Ministry: The Work of God’s People - 1 - Connecting in Peace

Scripture: Ephesians 2:11-22

Ephesians 2:11–22 NIV

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. 13 But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far away have been brought near by the blood of Christ. 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. 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. 19 Consequently, you are no longer foreigners and strangers, but fellow citizens with God’s people and also members of his household, 20 built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the chief cornerstone. 21 In him the whole building is joined together and rises to become a holy temple in the Lord. 22 And in him you too are being built together to become a dwelling in which God lives by his Spirit.

7/21/2024

Order of Service:

Announcements

Opening Worship

Prayer Requests

Prayer Song

Pastoral Prayer

Kid’s Time

Special Music

Offering (Doxology and Offering Prayer)

Scripture Reading

Sermon

Closing Song

Benediction

Special Notes:

Week 3: Special Music

No Special Music

Opening Prayer:

Holy God of Israel,

ever present and moving among your people,

draw us near to you,

that in place of hostility there may be peace;

in place of loneliness, compassion;

in place of aimlessness, direction;

and in place of sickness, healing;

through Christ Jesus, in whom you draw near to us. Amen.

Connecting in Peace

The Mystery

Over the last year, we have gotten to know Jesus better through the gospels and understand the faith He founded and came from in the Old Testament. Today, we are turning a corner, fully moving into our second year of the church together. In the summer season, focusing on mission and ministry, we turn to the letters of Paul to learn how Jesus shapes us into His Church.

Paul’s letters, especially if taken together, become a kind of theology soup for us to keep returning to repeatedly. Like all scripture, we find new things each time we read them. This is easier to understand when dealing with narrative retellings of Jesus and his ministry because we can always relate to different people in those stories. However, it is more surprising to find similar results from letters filled with instruction and theological explanations. You see, Paul wrote some of these letters to give many of his non-Jewish friends a kind of Cliffnotes or summarized versions of the stories of Jesus. For those who never knew Moses, Paul attempted to explain how Jesus fulfilled the Covenant Law between God and His people. To those who have never read the prophets, Paul describes how Jesus made us right with God. Like a good soup, there’s something in here for everyone, every day.

The best soups cook for days, and some of Paul’s larger letters, like the letter to the Romans, take days to get through. Then, there are some small batch letters that you can read in one sitting. Our scripture today, from Ephesians, is somewhere in between. It is shorter and more compact than Romans or Corinthians but packs a big punch like chili on a crock pot. You won’t know how spicy it is until you dip your spoon in and taste it.

You may also have noticed that we did not start in Chapter 1 today. We will come back and cover it later to help us see how these themes hold the whole letter together with a particular purpose. But for today, I want you to know that Chapter 1 has two significant points that lead us into our passage. These points help explain the mystery of our purpose in life and why God has done all He has done since the world’s creation.

First, Paul explains that Christ is above all. It took a long time for this to be revealed, but God glorified Himself in all of Who Jesus was and is and in the way He suffered and conquered death for us. Jesus is above everything, and all creation, including us, find our rightful place serving under Him.

Second, you and I were chosen, along with all of God’s people, to fill in the gaps between Jesus and the rest of creation. We are like His emissaries, ambassadors, and servants who get everyone lined up so that they are both under His protection and in His service. Sometimes, He sends us to bring new citizens to His Kingdom. Other times, He has us serve by keeping us all working together under His rule. Regardless, we all serve Jesus by bringing the rest of Creation to new life in Him.

Chosen

Sometimes, we get tripped up by the concept of being chosen by God, especially when we only think about salvation and skip the reason we are saved and the purpose for this new life we are given. We wonder why God chose us or if He did at all.

For now, when you come across the idea that God chooses people — that God chose you, I want you to think of King David. King David was probably the shortest king of the unified nation of Israel. He was the smallest and youngest competitor for the throne and likely the poorest. When God chose him, he had no experience leading people at all. Indeed, God spent twenty years teaching David how to lead faithfully before He ever became king officially.

So, when you consider what it means to be chosen by Jesus, keep in mind that Jesus does not choose us just to be saved from hell and death. He chooses us to serve Him as He works to save and redeem all creation. While we cannot serve Him on our own, He makes us able by bringing us under His rule and power.

Our passage today identifies one of the first ways we serve Him: by being peacemakers who help bring everything under Jesus. According to our calling, we follow Jesus in this work because Jesus is the Peace that breaks the division and hostility between us.

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Jesus is Our Peace

Jesus is our Peace.

He holds us together when the world tries to tear us apart. He protects us from enemies we don’t even know we have. He is our Good Shepherd, and He proved He was willing and able to lay down His own life to save ours.

In a world that constantly battles to have military power, economic leverage, and the power of personal charisma to stay above the chaos of violence and war, Jesus dove in headfirst and pulled us out of it by the only true power that lasts: the power of God.

