Ephesians 2:11-22

Introduction:

Last week, Paul reminded us of a powerful truth: we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works that He prepared beforehand for us to walk in.

The focus was personal and individual—what God has done in you and what God intends to do through you.

We saw that salvation is not only about being rescued from sin, but being restored with purpose. God has work for His people to accomplish.

But as we move forward in the text, Paul widens the lens. The focus shifts from the individual to the collective, from you to us.

He now addresses two groups who once stood far apart—Jews and Gentiles—and shows how the same grace that saves individuals also creates a new people.

What God builds in us personally, He also intends to display through us corporately, as one unified body in Christ.

Paul calls the Ephesians to remember who they once were—Gentiles, separated from God, without hope, and strangers to His promises.

He reminds them not to shame them, but to magnify God’s grace.

1. (V11) Remember that you were once Gentiles in the flesh

Our past condition was without hope (V11-12)

Last week’s focus was on you, but now the focus transfer to two people groups, the jews and the gentiles

a) Paul reminds them of their past condition

Paul calls the Ephesians to remember who they once were. Most of the believers in the church at Ephesus were Gentiles, and their former condition was bleak.

Prior to coming to Christ they were without hope, in a desperate situation, separated from the promises of God.

Paul intentionally brings this to their remembrance—not to shame them, but to magnify grace.

In light of what God has done for us, and in light of the good works He has called us to walk in, Paul draws a sharp contrast between their former state and their present reality in Christ.

Before we can fully appreciate who we are now, we must remember who we once were. He brings us back to our former nature so that gratitude, humility, and worship might grow.

b)  Gentiles in the flesh:

When Paul refers to them as “Gentiles in the flesh,” he is speaking of those who were not Jewish and who did not bear the physical mark of circumcision—an outward sign that had long defined Jewish identity.

The word circumcise literally means “to cut around.” As a religious rite, circumcision was required of all of Abraham’s descendants as a sign of the covenant God made with him (Genesis 17)

Over time, many Jews began to look down on Gentiles with an attitude God never intended.

God chose Abraham and made a distinction between Jew and Gentile, not so that the Jews might boast, but so that they might become a blessing to the nations.

Israel was set apart to be a channel of God’s revelation and goodness to the surrounding world. The problem was never God’s design—it was human pride.

What Paul shows us here is that God’s work of reconciliation is not only vertical, between God and the individual—though it must begin there.

It is also horizontal, between people and groups who are at odds. In Paul’s day, no divide was greater than that between Jews and Gentiles.

Illustration and Application

We saw a glimpse of this truth lived out at the Community Christmas lunch. People from all different walks of life came together, and it was deeply encouraging to see believers serving and ministering to those who did not yet know Christ. That is the heart of the gospel on display—grace crossing boundaries.

Application: God does not want us to look down on anyone for any reason. The same grace that brought us near is the grace He desires to extend through us to others.”

1.1 (V12) Without Christ

a) Without Christ they were without hope

Paul reminds the Ephesians that apart from Christ, their condition was one of complete spiritual loss.

They were aliens, strangers, and without hope, living apart from God and His promises.

Talking to the unsaved at the Christmas dinner the common denominator is they are without hope.

They have been done wrong by one thing or another and there is a seed of bitterness that can’t let go of, there’s no hope in their current situation.

b) Their condition explained:

Without Christ

These are devastating words that sum up the tragic condition of every lost person.

To be without Christ is to be separated from life, truth, and salvation itself.

Without God

The Ephesians worshiped the goddess Diana and many other false gods.

Though religious, they did not know the true and living God.

To not know God is ultimately to have no real hope.

Without citizenship

God called the Jews, formed them into a nation, and gave them unique blessings and promises.

The Gentiles stood outside the commonwealth of Israel, excluded from those privileges.

Without covenants

God made His covenants with Israel, not with the Gentile nations.

The promises of redemption, blessing, and future hope were not theirs by birth.

Without hope

Historians tell us that a dark cloud of hopelessness hung over the ancient world.

Philosophies could not answer life’s deepest questions, and false religions offered no lasting assurance.

The Gentiles, as a people group, were excluded and left without certainty or comfort.

To be without Christ is to be without God.

And to be without God is to be without hope.

When you look closely at the world around us, you can still see the same hopelessness Paul describes here.”

Here are a few examples…

Success without hope: “Some people reach everything they aimed for—career, money, recognition—and still feel empty, because success can’t save a soul.”

Fear of death: “Without Christ, death isn’t a doorway—it’s a dead end, and people spend their lives trying not to think about it.”

Religious but lost: “Like the Ephesians who worshiped Diana, many are religious but not redeemed—busy with rituals, yet lacking peace.”

Burdened by the past: “Without the forgiveness of Christ, people don’t move on from their past—they live under it.”

Distracted despair: “Much of what looks like pleasure in our world is really an attempt to escape hopelessness.”

“Paul does not remind them of their past to leave them there. He brings them low only so that grace might lift them higher.

