2011-05-15pm Sermon Ephesians 2

110515pm Eph 2:11-22 Luke 19:37-48

Our readings continue the Temple theme from last week. Jesus was very critical of the Temple as the centre of Israel's rebellion against God. In this he was like the prophets before him, and when he entered the Temple and drove everyone out, he quoted the prophet Isaiah. Isaiah looked forward to the day when those who were excluded by the Law, foreigners and eunuchs, would be included. God said, Isaiah 56:6-7. So it was to be a house of prayer (not commerce and trade) and a house for all nations (not only for those under the Law).

I said last week how Jesus was accused of speaking against the Temple and saying he would destroy it – it would be like someone going on the hajj to Mecca and standing among the crowd denouncing the whole business. What he actually said was, Destroy this temple and I will raise it again in three days... but the temple he had spoken of was his body. After he was raised from the dead his disciples recalled what he had said (John 2:19ff). For Jesus the true Temple was his physical body, the place on earth where the Word of God was not just symbolically but really present.

Now that Jesus is raised, his Body on earth is his Temple, the place where his Spirit dwells, namely us his people, as Gareth described last week. Here in Ephesians he's writing to Gentiles, and points out the massive differences between what they were and what they have become now that they are in Christ. Back in 2:1-3 he says you were dead... It's like a horror movie, the night of the living dead! But now v.4. How has this happened? Because of Christ: v.14-18 – his flesh, his blood, has made peace.

So in v.11-22 he gives a series of contrasts. You were uncircumcised (lacking the physical sign of belonging to the covenant people), separate from Christ, excluded from citizenship, foreigners, without hope and without God in the world, far away, aliens. Many people still live like that, as many of us did, and I myself did. But that is completely unnecessary: now in Christ you are circumcised spiritually, included, fellow citizens, members of God's house (=Temple) v.20-22.

The point is this: under the old arrangements, if you wanted to meet with the presence of God, the place to go was a building in Jerusalem. Now the place to go is Jesus as embodied in his actual people. It's in our real, concrete relationships with actual, living, breathing bodies, real people with all their foibles, that the explosion of Jesus Christ, his monumental death and mind-blowing resurrection, actually have their effect. So Paul goes on to describe in more detail how the life of Jesus is shown among real people – using our gifts to serve each other, having a whole new attitude of mind, speaking the truth, giving rather than stealing, purity, joy, laying down our lives for each other... this is life as the Temple.

I learned early on after I was ordained that the church is what it is. In theological college you are there because you have decided to dedicate your whole life to the gospel. I was surrounded by people who had given up everything, homes, careers, to become priests. We were keen – keen to learn, keen to think, keen to pray, keen to get out and evangelise. When I got into my first curacy, raring to go, I discovered that a lot of people in the church were much less zealous. It's like when you have been on a mind blowing holiday and seen the wonders of the world, and you come back home to people who haven't experienced it, and they say, Oh right, and go back to what they were doing. But I learned that it's no good thinking about the church you would like to have, you just have to work with the church you've got. And I discovered that in fact this is not just a compromise with the apathetic, you discover among the real people of the church immense depths of wisdom, discipleship, suffering and joy in Christ.

And this extends far beyond the particular cell or congregation we see most often. Paul's vision here is global. He's talking about one new humanity made of people from every continent and every culture. What is our attitude to people of other backgrounds, other cultures, other countries, other religious backgrounds? What Paul proposes, what Jesus has enacted, is truly radical. It's normal in every culture to feel an obligation and responsibility towards your own people, your family, your clan, your tribe, but not to others. They are potential rivals, competitors, even enemies, and you are not seen as owing them anything. But Christ blows that apart.

I was very intrigued to read of a young lecturer in Oxford who is inviting people to give away as much money as possible to charities that help the world's poor. Toby Ord lives with his wife at Balliol College and teaches philosophy, and he has decided to give away a million pounds over his lifetime. This is a man on a modest salary, not Bill Gates. He is giving away one third of his salary, and has set up a small group to encourage others to do similarly. They carefully assess charities for their cost effectiveness, and point to those that make possible most lives saved or most years of healthy life added. His argument is this: if you were on your way to a concert and saw a child had fallen face down in a pond and was drowning, it would obviously be your duty to forego your pleasure, wade in wearing your best clothes, and save him. You should clearly take on moderate inconvenience to save someone's life. Exactly the same argument applies to the vast numbers of people who live on less than a dollar a day. The method is more complicated, but you are no less obliged to them just because you don't see them.

I think that is an argument that Paul would recognise, with his vision of one new humanity across the world, all barriers broken down. It's true of people near to us and far away. Christians above all should feel that they are brothers and sisters with the world wide Church, and among them there are very many who suffer unnecessarily from poverty and disease. And we should feel that we are brothers and sisters with those we see week in and week out.

One reason I love these pictures of Si Smith is that by imaginatively placing the Bible story in modern Leeds (as artists have always done), he makes us feel that our faith is more located in the real everyday world. Twelve real men sitting in their equivalent of Starbucks with the real risen Jesus, wounds and all: that makes me feel more firmly what it is to be the Body of Christ, the living Temple. So you are invited to get up and wander around, take in the pictures, meditate, listen to the Holy Spirit. As you move your body around, reflect on being the Body of Christ, the Temple of his Presence, where we bump into him as we bump into each other.