Jesus gives us true peace when we face trouble and turmoil, from without and from within. The world teaches us to acquire and use things to make us feel safe. Jesus is different. He used His words. That sounds like something our teachers used to tell us, “Use your words instead of your fists.” But the words of Jesus are different from our words. They held a greater authority that disarmed, convicted, motivated, inspired, and changed people’s lives. Some of them He only spoke once, yet they continue to change lives irrevocably thousands of years later.

And He backed that word up because He gave Himself. He invited us to His table, washed our feet, gave us food and drink, and gave us His very life. At that moment, we knew He forgave us, and we began to realize that we needed Jesus. Before we were forgiven, we didn’t even know we needed Him, but once His grace touched our lives, we knew we needed Him more than life itself. Jesus is our peace because only He can defeat our true enemies: sin and death, and He does so by bringing us all together, friend and foe alike, to His table.

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Peace with Purpose

Jesus gives us peace, but not like the world gives us peace. In John 14, he told the disciples that He would provide them peace that would last, not a temporary reprieve from troubles. The world gets tired from fighting and takes a break. It does not give us anything. The peace of Jesus is a strong peace that has a purpose. It connects us to Him and each other. It is peace with a purpose.

Much like the Peace of Rome, which Roman soldiers might have used like bumper stickers on their chariots in the first century, this peace holds people together so that the reign of Jesus might grow in our lives. If we are satisfied in Christ and trust in His protection and provision, we won’t waste our lives fighting to protect what we think is ours or trying to capture the things we want. It allows us to grow and flourish like domestic crops instead of the wild vines that spend their energy on surviving rather than producing good fruit.

The Peace of Christ reframes the way we look at the world and who we consider friends and enemies. As it says in Psalm 23, Jesus brings enemies together to the same table and serves them all the same grace and forgiveness, putting us all on equal footing as sinners saved by grace and potential saints in the making. Jesus becomes the only thing we need in common to make peace where there is none.

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Fellowship of Peacemakers

Jesus taught His disciples how to be peacemakers by example. He took a ragtag bunch of men from all walks of life. He turned them into a team that worked together against the world, against all odds, facing certain death, with the sole purpose of inviting everyone to Christ’s table in fellowship, brotherhood, and one another. We think about the Jewish revolutionaries and tax collectors, along with the fishermen and followers of John the Baptist, and wonder what kind of dinner conversations they would have had with each other.

And that’s not even considering the women. We know Mary and Martha struggled to get along with their different personalities—and were sisters. What happens when you add Mary, the mother of Jesus, and Mary Magdelene, the woman formerly possessed by seven demons, into that mix? All of those things mattered. They were all part of the story of who these people were, where they came from, who their families were. But none of it mattered more than Jesus.

We do not become instruments of peace on the battlefield. We become instruments of peace at the dinner table when we surrender our agendas to Jesus and sit and eat with the people He wants to share His peace with. When we serve beside each other as a team for Jesus in ways where we have to rely on each other and get to know one another, we become vessels of the Peace of Christ. That peace can break through into our lives during worship as we surrender ourselves to Jesus and admit our need for Him to rule us. Anywhere we have fellowship opportunities, we have opportunities where relationships can be transformed, and the peace of Christ can flow and grow through us.

This peace that Jesus gives us is not limited to particular places or moments. It can grow slowly over time and at great distances. Again, any opportunity we have to connect with others and Jesus between us, and where we surrender our agenda to Him, is an opportunity for peace. We can share genuine fellowship with phone calls, sending cards, writing letters, and many other ways of inviting people to Christ’s fellowship and family. Any of these activities, especially the ones where we listen more than talk, are opportunities for peace.

Sometimes, we don’t feel we have enough peace to share with anyone. But when we share the peace of Christ, we are not giving of ourselves. We are bringing someone along with us as we return to the true source of peace — Jesus Himself. As Christ builds us all, friends and family, enemies and strangers alike, into His Holy Temple, His Body, and His Church, it is not peace we bring to the world and to each other. We bring them Jesus. He is our peace.

Where do you need peace in your life today?

Who do you see around you that needs the peace of Jesus?

What is one way, one thing you can do this week to reach out to them in fellowship and go to Jesus with them as He shares His peace with you?

Closing Prayer

Lord Jesus, You are our Prince of Peace. You are the Lord of all creation, and we know our world will only know true Peace when we submit to Your rule in our lives. We cannot find peace on our own. And we know the world will not find peace until we find peace in You ourselves. Your Word has changed lives over the centuries, and it continues to work in us today. Help us stop trying to fix each other and start bringing one another to You. As we gather in fellowship with You, we invite You to build us into Your Temple, Your Church, and Your Body, however You see fit. Fit us wherever You desire, and as we follow where You lead us, make us one with our enemies and strangers in Your grace and mercy, and help us to know the peace that goes beyond our understanding that we get from being in Your presence. In Jesus’s name. Amen.

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