Of God's Household, Eph, 2:19

Good morning. We're privileged this morning to look at this verse that has just such tremendous depth in it and some marvelous things. So we'll just need to get moving here. So we'll hook up your pew belts, put it in gear, get a little shot of nitrous, and let's go. All right. Now, this verse starts off, we want to get the big picture. He starts off, we're no longer strangers and aliens, and then has this contrast word, but, right there in the middle of it. And then after that, here are all the things that contrast with that being strangers and aliens.

Fellow citizens with the saints, first thought right after that. Right after that, he says, of God's household. Next week, we'll finish off his thought and what's in contrast to no longer strangers and aliens, and that's a temple of the Lord. We'll look at the first two here this morning. verses 20 through 22 that we'll be looking at next week focus on this Paul's final point. It's an illustration of his character of the church composed of both Jews and Gentiles, created as one body in the Lord. And this passage we'll look at next week will finish off the second chapter.

All right, now as we look at this passage here, it starts off, so then, or as you have it in the King James, now therefore, Either way you look at it, it's a logical connection. He's saying, based on the things that have been set out before, this is where you stand. That's what he's laying out here. So then, because of everything that's been laid out in front of us before, here is the logical outcome. So then, you are Jews and Gentiles who have been put together, no longer these strangers and aliens, made into one new humanity.

What we see and we pointed out before, we just want to make sure it's abundantly clear, is God is the one who has taken the action. It's He who is the one who has brought near those who are Gentiles. It is He who is the one who has made the two into one. It is He who took the step to break down the dividing wall. By the way, only He could, and He did. He took the action. He abolished in Christ's flesh the enmity, the hostility, He took the action to do that, in order that he might make the two into one new man, establishing peace. God consistently in this passage takes on the verbs, that he might reconcile both to God. Having put to death the enmity, finally he came and preached, which is what we saw last week.

What you see here is God owns the verbs. What's interesting is that the inclination in man-made religion, and we made a contrast a few weeks back, the inclination in man-made religion is to sit there and point to you, get going, do this, do that. And certainly there is a place and a time and a reason for action, but not without first understanding how God acted. And that's what Paul wants to make really clear to them here. God owns the verbs.

It's not the job of anyone to create the Church. or to create a unity. Those are both things the Scripture makes abundantly clear are God's doing. It's not our job. He's already done it. It is a matter of standing and acting in what He has already done, not creating it of our own doing. One cannot look at a church body and call it his own in the sense of one's own creation. One cannot look at a church body and say, hey, that's my personal project or possession.

There are a good number of churches in the United States for which we've somehow gotten the idea. We identify the church by the pastor. Have you run across that? Oh, that's so-and-so's church. No, it isn't. If it's a church at all, it's a church that's Jesus Christ's church.

What's real interesting as we look through the New Testament, outside of the church in Jerusalem, we don't know the name of a single elder in all the churches of the New Testament. I think that's on purpose. Elders are not called to be big names, not in flashing lights and neon banners. Instead, the focus is to be upon the Lord. If any human being becomes our focus for the church, that person has gone in the way.

The focus is what Paul is going to bring up later here in Ephesians 4.15, but speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in all aspects unto him who is the head, even Christ. That's where we're growing up into. That's who we're growing up into. He says, then you are no longer, this is the logical consequence, no longer strangers and aliens. Here's the negative statement, not this. So he's laying that out in front of us here.

The prior situation, prior to God taking action, is Gentiles could only be in the circle sort of by becoming a Jewish proselyte. I say sort of, and we'll explain that a little further. They could get closer to the circle and maybe kind of straddle a line, but they were never really inside the circle. The Jews were the ones in the circle. That was the way things were laid out, and there was no changing that. and approach God through the Jews, but the door was not wide open. The prior situation, the Jews were in the circle, the Gentiles were the ones who were strangers and aliens. So what is he making the contrast with here? He says, now, in the Church, having been made one, you are no longer strangers and aliens. The Gentiles, contrary to the prior situation, are now no longer on the outside.

Believing is the criteria. That's what the whole Gospel of John is written for. John is explicit about why he wrote the Gospel. These are written that you might believe, and that believing you might have life through his name. Believing is the criteria.

A believer may be ethnically Jew or Gentile. I don't know about you, but I'm a, I hope you don't mind this, a Northern European mongrel. A mixture of all sorts of things. But nonetheless, I'm not in the circle of Judaism. I'm in the circle of what Christ has created, the Church, because of believing, regardless of what the ethnic background is. Those distinctions just plain don't matter.

