Tag: Markus Barth

For the Remaining Time…

Psalm 84:9-11 For one day in your courts is better than a thousand in my own room, and to stand at the threshold of the house of my God than to dwell in the tents of the wicked. For Abba  God is both sun and shield; God will give grace and glory…

Introduction

The author of Ephesians begins their final thoughts, weaving together all that has transpired. The Ephesians are reminded, once again, to remember and have hope and thus to pray standing firm on the ground of remembrance of Christ and hope in God fort hey are sealed unto God and Christ by the power the Holy Spirit (Eph. 1). There is great unity and wholeness for this sealed body of believers who are united together through memory and hope and prayer; the Ephesians are asked to look again at the absence of the division wall of the fence, of enmity and hostility, of laws that keep some in and some out (Eph 2). The exhortation to grow (Eph 3) echoes, the arduous task of bringing the outer person in line with the inner person is not a one-and-done thing; it is daily arising and intentionally (re)learning about God’s love made tangible in Christ and sealed by the Holy Spirt. The movement from doxology to praxis and ethics is once again solidified as our praise of God informs our activity in the world to the well-being of the neighbor which returns our ethical activity into doxology and the praising of God‘s name and bringing God glory because God’s love pro nobis (for us) is the bedrock and the source of our power in the world before God (coram deo)and before humanity (coram hominibus) (Eph. 4). The emphasis on the truth is affirmed again as the Ephesians are given real ways to participate in the cosmic battle between the truth of the reign of God and the untruth of the kingdom of humanity through keeping track on how their words and deeds toward and about others either builds up or tears down, being reminded that our words (especially) and our deeds (generally) participate in the sacramental nature of the communication of God’s grace to others (Eph. 4-5).

And now in these final exhortations, Paul describes the believer as a warrior, but not one laden with the weaponry of the kingdom of humanity with the intent to harm and destroy flesh and blood, but a warrior of the reign of God, clothed in Christ, empowered by the Holy Spirit, and absolutely, positively, dependent on God and God’s love, ready to go out, divine orders in hand, to participate in God’s mission in the world.

Ephesians 6:10-20

For the remaining time, be filled with power by Christ and in the strength of his ability. Be clothed in the complete armor of God so as to be able to stand firm against the wiliness of the devil. For the struggle against blood and flesh is not for us. Rather, [we are to struggle] with the kingdom of humanity, with authorities, with the ruler of this world of darkness, with the spiritual hosts of iniquity in the heavenly speres. (Eph. 6:10-12)

Paul begins these final remarks for this remaining time by exhorting the Ephesians to press into Christ, to find themselves empowered not by their own will power but by the power of Christ and in the strength of [Christ’s] ability.[1] Everything comes from God: it starts with God and it ends with God,[2] so goes Ephesians. [3] For what the Ephesians are going to stand to do in remaining times cannot be done by human strength alone, but only by the will and power of God through Christ by the Holy Spirit—the same power that turned death into life on Easter morning.[4],[5]

Following the exhortation to be strong in and by Christ, is: be clothed in the complete armor of God so as to be able to stand firm against the wiliness of the devil. This is the adversary against which the Ephesians must contend; this is why they are to press into the strength of Christ and his ability so that they can follow in Christ’s footsteps and refute the devil’s advancements at every point. Thus, they are to put on/be clothed in the offensive and defensive equipment of God;[6] this means they must take off the offensive and defensive equipment of the kingdom of humanity. Just as one cannot have two masters, one cannot be dressed in two version of complete armor. Just as the Ephesians are exhorted to ditch the lies and the untruths of the kingdom of humanity and adhere to the truth of the reign of God (contending with the old Adam within themselves so that the new Adam may be born anew[7]), so are they to be dressed appropriately in the panoply of God.[8]

Clothed as such, the Ephesians can confront the devil and his craftiness and not other human beings. For Paul writes, Because the struggle for us is not against blood and flesh. Rather, [we are to struggle] with the kingdom of humanity, with authorities, with the ruler of this world of darkness, with the spiritual hosts of iniquity in the heavenly speres. In other words, the Ephesians are neither to take up real weapons to fight against other human beings (uh oh, Church History) nor are they to take it upon themselves to defend God and legislate God’s will (uh oh, Christian Nationalists);[9] rather, they are to wrestle like athletes[10] against the advancements of the “devil” and the powers antagonistic to the divine revolution of love, life and liberation. I could say it another way, the Ephesians are to combat untruth with truth, light with not light, love with not love (etc.). This is a wrestling/boxing match that will last until Christ comes again, and not something human beings—no matter how well intended—can do of their own power. With this preparation, clothing, and orientation in the world, the Ephesians, says Paul, should be able to withstand in the toilsome day and stand accomplishing everything. What God has set out to do—reconcile the beloved to God’s self, bringing love, life and liberation to the cosmos—God will do; the Ephesians are invited in and encouraged to participate and stand firm during these dark days (today and tomorrow[11]),[12] fully dependent and made able by God.[13]

Then Paul lists the different elements of the complete armor of God: putting on the belt[14] of truth, putting on the cuirass of justice, binding under the feet the solid foundation of the good news of peace, and with all [this] taking up the large shield of the faith with which you will be able to extinguish all the flaming javelins of the evil one, receive the helmet [of victory] of salvation and the dagger from the Spirit, which is the word of God. The Ephesians are exhorted to gird themselves and be led by God and God’s truth; they are not to be girded and lead away by someone else or untruth.[15] They are to be fully covered in protective armor by God’s righteousness which is God’s justice; not only do they have God and God’s justice on their side, they stand on and have truth binding them, being conformed to God’s will, to pursue what God pursues. This does not mean doing things in God’s name by baptizing human action as God’s will. Rather, it is to be the clay vessels through whom God brings God’s justice: life, love, and liberation. The Ephesians, thusly, stand on the gospel that is the proclamation of Christ and the work of Christ that brings peace—the elimination of dividing walls, enmity, and laws of division—the word that makes humanity one.[16] The Ephesians are to put out the flaming arrows of the evil one with their shield of faith, thus faith—see rightly by the power of God—can put out the destructive untruths of the kingdom of humanity; here, the Ephesians do not fight fire with fire,[17] but extinguish the lies by faith by speaking the truth in love.[18] They are to wear their helmet of victory because what God started God will finish and victory is already God’s; thus the Ephesians can enter their spiritual battles knowing their victory is secured.[19] Last, they are to use the one weapon they have, the word of God; [20] the goal is not to tear down but to defend the lives of others with the word of God, to build up, to protect, to advocate, to resist on behalf of the neighbor, to, ultimately, proclaim the good news that brings liberation to the captives.[21]

Paul closes with an(other) exhortation to prayer. Throughout the letter of Ephesians, prayer has been the backbone concept throughout the text.[22] Now it comes out full force, through all prayer and supplication, pray in the Spirit in all seasons, and toward this being awake with all steadfastness and entreaty on behalf of all the holy ones, and on behalf of me… Prayer is both the way the believer is clothed in the complete armor of God and is the seizing of the sword of God, the word—not purely scripture, but the living breathing word of life, love and liberation that ushers forth from God’s lips anew every day.[23],[24] It is the core of the life of the believer in the world who, facing both good and bad times, is the representative of Christ, thus of God among and with the beloved of God—thus, the exhortation to be awake[25] and with all steadfastness and entreaty on behalf of all…[26] The faithful representative of God brings God close the neighbor and, through prayer, brings the neighbor close to God.

Conclusion

So, beloved, Ephesians leaves us drenched and soaked in the presence of God. What started off with remembering and hoping and prayer, ends with them. We are, according to Ephesians, part and participant in this great cloud of witnesses that not only sees God’s glory but also gets to share in bringing that glory further and deeper into the world. You may feel insignificant for such a cosmic task, but you are the perfect and most precious breakable vessel spreading God’s mission in the world. Together here, through our minds and our hearts, we see, hear, and experience in the proclamation of Christ the destruction of the dividing walls, the elimination of enmity, and the rendering obsolete oppressive laws. Each week, according to Ephesians, we grow in this knowledge of divine equity and we grow more mature in our knowledge and love of God and as a community eager to reach out and support each other, to stand in solidarity together, to have compassion, and to care. Then we bring this very reality out into the world—each of us—as God’s representatives, charged with an invaluable charge to participate in God’s divine revolution of love, life, and liberation. And this brings us back here, again, to remember, to hope, and to pray. Our doxology becomes our praxis that comes back again as our doxology.

[1] Barth, Markus, Ephesians: Introduction, Translation, and Commentary on Chapters 1-3, The Anchor Bible Series (Garden City: Doubleday, 1971), 760. “…a power which comes to man from outside is meant, rather than an increase in strength flowing from internal resources.”

[2] Allen Verhey and Joseph S. Harvard, Ephesians, Belief: A Theological Commentary on the Bible, eds. Amy Plantinga Pauw and William C. Placher (Louisville: WJK, 2011), 249-250. “…’Be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his power.’ The ‘in the lord’ signals the solidarity with the Lord, and ‘in the strength of his power’ displays that we have been made alive together with him (2:5). We have been raised with him; we are seated with him above the principalities and powers (2:6) it is not our own strength upon which we rely; it is God’s strength. But we must live in it! We mut perform our baptism, our being raised with Christ, our being united not only to Christ but to those who are different from us to those the culture of enmity has trained us to despise…”

[3] Barth, Ephesians, 760. “…no strength other than God’s own can fortify the saints…”

[4] Barth, Ephesians, 760. “They are ‘citizens…in the kingdom of the Messiah and God’ (2:19, 5:5); they live from the incomparable power that was demonstrated in the past through the resurrection of Christ and the subjugation of all other powers (1:19-21), and that will now and from day to day strengthen the heart of each individual. (3:16-19).”

[5] Barth, Ephesians, 760-761. “The strength available to them is the resurrection power; more briefly, God is their power in person. They can and shall rely on it, that is, on Him.”

