The document discusses the spiritual condition of individuals before their conversion to Christianity, describing them as 'without Christ,' excluded from the commonwealth of Israel, and lacking any hope or knowledge of God. It emphasizes the importance of recognizing one's previous state of alienation and the transformative power of embracing Christ and His promises. The text highlights the despair and darkness faced by those who live without the true knowledge of God and the Savior.

1. EPHESIA S 2 12-22 COMME TARY
EDITED BY GLE PEASE
12
remember that at that time you were separate
from Christ, excluded from citizenship in Israel
and foreigners to the covenants of the promise,
without hope and without God in the world.
BAR ES, "Ye were without Christ - You were without the knowledge of the
Messiah. You had not heard of him; of course you had not embraced him. You were
living without any of the hopes and consolations which you now have, from having
embraced him. The object of the apostle is to remind them of the deplorable condition in
which they were by nature; and nothing would better express it than to say they were
“without Christ,” or that they had no knowledge of a Saviour. They knew of no
atonement for sin. They had no assurance of pardon. They had no well-founded hope of
eternal life. They were in a state of darkness and condemnation, from which nothing but
a knowledge of Christ could deliver them. All Christians may in like manner be reminded
of the fact that, before their conversion, they were “without Christ.” Though they had
heard of him, and were constantly under the instruction which reminded them of him,
yet they were without any true knowledge of him, and without any of the hopes which
result from having embraced him. Many were infidels. Many were scoffers. Many were
profane, sensual, corrupt. Many rejected Christ with scorn; many, by simple neglect. All
were without any true knowledge of him; all were destitute of the peace and hope which
result from a saving acquaintance with him. We may add, that there is no more affecting
description of the state of man by nature than to say, he is without a Saviour. Sad would
be the condition of the world without a Redeemer - sad is the state of that portion of
mankind who reject him. Reader, are you without Christ?
Being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel - This is the second
characteristic of their state before their conversion to Christianity. This means more
than that they were not Jews. It means that they were strangers to that “polity” - πολιτεία
politeia - or arrangement by which the worship of the true God had been kept up in the
world, and of course were strangers to the true religion The arrangements for the public
worship of Yahweh were made among the Jews. They had his law, his temple, his

2. sabbaths, and the ordinances of his religion; see the notes at Rom_3:2. To all these the
pagans had been strangers, and of course they were deprived of all the privileges which
resulted from having the true religion. The word rendered here as “commonwealth” -
πολιτεία politeia - means properly citizenship, or the right of citizenship, and then a
community, or state. It means here that arrangement or organization by which the
worship of the true God was maintained. The word “aliens” - ᅊπηλλοτριωµένοι
apēllotriōmenoi - here means merely that they were strangers to. It does not denote, of
necessity, that they were hostile to it; but that they were ignorant of it, and were,
therefore, deprived of the benefits which they might have derived from it, if they had
been acquainted with it.
And strangers - This word - ξένος xenos - means properly a guest, or a stranger, who
is hospitably entertained; then a foreigner, or one from a distant country; and here
means that they did not belong to the community where the covenants of promise were
enjoyed; that is, they were strangers to the privileges of the people of God.
The covenants of promise - see the notes at Rom_9:4. The covenants of promise
were those various arrangements which God made with his people, by which he
promised them future blessings, and especially by which he promised that the Messiah
should come. To be in possession of them was regarded as a high honor and privilege;
and Paul refers to it here to show that, though the Ephesians had been by nature without
these, yet they had now been brought to enjoy all the benefits of them. On the word
covenant, see the notes on Gal_3:15. It may be remarked, that Walton (Polyglott) and
Rosenmuller unite the word “promise” here with the word “hope” - “having no hope of
the promise.” But the more obvious and usual interpretation is that in our common
version, meaning that they were not by nature favored with the covenants made with
Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, etc., by which there was a promise of future blessings under the
Messiah.
Having no hope - The apostle does not mean to affirm that they did not cherish any
hope, for this is scarcely true of any man; but that they were without any proper ground
of hope. It is true of perhaps nearly all people that they cherish some hope of future
happiness. But the ground on which they do this is not well understood by themselves,
nor do they in general regard it as a matter worth particular inquiry. Some rely on
morality; some on forms of religion; some on the doctrine of universal salvation; all who
are impenitent believe that they do not “deserve” eternal death, and expect to be saved
by “justice.” Such hopes, however, must be unfounded. No hope of life in a future world
can be founded on a proper basis which does not rest on some promise of God, or some
assurance that he will save us; and these hopes, therefore, which people take up they
know not why, are delusive and vain.
And without God in the world - Greek ᅎθεοι atheoi - “atheists;” that is, those who
had no knowledge of the true God. This is the last specification of their miserable
condition before they were converted; and it is an appropriate crowning of the climax.
What an expression! To be without God - without God in his own world, and where he is
all around us! To have no evidence of his favor, no assurance of his love, no hope of
dwelling with him! The meaning, as applied to the pagan Ephesians, was, that they had
no knowledge of the true God. This was true of the pagan, and in an important sense also
it is true of all impenitent sinners, and was once true of all who are now Christians. They
had no God. They did not worship him, or love him, or serve him, or seek his favors, or
act with reference to him and his glory. Nothing can be a more appropriate and striking

3. description of a sinner now than to say that he is “without God in the world.”
He lives, and feels, and acts, as if there were no God. He neither worships him in
secret, nor in his family, nor in public. He acts with no reference to his will. He puts no
confidence in his promises, and fears not when he threatens; and were it announced to
him that there “is no God,” it would produce no change in his plan of life, or in his
emotions. The announcement that the emperor of China, or the king of Siam, or the
sultan of Constantinople, was dead, would produce some emotion, and might change
some of his commercial arrangements; but the announcement that there is no God
would interfere with none of his plans, and demand no change of life. And, if so, what is
man in this beautiful world without a God? A traveler to eternity without a God!
Standing over the grave without a God! An immortal being without a God! A man -
fallen, sunk, ruined, with no God to praise, to love, to confide in; with no altar, no
sacrifice, no worship, no hope; with no Father in trial, no counselor in perplexity, no
support in death! Such is the state of man by nature. Such are the effects of sin.
CLARKE, "That at that time ye were without Christ - Not only were not
Christians, but had no knowledge of the Christ or Messiah, and no title to the blessings
which were to proceed from him.
Aliens from the commonwealth of Israel - Ye were by your birth, idolatry, etc.,
alienated from the commonwealth of Israel - from the civil and religious privileges of the
Jewish people.
Strangers from the covenants of promise - Having no part in the promise of the
covenant made with Abraham, whether considered as relating to his natural or spiritual
seed; and no part in that of the covenant made at Horeb with the Israelites, when a holy
law was given them, and God condescended to dwell among them, and to lead them to
the promised land.
Having no hope - Either of the pardon of sin or of the resurrection of the body, nor
indeed of the immortality of the soul. Of all these things the Gentiles had no rational or
well-grounded hope.
Without God in the world - They had gods many, and lords many; but in no
Gentile nation was the true God known: nor indeed had they any correct notion of the
Divine nature. Their idols were by nature no gods - they could neither do evil nor good,
and therefore they were properly without God, having no true object of worship, and no
source of comfort. He who has neither God nor Christ is in a most deplorable state; he
has neither a God to worship, nor a Christ to justify him. And this is the state of every
man who is living without the grace and Spirit of Christ. All such, whatever they may
profess, are no better than practical atheists.
GILL, "That at that time ye were without Christ,.... Or separate from him: they
were chosen in him and were preserved in him, and were redeemed by him before; but
they were without any knowledge of him, faith in him, love to him, communion with
him, or subjection to him, his Gospel, government, laws, and ordinances; and
particularly they were without any promises of him, or prophecies concerning him,
which were peculiar to the Jews; hence the Messiah is called ‫דישראל‬ ‫,משיחא‬ "the Christ of
Israel" (w), and who as he was promised, so he was sent only to the lost sheep of the
house, of Israel: hence it follows,

4. being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel; both from their civil and church
state; the Gentiles might not dwell among them, nor have any dealings with them in
things civil, unless they conformed to certain laws; nor might the Jews go into any, nor
eat or converse with any, that were uncircumcised; so great an alienation and distance
were there between these two people; and much less might they eat the passover and
join with them in religious worship; the word for "commonwealth" here used,
Harpocratian says (x), is commonly used by Greek writers for a "democracy" though the
original constitution of the Israelites was properly a "theocracy":
strangers to the covenants of promise; to the covenant of circumcision given to
Abraham; and to the covenant at Mount Sinai, made with Israel; and to the dispensation
of the covenant of grace to that people, sometimes called the first covenant and the old
covenant, and which peculiarly belonged to them, Rom_9:4 one copy reads, "strangers
to the promises of the covenant"; which is natural enough; the Vulgate Latin version
joins the word "promise" to the next clause, and reads,
having no hope of the promise of the promised Messiah: "having no hope"; of the
Messiah and salvation by him, of the resurrection of the dead, of a future state, and of
eternal life; none that is sure and steadfast, that is purifying, and makes not ashamed; or
which is a good hope through grace, is the gift of God, the fruit of his love, and the effect
of his power; and this is to be in a miserable condition: Philo, the Jew (y), observes, that
"the Chaldeans call a man Enos, as if he only was truly a man that expects good things,
and supports himself with good hopes; and adds, hence it is manifest that one without
hope is not reckoned a man, but a beast in an human form; since he is destitute of hope,
which is the property of the human soul;''
and without God in the world; without the knowledge of God in Christ; without the
image of God, which was defaced by sin; without the grace and fear of God; and without
communion with him, and the worship of him; and while they were so they were in the
world, among the men of it, and were a part of it, not being yet called out of it: the word
signifies "atheists": so some of the Gentiles were in "theory", as they all were in practice;
and they were by the Jews reckoned no other than "atheists"; it is a common saying with
them (z) that
"he that dwells without the land (of Israel) is like one ‫אלוה‬ ‫לו‬ ‫,שאין‬ "who has no God":''
JAMISO , "without Christ — Greek, “separate from Christ”; having no part in
Him; far from Him. A different Greek word (aneu) would be required to express, “Christ
was not present with you” [Tittmann].
aliens — Greek, “alienated from,” not merely “separated from.” The Israelites were
cut off from the commonwealth of God, but it was as being self-righteous, indolent, and
unworthy, not as aliens and strangers [Chrysostom]. The expression, “alienated from,”
takes it for granted that the Gentiles, before they had apostatized from the primitive
truth, had been sharers in light and life (compare Eph_4:18, Eph_4:23). The hope of
redemption through the Messiah, on their subsequent apostasy, was embodied into a
definite “commonwealth” or polity, namely, that “of Israel,” from which the Gentiles

5. were alienated. Contrast Eph_2:13; Eph_3:6; Eph_4:4, Eph_4:5, with Psa_147:20.
covenants of promise — rather, “... of the promise,” namely, “to thee and thy seed
will I give this land” (Rom_9:4; Gal_3:16). The plural implies the several renewals of the
covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and with the whole people at Sinai [Alford].
“The promise” is singular, to signify that the covenant, in reality, and substantially, is
one and the same at all times, but only different in its accidents and external
circumstances (compare Heb_1:1, “at sundry times and in divers manners”).
having no ... hope — beyond this life (1Co_15:19). The CONJECTURES of heathen
philosophers as to a future life were at best vague and utterly unsatisfactory. They had
no divine “promise,” and therefore no sure ground of “hope.” Epicurus and Aristotle did
not believe in it at all. The Platonists believed the soul passed through perpetual
changes, now happy, and then again miserable; the Stoics, that it existed no longer than
till the time of the general burning up of all things.
without God — Greek, “atheists,” that is, they had not “God” in the sense we use the
word, the Eternal Being who made and governs all things (compare Act_14:15, “Turn
from these vanities unto the living God who made heaven, and earth, and the sea, and all
things therein”), whereas the Jews had distinct ideas of God and immortality. Compare
also Gal_4:8, “Ye knew not God ... ye did service unto them which are no gods” (1Th_
4:5). So also pantheists are atheists, for an impersonal God is NO GOD, and an ideal
immortality no immortality [Tholuck].
in the world — in contrast to belonging to “the commonwealth of Israel.” Having
their portion and their all in this godless vain world (Psa_17:14), from which Christ
delivers His people (Joh_15:19; Joh_17:14; Gal_1:4).
RWP, "Separate from Christ (chōris Christou). Ablative case with adverbial
preposition chōris, describing their former condition as heathen.
Alienated from the commonwealth of Israel (apēllotriōmenoi tēs politeias tou
Israēl). Perfect passive participle of apallotrioō, for which see note on Col_1:21. Here
followed by ablative case politeias, old word from politeuō, to be a citizen (Phi_1:27) from
politēs and that from polis (city). Only twice in N.T., here as commonwealth (the spiritual
Israel or Kingdom of God) and Act_22:28 as citizenship.
Strangers from the covenants of the promise (xenoi tōn diathēkōn tēs
epaggelias). For xenos (Latin hospes), as stranger see Mat_25:35, Mat_25:38, and Mat_
25:43.; as guest-friend see note on Rom_16:23. Here it is followed by the ablative case
diathēkōn.
Having no hope (elpida mē echontes). No hope of any kind. In Gal_4:8 ouk (strong
negative) occurs with eidotes theon, but here mē gives a more subjective picture (1Th_
4:5).
Without God (atheoi). Old Greek word, not in lxx, only here in N.T. Atheists in the
original sense of being without God and also in the sense of hostility to God from failure
to worship him. See Paul’s words in Rom_1:18-32. “In the world” (en tōi kosmōi) goes
with both phrases. It is a terrible picture that Paul gives, but a true one.

