Strangers, Aliens, and Citizens
Download MP3Father, we thank you for your word. And father, we are desperate to hear from you tonight. Father, I know for many of us, this has been, a challenging week. I spoke with many people this week that, just were facing so much. And so, father, we we come into this place, and we we are desperate to hear from you.
Collin Hansen:That you would speak truth into our darkness. That we would not be afraid of the mysteries that you bring us. So, father, we ask that you would speak now. No one needs to hear from me, but we so desperately need to hear from you. We pray these things in your son's name, Jesus Christ, amen.
Collin Hansen:Thank you all for being here. So we're gonna be in Ephesians 2, so if you wanna go ahead and start flipping over there. We're gonna be looking at Ephesians 2, mostly the second half. If you've heard me speak before, there's a good chance that you heard me talk about the first half of Ephesians 2 because it's it's the it's a part of scripture that, has romanced me for some time, and so I'm just drawn to it. But we're gonna look at the, at the latter half tonight.
Collin Hansen:When I was in college, in undergraduate, I took a learning and memory class. And, it was a weird class, but I and I actually, I don't remember what I made in that class, and that is what we call selective memory. But but it was a it was a it was an interesting class. We talked about memory and learning things and the 3 different phases of memory, and that is acquisition, retention, and retrieval. So you acquire, you retain, and you retrieve.
Collin Hansen:And so I was thinking about, you know, when when we encounter a specific date, like when you start dating someone, you're seeing them, but this is high school time, so it's it's all revert. So high school time, when you start dating someone, and then that initial date, whatever that that day is, becomes very significant, and you have these anniversaries. Now, again, we're we're reverting here, so high school means anniversary is not yearly, which is what adult world is, but monthly, and some of you weekly. Tuesdays, we're like, it's Tuesday, I should get a rose today. But you know, you remember that date because it's going to be very important that you remember that each month or week, which is really sad, you guys, if you did that.
Collin Hansen:But if you really think about it, if you really stop to think about it, after the breakup, the inevitable breakup, After that was that was over and some time went by, and you experienced that date a couple of times maybe the 1st year you remembered it, but the 2nd year, the 3rd year, the 4th year, the 5th year. So can anyone think right now, the 1st week of February, was there an anniversary there? Was there an important date that maybe not until see, I gave myself this test last night, and I realized that tomorrow would be the 9 year anniversary of a high school relationship. And for the past 7 years, I've completely forgotten that. And then this Wednesday is actually 4 years since I proposed to Jess.
Collin Hansen:Had I not thought about this last night, and trust me, I'm sure that she's thinking about this for the first time as well, we would have just passed over that. Now, at that night, like when I had the ring, and I was freaking out, and everything was falling apart, and nothing was going to plan, I was just thinking, I have ruined the memory I will think about every single day of my life. But we just don't, because really, remembering is very hard to do. Forgetting is very easy to do. And so with this acquisition and retention and retrieval, there's this retrieval cue hypothesis, which is a theory about forgetting, and that if we don't have sufficient cues after acquisition, it's not that we lose the memory altogether, but it's that we don't have cues to bring it up that we will retrieve it.
Collin Hansen:So it's as though we have forgotten. It's as though it it really never existed at all. And so Paul is calling on the Ephesians to remember, to remember who they were, to remember where they were, because there's a great danger in forgetting. Because when we forget, we start to function differently. So if you would, look with me, in in chapter 2.
Collin Hansen:There are 2 key things that I think we should, be looking for as we walk through this text. The first thing is to understand that whenever Paul is talking about you, he's he's usually meaning you all. It is a a second person plural, you all. I will not go down into the y'all, but it's it's the you all that he's talking about. And then to see when he goes from the you all to the we.
Collin Hansen:So be looking for that. Also, watch the tenses. Watch when he is talking about once, and when he is talking about now. That first section of chapter 2, verses 1 through 10, that primarily is dealing with the individual y'all, the individual you all, as we look at ourselves and what we weren't once were, and he says, you were dead in your sins and trespasses. And he goes through the once, and as he walks through the once, he then comes to verse 4, which is the hode theos, but now god, but the god.
