Homily 5 — Ephesians 2, verses 11 to 16

“Therefore remember that at one time you, the Gentiles in the flesh, who are called Uncircumcision by what is called Circumcision, made in the flesh by hands — that you were at that time separate from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers to the covenants of the promise, having no hope, and without God in the world.” [a]

There are many things that show God’s love for humankind. First, that he saved us by himself, and by himself through a method like this. Second, that he saved us when we were what we were. Third, that he has raised us to the place where we now are. All these things carry in themselves the greatest proof of his love for humankind, and they are the very subjects Paul is now taking up in his letter.

He had been saying that when we were dead through our trespasses, and children of wrath, God saved us. Now he goes on to tell us to whom he has made us equal. “Therefore,” he says, “remember.” For it is the way with all of us, when we are raised from a very low condition to an equal or perhaps a greater dignity, not to keep so much as a memory of what we used to be, so taken up are we with our new glory. That is why he says, “Therefore remember.” “Therefore” — why “therefore”?

Because we have been created for good works, and that alone would be enough to lead us to practice virtue. “Remember” — for remembering is enough to make us grateful to our Benefactor — “that you were once Gentiles.” Notice how he lowers the advantages of the Jews and marvels at the disadvantages of the Gentiles. Not that it really was a disadvantage; but he is speaking to each side in terms of its own character and way of life. [c]

“Who are called Uncircumcision.” So the honor of the Jews lies in names, and their privilege in the flesh. For uncircumcision is nothing, and circumcision is nothing.

“By what is called,” he says, “Circumcision, made in the flesh by hands — that you were at that time separate from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers to the covenants of the promise, having no hope, and without God in the world.” You, he means, who were called this by the Jews.

But why, when he is about to show that the blessing given to them consisted in this very thing, in sharing with Israel, does he belittle Israel’s privilege? He does not belittle it. In the things that matter he raises it higher; he belittles it only in those points in which they had no share. For further on he says, “You are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God.”

Notice how far he is from belittling it. These things, he says, make no difference. Never think, he says, that because you happen not to be circumcised, and are now in uncircumcision, this makes any difference. No, the real trouble was this: being “without Christ,” being “aliens from the commonwealth of Israel.” And this circumcision is not “the commonwealth.” Again, being strangers to the covenants of the promise, having no hope for what is to come, being without God in this world — all these were part of their condition.

He had been speaking of heavenly things; he speaks also of the things on earth, since the Jews thought highly of these. So too Christ, comforting his disciples, after saying, “Blessed are those who have been persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven,” adds the lesser point of comfort: “For in the same way,” he says, “they persecuted the prophets who were before you” (Matthew 5, verses 10 to 12). Compared with the greatness of the first, this is far smaller; yet in regard to being close at hand, and to believing, it is great and sufficient, and carries much force.

This, then, was the sharing in the commonwealth. His word is not “separated” but “alienated from the commonwealth.” His word is not “you took no interest in it,” but “you had no part in it at all, and were strangers.” The expressions are very strong and show that the separation was very wide. For the Israelites themselves were outside this commonwealth too, though not as aliens but as people indifferent to it; and they fell from the covenants, not as strangers but as unworthy.

But what were “the covenants of the promise”? “To you and to your offspring,” he says, “I will give this land” (Genesis 17, verse 8), and whatever else he promised. [f]

“Having no hope,” he adds, “and without God.” They did worship gods, it is true, but they were no gods: “for an idol is nothing” (First Corinthians 10, verse 19).

Verses 13 to 15: “But now, in Christ Jesus, you who once were far off have been brought near in the blood of Christ. For he is our peace, who made both one, and broke down the middle wall of partition, having abolished in his flesh the enmity.”

“So this is the great privilege — that we have been admitted into the commonwealth of the Jews? What are you saying? ‘He has summed up all things in heaven and on earth,’ and now you tell us about Israelites?” Yes, he would say. Those higher privileges we must grasp by faith; these, by the things themselves. “But now,” he says, “in Christ Jesus, you who once were far off have been brought near” — that is, in relation to the commonwealth. For being “far off” and being “near” are matters of will and choice alone.

“For he is our peace, who made both one.” What does “both one” mean? He does not mean that he has raised us to their noble ancestry, but that he has raised both us and them to one still higher. Only, the blessing to us is greater, because to them it had been promised, and they were nearer than we were; to us it had not been promised, and we were farther off than they were. That is why he says, “And that the Gentiles might glorify God for his mercy” (Romans 15, verse 9). [g]

He gave the promise to the Israelites, but they were unworthy. To us he gave no promise; no, we were even strangers, with nothing in common with them. Yet he has made us one — not by joining us to them, but by joining both them and us together into one.

Let me give you an illustration. Suppose there are two statues, one of silver and the other of lead, and both are melted down, and the two come out gold. That is how he has made the two one. Or put it another way. Let the two be a slave and an adopted son, and let both offend him — the one as a disinherited child, the other as a runaway, and one who never knew a father. Then let both be made heirs, both true-born sons. Look: they are raised to one and the same dignity. The two have become one, the one coming from a greater distance and the other from a nearer one, and the slave becoming more noble than he was before he offended.