6. CALVI , "12.That at that time ye were without Christ. He now declares that the
Ephesians had been excluded, not only from the outward badge, but from
everything necessary to the salvation and happiness of men. As Christ is the
foundation of hope and of all the promises, he mentions, first of all, that they were
without Christ. But for him that is without Christ, there remains nothing but
destruction. On Him the commonwealth of Israel was founded; and in whom, but in
Himself, could the people of God be collected into one holy society?
A similar observation might be made as to the tables of the promise On one great
promise made to Abraham all the others hang, and without it they lose all their
value:
“ thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed.”
(Gen_22:18.)
Hence our apostle says elsewhere,
“ the promises of God in him are yea, and in him Amen.”
(2Co_1:20.)
Take away the covenant of salvation, and there remains no hope. I have translated
τῶν διαθηκῶν by the tables, or, in ordinary legal phrase, the instruments. By
solemn ritual did God sanction His covenant with Abraham and his posterity, that
he would be their God for ever and ever. (Gen_15:9.) Tables of this covenant were
ratified by the hand of Moses, and intrusted, as a peculiar treasure, to the people of
Israel, to whom, and not to the Gentiles, “ the covenants.” (Rom_9:4.)
And without God in the world. But at no period were the Ephesians, or any other
Gentiles, destitute of all religion. Why, then, are they styled ( ἄθεοι) Atheists? for (
ἄθεος) an Atheist, strictly speaking, is one who does not believe, and who absolutely
ridicules, the being of a God. That appellation, certainly, is not usually given to
superstitious persons, but to those who have no feeling of religion, and who desire to
see it utterly destroyed. I answer, Paul was right in giving them this name, for he
treated all the notions entertained respecting false gods as nothing; and with the
utmost propriety do godly persons regard all idols as “ in the world.” (1Co_8:4.)
Those who do not worship the true God, whatever may be the variety of their
worship, or the multitude of laborious ceremonies which they perform, are without
God: they adore what they know not. (Act_17:23.) Let it be carefully observed, that
the Ephesians are not charged with ( ἀθεϊσµὸς) Atheism, in the same degree as
Diagoras, and others of the same stamp, who were subjected to that reproach.
Persons who imagined themselves to be very religious are charged with that crime;
for an idol is a forgery, an imposition, not a Divinity.

7. From what has been said, the conclusion will be easily drawn, that out of Christ
there are none but idols. Those who were formerly declared to be without Christ,
are now declared to be without God; (125) as John says,
“ hath not the Son, hath not the Father,”
(1Jo_2:23;)
and again,
“ transgresseth, and abideth not in the doctrine of Christ, hath not God.”
(2Jo_1:9.)
Let us know, therefore, that all who do not keep this way wander from the true God.
We shall next be asked, Did God never reveal himself to any of the Gentiles? I
answer, no manifestation of God without Christ was ever made among the Gentiles,
any more than among the Jews. It is not to one age only, or to one nation, that the
saying of our Lord applies,
“ am the way;” for he adds, “ man cometh
unto the Father but by me.” (Joh_14:6.)
(125) “ either knew him not, or did not worship him as God; they had not avouched,
or solemnly owned, or taken him for their God; and, in consequence, were not
avouched, were not owned, and blessed, and accepted by him as his peculiar people.
This was their condition as Gentiles born.” — Chandler.
SIMEO , "THE STATES OF THE REGE ERATE A D THE
U REGE ERATE CO TRASTED
Eph_2:12-13. Ye were without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of
Israel, and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope, and without
God in the world: but now in Christ Jesus ye who sometimes were far off are made
nigh by the blood of Christ.
THERE is scarcely any thing which has a greater tendency to impress our minds
with exalted views of the grace of God, than to compare the guilt and misery of an
unconverted state, with the purity and happiness into which we are brought by the
Gospel of Christ. As a shipwrecked person, viewing the tempest from a rock on
which he has been cast, feels a solemn and grateful sense of the mercy vouchsafed
unto him; so surely must every one, who “looks unto the rock whence he has been
hewn, and to the hole of the pit whence he has been digged,” stand amazed at the

8. Divine goodness, and be quickened to pour out his soul in grateful adorations. To
produce this frame, is the scope of the whole preceding part of this epistle, wherein
the Apostle extols and magnifies the grace of God, as manifested to his redeemed
people. Having shewn what their state had been previous to conversion, and
contrasted it with that to which they are introduced by the Gospel, he exhorts them
to bear it in remembrance: “Wherefore remember;” remember what ye were, that
ye may be thankful for what ye are [ ote: ver. 11. with the text.].
We propose to shew,
I. The state of unregenerate men—
The state of the Jews and Gentiles represented in a very lively manner the
conditions of persons under the Gospel: the external privileges of the Jews, typifying
the internal and spiritual privileges of the regenerate; and the abhorred state of the
Gentiles marking with equal clearness the ignorance and misery of the
unregenerate. In this view, what the Apostle says of the Ephesians, previous to their
conversion to Christianity, may be considered as applicable to all at this day, who
are not truly and savingly converted:
1. They are “without Christ”—
[The Gentiles, of course, had no knowledge of, nor any interest in, the Lord Jesus
Christ. And thus it is with the unregenerate amongst ourselves: they are without
Christ [ ote: ÷ ù ñ ὶ ò × ñ é ó ô ï ῦ . Comp. Joh_15:5.]; they are separated from him
as branches cut off from the vine: they do not depend upon him, or receive sap and
nutriment from him. They indeed call themselves Christians; but they have no
union with Christ, nor any communications from him.]
2. They are “aliens from the commonwealth of Israel”—
[Israel are called a commonwealth, because they were governed by laws different
from all other people, and possessed privileges unknown to the rest of the world.
Thus the true Israel at this day may be considered in the same light; because they,
and they only, acknowledge Christ as their governor: they alone yield obedience to
his laws, and they alone enjoy the privileges of his people. ow as the Gentiles were
“aliens” from the commonwealth of the Jews, so are all unconverted men “aliens”
from the commonwealth of the converted. They are governed by different laws;
following the customs, fashions, and erroneous maxims of the world: they are
separated from them in heart and affection; and though, from necessity, they must
sometimes have intercourse with the godly, they never unite with them as one
people, or desire to have one lot together with them.]
3. They are “strangers from the covenants of promise”—
[There is, strictly speaking, but one covenant of grace: but the Apostle speaks of it in
the plural number; because it was given at different times, and always with

9. increasing fulness and perspicuity. Whether given to Adam, to oah, to Abraham,
or to Moses, it was always the same: only the promises annexed to it were more
copious and explicit. It is called “the covenant of promise,” to distinguish it from the
covenant of works, which consisted only in requirements; whereas this consists
chiefly in promises: under the covenant of works, men were to do all; under the
covenant of grace they were to receive all.
It is obvious that the Gentiles were “strangers” to this covenant: and though it is not
alike obvious, it is equally true, that the unconverted are strangers to it also. We
confess they are admitted into the external bond of it in their baptism: but they do
not become partakers of the promised blessings till they sue for them in the excercise
of faith and prayer. And we will venture to appeal to the generality of baptized
persons, Whether they are not as much strangers to the covenant of promise, as if no
such covenant existed? Do they rest upon the promises? Do they treasure them up in
their minds? Do they plead them in prayer before God? Do they found all their
hopes of happiness upon them? Alas! they have little acquaintance with the nature
of the covenant, and no submission to its terms: and consequently they are utter
strangers to the covenant, and to the promises contained in it.]
4. They are without hope—
[The Gentile world are always represented as in a hopeless state; and though we
presume not to say, that God will not extend uncovenanted mercy to any, yet we
have no warrant to affirm that he will. If indeed they perfectly fulfilled the law-
written in their hearts, there is reason to think God would have mercy on them
[ ote: Rom_2:26-27.]: but who amongst them does perfectly fulfil that law? But,
waving this, there is an absolute certainty that the state of unconverted men under
the Gospel is hopeless: no mercy can possibly be extended to them, if they continue
unconverted: they must inevitably and eternally perish. For, how should they have
any hope, when they are “without Christ” (who is the Head of all vital influence),
and “aliens from the commonwealth of Israel” (to which alone any saving blessings
are communicated), and “strangers from the covenant of promise” (which is the
only channel by which those blessings are conveyed to us)? From whence then can
they derive any hope? or what foundation can they have for it?]
5. They are “without God in the world”—
[The gods of the heathen were no gods: therefore they to whom the God of Israel
was unknown, were “without God in the world.” And thus it is with the
unconverted amongst ourselves: for though they acknowledge the being of a God,
they know not what a just and holy God he is; nor do they glorify him as God, by a
conformity to his revealed will. They love not to hear of him: they endeavour to blot
out the remembrance of him from their minds; their whole conduct accords with
that of Pharaoh, when he said, “Who is the Lord, that I should obey his voice? I
know not the Lord, neither will I let Israel go [ ote: Exo_5:2.].” In a word, the
language of their hearts is like that of the fool whom David speaks of, “ o God;”
there is no God to controul or punish me; or, if there be, I wish there were none

10. [ ote: Psa_14:1.].]
But that all do not continue in that deplorable condition, will appear by considering,
II. The state to which they are introduced by the Gospel—
Every living man once was in the state above described; but in conversion, men
“who were sometimes afar off, are made nigh to God”—
[In what the nearness of converted men to God consists, will appear by the very
same considerations as have already been used to illustrate their distance from him
in their unconverted state. The Gentiles had no liberty of access to God among the
Jews: they had an outer court assigned them; and it would have been at the peril of
their lives, if they had presumed to enter the place appropriated to the Jews. But on
conversion to Judaism, they were admitted to a participation of all the rights and
privileges of the Jews themselves. Thus persons truly converted to God have liberty
to approach, the Majesty of heaven; yea, since the vail of the temple was rent in
twain, a new and living way is opened for them into the holiest of all: they may go
even to the throne of God, and draw nigh to him as their reconciled God and Father.
As soon as ever they are “in Christ Jesus,” united to him by faith, and interested in
his merits, they have every privilege which the most eminent saints enjoy: their sins
are pardoned; they have peace with God; and, though they may not be so full of joy
as others, yet they have the same grounds of joy, inasmuch as “their Beloved is
theirs, and they are his.”]
To this happy state they are brought “by the blood of Christ”—
[It was the blood of the sacrifice that availed for the restoration of sinners to the
Divine favour under the law: and in the same manner it is the blood of Christ, and
that only, that can avail for us. But as in the former case, so also in this, two things
are necessary: the blood must be shed as an atonement for sin; and it must be
sprinkled on the offender himself, to intimate his entire affiance in it. ow the
shedding of Christ’s blood was effected on Calvary, many hundred years ago: and
that one offering is sufficient to atone for the sins of the whole world. othing more
therefore is wanting to reconcile us to the Deity. But the sprinkling of his blood
upon our hearts and consciences must be done by every one for himself: we must, as
it were, dip the hyssop in the blood, and apply it to our own souls: or, in other
words, we must exercise faith on the atonement of Christ as the only ground of our
acceptance before God. In this way, and in this only, are we ever brought to a state
of favour with God, and of fellowship with his people.]
This subject being mentioned as that which was deserving of continual
remembrance, we would call upon you to “remember” it—
1. As a criterion whereby to judge of your state—
[It is evident, that, if once we were afar off from God, and now we are nigh to him,

11. there must have been a transition from the one state to the other, or, as the
Scripture expresses it, a “passing from death unto life.” Has this transition then ever
taken place in your souls? It is not necessary that you should be able to trace the
precise time when it began, and the various steps by which it was accomplished: but
there is an impossibility for it to have taken place, without your having sought it
humbly, and laboured for it diligently. Have you then this evidence at least that it
has been accomplished? If not, you can have no reason to think that you have ever
yet experienced the change, which characterizes all who are made heirs of
salvation.]
2. As a ground of humiliation—
[If you were the most eminent saint that ever lived, it would be well to bear in mind
what you once were, and what you would still have been, if Divine grace had not
wrought a change within you. Look then at those who “are afar off;” and, when you
see their alienation from God, their enmity against his people, their distance from
even a hope of salvation, behold your own image, and be confounded on account of
your past abominations: yea, “walk softly also before God all the days of your life,”
in the recollection, that, as that once was your state, so it would be again, if the grace
that originally interposed to change you, do not continually maintain that change in
your souls.]
3. As a source of gratitude and joy—
[It is scarcely needful to say, that they who have experienced a restoration to God’s
favour, should bless and magnify their Benefactor and Redeemer. But have not
those also, who are at the greatest distance from God, reason to rejoice and sing?
Yes surely; for they may look at those who are now in heaven, and say, “The blood
which availed to bring them nigh to God will also avail for me.” O joyful thought!
Ponder it in your hearts, ye careless sinners: consider what the Lord Jesus Christ is
both able and willing to do for you. Every saint, whether on earth or in heaven, was
once in your state; and if you will seek remission through the blood of Christ, you
shall be partakers of their privileges, both in this world and in the world to come.]
BI, "Without Christ.
Spiritual misery
1. The head of all spiritual misery is to be without Christ.
(1) umbers are still in this miserable condition.

