -  and there I believe the reference is to the literal wall that divided off the Court of the Gentiles, the one that Paul was accused of violating.

The Jews accused Paul of bringing a gentile past that wall, a charge that was false.

You might say that this barrier is the thing that landed him in prison, the very cell he is writing from!  :* 9*  Let’s go on -  /15by abolishing in His flesh the enmity, which is the Law of commandments contained in ordinances, so that in Himself He might make the two into one new man, thus establishing peace, 16and might reconcile them both in one body to God through the cross, by it having put to death the enmity.

17And He came and preached peace to you who were far away, and peace to those who were near; 18for through Him we both have our access in one Spirit to the Father./

:* 10*  Now, let’s remember “forward.”

By that I mean, it’s important to remember where we came from, BUT equally important, we must never to forget what we were saved for – what God did for us, how He brought us near to Him, and how that relates to our lives right now, especially in the area of relationships.

There are four things I want us to see in these verses:  (*First*), Paul identifies the source of the hatred between the Jews and the Gentiles.

We see in verse 15 that it is “the Law of commandments contained in ordinances”  or the Law of Moses.

(*Second*)   God doesn’t solve the problem by somehow turning the Gentiles into Jews.

God takes the Jews from Israel and the Gentiles from the world and creates something brand new – the Church.

(*Third*) The Gentiles were not the only ones in need of reconciliation to God.

The Jews needed reconciliation as well.

And (*Finally*) The horizontal reconciliation of Jews and Gentiles – and really all of us, is a direct result of a vertical reconciliation to God.

 

:* 11*  So, let’s look *first* at the *Law of Moses*.

Let’s think for a minute about the function of the Law.

It had a moral component, like the 10 commandments.

This part of the Law demonstrated how different God was from sinful man.

God is holy and here is a standard that identifies that holiness.

But there were also laws that served to remind the Jews how different they were supposed to be from the nations around them.

The Law established boundaries which touched every area of life:  what kind of food they ate, how to care for diseases, how to wash your hands, how far you could go on the Sabbath – and as the person got closer to the Temple and finally to the Holy of Holies, the Laws multiplied: what kind of sacrifice to bring, for what kind of sin, what kind of clothes the priests should wear, on what days, how the lamps should be trimmed, what to do with the ashes and the blood  – all emphasizing that God is holy, and we are not.

You can’t just do things any old way you want.

When it comes to God, you have to do it His way!  God must be set apart, and those who would approach Him must also be set apart.

Now the Jews were set apart because they had these laws.

God sovereignly and graciously chose Israel, as He makes choices all throughout history.

But it was not due to any special merit on the part of the Jews.

Unfortunately, Israel as a nation did not see it that way.

They equated their unique role in God’s program with salvation.

They thought, just because they were Jews, and by followed the Law, they would be saved.

Unfortunately, if you think like that, the object of your faith was no longer God, but the Law, and ultimately yourself, in your own ability to keep the Law.

But what if the requirement of the Law is satisfied in another way?

What if God, through the person of Jesus Christ, satisfies the Law, declaring righteous and holy anyone who simply would trust in His work on their behalf?

In that case, the whole basis for the Jew’s special standing – whether real or supposed, is destroyed, isn’t it?

In Christ, everyone comes on a level field.

There is no one, no nation, that is more qualified or worthy than another.

That’s what Paul means when he says in verse 15: /15by abolishing in His flesh the enmity,/ - or the hatred - / which is the Law of commandments contained in ordinances.

/  And as Jesus said, “I didn’t come to abolish the Law, but to fulfill it.”

(Matt 5:17)  And when He fulfilled it, He made it ineffective in its claim over men, and ineffective in its ability to draw a distinction between men, because everyone comes to God on the same basis, by faith, and everyone is declared equally righteous, apart from the Law.

:* 12*  So here is our *second* point:  God doesn’t solve the problem by somehow turning the Gentiles into Jews.

God takes the Jews from Israel and the Gentiles from the world and creates something brand new – the Church.

The Church is not a spiritual version of Israel.

No,  the Church, as Paul says here, is “a new man” with Christ as the Head of the body.

:* 13*  You have probably figured this out by now, but our *third* point is that the Gentiles were not the only ones in need of reconciliation to God.

The Jews needed it as well!  :* 14*  Look carefully at the wording of verse 16:  /16and might reconcile them both in one body to God /- BOTH Gentiles and Jews were in need of reconciliation to God.