“And broke down,” he goes on, “the middle wall of partition.” What the middle wall of partition is, he explains by saying, “having abolished in his flesh the enmity, the law of commandments contained in ordinances.” [h]

Some say he means the wall of the Jews against the Greeks, because it did not allow the Jews to associate with the Greeks. To me, however, this does not seem to be the meaning. Rather, he calls “the enmity in the flesh” a middle wall because it is a barrier common to both, cutting us all off alike from God. As the prophet says, “Your wrongdoings separate you from me” (Isaiah 59, verse 2). For the enmity he held against both Jews and Gentiles was a kind of middle wall.

And while the law was in force, this wall was not only not abolished; it was made stronger. “For the law,” the apostle says, “brings about wrath” (Romans 4, verse 15). When he says there that “the law brings about wrath,” he does not lay the whole of this effect on the law itself; it is to be understood that it is because we broke it. In the same way he calls it here a middle wall, because through being disobeyed it produced enmity.

The law was a hedge. But it was made for the sake of safety, and that is why it was called “a hedge”: to form an enclosure. Listen again to the prophet where he says, “I made a trench around it” (Isaiah 5, verse 2). And again, “You have broken down her fences, so that all who pass by the way pluck from her” (Psalm 80, verse 12). Here, then, it means safety. And again, “I will take away its hedge, and it will be trampled down” (Isaiah 5, verse 5).

And again, “He gave them the law for a defense” (Isaiah 8, verse 20). And again, “The Lord carries out righteous acts, and made known his ways to Israel” (Psalm 103, verses 6 and 7). But it became a middle wall, no longer keeping them safe, but cutting them off from God. That, then, is the middle wall of partition, formed out of the hedge. And to explain what this is, he adds, “having abolished in his flesh the enmity, the law of commandments.” [j]

How so? In that he was killed, and in doing so dissolved the enmity. And not only in this way, but also by keeping the law. But what then? Suppose we are released from the former transgression, and yet are made to keep the law all over again? Then the situation would be the same as before. But he has done away with the law itself. For he says, “having abolished the law of commandments contained in ordinances.”

What amazing love for humankind! He gave us a law so that we would keep it; and when we did not keep it, and ought to have been punished, he did away with the law itself. It is as if a man had put a child in the charge of a tutor, and when the child turned out disobedient, set him free even from the tutor and took him away.

How great a love for humankind this would be! What is meant by “having abolished by ordinances”? For he makes a wide distinction between “commandments” and “ordinances.” Either he means “faith,” calling that an “ordinance” — for by faith alone he saved us — or he means a precept such as Christ gave when he said, “But I say to you that you are not to be angry at all” (Matthew 5, verse 22). [k]

That is to say, “If you believe that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved” (Romans 10, verses 6 to 9). And again, “The word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart. Do not say, Who will go up into heaven, or who will go down into the abyss?” — or who has “brought him back from the dead?” In place of a particular way of life, he brought in faith. For so that he would not save us to no purpose, he both bore the penalty himself and required of people the faith that comes through teachings.

“That he might create in himself one new man out of the two.” Notice that it is not that the Gentile has become a Jew, but that both the one and the other have entered into a different condition. His purpose was not simply to make the one into something other than he was, but rather to create the two anew. And he does well to use the word “create” every time, and not to say “change.” He does it to show the power of what was done: that even though this creation is invisible, it is no less a creation than the visible one, and that from now on we ought not to shy away from it, as from the things of nature.

“That he might in himself out of the two…” That is, by himself. He did not hand this task to another. He himself, by himself, melted down both the one and the other and produced one glorious new man, greater than the first creation — and that one, first of all, was himself. That is the meaning of “in himself.” He himself first gave the pattern and the example. [n]

Taking hold of the Jew with one hand and the Gentile with the other, and standing himself in the middle, he blended them together. He made all the estrangement between them disappear, and fashioned them anew from above by fire and by water — no longer with water and earth, but with water and fire. He became a Jew by circumcision; he became accursed; he became a Gentile, outside the law; and he was over both Gentiles and Jews.

“One new man,” he says, “so making peace” — peace for both of them, toward God and toward each other. For as long as they remained Jews and Gentiles, they could not have been reconciled. And unless each had been set free from his own particular condition, they would not have come to another and a higher one. For the Jew is united to the Gentile when he becomes a believer. It is like people in a house with two rooms on the ground floor and one large and splendid room upstairs: they could not see each other until they had gone up.

“Making peace” — above all toward God. The context shows this, for what does he say? [o]

Verse 16: “And might reconcile them both in one body to God through the cross.” He does not say merely “might reconcile,” but “might reconcile thoroughly,” indicating that in earlier times human nature had been easily reconciled, as for example in the case of the saints, and before the time of the law.

“In one body,” he says — his own — “to God.” How is this brought about? By his suffering the penalty due, he means, himself.

“Through the cross, having killed the enmity by it.” Nothing could be more decisive, nothing more expressive, than these words. His death, the apostle says, has “killed” the enmity. He has wounded it and put it to death — not by giving the task to another, and not only by what he did, but also by what he suffered. He does not say “having dissolved,” nor “having canceled,” but, what is stronger than all, “having killed,” so that it would never rise again. How is it, then, that it does rise again?

