God Speaks
Once you were under God’s curse, doomed forever for your sins. 2 You went along with the crowd and were just like all the others, full of sin, obeying Satan, the mighty prince of the power of the air, who is at work right now in the hearts of those who are against the Lord. 3 All of us used to be just as they are, our lives expressing the evil within us, doing every wicked thing that our passions or our evil thoughts might lead us into. We started out bad, being born with evil natures, and were under God’s anger just like everyone else.
4 But God is so rich in mercy; he loved us so much 5 that even though we were spiritually dead and doomed by our sins, he gave us back our lives again when he raised Christ from the dead—only by his undeserved favor have we ever been saved— 6 and lifted us up from the grave into glory along with Christ, where we sit with him in the heavenly realms—all because of what Christ Jesus did. 7 And now God can always point to us as examples of how very, very rich his kindness is, as shown in all he has done for us through Jesus Christ.
8 Because of his kindness, you have been saved through trusting Christ. And even trusting is not of yourselves; it too is a gift from God. 9 Salvation is not a reward for the good we have done, so none of us can take any credit for it. 10 It is God himself who has made us what we are and given us new lives from Christ Jesus; and long ages ago he planned that we should spend these lives in helping others.
11 Never forget that once you were heathen and that you were called godless and “unclean” by the Jews. (But their hearts, too, were still unclean, even though they were going through the ceremonies and rituals of the godly, for they circumcised themselves as a sign of godliness.) 12 Remember that in those days you were living utterly apart from Christ; you were enemies of God’s children, and he had promised you no help. You were lost, without God, without hope.
13 But now you belong to Christ Jesus, and though you once were far away from God, now you have been brought very near to him because of what Jesus Christ has done for you with his blood.
14 For Christ himself is our way of peace. He has made peace between us Jews and you Gentiles by making us all one family, breaking down the wall of contempt* that used to separate us. 15 By his death he ended the angry resentment between us, caused by the Jewish laws that favored the Jews and excluded the Gentiles, for he died to annul that whole system of Jewish laws. Then he took the two groups that had been opposed to each other and made them parts of himself; thus he fused us together to become one new person, and at last there was peace. 16 As parts of the same body, our anger against each other has disappeared, for both of us have been reconciled to God. And so the feud ended at last at the cross. 17 And he has brought this Good News of peace to you Gentiles who were very far away from him, and to us Jews who were near. 18 Now all of us, whether Jews or Gentiles, may come to God the Father with the Holy Spirit’s help because of what Christ has done for us.
19 Now you are no longer strangers to God and foreigners to heaven, but you are members of God’s very own family, citizens of God’s country, and you belong in God’s household with every other Christian.
20 What a foundation you stand on now: the apostles and the prophets; and the cornerstone of the building is Jesus Christ himself! 21 We who believe are carefully joined together with Christ as parts of a beautiful, constantly growing temple for God. 22 And you also are joined with him and with each other by the Spirit and are part of this dwelling place of God.
Version: The Living Bible BibleGateway.com
We Respond
Reflection: [Author’s note: In this chapter Paul is emphasizing what Gentile believers in Christ used to be like before they turned to depend on Christ in faith and what they are now. Since I and the majority of the readers of this blog are Gentile (non-Jewish) believers, I will summarize and apply it to us.]
We used to be under God’s curse because we, like every other human being, continually did whatever we wanted regardless of what God or anyone else wanted. We were controlled by Satan through our passions, evil thoughts and sinful natures. We were against God whether we realized it or not. And God was against us for that reason. Spiritual death was God’s just punishment for these attitudes and actions. But God in His great mercy and love had a better plan. Jesus Christ, God the Son, came to earth in a human body, lived a God-glorifying, sin-free life and died on the cross taking our place. Because that satisfied the death-for-sin penalty, God raised Him from the dead setting whoever will believe free. Not only that, God raised us out of the grave with Christ. From God’s viewpoint, we are now seated with Him in Heaven in Christ Jesus. God did all this so that throughout the coming ages He could pour out His infinite grace and kindness on us in Christ. All we have to (or can) do is trust and cooperate with Him to work things out for our ultimate good and His glory. We can’t do anything on our own. We don’t have any reason to brag. We just do the good work He designed for us. Because of Christ dying for all, there are now no insiders (Jews who first had God’s rules, promises, land and blessings) or outsiders (Gentiles–any other people groups, who did not). The blood Jesus shed at the cross broke down the wall between the haves and the have-nots. There is no longer any need for jealousy or hostility. All who trust Christ are declared equal citizens of the Kingdom of God with all the rights and privileges of Christ. Each believer is part of the new dwelling place God is building by His Spirit with Jesus Christ as the center and focal point.
Prayer: Dear Father God, thank You that I no longer have to give in to the promptings of my own desires, the urges of my sinful nature or Satan’s deceitful schemes. You, Lord God, used Jesus’s voluntary death to set me free to know and love You and other people. Because of Your obedience, Jesus, I am free to love and obey God the Father and to love other people just like You. I’m no longer an outsider. I am an adopted child of God, a co-heir with Christ. I’ll never come to the end of thanking You. AMEN
Action (Ask God, the Holy Spirit, which one of these He wants you to work on or something else more personal that He points out.)
- I will reread this chapter aloud and personalize it by substituting I or we for you or they, etc.
- I will think about what I’m reading and “take it to heart.”
- I will ask God to show me at least one way I can show love to another of God’s children today, then do it.
- I will talk with someone today about how they can become a citizen of the Kingdom of God.
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I plan to share what I’ve learned with __________.