Peace in a Hostile World

the following message by Alistair beg is made available by truth for life for more information visit us online at truthfortheworld.org in Ephesians 2 we read from 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 wear at that time separated from Christ alienated from the Commonwealth of Israel and strangers to the covenants of promise having no hope and without God in the world but now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ for he himself is our peace who has made us both one and has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility by abolishing the law of Commandments expressed in ordinances that he might create in himself one new man in place of the two so making peace and might reconcile us both to God and one body through the cross thereby killing the hostility and he came and preached peace to you who were far off and peace to those who were near for through him we both have access in one spirit to the Father so then you're no longer strangers and aliens 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 in him you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit amen we can gracious god to you as we turn to your word living and active as it is and we pray that we might bow down underneath it as it were that we might hear by the Holy Spirit your voice beyond the voice of a mere man and that together preacher and congregation alike but we may be found in submission to its truth so that we might live in the enjoyment of his blessings and we ask it in Jesus name Amen if you visit the official website of the late John Lennon you will find that when you open it up there is a picture of him seated at the white baby grand piano it's a pretty iconic kind of picture now those of you who were around when the video was shot for the recording of imagine will know that it was at that piano that he was playing when the video was shot you'll also find that you're given an opportunity to purchase a t-shirt a white t-shirt that bears a simple inscription on the front in black lettering just three words that all run into one another actually war is over war is over and that t-shirt is available in 100 different languages it's a quite interesting thought that somebody who never even knew what a website was because he died in 1980 she would remain so influential in our world and still proclaiming in his death that for which he personally longed it's 36 years since his sad untimely violent death outside the Dakota building and what he hoped for frankly just hasn't happened in fact our world today in 2016 is a farm war strife filled and war torn world than it was when he exited it all these years ago and at the heart of it all he left behind this what has become really a mantra imagine there's no countries it isn't hard to do nothing to kill or die for and no religion too imagine all the people living life in peace now you may say I'm a dreamer but I'm not the only one I hope someday you'll join us and the world will live as one now that longing was not unique to him it's a longing that exists in the human heart I've spoken with people already this morning who longed for harmony in a house that is marked by hostility parents who long for relationships with their children that are marked by strife people who go routinely to work in a place that is marked by disintegration rather than integration and a very heart of what Lenin is saying there is a fundamental notion which is a pervasive notion in our culture namely that we might be able to achieve this but it will involve the end of religion if we could imagine a world without religion then of course we could all live properly that's the notion in fact it is so interesting to me that after all these years for young people this is still kind of secular him in fact we really just have to secular hymns from where I stand one is the funeral hymn by old blue eyes I did in my way and then now we have this as secular hymn which is if you can imagine this then you can probably see it brought about now of course we can't so the end of religion and along with that what we have made reference to most recently because of our studies in Ephesians the co-exist foundation which is found on the bumpers of cars as we drive around our community where the notion inherent in that foundation is not that we will we will achieve this in the end of religion but we we'll be able to achieve it in the blend of religion and so the fundamental notion is if everybody could just stop making fuss about the idiosyncratic elements in their religious or philosophical persuasion then of course we could all live together quite happily it is on the one hand a naive notion it is on the other hand a sinister notion nobody today is prepared to deny in fact there is universal agreement about the condition of our world it's broken Dillons know my favorite poet but he usually manages to say it fairly succinctly doesn't he broken bottles broken plates broken switches broken gates broken dishes broken parts streets are filled with broken hearts ain't no use jiving ain't no use joking everything is broken there's universal agreement on that where the disagreement comes is what's the cause of this brokenness and what is the solution to the brokenness and here in our studies in Ephesians a book written a long time ago a letter written a long time ago by a converted Jew by the name of Saul of Tarsus Paul the Apostle we are at the very heart of peace discovered in a context of hostility I think if you listen carefully when I read this you would see that in verse 14 we're introduced to Jesus immediately as our peace that this peace is discovered not in a program but instead in a person he is our peace verse 14 he's making peace at the end of verse 15 and he preached peace verse 17 there's no surprise because