Galatians 3.28. Now, he says, you are no longer, this is a pivot word that Paul uses here, no more in the King James, It occurs only here in the book of Ephesians, but Paul commonly uses it in his letters as he's making distinction between the condition before his readers were believers to the time after. You were this, but no longer, now this. It's the dividing line that Paul places as he often speaks to the believers.

In 2 Corinthians 5.16, which those in the 2 Corinthians class will have a chance to study up on later. Therefore, from now on we recognize no one according to the flesh, even though we have known Christ according to the flesh, yet now we know him in this way no longer. How we know him is now different. No longer do we know him as we did.

In Galatians chapters 3 and 4, Paul is explaining, using multiple illustrations and points, that the believers in the church are no longer under the law. And one of the illustrations that he uses, he says, the law is a tutor. So, Galatians 3, 25 and 26, now that faith has come, we are no longer under a tutor. No longer under a tutor. Why? The law is this tutor. The law is this schoolmaster to lead us to Christ. In the next chapter, he says, you are no longer a slave. The law is a slave master, okay? But a son, and if a son, an heir through God. Why? The law has been through the death of Christ, been put out of commission.

No longer strangers and aliens. Now let's look at that, strangers and aliens. The King James has a slightly different translation, strangers and foreigners, but you know what I found out? No matter what English translation you have, you still have to explain it, because there's more depth to the words than comes out in our translations. These words have a similar meaning, but there's a shaded difference that I think is helpful for us to know.

And we saw, when we were studying Ephesians 2.12, that this word xenos, that's the first one here, comes out. And if we look at that here, we're going to step back in time. Strangers to the covenants of promise is what we see in 2.12.

We mentioned when we were studying that that in the book of Ruth, Ruth 2.10, Ruth is speaking and she acknowledges that she says, I am a xenos. I am one who is on the outside. I am a stranger. So these Xenos were those who were allowed to be in the country, but in fact they remained without all the rights and privileges. That lacks the definite article here, so it means the focus is upon the character strangers, very much of character strangers.

Now, in Ephesians 2.17 here, these strangers and aliens, Excuse me, I think I should be 219. Strangers and aliens.

Xenos kai paraikos. Paraikos is a compound word, as Paul is prone to use. Paraoikos, and it means alongside the house, and it used to be used for the word neighbor. The way it goes is this. Xenos were those who are traveling typically short term, but without right of citizenship. Paraikos were those who were Originally, centuries before, it meant just neighbor, but it came to mean the idea of those who are sort of resident aliens. You may be there for a long time, but you're still not on the inside. Have you ever been there? Been there for a long time, but still not on the inside?

It's that idea. What I want to do here before we move on, though, is I want to clarify something. I brought this up before, but I just want to make sure it's abundantly clear so that we have no confusion. We have encountered, and we will be encountering, this oikos family of Greek words.

And we need to let you know, oik is not oikos, oikos. There's nothing of the sort. Oik, that's not like a pig with a cold or anything of that sort. And I need to tell you, I've spoken to several pigs at length, and none of them know Greek, so there's nothing to get confused about there.

Now that that's abundantly clear, we'll get back on to the passage here. Xenos kaipareikos. A Xenos was kind of equivalent to our idea of a tourist visa. You've got a short-term traveling allowance to come through here, but you're still really on the outside. You have no long-term connection, certainly, and we're glad to have you here, but the truth is you're not a citizen. You just lack that status. And you can be here as long as your visa is valid.

It's kind of that idea. Then this other word, Paroikos here, is the equivalent of a resident alien, a long-term resident, but still on the outside. Now, real interesting, we want to take a look at this word peroikos, because when we say long-term but still on the outside, we mean long-term. And you'll find a full-color map is available as you exit on the left if you're interested in taking up one, so you don't have to scratch wildly. But track me through this map here as we go through the steps.

Deuteronomy 23.7 says, You shall not detest an Edomite, for he is your brother. You shall not detest an Egyptian, because you were an alien in his land. That's this word peroikos. The Edomite is a descendant of Esau, and peroikos here is this word.

You had a resident alien, long-term status. Now, how long did they live in Egypt? 430 years to the day. That's not long enough to become anything more than a resident alien. How about that? Let's take a look at this map here. We'll step our way through it.

Deuteronomy 23.7 says you were a resident alien for 430 years with the Egyptians, but you still were on the outside. You see the idea? So when we see this word paroikos, I mean, you can be there for centuries and you're still on the outside.