12. (2) If you would have Him, you must take Him as God’s free gift.
2. A second degree of misery, is to be barred from communion and fellowship with
the Church of God.
3. aturally, we hate the means of salvation.
4. It is a great misery to be without the doctrine of the covenant of God.
5. The Lord left the Gentiles without the means of calling them to salvation.
6. It is a great misery to be without hope. (Paul Bayne.)
Life without Christ
The greatest event by far in the history of our world was the visit of Christ. From
that moment, everything upon this earth measures itself by its relation to the Cross.
Could it be otherwise? For he was “the Son of God.” What must that man be to God
the Father, who treats that death of His dear Son as he would treat a mere matter of
business? We may say of the man who is “without Christ,” that that man stands
before God just as he is in himself, and nothing else. There is nothing to better him;
there is nothing to excuse him. There is nothing to palliate or extenuate a fault.
There is nothing to add any righteousness to amend. There can be no heaven for
him except there be fitness; and there can be no pardon except there be a claim.
ow, how would the best of us like to be dealt with on that principle? To stand
before God in your own real individual character! o Intercessor to plead for you!
o refuge to fly to! And consider this. A man “without Christ” has no motive, no
motive sufficient to rule his life. The motive, the only secure and effective motive of
life, is love. But you cannot love God unless you believe that God has pardoned you.
You cannot love an angry God. But there is no pardon out of Christ. But, out of
Christ, there can be no love because there is no forgiveness. So Christ makes the
motive of life; and a man “without Christ” must be motiveless. Let me add another
thing. All nature looks out for sympathy. Sympathy, in a degree, God has given to
every man; but perfect sympathy belongs to Christ. It is His unapproachable
prerogative. Therefore, if you do not know Christ, really know Him, as a believer
knows Him, you do not yet know what sympathy can mean; for the rest is all very
well, but it will stand you in very little stead in some dark hour. But that sympathy
is perfect. You cannot find anyone else who has been, and who can be, “touched
with the feeling of your infirmity”: always tender; always capable; always wise; true
to every fibre of your being; matching all its cravings. That is not given to any
creature upon earth. That is Jesus. And if you are without Jesus, you are without
sympathy. And when that lonely passage comes, which is to take you out into the
unknown, we must all die alone. What, if there be no arm--no companionship--no
sweet voice to say, “I am with you!” o finished work! o Jesus in the valley! What
will it be to die “without Christ?” An awful thing! And the more awful, the less you

13. feel it! (J. Vaughan, M. A.)
The Christless state
I. The misery of our past estate.
1. The man who is without Christ is without any of those spiritual blessings which
only Christ can bestow. Christ is the life of the believer, but the man who is without
Christ is dead in trespasses and sins. So, too, Christ is the light of the world.
Without Christ there is no light of true spiritual knowledge, no light of true spiritual
enjoyment, no light in which the brightness of truth can be seen, or the warmth of
fellowship proved. Without Christ there is no peace, no rest, no safety, no hope.
2. Without Christ, beloved, remember that all the religious acts of men are vanity.
What are they but mere air bags, having nothing in them whatever that God can
accept? There is the semblance of worship--the altar, the victim, the wood laid in
order--and the votaries bow the knee or prostrate their bodies, but Christ alone can
send the fire of heaven’s acceptance.
3. Without Christ implies, of course, that you are without the benefit of all those
gracious offices of Christ, which are so necessary to the sons of men, you have no
true prophet. Without Christ truth itself will prove a terror to you. Like Balaam,
your eyes may be open while your life is alienated. Without Christ you have no
priest to atone or to intercede on your behalf. Without Christ you are without a
Saviour; how will you do? and without a friend in heaven you must needs be if you
are without Christ. Without Christ, though you be rich as Croesus, and famous as
Alexander, and wise as Socrates, yet are you naked and poor and miserable, for you
lack Him by whom are all things, and for whom are all things, and who is Himself
all in all.
II. The great deliverance which God has wrought for us. We are not without Christ
now, but let me ask you, who are believers, where you would have been now without
Christ. I think the Indian’s picture is a very fair one of where we should have been
without Christ. When asked what Christ had done for him, he picked up a worm,
put it on the ground, and made a ring of straw and wood round it, which he set
alight. As the wood began to glow the poor worm began to twist and wriggle in
agony, whereupon he stooped down, took it gently up with his finger, and said,
“That is what Jesus did for me; I was surrounded, without power to help myself, by
a ring of dreadful fire that must have been my ruin, but His pierced hand lifted me
out of the burning.” Think of that, Christians, and as your hearts melt, come to His
table, and praise Him that you are not now without Christ.

14. 1. Then think what His blood has done for you. Take only one thing out of a
thousand. It has put away your many, many sins.
2. Bethink you, too, now that you have Christ, of the way in which He came and
made you partaker of Himself. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
Without Christ
I. When it can be said of a man, that he is “without Christ.
1. When he has no head knowledge of Him. The heathen, of course, who never yet
heard the gospel, come first under this description. But unhappily they do not stand
alone. There are thousands of people dying in England at this very day, who have
hardly any clearer ideas about Christ than the very heathen.
2. When he has no heart faith in Him as his Saviour. Many know every article of the
Belief, but make no practical use of their knowledge. They put their trust in
something which is not “Christ.”
3. When the Holy Spirit’s work cannot be seen in his life. Who can avoid seeing, if
he uses his eyes, that myriads of professing Christians know nothing of inward
conversion of heart?
II. The actual condition of a man “without Christ.”
1. To be without Christ is to be without God. St. Paul told the Ephesians as much as
this in plain words. He ends the famous sentence which begins, “Ye were without
Christ,” by saying, “Ye were without God in the world.” And who that thinks can
wonder? That man can have very low ideas of God who does not conceive Him a
most pure, and holy, and glorious, and spiritual Being. How then can such a worm
as man draw near to God with comfort?
2. To be without Christ is to be without peace. Every man has a conscience within
him, which must be satisfied before he can be truly happy. There is only one thing
can give peace to the conscience, and that is the blood of Jesus Christ sprinkled on
it.
3. To be without Christ is to be without hope. Hope of some sort or other almost
every one thinks he possesses. There is but one hope that has roots, life, strength,
and solidity, and that is the hope which is built on the great rock of Christ’s work

15. and office as Redeemer.
4. To be without Christ is to be without heaven. In saying this I do not merely mean
that there is no entrance into heaven, but that “without Christ” there could be no
happiness in being there. A man without a Saviour and Redeemer could never feel
at home in heaven. He would feel that he had no lawful fight or title to be there;
boldness and confidence and ease of heart would be impossible. (Bishop Ryle.)
Without Christ
It is not long since that a prominent business man, when closely pressed by his
pastor, who had lately come to the church, replied with a calm force which was
meant to put an end to further pertinacity, “I am interested in all religious matters;
I am always glad to see the ministers when they call; but I have in the years past
thought the subject over long and carefully, and I have come to the decision
deliberately that I have no need of Jesus Christ as a Saviour in the sense you
preach.” Only two weeks from this interview the same man was suddenly prostrated
with disease; the illness was of such a character as to forbid his conversing with
anyone, and the interdict from speaking was continued until he was within an hour
of death, A solemn moment was that in which a question was put to him, intimating
that he might talk now if he could--nothing would harm him. The last thing, the
only thing, he said, was in a melancholy and frightened whisper, “Who will carry
me over the fiver?”
Having no hope.--
Hope abandoned
Over the huge hideous iron gates of the Prison de la Roquette, in Paris, which is set
apart for criminals that are condemned to death, there is an inscription, which
sends a thrill of horror through those who read it--“Abandon hope, all ye who enter
here!”
Hopes for eternity, what they rest on
When John Wesley lay on an expected death bed (though God spared him some
years longer to the world and the Church) his attendants asked him what were his
hopes for eternity? And something like this was his reply--“For fifty years, amid
scorn and hardship, I have been wandering up and down this world, to preach Jesus
Christ; and I have done what in me lay to serve my blessed Master!” What he had
done his life and works attest. They are recorded in his Church’s history, and shine
in the crown he wears so bright with a blaze of jewels--sinners saved through his
agency. Yet thus he spake,
“My hope for eternity--my hopes rest only on Christ--

16. ‘I the chief of sinners am But Jesus died for me.’”
(T. Guthrie, D. D.)
Mournful ignorance
I have seen a child in ignorance of its great loss totter across the floor to its mother’s
coffin, and, caught by their glitter, seize the handles, to look round and smile as it
rattled them on the hollow sides. I have seen a boy, forgetting his sorrow in his
dress, survey himself with evident satisfaction as he followed the bier that bore his
father to the grave. And however painful such spectacles, as jarring our feelings,
and out of all harmony with such sad and sombre scenes, they excite no surprise nor
indignation. We only pity those who, through ignorance of their loss or inability to
appreciate it, find pleasure in what should move their grief. (T. Guthrie, D. D.)
Having no hope
I have read of a tribe of savages that bury their dead in secret, by the hands of
unconcerned officials. o grassy mound, no memorial stone guides the poor
mother’s steps to the quiet corner where her infant lies. The grave is levelled with
the soil; and afterwards a herd of cattle is driven over and over the ground, till
every trace of the burial has been obliterated by their hoofs. Anxious to forget death
and its inconsolable griefs, these heathen resent any allusion to the dead. You may
not speak of them. In a mother’s hearing, name, however tenderly, her lost one,
recall a dead father to the memory of his son, and there is no injury which they feel
more deeply. From the thought of the dead their hearts recoil. How strange! How
unnatural! o, not unnatural. Benighted heathen, their grief has none of the
alleviations which are balm to our wounds, none of the hopes that bear us up
beneath a weight of sorrows. Their dead are sweet flowers withered, never to revive;
joys gone, never to return. To remember them is to keep open a rankling wound,
and preserve the memory of a loss which was bitter to feel and still is bitter to think
of: a loss which brought only grief to the living, and no gain to the dead. To me, says
Paul, to live is Christ, and to die is gain. They know nothing of this; nothing of the
hopes that associate our dead in Christ with sinless souls, and sunny skies, and
shining angels, and songs seraphic, and crowns of glory, and harps of gold. (T.
Guthrie, D. D.)
Hopefulness and steadfastness
A good Methodist in a prayer meeting said that when, many years since, he crossed

17. old ocean he was much in the habit of looking over the ship’s side, particularly near
the prow, and watching the vessel as she steadily ploughed her way through the
waves. Just under the bowsprit was the image of a human face. This face to him
came to be invested with a wondrous interest. Whatever the hour, whether by night
or by day; whatever the weather, whether in sunshine or in storm, that face seemed
ever steadfastly looking forward to port. Sometimes tempests would prevail. Great
surges would rise, and for a time completely submerge the face of his friend. But as
soon as the vessel recovered from its lurch, on looking again over the ship’s side,
there the placid face of his friend was to be seen, still faithfully, steadfastly looking
out for port. “And so,” he exclaimed, his countenance radiant with the light of the
Christian’s hope, “I humbly trust it is in my own case. Yea, whatever the trials of
the past, notwithstanding all the toils and disappointments of the present, by the
grace of God I am still looking out for port, and not long hence I am anticipating a
joyful, triumphant, abundant entrance therein.” Without God.
I am told to believe that there is no God; but, before doing so, I want to look on the
world in the light of this solemn denial In giving up this idea, several sacrifices are
involved. Let us see what they are.
1. I shall have to part with the most inspiring and ennobling books in my library.
2. I shall have to banish the earliest and tenderest memories which have gladdened
my days.
3. I shall have to give up the hope that in the long run right will be vindicated and
wrong be put to eternal shame.
4. I shall have to sacrifice my reason, my conscience--in a word, myself. My whole
life is built upon the holy doctrine of God’s existence. (Joseph Parker, D. D.)
Practical atheism
It is not speculative atheism that I lay to your charge; I am far from asserting or
supposing that you are intellectually without God. But of practical atheism, of being
virtually without God, I must and do accuse mankind and some of you. By practical
atheism I mean the believing that there is a God, and yet thinking and feeling and
acting just as if there were none.
1. I adduce forgetfulness of God as a proof, or rather as one form of practical
atheism.
2. As an evidence of practical atheism, a neglect to worship Him and to maintain
friendly and filial intercourse with Him.
3. I state as another evidence of practical atheism, the general conduct of mankind

18. under the various dispensations of Divine providence. Does not the rich man say in
his heart, “My power and the might of my hand hath gotten me this wealth”? Or, if
he cannot ascribe it altogether to his own industry and prudence, he divides the
credit of it with fortune, and speaks of the lucky throw, the fortunate speculation, or
the prosperous voyage, to the success of which many things conspired, but He whom
the winds and waves obey is not supposed to have contributed anything.
4. As another proof of practical atheism, that men are in the habit of forming their
plans and purposes, without respect to their dependence on God for the
accomplishment of them, and without consulting Him. They resolve with themselves
where they will go, what they will do, how much they will accomplish, just as if they
had life in themselves, and were independent in wisdom and power.
5. The conduct of many, in seasons of affliction, evinces that they are without God in
the world.
6. Finally, mankind, in their pursuit of happiness, evince their practical atheism.
Whither should a creature in quest of joy go to obtain it, but straight to Him, who
made, and who sustains both that which enjoys and that which is enjoyed, his
Maker and Preserver, and the world’s? Yet men fly from God for happiness.
Whence have you your joys and comforts now?--from your family?--it shall be
broken up; from your business?--it shall be discontinued, and you shall leave the
world, and the world itself shall be consumed, and nothing will be left but the soul
and God. You cannot be happy in anything else; and, if you love Him not, you
cannot be happy in Him. (W. evins, D. D.)
Without God
Three ways a man may be said to be without God.
1. By profane atheism.
2. By false worship.
3. By want of spiritual worship.
Great is the misery of those who are without God. God is a fountain of life; whoso is
far from Him must perish. (Paul Bayne.)
The misery of being without God
The misery of such as have not God for their God, in how sad a condition are they,
when an hour of distress comes! This was Saul’s case: “I am sore distressed; for the

