Welcome to Timeless Truth with Pastor Jim Thomas. In season 1, Pastor Jim is leading us in a study of Ephesians. Today’s passage is Ephesians 2:19-22.
Chapters 1-3 indicatives/what Christ has done
Chapters 4-6 imperatives/what it means to follow Christ
As strangers we were unknown and unfamiliar. As aliens we were foreigners and outsiders, we had no sense of belonging or citizenship.
All that has changed now that we are “in Christ” we belong to:
1. The family of God.
No longer strangers and aliens, in Christ, we belong to God as His chosen family, not merely God’s property but now God’s family, as God’s sons and daughters! Once you belong to Christ and His kingdom family, you are never, ever alone again.
“Everybody who belongs to Christ belongs to everybody who belongs to Christ.”
– E. Stanley Jones
2. The dwelling place of God.
You and I as individuals, and every other individual member of the family of God are also now the dwelling place of God. This is the place where God is worshiped, where the scriptures are taught and where the love of God is both on the move and on display between all those who are God’s sons and daughters.
“For just as we have many members in one body and all the members do not have the same function, so we, who are many, are one body in Christ, and individually members one of another… Be devoted to one another in brotherly love; give preference to one another in honor; rejoicing in hope, persevering in tribulation, devoted to prayer, contributing to the needs of the saints, practicing hospitality.”
– Romans 12:4-5, 10, 12-13
“I wonder if anything is more urgent today, for the honour of Christ and for the spread of the gospel, than what the church should be, and should be seen to be, what by God’s purpose and Christ’s achievement it already is — a single new humanity, a model of human community, a family of reconciled brothers and sisters who love their Father and love each other, the evident dwelling place of God by his Spirit. Only then will the world believe in Christ as Peacemaker. Only then will God receive the glory due to his name.”
– John Stott, The Message of Ephesians
“To be loved but not known is comforting but superficial. To be known and not loved is our greatest fear. But to be fully known and truly loved is, well, a lot like being loved by God. It is what we need more than anything. It liberates us from pretense, humbles us out of our self-righteousness, and fortifies us for any difficulty life can throw at us.”
– Timothy Keller, The Meaning of Marriage: Finding Happiness in Your Most Profound Relationship