And that's the status that the Israelites had. Why? Because they were slaves. They couldn't be Egyptians. If you're an Israelite, you're going to be a slave. Here's Edom, over on the right side here. The Edomites were descendants of Esau. He says, those your brothers? Why? There's Jacob and Esau. Brothers? That's the relationship. Jacob's brother was Esau. Don't despise him. Don't despise the Egyptians.

In Exodus 2.22, Moses says, I was with the Midianites. How long was he with them? Forty years. And what does he say? I was a paroikos. Forty years wasn't long enough, even if you marry one of them, to be on the inside. You're still a little bit on the outs. Not quite there. We're not done.

Genesis 15.13, the Lord tells Abraham, your descendants are going to be in Egypt. for 400 some odd years as peroikos, long-term resident aliens, but still on the outside. Then, in 23-4, Abraham says to the Canaanites, I am a peroikos, a resident alien in Canaan. For years he was there. Still he says, I'm on the outside.

I'm not one of you. So now we have all three of those. You can feel free to pick up one of those maps if you like. So we come back to the situation here. The Gentiles, before being brought into the church, they were either short-term visitors with the Jews, glad to have you here, but sorry, you're still on the out, or you're a paroikos, you may be here for centuries, but you're still on the out. The Jews would be alongside the Gentiles. The Gentiles would even come regularly to the synagogue and do everything they possibly could to act like Jews, and the Jews would say, you're still paroikos, not quite there. As a matter of fact, I drew it kind of like this, a little closer to the circle, but still not there.

So he says, when you're no longer strangers and aliens, he says, you are not any longer on the outs. no longer having a short-term visa or resident alien status visa. But, so here's this big little word, it means in context a sharp contrast. Allah is the Greek there. He's telling them the difference between that stranger and alien status that you had and what God has created now is in sharp contrast, not a minor difference. It's no that we're talking about here. Big difference, big contrast. So to make it clear, so then, you Gentiles are no longer strangers and aliens, but you Gentiles are fellow citizens with the saints and are of God's household. So then, you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are Let's take a look at that.

This R is a state of being. It's a present indicative. It's a current state in continuance. They are right now continuing to have this status. Someday, if you guys really, really, really work at it, we'll let you in and you'll all be on the same status. Someday, it'll be okay and you'll just hang in there. No, right now.

And it's continuing. the sense of the verb that's used there. God did the work, and I added here on the overhead a red exclamation point in bold. God did the work. It is the change not because of anything they've done, but only because they believe in what God has done. Now, this word fellow, in truth, we've broken this up into two.

Fellow, however, is really a prefix, as we'll see here. It's not a separate word, but it translates the prefix soon. Here comes the soon. Paul often uses the soon prefix when he wants to communicate something happening together spiritually, and this is no exception.

It's one of his favorite words for communicating something happening together spiritually. It either uses a prefix, or in some cases he does use it as a separate word. It can be used either way. Paul uses it to express He uses it to express spiritual reality and position. Key. He uses it to express position.

He used it already, we saw in Ephesians 2, 4-6, to speak of our having been made alive together. That's soon word. With Christ, having been raised with Christ, and having been seated with Him. So we've seen this word. He is again stating a matter of position.

When we find these soon words, they are often a statement of our position. Not always, but often a statement of our position in Christ, true of every single believer. These soon words, when you see them as a statement of the position of the believer, they are always God's accomplishment. Do you know our position?

There is none of our position that is our accomplishment. God doesn't say, He doesn't work that way. Every statement of our position, when He uses these soon words, every statement of our position is God's accomplishment. We are His workmanship. Scripture makes it clear. Like this, the other soon words which describe our position in Christ, there's also no threat of being undone. You don't have to worry about it. You won't get unsooned. Nobody gets unsuined. Our position is fixed in the heavenlies. Alright, see what I mean.

I want to ask about this. Chapters 4, 5, and 6, Paul is going to deal with current moral problems with the believers in the church at Ephesus. They're right now going on. He is going to deal with them, but he doesn't even begin to touch those until he first talks about the position that they have in Christ, including those who have the moral problems. but are believers.

He is not encouraging moral problems in doing this, but he's also not going to threaten them or beat them over the head with some loss of this identification with Christ. He's not going to beat them over the head with the idea that they're going to lose their citizenship. And this is what we see here in this very passage. He tells them, fellow citizens with the saints, you know, there's no complementary threat.

Hey, be careful, you're going to be un-citizenship. It doesn't say that. Now, fellow citizens, and it's broken up in English in two words. In fact, in the Greek it's one word. We've seen that here. Citizens are those who have all the rights and privileges that go along with being a citizen of the country. In this case, it's not to any country that's on this planet. We're all fellow citizens, but the citizenship is heavenly.