the Old Testament looked forward to the one who had come who was the Prince of Peace and what Paul is saying is I discovered that Jesus really is the Prince of Peace my life was marked by hostility I had a hatred for people I was pursuing these people to the point of imprisonment and of death but I've discovered how wrong that was how warped I was and how wonderful Jesus is of this piece he made it he preached it he is it and so when we read the gospel records of course we discover that this is exactly what Jesus himself said I'm going to leave he said is to his followers I'm going to leave my peace with you I don't give you peace the way you'll find it in the world this peace is a revolution in itself when he came to look over Jerusalem lucre courts when he drew near and saw the city he wept over it saying would that you even you had known on this day the things that made for peace and what he was saying was of all the people in the world you should know you had the prophets you had the law you had all the lines running forward to the Messiah who was to come and yet here you are how often I would have gathered you the way their hand gathers her chicks but you wouldn't come to me it's not too hard to imagine Christ as it were looking over the cities of North America and saying the exact same thing if only you would listen Cleveland if you would only pay attention New York City you see the devil is the great fabricator isn't he because the devil has convinced people that the answer is the problem the problem is you people on about Jesus as if some are another we're the ones causing the trouble by stating the truth if only you would stop that and join in with a bumper sticker all would be well well but we can't it's not a matter of being bombastic it's not a matter of being even dogmatic it's not a matter of just trying to promulgate a concept on the world it's a matter of truth what is truth that was the question from Pontius Pilate wasn't what did he say what is truth please tell me or did he say what's truth what's truth I mean was was Pontius Pilate post-modern hey what's truth truths whatever he wanted to be you can't find truth or truth is in the amalgamation of every concept of truth and against that Jesus stands and he says I am the way and the truth and alive and no one comes to the Father except through me the only way to meet the God who made you is in and through he who is the Prince of Peace and the staggering as it sounds that is the claim that the Bible makes and it is that which Paul is saying here we've been at it for a couple of weeks we're building on what has already been said verse 13 you once were far off have been brought near by the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ the cross of Christ offers a real and a lasting peace both on the vertical axis and on the horizontal and so it is that he's saying to the church at Ephesus essentially one day in perfection that which God has purposed in the mystery of his will to unite all things in heaven and on earth that which will finally be brought to fruition in a new heaven and a new earth is to be present amongst you in a kind of microcosm as you then benefiting from all that is yours in Jesus live with one another on that vertical play on that horizontal plane as a result of the difference that Jesus has made now you see this was a pressing import for these people because Ephesus as with other communities of the time was marked by separation and it was marked by hostility Jesus in the gospel had if you like invaded the community as the word had been preached through the Apostle Paul and separation had now been replaced with integration and hostility was now being swallowed up in community and the reason this was happening is because God had purposed to create a whole new society that's why in the that we read he talks about creating one new man one new man that God is doing something that is he is creating a single new reconciled humanity that completes supersedes transcends all the old divisive barriers which have been broken down as a result of his work all right so the church is that society the church is that society invisible visible in variety of places here and there but we are supposed to be an indication to a broken world of what happens when people discover that Jesus has dealt with a brokenness now it's not ever going to be perfect this side of eternity but the fact that it isn't perfect does not give us any excuse for not doing our best to see it perfect in other words that the problem or not to be on our side by as a result of a lack of endeavor or willingness or as a result of our own divisive prejudices or because of things that we hold on to in our past now Paul says you'll be helped in this if you realize a number of things let me summarize them number one that Jesus has broken down the wall Jesus has broken down the wall he is our peace he's made us both one has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility many of us have grown up or grew up with certainly since 1961 I was nine when they constructed the Berlin wall and I lived from the age of nine for a long time assuming that that was the future of humanity that wall would never come down that it divided a stand West Berlin divided in many ways large segments of the world and along with many of you I was intrigued when Ronald Reagan at the Brandenburg Gate was it stands up and says mr. Gorbachev tear down this wall was a great day I wasn't even an American I was like yes this is fantastic I love I love this guy you know when he said that 29 years ago on the 12th of June 29 years ago today took a little while three years later in 1990 on the 13th of June the official demolition of the wall began it was actually being demolished before the official demolition began if you will remember the