Far, Far Away

Ephesians 2:11-13

Your view of the church todaymeans more when you remember your distance from God before.

Sometimes we fail to value thechurch we’re in because we’ve forgotten where we’ve come from.

When churches first began,believers struggled to appreciate one another. Jewish Christians and non-JewishChristians were at odds, even though God had placed them together in churches.

To solve this problem, Pauldid not advise them to separate into Jewish and non-Jewish churches. Instead,he taught reasons why they should continue worshiping and serving together inthe same assemblies. In Eph 2-3, Paul provides such teaching.

While we may struggle withsimilar tendencies today, I doubt many who hear this message are questioningwhether Jews and Gentiles should worship in the same church together. Today,the struggle is more vague. We struggle to value the church much at all.

Many people today claim tobelieve on Christ but have no or low commitment to the church. Some reject all “organized”religion. Others say churches are full of hypocrites. Still others have gonethrough bad experiences at church, and the list of reasons runs on.

This uncertainty about thechurch reveals a serious misunderstanding about the Christian life because tofollow Christ requires full cooperation with a specific congregation. This factwill become clearer as we continue our study of Ephesians, so I’ll not belaborit here.

For now, we will focus on one biblicalperspective that Paul teaches to strengthen our commitment to the church. InEph 2:11-13, he teaches us to compare the experience of our pre-Christian lifein the world to our present experience as Christians in the church.

In the past, we were far, faraway.

In Eph 2:13, Paul summarizesthe previous two verses by saying, “You who once were far off…” By saying this,he is speaking to the non-Jewish members of that church. They were “Gentiles inthe flesh” (Eph 2:11).

The word Gentiles comesfrom the Greek word ethnos (ἔθνος), the source for our English word ethnicity.The NKJV translates it as Gentiles (97x), nations (66x), and people(1x). The KJV sometimes uses heathen, while other translations sometimesuse pagans.

When we read this word in theBible, we should think “non-Jewish” because it refers to nations and peoplegroups other than Israel. This in mind, Paul raises an important butunfortunate reality – that Jews and Gentiles despised each other. For thatreason …

We experienced socialseparation.

Paul draws attention to thisproblem by saying this, “Who are called uncircumcision by what is called thecircumcision made in the flesh by hands” (Eph 2:11).

This statement refers to thecustom that God required of Israelites, that all Jewish men should becircumcised from Abraham forward (Gen 17:1-14). It was supposed to be aperpetual reminder that God had promised to bless Abraham’s descendants.

To follow this tradition, theIsraelites circumcised their sons at eight-days old. Men who wanted to convertto Judaism were also required to be circumcised first (Exo 12:43-49).

Sadly, this God-given reminderbecame a point of ethnic pride. Since many Gentile nations did not practicecircumcision (though some did), Jewish people often viewed their circumcisionas a “badge of honor and superiority” and called them “uncircumcised” in aderogatory, condescending way.

Though Paul was Jewish andcircumcised, he described circumcision here in a surprising way, as “made inthe flesh by hands.” This word means “done by hand” and was commonly used todescribe pagan, non-Jewish idols that were crafted by hand.

Israel twisted God’s command dueto ethnic arrogance.

This attitude towardsnon-Jewish people pushed them farther away from God not closer.

For Israel to push othernations away from God was a serious problem because God had sovereignly chosenthe Jewish people for the purpose of blessing the other nations through Israel,not pushing them away (Gen12:3).

Furthermore, God gave Israelthe mission of being a “light to the Gentiles” (Isa 42:6; 49:6; 60:3; 62:1-2). Hegave them the responsibility of spreading the knowledge of God to the rest ofthe world so that people throughout the world would come to him.

Rather than spread theknowledge of God to the world, however, they turned people away from Godinstead. As a church, do we have a similar problem? Do we despise nonbelievers,or do we show God’s love and salvation to them as he intends?

God loved the world (not justIsrael) so much that he sent Christ to die for their sins (John 3:16). ThenChrist commanded us to “make disciples of all nations” (Matt 28:19) and to be his witnesses “to theend of the earth” (Acts1:8).

Paul will return to this pointlater on in Ephesians, so we will move on from it for now to focus on hislarger focuses in these verses. In addition to social separation …

We experienced spiritualseparation.

This problem was greater thanour social separation. Social separation is a serious problem, but it issecondary to spiritual separation, which is primary. To remind us about how farfrom God we once were, he gives us five ways we were separated from God.

We should understand these five ways as being in addition to the problemsPaul already described in Eph 2:1-10. We were (1) born spirituallydead, (2) controlled by the world, the flesh, and the devil, (3) destined toreceive the wrath of God.

These three spiritual problemsare true of all nonbelievers, whether Jewish or Gentile and they are badenough. The next five problems are additional problems for nonbelievers whowere born as Gentiles, not Jews.

We had no Savior (“withoutChrist”).

This does not mean that onlyIsraelites could be saved, nor does it mean that all Israelites were saved –for many did not believe, despite their knowledge of the Messiah. Instead, itmeans no one outside of Israel had easy access or exposure to the good newsabout a Messiah who would save us from our sins.

We had no citizenship (“aliensfrom the commonwealth of Israel”).