19. Philistines make war against me, and the Lord has departed from me.” A wicked
man, in time of trouble, is like a vessel tossed on the sea without an anchor, it falls
on rocks or sands; a sinner not having God to be his God, though he makes a shift
while health and estate last, yet, when these crutches, which he leaned upon, are
broken, his heart sinks. It is with a wicked man as with the old world, when the
flood came; the waters at first came to the valleys, but then the people would get to
the hills and mountains, but when the waters came to the mountains, then there
might be some trees on the high hills, and they would climb up to them; ay, but then
the waters did rise up to the tops of the trees; now all hopes of being saved were
gone, their hearts failed them. So it is with a man that hath not God to be his God; if
one comfort be taken away, he hath another; if he lose a child, he hath an estate; ay,
but when the waters rise higher, death comes and takes away all; now he hath
nothing to help himself with, no God to go to, he must needs die despairing. (T.
Watson.)
Without God in the world
“Without God in the world.” Think!--what a description!--and applicable to
individuals without number! If it had been without friends, shelter, or food, that
would have been a gloomy sound. But without God! without Him (that is, in no
happy relation to Him), who is the very origin, support, and life of all things;
without Him who can make good flow to His creatures from an infinity of sources;
without Him whose favour possessed is the best, the sublimest, of all delights, all
triumphs, all glories. What do those under so sad a destitution value and seek
instead of Him? What will anything, or all things, be worth in His absence? It may
be instructive to consider a little to what states of mind this description is
applicable; and what a wrong and, calamitous thing the condition is in all of them.
We need not dwell on that condition of humanity in which there is no notion of
Deity at all--some outcast, savage tribes--souls destitute of the very ideal ot one
idea exalted anti resplendent above the rest casting a glory sometimes across the
little intellectual field! It is as if, in the outward world of nature, they had no visible
heaven--the spirit nothing to go out to, beyond its clay tenement, but the
immediately surrounding elements and other creatures of the same order. The
adorers of false gods may just be named as coming under the description. There is,
almost throughout the race, a feeling in men’s minds that belongs to the Divinity;
but think how all manner of objects, real and imaginary, have been supplicated to
accept and absorb this feeling, that the true God might not take it! It is too obvious
almost to be worth noting, how plainly the description applies itself to those who
persuade themselves that there is no God. The Divine Spirit and all spirit abolished,
he is left amidst masses and systems of matter without a first cause--ruled by
chance, or by a blind mechanical impulse of what he calls fate; and, as a little
composition of atoms, he is himself to take his chance for a few moments of
conscious being, and then be no more forever! And yet, in this infinite prostration of
all things, he feels an elation of intellectual pride! But we have to consider the text in
an application much more important to us, and to men in general; for, with a most

20. settled belief of the Divine existence, they may be “without God in the world.” This
is too truly and sadly the applicable description when this belief and its object do
not maintain habitually the ascendant influence over us--over the whole system of
our thoughts, feelings, purposes, and actions. Can we glance over the earth, and into
the wilderness of worlds in infinite space, without the solemn thought that all this is
but the sign and proof of something infinitely more glorious than itself? Are we not
reminded--“This is a production of His almighty power--that is an adjustment of
His all-comprehending intelligence and foresight--there is a glimmer, a ray of His
beauty, His glory--there an emanation of His benignity--but for Him all this would
never have been; and if, for a moment, His pervading energy were by His will
restrained or suspended, what would it all be then?” ot to have some such
perceptions and thoughts, accompanied by devout sentiments, is, so far, to “be
without God in the world.” Again, the text is applicable to those who have no solemn
recognition of God’s all-disposing government and providence--who have no
thought of the course of things but as just “going on”--going on some way or other,
just as it canto whom it appears abandoned to a strife and competition of various
mortal powers; or surrendered to something they call general laws, and then
blended with chance; who have, perhaps, a crude Epicurean notion of exempting
the Divine Being from the infinite toil and care of such a charge. The text is a
description of those who have but a slight sense of universal accountableness to God
as the supreme authority who have not a conscience constantly looking and listening
to Him, and testifying for Him; who proceed as if this world were a, province
absolved from the strictness of His dominion and His laws; who will not apprehend
that there is “His” will and warning affixed to everything; who will not submissively
ask, “What dost Thou pronounce on this? To be insensible to the Divine character
as Lawgiver, rightful Authority, and Judge, is truly to be “without God in the
world,” for thus every emotion of the soul and action of the life assumes that He is
absent or does not exist. This insensibility of accountableness exists almost entire (a
stupefaction of conscience) in very many minds. But in many others there is a
disturbed yet inefficacious feeling; and might not some of these be disposed to say,
“We are not ‘without God in the world,’ as an awful Authority and Judge; for we
are followed, and harassed, and persecuted, sometimes quite to misery, by the
thought of Him in this character. We cannot go on peacefully in the way our
inclinations lead; a portentous sound alarms us, a formidable spectre encounters us,
though we still persist.” The cause here is that men wish to be “without God in the
world”--would, in preference to any other prayer, implore Him to “Depart from us,
for we desire not the knowledge of His ways.” They would be willing to resume the
enterprise of the rebellious angels, if there were any hope. “Oh, that He, with His
judgment and laws, were far away!” To be thus with God is in the most emphatical
sense to be without Him--without Him as a friend, approver, and patron; each
thought of Him tells the soul who it is that it is without, and who it is that in a very
fearful sense it never can be without. The description belongs to that state of mind
in which there is no communion with God maintained or even sought with cordial
aspiration--no devout, ennobling converse held with Him--no conscious reception of
delightful impressions, sacred influences, suggested sentiments--no pouring out of
the soul in fervent desires for His illuminations, His compassion, His forgiveness,
His transforming operations--no earnest, penitential, hopeful pleading in the name

21. of the gracious Intercessor--no solemn, affectionate dedication of the whole being--
no animation and vigour obtained for the labours and warfare of a Christian life.
But how lamentable to be without God! Consider it in one single view only--that of
the loneliness of a human soul in this destitution. All other beings are necessarily
(shall we express it so?) extraneous to the soul; they may communicate with it, but
they are still separate and without it; an intermediate vacancy keeps them forever
asunder, so that the soul must be, in a sense, in an inseparable and eternal solitude--
that is, as to all creatures. But God, on the contrary, has an all-pervading power--
can interfuse, as it were, His very essence through the being of His creatures--can
cause Himself to be apprehended and felt as absolutely in the soul--such an inter-
communion as is, by the nature of things, impossible between created beings; and
thus the interior central loneliness--the solitude of the soul--is banished by a
perfectly intimate presence, which imparts the most affecting sense of society--a
society, a communion, which imparts life and joy, and may continue in perpetuity.
To men completely immersed in the world this might appear a very abstracted and
enthusiastic notion of felicity; but to those who have in any measure attained it, the
idea of its loss would give the most emphatic sense of the expression, “Without God
in the world.” The terms are a true description also of the state of mind in which
there is no habitual anticipation of the great event of going at length into the
presence of God--absence of the thought of being with Him in another world--of
being with Him in judgment, and whither to be with Him forever; not considering
that He awaits us somewhere, that the whole movement of life is absolutely towards
Him, that the course of life is deciding in what manner we shall appear in His
presence; not thinking what manner of fact that will be, what experience, what
consciousness, what emotion; not regarding it as the grand purpose of our present
state of existence that we may attain a final dwelling in His presence. One more, and
the last application we would make of the description is to those who, while
professing to retain God in their thoughts with a religious regard, frame the religion
in which they are to acknowledge Him according to their own speculation and
fancy. Thus many rejecters of Divine revelation have professed, nevertheless, a
reverential homage to the Deity; but the God of their faith was to be such as their
sovereign reason chose to feign, and therefore the mode of their religion entirely
arbitrary. But, if revelation be true, the simple question is, Will the Almighty
acknowledge your feigned God for Himself?--and admit your religion to be
equivalent to that which He has declared and defined? If He should not, you are
“without God in the world.” (John Foster.)
13
But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far

22. away have been brought near through the blood
of Christ.
BAR ES, "But now, in Christ Jesus - By the coming and atonement of the Lord
Jesus, and by the gospel which he preached.
Ye who sometimes were afar off - Who were “formerly” - ποτᆯ pote Tyndale
translates it, “a whyle agoo.” The phrase “afar off” - µακρᆭν makran - means that they
were formerly far off from God and his people. The expression is derived from the
custom of speaking among the Hebrews. God was supposed to reside in the temple. It
was a privilege to be near the temple. Those who were remote from Jerusalem and the
temple were regarded as far off from God, and hence as especially irreligious and
wicked; see the notes at Isa_57:19.
Are made nigh - Are admitted to the favor of God, and permitted to approach him
as his worshippers.
By the blood of Christ - The Jews came near to the mercy seat on which the symbol
of the divine presence rested (the notes at Rom_3:25), by the blood that was offered in
sacrifice; that is, the high priest approached that mercy-seat with blood and sprinkled it
before God. Now we are permitted to approach him with the blood of the atonement.
The shedding of that blood has prepared the way by which Gentiles as well as Jews may
approach God, and it is by that offering that we are led to seek God.
CLARKE, "Ye who sometimes were far off - To be far off, and to be near, are
sayings much in use among the Jews; and among them, to be near signifies,
1. To be in the approbation or favor of God; and to be far off signifies to be under his
displeasure. So a wicked Jew might be said to be far off from God when he was
exposed to his displeasure; and a holy man, or a genuine penitent, might be said to
be nigh to God, because such persons are in his favor.
2. Every person who offered a sacrifice to God was considered as having access to
him by the blood of that sacrifice: hence the priests, whose office it was to offer
sacrifices, were considered as being nigh to God; and all who brought gifts to the
altar were considered as approaching the Almighty.
3. Being far off, signified the state of the Gentiles as contradistinguished from the
Jews, who were nigh. And these expressions were used in reference to the
tabernacle, God’s dwelling-place among the Israelites, and the sacrifices there
offered. All those who had access to this tabernacle, or were nigh to it or encamped
about it, were said to be nigh to God; those who had no access to it were said to be
far off.

23. Hence the latter phrase is used to distinguish the Gentiles from the Jewish people; and
this appears to be the meaning of the prophet, Isa_57:19 : I create the fruit of the lips;
Peace, peace to him that is far off, and to him that is near, saith the Lord; i.e. I give cause
of praise and rejoicing to the Gentile as well as to the Jew. And to this scripture, and to
this thing, the apostle seems here to allude. You Gentiles, who were unacquainted with
God, and were even without God in the world, are brought to an acquaintance with him;
and are now, through Christ Jesus, brought into the favor and fellowship of God. And as
the Jews of old approached God by the blood of their sacrifices, so you approach him by
the blood of Christ.
GILL, "But now in Christ Jesus,.... Being openly and visibly in Christ, created in
him, and become believers in him; as they were before secretly in him, as chosen and
blessed in him before the foundation of the world:
ye who sometimes were far off; who in their state of unregeneracy were afar off
from God, and from his law, and from any spiritual knowledge of him and fellowship
with him; and from Jesus Christ, and from the knowledge of his righteousness, and the
way of salvation by him; and from the Spirit, and any acquaintance with the things of the
Spirit, and from minding them, and from walking after him; and from the saints and
people of God, and from any love to them, and communion with them; and from any
solid hopes of happiness, or real peace and comfort; which distance was owing both to
Adam's sin and to their own transgressions: it is an observation of a Jewish writer (a) on
Gen_3:9 "where art thou?" he (God) knew where he was, but he said so to show him that
he was ‫,מרוחפ‬ "afar off from" God by his sin: see Isa_59:2, and yet
are made nigh by the blood of Christ: so as to have nearness of access to and
communion with God, Father, Son, and Spirit, and the saints, in virtue of the blood of
Christ; which gives boldness and speaks peace; by which their persons are justified, the
pardon of their sins is procured, reconciliation is made, and their garments are washed,
and made white; and so they draw nigh with confidence by the faith of him.
HE RY, "The apostle proceeds (Eph_2:13) further to illustrate the happy change
that was made in their state: But now, in Christ Jesus, you who sometimes were far off,
etc. They were far off from Christ, from his church, from the promises, from the
Christian hope, and from God himself; and therefore from all good, like the prodigal son
in the far country: this had been represented in the preceding verses. Unconverted
sinners remove themselves at a distance from God, and God puts them at a distance: He
beholds the proud afar off. “But now in Christ Jesus, etc., upon your conversion, by
virtue of union with Christ, and interest in him by faith, you are made nigh.” They were
brought home to God, received into the church, taken into the covenant, and possessed
of all other privileges consequent upon these. Note, The saints are a people near to God.
Salvation is far from the wicked; but God is a help at hand to his people; and this is by
the blood of Christ, by the merit of his sufferings and death. Every believing sinner owes
his nearness to God, and his interest in his favour, to the death and sacrifice of Christ.
JAMISO , "now — in contrast to “at that time” (Eph_2:12).
in Christ Jesus — “Jesus” is here added, whereas the expression before (Eph_2:12)

24. had been merely “Christ,” to mark that they know Christ as the personal Savior, “Jesus.”
sometimes — Greek, “aforetime.”
far off — the Jewish description of the Gentiles. Far off from God and from the
people of God (Eph_2:17; Isa_57:19; Act_2:39).
are — Greek, “have been.”
by — Greek, “in.” Thus “the blood of Christ” is made the seal of a covenant IN which
their nearness to God consists. In Eph_1:7, where the blood is more directly spoken of as
the instrument, it is “through His blood” [Alford].
RWP, "But now (nuni de). Strong contrast, as opposed to “at that time.”
Afar off (makran). Adverb (accusative feminine adjective with hodon understood).
From the politeia and its hope in God.
Are made nigh (egenēthēte eggus). First aorist passive indicative of ginomai, a sort
of timeless aorist. Nigh to the commonwealth of Israel in Christ.
In the blood of Christ (en tōi haimati tou Christou). Not a perfunctory addition, but
essential (Eph_1:7), particularly in view of the Gnostic denial of Christ’s real humanity.
CALVI , "13.But now in Christ Jesus. We must either supply the verb, now that ye
have been received in Christ Jesus, or connect the word now with the conclusion of
the verse, now through the blood of Christ, — which will be a still clearer
exposition. In either case, the meaning is, that the Ephesians, who were far off from
God and from salvation, had been reconciled to God through Christ, and made nigh
by his blood; for the blood of Christ has taken away the enmity which existed
between them and God, and from being enemies hath made them sons.
BURKITT, "The apostle having set before the Ephesians the black and dark part of
their lives, before their conversion to Christianity, in the foregoing verse; comes
here in this to acquaint them with the blessed change which was made in their state,
and by whom. ow, says he, in or by Christ Jesus, ye, who were before afar off,
namely, from Christ, his church, his covenant, from saving hope, and from God
himself, are made as nigh as the Jews, and have as much right to expect the
aforesaid benefits as they, the blood of Christ having purchased them for you, and
sealed them to you; Ye that were before afar off, are now made nigh by the blood of
Christ.
Where note, That persons who are most remote, and at the farthest distance from
God, are sometimes unexpectedly brought home unto him: Ye who were afar off,
are now made nigh.
ote, 2. That it is owing to the blood of Christ, to his death and sufferings, that any
soul is brought into a state of nearness unto God, and finds acceptance with him: Ye
are made nigh by the blood of Christ.

