What Does the Gospel Bring (Ephesians 2:18-19)

We have no idea of how dark the world was when Jesus sent his apostles with his gospel into it. This can be explained in numerous ways. It was full of idolatry that gave them no comfort in life and in death. It was full of cruelty and barbarism and the insights of the great philosophers did not bring about a society marked by concern for others. There were no believers functioning as salt in those decadent societies. As Paul says elsewhere, people everywhere lived without God and without hope. An author called David Macintyre wrote that the world did not see real joy until Christian communities were formed in them, with the members enjoying the kind of joy that Peter describes as unspeakable and full of glory. Their lives were so different that others wondered about them.

 

The coming of the gospel

It is a common question to ask, ‘When did the gospel first come to a country?’ That is an interesting question about our own locality. Was the gospel here before Columba and the Celtic Church traversed through the area? Maybe it was. There are books that suggest it could have been. Perhaps we are here in answer to their prayers because we should pray about future generations.

 

Wherever we ask that question and whenever the origin occurred, we should look beyond the human instruments whom God used and remind ourselves that the active person in the arrival of the gospel here was Jesus (by the work of the Holy Spirit whom he and the Father sent into the world on the Day of Pentecost). This is what Paul says in verse 17 about the gospel coming to Ephesus through the activity of Jesus. We know from the Book of Acts that Paul and his colleagues took the gospel there, but Paul states here that behind the scenes and working through them was Jesus. He was present in power as the inhabitants of that great city heard his servants spread the good news.

 

Who lived in Ephesus when the gospel came to them? No doubt, many different ways of describing the inhabitants could be given. We could say they were rich and poor, male and female, free and slave, old and young. Paul has another, very different description of them: they were either ‘those who were far off’ or ‘those who were near’. When Paul uses the language of far off and near, he is not speaking in geographical terms. Rather he is speaking in spiritual terms about their relationship with the God they did not know.

 

Those who were far off from God were the Gentiles and those who were near to God were the Jews because of the various benefits that God had given to them as his special people in Old Testament times. Nevertheless, they were still strangers to God. Yet as we think about this way of dividing the inhabitants, we can see that the Gentiles, while far away, were not too far away, whereas the Jews, while near, were not near enough. Both groups needed to be brought near to God, and that is what the gospel did.

The crux of the gospel

Paul also points out that Jesus preached the same message to both groups, a message of peace. What was included in this message of peace?

 

First, there was the need of peace. The problem they had of being estranged from God was caused by their sins which had separated them from God. This separation exists in two ways which we can call shared and individual. The shared aspect comes from our connection to Adam who as the first man was the representative of the human race. When he sinned in the garden of Eden by eating the forbidden fruit, we all became separated from God, and as a consequence we come into the world detached from him in a relational sense. The individual aspect comes from us being born with a sinful nature, and life gives to us ongoing opportunities to show it. We reveal that we are separated from God by the kinds of life that we live. So in order for peace to be available, God would have to deal with those causes of alienation, our sinfulness and our sins.

 

Second, there is the nature of the peace that Jesus declared. What is included in it? The contents of the peace are all connected to what Jesus did. Even as Adam was our representative, so Jesus was the representative of those who would believe in him. In his message, declared through his servants, he says that he lived a perfect life and died an atoning death. In order to understand this, we should ask ourselves what God will demand of us on the Day of Judgement. Basically, he will demand two things: a perfect life of obedience to his law and a full payment for the sins we have committed against him. We can provide neither, but Jesus can provide both. He lived a perfect life on our behalf and then he offered himself on the cross as the sinbearer and paid the penalty on our behalf. 

 

When we respond to the gospel and believe on Jesus, certain things happen in the court of heaven. One such action is what is called justification. In justification, which is an act of God and not an act of any sinner, God reckons to the account of the believing sinner the perfect life of Jesus. That is the positive side of justification in that we are clothed in the righteousness of Jesus. At the same time, he reckons to our account the payment that Jesus made on the cross for sin. They can be forgiven their sins

 

A consequence of the gospel (v. 18)

What does this verse say about the consequences of the gospel? Obviously, it does not mention all of them. Indeed, in one sense, it mentions only one consequence. But what it does describe is for all Christians. That is indicated in the word ‘both’. It made no difference to the converted Jews and converted Gentiles that they had different pasts as far as experiencing this gospel consequence is concerned. They had all been given it when they believed.