[6] Barth, Ephesians, 761. Panoply “…often the term means the full and complete equipment of a soldier with weapons of offense and defense. …It can also serve as a summary description of all the apparel with which a woman ‘dresses up’ to show herself in public.”

[7] Verhey and Harvard, Ephesians, 250-251. “This is a cosmic conflict that is as old as sin. To be sure, it is a battle that is fought on the turf of every soul. A battle rages between ‘the old self’ and the ‘new self,’ a battle between our inclination to hate and despise and our participation in the peaceable difference of our creation and renewal. From the beginning the vision in Ephesians has been cosmic in scope and social and political in its implications. Here it would enlist us in a battle not only or our own souls but especially for the renewal of the cosmos and humanity.”

[8] Barth, Ephesians, 762. “The saints are ‘able’-bodied men not by nature, nor by one act of ordination in the past (e.g. by their baptism), but only inasmuch as again and again they take up the special armor given to them.”

[9] Verhey and Harvard, Ephesians, 251. “The final struggle is not ours to win; that is already sure and in God’s hands. But in the interim we are to resist the resistance to God’s cause. We are not called to defend God, not even called exactly to defend our own souls; we are called to defend the beachheads God’s cause has made, they displays here and there of a renewed creation and a new humanity, the places and times that bear the primes of God’s good future.”

[10] Barth, Ephesians, 763. “No doubt Eph 6 describes a ‘spiritual war’ and ‘spiritual weapons’; but rather than use the term ‘war’ (polemos) Paul chooses a concept that originally denotes the activity of an athlete.”

[11] Barth, Ephesians, 765. Darkest day may be just a reference to evil days in a regular life or “may indicate that even now is the last time.”

[12] Barth, Ephesians, 765. “….’taking up’ is sometimes a a technical military term. It describe the last preparation and final step necessary before the actual battle begins.”

[13] Barth, Ephesians, 766. “In Eph 6 far more emphasis is placed on readiness and firmness in the struggle than upon any actual human accomplishment during the battle. The good works which they will do according to 2:10 are prepared by God’ long beforehand.”

[14] Barth, Ephesians, 767. “girdle” belt “…the special belt or sash…designating an officer or high official.”

[15] Barth, Ephesians, 767. “For the strength of God’s power is promised to each of them, and the expression ‘gird one’s loins’ …is synonymous with the idiom, ‘gird with strength.’ The opposite is to be girded by someone else and to e led away involuntarily…or to be girded with a. rope or with sackcloth…”

[16] Barth, Ephesians, 771. “The ‘peace’ and the ‘gospel’ to which Eph 6:15 refers can only be the ‘peace made’ and ‘proclaimed’ by the Messiah which is described in 2:13-18. It is not a victory of men inside God’s kingdom over men outside it that make the saints stand ‘steadfast.’ Rather the Messianic ‘peace’ which has united and will further draw together ‘those far’ and ‘those near’ gives the strength to resist non-human, demonic attacks however spiritual their origin.”

[17] Verhey and Harvard, Ephesians, 255. “Compared to the armor of the Zealots and the Roman soldiers, this list of items—truthfulness and righteousness and the proclamation of the gospel of peace, faithfulness and the gifts of salvation and the word—is deeply countercultural. There is no confidence in the ordinary weapons of war; there is confidence in God. it is as deeply countercultural as peace and unity in the midst of the cultures of enmity that marked the life of the first century.”

[18] Barth, Ephesians, 774. “Instead of flame throwers and napalm-canisters by which the opponents and their strongholds might be burned, they are given shields which ‘enable them to quench’ (only) the fire thrown at them. The fiery attacks endured now are unlike the fire of the last judgment of God who which all men and all the creation will be exposed…”

[19] Barth, Ephesians, 775. “Most likely, a ‘helmet of victory’ is in mind which is more ornate than a battle helmet and demonstrates that the battle has been won: the saints are to ‘take’ this helmet as a gift from God. they go into battle and stand the heat of the day in full confidence of the outcome, with no uncertainty in their minds; for they were the same battle-proven helmet which God straps on his head…and which is defined by ‘impartial justice’ in…”

[20] Barth, Ephesians, 777. “Whether a traditional or a freshly inspired ‘word of God’ is in mind, this ‘word’ can be called the cutting edge of the Spirit—but it must be maintained that the word itself, not the Spirit, is the sword.”

[21] Barth, Ephesians, 777. “Therefore it is probable that the ‘word of God,’ which he calls a ‘sword,’ has to do mostly directly with the preaching of the gospel and with prayer, or is identified with them.”

[22] Verhey and Harvard, Ephesians, 258. “We are not surprised to find that the last world of the exhortation is an exhortation to pray. Prayer here, finally, is a form of watchfulness, of waiting and hoping for God’s good future. It is a way to ‘stay alert.’ But here too this form of attention to God, this waiting and hoping, is not simply passivity. Attentive to God, we are attentive to the one who makes us agents in God’s cause, the one who invites us to bless God, the one who invites our lives and our common life to be doxology, to be for ‘the praise of [God’s] glory’ (1:12,14).”

[23] Barth, Ephesians, 777. “In consequence, persistent ‘prayer’ can be the essence and modality of the whole process of arming oneself, or only of the seizing of the sword.”

[24] Verhey and Harvard, Ephesians, 255. “The Spirit’s sword is not simply identical with Scripture, at least not as an artifact that we can hold in our hand. It is rather the powerful and creative Word of God.”

[25] Barth, Ephesians, 779. “The purpose of staying awake is ‘praying,’ rather than putting on arms.”

[26] Barth, Ephesians, 778. “Nothing less is suggested than that the life and strife of the saints be one great prayer to God, that this prayer be offered in ever new forms however good or bad the circumstance, and that this prayer not be self-centered but express the need and hope of all the saints.”

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Imitators of God, Beloved Children

Psalm 111:1, 10 Hallelujah! I will give thanks to Abba God with my whole heart, in the assembly of the upright, in the congregation. The fear of God is the beginning of wisdom; those who act accordingly have a good understanding; God’s praise endures for ever.

Introduction

At the end of the sermon from August 4th on Ephesians 4:1-16, there was this exhortation at the end, “Beloved, we are exhorted and begged through the words of Ephesians to grow…to grow up! [1] For the love of God, to the glory of God, and for the well-being of our neighbors, we are to grow up and be(come) the body of Christ in the world, bearing into the world by acts of love that which has been born in us through faith.” That exhortation still holds here in Ephesians 4:25-5:2. The Ephesians are given not generalized commands but specific ways to work out their faith through deeds of love to the glory of God and to the wellbeing of the neighbor. These deeds produced by love are the deeds that reflect the truth of what God has done for the Ephesians through Christ and, by the power of the Holy Spirit, are the very exact way the Ephesians participate in furthering God’s mission in the world and bringing the kingdom of humanity into confrontation with the reign of God. Each of these three ethical chapters guide the Ephesians toward actions that materialize in the world what is occurring/has occurred/will occur by faith in their hearts so joined together with God.

Ephesians 4:25-5:2

On which account…do not distress the Holy Spirit of God, in whom you were sealed toward the day of redemption…Therefore, become an imitator of God, as beloved children, and walk in love, just as also Christ loved us and betrayed himself on our behalf—a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God. (Eph. 4:25a, 30; 5:1-2)[2]

Considering what Christ has done and the urging of the Ephesians to grow, Paul exhorts the Ephesians to renounce untruth preferring instead that they speak truth—each one—with their neighbor because we are a part of one another. The Ephesians are to leave behind the life of lies—peddled by the kingdom of humanity—in exchange for the truth—the Word that is of the reign of God. The Ephesians are to live into truth by word and deed what God revealed in Christ and made known to them by the power of the Holy Spirit.[3] In other words, if God is love and has loved them then they—in desiring to speak the truth—share this love in word and deed toward their neighbor because, according to Ephesians, everyone is a part of everyone else.[4],[5] This orientation away from untruth and toward truth grows this community of solidarity into becoming like Christ and displaying their righteous clothing of works of love.[6] The Ephesians are to be the well clothed representatives of God in the world; wherever they go, God is there and that ground is holy (ref. Ex. 3).

A part of being so well clothed is knowing when and where to allow one’s anger to do the walking and talking:[7] if it is against injustice and oppression of the neighbor, then it is well placed and will fuel righteous deeds;[8] but, if this violent irritation[9] is to defend oneself or is because of pride, then it is ill placed and must be exposed to the light of confession so that it does not fester in the darkness. Conjoined here is the demand not to steal[10]—the one who steals no longer steals. There is no designation specifically to whom Paul is speaking, so we must keep a broad view in mind. Therefore, everyone must grow weary working well by their own hands. Rather than this being strictly about petty theft (though it is addressing this), it’s also about obtaining money without working with one’s own hands. Theft—no matter what[11] or who[12]—is not to be tolerated. Why? So that they may have the ability to bestow to those who have needs. For Paul, the emphasis is on providing for the needy. Thus, those who earn by means of skimming off the top of what’s not theirs—not done by their own hands—are exhorted to stop and find “hard work” so to give from what is theirs. And this, in turn, becomes how those who steal out of necessity no longer need to. The exhortation is the solution.[13]

Moving along, the author brings up the “fruit of the lips” as a measure of the heart of the believer.[14] If the Ephesians are to be clothed in righteous garb, then truly their speech must reflect such a status. The Ephesians are to prevent every rotten word from leaving their mouths, rather they are to spew forth whatever is good toward the building up so that it might give grace to those who hear. The community is not only to prohibit the stealing of material goods but also the stealing of the honor and dignity of each person.[15] Words designed to destroy rather than build are to be avoided at all costs because this community who wears Christ and is to be like Christ is to see each and every word in a sacramental light, giving grace to those who hear.[16],[17] Words must be drenched in truth and love.[18]

Finally, the community is exhorted not to distress the Holy Spirit of God in whom they have been sealed toward the day of redemption by letting all bitterness and passionate outbursts and wrath and clamoring against each other and slandering be removed from them together with all malice. In other words, anything that tries to grab the edges of this finely stitched quilt and pull it apart and destroy it is the very cause of God’s distress.[19] To grieve the Holy Spirit, to cause God’s Spirit distress is to try to tear apart that which God has joined together: God’s self and God’s people, thus God’s people with each other. This community is to turn toward each other, reinforcing the well stitched seems, being useful [and] tender hearted toward each other, giving freely to each other just as God in Christ gave to you. The exhortation lands in the laps of the Ephesians, you who have received so much from God in Christ[20] are to build up and not tear down, you are to be compassionate and not dispassionate, you are to be useful toward each other and not useless, you are to give freely and not hoard and steal. [21]

In this way, these humble, breakable vessels become imitators of God,[22] as beloved children, and by being this way toward each other and toward their neighbors they walk in love just as Christ loved [walked in love toward] us and betrayed himself on our behalf a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God. In other words, the Ephesians do not need to perform special material sacrifices to please God but they themselves are the fragrant sacrifice,[23] those who betray themselves (put themselves aside) on behalf of others—not just their family and friends, but their neighbor whomever they are—these are the imitators of God and are like Christ.[24] These are the divine representatives in the world who are inspired and sealed by the power of the Holy Spirit.