25. BI, "But now in Christ Jesus ye who sometimes were far off are made nigh by the
blood of Christ.
Sin, the separator
Sin has its dark offices--offices which it is always fulfilling. For sin is that dividing
element, which, where it comes in, breaks up the harmony of all things, and sends
them out into the distance of chaos and dismay. God, at the beginning, made the
heaven to be subservient to the earth; and the earth to be subservient to the harvest;
and the harvest to be subservient to His people. But sin has broken the beautiful
chain of the material universe. When man fell, nature fell; and the links were
severed by the fall. There is an interval, and an interruption now, between the right
causes and the right effects in God’s creation. And worse than this, man is divided
from man; every one from his fellow. The very Church is broken up--Christian
from Christian. And St. James traces it out: “From whence come wars and fightings
among you? come they not hence, even of your lusts that war in your members?”
The lust of pride, the lust of an opinionated mind--the lust of prejudice--the lust of
jealousy--the lust of selfishness--the lust of a worldly ambition: these are the
fabricators of all discord. These make foes out of hearts which were meant to love as
brethren. And what are these, but some of sin’s many forms which it loves to take,
that it may then better work as a separator between man and man? o wonder, for
sin separates a man from himself. I question whether any man is at variance with
his brother, till he has first been at variance with himself. But sin takes away a
man’s consistency. A man is not one; but he is two--he is many characters. What he
is one time, that is just what he is not another. Passions within him conflict with
reason--passions with passions--feelings with feelings--he is “far off” from himself.
And this the separator does. But never does he do that, till he has done another act
of separation--and because he has done that other--he separates man from God. If
you wish to know how “far” sin has thrown man away from God--you must
measure it by the master-work which has spanned the gulf. The eternal counsel--the
immensity of a Divine nature clothing Himself in manhood--love, to which all other
love is as a drop to the fountain, from whence it springs--a life, spotless--sufferings,
which make all other sufferings a feather’s weight in the balance--a death, which
merged all deaths--all this, and far more than this, has gone to make the return
possible. And when it was possible; then the life of discipline and struggle--a work of
sanctification, going on day by day--many crucifixions--the seven-fold operations of
the Holy Ghost--death--resurrection--these must make the possible return a fact. By
all these you must make your calculation, if you wish to measure the distance of that
“far off,” which we ewe to that great separator--sin. And this is the reason why God
so hates sin, because it has put so “far” away from Him those He so dearly loves.
And now let us deal with this matter a little more practically. Since Christ died,
there is no necessary separation between any man and God. Without that death,
there was. (J. Vaughan, M. A.)

26. earness to God
I. We commence, by endeavouring to explain the meaning of the two key words--“In
Christ Jesus,” and, “by the blood of Christ.” “We who sometimes were far off are
made nigh.”
1. First, because we are “in Christ Jesus.” All the elect of God are in Christ Jesus by
a federal union. He is their Head, ordained of old to be so from before the
foundation of the world. This federal union leads in due time, by the grace of God,
to a manifest and vital union, a union of life, and for life, even unto eternal life, of
which the visible bond is faith.
2. The other key word of the text is, “by the blood of Christ.”
(1) If it he asked what power lies in the blood to bring nigh, it must be answered,
first, that the blood is the symbol of covenant. Ever in Scripture, when covenants
are made, victims are offered, and the victim becomes the place and ground of
approach between the two covenanting parties. The blood of our Lord Jesus Christ
is expressly called “the blood of the everlasting covenant,” for God comes in
covenant near to us by the blood of His only begotten Son. Every man whose faith
rests upon the blood of Jesus slain from before the foundation of the world, is in
covenant with God, and that covenant becomes to him most sure and certain
because it has been ratified by the blood of Jesus Christ, and therefore can never be
changed or disannulled.
(2) The blood brings us near in another sense, because it is the taking away of the
sin which separated us. When we read the word “blood” as in the text, it means
mortal suffering; we are made nigh by the grief and agonies of the Redeemer. The
shedding of blood indicates pain, loss of energy, health, comfort, happiness; but it
goes further still--the term “blood” signifies death. It is the death of Jesus in which
we trust. We glory in His life, we triumph in His resurrection, but the ground of our
nearness to God lies in His death. The term “blood,” moreover, signifies not a mere
expiring, but a painful and ignominious and penal death. It refers directly to the
crucifixion of Christ.
3. Experimentally we are brought nigh by the application of the blood to our
conscience. We see that sin is pardoned, and bless the God who has saved us in so
admirable a manner, and then we who hated Him before come to love Him; we who
had no thought towards Him desire to be like Him. The great attracting loadstone of
the gospel is the doctrine of the Cross.
(1) The first illustration is from our first parent, Adam. Adam dwelt in the garden,

27. abiding with God in devout communion. The Lord God walked in the garden in the
cool of the day with Adam. As a favoured creature, the first man was permitted to
know much of his Creator, and to be nigh to Him; but, alas! Adam sinned, and at
once we see the first stage of our own distance from God as we perceive Adam in the
garden without his God. But, ah! brethren, you and I were farther off than that--
much farther off than that, when love made us nigh.
(2) Let me now give you a second illustration, which may place this wonder of love
in a still clearer light. It shall be taken from the children of Israel travelling through
the wilderness. If an angel had poised himself in mid air, and watched awhile in the
days of Moses, gazing down upon the people in the wilderness and all else that
surrounded them, his eye would have rested upon the central spot, the tabernacle,
over which rested the pillar of cloud and fire by day and night as the outward index
of the presence of God. ow, observe yonder select persons, clad in fair white linen,
who come near, very near, to that great centre; they are priests, men who are
engaged from day to day sacrificing bullocks and lambs, and serving God. They are
near to the Lord, and engaged in most hallowed work, but they are not the nearest
of all; one man alone comes nearest; he is the high priest, who, once every year,
enters into that which is within the veil. Ah, what condescension is that which gives
us the selfsame access to God. The priests are servants of God, and very near to
Him, but not nearest; and it would be great grace if God permitted the priests to
enter into the most holy place; but, brethren, we were not by nature comparable to
the priests; we were not the Lord’s servants; we were not devoted to His fear; and
the grace that has brought us nigh through the precious blood was much greater
than that which admits a priest within the veil. Every priest that went within the veil
entered there by blood, which he sprinkled on the mercy seat. If made nighest, even
from the nearer stage, it must be by blood, and in connection with the one only High
Priest. If the angel continued his gaze, he would next see lying all round the
tabernacle the twelve tribes in their tents. These were a people near unto God, for
what nation hath God so nigh unto them? (Deu_4:7). But they are nothing like so
near as the priests, they did not abide in the holy court, nor were they always
occupied in worship. Israel may fitly represent the outward Church, the members of
which have not yet received all the spiritual blessing they might have, yet are they
blessed and made nigh. If ever an Israelite advanced into the court of the priests, it
was with blood; he came with sacrifice; there was no access without it. It was great
favour which permitted the Israelite to come into the court of the priests and
partake in Divine worship; but, brethren, you and I were farther off than Israel,
and it needed more grace by far to bring us nigh. By blood alone are we made nigh,
and by blood displayed in all the glory of its power.
(3) A third illustration of our nearness to God will be found around the peaks of the
mount of God, even Sinai, where the various degrees of access to God are set forth
with singular beauty and preciseness of detail. The nineteenth chapter of the Book
of Exodus tells us that the Lord revealed Himself on the top of Sinai with flaming
fire, and the smoke thereof ascended as the smoke of a furnace. Jehovah drew near
unto his people Israel, coming down in the sight of all the people upon Mount Sinai,
while the tribes stood at the nether part of the mount. o, remember that our

28. natural position was much more remote than Israel at the foot of the mount, for we
were a Gentile nation to whom God did not appear in His glory, and with whom He
spake not as with Israel. We were living in darkness, and in the valley of the shadow
of death; but Israel was privileged to come very near as compared with us; hence
the apostle in the chapter from which the text is taken, speaks of the circumcised as
nigh. I take Israel to be to us this morning the type of those who live under gospel
privileges, and are allowed to hear the joyful sound of salvation bought with blood.
The gospel command has come to your conscience with such power that you have
been compelled to promise obedience to it: but, alas, what has been the result of
your fear and your vow? You have gone back farther from God, and have plunged
anew into the world’s idolatry, and are today worshipping yourselves, your
pleasures, your sins, or your righteousness; and when the Lord cometh, the nearness
of opportunity which you have enjoyed will prove to have been to you a most fearful
responsibility, and nothing more.
III. Let us note some of the displays of the realizations of this nearness to God as
granted to us by blood through our union with Christ. We perceive and see
manifestly our nearness to God in the very first hour of our conversion. The father
fell upon the prodigal’s neck and kissed him--no greater nearness than that; the
prodigal becomes an accepted child, is and must be very near his father’s heart; and
we who sometimes were far off are as near to God as a child to his parents. We have
a renewed sense of this nearness in times of restorations after backsliding, when,
pleading the precious blood, we say, “Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean;
wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.” We come to God, and feel that He is
nigh unto them that are of a broken heart. We come near to God in prayer. Our
nearness to God is peculiarly evinced at the mercy seat. But, brethren, we never get
to God in prayer unless it is through pleading the precious blood.
IV. Brief exhortation.
1. Let us live in the power of the nearness which union with Christ and the blood
hath given us.
2. Let us enjoy the things which this nearness was intended to bring.
3. Let us exercise much faith in God.
4. Let our behaviour be in accordance with our position. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
The Christian’s retrospect

29. I. A state of nature.
1. Moral darkness.
2. Spiritual blindness and deafness.
3. Moral and spiritual death.4. Enmity to and alienation from God.
II. A state of grace.
1. Light.
2. Peace.
3. Joy.
4. Unclouded faith and hope.
III. The characteristics of a natural man.
1. The depravity of his heart and the sinfulness of his unholy affections are stronger
than the impulses of his soul.
2. He is destitute of proper knowledge.
3. He is satisfied with this world. He has not raised his affections above temporal
joys.
4. He is ignorant, blind, naked, condemned in sin, the slave of his lusts, the servant
of Satan, the heir of hell.
IV. The characteristics of a spiritual man.
1. He is penitent. The sins of the past he hopes are forgiven, the sins of the present
he daily implores God may be pardoned.
2. He is humble. He is not self-complacent over discharge of known duty.
3. He is dependent upon God.

