The destruction of the double wall
The church at Ephesus was largely comprised of converted Gentiles. In the opening ten verses of Ephesians 2, Paul shows that, prior to their conversion, they (the “you”) had shared a common spiritual predicament with believing Jews (the “we” and the “us”). Both had been spiritually dead. But, from verse 11, Paul shows that prior to their conversion, they, as Gentiles, had been not only spiritually dead, but spiritually distant.
The word “Gentiles” sums up their former spiritual condition perfectly, carrying with it a seven-fold disadvantage and deficiency (vv. 11-13): they were (i) uncircumcised; (ii) without (“apart from”) Christ, having no claim on Israel’s Messiah; (iii) alienated (“estranged”) from the “commonwealth” (literally, “citizenship”) of Israel; (iv) strangers to God’s covenants of promise—the covenants of blessing such as God had made with the patriarchs and with David; (v) without anything to look forward to in the future (“no hope”); (vi) lacking God to whom they could turn in the present (“without God in the world”); and (vii) “far off”, removed from Israel’s privileged religious position. Their spiritual condition had been grim in the extreme!
“But now…”
Starting at verse 13, the apostle describes how the work of Christ has changed everything for them—in two entirely different dimensions and directions: first horizontally, in their relationship with the Jews; then vertically, in their relationship with God.
In the section down to verse 18, the Lord Jesus is associated with peace three times. “He is our peace” (v. 14), He “made peace” (v. 15), and He “preached peace” (v. 17). In the context, this peace is mainly that between Jew and Gentile. But the peace which our Lord “came and preached” (v. 17) through His apostles and other gospel messengers, probably points not only immediately to harmony between Jew and Gentile, but ultimately to a restored relationship between them both and God.
The apostle describes the peace accomplished by our Lord in both negative and positive terms.
First, negatively, the Lord Jesus broke down “the middle wall of division [partition, enclosure]” (v. 14). In all likelihood, Paul had in mind the layout of the temple of Jerusalem. The temple rested on a huge stone platform which was divided into the Court of the Gentiles and a smaller court around the Temple proper. A five-foot stone wall surrounded the inner area, symbolizing the separation between Israel and the Gentile nations. Stern warnings about the penalty for Gentiles trespassing beyond the wall were displayed in Greek and Latin on its pillars.1 Interestingly, Paul wrote this very letter while a prisoner at Rome, as a result of having been wrongly accused of taking an Ephesian Gentile (Trophimus) beyond this wall (Acts 21:28–29).
The commandments contained in God’s Law were intended to keep Israel pure, free from the idolatry and immorality of the Gentile nations around. But the Jews not only failed to keep that Law, they took pride in their very possession of it. And, when they looked down contemptuously on the Gentiles because they didn’t have the Law, the Gentiles retaliated by regarding the Jews as haughty and ignorant bigots. The Law, therefore, became the innocent cause of deep hostility and hatred between Jews and Gentiles.
But in His death, our Lord Jesus removed all barriers to peace between Jew and Gentile by demolishing the dividing wall and abolishing [annulling, rendering inoperative] the Law in that its ordinances are no longer binding.
Second, positively, the Saviour not only removed the barriers to peace, He “created in Himself one new man,” comprised of converted Jews and Gentiles. The word “new” indicating that which is new in quality; that which is different in nature. For He neither made Jews into Gentiles nor Gentiles into Jews. The Lord Jesus did something far more wonderful: He obliterated all distinction between believing Jews and Gentiles.
But the peace that our Lord made between believing Jews and Gentiles (v. 15) was tied up inextricably with an even greater work: the reconciliation of both Jews and Gentiles in one body to God (v. 16). When Paul says that converted Gentiles were “made near by the blood of Christ,” (v. 13), he is referring to the removal of the barrier between Jew and Gentile. When he says that both are reconciled “through the cross,” (v. 16), he is referring to the removal of the barrier between men and God.
Paul concludes by saying that converted Gentiles are therefore “no longer strangers” (those found among a people they cannot call their own), but are “members of God’s household.” They are “no longer … foreigners” (those sojourning in a place they cannot call their own, having no citizen rights), but are now “ fellow citizens with the saints,” that is, fellow citizens with all God’s people generally, and, with regard to the context, with Jewish believers especially. Although as Gentiles they had been “alienated from the citizenship of Israel” (v. 12, literal translation), now as “ fellow citizens with the saints,” they share equally in all the rights and privileges of every child of God.
Paul’s multiple citizenship
It is not surprising that Paul should express the identical blessings of believing Jews and Gentiles in terms of joint citizenship because he enjoyed no fewer than four citizenships himself.
The apostle was a citizen of Tarsus (Acts 21:39), Rome (Acts 16:37-38; 22:25-28), Israel (Eph. 2:12; Php. 3:5), and heaven (Php. 3:20). The Gentile believers at Ephesus could not share Paul’s citizenship of Tarsus, Rome, or Israel. But he insisted that they certainly shared the most important of his citizenships. For, along with the rest of God’s people, they enjoyed the full citizen rights of heaven! There are no second-class citizens in the church.
Perhaps we ought to remember that the man who wrote verse 19 was a Pharisee, and that it had been to Pharisees that our Lord had once told His parable of the prodigal son. Towards the close of that parable, in Luke 15:24, the returned prodigal’s father said, “This my son was dead and is alive again” (which is, in a sense, the teaching of the first half of Ephesians 2); “he was lost and is found” (which is, in a sense, the teaching of the second
half of Ephesians 2: those who were once distant coming from the far country to the father). “Note the marvellous change in the heart of that elder brother, the erstwhile bigot, Saul of Tarsus! Listen to that Hebrew of the Hebrews, as he welcomes the prodigal son home… .”2
By God’s grace, we can say with both converted Jews and converted Gentiles of the first century, “Here we have no continuing city, but we seek the one to come” (Heb. 13:14). That is the only citizenship that matters.
So what?
Paul exhorted the Philippians, “let your conduct be worthy of the gospel of Christ” (Php. 1:27), where the word translated “let your conduct” is closely akin to that translated “citizenship” at the close of chapter 3.3 Paul’s words could well be rendered, “Continue to exercise your [heavenly] citizenship in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ.”4 Our minds should not be set on earthly things (Php. 3:19); our manner of life should demonstrate to the world the kind of citizenship which is ours in Christ. May God so help us.
Endnotes
1 These “No trespassing signs” made chilling reading: “No Gentile is to enter within the wall and enclosure around the holy place. Whoever is caught there will have only himself to blame for his death, which will follow”! Copies of the actual inscription were found in 1871 and 1938.
2 Ruth Paxson, The Wealth, Walk and Warfare of the Christian (London, GB: Oliphants Ltd, 1939), pp. 68-69.
3 “Paul uses here a verb here that strictly means ‘live as citizens.’” F. F. Bruce, “Philippians” in Good News Commentary (San Francisco, CA: Harper & Row Publishers, 1983).
4 See William Hendricksen, New Testament Commentary, Philippians (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Book House, 1962), p. 80. “Do your duty as good citizens of a heavenly kingdom” is J. B. Lightfoot’s paraphrase in Saint Paul’s Epistle to the Philippians (London, GB: Macmillan and Co, 1879), p. 105.