Conclusion

Working like a talented seamstress, the author of the letter to the Ephesians stitches the hearer to the fullness of God; through each intentional retelling of what God has done for us in Christ and how the Spirit applies this to our lives is a careful working over of the seam joining the two, adding layer upon layer of words as thread to forbid the joining to break. These two are one. But to be one with this God, according to the logic of Ephesians, is to be one with whom God loves: the neighbor. Thus, with the same deftness, this author-seamstress stitches each of the hearers together anchoring them—together—into God and—together—to each other. These many are one and this one is joined to God thus they are all one–dividing walls destroyed, and laws of separation rendered inoperative. The believers are chosen from the beginning of time to be those whom God will work through to further God’s divine revolution of love, life and liberation that God started, revealed in Christ, and makes available to all who hear God’s summons by the power of the Holy Spirit.

All that has transpired thus far in Ephesians brings us to the real and practical conclusions that we are not our own and that we are God’s and thus our neighbor’s. We live not for ourselves but for Christ and for the divine mission revealed by God through Christ. In this part of Ephesians, we see that every part of our existence is tied up, threaded into this divine tapestry of God’s activity in the world. Our words and thoughts carry weight, our actions have force and power, our bodies are to bear Christ into the world reminding the world that God is not dead, that there’s always another way, and that hope and peace are possible. This is not about being seduced into the slumber of saccharine positivity but about looking the kingdom of humanity square in the eye and in speaking the truth saying, “No, this is not all there is and it is not the only way…there’s more…things can be different…”

So, beloved, we love because we have first been loved.

[1] Allen Verhey and Joseph S. Harvard, Ephesians, Belief: A Theological Commentary on the Bible, eds. Amy Plantinga Pauw and William C. Placher (Louisville: WJK, 2011), 176. “Live a common life worthy of God’s grace and gift, worthy of God’s promise and plan. Grow up! Build a body fitting to Christ as the head! Love one another!”

[2] Translation mine unless otherwise noted

[3] Barth, Markus, Ephesians: Introduction, Translation, and Commentary on Chapters 1-3, The Anchor Bible Series (Garden City: Doubleday, 1971), 511. “Thus the whole former existence of the saints Is defined as a lie, or as living a lie; if the existentialist’ terminology has any validity as a tool for interpreting Paul, then this is the place to speak of ‘inauthentic existence.’ But while secular existentialism considers inauthenticity a deviation from each individual man’s potential, Paul measures man’s existence against the ‘truth in Jesus’ or the ‘true word,’ i.e. the Gospel, and their social effect, i.e. the fact that ‘we are members of one body.’”

[4] Barth, Ephesians, 512. “And he ‘speaks the truth in love’ who acts as a man responsible for the growth of a community ‘toward Christ’ and ‘from him’ (4:15-16).”

[5] Verhey and Harvard, Ephesians, 188. “The ‘truth’ in Jesus of our social solidarity, that ‘we are members of one another,’ points beyond the church to the universal community that is God’s plan. It may be a ‘secret’ too well kept that we are members of one another in a universal community, but it is the truth in Jesus.”

[6] Barth, Ephesians, 512. “The command to ‘speak the truth’ includes and expresses the responsibility to be a witness to revelation, to follow Christ who gave his life for saving sinners, to show unselfish love, and to build up the fellow man to his own best.”

[7] Barth, Ephesians, 513. “…concedes that righteous anger is aroused by injustice…’Wrath against a brother’ draws judgment upon the angry man….but ‘indignation on behalf of other is one of the common bonds by which society is held together.”

[8] Verhey and Harvard, Ephesians, 190. “Anger at injustice is permitted. Indeed, an injustice not only prompts anger; it requires it. When we see the poor oppressed, we should get angry. When the ‘other’ is demeaned or insulted, we should get angry. But anger can be an occasion of sin, for seeking revenge instead of justice, for holding a grudge instead of seeking reconciliation. It is sin that is renounced.”

[9] Barth, Ephesians, 514. “A violent irritation is meant, expressed either by hiding oneself form others or by flaming looks, harmful words, inconsiderate actions, that is, something distinctly less permanent than deep-rooted wrath, anger or hostility.”

[10] Barth, Ephesians, 518. “…the ‘needy’ (whoever he may be!) is to be the beneficiary of the saint’s labor! This universality of concerns is characteristic of Ephesians.”

[11] Barth, Ephesians, 515. “…it is probably that Paul includes in the term ‘thief’ those who make money without working; who get rich at the expense of slaves or employees; who by artificial price-fixing take advantage of those in need or who cheat the community of saints after the pattern of Ananias and Sapphira…”

[12] Barth, Ephesians, 515. “However uncomplimentary it is for saints to realize that the apostle reckons with thieves in their midst, Paul fights the opinion that theft in any form may be sanctified if the thief is a member of the congregation.”

[13] Barth, Ephesians, 517. ‘In Eph 4:28 the opportunity to help the needy fellow man is the rationale for working, not self-satisfaction. What a man may gain for himself is certainly not excluded, but it is incidental to the motive here given: labor is necessary in order that the needy may live! In turn, liberal giving of the gilds of one’s labor is not recommended. As a meritorious act deserving a reward or covering sins; it is rather a recognition of God’s immeasurably rich gift…”

[14] Barth, Ephesians, 518. “The ‘fruit of the lips,’ i.e. man’s speech, reveals the quality of the tree. Bad language and foul talk defile the whole man and manifest his corruption.”

[15] Barth, Ephesians, 519. “Constructive work has to be done, and in all conversations the choice of language and subject matter has to be such that edification takes place. Obviously no room is left for empty chatter or for remarks that serve no other purpose than to detract from a person’s honor.”

[16] Barth, Ephesians, 520. “Therefore, 4:29 can be understood to say that dialogue is a sacrament.”

[17] Verhey and Harvard, Ephesians, 196. “Our talk should bear a resemblance to the grace god gave and gives…to Christ. That grace should make us bold to speak, but also careful to talk in ways that build up the neighbor and the community. We are made agents by the grace or God, and by God’s gift and grace our own words ‘may give grace to those who hear.’ They may not be rhetorically powerful words, but they must be ‘gracious words.’”

[18] Verhey and Harvard, Ephesians, 195. “If our talk is to be ‘speaking the truth in love,’ then it is not just talk that violates truth that we must renounce but also any talk that violates love.”

[19] Verhey and Harvard, Ephesians, . “We make the Spirit sad when we do not live ‘to the praise of his glory,’ when we do not serve God’s cause in the world, when we do not make ‘the secret’ known by putting ‘the new humanity’ created by Christ on display. We make the Spirit sad when we lie and when we nurse a grudge or insult a neighbor, when we do not share with the needy, when our talk is destructive to person or to the community. We make the Spirit sad whenever we are conformed to this present evil age rather than transformed by a vision of God’s good future and by a devotion to God’s cause. This is no ‘passionless’ God. When we sin, the Spirit grieves.”

[20] Verhey and Harvard, Ephesians, 206. “Both God’s forgiveness and the practice of forgiveness within the church are, after all, works of grace. Moreover, kindness, compassion, and forgiveness—and the whole set of renunciations and exhortations in this section—find their final motive and basis in the grace of God made known in Christ.”

[21] Barth, Ephesians, 546. “Ethics makes the gospel concrete. The Ephesians are told by the apostle that there is no reason to despair of speech and labor, of thought and decision; for in the name of the Lord it is asserted that your dirty tongue, your crafty hands, and your hard and violent heart (that is, precisely you, the egotists), can and shall do what befits a ‘member of one body.’ You and no one else are to take care of the ’needs’ of others; you are to ‘build them up’; you re to perform that which is ‘good’ for many.”

[22] Barth, Ephesians, 557. “Men cannot copy the essence of God, e.g. his work as creator or redeemer, or his trinity, but they are called to imitate his love and make progress on the way of love.”

[23] Verhey and Harvard, Ephesians, 207. “We do not seal the new covenant by our little sacrifices, but we celebrate it by living in love, by kindness, by compassion, by forgiveness, by speaking the truth, by reconciling with our enemies, by sharing with the needy, and by words that are gracious.”

[24] Barth, Ephesians, 559. “Because Christ’s love is a s unique and inimitable as God the Father’s, the Gentile-born Ephesians are brothers, have brothers, and can behave as brothers united in love. Because Christ is the first-born among many brethren…his way, including his death, invites and inspires the saints to follow in his footsteps on the way of love…”

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Christians! Grow! Become AS Christ!