30. 4. He is a man of active Christianity. He locks up, and is ever moving onward and
upward.
5. He is a man of love and forbearance. He wears God’s image, looks like His Son,
has the spirit of an angel, and the praise for his God of a seraph.
V. The change of our condition as affected by the application of the text. It intimates
that a certain time we were without Christ (verses 11 and 12). “At that time ye were
without Christ” refers to the condition of the heathen. “They were without God and
hope in the world.” The science of Egypt, Chaldea, Greece, and Rome had
discovered much as to things pertaining to the present life; but in respect of a
hereafter all was enveloped in gross darkness. The text intimates the mode of the
great change. Having asserted that those “who sometimes were afar off are brought
nigh to God,” the apostle affirms that this is accomplished in Christ, and through
the application of His blood. Therefore--
1. The blood of Christ is the means, when preached, through which sinners are
brought near to God. “Thus it is written, and thus it behoved Christ to suffer and to
rise from the dead the third day, and that repentance and remission of sins should
be preached in His name among all nations, beginning at Jerusalem.”
2. “By the bleed of Christ, as shed upon the cross, atonement was made, sin was
expiated, and a way opened for God to draw near to the sinner, and the sinner to
God,” This is a proposition of Andrew Fuller. “God sent His own Son in the likeness
of sinful flesh, and for sin (or by a sacrifice for sin) condemned sin in the flesh.” “He
that spared not His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with
Him also freely give us all things?” This proposition and this passage are a
summary of gospel truth.
3. We are brought into sacred nearness to God, and enter a state of salvation
through the blood of Christ. This is applied spiritually, and is the true remission of
sins. Divine grace applies spiritually the Divine Redeemer’s blood, to cleanse from
sin. (W. C. Crane, D. D.)
Brought nigh through death
A mother in ew York whose son had got into dissipated and abandoned habits,
after repeated remonstrances and threats, was turned out of doors by his father,
and he left vowing he would never return unless his father asked him, which the
father said would never be. Grief over her son soon laid the mother on her dying
bed, and when her husband asked if there was nothing he could do for her ere she
departed this life, she said, “Yes; you can send for my boy.” The father was at first

31. unwilling, but at length, seeing her so near her end, he sent for his son. The young
man came, and as he entered the sick room his father turned his back upon him. As
the mother was sinking rapidly, the two stood on opposite sides of her bed, all love
and sorrow for her, but not exchanging a word with each other. She asked the
father to forgive the boy; no, he wouldn’t until the son asked it. Turning to him, she
begged of him to ask his father’s forgiveness; no, his proud heart would not let him
take the first step. After repeated attempts she failed, but as she was just expiring,
with one last effort she got hold of the father’s hand in one hand, and her son’s in
the other, and exerting all her feeble strength, she joined their hands, and, with one
last appealing look, she was gone. Over her dead body they were reconciled, but it
took the mother’s death to bring it about. So, has not God made a great sacrifice
that we might be reconciled--even the death of His own dear Son? (D. L. Moody.)
Jesus the only hope
A Christian Hindoo was dying, and his heathen comrades came around him, and
tried to comfort him by reading some of the pages of their theology; but he waved
his hand, as much as to say, “I don’t want to hear it.” Then they called in a heathen
priest, and he said, “If you will only recite the umtra it will deliver you from hell.”
He waved his hand, as much as to say, “I don’t want to hear that.” Then they said,
“Call on Juggernaut.” He shook his head, as much as to say, “I can’t do that.” Then
they thought perhaps he was too weary to speak, and they said, “ ow, if you can’t
say ‘Juggernaut,’ think of that god.” He shook his head again, as much as to say,
“ o, no, no.” Then they bent down to his pillow, and they said, “In what will you
trust?” His face lighted up with the very glories of the celestial sphere as he cried
out, rallying all his dying energies, “Jesus!” (Dr. Talmage.)
The blood of Christ
Captain Hedley Vicars, when under deep conviction of sin, one morning came to his
table almost broken hearted, and bowed to the dust with a sense of his guilt. “Oh,
wretched man that I am!” he repeated to himself, at the same time glancing at his
Bible, which lay open before him. His eyes suddenly rested on that beautiful verse,
“The blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanseth from all sin.” “Then,” said he, “it can
cleanse me from mine”; and he instantly believed with his heart unto righteousness,
and was filled with peace and joy. From that time to the hour in which he lay bathed
in his own blood, in the trenches before Sebastopol, he never doubted his
forgiveness, or God’s ability and willingness to pardon the chief of sinners. (S. M.
Haughton.)
Aliens brought nigh to God

32. 1. We must so look on our misery as to remember our estate by mercy. The devil will
labour to swallow up in sorrow, as well as to kill by carnal security. This teaches
ministers how to dispense the Word in wisdom, and Christians how to carry
themselves; they must not be all in one extreme, like those philosophers that are
either always weeping, or else always laughing; but, if there be heaviness with them
in the evening, they must look to that which may bring, joy in the morning; and as a
man after hard labour delights to take the air m a garden, so must they, when they
have humbled their souls, in viewing their mercy, refresh themselves in walking
among those sweet flowers, even the benefits of God.
2. The Lord brings such as are furthest estranged from Him to be near unto Him. If
the king pardon one whose goodwill is doubtful, and take him into his favour, it is
much; but when one has lived in making attempts on his person, then to forget and
to forgive were more than credible clemency. Yet this is what God has done.
(1) one, then, need despair of himself.
(2) o, nor of others, however bad.
(3) Comfort to those already converted.
3. A wonderful change is made in those who are in Christ.
(1) earness to God. God dwells with Christ; we, therefore, being in Him, must
needs have communion with the Father and the Holy Spirit.
(2) And to our fellow Christians. Christ is the head of His members; we must
therefore needs be near to those who are in affinity with Christ, as in wedlock.
4. It is by the blood of Christ that we are reconciled to God. When we think of
Christ crucified and shedding of His blood, there we may see--
(1) Our sins punished to the full.
(2) Our sins pardoned to the full.
(3) Our sins crucified and mortified by His blood.
(4) The flesh crucified (Gal_5:14).
(5) Ourselves crucified to the world, and the world to us (Gal_6:14).
(6) There we behold how patient we should be in affliction, even to the death.
(7) There is the picture of our whole life, which must be a continual course of
mortification.

33. (8) There is the seasoning of our death, that whenever it comes it shall be a sweet
passage to a better life.
(9) There we see all evils turned to our good.
(10) Therein we see all good things purchased for us: grace, mercy, peace, eternal
salvation, yea, a heaven of treasures and riches gathered for us, and that we are
made partakers of, by a due view of meditation of Christ crucified. (Paul Bayne.)
The nearness of God
I. A reconciled God. We are all naturally far from God, not as being out of His
reach, or out of His sight, or out of His presence, but as differing from Him, as being
out of sympathy with Him--as forgetting or not thinking about Him--as disobeying
Him, and disliking Him, and thus having incurred His displeasure. Such things as
these create a distance between one and another. They need to he brought near, or,
as our text puts it, “made nigh” to each other. And how is that to be done? By their
being in some way reconciled; by some one coming between them and making them
friends--making them one. That might he done in various ways. I might appeal to
them, as a friend of both of them, to lay aside their enmity for my sake, and be
friends. I might put the hand of the one in that of the other, and take both in my
own; and so they might be said to be “made nigh” by me. Or if one had wronged the
other, I might offer to be responsible for the wrong, and to put it right. If the one
had taken money that belonged to the other, and had spent it or lost it, and could
not make it good, I might offer to replace it. And so they might be “made nigh”
through me. I have heard of a devoted Christian minister, who lay on his deathbed,
getting two friends who were visiting him, and who had quarrelled with each other,
to shake hands over his body, as they stood at opposite sides of his bed; and so they
were “made nigh” through him. They did not need to move from where they were
standing before in order to be thus “made nigh.” Or I might illustrate it in another
way. In Shetland, between the mainland and a small island rising up into a lofty
rock, there is a deep and awful-looking gorge. Looking over the edge you see and
hear the sea rushing and foaming below. It makes one dizzy to look down. Two
people standing on each side of that gorge, though they could almost join hands
across it, might be far enough apart from each other. For many years there was a
kind of basket bridge. A basket was swung across by means of a rope, The people
got into the basket and slid across in it. They were “made nigh” by means of it. Two
of you wish to meet each other at a canal. You stand one on each side. The
drawbridge is up, and though the water is only a few yards in breadth, you cannot
get to each other except by going nearly a quarter of a mile round about, which
makes it all one as if the canal were a quarter of a mile broad. You may be said to be
all that distance apart from each other. But the bridge comes down, and at once

34. makes you “nigh.” Little more than a step brings you together. ow, as I have said,
the sinner and God are thus apart from each other--separated from each other,
wide, wide apart. The sinner is “without God.” His sins have hid God’s face from
him. “God is not in all his thoughts.” How shall they be “made nigh”? The sinner
cannot make himself nigh. He can only get farther away from God. And so the Lord
Jesus comes in as the Mediator.
II. God able to see us. That is implied in His being “near” us--His being “not far
from every one of us.” When we are very far away, we cannot see things at all. If
some one were holding out a book to you at a distance, you could not see the letters,
you could not read them even though the print were pretty large. You would say, “It
is too far off; I must have it nearer.” And when you get near to it, you can read,
without difficulty, even the smallest print. When we are at sea, the land in the
distance is seen very dimly. But for being told, we should not know it to be land at
all. It is more like cloud. But as we come nearer we can distinguish mountains, and
fields, and houses, and as we enter into the harbour we can see everything and
everybody. Our being near enables us to see. You cannot distinguish people’s faces
at a distance, you cannot tell what people are doing. But when you come near--when
you are standing beside them--you see all. ow just so it is with God. He is near. He
is “a God at hand.” He sees your thoughts. He sees your acts--every one of them. He
sees every letter you write--every line you write. He can see everything about you,
for He is near you wherever you are. Think what it would be if a person were
constantly beside you, all through the night and day, never sleeping, his wakeful eye
ever upon you. What a knowledge of you he would have! When travelling in the
country, I saw a policeman and another man keeping very close together. They went
into the railway carriage together and came out together. They sat together, they
walked on the platform together. And then I noticed that the one was chained to the
other. The handcuff round the wrist of each told how it was. The prisoner could do
nothing which the policeman could not see. So it was with Paul when he was chained
to the soldier during his imprisonment at Rome. What a knowledge of the great
apostle that soldier must have had! So near--so constantly near you is God.
III. As He sees all, as we should with the microscope, so He hears all, as we should
with the microphone or telephone--every sound we utter, every word we speak. I
saw a very curious thing one day. An old lady whom I knew was very deaf. I could
not make her hear a word. But when I was calling at her house, her daughter spoke
to her, and though she did not hear a word, she was able to understand the
movement of the lips so thoroughly that it was as if she had heard every word,
which indeed she repeated exactly as it was spoken. In this way some people do not
need to hear in order to know what is being said or done. But, as I have said, it is
nearness that is the great help to hearing. People in church who cannot hear well,
wish to get as near the pulpit as possible. Deaf people in a room bring their chair
close to you, or draw you close to them, and so, if at all possible, they hear. If

35. anything is certain, it is that God hears--hears every one--hears everything, for “He
is not far from every one of us.” If you knew that some one whom you stand in awe
of were near, would it not influence you in all that you said? I was one day
travelling in a railway carriage, when the conversation of my fellow travellers
turned on a particular friend of mine. Suddenly there was silence. One of the party
had recognized me, and, with a look and a shrug, indicated that they had better take
care what they said. How often that might be done in a different way! If I were at
your elbow, might I not often gently whisper, “Hush! He is here!” Who? God. Or I
might point upward--as much as to say, “He is listening!--take care what you say.”
IV. God able to help us. One reason why friends cannot help us, even when they
would, is that they are too far away. This can never happen with God. He is always
close at hand, always within reach. The doors of the Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh
are never locked. Above the principal entrance there are two panels. On the one are
inscribed the words, “I was sick and ye visited Me”: and on the other, “I was a
stranger and ye took me in”; and between the panels is the crest of the infirmary,
“Patet omnibus,” which may be rendered, “Open to all.” And at any hour, night or
day, if any accident occurs, there is instant admittance. Might I not say, God’s door
is never locked, and it is close to every one of us. At any hour of the day or of the
night, He is near--able and willing to help. (J. H. Wilson, D. D.)
Sinners brought nigh by the blood of Christ
I. We were sometime far off. Distance = ignorance of God, and under His
displeasure. What the peculiar nature of our erroneous path, our remote situation,
was, is comparatively of little consequence. Some of us were lost in the cares of the
world. Some were deluded by the deceitfulness of riches. The lust of other things
held some captive. While others were intoxicated by pleasure, or enchanted by
worldly science, or drawn away by the meaner things which attract the attention of
sordid souls. It is enough, more than enough, that we were far from God. Let us now
turn our attention to our present situations.
II. ow are we made nigh. These words convey to the mind ideas of Relationship,
Friendship, Union, and Communion. Thus we are made nigh; and our text leads us,
in the next place, to consider how this blessed, this important, change has been
effected.

36. III. In Christ Jesus--by the blood of Christ.
1. In Christ Jesus. He is our Mediator--God with God; man with men (see 1Ti_2:5;
Heb_12:24). It is here the distant parties meet. Here the Gentile meets the Jew (verse
14). Here the returning sinner meets a gracious, a merciful, a forgiving God (Eph_
1:6-7, and Eph_1:18). Here persons that were distant, that were hostile, meet,
cordially unite, and perfectly agree (see Gal_3:28-29; Col_3:11; Joh_10:16). Here
even Saul of Tarsus meets the followers of Jesus of azareth on amicable terms.
Here all real Christians of every sect and name meet; and here all men may know
that they are disciples of Christ, because they love one another (Joh_13:35). Here,
too, they all ascribe their salvation to Jesus, and glory in being “made nigh.”
2. By the blood of Christ. Under the old dispensation this blood was yearly typified
by that of the paschal lamb (Exo_12:4-5; 1Co_5:7); daily by that of the sacrificial
lamb (Exo_29:38-39; Joh_1:29); and frequently by that of other sacrifices (Heb_9:1-
28; Heb_10:1-39). Covenants were ratified by blood (Exo_24:8; Heb_9:18-20); “and
without shedding of blood is no remission” (Heb_9:22). “We enter into the holiest by
the blood of Jesus” (Heb_10:19). Almost every important circumstance connected
with our salvation has reference to the blood of Christ. We are redeemed by His
blood (chap. 1:7; Col_1:14; 1Pe_1:19; Rev_5:9). Justified by His blood (Rom_5:9);
washed, cleansed by His blood (1Jn_1:7; Rev_1:5; Rev_7:14); we conquer through
His blood (Rev_12:11); we are made nigh by His blood. (Theological Sketchbook.)
Brought nigh by Christ’s blood
I. What is meant by being “afar off.”
1. It intimates distance (Eph_4:14).
2. Being destitute of His image (Eph_4:22).
3. Under God’s revealed displeasure (Eph_1:1-3).
4. Unconnected with Christ.
II. What is meant by being “made nigh.” The renegade is reclaimed; the outlaw is
captured; the rebel has Rounded his arms; the ferocious lion is now changed into a
placid lamb; and the stoner is now reconciled to, and made one with, God in Jesus
Christ our Lord. Hence, being “made nigh” signifies--
1. Relationship (2Co_3:17-18).