Now, we need to make a purposeful detour here. We need to step off to the side a little bit, but there's a reason for it. So there's a detour ahead, but don't worry about it. You'll be okay. We're not going to do anything precarious. Nothing precarious on this detour.

Long, long ago, in a church far, far away, we studied Philippians 3, 20-21. For our citizenship is in heaven, from which we eagerly wait for a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ. That's what we saw there. And when we looked at that, there was a word that jumped out at us. This word here that Paul is using in Ephesians 2, here is a related word to this one here, palatauma. And this is a word here that has the idea, because he'd already spoken in chapter 1 about conducting yourselves as citizens, now he's stating the fact that you have citizenship. Believers have a heavenly citizenship, and he made that abundantly clear as he wrote to the church at Philippi.

Remember, as we went through that, that the people in Philippi were either people in great part who either had Roman citizenship or were working hard to gain it. Most Roman soldiers got, as one of their retirement packages, a Roman citizenship. Some of them got it in advance of that for various reasons, but a great many of them Philippi being a Roman colony, were looking for that citizenship. And what Paul was telling them, he says, you already have the citizenship that counts, all of you, even the slaves.

And that citizenship is in heaven when nobody else had any hope of such rights. And you got it not by working for it, but by believing. So Paul used this verb form of citizenship in Philippians 127 to address the behavior as saints And I have an additional note here that I have in the green there. It's their present condition. In 320, he used the noun form to say that their citizenship is in heaven. Their eternal position in Christ is heavenly. So he addressed both their condition and their position. Meanwhile, back at Ephesus here.

Ephesians 2.19, Paul writes to the Gentiles in Ephesus to tell them they're together citizens. So it's a different word. but together citizens right alongside all the other saints. The Gentiles are now no longer secondary citizens. They are together citizens with all the saints, period. No reservations, no secondary status.

Now, to get the backdrop, why is it making such a big deal of it? Why doesn't he just say this and move on? He's spending several verses here, and we'll see more next week. Several verses because there's an issue here that's been an issue for a long time.

We've brought up before the Jews have been situated in the area around Ephesus for about two and a half centuries plus before this letter gets written. So they've been there a long time. The Jews and the Gentiles have often not gotten along. And here is the status of any Gentile decided, hey, I'd like to get closer to this Jewish God. Here's the way things worked. You had these Jewish synagogues that you could go to, including one there in Ephesus. The Pharisees were often the ones with substantial influence in these synagogues. They were often the ones who established them.

The Gentiles attended. They could do so. They could attend regularly. They were still held in a separate category. They had to sit separately. They were still considered not quite there. They're still on the outs, even if they did everything to behave and act as Jews in every other way.

We see the example and the distinction through the Book of Acts. You'll see Jews, and they'll say God-fearing Gentiles, or some combination like that, or proselytes. This word proselyte, we think of it as a sort of a religious conversion. The fact is, from the Greek word there, it means to be brought in from a foreign region. So that's the reason for the use of the word.

Acts 2.10 was where the word was used. In Deuteronomy, the Jews were told. This is the law now. The Jews were told.

God executes justice for the orphan and the widow and shows his love, by the way, this is agape love, agapeo love, for the alien, the proselyte, the one brought in from a foreign region. This is the Gentile convert, by giving him food and clothing. So show your agape love, agapeo, for the proselyte. They were supposed to love those people. For you were proselytes brought in from a foreign land, in Egypt.

So Acts 10.22, here is where the first Gentiles become believers. Peter is there, and it says, They said, Cornelius, a Roman centurion, a righteous and God-fearing man, but still Roman, Well spoken of by the entire nation of Jews. All the Jews respect him, but he's still Roman. He's still on the outside. He can never be one of them.

Acts 13.43. This is Paul's first missionary journey.

When the meeting of the synagogue had broken up, many of the Jews and of the God-fearing proselytes to Judaism... So here again, the distinction is still made. shows up again, Acts 17. And some of them were persuaded and joined Paul and Silas along with a large number of the God-fearing Greeks, and in this case, but the Jews. The God-fearing Greeks had one response, the Jews had another. There was a contrast between the two groups.

And finally in Acts 17.17, so he was reasoning in the synagogue with the Jews and the God-fearing Gentiles.

Constantly the distinction, constantly separating the two groups out. Even though it had been centuries for some of those Gentiles to come across into Judaism, they were still held at bay. What Paul was trying to avoid here was the pattern of, okay, for two and a half centuries you guys have been kept separate, even those who wanted to become Jews couldn't come in the circle. They were still kept in a separate group.

