Second Pass at This Weekend's Bible Lesson: Ephesians 2:11-22

[Each week, I present as many updates on my reflections and study of the Biblical texts on which our weekend worship celebrations will be built as I can. The purpose is to help the people of the congregation I serve as pastor, Friendship Lutheran Church of Amelia, Ohio, get ready for worship. Hopefully, it's helpful to others as well, since most weekends, our Bible lesson is one from the weekly lectionary, variations of which are used in most of the churches of the world.]

For the first pass at this lesson, presented earlier in the week, see here. It provides a general overview.

Now, for some verse-by-verse comments...

11So then, remember that at one time you Gentiles by birth, called “the uncircumcision” by those who are called “the circumcision” —a physical circumcision made in the flesh by human hands—
(1) Circumcision, of course, was the entry rite for males into the Jewish faith. In ancient times, baby boys were circumcised eight days after their births. When the term uncircumcised was used by Jews, it had, at its worst, a derogatory tone. At best, it was a designation of not being in covenant with God and therefore, having no standing with God.

(2) The author of Ephesians, echoing words found in First Peter, calls on the Gentile Christians at Ephesus to remember that before they came to faith in Christ, they had no standing before God.

(3) Here, the writer seems to totally ignore that God had instituted circumcision among the Jews (Genesis 17:11-14). Instead, he sees it as a human action and thereby, inferior to the spiritual connection that Gentile believers have with God through faith in Christ. More on this later.

12remember that you were at that time without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world.
(1) Because the Gentiles were formerly without Christ, they were alienated from the only way it had previously been possible for one to have a relationship with God: being part of the commonwealth of Israel.

(2) Those terms aliens and strangers were among the terms used by historic Israel about outsiders. Although aliens and strangers were, according to Old Testament law, to be treated with respect and neighborliness, Israelites understood that they weren't part of God's people. First Peter picks up on the aliens and strangers motif to describe the status of Christian believers in the world, out of place because our real home is with God. More on that later.

(3) The New Interpreter's Bible points out the connection between this passage and Romans 9:4-5, where Paul enumerates the privileges associated with being part of God's people. Here, the author is saying that because the Gentiles hadn't been Jewish believers, they enjoyed none of the privileges associated with being reconciled with and close to God.

(4) The concept of "commonwealth of Israel" is most clearly seen in Deuteronomy 5:1 and Isaiah 65:9.

13But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ.
(1) Only Jesus Christ affords the privileges that come with reconciliation and closeness to God that formerly only belonged to Jewish believers in God under the old Abrahamic and Mosaic covenants.

Bryan Findlayson puts it simply:

Membership in God's eternal family is now [simply] a matter of grace through faith in Christ.

(2) An important point made by several commentators and which is clear from a simple reading of it: Christians don't inherit these blessings by becoming part of the Jewish faith. If at former times, one way of living was with God as part of the family of Israel and another way was apart from God as a Gentile, in Christ, God has given a third way for all people. We become reconciled to God and to each other through the shed blood of Jesus Christ, Who died for the sins of all.

William Loader puts it this way:

This is not about incorporating Gentiles into Israel. It is about bringing both, together, to God. The reason why Gentiles now belong is not because they have been given something which the Jews already had; it is because God has done something for both which both needed. [italics added by me]...

Both Jews and Gentiles are now members of something new. There is a new household of God, a new building, a new temple. So with imagery drawn from Jewish tradition the author nevertheless celebrates a third reality which is beyond Israel and beyond Gentiles. The author celebrates the church as a community of people who have new access to God. Christ is the cornerstone; the Christian apostles and prophets are the foundation stones. We are the building which is ever growing.

(3) The Old Testament idea of Gentiles being "far off" from God can be seen in many places, including: Deuteronomy 28:49; First Kings 8:41; and Jeremiah 5:15.

(4) Unlike some similar passages in Paul's New Testament writings, no effort is made to analogize circumcision and baptism, even with the mention of circumcision that appears here. Instead, oneness with God happens by faith in Christ. There is no sacramental or ritual element to inclusion in the new family of God. In fact, the writer of Ephesians appears to disdain rites altogether.

14For he is our peace; in his flesh he has made both groups into one and has broken down the dividing wall, that is, the hostility between us.
(1) Christ effects reconciliation for those with faith in Him not only in our relationship with God, but with each other. Jew and Gentile Christians were, the writer of Ephesians was saying, reconciled to each other.

