Ephesians Study 2: 11-22

Ephesians 2: 11-22 

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— 12 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. 13 But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. 14 For he himself is our peace, who has made us both one and has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility 15 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, 16 and might reconcile us both to God in one body through the cross, thereby killing the hostility. 17 And he came and preached peace to you who were far off and peace to those who were near. 18 For through him we both have access in one Spirit to the Father. 19 So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, 20 built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone, 21 in whom the whole structure, being joined together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord. 22 In him you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit.

• Does anything jump out to you?

Before we launch into the text, a bit of background…

Paul has in mind a particular incident that some of them will have remembered, which he also refers to in the following section (3: 1), I, Paul, a prisoner of Christ Jesus on behalf of you Gentiles.

At the end of Acts 20, Paul travelled from Ephesus; he arrived in Jerusalem in Acts 21 and in vv.18, 19 he greeted the ‘apostles and elders’ and gave them a glowing report of what God was doing among the Gentiles.

They glorified God about this, but immediately followed it with a ‘word in love, brother.’ Lots of Jews who believed in Jesus were zealous for the Law. Clearly ‘the Elders’ approve of this; they are concerned that ‘you teach all the Jews who are among the Gentiles to forsake Moses, telling them not to circumcise their children or walk according to our customs (v.21)’.

So, they advise Paul to be super-Jewish while he was in Jerusalem. He accompanied some Jews to the temple as they completed a vow, showing that he was not really against the Law of Moses (v.26).

When this process was almost completed, some Jews from the region of Ephesus recognised him, caused an uproar, and this led to him being arrested by the Romans. The excuse was that they had seen him with an Ephesian Christian called Trophimus, and assumed that he must have taken him into the Temple (v.29).

The actual precinct of the Temple was surrounded by a wall that separated it from a wide courtyard that was open to Gentiles. This is the wall that Paul is referring to in v.14—the dividing wall of hostility.

The ethnic and spiritual division between the Jews and the non-Jews is perfectly visualised by an actual wall around the sanctuary of the Temple.

What happened to Trophimus? We don’t know much. At some point, Paul left him self-isolating in Miletus (2 Tim 4: 20), but I picture him sitting in the church in Ephesus feeling awkward while this section was read out.

The Catholics venerate him as a martyr, but that’s probably not why.


Ephesians 2: 11, 12 

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— 12 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. 

• The Jews were defined by male circumcision. What was its significance?

The Jews treated Gentiles with contempt. In the opinion of most Jews of the time, according to Barclay, the purpose of Gentiles was to ‘fuel the fires of hell’ and that God only loved the Jews out of all the nations he had made. (This is not a close reading of the OT, by the way.)

If a Jew were to marry a Gentile, a funeral would be carried out—such contact with a Gentile was the equivalent of death; even to go into a Gentile house rendered a Jew unclean. The wall around the sanctuary of the Temple was deeply significant for the Jews

v.12 separated from Christ. It’s not just that, as Gentiles, they had no Messianic promises, but they were without anointing (without christ), there was no presence of God, no message of salvation and therefore no hope.

vv.12, 13 

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. 13 But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. 

But Jesus has made a critical difference to them. At one time they were outside, but now they are inside. They have been brought near by the blood of Christ, brought near to God.

That is what Christ does. He is our peace. It is in a common love of him that people come to love each other. That peace is won at the price of his blood, for the great awakener of love is the Cross. The sight of that Cross awakens in the hearts of men of all nations love for Christ, and only when they all love Christ will they love each other. It is not in treaties and leagues to produce peace. There can be peace only in Jesus Christ.

William Barclay

James 4: 8

Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you

• How can we ‘draw near’?

vv.14-16 

For he himself is our peace, who has made us both one and has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility 15 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, 16 and might reconcile us both to God in one body through the cross, thereby killing the hostility. 

So, there is this idea of two races of people: the Jews and the Gentiles that are both in the church, eyeing one another with mutual suspicion.

We have already seen that God’s plan, this hidden mystery, is to unite all things in Christ (1: 10), and here it begins. The Jews, the Chosen Few, ordained and selected by God, recipients of covenants, laws and promises, and the Gentiles, everyone else, the great uncultured and unwashed.

But Paul has just told them (v.3) that they are all, Jews and Gentiles, children of wrath; however special the Jews thought themselves, they weren’t that special.

[Christ] himself is our peace, who has made us both one and has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility…

Jesus, being the dwelling place of the Holy Spirit, is a type of the Temple. He represented it. He was where heaven touched earth, and when he died, it’s as if he was letting the Holy Spirit loose into the world. The wall that physically separated the Gentiles from proximity with God was torn down … and so it was, not long after this was written.

[He abolished] the law of commandments expressed in ordinances; that is, the Torah and the Jewish religion—you can see why the devout Jews had a problem with Paul!

But Jesus did that, not Paul.

In Christ Jesus, through the Holy Spirit, both Jews and Gentiles are united into a new creation.

