Zion Lutheran Church

God's Reign of Grace and Peace

The Rev. Mark Sherwindt, Pastor
Zion Evangelical Lutheran Church
Pentecost 8: July 29-30, 2006

For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named, that according to the riches of his glory he may grant you to be strengthened with power through his Spirit in your inner being, and that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may have power to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God. Now to him who by the power at work within us is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or imagine, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations, for ever and ever. Amen.
[Ephesians 3:14-21]

УFor this reason I bow my knees before the FatherЕФ For what reason? First of all, whatever the reason, it was for this reason that Paul was humbled to kneel before the Father God of all that is, combining in his words of praise God's majesty as the Creator of the universe and the love that was so decisively revealed in the Son Jesus Christ. The truth is that Ephesians combines the loftiest language of God's glorious majesty as God with the most intimate details of Jesus' saving sacrifice on the Cross, the utterly unmeasured self-giving of Christ in death. In a related matter, it was for this reason, namely, Paul's insight into the gospel of our salvation, Paul's incisive understanding of what God desired to do, and did, in Christ, that the whole of the Gentile world, all the nations beyond the boundaries of Israel, all the nations of the world, can turn to Paul - not Peter, not James, not John - they can now turn to Paul, who didn't know Jesus, never met him, didn't even know what he looked like, as their primary source of insight into the nature of God's life, the center of His will, and the character of His love.

Of course, the reason for Paul's bowing on bended knee before the Father is not about Paul, or what Paul knows. This reason is about God, and what God has done in Christ to reveal the power of the grace, and its principle effect, peace. That's how Paul begins his epistle, УGrace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.Ф [Ephesians 1:2] God's grace is what Paul describes in Chapter 1; God's peace is the focal point in Chapter 2. There it is, right in the heart of Chapter 2, a key reference to Christ connecting the gracious gift of God's forgiveness through the Cross to the Church: УFor he is our peace Е in his flesh Е on the cross Е breaking down the dividing wall of hostility Е making friends of former enemies, one people of many peoples, turning feuding families into a household of faith, a fellowship of love, the church, with Christ the cornerstone, built upon the foundation of the apostles, alive through the presence and the power of the Spirit, permeating every stone in the structure, every living cell in the Body of Christ." [a loose translation of Ephesians 2:11-22]

I am anxious to introduce us to everything this epistle has to teach us, and for this reason we have made Ephesians the focus of our six-week study during Sunday School between the services in Luther Hall; but its power is enhanced by looking to the world around us. The headlines are once again filled with news of violence in the Middle East Е all week long, for months now, for years and generations. In my lifetime, it was the six-day war in 1967. There was the Camp David Accord under Carter, the bombing in Beirut under Reagan, Desert Storm with Bush I, Yasser Arafat walking away from Madelyn Albright under Clinton, Afghanistan and Iraq with Bush II, and now Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah in Lebanon. The Middle East throughout history has been the poster child for an insolvable political mess, with the roots of these problems related to religious differences, cultural differences, differences in language, in history, in political allegiances, and religious hopes. Every generation learns anew that Palestine is a highly charged combustion chamber ready to explode at the slightest provocation. It has been that way in our time, and it was that way during Paul's day as well.

It is into this world that God's grace and peace arrive with the proclamation of the gospel. We have taken the teeth out of God's one-two punch of grace and peace. We have too often thought of God's grace in a passive way, as in a Уgrace-periodФ that applies when law-breakers are allowed to make amends without fear of penalty or punishment. Grace is a temporary suspending of the rules. But when it comes to the gospel of our salvation, grace is more than a temporary suspending of the rules. Grace is more than a temporary strategy for dealing with the problem of sin and sinners, and peace is more than just an added option thrown in with the whole package of salvation, which already includes the forgiveness of sins, life after death, and all sorts of added benefits. This way of looking at grace and peace doesn't capture the essence of grace or peace. For grace is the character of God's rule, the content of God's power, the form of God's love. Peace is the visible and actual effect among those who are claimed by God's grace. Grace is God's power; and peace is its promise. Grace is God's gift; and peace, our enjoyment of it. It is so elegant in its simplicity, and so very miraculous in its effect. Grace and peace is ours: the grace of God our Father; his peace through our Lord Jesus Christ.

Chapters One and Two are the reason Paul is on his knees in Chapter Three. God's grace, described with the glorious praise of one long run-on sentence of dangling participles hanging on a prayer, a prayer of praise, and God's peace, won through the sacrifice of Jesus' body dying on the Cross, alive through Christ's body living in this spiritual house we call the Church: these are the reasons Paul is on his knees in Chapter Three praying that, Уaccording to the riches of his glory God may grant that you be strengthened in your inner being with power through his Spirit, and that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith, as you are being rooted and grounded in love.Ф [Ephesians 3:16-17] Again, Paul hadn't just read a book about the grace of God, or heard about it from others. Paul had been personally blessed, blinded, in fact, by the overpowering truth that in Christ God had decided to reveal the saving power of his grace to the whole of creation and the whole of humanity - to the Jew first but also to the Gentiles, to nations of the world, that all could know the joy of being claimed and embraced by the life-giving power of God's love, a love that makes peace Е by creating it Е and restoring the right relationships that come with it - a right relationship with God, our harmony with others, and serenity within.

Paul's experience of God's love was both deeply personal and evidently social, because the church was its creation, and evidence of its power and presence. Paul wasn't convinced that in Christ God's grace became our peace by reading about it in the Bible, or by listening to the preachers expound on it, or following the theories Christian theologians had devised to explain it. God's peace wasn't an abstraction, or a doctrine. It was the concrete reality of the church, where Jews and Gentiles, rich and poor, men and women, shared equally through the Spirit in the gifts of God's grace, and found that Christ's love living through them broke down the walls of hostility that had previously divided them.

Grace is the arrival of God's reign, and peace is its effect. Grace is God's power, and peace its promise. Grace is God's gift, and peace, our enjoyment of it. The world doesn't need any more books about peace. The world needs a community that can live it, and will. That's what God gave the world with the Body of Christ, the gracious gift of peace, which starts with Jesus' body on the cross, and comes to life through the body of Christ here in the church. The church could convert the likes of disbelievers like Paul even today if we could just understand that it's not the doctrines we teach but the peace that we live that opens eyes and wins hearts.

Paul is certainly telling us that the proclamation of the gospel of God's grace really is the key to peace on earth, but not if it simply inspires Christians to tell the nations to stop their warring. When God's grace creates communities that live God's peace, then the world can see how peace is won, through advancing the rule of Christ, not enhancing the role of guns. Look, the world doesn't need more armchair generals telling Israel how to win the war. The world needs people like you and me who have been called to live the peace that Christ won dying on the Cross. Paul saw that happen, and it changed his life. It changed the course of history. We are a part of this change; but it's important that we not be conformed to the ways of the world, thinking as the world thinks, but that we be transformed by the power of the Spirit, which here and now is "strengthening our inner being, that Christ may dwell in our hearts as our lives are learning to be rooted and grounded in love.Ф That's Paul's prayer, and ours. It is a prayer that invites our resounding Amen!