37. 2. Union--the vine and its branches (Joh_15:5).
3. Unity or oneness (1Co_12:13).
4. Stones builded on Christ (Eph_2:22).
5. Friendship (Joh_15:15).
6. Communion (Rom_8:14).
III. The instrument of bringing us nigh: “his blood.” That which effects such
wonderful achievements must itself be astonishingly magnificent. The effect is
Godlike, and the cause is with God. To accomplish an union between two opposite
and repulsive bodies is beyond the reach of philosophical ingenuity, with all its
power. But this is done by--
1. God’s decree in Jesus Christ (Eph_1:5).
2. In whom Jew and Gentile meet (Eph_2:14).
3. By Christ’s blood we are reconciled (Heb_9:28).
4. Thus we enter into the holiest (Heb_10:19).
5. Redeemed by His blood (Col_1:14).
6. Justified by His blood (Rom_5:9).
7. Washed by His blood (1Jn_1:7).
8. We conquer through His blood (Rev_12:11). (T. B. Baker.)
Made nigh in a new bond
The one gospel of God to the whole world, is that dark and distant spirits can not
only be brought nigh, but “made nigh in the blood of Christ,” as grafts are not
simply brought nigh, but “made nigh” to the tree from which they are to derive
their life. The graft is “made nigh,” taken up into unity with the tree, by the life
blood of the tree. Man is “made nigh,” taken up into unity with God, by receiving
the life blood of Jesus into his spirit. As the sun gives out of himself to the earth, and
thus brings the earth into fellowship with himself, so Christ gives out of Himself to
the human soul and makes man one with God. (John Pulsford.)

38. Atonement in Christ’s blood
The Atonement is the great fact of the Bible, and Scripture and history alike bear
witness to it.
1. The universal practice of sacrifice points to the atonement of Christ, and shows
out the moral sentiments of the nations in the dark but distinct consciousness that
expiation is necessary before the sinner can approach God.
2. The whole Jewish economy is based upon the principle of sacrifice, and is to be
looked upon as a providential preparation for the gospel, in which the sacrifice of
the Cross holds such a conspicuous place, and both Testaments unite in declaring
that without shedding of blood there is no remission of sins (Heb_9:22; Exo_24:8;
Mat_26:28). Hence the spirit of the Old Testament is realized in the ew Testament
Victim, offered up upon the cross for the sin of the world. Hence the blood of Christ
is presented to our faith as the vindication of Jehovah’s love, and the refuge in
which our souls may safely await the issues of eternity. (W. Graham, D. D.)
eed of the blood of Jesus
I once heard a very earnest minister say that he had been accosted by a man who
had heard him preach, with this criticism: “I don’t like your theology at all--it’s too
bloody. It savours so of the shambles, it’s all blood, blood, blood. I like a pleasanter
gospel.” He replied to his objector: “My theology is bloody, I allow; it recognizes as
its foundation a very sanguinary scene--the death of Christ, with bleeding hands
and feet and side. And I am quite content that it should be bloody, for God hath
said, ‘that without shedding of blood there is no remission of sins.’” (C. D. Foss.)
Value of Christ’s brood
I dare assert, without fear of successful contradiction, that the inspired writers
attribute all the blessings of salvation to the precious blood of Jesus Christ. If we
have redemption, it is through His blood; if we are justified, it is by His blood; if
washed from our moral stains, it is by His blood, which cleanseth us from all sin; if
we have victory over “the last enemy,” we obtain it, not only by the word of the
Divine testimony, but through the blood of the Lamb; and, if we gain admittance
into heaven, it is because we have washed our robes and made them white in the
blood of the Lamb. Everything depends on the blood of Christ, who paid it as the
price of cur redemption to eternal life and glory. (Dr. R. ewton.)

39. Toplady, the writer of the hymn, “Rock of Ages, cleft for me,” was converted
through hearing a working man preach in a barn from Eph_2:13, “But now in
Christ Jesus ye who sometimes were far off are made nigh by the blood of Christ.”
14
For he himself is our peace, who has made the two
one and has destroyed the barrier, the dividing
wall of hostility,
BAR ES, "For he is our peace - There is evident allusion here to Isa_57:19. See
the notes at that verse. The “peace” here referred to is that by which a “union” in worship
and in feeling has been produced between the Jews and the Gentiles Formerly they were
alienated and separate. They had different objects of worship; different religious rites;
different views and feelings. The Jews regarded the Gentiles with hatred, and the
Gentiles the Jews with scorn. Now, says the apostle, they are at peace. They worship the
same God. They have the same Saviour. They depend on the same atonement. They have
the same hope. They look forward to the same heaven. They belong to the same
redeemed family. Reconciliation has not only taken place with God, but with each other.
“The best way to produce peace between alienated minds is to bring them to the same
Saviour.” That will do more to silence contentions, and to heal alienations, than any or
all other means. Bring people around the same cross; fill them with love to the same
Redeemer, and give them the same hope of heaven, and you put a period to alienation
and strife. The love at Christ is so absorbing, and the dependence in his blood so entire,
that they will lay aside these alienations, and cease their contentions. The work of the
atonement is thus designed not only to produce peace with God, but peace between
alienated and contending minds. The feeling that we are redeemed by the same blood,
and that we have the same Saviour, will unite the rich and the poor, the bond and the
free, the high and the low, in the ties of brotherhood, and make them feel that they are
one. This great work of the atonement is thus designed to produce peace in alienated
minds every where, and to diffuse abroad the feeling of universal brotherhood.
Who hath made both one - Both Gentiles and Jews. He has united them in one

40. society.
And hath broken down the middle wall - There is an allusion here undoubtedly
to the wall of partition in the temple by which the court of the Gentiles was separated
from that of the Jews; see the notes and the plan of the temple, in Mat_21:12. The idea
here is, that that was now broken down, and that the Gentiles had the same access to the
temple as the Jews. The sense is, that in virtue of the sacrifice of the Redeemer they were
admitted to the same privileges and hopes.
CLARKE, "For he is our peace - Jesus Christ has died for both Jews and Gentiles,
and has become a peace-offering, ‫שלום‬ shalom, to reconcile both to God and to each
other.
Who hath made both one - Formed one Church out of the believers of both people.
The middle wall of partition - By abolishing the law of Jewish ordinances, he has
removed that which kept the two parties, not only in a state of separation, but also at
variance.
This expression, the middle wall, can refer only to that most marked distinction which
the Jewish laws and customs made between them and all other nations whatsoever.
Some think it refers to their ancient manner of living among the Gentiles, as they
always endeavored to live in some place by themselves, and to have a river or a wall
between them and their heathen neighbors. Indeed, wherever they went, their own rites,
ordinances, and customs were a sufficient separation between them and others; and as
Jesus Christ abolished those customs, admitting all into his Church, both Jews and
Gentiles, by repentance and faith, he may be said to have broken down the middle wall
of partition. When, at the death of Christ, the veil of the temple was rent from the top to
the bottom, it was an emblem that the way to the holiest was laid open, and that the
people at large, both Jews and Gentiles, were to have access to the holiest by the blood of
Jesus.
Some think there is an allusion here to the wall called chel, which separated the court
of Israel from the court of the Gentiles; but this was not broken down till the temple
itself was destroyed: and to this transaction the apostle cannot be supposed to allude, as
it did not take place till long after the writing of this epistle.
GILL, "For he is our peace,.... The author of peace between Jew and Gentile: there
was a great enmity of the Jew against the Gentile, and of the Gentile against the Jew; and
chiefly on account of circumcision, the one being without it, and the other insisting on it,
and branding one another with nicknames on account of it; but Christ has made peace
between them by abrogating the ceremonial law, which was the occasion of the
difference, and by sending the Gospel of peace to them both, by converting some of each,
and by granting the like privileges to them all, as may be observed in the following
verses: and Christ is the author of peace between God and his people; there is naturally
in man an enmity to God; sin has separated chief friends; nor can man make his peace
with God; what he does, or can do, will not do it; and what will, he cannot do; Christ is
the only fit and proper person for this work, being a middle person between both, and is
only able to effect it, being God as well as man; and so could draw nigh to God, and treat
with him about terms of peace, and agree to them, and perform them; and which he has
brought about by his blood, his sufferings and death; and which is made on honourable

41. terms, by a full satisfaction to the law and justice of God; and so is a lasting one, and
attended with a train of blessings: moreover, Christ is the donor of peace, of external
peace in his churches, and of internal peace of conscience, and of eternal peace in
heaven: this is one of the names of the Messiah with the Jews (b);
"says R. Jose the Galilean, even the name of the Messiah is called ‫,שלום‬ "peace"; as it is
said, Isa_9:6 "the everlasting Father, the Prince of peace";''
see Mic_5:5 where it is said, "and this man shall be the peace"; which the Jewish (c)
writers understand of the Messiah:
who hath made both one; Jews and Gentiles, one people, one body, one church; he
united them together, and caused them to agree in one, and made them to be of one
mind and judgment by the above methods; as well as he gathered them together in one,
in one head, himself, who represented them all:
and hath broken down the middle wall of partition between us; the ceremonial
law, which was made up of many hard and intolerable commands, and distinguished,
and divided, and kept up a division between Jews and Gentiles: so the Jews call the law a
wall, "if she be a wall", Son_8:9 ‫תורה‬ ‫,זו‬ "this is the law", say they (d): and hence we read
of ‫התורה‬ ‫,חומת‬ "the wall of the law" (e); and sometimes the phrase, a "partition wall", is
used for a division or disagreement; so R. Benjamin says (f), that between the Karaites
and Rabbanites, who were the disciples of the wise men, there was ‫,מחיצה‬ "a middle wall
of partition"; a great difference and distance; and such there was between the Jew and
Gentile, by reason of the ceremonial law; but Christ removed it, and made up the
difference: the allusion seems to be to the wall which divided the court of Israel from the
court of the Gentiles, in the temple, and which kept them at a distance in worship.
HE RY, 14-22, "We have now come to the last part of the chapter, which contains an
account of the great and mighty privileges that converted Jews and Gentiles both receive
from Christ. The apostle here shows that those who were in a state of enmity are
reconciled. Between the Jews and the Gentiles there had been a great enmity; so there is
between God and every unregenerate man. Now Jesus Christ is our peace, Eph_2:14. He
made peace by the sacrifice of himself; and came to reconcile, 1. Jews and Gentiles to
each other. He made both one, by reconciling these two divisions of men, who were wont
to malign, to hate, and to reproach each other before. He broke down the middle wall of
partition, the ceremonial law, that made the great feud, and was the badge of the Jews'
peculiarity, called the partition-wall by way of allusion to the partition in the temple,
which separated the court of the Gentiles from that into which the Jews only had liberty
to enter. Thus he abolished in his flesh the enmity, Eph_2:15. By his sufferings in the
flesh, to took away the binding power of the ceremonial law (so removing that cause of
enmity and distance between them), which is here called the law of commandments
contained in ordinances, because it enjoined a multitude of external rites and
ceremonies, and consisted of many institutions and appointments about the outward
parts of divine worship. The legal ceremonies were abrogated by Christ, having their
accomplishment in him. By taking these out of the way, he formed one church of
believers, whether they had been Jews or Gentiles. Thus he made in himself of twain one
new man. He framed both these parties into one new society, or body of God's people,
uniting them to himself as their common head, they being renewed by the Holy Ghost,

42. and now concurring in a new way of gospel worship, so making peace between these two
parties, who were so much at variance before. 2. There is an enmity between God and
sinners, whether Jews and Gentiles; and Christ came to slay that enmity, and to
reconcile them both to God, Eph_2:16. Sin breeds a quarrel between God and men.
Christ came to take up the quarrel, and to bring it to an end, by reconciling both Jew and
Gentile, now collected and gathered into one body, to a provoked and an offended God:
and this by the cross, or by the sacrifice of himself upon the cross, having slain the
enmity thereby. He, being slain or sacrificed, slew the enmity that there was between
God and poor sinners. The apostle proceeds to illustrate the great advantages which
both parties gain by the mediation of our Lord Jesus Christ, Eph_2:17. Christ, who
purchased peace on the cross, came, partly in his own person, as to the Jews, who are
here said to have been nigh, and partly in his apostles, whom he commissioned to preach
the gospel to the Gentiles, who are said to have been afar off, in the sense that has been
given before. And preached peace, or published the terms of reconciliation with God and
of eternal life. Note here, When the messengers of Christ deliver his truths, it is in effect
the same as if he did it immediately himself. He is said to preach by them, insomuch that
he who receiveth them receiveth him, and he who despiseth them (acting by virtue of his
commission, and delivering his message) despiseth and rejecteth Christ himself. Now
the effect of this peace is the free access which both Jews and Gentiles have unto God
(Eph_2:18): For through him, in his name and by virtue of his mediation, we both have
access or admission into the presence of God, who has become the common reconciled
Father of both: the throne of grace is erected for us to come to, and liberty of approach
to that throne is allowed us. Our access is by the Holy Spirit. Christ purchased for us
leave to come to God, and the Spirit gives us a heart to come and strength to come, even
grace to serve God acceptably. Observe, We draw nigh to God, through Jesus Christ, by
the help of the Spirit. The Ephesians, upon their conversion, having such an access to
God, as well as the Jews, and by the same Spirit, the apostle tells them, Now therefore
you are no more strangers and foreigners, Eph_2:19. This he mentions by way of
opposition to what he had observed of them in their heathenism: they were now no
longer aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and no longer what the Jews were wont
to account all the nations of the earth besides themselves (namely, strangers to God), but
fellow-citizens with the saints, and of the household of God, that is, members of the
church of Christ, and having a right to all the privileges of it. Observe here, The church is
compared to a city, and every converted sinner is free of it. It is also compared to a
house, and every converted sinner is one of the domestics, one of the family, a servant
and a child in God's house. In Eph_2:20 the church is compared to a building. The
apostles and prophets are the foundation of that building. They may be so called in a
secondary sense, Christ himself being the primary foundation; but we are rather to
understand it of the doctrine delivered by the prophets of the Old Testament and the
apostles of the New. It follows, Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner-stone. In him
both Jews and Gentiles meet, and constitute one church; and Christ supports the
building by his strength: In whom all the building, fitly framed together, etc., Eph_2:21.
All believers, of whom it consists, being united to Christ by faith, and among themselves
by Christian charity, grow unto a holy temple, become a sacred society, in which there is
much communion between God and his people, as in the temple, they worshipping and
serving him, he manifesting himself unto them, they offering up spiritual sacrifices to
God and he dispensing his blessings and favours to them. Thus the building, for the
nature of it, is a temple, a holy temple; for the church is the place which God hath chosen
to put his name there, and it becomes such a temple by grace and strength derived from
himself - in the Lord. The universal church being built upon Christ as the foundation-
stone, and united in Christ as the corner-stone, comes at length to be glorified in him as