Psalm 51:11-13 Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me. Cast me not away from your presence and take not your holy Spirit from me. Give me the joy of your saving help again and sustain me with your bountiful Spirit.

Introduction

Ephesians 1 called believers to remember the work of Christ as God’s word in the world. In remembering, we find Christ with us and this presence is the source of our hope. Remembering and hope then become the ground upon which we kneel and pray, giving space and time for the divine Spirit in us (the deposit and guarantor of our faith) to mold our will to the will of God moving us as participatants in God’s mission in the world made known to us in remembering Christ: bringing the divine revolution of love, life, and liberation to the beloved.

Ephesians 2 exhorted believers toward wholeness: wholeness with God, with the neighbor, and with the self by pressing into Christ’s destruction of the division-wall of the fence, the eradication of enmity, and the lessening the bite of the law as a means to creating in-groups and out-groups. This destruction, eradication, and lessening brings people of various stripes and types, walks and talks, lives and vibes together: together with God, with each other, and with themselves; this is the source of peace Christ brings to those who follow him.

Ephesians 3 encouraged believers to grow and grow! in the knowledge of God’s profound love. The believer is always growing and bringing the outer person in line with the inner person. Thus, the idea of getting to a fixed point where the believer thinks they know everything is eliminated as Ephesians leans to the reality that the believer—individually and communally—will always be in a posture of learning about God’s love made tangible in Christ because the Spirit revealing God’s self to the believers anew through remembering Christ. This process prepares and causes Christians to grow into the able partners of God.

Now the text moves from theologically infused doxological statements creating the groundwork of the believer’s life in Christ with the neighbor to the glory of God. In Ephesians 4, we turn toward the natural outpouring of faith eagerly working itself out in love toward the neighbor. Love is not only the bedrock but is the very power that motivates us and that desires to be born from us as we are born from Love.

Ephesians 4:1-16

Therefore, I, a prisoner in the Lord, beseech you to conduct yourself in manner worthy of the vocation into which you were summoned, with all humility and gentleness, with forbearance enduring with one another in love, hastening to guard the unity of the Spirit in the peace that binds together…speaking truth in love, we might grow in every way into him, who is the head, Christ, out of whom the entire body is being fit and brought together thru every joint of the support according to the proper activity of each part causing the growth of its body for the purpose of building itself up in love. (Eph 4:1-3, 16)*

Here in Ephesians, the content swings from doxological to ethical; for the author of Ephesians, to praise God results in right Christian work[1] in the world that is (also![2]) doxological, bringing the praise of God to the lips of those encountered by the loving hands and feet of the believers.[3] The therefore and then Paul’s I, a prisoner in the Lord, beseech you to conduct yourself in manner worthy of the vocation into which you were summoned, provides the hinge transitioning into the ethical portion of this doxological letter. How are the Ephesians to conduct themselves? What is the worthy manner of their vocation as priests in the world? The author begs them to act with humility and gentleness, and to act with forbearance [by] enduring with one another in love. To act with humility and gentleness is, like Christ, to shrug off that which is privilege and power in the kingdom of humanity and to become as and like our neighbor in the reign of God like Christ did (ref. Phil 2).[4] And this “shrugging off” is the ground of the forbearance that is suffering with one another in love.

According to Ephesians, the believer is to identify so deeply with their neighbor that the neighbor’s problems become their problems; here, the believer cannot ignore the neighbor as if the neighbor’s well-being has no impact or import to the believer’s well-being. Rather, the believer shrugs off their own comfort, their own power, their own privilege, shrugs off their own self[5] as privatized and prioritized over the neighbor.[6] Ephesians puts the believer on the hook: to be as Christ in the world, to humble themselves, to choose to be gentle, to bear the burdens of human existence, to step in and under the trials and tribulations and refusing to let the neighbor go, to grab their hand and whisper, I will not leave you or forsake you. This, according to Ephesians, is the answer to the what now? of the season of Pentecost: we are to bring the love of Christ[7] deep into the world. And to do this, according to Ephesians, is how they will know we are Christians by our love—the unequivocal love that is our foundation of our mutuality, equity, and union with our neighbor,[8] the essence of divine peace within our lives, the substance of our life together, the marrow of our actions, and the air we breathe in and out.[9]

For we are, according to Ephesians, one body, one spirit, just as also you were summoned in one hope of your vocation; one Lord, one faith, one baptism; one God and parent of all people… The church is one historically in remembering Christ, one currently by being in the presence of Christ through the proclamation of the Word of God and by the power of the Holy Spirit, and always will be one because the source of this unity is God who is before all people and through all people and in all people. In other words, the foundation and source of the church—yesterday-today-tomorrow—is always God.[10] And God is (also!) the source and foundation of our mutual love, union, and our equity among each other because we are each recipient of God’s grace given according to the measure of the free gift of Christ.

Because Christ was given to the whole cosmos (Jn 3:16) none of us can claim to have more grace than another person and none of us can try to obtain more because the divine gift of Christ is free.[11] We are all, each of us, under the headship of Christ. According to Ephesians, we are not under any human person holding authority in the kingdom of humanity, but under the divine leadership of God made known in Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit. Therefore, this church/“institution” must run differently, not like the kingdom of humanity, by lording over others assumed authority but by pressing into the omnipresent divine equity of the reign of God.[12] We may all have different vocations within this communal vocation to be priests in the world to the glory of God and the well-being of the neighbor (v. 11)); yet, this doesn’t indicate, according to Ephesians, a hierarchy of human beings within the body of Christ (v. 12).[13]

According to the inner logic of Ephesians, these vocations within the divine vocation to the community of believers functions in two ways: 1. assisting the body of Christ to grow into maturity[14] in the love of Christ to be as Christ in the world,[15] and 2. causing the body of Christ to grow away from being held captive like infants by the blusterous and empty yet attractive doctrine of the kingdom of humanity oriented toward deceiving and misleading(vv. 13-14). Thus, through faithful teachers and preachers and ministers[16] who speak the truth in love, so then does the entire congregation confess and live rightly into their vocation to the glory of God and the well-being of the neighbor.[17] The whole congregation—the entire body is being fit and brought together thru every joint … according to the proper activity of each part—is charged as a “personal partner”[18] of Christ to confess Christ not just within the unique gathering, but into the world by loving acts in word and deed.[19] According to Paul, this confession by each believer causes the growth of its body for the purpose of building itself up in love.[20]

Conclusion

Beloved, we are exhorted and begged through the words of Ephesians to grow…to grow up! [21] For the love of God, to the glory of God, and for the well-being of our neighbors, we are to grow up and be(come) the body of Christ in the world, bearing into the world by acts of love that which has been born in us through faith. As those summoned to be formed by, to live into, and to participate in God’s good will made known in Christ and deposited in our hearts by the power of the Holy Spirit, we are called to live in humility and gentleness. We are not to be prideful about our own faith and lives as if we are superior to our neighbor. We are not to act cruelly by forcing others to conform to our ideology/ies. We are exhorted to bear the burdens of our neighbor, not turn a blind eye because we have ours as if that’s all that matters. We are to dare to live radically by adhering to divine inspired equity among humanity, willingly stepping into the voids created between groups by the kingdom of humanity to call into reality the possibility of the reign of God. We are to be the socio-political wild cards, like Christ, ready at any moment to do what it takes to bring God’s mission of the divine revolution of love, life, and liberation deeper into the cosmos.

*Translation mine and v. 16 with the help of my Greek professor, Ann Castro ❤

[1] Allen Verhey and Joseph S. Harvard, Ephesians, Belief: A Theological Commentary on the Bible, eds. Amy Plantinga Pauw and William C. Placher (Louisville: WJK, 2011), 131. “Ethics is fundamentally a response to God.”

[2] Verhey and Harvard, Ephesians, 132-133. “In Ephesians… ‘therefore’ signals a link, not just a transition. It is a moral theology in the first three chapters, announcing the ‘immeasurable greatness of God’s power’…, attentive to the grace and the cause of God, but always already with an eye toward the implications of the gospel for the lives of Christians and the common life of the churches. And it is a theological morality in the last three chapters, announcing the gospel now in the imperative mood, attentive to the sort of conduct, character, and the community that are empowered and required by God’s grace and cause.”

[3] Barth, Markus, Ephesians: Introduction, Translation, and Commentary on Chapters 1-3, The Anchor Bible Series (Garden City: Doubleday, 1971), 426. “Moral indoctrination therefore appears to be derived from dogmatic doctrine. However, the content of Eph 1-3 is doxological rather than dogmatic. The direct connection of the ethical chapters 4-6 with the praise of God rather than with a doctrine of God is a specific feature of Ephesians.”

[4] Verhey and Harvard, Ephesians, 138. “This community maintains and performs this unity when the members of the community practice ‘humility and gentleness [and] patience, bearing with one another in love’ (4:2). These are virtues for living in community with those who are different from you. These are virtues to make and maintain community of peaceable difference” peace like dividing wall down peace.

[5] Verhey and Harvard, Ephesians, 157. “The unity of the church does not require an oppressive uniformity. It requires self-giving love and peaceable difference. That is the way and the will of triune God, the ‘one God and Father of all, who is above all and through all and in all’ (4:6). The unity of the church includes diverse people and it is nurtured and sustained by a diversity of gifts.”

[6] Barth, Ephesians, 427-428. “If to love includes bearing one’s neighbor, then love is not just an emotion or ideal of the individual soul; rather the personalities of specific neighbors and personal relations actually existing among the saints become the field and material of love. According to this passage there is no love except in relation to specific neighbors. Love is not a disposition of the soul which can be perfect in itself, without being given and shaped in ever new concrete encounters. It is always specific. Always costly, always a miraculous event.”

[7] Barth, Ephesians, 427. “The ‘love’ mentioned here is probably the brotherly love among the saints which bears testimony to God’s and Christ’s love.”

