©2003 Larry Huntsperger Peninsula Bible Fellowship

08/24/03

Life On The Inside

Ephesians 2

8/24/03 Life On The Inside

We are going to return to our study of the book of Ephesians this morning,

picking up out study with the final few verses of chapter 2.

I know we’ve been moving in and out of this study for several months now,

and when we do that

it becomes virtually impossible for us to keep a clear perspective

on where we’ve been in past studies

and how Paul has gotten us to where we are.

And so, to help us get our minds back into what’s happening here,

I want to take us back to a prayer we encountered in this letter

during the early weeks in this study.

If you were with us for those early studies

you may remember that I shared with you

something that I have found to be a valuable tool

in my own study of several letters in the New Testament written by Paul.

In a few of his letters

we find a fascinating thing taking place early in his writing.

We find him allowing us to eavesdrop on his private conversation with his Lord,

letting us listen in on specific requests that he is making

concerning the people he’s writing to.

And in those prayers

we find him asking God to reveal to his readers some truth or insight,

or to accomplish some work in their lives

that he then goes on to try to bring about through the very letter that follows.

Once I realized what Paul was doing in these recorded prayers

I realized, too, that those prayers provide us with a tremendous head start

in our efforts to correctly understand the letters that follow.

We see Paul doing this both in his letter to the Colossians and his letter to the Ephesians.

In Colossians 1:9, for example, Paul says,

For this reason also, since the day we heard of it, we have not ceased to pray for you and to ask that you may be filled with the knowledge of His will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding...

He prays that his readers will be filled with the knowledge of the will of God in all spiritual wisdom and understanding.

Then he goes on to reveal to them

just exactly what that will is.

And what he then reveals to them

is a truth that forever destroys the foundations

of all man-made, flesh-based religious systems.

He tells them that God’s plan for all who come to Him through Christ

is not that we attempt to live for God through faithful adherence to some external list of duties and obligations,

but rather that Christ now literally lives through us on a moment by moment basis.

COL 1:27 ...to whom God willed to make known what is the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory.

And here in the book of Ephesians

we see him following this same pattern.

In Ephesians 1:18-19 we hear Paul making this request of God,

 I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened, so that you may know what is the hope of His calling, what are the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints, and what is the surpassing greatness of His power toward us who believe.

He makes three specific requests of God -

1) that we would understand at the heart level the amazing calling that comes to us through Christ,

2) that we would understand the great riches that God Himself inherited in the saints as the result of Christ’s death,

3) and that we would understand the greatness of God’s power poured out on us who believe.

From that point Paul then goes on

to write out for us the knowledge

that can be used by God’s Spirit

to make that prayer a living reality in our lives.

Now, we have not yet moved through this letter

to the point where Paul has revealed to us

all that we need to know

in order for that prayer to be fully answered in our lives,

but we have made some progress.

As we moved through our study of chapter two

we listened to Paul describe for us

that remarkable personal history

that is a part of every believer’s life.

He began that history where we all begin,

both in this life

and in our relationship with our Creator...

EPH 2:1 And you were dead in your trespasses and sins...

And then from there we listened to Paul

as he described for us

that utterly amazing recreative process

that God’s Spirit takes every person through

who comes to Him through faith in Christ.

He described the way in which God makes us alive to Him for the first time in our lives,

raising us up with Christ

and seating us with Christ in the very presence of God Himself.

There was a contemporary Christian song that came out a number of years back that contained these words -

“I have been revived.

For the first time in my life I am alive.

When I looked into Jesus

I found me a friend,

and I’m never going back to my old life ever again.”

For the first time in my life I am alive...

I love that line

because it captures the truth of what Paul is saying to us in this second chapter of Ephesians.

And whenever I get near this truth

I find myself wanting to emphasize once again

that we are not talking here

simply about some positional

or theoretical doctrinal truth.

We are talking about the actual, literal awakening of our spirits

to the reality of God Himself.

When Christ entered my life

in the fall of 1966

I understood almost nothing whatsoever about what had just taken place.

I understood nothing about His grace,

or about the new spirit He had just recreated within me,

or about what it means to live in His presence on a daily basis.

But there was one thing I did understand from the very beginning,

one thing that altered every aspect of my life from that point on, forever.

If I would have put it into words at the time

do you know what I would have said?

“OH MY GOD, YOU’RE REAL!”

I’m not altogether sure whether it’s wise for me to try to put this into words,

because I know God relates to each of us

in ways that are perfectly matched to our unique identities,

but I know, too, that there is a counterfeit Christianity

that has robbed and cheated countless people throughout history.

It is a counterfeit Christianity created by Satan himself

to blind people to the real thing.

