Isaiah - Verse By Verse | Walking through Ephesians

Walking through Ephesians - Day 35

versebyverse | November 25, 2007 16:15

Thought: To me, we're all suffering an identity crisis in regard to knowing God--unless we've come to know Jesus Christ.

Question: Am I still a "gentile in spirit", or have I been born into the family of God by receiving Christ?

Scripture: Ephesians 2:12 (NIV): "remember that at that time you were separate from Christ, excluded from citizenship in Israel and foreigners to the covenants of the promise, without hope and without God in the world."

The lot of a gentile (non-Jew) unbeliever is truly a sad experience, especially for those alive at this time when Judaism was on the rise. No wonder they were called "gentile dogs." The Ephesian Christians had formerly been 1) "separate from Christ." That's the worst experience of all for anyone, gentile or Jew. Without Jesus they were dead nothings, even if they were lucky enough to have been Jews. The Ephesian Christians had formerly been 2) "excluded from citizenship in Israel." Uncircumcision banned them from Israeli citizenship. They were politically outcast as well as socially separated. They were thus categorized as pagans. The Ephesian Christians had formerly been 3) "foreigners to the covenants of the promise." Jews only were given the covenant promises by God, that is, that Abraham would father their nation, blessed of God and protected. Gentile non-Jews had to survive somehow as "foreigners" to these wonderful promises. And lastly, the Ephesian Christians had formerly been "without hope and without God in the world." Only Jews had an in-road with God. This left everyone else, gentiles, out in the cold. This shunning left them no hope. No hope equates to no God. This is the condition of anyone, really, who does not come to God in and through Jesus Christ. Thus the picture of the gentile/Jew problem is in reality a true picture of the unbeliever problem we each have to deal with as we seek for salvation. To be "gentile" in spirit is to have no hope, no God, no Christ--to be lost "in the world" of sin and death.

Prayer: Lord, help me to remember what I would be without You--without Your Son--so that I may fully appreciate Your Great Salvation. Amen!