When two parties are at variance, the surest way to bring them together is through someone whom they both love. One of the tragedies of the nineteenth century was the career of Oscar Wilde. Let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth, but that which is good to the use of edifying, that it may minister grace unto the hearers.". "There are three outstanding schools of moral pathology traceable throughout the centuries. 2. l Caphtor, fol. At the same time there is no exclusion of Gentile believers, but the reverse. Gideon's answer was: "I will not rule over you, and my son will not rule over you; the Lord shall rule over you" ( Judges 8:23). All have sinned, or missed the mark, and come short of the glory of God. We are sealed with the mark of the Holy Good works cannot earn them salvation, but once they are saved their lives should be full of good works. He is the Lord our God; his judgments are in all the earth. And what then is the truth as it is in Jesus? Whereas you talk about so many who say, "When I get to my death bed, maybe, you know, I will consider turning my life over to Him. They said that the Gentiles were created by God to be fuel for the fires of Hell; that God loved only Israel of all the nations that he had made; that the best of the serpents crushed, the best of the Gentiles killed. The Unity In Christ ( Ephesians 2:13-18 Continued). God alone is worthy of worship. "You" refers to Gentiles (2:11). It was a choice of God Himself before there was any creature responsible or dependent. The mark that God has established for you is perfection. To honour one's father and mother was both an obligation and had a special promise under law. The English translators did not know what to make of the apostle, and so they changed it to "high places," which was an unwarrantable liberty, and gives the most perverse meaning. Such is the truth, if indeed we have learnt the Christ as God teaches Him. It is possible that you would be trying very hard to hit the mark. Space, time, matter, and energy were all created by him, which means that he himself does not consist in space, time, matter, or energy. That is what God says about us, you may come closer than others, but we have all come short of the glory of God. I would say, "Okay, start out in the back yard, that weed patch back there. I thought I was going to die. The Revised Common Lectionary reads through Ephesians in Year B, Pentecost season. P: Even though it is summertime, our lives are crowded and rushed. It cannot have escaped observation that there are two great parts in that which has come before us. The first thing is to "be strong in the Lord, and in the power of his might." He is the God of Jesus; He is the Father of Jesus. X, p. 638. He may shed abroad the love of God therein; but He is rather said to dwell in us, making the body God's temple. It is neither "faith" nor "the faith." It cannot be otherwise. What benefit did you reap at that time from the things ("sins" Ephesians 2:20) you are now ashamed of? for who should be more above the feelings of jealousy than those who delight in that which shows the greatness, and the glory, and the perfect goodness of God in His greatest work? They have run the full ten yards, it is still empty. This literally means a slip or a fall. Reader 1 But now in Christ you who once were far away. The man who is under their domination has taken sides against God. Here are some indexes that might be helpful. The words "trespasses" and "sins" are probably synonymous (compare 1 Corinthians 15:3 and Romans 4:25). All rights reserved worldwide. Pythagoras said: "The whole air is full of Spirits." Forgive us when we create barriers rather than tear them down. As our children grow older, do we come nearer to them, or do they drift away until conversation is often difficult and we and they are practically strangers? When the Psalmist sang: "I will extol thee, my God and king" ( Psalms 145:1) he meant it literally. All other combats are outside the calling of a Christian. There might be an adopted son without the nature. Submissions: I am so grateful to those of you who send me your own material to post! The priest sprinkled the blood around the altar because it was atonement for the soul. The love of God is the most amazing, the most powerful, the most abundant, the most intimate, the most lovely thing. In every Greek city there were xenoi ( G3581) and their life was not easy. It is evident in this verse that the deadness of unregenerated people is a derivative, not of their birth, but of their sins. (iii) Greater than anything else, Jesus Christ revives and restores the lost will. And that not of yourselves: it is a gift of God: not of works, lest any man should boast. L: Come into this time of peace and children of God, citizens of the Kingdom. But the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ "hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ." to live in the praise of his glorious grace! (vi) It is life which is deserving only of the wrath of God. WebPaul writes to the Ephesians that "in the past you were spiritually dead because of your disobedienc One of my son's housemates -- Ephesians 2:1-10 -- Fourth Sunday in Lent - B -- 2003 One of my son's housemates at college is an artist. Oh give thanks to the Lord; call upon his name; make known his deeds among the peoples! In any Christless society there can be nothing but middle walls of partition. Jesus wants to do good things through us! And he never recovered the full use of that most precious faculty, the boon of youth and happy childhood, and which he had once possessed, without knowing it, in such singular and exceptional completeness. (Ephesians 2:1). 14. Who hath made both one, and hath broken down the middle wall of partition between us; There is no longer the division between Jews and Gentiles. Well, dear friends, if we have been quickened, we have been quickened from above. And I worship Him in Spirit and in truth.And so He has made us alive, alive spiritually, for by grace are we saved. 