The text this morning is from Paul’s Letter to the Ephesians, the third chapter:
For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named, that according to the riches of his glory he may grant you to be strengthened with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith—that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God. Now to him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever. Amen.
Thus far the text.
My dear friends in Christ,
The pericope today starts in a strange place. “For this reason…” What reason, we should ask? Why is Paul bowing his knees before the Father of Jesus Christ? Well, it goes back to the ending of last week’s Epistle Lesson, where Paul speaks of the local congregation: “In him you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit.”
Paul tells the Ephesians that, being a part of the larger Church, they “…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.” Then he tells them that they are being joined together, as a local congregation, are also being built together, so that when one looks at the Ephesians, they can say definitively, “God is there in that place.”
You see, it’s one thing to know that we are the big-C Church, the whole Christian on eart. It’s one thing, and it’s a very good thing to confess that we, together with all of the saints on earth and the saints in heaven, built upon the teaching of the apostles and the prophets, are the Church. But, it’s another to say we are a family of faith.
But, that’s what Paul is saying. In fact, he says it explicitly in today’s text: you are a family of faith, named for the Father of Jesus Christ. We don’t hear it in English, but in Greek, Paul says we are a patria, a family, named for the pater, the Father. We are a patria of the pater. You hear how those words sound similar here. Paul says that the Ephesians are a family because they are in the Father, and God there is with them, dwelling there among them by the power of the Holy Spirit.
And I think Paul would say this to us, as well. When we gather together, we are a family of faith, that people can look and say, “God is in this place.” Now, we don’t expect the unbeliever to get that. We can’t. They don’t see where God is in this place. After all, if any outsider looked at any congregation, including our own, they would see discord, disharmony, sin. They would see us each as individuals attempting our own power plays, trying to get our own ways, trying to push everyone to what we think is best. And that’s every congregation, because every congregation is made up of sinners, people who look out first for themselves like we do.
But, still, when we gather together, one who has been enlightened by faith to Jesus Christ, should look at the church, the congregation, and say, “I see God.” But, by what means do they do this? It is the same way that Christians throughout the ages have used to judge whether a place is a member of the Church, a member of the Body of Christ. We even talk about it in our Lutheran Confessions: “The Church is the congregation of saints in which the Gospel is purely taught and the Sacraments are correctly administered.”
One should look at the Church and see of a congregation that the Word is purely taught and the Sacraments are properly administered. If both of those things are true, then we are a church, we are a family in the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. And when they are not true, when lies and deceit and false doctrine come from the pulpit or are forced upon the church by the people, when the Sacraments take a backseat, aren’t preached, are forgotten, are pushed aside, aren’t practiced properly and regularly, then that place is no church at all.
But, we are a church. The Word of God is taught in all of its purity, and the Sacraments are offered in their proper order here. And so, knowing we are a church, the prayer of Paul for the Ephesians may also be for us.
In fact, all of this pericope is a prayer or a benediction from Paul to the Church. First, he places himself in a humble position, showing obedience, reverence, humility before the Father. In Jewish tradition, the one who would pray would stand, arms reaching to heaven to receive all that God would give. But, for Paul, he humbly goes to the Father, asking these things for the Ephesians for the sake of Christ, begging for them, demanding them, and, certainly, promising them to the Ephesians and to us.
First, Paul asks that the riches of God’s glory would strengthen us all. It would do this through the power of the Holy Spirit; not that we receive power, but that by His power, we would know, in our guts, with every fiber of our being, that we are strengthened in the one true faith in Jesus Christ unto life everlasting. There seems to be only one thing that Paul is talking about here: the Sacrament of the Altar. What else is so rich that we may behold Christ’s glory by the power of the Holy Spirit, but that which we see upon the Altar, Christ’s body given and His blood shed for the forgiveness of our sins? The Sacrament of the Altar is and should be the climax of every service, when Christ comes to you in this way by the Spirit’s work and delivers to you the forgiveness of your sins and the strengthening of your faith.
Second, Paul prays that Christ would then dwell in your hearts through faith. And certainly He does. In our English versions, this seems to be translated as belonging to the first plea and promise. But Paul here means a second plea, perhaps as it comes to us by the first plea, that Christ would dwell in us by faith. The Altar gives to us a wonderful thing, which is Christ truly coming into our bodies and dwelling there. By our mouths, through simple means, Christ enters our hearts. We can see it, we can feel it, we can taste it. And there He dwells, making us one together in Him.