[8] Barth, Ephesians, 461. “‘Love’ needs the neighbor and is dependent upon him. The neighbor—even the one who is a burden and whose character and behavior prove cumbersome—is much more than just an occasion or test of love. He is its very material. Love is not an abstract substance or mood that can be present in a man’s heart even when there are no other sin sight and no confrontations are taking place. It does not exist in a vacuum, in abstracto, in detachment from involvement in other men’s lives. Rather it is a question of being surprised by a neighbor, accepting him, going out to him, and seeking solidarity and unity just with him even if this should mean temporary neglect of, or estrangement from, others.”

[9] Barth, Ephesians, 427. “The gracious election of the Jewish and Gentile neighbor is the presupposition, the unshakable ground, and the undying source of the saints’ mutual love. The love that rules among them is the necessary and indispensable result of God’s care for them. It is the essence of the ‘good works’ created for them, and the ground on which they are to walk…”

[10] Barth, Ephesians, 429. “The unity of the church is …. Not constituted by something underneath or inside the church or her several members. Rather it is eschatological: the reason for the church’s hope for unity, and for her commitment to unity, is ‘deposited in heaven’ (Col 1:5). Not the attainment to unity, but the guarantee of that attainment is, in the best interest of the church preserved at a place ‘out of this world.’”

[11] Barth, Ephesians, 435-436. “By providing for all saints equally, God constitutes the unity of the church. No one member possesses anything that is not given to the whole body of Christ. It is impossible for any group inside the church to claim an extra gift from the exalted Messiah.”

[12] Barth, Ephesians, 481. “…the task of the special ministers mentioned in Eph 4:11 is to be servants in that ministry which is entrusted to the whole church. Their place is not above but below the great number of saints who are not adorned by resounding titles. Every one of the special ministers is a servus servorum Dei. He is a ‘pastor’ of God’s flock who understands himself as a minister to ministers.”

[13] Barth, Ephesians, 435. “God appoints Christ to be head over church and world…; the exalted Christ will fill all, and he appoints ministers to the church… That is all!”

[14] Barth, Ephesians, 443. “The heretical teachers are bluntly accused of bad intentions. All the more do unstable and immature saints need teachers who can lead them out of error and toward solid knowledge of the truth.”

[15] Verhey and Harvard, Ephesians, 168. “The church is Christ’s body, filled with Christ. And the church must grow into that body, ‘to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ.’ By the grace and power and blessing of God, the church is and is called to be an agent in blessing God in words and lives of doxology, in service to God’s cause by its proclamation and its display of ta new humanity ‘to the praise of God’s glory.’ That is the final and climactic purpose of the one gift of grace God gave to the church (4:7), of the leaders Christ gave to the church, and of the many diverse gifts of the saints.”

[16] Verhey and Harvard, Ephesians, 169. “We need teachers and leaders who hold tight to the confession of the unity creed, who hold tight to ‘the faith and knowledge of the Son of God,’ who proclaim a gospel of peaceable difference and hold us to it. Those who would divide, who would boast about some little truth they think they know well or some little good that they think they do well, and who for the sake of that little truth or that little good undercut the unity and peace that God intends, are less than faithful leaders and teachers. They are to be regarded as crafty and deceitful schemers (4:14). Our lives and our common life must be shaped by the truth o this one body, one Spirit, on hope, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, and one God and Father of all. Instead of using speech as a weapon against other Christians, instead of engaging in deceit or speaking in ways that destroy the unity of the body, we are to ‘speak the truth in love’ (4:15)…”

[17] Barth, Ephesians, 444. v. 15 “The passage calls for the right confession, and it urges the whole church and all its members to be a confessing church.”

[18] Barth, Ephesians, 450. “The church is a personal partner…rather than an impersonal outgrowth or extension of Christ.”

[19] Barth, Ephesians, 444. “The truth entrusted to the congregation is the truth of all-conquering love. Where there is no love, the truth revealed by God is denied. Equally, without ‘truth’ there may well be a ‘conspiracy’ that aims to subjugate men to human “opinions’ (Calvin), but no solid unity and community.”

[20] Barth, Ephesians, 449. “Most likely the apostle intends to say that tin their mutual dependence and communication all church members are chosen tools of the head for communicating nourishment, vitality, unity, solidity to the body (or building) as a whole. The weakest member or part is in this case as essential to the life and unity of the whole as the strongest.”

[21] Verhey and Harvard, Ephesians, 176. “Live a common life worthy of God’s grace and gift, worthy of God’s promise and plan. Grow up! Build a body fitting to Christ as the head! Love one another!”

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Growing From and Into Love

Psalm 145: 10-11, 19 All your works praise you, O God, and your faithful servants bless you. They make known the glory of your kingdom and speak of your power…Abba God is near to those who call upon him, to all who call upon him faithfully

Introduction

Through Ephesians we’ve talked about the need for heartfelt, mind-filled remembrance of Christ’s work in the world thru the Cross and Resurrection event and how remembering this brings Christ close to us by the power of the Holy Spirit. Thus, here, we have hope. What God has done combined with God’s presence with the community through remembrance makes us hopeful because we are not abandoned and have something to participate in: the divine mission of the revolution of love, life, and liberation in the world for the beloved. And at the intersection of hope and remembrance we find ourselves bending our knee to pray, not as a last-ditch effort but to find our ground and our language so we can move through God and toward our neighbor, bringing tangible hope that is faith working itself out in action for those who are in need, on death’s door, frail and fatigued, on the verge of giving up.

Last week we dove into the peace that Christ brings us by destroying dividing walls, ridding us of hostility and enmity, and rendering inoperative laws that cause in groups and out groups. Within the Christian walk and life, the act of rebuilding walls keeping many out and few elite in, fomenting hostility and fear, and forcing the gospel to become a law in the church or the state is anathema. According to Ephesians, the followers of Christ cannot support any of these things or anything that supports these things. We have been liberated into radical equity with our neighbor through the work of Christ and the event of the Cross and Resurrection—(we are not, have never been, and will never be superior to our neighbor).

But all of this is moot if we don’t grow—individually and corporately—bringing the outer person in line with the inner person. Ephesians 3 exhorts us to grow in such a way so we can be stronger and more able partners of God participating in God’s mission in the world made known to us in Christ and inspiring our hearts, minds, and actions by the power of the Holy Spirit.

Ephesians 3:14-21

…so that [God] might give to you according to the abundance of his glory the power to grow through [God’s] Spirit to align with the inner person [and] establish Christ in your hearts through faith. Having been fixed firmly on and having laid the foundation of love, [stand on love] so that you might be perfectly able to comprehend with all the saints what the breadth and length and weight and depth, and to ascertain the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge… (Eph. 3: 16-19a)

This portion of Ephesians is a prayer to God the Father. The hint is For this reason I bend my knees to the Father, from whom all families in heaven and on earth received [their] name… I retained the use of “Father” in the translation to highlight that Paul isn’t praying to some distant deity,[1] but to a loving parent, who is involved in our lineage and our name.[2] But the point of the passage isn’t the emphasis on “Father” but rather the “bending of my knees,” the fact that Paul prays for the Ephesians.

So, Paul prays and prays these three petitions: for 1. Inner strength, 2. Profound understanding of God’s love, and 3. Being filled with God’s fullness.[3] The request for “inner strength”—so that [God] might give to you according to the abundance of his glory the power to grow through [God’s] Spirit to align with the inner person [and] establish Christ in your hearts through faith—is a statement that nothing is taken from God[4] as God inspires and woos the believer and the congregation as a whole[5] to bring the outer person into alignment with the inner person. In other words, the wholeness of self—the receipt of the believer’s self—hinted at in chapter 2 (last week) is confirmed here in chapter 3 as Paul prays that God out of God’s abundance gives abundant strength to the believer to be a whole person by bringing the outer person in line with the inner person. According to our letter, to be loved by God is healing balm that then empowers the believer to love as they have been loved and this is done from the firm ground and fixed foundation of Christ’s love and the believer’s faith that this God (as parent) really does love them.[6]

And because Paul sees the Ephesians as grounded and substantiated in God by love, Paul can write, Having been fixed firmly on and having laid the foundation of love, [stand on love] so that you might be perfectly able to comprehend with all the saints what the breadth and length and weight and depth, and to ascertain the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge… In this prayer, the author of the letter bases everything on the love of Christ—on which the Ephesians have been firmly fixed and which is the foundation under the ground where they stand in the spiritual realm. The love of Christ is the starting point for the believers in Ephesus, from here they not only understand just how massive and astounding is God’s love (which is truly beyond human understanding),[7] but from where they move, have their being, and participate in God’s mission of divine revolution of love, life, and liberation for the beloved. The great mystery that the Ephesians are let in on is the divine mystery that is Christ’s birth, life, death, resurrection, and ascension and the impact of this divine event for the cosmos. But even then, understanding those points does not now make the Ephesians perfect or filled, or the arbiters of all that is of God[8] as if there is nothing more to learn or understand; this mystery surpasses all human knowledge. [9] For Paul these two things—the alignment of the outer with the inner person and the understanding the depth of God’s love—are woven together to create the situation where the believer might be filled into all fullness of God.[10] Embedded in the prayerful entreaty is Paul’s awareness that the Ephesians can never fully be filled with God’s fullness as if it is one and done. Rather, it is to be worked out; it’s on going—happening in the future and happening right now. This is what it means to grow: to grow in strength, to grow in act, to grow in prayer and dependence on God, to grow into fullness of the relationship with God, with the neighbor, and with the self.[11]

Paul then ends with And to the one who is able to do abundantly more than all things of which we ask or we can perceive according to the one who strengthens us, to [that one] be glory in the assembly and in Christ Jesus from all the families of the ages of ages, amen. As the three petitions work themselves out in the lives of the believers by the power of God, the Spirit,[12] glory is brought to God because where this community remembers, hopes, and prays, there is God in Christ. It is this that is the firm foundation and starting point for the one community that is the temple of God who worships together and then proceeds to move through God to serve the beloved, the neighbor. And as the neighbor is served, their God’s name is blessed (hallowed,[13] honored[14]) and glory is brought to God in the community and in Christ Jesus.[15]

Conclusion

Beloved, we remember, we hope, and we pray. We have wholeness with God, with our neighbor, and with ourselves by faith in Christ as divisions, hostilities, and laws cease to pull apart in Christ. From here we grow, constantly being brought to the edge of our understanding of God’s love for us and not just for us but for our neighbor. Because, for Paul here in Ephesians, the community who is open to and able to go outside of itself is the community that is growing—individually and corporately—in the knowledge of God’s love.