Collin Hansen:And we will see that he does something very similar in the second half. So if you would, verse 11. Therefore, remember that at one time, you Gentiles in the flesh called the uncircumcision, by what is called the circumcision, which is made in the flesh by hands. Remember that you were at that time separated from Christ. Now notice already, there's the, therefore remember, because of that love with which he loved us, that great love that Paul is talking about earlier, because of that, therefore, remember, remember that at one time, once.
Collin Hansen:You Gentiles. Gentiles would be the non Jews, often just the pagans. It's ethnos, which we get ethnic and ethnicity, we get that, the derivative there. And so we we understand that these are the non Jews. So he's directing this to the non Jews that were called the uncircumcision, which is kind of like a a really bad term for the Gentiles.
Collin Hansen:And so in this derogatory term, he's saying for you guys that that were called that by the circumcision, those that were, by this because of what was done by hands in the flesh, remember, Remember that you all were at that time. And he gives these five things. Remember that you were separated from Christ, the Messiah. Separated. Remember that you were alienated from the Commonwealth of Israel.
Collin Hansen:Remember that you were strangers to the covenants of promise. Remember that you are without hope. Remember you were without god. You see, sometimes we get so excited about that first part of Ephesians, where he starts talking about, even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. In love, he predestined us for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will.
Collin Hansen:We get so excited about that, that we think that forever and always, we have been with God in Christ, and everything has always been okay. We just waited for a day where we made this public profession of faith. But Paul is reminding them that there was a time, there was a day when they were without hope, and apart from Christ, without God. We have to remember this. We have to remember.
Collin Hansen:Strangers, if you, if you have the big thick ESV study bible, it breaks some of these down here at the bottom. But, strangers, strangers from Christ, strangers were complete foreigners with no rights or privileges. And then, aliens were non citizens who dwelt in the city and were accorded customary privileges as neighbors, so strangers got the strictest sense of, you are complete foreigners. You have no rights here. So in relationship to Christ, the messiah, we were completely foreign with no rights, no privileges to the messiah.
Collin Hansen:We were alienated. Alienated from the Commonwealth of Israel and strangers to the promises, the covenant promises. See, we have to do work to remember, and he's pushing these people. He's pushing the Ephesians, and really, there are a number of people that would have received this letter. And and many, transcripts and many things that they have found of these these scraps of papyrus, the word Ephesus is actually taken out, because this was so widely circulated that it went from place to place.
Collin Hansen:And so Paul was talking to many people, and he's pushing us to see, because this has huge implications. Look with me, at verse 13. Verse 13 has, quite a punch in the first three words. It's very similar to that verse 4 that says, but the God. Paul writes, but now in Christ Jesus.
Collin Hansen:But now. So we once were, and we have to hold that in mind so that we can understand, but now in Christ Jesus, you who were once far off, which spoke of the Gentiles, the non Jews, those who were far off, you have been brought near. Brought near by the blood of Christ. So that takes us to another thing that we have to remember, brought near. We have to remember that we were we did not come near.
Collin Hansen:We did not one day get enough information to where in our own strength, we decided to come near. Now this changes things, Because if we forget this, it is very dangerous. We have been brought, Perhaps it should say, drug. Verse 14, for he himself is our peace. See, this is that switch, that switch from you all, the switch to our, because he is he is a Jew riding to these Gentiles, and he is talking about a progression that is happening.
Collin Hansen:But now in Christ Jesus, you, who were once far off, have been brought near by the blood of Christ, for he himself is our peace, who has made us both 1. Another reading could be, has made us all 1. The Jews and the Gentiles, the Jews who had hope, the Jews who had god, who had privilege, they were not strangers, that he has made us both 1, and has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility. And the dividing wall was a very literal thing. In the temple, there was a wall that warned that if the Gentiles came any further in, it's their own fault that they will be killed.
Collin Hansen:And so, he is talking about a literal and a figurative wall, that this difference between the Jew and the gentile, that in the flesh of Christ himself, the wall of hostility has been broken down by abolishing the law of commandments expressed in ordinances that he might create in himself one new man in place of the 2, so making peace. And might reconcile us both to god, in one body through the cross, thereby killing hostility. Which is a really intense way to say, like, it's not just like, and he pieced the hostility away, but that he killed hostility in his flesh. It's such an intense visual, especially with all this peace language that is happening, that it took a violent murdering of hostility because that hostility was so violent and so so divisive. That in Christ's flesh, the hostility was killed.