scenes as the gates were opened and people were able to cross from East into West it's etched indelibly in our minds if we have lived through that history and in a far greater and more significant way what Paul is saying here concerning this wall alters absolutely everything and for the Jew and for the Gentile it it is made all things new now there was a literal wall there was a physical wall in the temple courts and some of the commentators say but since Paul wrote Ephesians before the destruction of the temple in AD 70 he couldn't possibly be mentioning the the breaking down of that wall because the wall was still up well why of course he could be and I think he probably is essentially what he's saying is the wall may physically be still sitting there in Jerusalem but the reality is my dear brothers and sisters in Ephesus that in his flesh Jesus Christ has broken down that wall his flesh has been torn and the curtain has been torn and access has been opened up to everybody and on that day when that curtain was torn and the whole shooting match was changed and Jew and Gentile now had access to God directly in and through the flesh of the Lord Jesus Christ so that in his death all of the symbolism that was represented in the wall because while there is a physical wall four and a half feet high a partition real wall around the Jews was the wall that was placed around the Jew by the law by all of those bits and pieces by the regulations about what you could eat and what you could drink and how many times you washed your hands and where you were going and how many feet you could walk on the Sabbath and how many things you hung from your head and the tassels that hang from your your code and all of those other things they all said to the people around them you ain't got none of this and we are really special ok well in actual fact they were really special because God had chosen them God had called Abraham out of our of the Col deze and when he called his people out of Egypt you remember that he took them to the Holy Land and on the way to the Holy Land he gave them his commandments so that they might express their distinctiveness in a holy lifestyle he promised in the journeys to meet them at a holy place and by means of the rituals and the sacrifices he portrayed for them his willingness to forgive them and to restore them and that's just a matter of historical record you know that that is the case because you live in a Jewish community in the city of Cleveland and it is not uncommon for you to be in a place where it is absolutely obvious that there is a dividing wall between myself as a Gentile and my Jewish friends it doesn't need to be a bad issue it's just an issue I grew up a third in my class in Glasgow elementary school was Jewish I spent a lot of time with my Jewish friends but 4 o'clock on a Friday afternoon when the when the when the daylight began to flee in in in a winter winter evening in Scotland I was I was told to go home because I did not belong in their Sabbath celebrations I was not part of that I get that and that's what he's referring to here and he's saying God gave that to you for a very very good purpose the fact that you may have turned it into a bad purpose does not alter the reality of God's purpose however it was only intended ever to be an interim arrangement it was a Mosaic law for a select group of people in a select place for a select period of time and the rituals and the food regulations and the material sacrifices all pointed forward to the fulfillment in the Lord Jesus Christ I need no other sacrifice I need no other plea it has been dealt with in Jesus and so then the believing Jew and the believing Gentile discovered that their relationship with God is on the same basis and on the only basis that we have access to the Father through one mediator even the Lord Jesus Christ now you see loved ones this is why the notions of our society about how you create for example Middle East peace are destined for failure because the only way that you can actually get an Arab and a Jew to unite at an organic heart level I suggest to you is in the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ because when I go to Israel later this year and then go to Egypt after that I guarantee you that I will be with Jewish believers and Arab believers who have radically different political perspectives in the way that there are people in this congregation now that have radically different political perspectives but that's not the issue the issue is that when the Arab and the Gentile when the Jew and the Gentile stand up and sing together what are they saying they sing the same song in Christ alone my hope is found he is my light my strength my song he is my cornerstone he is my solid ground the Jew says I had all of these things in my heritage but I realized that they only were pointing me to Jesus now that I have Jesus this this this thing has been broken down now don't misunderstand it it's enough for this morning some people take this and they say and that's why once you're in Christ we were once under law but now we're under grace therefore there's no law that's not what we're dealing with here Christ has fulfilled the law insofar as he is exhausted its demands and borne its punishment and kept it in all of its fullness the law remains for the believer a mirror in which we see ourselves so the Ten Commandments is not a ladder of which I climb to acceptance with God but it is a mirror in which I see the fight that I did tell lies and that I have been covetous and my only hope is in Christ alone and that when I am wondering what it means to live in purity and in holiness and not to covet and not to tell lies and to honor my father and my mother the work of a Spirit of God is to show me the moral law of God not as a means of acceptance