 

Moreover, the benefit or consequence is described as ongoing experience – we see that in the present tense of the verb, ‘we have.’ At the moment of writing the letter, Paul realised that his future readers had this experience wherever they happened to be, even although he was not with them physically. And they would still have the shared experience whenever they would read it or hear his words even although he still would not be with them spiritually. This consequence of the gospel describes something permanent, something ongoing.

 

What is it that Paul has in mind? Something truly amazing, indeed so incredible that if someone outside the Bible suggested it we would be very hesitant to accept it. Paul says in this verse that every Christian has been brought into direct and permanent contact with each of the persons of the divine Trinity. We can break it down a bit in order to appreciate what the apostle is saying.

 

Paul says that it is through Jesus we have this access to the Father. Paul uses an illustration here that is taken from the custom of how access was obtained to ancient rulers. It was the custom in the ancient world, if an individual wanted to go into the presence of a ruler, for an important person who was acceptable to the ruler to take the enquirer into the presence of the ruler. The acceptable person had the authority of the ruler to allow people in, and those people could not be thrown out even if they had offended the ruler previously. It is not difficult for us to the see the meaning of the illustration. 

 

God is the ruler, Jesus is the acceptable person or mediator, and sinners are those wanting to go into God’s presence. Jesus will keep them out if they try and enter there without following the path he has provided, but if sinners follow the path, which is to believe in him, Jesus immediately takes them right into the presence of God, and they are taken there peacefully despite their previous rebellion. 

 

Obviously, in everyday life, when a person was granted access to the ruler’s presence, he or she could not stay there indefinitely. They would need to return to where they lived. And it would not be practical to have large numbers coming at the same time to see the ruler. The amazing feature of the access that Jesus gives is that it is permanent, and it does not matter how many of them there are who have been given it. His people never leave the presence of God, which is why the verse is not just describing prayer. Believers truly live in the comfortable, peaceful presence of the heavenly Father. 

 

No doubt, when a person wanted to see a ruler, he would make enquiries as to how he should behave while in the presence of the ruler. How are Christians prepared for living in the presence of God? The answer from this verse is that the Holy Spirit prepares them constantly. He is the one who works in their hearts and minds as he sanctifies them, he produces in their character his fruit, and he enables them to appreciate the blessings of peace.

 

Sometimes, someone asks us, where do you live? In reply, we give our address. But what would we say if they asked us where we live in a spiritual sense? The answer would be, if we are Christians, that we live in the location of peace, that we no longer live in the location where disharmony and hostility are found. And if they should then ask us, with whom do you live in a spiritual sense, we should reply, ‘I live with all other Christians in the presence of God.’

 

Paul mentions this new spiritual location in the well-known words of Romans 5:1-2: ‘Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Through him we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God.’ There Paul says that we stand in the location of grace, and as we do so we joyfully look forward to the glory to come.

 

There is an obvious sense in which this experience is a foretaste of the life of heaven. The words of verse 18 are a beautiful description of what is going on in the presence of God even now: through Jesus those in heaven have access in one Spirit to the Father. But Paul is describing the spiritual life of the believers who were resident in Ephesus or anywhere else on earth. What an amazing experience, and what a consequence of the gospel!

 

In this verse, we have a description of Christian unity. When we see another Christian, perhaps on the television, or read about them in a magazine, we see a resident of the same country, the country of peace. We have been reconciled by Jesus to the Father and the Holy Spirit is at work within us to make us like Jesus. We might not speak the same language verbally, but we speak the same language spiritually, and together we rejoice in God’s great salvation.

 

Spurgeon has a sermon somewhere about this peace which he calls ‘Peace a Fact but Also a Feeling.’ If I happened to meet an American who did not feel like an American, I would suspect that something was wrong with him. In a higher sense, if I meet a Christian who does not feel like a Christian, something is wrong. After all, we live in the company of the triune God. When we waken up in the morning we can speak to the heavenly Father. When we go through the day we are being sanctified by the Spirit. Constantly we are clothed in the righteousness of Jesus, and he leads us to the various benefits found in the heavenly country of peace.

 

What a gospel and what a consequence!