Collin Hansen:Verse 17, and he came to preach peace. Peace to you, Gentiles, who were far off, and peace to those who were near, the Jews. For through him, we we both have access in one spirit to the father. This is why we call it a gospel of peace. Peace, a harmony amongst people and a harmony with God, reconciliation, restoration, redemption.
Collin Hansen:Peace as a wholeness and a new order. Not just nonviolence, not just non resistance. I mean, this is something that is a new order entirely. Peace as a person. Romans 5:1 says, therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.
Collin Hansen:In verse 10 of chapter 5 says, for if while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his son, much more now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by his life. Colossians chapter 1 verses 1920, for in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross. Peace by his blood, killing hostility. He gives that peace, and indeed, he himself is that peace. Peace as a person.
Collin Hansen:Look with me at verse 19, Ephesians 2/19. So then, you are no longer strangers, no rights. No longer aliens, merely neighbors. 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.
Collin Hansen:In him, you also are being built into a dwelling place for god by the spirit. The third thing to remember, that we are being joined together, built together, members of the household of god. That there is this purpose. Another time where this language about being of people being a household, a dwelling place for the Lord, is actually what we've looked at recently in the song of Moses, where he talks about a people being an abode, a dwelling place. Not that we would build up structures, but that we would be a people, a people that are the dwelling place of the lord.
Collin Hansen:So if we remember how things were, how things once were, that we were strangers, that we were aliens. And then we also remember that we who were far away were brought near, and then that we are being built into, joined together into a dwelling place for god, then perhaps that would change the way that we function, because there is great danger in forgetting. If we forget that we were strangers, we will begin to act as though we are entitled, and we will be prideful. If we forget that we were brought, we will believe ourselves to be powerful and that God is at our beck and call. And if we forget that we are being built together, this this, we mentality, if we forget this, then we'll see faith solely as our relationship with God individually.
Collin Hansen:We will fall into the sin of individualism, where it is just about me. And if you're doing poorly, if you are hurting, if you are not, if you are not fighting for the faith, I can feel sorry for you, but I don't have to care. If it's individualism, then I hope that I have a good time at church tonight. I hope that I get something out of it. And you know what?
Collin Hansen:If I don't, I'm going to leave this place and get to a place where I can get something, because it really is about me. And we will leave places behind, hurting places. You know, this week, they announced that the bird's nest in Beijing, was falling apart. That was the multi, multimillion complex that was built for the Olympics this past year. And it's already falling apart because nobody's using it.
Collin Hansen:It's kind of a tourist place, people will walk around. And we do that with these buildings that we call churches, and we do that to each other, where we will walk away because I'm not really getting anything out of it anymore. Because I'm not really seeing all the bells and whistles that I really need to see. I've got to have a little bit more for me. It's not about this individualism that everything in our world screams at us to be like.
Collin Hansen:I don't think I have it up here, but the the quote from Bonhoeffer, where he is talking about a community of individuals, where the individual is not absorbed, the individual doesn't disappear, but a community of individuals, where we come in our own abilities and inabilities, with our joys and our frustrations, with our successes and our failures, and we stand as individuals in community at one time. That is being built together. There is great danger in forgetting. And if we don't have these cues, if we don't have these reminders And sometimes, we wanna make a cue just a book or a devotional that we're doing. But, really, the the most significant cue that we have on this earth is each other.
Collin Hansen:Will you cue me to remember? Will you cause me to remember? Will you stir me up for good works? And so we have to ask ourselves, are we remembering? We who were once far off, strangers to the promise, without hope, without god.
Collin Hansen:No longer strangers, No longer alienated. Yes. Once we were, but now we are. Will you pray with me? Father, as we move now to another way to remember, will you please lead us?
Collin Hansen:Will you please challenge us with each other's testimony? With each other's lives, with each other's hurts, with each other's joys? Help us that every time we come to this table, that we might know the people next to us better and better. And as we see them take of the cup and drink, and when they take the bread and they eat, that we are queuing to one another of our desperation and our amazing satisfaction in you. Father, please, take your word and and plant it deep in our hearts, As we continue in this time to worship you, we pray these things in the name of Christ.
Collin Hansen:Amen.