Paul prays for the believers—in Ephesus, and here today—that we would completely and fully—as limited as we are—understand just how much God loves us. Paul reminds us of the work of Christ on our behalf—the great mystery of the divinely inspired cosmos—and that we—who were once far off—are now counted among the children and families of God—spanning all time and space. And all of this never for ourselves in some privatized fashion so promoted by current American evangelical theology, but in a deprivatized way: for we are so loved by God that we can bring our outer person (personal and corporate) in line with the inner person (personal and corporate) and live in the world in love as we have been loved—no dividing walls and fences, no enmity and hostility, no laws keeping some in and some out. As we remember Christ, hope, pray, embrace radical divine equity, and grow, we can work to bring love to those who suffer under the oppression of indifference, life to those who are dying and liberation to those who are captive.

[1] Allen Verhey and Joseph S. Harvard, Ephesians, Belief: A Theological Commentary on the Bible, eds. Amy Plantinga Pauw and William C. Placher (Louisville: WJK, 2011), 123-124. “The ‘every family’ would have God as ‘Father,’ and every tribe and nation would be counted among the children of God. Then the invocation could be translated, ‘Father of all families [or tribes or nations].’ It is clearly not a biological relationship that is affirmed, but the care a father takes to supply the needs of his family, as when God is praised in Psalm 68:5 as the ‘father of orphans,’ the father of the fatherless. The scope of God’s parental care is not limited to those who know to call God ‘Father.’ Its reach extends beyond those who are near, and even beyond those who have been brought near.”

[2] Verhey and Harvard, Ephesians, 124. “This is no tribal deity, no local god, not just the god of our ancestors. This God is not just committed to the flourishing of ap articular culture, country, or family. This God is the God of ‘all the families of the earth,’ the God of ‘all things.’ And to this God alone the Jews and Gentiles of the Lycus Valley—and we—owe ultimate loyalty.”

[3] Barth, Markus, Ephesians: Introduction, Translation, and Commentary on Chapters 1-3, The Anchor Bible Series (Garden City: Doubleday, 1971), 368. “Three petitions may be discerned in what follows. (a) Intercession for the inner fortification of the saints; this is unfolded in the prayer that Christ reside in their hearts (vss. 16-17). (b) supplication for their strong perception of all the dimensions of God’s will; this supplication is interpreted by a request for knowledge of Christ’s love (vss. 18-19a). (c) Petition for perfection with God’s perfection (vs. 19b).”

[4] Barth, Ephesians, 369. “In remembering the ‘riches’ and ‘glory’ of the Father, Paul is convinced that God need not change or lose anything by granting the requests made to him. God is expected to act according to his nature, his character, i.e. his radiating love and power.”

[5] Barth, Ephesians, 385. “The gospel proclaimed in Ephesians is distinct from many variants of secular and religious collectivism by the vital concern shown for the enrichment, strength, stability, love, knowledge, grown, and perfection of each member of the community and, virtually, of every man.”

[6] Barth, Ephesians, 369. “If this command is a parallel to the prayer contained in 3:16, then ‘the Lord’ is the aim, focus, and source of gathering strength—he, and not some innate self that resides in the nature of man and constitutes his individual quality.”

[7] Barth, Ephesians, 369. “In Eph 3 these nouns are so arranged as to make it clear that man must be invigorated by God’s Spirit before he is able to grasp God’s manifold wisdom and hold onto it in knowledge. Paul would hardly affirm in general terms, that knowledge is power. Rather he avers that through his Spirit God empowers man to know things that are beyond the human mind, eye, ear…”

[8] Verhey and Harvard, Ephesians, 127-128. “Paul pleads that the church will grow strong enough to hold onto the mystery of God without claiming to be able to understand that mystery fully. That is, after all, what ‘all the saints’ (Eph. 3:18), including Job, did.”

[9] Barth, Ephesians, 373. “God laid his heart bare when he showed that from eternity the Gentiles are included in his love and in the Messiah’s realm, but the saints’ knowledge and understanding of the secret is still ‘imperfect’…”

[10] Verhey and Harvard, Ephesians, 128. “Here Paul prays that the church will in fact be ‘filled with all the fullness of God’…that is, with Christ…., in whom the secret was made known and who will bring the plan of God to complete fruition. That grace, that glory, that loves is not created by human beings, but it exalts human beings. It creates and restores humanity, and it strengthens the church to respond to God’s grace and glory and love, to be responsible agents in service to God’s plan.”

[11] Barth, Ephesians, 373. “While Col 1:19 and 2:9 speak of the ‘indwelling’ of ‘the whole fullness of God’ in Christ and the church, and described it as an accomplished fact, it is (despite all elements of ‘realized eschatology’) characteristic of Ephesians to speak of ‘filling’ as a process still going on.”

[12] Verhey and Harvard, Ephesians, 125. “The petition is that the church will be empowered by the Spirit to grow into Christ.”

[13] Let your name be hallowed (Lord’s Prayer)

[14] Honor your Father and Mother (Ten Commandments)

[15] Barth, Ephesians, 376. “In Eph 4:4-6 Paul mentions the church first because he starts from the actual locus of God’s praise. Then he adds a reference to the Messiah Jesus to designate the basis of the that praise. The existence and manifestation of God’s glory in the church is and remains dependent upon glorification of God through the Son. The secret of God is indeed now known only to the church, but it was revealed in Christ of the benefit of the whole world.”

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Christ Who is Our Peace

Psalm 23:1-3 Abba God is my shepherd; I shall not be in want. Abba God makes me lie down in green pastures and leads me beside still waters.  God revives my soul and guides me along right pathways for God’s Name’s sake.

Introduction

At the end of last’s week sermon, we ended talking about remembrance, hope, and prayer. For Christians, when we gather to speak of, read of, hear of, and consume together with Christ in our weekly fellowship and worship, we are remembering Christ and by the power of the Holy Spirit, we are not just remembering Christ but participating the work of God made tangible in Christ: the divine revolution and mission of love, life, and liberation in the world for the beloved. This is truly εὐαγγέλιον. And if this is truly εὐαγγέλιον, then it is also the source and foundation of our hope that exists to sustain us today.

In remembering and having hope we are led to pray, to bring ourselves deeply into God, to bend our knee (literal or figurative), to be creatures fully dependent on God. We remember, we have hope, and we pray, and it is this that is the beginning of all our activity within the walls of the church and without. As mentioned last week, “Prayer does not resign the believer to non-activity as if it is the final act in the face of trouble; it is the starting point. Prayer is how the believer unites with God and God’s passion for life, love, and liberation.[1] It is the bold request for God to enter in, to act; in prayer God is spoken to and from, in prayer God is remembered, so, too, the neighbor.”[2]

But the author of Ephesians isn’t done with us yet as if it’s just about remembering and hoping and praying. But that this remembering, hoping, and praying participates in making believers one with God and with each other in Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit and bringing them into the true peace that surpasses all understanding.

Ephesians 2:11-22

For [Christ] is our peace, the one who made both [the Israelites and the Gentiles] one and [the one who] destroyed in his flesh the division-wall of the fence, [and] the enmity [between the two], and [the one who] rendered inoperative the law of the commands and public decrees, so that the two might build in him one new peace-making humanity… (Eph. 2:14-15)

So, the author of Ephesians verbally exhorts us (using an imperative!) to remember. To remember what? Not only Christ but who we were prior to being encountered by Christ in the event of faith. …remember that in the past you [were] Gentiles in the flesh, the ones who were called “The Uncircumcised” by the ones who were called “The Circumcised” in the flesh done by [human] hands (v. 11). But that isn’t enough; Paul asks his audience to remember, further, that they were for a time without Christ, having been alienated from the citizenship of Israel and a stranger of the covenant of the promise, not possessing hope and [were] without God in the cosmos (v 12). Paul is eager to recreate the situation for the Ephesians to cause more than just recall but real, heart-felt remembering,[3] pressing into the reality that apart from Christ they were dead in their false-steps and missing the mark (sin) (v 1), they were strangers to the promises of God, to Christ, and to the hope of God which is the hope of the reign of God in Christ.[4],[5] According to Ephesians, the Gentiles were overcome by their own desires, turned in on themselves, stuck in place by division, and consumed by hostility. This isn’t something that someone can work themselves out of, no matter how hard they try. For Paul, it is only through the encounter with Christ where one finds God, finds their neighbor, and finds themself; it is only in Christ where one finds true life, love, and liberation.[6] But at this time you who were once far off you became near by the blood of Christ (v 13). In other words, this is not done by human hands (χειροποιήτου in v 11), but by the love of God in Christ done by the power of the Spirit[7] as the down-payment in lives of the believers in Ephesus.

