church

The Grace of God Unites the Church: Ephesians 2:11-22

/ Neal Embry

I regularly meet with two guys on Monday nights for a discipleship group. We meet to discuss God’s Word and God’s work in our lives. We meet together, eat together, laugh together, pray together, and encourage each other together in Christ.

Outside of our common faith in Christ, though, I don’t have much else in common with these guys. Our hobbies are very different, and our career trajectories couldn’t be much further apart. But we are united in Christ. We are a living testimony to God’s Word in Ephesians 2:11-22. We would not usually meet together. Were it not for our faith, I most likely would not have met these guys and been able to form a friendship with them.

The grace of God, and not anything else, unites and identifies His church.

“Therefore remember that at one time you Gentiles in the flesh, called ‘the uncircumcision’ by what is called the circumcision, which is made in the flesh by hands–remember that you were at that time separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world.”–Eph. 2:11-12

Paul addresses his largely Gentile audience, reminding them that before they met Christ, they had no hope. The Gentiles weren’t disobedient people of God–they had no knowledge of God’s covenant, no expectation that God would look at them with anything but wrath.

“But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ.  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.”–Eph. 2:13-18

The “But now” here mirrors the “But God” of verse 4. Humans were powerless to act to save themselves or reconcile man to God or man to man. But God acted in His grace.

Those who were once as far from God as possible are brought near because of the precious blood of Jesus. The blood of Jesus removes our sins and removes the barrier for fellowship and relationship with God. He breaks down the “dividing wall of hostility” between us and God, and allows us to become God’s children, by His grace.

But what does any of that have to do with Joe, my annoying neighbor who also loves Jesus? What does this have to do with the guy who cheers for a different team and sits in front of me on Sunday morning? What does this have to do with the church at all? How does God’s grace actually bring us together?

Jesus destroyed the wall of hostility between God and man by “abolishing the law of commandments.” Jesus lived perfectly in order that we may be counted righteous in Him and died on the cross so that we may be forgiven. And this changes everything–literally, everything. Nothing is the same because of Jesus. We were powerless to save ourselves, but then God stepped in and sent His Son.

Because of this, our hope is in Christ. Our salvation is in Christ. This makes us humble, and destroys our pride, which could keep us from others we see as “less worthy” than ourselves. It leads us to find our identity in Christ and what He’s done for us, which, in turn, leads us to not judge or push away others in the church who are different from us, because, in Christ, we are all one. We are all the same before God. We are all sinners that have met a great Savior.

God’s grace toward us should make us so humble and so grateful that we have no room for racism, arrogance, stereotypes, or anything else that takes away from the glory of God. God’s grace should change our identity and lead us to see that it is Christ, not our careers, sports teams, or skin color that gives us identity and meaning. And when we find our identity in Christ, we will not look down on those whose careers, sports teams, or skin color is different than ours.

Even more than that, verse 18 says that we all approach the same Father through the same Spirit! The Jews and Gentiles, who once warred with each other, now share the same Father and talk to Him through the same Spirit, because of the gracious work of the Son. The Triune God has eternally acted to bring sinners from vastly different backgrounds, even and especially backgrounds that normally would not interact and may even hate each other, together in Christ in order to display His glory by His grace!

“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.”–Eph. 2:19-22

It’s been said that an American Christian has more in common with, say, an African or Asian Christian, than he or she has with an non-Christian American. Our identity in Christ is rooted in what He has done, and we now relate to others in the church, not based on ethnic or racial makeup, but by a common faith in and experience of the grace of God.

Did you catch what Paul says at the end of this chapter? He says the church is “being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit.” This is incredible! A group of people who normally would have nothing in common is becoming more and more like Jesus because of Jesus! A group of people who have been humbled by a shared experience of grace and now find their identity in Christ are learning to live that out together, with people from various backgrounds and social statuses. This is good news!

The church is really a miracle, when you think about it. We are only together because of Christ. As I said in the beginning, the two guys in my small group became my friends because of our common faith. While they’re excellent people and fun to hang around, I likely wouldn’t have met them if it were not for the grace of God.

God destroys the wall of hostility, taking foes and making them friends, in Christ. He takes those who would not ever be together nor want to be together and calls them His children, and they begin to worship together, live together, eat together.

We are identified by Christ. We are saved by Christ. We are united by Christ. Praise God.

Lord, may we remember your grace toward us. May we remember your grace so that we can show it to others, and treat our brothers and sisters in Christ with grace. May we never forget that we are united and identified by you, and may this help us be a united church, a beautiful church, a church made up of many different people praising the same Savior.

God bless,

Neal E.

Death or Life: Which Will You Choose?

/ Neal Embry / Leave a comment

That seems like a pretty easy question to answer, doesn’t it?  If I were a betting man, I’d be willing to bet that 100% of people, when presented with a choice between life and death, will choose life.  I believe it’s safe to assume that we like living more than we like dying.  Most people, when they’re asked if they’d like to have eternal life, will say yes.  Again, I don’t have statistics to back that claim up, but I feel like it’s a safe assumption.

But do we know how to gain eternal life?  There’s no denying that we all want it, but Jesus makes it clear that not all will have eternal life.  Not all will be with God forever.  While we all want to have eternal life, or as Kenny Chesney put it, “everybody wants to go to heaven,” how can we know that we will go there?  How can we be sure that we have life?  Jesus has answered that question for us in Matthew 7:13-14.

“Enter by the narrow gate.  For the gate is wide and the way is easy that leads to destruction, and those who enter by it are many.  For the gate is narrow and the way is hard that leads to life, and those who find it are few.”