4 all the earth bows down to you; they sing praise to you, they sing the praises of your name. 8 praise our god, all peoples, let the sound of his praise be heard; 9 he has preserved our lives and kept our God has "abounded toward us in all wisdom and prudence; having made known unto us [what is the special proof of it] the mystery of his will." And then, as He begins to minister His truth to our heart, and He begins to really speak to us, they don't understand that thrill of God's Word really ministering to our lives and to the things of our lives. People are invited he has made us alive together with Christ, (for by grace you are saved;) ( Ephesians 2:5 ). I must draw near to him in prayer.". They were chosen in time. When I tried to hide my guilt I was miserable. He came and preached peace to you who were far off. You were not the chosen Israelites, you have not the covenant mark in your flesh. And so he began to amass to himself wealth until he was the richest man in the world, and silver was as common as rocks in Israel. Hopeless And Helpless ( Ephesians 2:11-12 Continued). Need I say that this is altogether above human comprehension? That reality will lead to despair, therefore you cannot face reality. But not merely this. They believed that it went on for three thousand years; then came a conflagration in which the whole universe was consumed in flames; then the whole process began all over again, and the same events and the same people exactly repeated themselves. During Lent Come now, let us reason together, says the Lord: though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be like snow; though they are red like crimson, they shall become like wool. Through Jesus there is a place for all men in the family of God. Just as the Canaanites tried to keep the Israelites out of the land which God assured Moses the tribes were to have for their possession, so Satan's great effort is to hinder the saints of God from realizing their blessedness in heavenly places. He knows about himself better than you do. In fact, it comes from a game in archery that the British used to have. Its tougher than titanium and softer than a feather, more electric than lightning, more vast than the universe. It was brought in either to convict the Corinthians of their utter departure through the spirit of the world, the flesh taking that shape, or it was brought in triumphantly on their restoration. A state of sin is a state of conformity to this world, Ephesians 2:2; Ephesians 2:2. But as he said that by revelation it was made known to him, so he would from God communicate it to them. Now Paul uses two pictures, which would be specially vivid to a Jew, to show how that hatred is killed and a new unity has come. It will be observed that the desire is not merely that they might be enlightened as to the special glory of their standing, but that their hearts might be filled with the love of Christ, and this too as a present thing filling them to overflowing, though surely not to cease in the ages to come. 13But now in Christ Jesus you who once(AC) were far away have been brought near(AD) by the blood of Christ. So, too, has our modern world. "Now therefore". The Jews who believe are taken out of their former place, as much as the Gentiles, who had no place. We have not earned salvation nor could we have earned it. The main point then is that God has made believers alive, raised us up, and seated us with Christ. His boat was old and he did not worry over much about it; the engines were begrimed and ill-cared for. Therefore we need never fear, no matter what the blessing and the privilege may be. We confess our praying to you, and ask for your Spirit to pray within us. If you are spiritually dead, nothing here belongs to you; but if he hath quickened you, you may take every single sentence of the chapter, and say, "That is mine, and glory be the grace of God!". In the next verse the apostle opens out that which is move particularly connected with "the God of our Lord Jesus Christ." It was all a known thing that they were blessed by yea, with Christ, forming a part of Christ, expressly fellow-heirs, and of the same body. Now we are Christians; and this decides the character of the duties we have to pay, or of the good works which He has before prepared that we should walk in them; for "we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus" for this very purpose. Thus Israel stands in the permanent remembrance of power that redeemed them from the land of Egypt, and in the anticipation of a still greater manifestation that will eclipse whatever had been seen of old. I. Glory from the church, glory from generation upon generation. Oh, you did stutter and stammer over it! If you're interested in reading the results, visit here: https://pandemicworshipsurvey.blogspot.com/. Our present position is this, first, that we are raised from the dead. (iv) It is a life which is at the mercy of desire. That is the first part of our position, that we have come to live a separate life now, and have quitted the path we trod before. It comes to us with pain; it gives us many surprises; and it suggests a large number of questions. You had nothing to do with this. Not even Jesus can give a man back his lost innocence, for not even Jesus can put back the clock; but what he can do is take away the sense of guilt which the lost innocence necessarily brings with it. 17He came and preached peace(AL) to you who were far away and peace to those who were near. God grant you to know the joy of that condition! No, no. He tracked her down. The first thing sin does is create a feeling of estrangement between us and God. In this chapter, Paul discusses how that happens: Christs victory over evil powers makes reconciliation with God possible. In what sense were the people of Israel different from other peoples? In him we have been reconciled to God through the cross, made citizens with the saints and members of the household of God.. Forgive the poverty of our accomplishing. You are interested, you are pleased, you are amused, with what they say. But he has raised us up together, and made us sit together in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus ( Ephesians 2:6 ): Or in the heavenlies. I have in my church and congregation and I dare to say what men dare to do I have in my congregation women whose ruin and destruction have been wrought by some of the most respected men in respectable society. All the good works in the world cannot put us right with God; but there is something radically wrong with the Christianity which does not issue in good works. We cannot earn God's love; but we can and must show how grateful we are for it, by seeking with our whole hearts to live the kind of life which will bring joy to God's heart. To the father, the sinful "son" was dead in sin and lost. I spent my life trying to satisfy my fleshly desires.We read concerning Solomon the king, as he was trying to find meaning in life how that he pursued so many different directions. "And your feet shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace." "for which I am an ambassador in bonds: that therein I may speak boldly, as I ought to speak." In France some soldiers with their sergeant brought the body of a dead comrade to a French cemetery to have him buried. For by grace are ye saved through faith; We have this expression, "by grace are ye saved," twice over in this chapter. They tell me that "creeds are dead." His sin is as yet a secret thing, kept to himself: as yet there has been no breaking forth of iniquity, but only the conception of it in the heart; just the embryo of lust, not as yet broken out into act. "We were by nature the children of wrath, even as others." Sins, , may probably mean here habitual transgression; sinning knowingly and daringly. There must always be something about him: "Having abolished in his flesh. Let me put out a fleece of wool. 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