Other automatic things…
There is a lot more to that story, my story, both good and bad, but as I am using my story to tell of God’s we need to turn toward our passage. The first verse to pick up is the 13th of Ephesians 2. Last week’s last verse is this week’s first.
13 But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. (Ephesians 2:13–ESV)
Something about myself, my Baldwin Brook Drive family, injected a separation from others. My family and I were far off from others. This was not a geographic farness, but an interpersonal one. Paul is not writing of a geographic farness in the Jew-Gentile context, but an interreligious one complete with real implications both in their lives and for their eternities.
That interreligious separation was intrinsic in the Jewish spiritual heritage. When he tells the Gentiles that they were far off he implied being far off from God, and in the Jewish context that related to God’s presence at the temple. God had demonstrated his nearness to Israel from their earliest national days, the desert days. Remember how the cloud would descend and rest upon the Tabernacle? Eventually, the people of Israel gained their own territory in Canaan. King David solidified the national presence there and dreamt of a temple. His son King Solomon built that temple.
Solomon’s temple did not survive till the time of Christ, but Herod had built another one. That Jewish Temple can be drawn into the discussion for its intrinsic segregation. Herod’s temple was separated from the wider, secular Jerusalem by great columns. There was a wide court known as the court of the Gentiles. That, though, was as far as they could go. There was another set of walls that only the Jew could enter, but it, too, had walls. The first limited the women to an outer section. Then there was a closer section to God where the men could go. Finally, there was the Temple itself which had the Holy Place and the Holy of Holies. The innermost court was where God himself was supposed to be and only 1 person, the High Priest, could go there and then only 1 time per year at great personal risk.
The Gentiles Paul writes to are Christians. They are “in Christ Jesus.” As a result of this connection with Christ, they have been brought near to God the Father and the people of Israel. They worship in spirit and truth and as such do not need a temple. The Holy Spirit dwells in the follower of Christ. That is what God decided to do. He also decided to bring salvation through the Jews. The blood of Christ was the tunnel to nearness.
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