Luther tells us this, from a Maundy Thursday sermon in 1523:
There behold how unbelievably great a thing it is regarding that sacrament when one uses it in the right way, that a man must therein be delivered from death when he correctly perceives it for the great thing that it is. Reason cannot conceive of it. Is it not great that the high majesty steps forth for me and gives Himself to me for mine own, thereupon that all saints step forth for me and stand, take upon themselves what is mine and have concern for me, serve and help me? Thus God places us in the fellowship of Christ and all His chosen; there we have a great consolation where we forsake ourselves. If I am a sinner, thus Christ stands there and says, "The sinner is mine whom I grab hold of with My holy fingers. Who will grumble about that?" Thus my sin falls away and I partake of His righteousness. Thus we Christians also do with each other, take upon ourselves that of another, so that one person bears the sin and failings of another and serves the other with his piety.
We see Christ most clearly at the Altar, and we see Him dwelling in us by how He strengthens us to serve our neighbors. There at the Altar, the Lord helps us pick up our brothers’ and sisters’ burdens. And there, He aids us in laying ours down upon their shoulders as well. There at the Altar, we bear with one another, even if they have sinned, and, by doing so, show their sin to be no burden to us, but like our sin, it is a sin for which Christ felt the wrath of God and died.
That is Christ dwelling in us by faith, that we bear the sin and failing of those who are around us and we still yet serve them, for they have been claimed by Christ. At the Altar, all are made one. There, the continuation of what happened in our Baptisms, where Christ comes to dwell with us, is continued as often as we take it.
Third, Paul goes on to talk about how, rooted in this love that we find for one another at the Altar, we may have the same strength as before to comprehend that there is no end, no depth, no height, nothing that can surpass the riches of His glory, again speaking of the Sacrament. You cannot outrun God’s forgiveness; He won’t ever get tired of giving it to you. As often as His Word and His Sacraments come to you, His forgiveness and life are there, and the Church will always do these things.
Fourth, Paul promises that you will indeed know that the love of Christ, which is both the love that Christ has shown us in His death for sinners and the love of Christ which we share for each other, will go beyond all knowledge and comprehension. If we could write all things that the Lord has done down in a book, there would not be enough room in all the world. Add to that the love that we share for each other… The knowledge of the love of Christ is greater than anything we can know or anything we can indeed recall.
And finally, fifth, Paul writes that we will be filled with the fullness of God. To really understand what this means, we need to go up to the first chapter of Ephesians, where Paul says, “And he put all things under his feet and gave him as head over all things to the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all.” When Paul then prays for the fullness of God, this means the consummation of the wedding feast between the Lamb of God and His Bride, the Church. That day is a giant festival, for that day, you, and all the saints in Christ, will be raised by Christ, and you shall live with Him forever in the Resurrection from the Dead. That day, will be bigger than Christmas, Easter, all your birthdays, all your anniversaries put together. That is the day of hope, the day we look forward to and beg God for even now. Paul tells us to look forward to the day of Christ’s second coming, where He shall make all things new and reside with His Church forever.
You see, Paul wants these things for the Church, and so the Church shall have them. And when a Church indeed has the Sacraments, the Word, the place where Christ dwells, the love of Christ for each other, and the knowledge to look forward to day of Christ’s return, any believer should walk into this place and say, “God is indeed here.” And we have this, my friends. This is not a mere wish. This is not a mere, “I sure hope so.” This is the promise of the Church. When the Gospel is taught in its purity, when the Sacraments of Christ are delivered properly, then there the Church is, and there then is God in Christ Jesus, giving gifts to you, His Bride, to prepare for His return. You, my friends, this local church, are cared for by Christ in ways beyond comprehension. You are cared for by Him by Word and Sacrament. So receive those gifts, as often as you are able. And through them, we are all being bound up together to become, in this place, a dwelling place for God, for, indeed, God lives here. In Jesus’ name, amen.
Now may the peace of God which passes all human understanding guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus, our Lord! Amen.
No comments:
Post a Comment