This is why Christ is the peace of everyone—for [Christ] is our peace (v 14a)—Children of Israel and Gentiles combined. Because, as Paul writes, the one who made both [the Israelites and the Gentiles] one and [the one who] destroyed in his flesh the division-wall of the fence, [and] the enmity [between the two], and [the one who] rendered inoperative the law of the commands and public decrees, so that the two might build in him one new peace-making humanity (vv 14b-15). There is now no longer us v. them, insiders v. outsiders, elected v. not-elected, Israel v. Gentiles, the circumcised v. the not circumcised.[8] There are not two groups, but one group. Thus, this peace Jesus brings in his own flesh, by the blood of the cross event and the glory of his resurrection is not just for privatized souls but for deprivatized humanity; it’s a socio-political event.[9] There is now no wall that keeps some in and some out, some included and some excluded; there is now (absolutely) no line—whether 2-D or 3-D—that can render some humans “good” and others “bad” based on which side of that line they fall because that line has been destroyed[10] and is now anathema for the believers and followers of Christ who benefit from the destruction of the division-wall of the fence by being included in to the heredity and mission of God by the work of Christ on the cross and the power of the Holy Spirits dwelling in their hearts.

And if the wall has been destroyed, so, too, division according to enmity,[11] which is the hostility and intolerance fomented between the two groups that was the fruit of the division wall; it is the anger of the kingdoms of humanity turned inward to tear humanity apart.[12] This includes the laws and public commandments used to make some clean and some unclean, some righteous and others unrighteous; these, too, like the wall and the enmity, have become inoperative in solidifying groups of people against each other. For Paul then writes, and so he might completely reconcile both in one body for God through the cross he killed the hostility in himself (v 16).By Christ’s work[13]—the mission of God’s revolution of love, life, and liberation for the world—there is now no wall, thus no enmity, thus no law[14] that can keep anyone out and in this radical establishment of divine equity, there is peace[15]—true peace that is not contingent on one group suffering under the weight of another.

Then the letter continues, [Christ] came and brought peace to you (all) who were far-off and peace to you (all) who were near because through him we—both in one spirit—possess access to God therefore now you are no longer a stranger and sojourner but you are a fellow citizens with the saints and of the family of God (vv 17-19). In Christ, these two have become one[16] and together they will dwell in and with God and they will have real peace—the type of peace that threatens the principalities and powers of the kingdom of humanity. [17] But this peace brought by Christ is more than reconciliation with each other, it is also reconciliation with God, thus, these two who are now one become the dwelling place of God. [18] As Paul continues, being built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets—Jesus Christ himself being the cornerstone—in whom all building is being fitted together and grows itself into a holy temple in the lord in whom you, you also were built together into the dwelling place of God in Spirit (vv 20-22). Boldly Ephesians declares, where there is a lack of enmity and hostility, division walls and lines, laws and commands geared to keep some in and some out, there God is and there the saints of God are; no one is excluded and left out and the church is caught up in this radical inclusion and equity, snatched into this divine peace that knows absolutely positively no walls or dividing lines.[19],[20]

Conclusion

The church is without excuse here, according to Ephesians. Peace—the very peace Christ brings through his birth, life, death, resurrection and ascension—is peace that is not contingent on the kingdom of humanity but dependent on the reign of God. It is peace that arises in the communion of humanity with humanity, humanity with God, and humanity with creation; it is peace that manifests within and among humanity in its unity to the glory of God, which is in opposition to the “peace” (i.e. “security” (“control”)) of the kingdom of humanity that thrives on the humanity’s disunity. None of us who claim to follow Christ can afford to support systems dead set on dividing and conquering, oppressing and marginalizing, and fostering anger and fear; these systems are antithetical to the gospel of Christ and to the faith and praxis of the believer in the world before God and neighbor. None of us who claim to follow Christ can find peace (and hope) anywhere else apart from God: not in federal positions and presidents, not in parties and platforms, not in promises and progress made with human hands. We can only find true peace in our reconciliation with God, which is reconciliation with our neighbor, and, thus, these two combined give us reconciliation with ourselves because we have been made one with our neighbor and thus have become the dwelling place of God.

We cannot find peace by building the world we long for with human hands because as soon as we build it it has expired and must be torn down to allow something new to be born. We cannot find peace by turning the gospel into a law as if it can found a nation that would only gift life, love, and liberation to those who qualify. We cannot find peace by letting enmity and hostility be the mortar holding the bricks of the division-wall together. We cannot find peace by legislating Christianity because the doctrines born of the second word of God that form the tissue of the Christian Church inherently resist such socio-political ossification. We can and will only find peace by pressing further into God, clinging to God’s Word in Christ, and leaning into the guidance and leading of the Spirit of God, the guarantor of the new covenant, the down payment of our adoption into God, and the fertile soil making us one with God, with our neighbor, thus, with ourselves. It is only here, in God and with God, do we find true and lasting peace that surpasses all understanding.

[1] See Sölle, Choosing Life, pp. 92-93

[2] This portion is taken from, Lauren R.E. Larkin, “Leaving Heaven Behind: Paradoxical Identity as the Anchor of Dorothee Sölle’s Theology of Political Resistance,” PhD Dissertation (University of Aberdeen, 2024), 202.

[3] Barth, Markus, Ephesians: Introduction, Translation, and Commentary on Chapters 1-3, The Anchor Bible Series (Garden City: Doubleday, 1971), 254. “Repentance, decision, and gratitude are called for, not a mental recollection only.”

[4] Barth, Ephesians, 257. “In Eph 2:12 a status of strangership is described, not an event leading to estrangement.”

[5] Barth, Ephesians, 259. \“Unless Paul flippantly denied or dispossessed the Gentiles of any hope he must have meant a specific hope. This ‘hope,’ then, could be understood as fostered in the minds of the Jews, because it was founded and guaranteed in the heart of God or ‘laid up in heaven’……It is the hope for the promised messiah from the root of David…”

[6] Barth, Ephesians, 254. “Paul’s thought moves from men in the grip of ‘flesh’ (2:11), over the work performed in ‘Christ’s flesh’ (2:14, to the operation of the ‘Spirit’ (2:18). Nothing can prevent the ‘Spirit’ from operating ‘in the realm of flesh.’”

[7] Barth, Ephesians, 255. “As the building of the temple by God is contrasted to the construction of temples by men, so circumcision of the heart…highly excels handmade circumcision.”

[8] Allen Verhey and Joseph S. Harvard, Ephesians, Belief: A Theological Commentary on the Bible, eds. Amy Plantinga Pauw and William C. Placher (Louisville: WJK, 2011), 93. “If it was especially the Jewish Christian who needed to be reminded earlier that all are ‘sinners,’ not just the ‘uncircumcised,’ not just the Gentiles, and that all are brought from death to life by the gift of God’s grace, not by ‘works’  of the law, the Gentiles are now reminded of the promises to Israel and that it is in the Jewish Messiah that they are given a share in them.”

[9] Barth, Ephesians, 262. “Christ is praised here not primarily for the peace he bring to individual souls; rather the peace he brings is a social and political event…”

[10] Barth, Ephesians, 263-264. “The combination of the two Greek nouns yields a composite sense: it is a wall that prevents certain person from entering a house or a city (cf. 2:19), and is as much a mark of hostility (2:14, 16) as, e.g. a ghetto wall, the Iron Curtain the Berlin Wall, a racial barrier, or a railroad track that separates the right from the wrong side of the city, not to speak of the wall between state and church.”

[11] Barth, Ephesians, 264. “In this case, the ‘enmity’ is as much the object of destruction as the wall.”

[12] Barth, Ephesians, 264. “The word ‘enmity’ defines the separation between Jews and Gentiles more specifically: this segregation implies intolerance, and is a passionate, totalitarian, bellicose affair. While the ‘enmity’ mentioned at the end of vs. 16 is the one-sided enmity of man against God, the ‘enmity’ of vs. 14 is mutual among men.”

[13] Barth, Ephesians, 265. “…the context of Eph 2:15 reveals that for the author (as much as for Paul himself) the death of Christ rather than the promulgation of new decrees stood behind the abolition of the divisive statutes.”

[14] Barth, Ephesians, 264. Wall, enmity, and law “Each of these terms throws light on the others; the author wants them to be considered as synonyms.”

[15] Verhey and Harvard, Ephesians, 96. “…God seals a ‘new covenant’ in ‘the blood of Christ.” And in that ‘new covenant’ there is a new community, a community of both Jew and Gentile, a community that shares the memory of Christ and the hope of God’s promises with a common meal.”

[16] Barth, Ephesians, 272. “After showing that the church exists only as a unity, that is, as one new man created out of Jews and Gentiles, the apostle does not proceed to split t into halves.”

[17] Verhey and Harvard, Ephesians, 97. “But this was not merely an idea, as the reality of baptism makes clear. This was not merely an ideal that exists outside history and toward which we must strive. This was and is a reality wrought in Christ on the cross and displayed in the churches when God initiates diverse people into Christ and into the church. Ideals are powerless against the forces in this world that divide and abuse, against the principalities and power that nurture cultures of enmity. But those forces are and will be finally powerless against the promise and reality of God’s future.”

[18] Barth, Ephesians, 274. “The church herself is not reconciliation but she lives form it and manifests it. She serves the glory of God inasmuch as her members mutually assist, support, and strengthen one another. Neither jews nor Gentiles nor any individual can independently claim after Christ’s coming to offer an appropriate residence For God but Jews and Gentiles together are now ordained by God to become his temple.”

[19] Barth, Ephesians, 324-325. “Now the church is the sign of his mercy, his peace, and his nearness the whole world. If God can and will use people are who are as tempted and weak as the Christian are, then he is certainly able and willing to exclude no one from his realm. The church lives by this hope and bears witness to it publicly.”

[20] Verhey and Harvard, Ephesians, 98. “They are called to break down the walls and to perform this new social reality by forming friendships with the people on the other side of the aisle, or on the other side of town.”

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A Community that Remembers

Psalm 24:1-2 The earth is Abba God’s and all that is in it, the world and all who dwell therein. For it is God who founded it upon the seas and made it firm upon the rivers of the deep.

Introduction

Throughout our study of 2 Corinthians, we juggled the twin questions: “What now?” and “Will they?” What do we do now that we are in the world but not of the world, breakable creatures carrying God’s Spirit and message, charged with carrying on the mission of God in the world: the advancement of the divine revolution of love, life, and liberation made incarnate in Christ and the wellbeing and benefit of the neighbor to the glory of God. Without Christ to guide the disciples, the disciples are left to figure it out by the leading of the Spirit.