2. (V13) But now in Christ

2. Our present peace in Christ (V13-18)

Your were distant strangers and considered aliens of the commonwealth of the covenant promises

a) But now in Christ

The Gentiles were once far off from God and the Jews, but the distance was closed by His sacrificial death

Peace between God and Gentile and Jewish believers

Brought near only by His blood

Because of His love

Paul continues to remind us to have a heart of praise fro all He has done

b) No other way to be brought near to God, but through His blood

Not by going to church

Not by doing good works

Only by the blood of Christ

People will often try to come to God through many ways, but it’s only through Christ that they can have access to the Father

John 10:9 “I am the door. If anyone enters by Me, he will be saved, and will go in and out and find pasture.”

Only through Christ atonement can remove the sin barrier

Hebrews 9:22 “And according to the law almost all things are purified with blood, and without shedding of blood there is no remission.”

It was through the blood of Christ that brought us near to him

2.1 (V14) For He Himself is our peace

Made one, broken down the wall between the jews and Gentiles

The wall of hostility has brought down

Two groups are now made one

a) He is the only true peace

Peace is mentioned four times in three verses

Only Christ offers true peace

The world offers a false peace or temporary peace

People look for peace in all the wrong places

b) He made both one

Jewish and Gentile believers are now one

This was a radical statement in those days

Peter:

Remember Peter playing the hypocrite, he would eat with the Gentiles, but as soon as the prominent Jews would show he would no longer eat with the Gentiles

c) He broke down the middle wall of separation

In the temple, in between the court of the Gentiles and the court of the women, there was a physical barrier, an actual wall of separation between Jew and Gentile.

The wall of hostility and the barrier destroyed

 If the Lordship of Jesus Christ is not greater than any difference you have with others – be it political, racial, economic, language, or whatever, then you have not fully understood what it means to be under the Lordship of Jesus.

If we have Christ in common we have everything in common

I have more in common with you then some of my biological family because we have Christ in common

We can talk about spiritual things

2.2 (V15) Having abolished in the flesh the enmity

a) Through he cross He broke down the wall of hatred

Through the cross, Christ broke down the dividing wall of hostility that separated Jew and Gentile.

By fulfilling the Law and removing its condemning power, He ended what once kept us apart.

For He Himself is our peace” — Jesus did not merely bring peace; He is our peace.

b) The new man is one in Christ

What once divided us has been nailed to the cross, and peace now stands where hostility once ruled

The cross put to death the hostility, not just between us and God, but between us and one another.

In Christ, former enemies are made into one new man, united by grace.

When we share Christ, we share a new identity, a new family, and a new hope.

2.3 (V16) He reconciled both to God putting to death the enmity

The hatred is put to death

Through the cross you have reconciled

2.4 (V17) He came and preached to you who were far off

a) No longer distant

Because He preached peace to both

The Gentiles were never an after though

Jesus preached mostly to the Jews, but the message of peace was carried through His disciples who preached to the Gentiles

In fact, the Apostle Paul was called specifically to preach and minister to the Gentiles

2.5 (V18) Through Him we have access by one Spirit to the Father

a) We all have the same access through the Holy Spirit

Access means you are able to approach the Father

Poor or rich, young or old, we all have the same access

I don’t have greater access to the Father, we have the same access through the Holy Spirit

1 Corinthians 12:13 “For by one Spirit we were all baptized into one body—whether Jews or Greeks, whether slaves or free—and have all been made to drink into one Spirit.”

3. (V19) No longer strangers, but citizens in the household of God

3. Our new position (V19-22)

a) No longer strangers

They should not regard themselves as “second-class citizens” in God’s kingdom in any regard. 

b) Fellow citizen, saint, and member of the household of God

All equal members of the household of God

3.1 (V20) Having been built on the foundation of the Apostles and prophets with Jesus as the cornerstone

a) The foundation has been laid

Built on the foundation of the apostles, the prophets, and Jesus is the cornerstone

The foundation has been established and cannot be changed

One cohesive plan from the very beginning

c) Jesus is the cornerstone

This corner stone “literally means at the tip of the angle.

It refers to the capstone or binding stone that holds the whole structure together… often the royal name was inscribed on it. In the East it was considered to be even more important than the foundation.” (Wood)

Corner stone: denotes the stone placed at the extreme corner, so as to bind the other stones in the building together – the most important stone in the structure, the one on which its stability depended.”

3.2 (V21) In whom the whole building be fitted together grows into a Holy temple

a) One building growing together in holiness

God is the great Architect.

We’re the building

Called to grow together in holiness

This tells us that the Church is a temple, holy and set apart to God.

We serve offering the spiritual sacrifices of our lips and hearts, our praises to God

1 Corinthians 3:16 “Do you not know that you are the temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwells in you?”

1 Corinthians 3:17 “If anyone defiles the temple of God, God will destroy him. For the temple of God is holy, which temple you are.”

3.3 (V22) We are His dwelling place

a) The Holy Spirit dwells inside of us

John 17:23 “I in them, and You in Me; that they may be made perfect in one, and that the world may know that You have sent Me, and have loved them as You have loved Me.”

We are all God’s precious children who are in dwelt with His Spirit, to love Him and make Him known

Ephesians 2:10 “For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.”

In Conclusion:

Christ has brought us near, torn down every dividing wall, and made former enemies one in His body.

We share the same peace, Spirit, and access to the Father. As His household, we are called to live as one—extending grace and reconciliation to others.

If Christ has broken down every barrier between us, what walls in your own life is He calling you to tear down today?

Is there something in your life that is hindering you from experiencing His abundant life?