It is a Christianity that has proper doctrine,

a Christianity that has a sinner’s prayer

and offers a promise of salvation,

a Christianity that closely parallels the real thing in countless ways,

and yet it is a liar and a cheat and a hideous enemy of the real thing.

And I know of only one certain way

to distinguish between the counterfeit and the truth.

The real thing always brings the human spirit into the discovery of the living reality of God Himself.

The counterfeit brings about only a commitment to a religious form and structure.

When the Apostle John wrote his first open letter to the people of God

he offered his readers a fascinating proof of our salvation.

It is one of the few such proofs that I am aware of anywhere in Scripture.

It’s found in I John 3:24.

John says, “And we know by this that He abides in us, by the Spirit whom He has given us.”

Isn’t that an amazing statement?

I understand John’s words to mean

that one of the greatest “proofs” we will ever have

that we really are in the family of God

is found in the way the Holy Spirit

opens the eyes of our hearts to the reality of God Himself.

And I mention this to you this morning

simply because I don’t ever want any of you

to stop short in your pilgrimage toward your Creator.

What you’re seeking,

what you have been called to discover,

the first and greatest purpose for which we have been placed on this planet

is not so that we can find the “right religion”,

it is so that we can find our way into the heart of our God.

And if your pilgrimage thus far

has only brought you to belief systems,

and groups,

and organizations,

and religious doctrines,

whatever you do,

don’t stop there.

Only when your spirit has been reborn by God Himself

and, in your own way, you have found yourself saying to your Creator, “Oh my God - you’re REAL!”

only then will you have found what you have been placed here to find.

That’s what Paul is talking about

as he traces for us that pilgrimage that he outlines for us in Ephesians chapter 2,

a pilgrimage that begins with us being dead in our sins,

and ends with us being seated with Christ in the very presence of God.

But there is an interesting thing that happens in this second chapter of Ephesians,

something that I don’t think I’ve mentioned in exactly these words in the past.

For, you see, Paul doesn’t just trace through our personal history once in this chapter,

he traces through it twice.

The first time he does so describing what has happened in our relationship with God,

beginning with “you were dead in you trespasses and sins”

and ending with that remarkable description of us seated with Christ in the presence of God.

But then the second time he goes through our pilgrimage

describing what has happened in our relationship to the family of God.

And this time he beings by saying,

EPH 2:11-12 “Therefore remember...that you were at that time separate from Christ, excluded from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world.”

You were all alone,

on the outside looking in.

Probably the most intensely lonely year I ever lived

was my first year in college.

I was not a Christian at the time,

though I honestly believed I was.

The last part of that year

I was living on a campus in Seattle

in an area that was surrounded by beautiful older residential streets.

I had a little motorcycle at the time

and sometimes in the evenings

I would get on my little Yamaha

and ride slowly through the streets surrounding the school,

looking in the glowing windows of the beautiful old homes.

In some of them I could see families gathered around dinner tables,

in others there were people coming home at the end of the day,

or sitting in the living rooms reading the paper or watching TV.

When I read Paul’s words at this point in Ephesians

as he describes our relationship to the family of God prior to our union with Christ,

emotionally I remember that time in my life,

that time when I was on the outside of everything, looking in.

“Therefore remember...that you were at that time separate from Christ, excluded from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world.”

But just as he brings us from spiritual death

to life in the presence of God in the first half of the chapter,

so in the second half of the chapter

he brings us from separation and isolation

to the acceptance,

and unity,

and comradeship,

and belonging that can only be found in the family of God.

Listen to the words he uses to end that chapter.

EPH 2:19-22 So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints, and are of God's household, having been built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus Himself being the corner stone, in whom the whole building, being fitted together is growing into a holy temple in the Lord; in whom you also are being built together into a dwelling of God in the Spirit.

Through Christ we have gone from death to God

into life in His presence,

and from isolation and exclusion from the family of God

into full citizenship in the household of the holy ones of God.

OK, now those are the facts.

Those are the absolute and unchangeable truths given to us by our God.

But they are not what we often experience in our lives on a daily basis.

Like so many other areas of our walk with the King,

there is often a great gulf between what we experience

and what our Lord tells us we have already been given by Him

as a result of our faith in Christ.

He tells us, for example, that we have already been given peace with God forever,

and yet many Christians continue to live with the belief

that their God continues to stand over them as their judge,

offering or withholding His acceptance on the basis of their performance at any given moment.

And our God tells us that through Christ we have already been freed from sin,

that its power over us has been broken forever,

and yet countless Christians continue to live their lives immersed in terrible sin bondage.