We saw that Paul, in 2 Corinthians, gave us ample direction to discover that the “What now?” and “Will they?” is never answered once for all, but brought to the disciples of Christ anew every season, and that in each season the disciples of Christ must depend fully on God, cling to God’s word made known in Christ, and to follow—eyes wide open—the leading of God’s Spirit residing in their hearts and guiding their minds toward God’s wisdom and discernment in the world, impassioned with God’s passion to bring love, life, and liberation to the whole world—participation in the mission of God by faith working itself out in freedom and responsibility.

Paul seemed to leave us, though, with the reality that the Christian journey and Christian life is as hard as easy, as sorrowful as joyous, as thorn-filled as rose-filled. It is certain that as Christians who follow God, God’s Word, and God’s Spirit, we will have great existential anguish as much as we will have great existential excitement; both states are part of the Christian life in the world that is not of the world. Paul left us in the world dependent on God as we walk.

If Paul left us on earth in 2 Corinthians 12; Ephesians launches us into that third heaven Paul referenced. It is through remembrance, hope, and prayer that we, those dependent on God, continue to move through the world bringing God’s love to our neighbor and our neighbor to a loving God.

Ephesians 1:3-14

Bless God, the parent of our Lord Jesus Christ, the one who blesses us in Christ in every kind of spiritual blessing in the heavenly sphere, just as God selected us in Christ before the conception of the cosmos to live holy and righteous before God in love, foreordaining us to adoption through Jesus Christ toward God according to the favorable favor of the will of God … (Eph. 1:3-6)[1]

Verses three to fourteen form one long sentence packed full of adoration, gratitude, praise, prayer, and doctrine. One of the most striking things, though, is the way this passage starts with humans blessing God. While some may feel compelled to shun this idea—preferring that it is God who blesses us so to keep God active and not passive[2]—the idea that we can bless God isn’t that foreign to our theology and prayer life. Take for example “The Lord’s Prayer” and the petition, let your name be made sacred. Isn’t God’s name already sacred? Yet the petition implies a capacity on our part to act in such a way that God’s name is praised and made holy. Thus, the idea that we bless God isn’t farfetched but makes sense: we have been made by God to be in the world and to bring God the glory God deserves through our love of God which is love of our neighbor. In other words, we are the “free otherness” from God who can return the blessing and bless God who blesses us.[3] The relationship with God by faith in Christ and the power of the Spirit is one where both the Lover and the Beloved are mutually dependent and mutually responsible.[4] God loves us, and we love God; God keeps us warm, and we keep God warm; God protects us, and we protect God.[5]

The author then moves to speak of our being blessed in every kind of spiritual blessing in the heavenly sphere, and of our selection in Christ from the laying-down of the cosmos. All of it oriented toward holy and blameless living before God that is characterized by love. This living is at once in the temporal realm and in the spiritual realm.[6] Human being and human love, according to Ephesians, is born of God’s love to go farther into the world to bring light where there is darkness, life where there is death, liberation where there is captivity, and love where there is indifference.[7] The believer is caught up into the cosmic battle between the creation that is of the reign of God and the destruction that is of the kingdom of humanity; it is the believer who is “enlisted” to be the epicenter of spiritual and temporal activity, at once the one who is adopted through Christ toward God, according to the good pleasure of the will of God and the breakable vessel, summoned out of the mud and dust.

It is these adopted of God and summoned from the dust and mud who are also endowed with God’s grace, the ones who have been loved, the recipients of liberation and forgiveness of false-steps, and,thus, recipientsof divine wisdom working out in human prudence.[8] It is these who are enlisted to act in the world to the glory of God by God’s will and leading (by the Holy Spirit), those who are charged to carry forward God’s Word (incarnated in Christ), and to participate in the continuation of God’s mission in the world to gather up all things in Christ, the things upon the heavens and the things upon the earth, those who were given a share foreordained according to the purpose of the one who is operative in all things according to the will of God. It is these identity markers of the beloved of God in Christ who are given a reason to hope because what we see in the world isn’t all there is. As the forces of the kingdom of humanity threaten death and destruction in the temporal realm, those who believe know that there is another realm—the spiritual realm—surging alongside, eager to make itself known through those who walk with the Spirit in Christ before God, who have heard the word of truth, the good news of salvation, and those who have eyes to see that there is more here than meets the eye because they have been sealed to the Holy Spirit of promise who is the security of our inheritance of liberation to praise of the glory of God.[9]

Conclusion

The author of the letter of Ephesians wants the community to remember. Remembering is key because it is in remembering together where we hold the presence of one absent among us as if they are still present. Though Christ is gone from us, Christ is present among us and among us with those who suffer as we remember him through proclamation and through remembering that the gift of the Holy Spirit to us (individually and corporately) is “security” that what has been started by God in Christ is not yet finished and that God will show up because God has promised to do so and God’s promises do not fall flat. God is not done with God’s world because God’s people still remember, and by remembering they (re)turn their gaze to God in the present thus to the future. Herein is the good hope of something different that will bring the divine revolution of love, life, and liberation farther into the world, and, ultimately, to is consummation in Christ’s return.[10]

And we do all of it through our dependence on God realized through our prayers—corporate[11] and individual. We do not go it alone. This letter to the Ephesians is an invitation to pray, to pray with our whole selves.[12] Prayer is the groundwork of the union with God that leads to the outpouring of divine love, liberation, and life for the neighbor in the world. Prayer solicits a self-awareness needed by God and the self-needing God and needing God to speak. It is in prayer where the believer is not only reoriented to God and thus to themself, but also where they are brought close to their neighbor. Prayer also participates in new language for the believer in the world where the believer represents the neighbor to God in words articulating the septic, antiquatedness of the kingdom of humanity. But prayer does not resign the believer to non-activity as if it is the final act in the face of trouble; it is the starting point. Prayer is how the believer unites with God and God’s passion for life, love, and liberation.[13] It is the bold request for God to enter in, to act; in prayer God is spoken to and from, in prayer God is remembered, so, too, the neighbor.[14]

[1] Translation mine.

[2] Allen Verhey and Joseph S. Harvard, Ephesians, Belief: A Theological Commentary on the Bible, eds. Amy Plantinga Pauw and William C. Placher (Louisville: WJK, 2011), 43. Blessing God “…seems to make God the recipient of blessing rather than the source of all blessing It seems to render God passive.”

[3] Verhey and Harvard, Ephesians, 43. “But this mysterious ‘passivity’ of God is precisely the nuance we should not neglect. By a powerful and creative word God created the universe and all that is in it, by God’s constant care God sustains it, and by God’s grace God redeems it. God is agent, active. But God creates, sustains and redeems the creation into a fertile and free otherness from God. God gives God’s creatures their own distinctive powers and upholds those powers, concurring in their own works not rendering the creation passive but active in God’s own project.”

[4] Cf Dorothee Sölle, Christ the Representative.

[5] Dorothee Sölle, “Laudation from Dorothee Sölle for Carola Moosbach, June 2, 2000, “When it is related to the children: God loves you, God protects you, God warms you, I completely agree with it. But just as important is it to say to them: God is in need of you, you can warm God. Sometimes, it is also cold here to God.

[6] Barth, Ephesians, 102. “‘Spiritual blessing,’…does not mean a timeless, otherworldly, abstract blessing. Rather it describes changes effected upon and among people of flesh and blood. It means a history, that is, decisions, actions, testimonies, suffering which have been set in motion and are as yet unfinished.”

[7] Verhey and Harvard, Ephesians, 45. Heavenlies “It is the mysterious and unseen realm above and behind this world. It is not another world, a different world, unconnected with this one. It is the realm at once of God, who creates and sustains this world, and of the ‘spiritual forces of evil’ (6:12), who are at work in this world to destroy it. It is the realm of a cosmic conflict. On the one side are God and his Christ; on the other are the principalities and powers who would usurp God’s rule. That cosmic conflict is that battle for sovereignty in this world, not some other one. It is the very cosmic conflict in which Christians find themselves enlisted (6:12).”

[8] Barth, Markus, Ephesians: Introduction, Translation, and Commentary on Chapters 1-3, The Anchor Bible Series (Garden City: Doubleday, 1971), 85. “The wise man knows how and when to speak; he gives good counsel; he lives up to his gifts; his actions make sense and are successful. For this reason the conjunction ‘and’ between ‘wisdom’ and ‘prudence’ is to be understood as expository. Paul speaks of that wisdom which is operating in prudence.”

[9] Verhey and Harvard, Ephesians, 45. “The decisive battle has been fought and won in this conflict, fought and won in this world, when God raise Jesus form the dead. The powers of death and doom had done their damnedest, but God raised Jesus up and set him at his right hand ‘in the heavenly places’ (1:20).”

[10] Verhey and Harvard, Ephesians, 47. “Remembrance has brought us to this point. It is because this community remembers Christ that it also hopes. It hopes for the good future of God, which is the good future for God’s creation, for ‘all things.’ This good future is our ‘inheritance’ in Christ (1:11), and the Spirit is the ‘pledge,’ the earnest, of that inheritance (1:14), the firstfruits of God’s good pleasure.”

[11] Verhey and Harvard, Ephesians, 49. “Ephesians sets its talk of God and its instructions concerning the common life in the context of prayer.”

[12] Verhey and Harvard, Ephesians, 49. “Ephesians invites us to pray. Much of the first three chapters is prayer.”

[13] See Sölle, Choosing Life, pp. 92-93

[14] This paragraph is taken from, Lauren R.E. Larkin, “Leaving Heaven Behind: Paradoxical Identity as the Anchor of Dorothee Sölle’s Theology of Political Resistance,” PhD Dissertation (University of Aberdeen, 2024), 202.

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