with God but as that directive by which through the spirit I am able to seek and to follow God with all that said the fact of the matter is that the Jew and the Gentile are now united as a result of the finished work of Christ he has broken down a wall let me see a second thing he has made one in place of two you see that there in verse 15 he has done this in order that he might create in himself one new man in place of the - four years - and I had a license plate it just said we too are one we thought it was really very nice and I still have it in the garage somewhere because I liked it we stole it the idea from an American couple that we admire very much for about a hundred years old now but the reason we did it was because we understand together don't we that marriage is one plus one equals one one plus one equals one that's married whom God has joined together let no man put asunder so that's the deal that is a picture of Christ in his church and what Paul is saying here is that he has taken those who were once separated from one another who were actually hostile towards one another calling each other names you don't have it we don't want it all that kind of stuff and he has created one new man in the place of two you see all the insider/outsider stuff which marked the context of Ephesus has been obliterated in the cross of Christ there is no longer says Paul to the Ephesians this distinction between those who are far away and those who are near those far away being the Gentiles in their unbelief those who are near being the the Jews in their proximity to God but the converted Jew has understood that the scaffolding within which his forefathers lived has actually been dismantled and therefore the things that he used the hold dear all I once held dear built my life upon you think about it in Philippian terms where Paul says I was a Pharisee of the Pharisees I was a Hebrew of the Hebrews I had a good background as far as the law is concerned I was fantastic then what is he said but in relationship to all of these things I now count them as nothing as refuse for the sake of Jesus nor Jesus Christ my lord in other words he says I have found in Christ that to which all of this stuff pointed I was up really close but I was far away the Gentile had none of that no circumcision no laws no dietary requirements no special beating places so what have they got to go on the exact same thing all I have is Christ when the Jew and the Gentile sing in fact when the church sings its it said the essence of what it's all about you know I once was lost in darkest night but thought I knew the way okay now let's go and say that's for example well let's do an interview let's do an interview with an with an up-close Nicodemus Nicodemus nice to meet you thanks for coming just wanted to ask you a few questions about this you're a religious man yes pretty well schooled in the law oh absolutely and so on that's how you would say you were pretty well up close where are you oh yeah I was as close to somebody could ever get so why did you go and start asking Jesus questions because I discovered that being that close I didn't actually have a living relationship with God or I I didn't know that so I went to see him one night and I asked him questions and we had a great conversation I'll tell you about it later thank you hold on just a minute one other lady to talk to AHA now you're from the far away Department aren't you oh yeah yeah I'm far I'm far out yeah yeah I had five five husbands a live-in lover and I met Jesus and he told me about living water and I was about as far away as you can get and where are you now well he brought me near near how did he bring you near and then she explains his story so now you've got I got this amazing picture of Nicodemus and the woman at the well holding hands singing I once was lost in darkest night I thought I knew the way all I have is Christ that's what he said and you see Paul says to the Ephesians the divisions and the distinctions that have marked you in bringing you to faith in Jesus Christ no longer may be tolerated they cannot be promulgated they cannot be elevated you cannot hold on to these things and I'm not gonna try and apply this but you can apply it for yourself we can't and as a church chastise ourselves because we're not what we would like to be or whatever it is we are what we are but we long to be what God wants us to be and in some measure at least there are to be the evidences of these very things the basis of our unity in the Lord Jesus Christ preached both to Jew and to Gentile he preached it to those who were far away preached it to those who were near it has been proclaimed it may be enjoyed but only as it is believed and accepted you get that he proclaimed it you may enjoy it but only as you believe and accept it for all that Christ has done for us is as no value to us so long as we remain outside of him he's broken down the wall he's made - out of the one and finally just in a word verse 18 and we both have access we both have access in fact you will notice in verse 18 how though the Father the Son and the Holy Spirit are involved in this great mystery through him that is Jesus the son we both have access in one spirit called the Holy Spirit to the Father there is the father and the remarkable thing and so hard for for the Jew to to believe apart from the enabling of the Spirit of God and so hard for the Gentile to believe but I haven't done this and I don't have that and how could I go in there on what basis can I go and that big sign has been up there for so long well Jew and Gentile share the same access access to we're not to a temple building in Jerusalem but directly to the Father you see Christ death on the cross and the tearing of that curtain basically finished that temple finished it ad 70 it was destroyed