From our own great wickedness. For as long as we remain in the body of Christ, as long as we are united, it does not rise again but lies dead. Or rather, that former enmity never rises again at all. But if we breed another, it is no longer because of him who destroyed and put to death the former one. It is you yourself who are in labor with a new one. “For the mind of the flesh,” he says, “is enmity against God” (Romans 8, verse 6). If we are in no way fleshly in our thinking, no new enmity will be produced, and that “peace” will remain. [p]

Think, then, how great an evil it is, when God has used so many means to reconcile us and has accomplished it, for us to fall back into enmity again! No second baptism awaits this enmity, but hell itself; no fresh forgiveness, but a searching examination. The mind of the flesh is luxury and idleness; the “mind of the flesh” is greed and every kind of sin.

Why is it called the mind of the flesh, when the flesh can do nothing without the soul? He does not say this to disparage the flesh, any more than, when he speaks of “the unspiritual man” (First Corinthians 2, verse 14), he uses that expression to disparage the soul. For neither body nor soul by itself, unless it receives the impulse that comes from far above, is able to accomplish anything great or noble. That is why he calls the acts the soul performs on its own “of the soul,” and those the body performs on its own “fleshly.” Not because they are like this by nature, but because, since they do not receive direction from heaven, they come to ruin.

The eyes are good; yet without light they will make countless mistakes. But this is the fault of their weakness, not of their nature. If the mistakes were natural, we could never use our eyes rightly at all. For nothing that is natural is evil. Why, then, does he call fleshly passions sins? Because whenever the flesh lifts itself up and gets the upper hand over its charioteer, it produces ten thousand harms. The virtue of the flesh is its submission to the soul; its vice is to rule the soul.

A horse may be good and quick, and yet this does not show without a rider. In the same way the flesh will show its goodness when we cut short its prancing. But neither does the rider show his quality if he lacks skill; no, he himself will do harm even more terrible than what was just described. So on every side we need the Spirit close at hand. When he is present, he will give the rider new strength; he will give beauty to both body and soul.

While the soul lives in the body, it makes the body beautiful. But when it leaves the body stripped of its own native energy and departs, the result is utter loathsomeness, like a painter mixing all his colors into a muddle: every one of the body’s parts hurries toward decay and dissolution. So it is also when the Spirit abandons both body and soul; the loathsomeness that follows is worse and greater.

So do not revile the body because it is inferior to the soul; for I, for my part, cannot bear to revile the soul because it has no strength without the Spirit. If one must say anything at all, the soul deserves more blame than the body. For the body can do no serious harm without the soul, while the soul can do a great deal without the body. We know that even when the body is wasting away and is in no condition for loose living, the soul is busy at work. Sorcerers, magicians, the envious, and enchanters are an example: they above all make the body waste away.

Besides this, not even luxury comes from the body’s needs; it comes rather from the soul’s carelessness. What the body needs is food, not feasting. If I choose to put on a strong bit, I stop the horse; but the body cannot hold the soul back from its evil courses.

Why, then, does he call it the mind of the flesh? Because it comes to be wholly of the flesh. When the flesh has the upper hand, then it goes wrong — as soon as it has robbed itself of reason and of the soul’s rule. So the virtue of the body lies in this: in its submission to the soul. For in itself the flesh is neither good nor evil. What could the body ever do on its own? It is by its connection that the body is good — good because of its submission — but in itself neither good nor evil, able to go either way and leaning equally toward either.

The body has a natural desire — not for sexual immorality or adultery, but for pleasure. The body desires not feasting, but food; not drunkenness, but drink. Here is the proof that drunkenness is not the body’s natural desire: notice how, whenever you go past the measure, whenever you cross the boundary lines, it cannot hold out a moment longer. Up to that point the desire belongs to the body. But all the excesses beyond it — when it is swept off into sensual indulgence, when it becomes dazed and stupefied — these belong to the soul.

For though the body is good, it is still far inferior to the soul, as lead is worth less than gold. And yet gold needs lead to solder it; in just the same way the soul needs the body. Or again, as a child of good family needs an attendant to guide him, so the soul needs the body. When we speak of “childish things,” we do not mean to disparage childhood, but only the things that are done during childhood. In the same way we are speaking now of the body.

Yet it is in our power, if we will, to be no longer in the flesh, no, nor on the earth, but in heaven and in the Spirit. For whether we are here or there is decided not so much by where we are placed as by how we are disposed. Of many people who are in a certain place, at least, we say that they are not there: “You were not here,” we say, and again, “You are not here.” [u]

And why do I say this? We often say, “You are not in yourself,” and “I am not in myself.” Yet what could be more bodily and local than a man’s being where he himself is? And still we say that he is not in himself.

Let us, then, be in ourselves, in heaven, in the Spirit. Let us remain in the peace and in the grace of God, so that we may be set free from all the things of the flesh and may be able to attain the good things promised in Jesus Christ our Lord, with whom to the Father, together with the Holy Spirit, be glory, and might, and honor, now and always, and forever and ever. Amen.