2 Corinthians 5: 17 

Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come. 

And he goes on there to describe a ministry of reconciliation. 

Killing the hostility is a strong phrase—almost oxymoronic—but this is what Christ has accomplished.

Notice, it isn’t that God has dissolved Israel and nullified their covenants, but he has opened these up, accessed by faith, to the Gentiles, so that Paul can appeal to the Corinthians (2 Corinthians 5: 20) be reconciled to God.

As we are reconciled to him, we are reconciled to one another; the hostility is ended.

Metaphorically, now anyone is able to enter the holiest places of the Temple, by the blood of Christ:

Hebrews 10: 19-22 

Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the holy places by the blood of Jesus, 20 by the new and living way that he opened for us through the curtain, that is, through his flesh … 22 let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith. 

vv.17-19 

And he came and preached peace to you who were far off and peace to those who were near. 18 For through him we both have access in one Spirit to the Father. 19 So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God… 

He came and preached peace… 

We get a hint of this in the Gospels, in the Roman Centurion, the Samaritan Woman and the Woman of Tyre. Jesus focuses his ministry to the Jews—his lost sheep—but this is never exclusive.

Through Jesus, as we saw last week (John 14: 6), we have access to the Father, both Jews and Gentiles.

v.19 is one of the most brilliant verses in Ephesians (well, along with all the other brilliant verses).

… You are no longer strangers and aliens, but … fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God…

Remember God’s original promise to Abram:

Genesis 12: 1-3 

Now the Lord said to Abram, “Go from your country and your kindred and your father's house to the land that I will show you. 2 And I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. 3 I will bless those who bless you, and him who dishonours you I will curse, and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.”

We could camp out on this, but we don’t really have time, but just think:

• A royal priesthood and a holy nation

• A kingdom of priests to God

• Reigning with Christ

We are the joint inheritors of all the promises God makes to his people.

This chapter finishes with a parallel passage to the end of chapter 1 (22, 23):

vv.20-22 

…built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone, 21 in whom the whole structure, being joined together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord. 22 In him you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit. 

Elsewhere Paul describes Christ as the foundation (1 Corinthians 3: 11).

• In what respect is the church built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets?

I think there are two aspects to this.

1. Apostles and prophets are both ministry gifts that Paul recognised in the early church (Ephesians 4: 11).

Jesus clearly appointed apostles, whom he sent out with his message; the church itself appears to have recognised and commissioned others, though this is rather less clear-cut. An ‘apostle’, at the end of the day, is someone ‘sent’ with a message, an emissary or a missionary. An ambassador, indeed (to quote that passage from 2 Corinthians 5 again).

The NT church had prophets; some are mentioned by name (Acts 13: 1 lists Barnabas and Saul; someone called Agabus is mentioned a couple of times; Philip’s daughters, and all the teaching in 1 Corinthians)

1. Apostles and prophets here are cognate to the Law and the Prophets:

Matthew 7: 12: 

So whatever you wish that others would do to you, do also to them, for this is the Law and the Prophets. 

I.e., the Hebrew Bible. In this case the prophets are the OT prophets, and the Law is represented by the Apostles of Christ, who received his word and declared it.

So, there is a sense that apostles and prophets in Scripture carry great authority, defining the essence of what Christian teaching is, but there is also a sense of an ongoing conversation with God in the real world, in response to dynamic situations.

We must be cautious if someone is identified with an apostolic or prophetic gift in the church. We are not putting them on a level with Paul or Peter in terms of their authority to define doctrine, but on the other hand, we need to hear from God in our generation.

Christ Jesus … the cornerstone, that is defining the levels and dimensions of this holy building (on this rock, I will build my church).

Jesus Christ, through the agency of the apostles and prophets, and all the other ministry gifts among God’s people, defines the levels and verticals of the building, which is his temple

Jesus was the dwelling place of God in the world—and so are we. Paul will develop this idea in Chapter 4.

So where does this leave us, today?

We might find it odd, that in the great ethnic diversity of the Roan empire, the only division that Paul sees is that between the Jews and the Gentiles.

• What are the things that divide us?

The obvious ethnic differences, but deeper than that are cultural divisions. Different ways of seeing the world, of understanding truth.

Conservative v. progressive

Men v. women

Left v. right

Religious differences; differences in Christian expression

Rich v Poor

Difference between any ‘identity’; tribalism

And then…

Us v. them

Me v. You

Galatians 3: 26-29 

in Christ Jesus you are all sons of God, through faith. 27 For as many of you as were baptised into Christ have put on Christ. 28 There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. 29 And if you are Christ's, then you are Abraham's offspring, heirs according to promise. 

"The problem of fences has grown to be one of the most acute that the world must face. Today there are all sorts of zig-zag and criss-crossing separating fences running through the races and people of the world. Modern progress has made the world a neighbourhood: God has given us the task of making it a brotherhood."

Sir Philip Gibbs, The Cross of Peace