This means we did not enjoythe special favor, care, and attention of God. Though God causes the rain tofall on the just and the unjust (Matt 5:45), he gives special attention toIsrael. He knows them in a special way (Amos 3:2) and watches over them in a special way (Psa 121:4).

We had no promises (“strangersfrom the covenants of promise”).

This means that we were notthe recipients of any covenant promises from God, referring specifically to theAbrahamic (Gen 12:2-3;17:7), Mosaic (Exo 19:5-8), Palestinian (Deut 29:10-15) and Davidic (2 Sam 8-16)covenants. God was not obligated to do anything for us.

We had no hope (“no hope”).

We could be confident aboutnothing (Psa 146:5). Our future was bleak, controlled by nothing but fate andcapricious gods as far as we were concerned – if we believed a future existedat all. A popular songwriter summarizes this hopelessness in a song that says,“Live like there’s no tomorrow – cause all we have is here right now.”

The Jewish people, however,could look forward to guaranteed blessing, protection, and restoration from God,no matter what difficulties they faced in the present (Psa 71:5; 146:5; Jer17:13; Acts 28:20).

We had no God (“without God”).

Though some of us claimed tohave no God (Psa 14:1) and others of us had “gods” of one kind or another, wehad no true God (Gal 4:8).We were entirely cut off from God and lived with no creator, provider, guider,or judge. The gods of Gentile nations and world religions were nothing morethan idols made by hands.

Altogether, these fiveproblems placed all the nations apart from Israel at a serious spiritual disadvantage.This disadvantage was further intensified because of Israel’s generallyunloving attitude towards outsiders, cutting them off from salvation.

Thankfully, the Old Testament(OT) shows us that despite the ethnic animosity of the Jewish people, numerous Gentiles still believedon the LORD. Some of these include: Jethro (a Midianite, Exo 18), Caleb(a Canaanite, Num 32:12), Rahab (a Canaanite prostitute, Josh 2), Othniel (aCanaanite, Judg 3:9), Jael (a Canaanite, Judg 4-5), Ruth (a Moabite, Ruth 1:4),Uriah (a Hittite, 2 Sam 11:3), Naaman (a Syrian, 2 Kings 5), the pagan sailorswho threw Jonah overboard (Jonah 1:16), the people of Nineveh who repented whenJonah preached to them (Jonah 3), and Nebuchadnezzar (a Baylonian, Dan 4).

Even so, this is a relatively smallnumber of people. Thankfully, the gospel message and the church overcomes thisJew and Gentile divide on a far greater scale today.

Today, we are near in everyway.

Christ paid the ultimate price(“by the blood of Christ”). To overcome the many ways that we were born so faraway from God, God could not rely on the Jewish people. He chose them to be aspecial nation and provided the world with a Savior through them, but theyfailed to be a light to the world by shunning the world instead.

This is astounding not only sincethey despised the Gentile nations. It is also astounding because they despisedthe Savior God sent, their own Messiah. In their hatred of Christ theycrucified him. By doing this, they unknowingly provided the Gentiles with aSavior.

Both social and spiritualseparation may only be solved by the greatest price – the violent death ofChrist.

We do not pay this price, Goddoes. His sacrifice – the basis for the gospel – is the only true solution tothe social and spiritual separation that permeates the world. Truly, ourgreatest distance from God required God to pay the greatest price to save us.

We are near to God.

The death of Jesus Christremoves our great distance from God and brings us near to him in a close andintimate relationship – like children with a father. Peter announced that thepromise of forgiveness of sins was given both to the Jews and “to all who areafar of, as many as the Lord our God will call” (Acts 2:39).

But the death of Christ doesmore than bring us near to God. Christ’s death brings us near to one anotherwho were formerly at odds with one another from a social and ethnic standpoint,not just spiritual.

We are near to one another.

The death of Jesus Christremoves the great distance we place between ourselves and people with otherethnic identities. The gospel does not discriminate people from any ethnicgroup – it is for every nation of the world. Paul will emphasize this amazingoutcome, this new reality in the following verses – so I will speak about thatin upcoming sermons, not here.

But this, my friends, is onereason why we should commit ourselves to full cooperation with a specificchurch, so that we can draw near to God and to one another on a regular basisin a public way.

Having considered Eph 2:11-13,we should take this truth to heart: your view of the church today means morewhen you remember your distance from God before. Sometimes we fail to value thechurch we’re in because we’ve forgotten where we’ve come from.

Personal, private worshipalone does not display the kind of spiritual and social reconciliation that thegospel makes possible.

It also fails to do what Godpaid the ultimate price to achieve – bringing together people who were onceseparated from one another, socially and spiritual.

One reason why we shouldcommit ourselves to full cooperation with a specific church is so that we candraw near to God and to one another on a regular basis in a regular, publicway. The more we do this, the more we value, cherish, and demonstrate the unityand reconciliation that Christ provides.

In this way, a church can be apreview of the future, eternal kingdom God has promised, a foretaste of heavenon earth – where people from “all nations, tribes, peoples, and tongues” willstand before the throne of God (Rev 7:9).

Let this principle drive youand deepen your determination to meet together with your church on Sundays, toworship with more devotion and serve with more sacrifice – alongside otherbrothers and sisters in Christ who were once as hopelessly far away from God asyou were, and just as distant from you as well.