Short Summaries of

Sermons on Ephesians

by Rev. Ralph Allan Smith

Oneness In Christ

(Eph. 1:10)

The mystery that God has revealed to us in Christ is "That in the dispensation of the fulness of times He might gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven, and which are on earth; even in Him" (Eph. 1:10). This truth is the answer to one of man's fundamental problems, the problem of unity. Non-Christian men seek unity in principles and ideas that either bring no unity or bring it only at the expense of meaning. Christ is the "principle" of unity in the universe, the One who unites things material and immaterial, animate and inanimate, human and non-human, man and man, and man and God: " For by him were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers: all things were created by him, and for him: And he is before all things, by him all things consist" (Col. 1:16-17).

The Problem of Unity in Society

The tower of Babel was the first attempt to create a unified society apart from God. Nimrod, a mighty hunter and builder, founded the cities of Nineveh and Babel as well as others (Gen. 10:8-12). The religion of Babel was a religion of unity in the State rather than God. Men spoke one language and lived in the same area so that a whole-world state was possible. For man in rebellion against God, it was the opportunity to establish the "kingdom of man."

The tower of Babel incident shows us that men have a profound desire for the kingdom of God implanted in their nature. The kingdom is an inescapable concept because it is part of what it means that man is created to be like God. God is one and three. Man, therefore, as God's image seeks both to express God's diversity and His unity. For man the sinner both of these motives become perverted. Unity degenerates into totalitarianism, diversity into anarchy. The tower of Babel was the first totalitarian kingdom established with the explicit motive of contradicting the kingdom program of God (Gen. 11:4).

God destroyed Nimrod's anti-Christian "kingdom of man" by miraculously confusing man's language. It is certain, however, that Nimrod would not have succeeded even without God's judgment. Consider the history of man until the tower was built. As soon as Adam sinned, his relationship with Eve was corrupted. He hated and accused her rather than rejoicing in her as the gift of God (Gen. 3:12). Nor could the first children of the human race maintain unity and love--Cain killed his brother for envy. At the time of Noah, after the descendents of Seth had compromised the Gospel by marrying non-Christians (Gen. 6:2), public morality eventually broke down. It was no longer possible to keep men from violence. Anarchy and oppression filled the earth so that God could not restrain His wrath any longer (Gen. 6:12-13).

What would have happened to Nimrod's kingdom if God had not judged it? It would have degenerated into the kind of dialectical confusion that filled the world before the flood--anarchy and totalitarianism feeding on one another. God would have been forced to judge the world again. It was a judgment of mercy, therefore, when God confused the languages at Babel and dispersed men to various parts of the earth. When men cannot even communicate, the lack of true unity is all the more apparent and false unity is virtually impossible to construct.

The Age of Fragmentation

Non-Christian thought in the twentieth century reflects the breakdown of unity apart from God. Francis Schaeffer refers to our time as "the age of fragmentation." The contradictions of non-Christian thought are coming to expression not only in splintered philosophies but more spectacularly in disintegrated societies. The connection between faith and life has been well expressed in Camus' The Rebel. Camus well understood that unless humanism could answer philosophical questions, it could never solve practical problems, the most practical of all being the problem of murder.

Camus defines what he calls "metaphysical rebellion" as "the movement by which man protests against his condition and against the whole of creation. It is metaphysical because it contests the ends of man and of creation. . . . [T]he metaphysical rebel protests against the condition in which he finds himself as a man. . . . [T]he metaphysical rebel declares that he is frustrated by the universe."

When men rebel against God and declare their independence of Him, they must find some other source of unity. "If men cannot refer to a common value, recognized by all as existing in each one, then man is incomprehensible to man. The rebel demands that this value should be clearly recognized in himself because he knows or suspects that, without this principle, crime and disorder would reign throughout the world. An act of rebellion on his part seems like a demand for clarity and unity." Camus claims to be motivated by "the concept of complete unity." For the rebel, God is the one who destroys unity because God distinguishes between the saved and the non-saved and has the audacity to kill men. The rebel, therefore, is not necessarily an atheist, but he is necessarily a blasphemer: "he blasphemes primarily in the name of order, denouncing God as the father of death and as the supreme outrage." The rebel's quest for order apart from God, however, has only led to progressive decomposition. Intellectually, politically, religiously, socially modern man faces a world of contradiction, hatred, and confusion. It is the world he himself has created because he has rejected the God of the Bible.

In Christ

Christ alone can bring men unity. The problem of fragmentation is the problem of sin. By dying for our sins and rising from the dead, victorious over Satan and death, Jesus can free us from the real "ultimate outrage" that rules our hearts and destroys our souls--sin. It is the purpose of God to completely reverse the effects of sin. By His grace we are reconciled to ourselves psychologically, to one another socially, to the world around us, and, first and most important of all, to God Himself.

The Gospel message is the message of the reconciliation of all things in Christ: "And, having made peace through the blood of his cross, by him to reconcile all things unto himself; by him, I say, whether they be things in earth, or things in heaven" (Col. 1:20). The world that had been ruined by man's sin is reunited by the cross of Christ. Christ Himself is the "Person-principle" that gives men the "common value" they need to have racial oneness.

Having died for the sins of the world, Jesus now sends us out into the world with the message of reconciliation so that through our ministry of His Gospel the world may be saved: "Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new. And all things are of God, who hath reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ, and hath given to us the ministry of reconciliation; To wit, that God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them; and hath committed unto us the word of reconciliation. Now then we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God did beseech you by us: we pray you in Christ's stead, be ye reconciled to God" (2 Cor. 5:17-20).

The Christian's daily prayer, that His will may be done on earth as it is in heaven, is both our petition to God for help and our plan of action. As we do His will in our homes and in our church, the kingdom of righteousness grows and the world is reconciled to our heavenly Father.