and when people talk now about going to the temple going to the temple I presume they're not reading their Bibles they read the book of Hebrews we have come to this place we have come to Mount Zion we have come to the temple we are here in the New Jerusalem the access which Jew and Gentile have is not to a temple building in the Middle East it is to God the Father himself in and through the Lord Jesus Christ all of that alienation that marked them all of that separation that spoiled them has been dealt with in Jesus and all alien nation the alienation that is present in our culture this morning his arm is ultimately subsumed under the fact that both Jew and Gentile are alienated by nature from God because we're sinners Jewish sinners Gentile sinners white sinners black sinners Chinese sinners Japanese sinners but sharing this reality in fact when Paul writes about it in Romans 5 he says if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God so God reconciles his enemies in other words we all have a relationship with God we either are related to God as his enemy or were related to God as his friend if while we were enemies we were reconciled how much more then that he has made us his friends through Jesus well I wonder where you are this morning in this continuum let's come back let's let's end with John shall we not the Gospel of John imagine there's no heaven it's easy if you try apparently I haven't tried I don't know imagine there's no heaven it's easy if you try there's no hell below us above us only sky imagine all the people living for today well that last part is not hard to imagine is it he was a golf tournament this afternoon on TV though about you'll only be watching at about 15 seconds and somebody will start on about and he's just in the moment he's just in the moment he's over this part and he's in the moment and his and they interview him afterwards and how did you get on on the 13th oh well I just tried to stay in the moment like you had a choice you were in the moment you only had that moment well just imagine all the people living for today that's the issue of ones we are living for today with no thought of yesterday and no prospect of tomorrow by nature without hope and without God in the world and into that hopelessness and into that alienation steps the Prince of Peace takes our punishment on himself grants to as a forgiveness that is entirely undeserved and looks out over the city of Cleveland and says oh if you had only known for makes for peace you know I hope John Lennon did not actually believe that deep down I hope it were the passion when he and Yoko Ono went to Scotland in that big gigantic Rolls Royce the old silver shadow or silver cloud that he had painted in psychedelic colors you didn't see it if you read the books and they ran it off one of the narrow Highland roads in Scotland and both ended up in the hospital the minister that went to see them the local Church of Scotland minister the free church minister that went to see them was was my friend Davie Patterson I've told you about Davy Patterson he's the guy who told me is it steak or is it or is it mince but that's another story altogether but Dave Davy went to see them in the hospital and told me afterwards he had the most amazing opportunity to share the gospel with her that he told them straight up he didn't he didn't go in and has for autographs he went in and did what he you should do and some days when I'm thinking about it I say Oh God I hope I hope somehow in the dying embers of his existence then he remembered what Davey told him and that he didn't have to imagine anymore because he found the reality in the person and work of Jesus Christ I don't know where you are in relationship to these things you're sensible people you got to read the Bible you think these things are you kind of live in an imaginary world or do you want to deal with the real world father thank you that we can look in your word and it's not just a matter of always being able to understand it but the more we read it we realize it understands us it shows us what we are some of us have convinced ourselves this morning that we're so far away that there is no possibility of access and then we hear that Jesus Christ is the great Shepherd and he comes seeking to save those that are lost and even when he had $99 in the camp he goes out over the hillsides in the darkness of the night searching for the one some of us may be here this morning we feel we are that one so far away and if we will just turn to you will discover that you're the God who brings us near and the very inclination of our hearts grounded in your grace some of us are up close we've been convincing ourselves for ages now that our baptism our fastidious attendants are keeping of the rules as dealt with everything that is required but in our hearts there is a helplessness in the core of our being there's no reality of forgiveness we are divisive disruptive we treat people as if they ought to be as we are we need your grace we want to be able to say from our hearts that all we really have is Christ for on the day that we stand for you we will have no other argument we will have no other plea it will only be enough that Jesus died and that he died for me accomplish your work Lord in our hearts in these moments and in our church over these days so that you may be glorified before we ask it in Christ's name this message was brought to you from truth for life where the learning is for living learn more about truth for life with alistair beg visit us online at truthfortheworld.org

Channel: Alistair Begg

Views: 2,033

Rating: 5 out of 5

Keywords: The Cross, Heaven, Redemptive History, Restoration, Alistair Begg, Truth For Life, Ephesians, Apostle Paul

Id: 3XfY9HWvfiU

Length: 38min 3sec (2283 seconds)

Published: Mon Feb 10 2020