Ephesians 4:1-6
The key word in this passage is repeated over and over: one. Paul lists all the things we have unity around: one body, one Spirit, one hope, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God. This sums up the theme of the letter - there aren't Jewish believers and Gentile believers, there are no upper and lower classes, no categories of Christians. We all belong to God through Jesus Christ and we are one.
The phrase that sticks out to me is "live a life worthy of the calling you have received." That's a big order! In this context, the calling that Paul is talking about is the calling to be united (he goes on to give some instruction on how to live out that calling: be humble and patient, bear with one another in live, make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit). I'm trying to figure out what this means in this present time because there is not a huge division between Jews and Gentiles (especially Western Gentiles) in the Christian family. However, I think there are still people groups that we see as "second class Christians": maybe natives (although I don't view them as such), evangelicals see people from liturgical churches (like Anglicans, Catholics and Lutherans) as second class (and vice-versa I'm guessing), etc. The big one that comes to mind is Arab Christians. In the western world, we are so pro-Israeli that we forget that when the send their troops into Lebanon that thousands of our brothers and sisters are being displaced and when they fire their rockets into Palestine, they are killing fellow Christians. However, the western Church sees the Arabs as bad and the Israelis (because they are God's chosen people) as being unable to do anything wrong. Maybe this is the people group that we need to bring into the "one body". That might be living a life worthy of the calling I received...
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Blevos is the name we came up with for web-logging-devotions. It all started with a discussion about the role of community and the role of "private" devotions. It was decided this was a great mix.
2 comments:
It looks like we got some similar insights into this passage. I agree with you totally, we are supposed to build unity and often we place people as second class Christians, even within our churches. Also sometimes I find we place non-Christians as second hand citizens as well, this needs to change, may God help us to live a life worthy of our calling.
yes, i agree with that - it's the church (first class) and the world (second class). we need to remember that we are citizens of the world (and that we are citizens of the kingdom of heaven, too). thanks for the reminder.
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