◄ What Does Ephesians 2:17 Mean? ►

God's gracious message to mankind, both to Jew and Gentile alike, is reconciliation. In His grace and kindness, God intervened in the long-standing bitter enmity and deep-seated mistrust that existed between Jew and Gentile by making them into one new man in Christ. He intervened in the enmity between God and man by bringing all who trust in Christ Jesus as Saviour back into close fellowship with Himself. And that bond of unity is in His Son.

God is Spirit and God is eternal, but God in His grace and love clothed Himself in human flesh so that He could become the incarnate Son of God and live a perfect life clothed in mortal flesh (yet without sin) in order to qualify Himself to become humanity's Kinsman-Redeemer. By willingly giving up His precious life on a cruel Roman cross, he enabled all who believe on His name not to perish, but have forgiveness of sins and life everlasting.

It was Paul to whom the mystery of the Church, which is the Body of Christ, was entrusted, and Jesus Christ was the one Who not only preached the message of peace, but became incarnate peace for mankind: peace with God and peace with each other.

Every physical, mental, ethnic, and spiritual barrier that ever separated Jew from Gentile was forever torn down in the Body of Christ. The middle wall of partition in the Temple court was irreversibly removed, as the veil of the Temple was rent in twain from top to bottom. The legal wall of Mosaic Law, which divided God's chosen people from Gentiles, was permanently removed at the Cross when Christ perfectly fulfilled the Law on account of all who trust in Him as Saviour.

Christ tore down legalistic walls and ethnic walls, and He even rent asunder the entrenched spiritual wall by making peace between the two. He married sinful Jews with sinful Gentiles, baptising them by the Spirit of God into the one New Man in Christ, which is the Church.

The Cross, which condemned both Jew and Gentile as sinners in need of a Saviour, is the same Cross that unites the two into the one Body of Christ, bringing peace to all who were far off and peace to those that were near, by means of His shed blood on Calvary's Cross.

Heavenly Father, how I praise and thank You that in Your grace and mercy, You have broken down the enmity that existed between Jew and Gentile and joined the two together into one new man, in Christ. Thank You that I am a part of that Body and one with all that have trusted Jesus as Saviour. I pray that I may be used of You to carry out the work that You have called me to do, to Your praise and glory. In Jesus' name, AMEN.