He says, now that we're in the church, we don't want to just carry over that pattern and convert the synagogue into that pattern. That's why Paul in Galatians 2 pointed out the hypocrisy where he saw Peter and Barnabas and some of the others going with him to separate themselves from the Gentiles. He said, Peter, that's hypocrisy. We can't have that. Paul's message there, he didn't want just a Christianized synagogue. He didn't want to just follow the custom of the culture and then sprinkle Christian dust on it. See that?

The dividing wall, the law, had been put completely out of commission. The believers, Jews and Gentiles alike, remember what we saw last week, had that special introduction to the Father through Christ, through Him. Fellow citizens, he points out here, where the Gentiles were not citizens, that in the church the Gentiles were indeed citizens and had every right of citizenship. God created the church to have no distinction and for the Gentiles have not in the least bit any secondary status.

One more point about citizens here. Remember when we went through the book of Philippians we point out that in the New Testament times the list of citizens in a city was maintained by the city officials, and that list was called the Book of the Living, or for short, the Book of Life. So the citizens who were part of that citizenship were on this list of those living. It's one more way that Paul reinforced in Philippians this idea of citizenship, having a citizenship in heaven.

Finally, of God's household. We pointed out the fact before that Paul is making the contrast. No longer strangers and aliens, but, in sharp contrast, fellow citizens with the saints and of God's household. Now he makes this final point here. We want to look at this of God's household part of the contrast.

So just what does it mean to be of God's household? Among the general population, most of them would say, OK, your household includes those that are in your immediate family, but also any slaves that are there or others who might be living under the household for various and sundry reasons. And so that word was used that way. But interestingly enough, that word, boikeos, was used explicitly and specifically among the Jews to mean those who are direct family members or at least blood related and in the tribe.

So what is he doing? He's pointing the finger to the Jews and saying, you Jews, you recognize these Gentiles are of the household. Don't you put them at a secondary status. They're of the family. The thing that we see that comes out here, that pattern that shows up throughout the New Testament, Galatians 6.10, He says, show good to all people, especially those who are of the household of the faith.

This passage here we see in Ephesians 2.19, God's household.

1 Timothy 3.15, I write so that you will know how one is to conduct himself in the household of God. This is just after he spent over a dozen verses talking about the qualifications of elders and deacons. And then finally in 1 Peter, Peter writes, for it is time for judgment to begin with the household of God. So this phrase, this understanding that believers are of God's household, is consistent to the New Testament. So we need to ask the question, what does that mean for the Church now? How does it apply itself?

The immediate thing is to make note that Jewish and Gentile believers, no matter what their ethnic background is, have the exact same position in Christ. There is no distinction. Whether you're talking about the fellow who is a Roman soldier, or the fellow who'd come out of the synagogue as a full-blooded Jew, they both, in Christ, had the exact same spiritual position. No difference.

But that also applies to any other distinctions we might be inclined to make. It's easy for us, in the worldly sense or in a fleshly sense, to fall into making distinctions. Oh, this person is of that background or that background. That's somehow not quite there.

No. No distinction gives any believer a different position from another. No human distinction. Any attempt to divide the Church on the basis of earthly distinctions goes over like a lead balloon. Here's your famous lead balloon, by the way. God does not care for any distinctions, artificial, that we might make that would be perceived as or be based upon an artificial All believers have the same position. Earthly distinction. All believers have the same position.

Personally, for you and me personally, it means that God sees every believer as having a first-order relationship, directly connected between yourself and the Lord. Immediate family member. One way to put it is God has no grandchildren, In the Church, every believer has a direct relationship with the Lord. Period. Every relationship is so close that there is no believer who is closer in position or more closely related to God. No distinction there.

It means that we can boldly approach the Father, but because we have immediate direct family relationship. We're of the household. No exceptions. If you're a believer here this morning, you have that relationship. It means that all the members of God's household, who are members by faith in Christ alone, have that family relationship also with one another. So if you're a believer here this morning, Welcome home, eternally, forever. Welcome home to Him.

Let's pray. Lord, we thank you for that heavenly citizenship that we can count upon when this earthly citizenship, as many rights as it might give us, will come to an end at some time. And Lord, we can count upon that citizenship with you. We thank you for the blessings that we have in you. We thank you for the relationship that we have with you, that introduction. We thank you for the unity that we have in you, because of what you have accomplished. And we thank you for the intimacy that we can have with you, as immediate family members, all the time, for eternity, forever. We give you thanks for all of this, in Jesus' name. Amen.