And He tells us that through Christ we have already been made adequate for the life He has called us to live,

and yet many believers feel utterly overwhelmed and inadequate for the life they have been called to.

And in the same way,

Paul tells us here in Ephesians

that through Christ we have been granted full and unqualified acceptance into the family of God,

no longer isolated,

no longer alone.

The words he uses in these few verses to describe our relationship to one another within the family of God are both powerful and remarkable.

He says we are no longer strangers,

no longer aliens.

We are no longer on the darkened road outside,

looking in the windows at a life we could never possess.

Now we are on the inside,

sitting at the table with those who make up our family.

We are now “fellow citizens with the holy ones of God”,

and we are a part of the household of God.

And Paul’s imagery doesn’t stop there.

He goes on to tell us that we are...

“being fitted together” by God

in a way that is growing us into a holy temple in the Lord.

And then he pulls this whole thing together

by telling us that we are now being built together into a dwelling of God in the Spirit.

OK, clearly what Paul is describing

is a relationship both with one another and with our Lord

that appears to be radically different

from what most of us experience in “church” today.

In fact,

not only do many Christians not experience a true sense of belonging in their church experience,

but in truth they come away from church

feeling more intimidated and even condemned

than anywhere else in their experience.

And the problem here

is the same problem we face

with so many of the other truths we find presented to us by our God.

They only become living realities in our lives

when we choose to trust what’s being said enough

to act as though it is true.

The truth is

we Christians here on the earth

are not just fellow members of the same religion.

We are not just fellow students of the same belief system.

When we enter the Body of Christ through faith in Christ

we become joined to one another in the most remarkable way,

and it is God’s intention,

it is His design that we grow together into a dwelling of God in the Spirit,

no longer isolated,

no longer alone,

no longer forced to carry the burdens of life all by ourselves.

But that growth only happens

as we choose to trust what our God is telling us

about our relationships with one another.

I had a phone call this past week from a very good friend of mine,

a fellow believer with whom I’ve been building a friendship for a number of years.

He was wrestling with some difficult issues in his life

and called just so that he could talk things through with a friend.

We must have talked for well over an hour,

and at one point in the conversation he said,

“Larry, I don’t know what I’d do without you.”

I knew exactly what he was saying because I felt the same way.

We had a good friendship before he called,

but we will have a far stronger one for the rest of our lives

because he chose to allow me to be a part of his life at a very difficult point.

I didn’t have a lot of “answers” for him,

but he chose to relate toward me

as if Paul’s words here in Ephesians were really true,

as if we really are a part of the same body,

indwelt by the same Spirit,

with the ability to grow together under the leadership of the Spirit of God within us,

and because he made that choice

we both end up stronger because of it,

stronger in ourselves,

stronger in our friendship with one another,

and stronger in our friendship with our Lord.

But here’s the catch.

That growth,

that reality of a life together within the Body of Christ never ever just happens.

It becomes a living reality in our lives

only when and if we are willing to risk acting as though it were true.

It happens only when we stop playing church

and start relating to one another

as fellow members of the family of God.

And with a truth like this

I know we need some beginning place,

some way of thinking differently about ourselves and our lives together

that will move us away from the isolation that is so typical within the world of religion.

And to help here

I’d like to leave you with two suggestions.

First of all,

I urge you to make a conscious decision

that you will become a safe person for your fellow Christians.

Becoming a safe person doesn’t just happen.

For most of us it takes a great deal of relearning and rethinking.

It means we have to let go of all of those filters with which we evaluate our fellow believers.

Do they have the right doctrine?

Do they use the right words?

Do they look or act the way I think they should?

It means we must let down our own defenses

and, with our attitudes, invite them into our lives.

It means we make an absolute commitment to ourselves and to our God

that we never ever take private knowledge

and share it with anyone else.

We do not gossip.

Becoming a safe person for those around us does not just happen.

It is something we must choose,

and then something we must learn how to do.

And then second,

at those times when you hurt,

or when you are fighting with temptation,

or with failure,

or with pain,

risk inviting a fellow believer you trust into what’s going on in your life.

The truth is

so much of the isolation we suffer in life as Christians

comes to us because we are so concerned about protecting our “image”

that we refuse to let our brother or sister into our struggle

and find there the strength that can only come from knowing

that someone else knows, and cares, and prays.

And then just one final suggestion.

If you decide to follow any of these suggestions,

begin close to home.

Begin with a real, live relationship,

with a Christian friend who is already in your world.

You don’t need to track down James Dobsen’s home phone number and call him.

What you’re looking for

your God has already supplied.

All you need is eyes to see it,

and the faith to trust what He’s said.

Let someone else in.

Determine to be a safe person.