Jesus lays out two possible paths for us to be on: on a hard road, having gone through a narrow gate, or on an easy road, having gone through a wide gate.  All of humanity is on one of these roads.  There is no middle ground here.  And Jesus says the gate that we enter by and the road we are on determines whether or not we have eternal life.

The way of destruction that Jesus describes is the way of the world, the way of those who don’t know Jesus.  The gate is wide because there’s room for all kinds of beliefs, all kinds of behaviors, all kinds of (false) saviors.  There is no one way through at this gate.

It’s not hard to look at the world around us and see that there are a lot of different religious beliefs.  Christianity is not the only religion in the world.  It is certainly not the only religion that claims to be the one and only way to heaven.  This broad gate accepts all sorts of beliefs.

Some will ask, “Why is that so bad?  Shouldn’t all beliefs be honored as equally valid?”  Not if they’re not true.  There’s a reason we don’t accept the opinion that the world is flat anymore–we know it to be false.  As someone who’s crossed the Pacific Ocean, I can testify that the world is indeed round, and not flat.  There’s a reason that children all across the world lose points on their math tests if they answer that two plus two equals seven.  Two plus two is four, case closed.  And when we argue about the existence of God, and the nature of who He is, and what we must do to be in right relationship with Him, we cannot afford to treat it as just another talking point.  There is nothing more important than understanding and knowing who God is, and being in right relationship with Him.  The wide gate leads to destruction because it allows false beliefs about false gods to creep in, meaning that those who are on it are not right with the real God.

The way that leads to destruction is also easy.  On this road, there is no sacrifice, no commitment, no change.  There’s no repentance, or change in behaviors.  It is the road of the “good life,” the “easy life,” the “my life feels like a vacation life.”  It is the road that justifies sinful behavior by promoting self-rule.  It is the road of “your best life now.”  If your best life is now, you don’t know Jesus.  For those who know Jesus, we know our best life is yet to come, because our life is in Jesus, and He is coming back to finish making all things new.

So if you choose the easy road, that requires no commitment to God, if you choose the wide gate that leaves room for all sorts of “gods,” you may have an easy life here.  You’ll have fun following the “gods” of self, sex, money, power, etc.  But 20,000,000 years later, you’ll be separated from the real God, the one you rebelled against your entire life, and there will be no way to get out of hell, out of separation from fellowship with God.  Scary?  Yes.  But praise God Jesus’ sermon doesn’t end there.

Jesus next describes the way that leads to life.  This way goes through a narrow gate.  Now, understand that Jesus isn’t preaching a works-based salvation.  He isn’t saying that the gate is narrow and you have to work really hard, and do a lot of good things, to pass through it.  The gate is narrow because there’s only one way through–Him.

You enter by the narrow gate when you give up on yourself and lean on the finished work of Christ alone for your salvation, and trust in Him alone to be your Lord and to lead you in a new life of knowing, trusting and obeying Him.  In other words, we are saved, by the grace of God, through faith in Jesus Christ as our Savior and Lord.

But isn’t that, someone may ask, insulting to Jews, Muslims, Buddhists, atheists, etc.?  Yes, it is.  It’s insulting to me, too.  It’s insulting to all of us.  The cross is insulting because the cross is humbling.  We want to save ourselves.  We want to pay back our sin debt.  We want to be in control, and we want God to listen to us.  We want the Creator to be at the mercy and will of the created, and that’s just not how it works.  You can’t be your own God and have God as your God at the same time.  You can’t have life while rejecting the God who gives life.  The question is not, “Is the cross insulting?” but rather, “Will I let God kill my pride that I may be saved through Christ?”

The Christian life is hard.  Sometimes, we like to dress it up like it’s a party, where we’re constantly in worship, constantly growing to be more like Christ, always smiling and happy.  We never struggle to believe God, or to give our time and money and energy to the kingdom of God.  But that’s not the truth, and anyone who’s trusted in Jesus for more than five minutes can testify to this fact!  On top of the sufferings and struggles every person, regardless of their relationship with Jesus, experiences, such as medical problems, job loss, relationship tensions, etc., Christians are also in a war with their sin.  A Christian is one who has made Christ their Lord and has made sin their enemy.  We hate our sin.  Jesus is in charge now.  He has given us His perfect righteousness.  He has forgiven us through His precious blood.  We recoil at the very thought of offending Him because of His great love for us.  But we do sin.  And we sin a lot.  And we sin horribly.  Some of the things I most regret in my life have come after I came to know Christ.  The difference is in how we respond to our sin.  Instead of simply shrugging our shoulders and getting on with our lives, we confess our sins before God.  We agree with Him that our sin is wrong.  We trust Him to help us follow Him, and we rest in His righteousness and in His forgiveness of our sins.

That’s hard work!  There’s joy in knowing we’re forgiven, but the pain of daily repentance and the effort required to daily pursue God threatens us and entices us to turn away from Him, and live our lives like He does not exist.  But Christ has not left us that option.  He is Lord.  And those who fight sin and trust Him for the entirety of their lives will be saved, and will have a joy beyond compare in the life to come.  Let’s choose that life today.

This is not the popular way.  To renounce self and put my dependence on Christ and follow Him as Lord never has been and never will be popular.  The result of Jesus’ ministry was public execution.  The result of some missionaries’ preaching of this gospel is their death.  But will we be popular, or saved?  Will we be with the world, or with God?  Will we be famous and living the easy life, or struggling for the glory of God?

Will you choose death, or will you choose life?

Lord, may we choose you.  May we trust that you love us, that you save us, that you lead us, and that no matter how hard this difficult road gets, we won’t ever walk it alone.  May the gospel rid us of all fear and doubt and lead us to give our lives for your sake.  May you be glorified in the lives of those who choose to enter by the narrow gate and embark on the hard way.

God bless,

Neal E.