(2) Through Christ, Bryan Findlayson notes, God "has created...a new people of God."

15He has abolished the law with its commandments and ordinances, that he might create in himself one new humanity in place of the two, thus making peace,
(1) This is the most troubling verse in the entire lesson. As I pointed out in my first pass, Jesus Himself never claimed to have come to abolish the Old Testament law, but to have fulfilled it.

I wanted to fudge this point by putting words or thoughts in the mind of Ephesians' author, saying that he was referring to Israel's ritual law, rather than to the Ten Commandments. But several commentators assert that I don't have that luxury.

Yet Jesus' death on the cross and its atoning value, something asserted constantly in Ephesians, becomes meaningless apart from a sense of what C.S. Lewis called "the law of human nature," the notion that there is something wrong in the human race. That something is our inability to conform to the very notions of right and wrong to which all of us, to one degree or another, subscribe.

I doubt though, that the writer of Ephesians wanted to say that the Ten Commandments' prohibition of murder or idolatry, for example, were no longer valid.

My guess is that this verse should be read as refuting the assertions of some Jewish Christians that conformity to rituals given in the Old Testament had to be followed for salvation to be complete, even under the new covenant established by Jesus. Even in Old Testament times, after all, salvation only came by faith in a gracious God. The prophets kept calling ancient Israel to faith in God, claiming that they had wandered like sheep from their shepherd or like an adulterous lover from her husband, precisely because it was possible to get all the rituals right and not have faith. This was why Jesus called the Pharisees He encountered "whitewashed tombs," having the look of life with God about them, but being dead inside because they believed not in God, but in their laws or in themselves and their own rectitude.

But there were laws that existed for those who were part of God's family. In upholding salvation by grace, the writer of Ephesians may have given an exaggerated version of the significance of those laws. He wanted people to understand that conformity with laws, even those from God, can not bring us salvation. Only faith in Christ can do that.

Of course, in this interpretation I could be completely and totally wrong.

16and might reconcile both groups to God in one body through the cross, thus putting to death that hostility through it.
(1) Bryan Findlayson writes of this and verse 15:

The purpose of Christ's work on the cross was to reconcile a family of believers with the living God. Christ's death on the cross serves to reconcile us with God and with each other, particularly, Jewish believers with Gentile believers.

17So he came and proclaimed peace to you who were far off and peace to those who were near; 18for through him both of us have access in one Spirit to the Father.
(1) The entire human race is given a single access point to God: Jesus Christ. Notice here that we see the Son (he), the (Holy) Spirit, and the Father.

(2) The Spirit is the One Who makes faith in the unseen Christ possible. Paul writes:

Therefore I want you to understand that no one speaking by the Spirit of God ever says “Let Jesus be cursed!” and no one can say “Jesus is Lord” except by the Holy Spirit. (First Corinthians 12:3)

(3) The Old Testament had always anticipated that what God started with the descendants of Abraham would eventually be taken to the whole world:

Peace, peace, to the far and the near, says the Lord; and I will heal them. (Isaiah 57:19)

Martin Luther said that Israel was the cradle in which the Savior of the world was lain. When Jesus the Savior fulfilled His mission, all the world was given access to God and eternity.

(4) According to The New Interpreter's Bible, the phrase, have access, would have reminded the original recipients of this letter of efforts by many in Asia Minor, where they lived, to gain access to powerful imperial persons. But what these influence-seekers strove to gain with piddling public officials through their efforts, God gave for free to all with faith in Christ: access! And not access to some political honcho who would soon pass from the scene, dead or replaced, but access to the God of the universe Whose word stands forever and Who, in Christ, had conquered death!

19So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are citizens with the saints and also members of the household of God,
(1) The New Interpreter's Bible also notes:

Access to a powerful person often implied entry into an impressive building.

It also says that cities in Asia Minor sought Rome's favor by building temples Emperor Augustus. Others built temples in order to gain access to gods.

The thrust of the final verses of our lesson is:

• that we cannot gain access to the transcendent through temples built with hands (or the rituals of our hands, cf. v. 11), but only through Jesus Christ, and
• that God has made peace with us and among those who believe in Christ that destroys old walls of enmity and misunderstanding.

(2) In fact, those of us who are part of God's household, are really bricks built into a living temple. This is a motif that appears also in First Peter.

20built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the cornerstone. 21In him the whole structure is joined together and grows into a holy temple in the Lord; 22in whom you also are built together spiritually into a dwelling place for God.