“[R]emember 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. 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. 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.
When you look around at our current cultural moment, it may well feel that life is in pieces. Life is fragmented through political divisions, racial divisions, family divisions, divisions over to wear a mask or not, to congregate with others or not…the divisions are all too pressing and real.
Our impulse amid these circumstances can range from checking out at one extreme or further drive a wedge at the other. We are overwhelmed by the inundation of opinions and commentary, each seeking to pull us into this tribe or that, to reduce us to a set of ideas or positions.
However, in Ephesians 2.10 Paul lays out for us as the church who we are as a people. We are God’s masterpiece, a workmanship crafted to spread the beauty of God’s good news through our good confession and works.
Further, Paul reminds us that this fragmented life, this place broken in pieces due to sin and the power struggles that resulted was once our place too.
But we are no longer defined by this reality.
We belong to a greater reality.
While we once were far off, Christ has brought us near through the blood He poured out on the cross for our victory. (Ephesians 2.13)
Further, He demolished the walls that divide us, built brick by brick from the material of legalism as we were shackled to the flesh. (Ephesians 2.14-17)
We are a new people…a new humanity…not one built on the splintered and fighting line inherited from Adam. Rather, we are a humanity built on the liberation and freedom embodied in the person and work of Jesus.
So we stand, watching the pieces shattered around us, lying on the floor of this reality. But we witness and point the way to a greater reality, one not enmeshed in the divisions of our day, but integrated into the wholeness that comes with abiding in Jesus.
This wholeness gives us the gift of seeing everyone we encounter as a sacred being reflecting the image of God. This wholeness helps us to put the divisions aside so we may love genuinely and well…so we can stand hand in hand with our sisters and brothers of every tribe, language, and nation as one new humanity. This wholeness helps us to recognize that Christ has already won the war.
He has tore down the walls that divide us. Therefore we can know the abiding presence of His peace.
We can lift others out of the pieces and welcome them into the peaceful life that is ours when we walk with Jesus.
Grace and Peace in Christ,
Matthew S. Miller
(Matthew is the preaching and discipleship minister at Highland Hills Church of Christ in Tullahoma, TN)