43. the top-stone: In whom you also are built together, etc., Eph_2:22. Observe, Not only
the universal church is called the temple of God, but particular churches; and even every
true believer is a living temple, is a habitation of God through the Spirit. God dwells in
all believers now, they having become the temple of God through the operations of the
blessed Spirit, and his dwelling with them now is an earnest of their dwelling together
with him to eternity.
JAMISO , "he — Greek, “Himself” alone, pre-eminently, and none else. Emphatical.
our peace — not merely “Peacemaker,” but “Himself” the price of our (Jews’ and
Gentiles’ alike) peace with God, and so the bond of union between “both” in God. He
took both into Himself, and reconciled them, united, to God, by His assuming our nature
and our penal and legal liabilities (Eph_2:15; Isa_9:5, Isa_9:6; Isa_53:5; Mic_5:5; Col_
1:20). His title, “Shiloh,” means the same (Gen_49:10).
the middle wall of partition — Greek, “... of the partition” or “fence”; the middle
wall which parted Jew and Gentile. There was a balustrade of stone which separated the
court of the Gentiles from the holy place, which it was death for a Gentile to pass. But
this, though incidentally alluded to, was but a symbol of the partition itself, namely, “the
enmity” between “both” and God (Eph_2:15), the real cause of separation from God, and
so the mediate cause of their separation from one another. Hence there was a twofold
wall of partition, one the inner wall, severing the Jewish people from entrance to the
holy part of the temple where the priests officiated, the other the outer wall, separating
the Gentile proselytes from access to the court of the Jews (compare Eze_44:7; Act_
21:28). Thus this twofold wall represented the Sinaitic law, which both severed all men,
even the Jews, from access to God (through sin, which is the violation of the law), and
also separated the Gentiles from the Jews. As the term “wall” implies the strength of the
partition, so “fence” implies that it was easily removed by God when the due time came.
RWP, "For he is our peace (autos gar estin hē eirēnē hēmōn). He himself, not just
what he did (necessary as that was and is). He is our peace with God and so with each
other (Jews and Gentiles).
Both one (ta amphotera hen). “The both” (Jew and Gentile). Jesus had said “other
sheep I have which are not of this fold” (Joh_10:16).
One (hen) is neuter singular (oneness, unity, identity) as in Gal_3:28. Race and
national distinctions vanish in Christ. If all men were really in Christ, war would
disappear.
Brake down the middle wall of partition (to mesotoichon tou phragmou lusas).
“Having loosened (first aorist active participle of luō, see note on Joh_2:19) the middle-
wall (late word, only here in N.T., and very rare anywhere, one in papyri, and one
inscription) of partition (phragmou, old word, fence, from phrassō, to fence or hedge, as
in Mat_21:33).” In the temple courts a partition wall divided the court of the Gentiles
from the court of Israel with an inscription forbidding a Gentile from going further
(Josephus, Ant. VIII. 3, 2). See the uproar when Paul was accused of taking Trophimus
beyond this wall (Act_21:28).

44. CALVI , " 14.For he is our peace. He now includes Jews in the privilege of
reconciliation, and shows that, through one Messiah, all are united to God. This
consideration was fitted to repress the false confidence of the Jews, who, despising
the grace of Christ, boasted that they were the holy people, and chosen inheritance,
of God. If Christ is our peace, all who are out of him must be at variance with God.
What a beautiful title is this which Christ possesses, — the peace between God and
men! Let no one who dwells in Christ entertain a doubt that he is reconciled to God.
Who hath made both one. This distinction was necessary. (126) All intercourse with
the Gentiles was held to be inconsistent with their own superior claims. (127) To
subdue this pride, he tells them that they and the Gentiles have been united into one
body. Put all these things together, and you will frame the following syllogism: If the
Jews wish to enjoy peace with God, they must have Christ as their Mediator. But
Christ will not be their peace in any other way than by making them one body with
the Gentiles. Therefore, unless the Jews admit the Gentiles to fellowship with them,
they have no friendship with God.
And breaking down the middle wall of partition. To understand this passage, two
things must be observed. The Jews were separated, for a certain time, from the
Gentiles, by the appointment of God; and ceremonial observances were the open
and avowed symbols of that separation. Passing by the Gentiles, God had chosen the
Jews to be a peculiar people to himself. A wide distinction was thus made, when the
one class were “ and of the household” (Eph_2:19) of the Church, and the other
were foreigners. This is stated in the Song of Moses:
“ the Most High divided to the nations their inheritance, when he separated the sons
of Adam, he set the bounds of the people according to the number of the children of
Israel: for the Lord’ portion is his people, Jacob is the lot of his inheritance.” (Deu_
32:8)
Bounds were thus fixed by God to separate one people from the rest; and hence
arose the enmity which is here mentioned. A separation is thus made. The Gentiles
are set aside. God is pleased to choose and sanctify the Jewish people, by freeing
them from the ordinary pollution of mankind. Ceremonial observances were
afterwards added, which, like walls, enclosed the inheritance of God, prevented it
from being open to all or mixed with other possessions, and thus excluded the
Gentiles from the kingdom of God.
But now, the apostle, says, the enmity is removed, and the wall is broken down. By
extending the privilege of adoption beyond the limits of Judea, Christ has now made
us all to be brethren. And so is fulfilled the prophecy,
“ shall enlarge Japheth,
and he shall dwell in the tents of Shem.” (Gen_9:27)

45. (126) “Il estoit necessaire que l’ distinguast ainsi les hommes en deux bandes.” “ was
necessary that the apostle should separate men into two classes.”
(127) “Les Juifs estans enflez du privilege que Dieu leur avoit fait, tenoyent les
Gentils pour indignes de communiquer avec eux en sorte quelconque.” “ Jews,
puffed up with the privilege which God had conferred upon them, reckoned the
Gentiles to be unworthy of being admitted to any intercourse whatever.”
BURKITT, "He is our peace: that is,
1. He is the Mediator of our peace, the great peace-maker betwixt God and men.
2.He is our peace: that is, the purchaser of our peace.
3. He is our peace; that is, the establisher of our peace. All which is to be
understood, not only of peace betwixt God and man, but also betwixt man and man.
Who hath made both one; that is, both Jews and Gentiles one church.
Here note, That there was a very great and deep-rooted enmity betwixt Jews and
Gentiles, until Christ purchased their peace and reconciliation.
The Jews derided, scorned, and hated the Gentiles as unclean, compared them to
dogs and swine.
The Gentiles, they reproached the Jews for circumcising their flesh, esteemed them,
of all nations, the worst; and would hold their nose at the Jews when they met them,
and cry, O faetentes Judaei! O ye stinking Jews! and turn away their eyes from
them.
Learn from hence then, That the uniting of both Jew and Gentile into one church,
was one blessed effect and sweet fruit of the purchase of Christ's blood; Christ's
offering of himself was intended as a sacrifice for enmities between man and man, as
well as for enmities between God and man: He is our peace, who hath made both
one.
Observe next, What Christ hath done in order to his making peace between Jew and
Gentile;
1. He has abolished the ceremonial law, called here a partition- wall, betwixt the
Jews and the Gentiles; in allusion, no doubt, to that wall to Solomon's temple which
separated the court of the Jews from that of the Gentiles, that they could neither
come at, nor look at one another. So that this partition-wall being said to be broken
down, intimates to us, that Jew and Gentile, who before had two manner of
religions, the one in and under a covenant with God, the other afar off, and without

46. God; yet now by Christ are both adopted into the same church, partakers of the
same covenants, incorporated into the same faith, entitled to the same glory.
2. Christ has abolished the enmity and perpetual strife which was occasioned
between Jew and Gentile, upon the account of the observation of the ceremonial
law, and the ordinances thereunto belonging: He hath abolished the enmity; that is,
the ceremonial law, which made the enmity between them. The ceremonial law was
the cause and the continuer of that enmity which was betwixt Jew and Gentile: this
is called the law of commandments contained in ordinances: because Almighty God
did actually separate the Jews from all the world, by giving them ordinances and
commandments, judicial and ceremonial laws, containing many visible and external
observances, which forbade them to communicate with the Gentile world.
ow Christ being come in the flesh, all those observances ceased, and those legal
ordinances vanished away; all nations become blessed in Christ, and Jews and
Gentiles become one church, both alike the people of God, both admitted equally
into covenant, and both alike blessed.
Here note, That the moral law, summarily comprised and comprehended in the Ten
Commandments, was no part of the partition-wall between Jew and Gentile. or
did the death of Christ abrogate this law, nor is it at all abolished: but it was the law
of ceremonies only, which the sufferings and death of Christ put an end unto; for
when he died, they all vanished; as the shadow disappears when the substance is
come.
BI, "For He is our Peace, who hath made both one, and hath broken down the
middle wall of partition.
Christ our Peace
1. Christ Jesus is the author of all our peace.
(1) In restoring the amity and friendship which we had in creation, but lost by the
Fall.
(2) In vanquishing those enemies which had taken us captive, and wrongfully
detained us.
2. There was a separation between Jew and Gentile, before they came to be in
Christ.
3. The way to obtain peace is to take away that which bars it. To make two rooms

47. into one, you must beat down the wall which forms the partition. (Paul Bayne.)
Peace from Christ alone
Christ is the author of all our peace; but He applies it successively by degrees. Like
Master, like man; like Prince, like people. Christ for a while endured great troubles,
and so must His members.
1. In all terror of conscience we must look to Christ. We keep the fire from our faces
and eyes with screens; but they are wise who put between their souls and God’s
wrath the screen of Christ’s reconciliation, lest this fire burn to the pit of
destruction. This stills the conscience, and fills it with good hope.
2. This must make us cleave unto Christ, even to let our tenderest bowels love Him
who has done this for us.
3. Seeing Christ alone is the author of all true peace, this should cause us to seek to
be under His kingdom, yea, to give our eyelids no rest till we have enlisted in the
army of Christ. Look how you would do, if the enemy had entered your gates, taken
your wives and children, spoiled you of your goods. If there were a town near you,
where you might prevent such danger, and find safe protection, and live peaceably
and securely, who would not with all expedition betake himself thither?
4. Seek to be, like Christ, a peace maker.
5. How miserable the condition of all out of Christ. (Paul Bayne.)
Christ the Peace of His people
I. The substitution.
1. This substitution of Christ in behalf of His mystical body is primary, original. It
runs as far back as the council of peace. He became our Peace then, when He
entered into the covenant of peace, met the stipulation for peace, undertook to
satisfy all the demands of law and justice for peace, and pledged Himself to be that
peace.
2. It is permanent--it runs through every dispensation of the Church of the living
God. There was not one sort of gospel to preach to Abraham, and another to preach
to the present race of sinners. The doctrine of substitution runs through the whole of
the Mosaic economy, and hence it is permanent, and comes down to the present

48. moment of the existence of the Church upon earth.
II. The union. The smallest finger in my hand can move, can grasp, can unite with
the other, in any effort that is put forth, because it is one with the hand, one with the
body, and derives its life and strength and blood from thence; but sever my little
finger from my hand, and it has no more strength--it is utterly useless. “Apart from
Me,” says Christ, “ye can do nothing.” But in vital union with Jesus, the strength
which is His flows to the feeblest and weakest member, and is put forth in the
mighty actings of faith, and the holy energies of the new man. Moreover, this union
is so experimental as always to produce communion. It is close, it is grasping, it is
uniting, it is abiding, it is mutual in interest. Moreover, it is evident and manifest,
because the world must see that the union which grace has effected between our
souls and Christ, has cut asunder the tie which once existed between us and them,
has cut asunder the union which made us once very fond of their fooleries.
III. The participation. His justice is perfectly satisfied on my behalf, that I may look
upon the bleeding Christ, the rising Christ, the exalted Christ, and the interceding
Christ, and say with Paul, “He loved me, and gave Himself for me.” What serenity!
A satisfactory, solid, sacred, holy, serenity of soul; a heavenly calm, a believing
acquiescence in the love, and power, and grace, and goodness, of my God, not only
in matters relating to Providence around me, but in matters relating to my soul’s
everlasting salvation. (J. Irons.)
The Prince of Peace
I. He is “our Peace,” in that He makes peace. Peace between God and man--
“reconciling both (Jew and Gentile) unto God--by the Cross, having slain the enmity
thereby” (Eph_2:16).
II. He is “our Peace,” in that He gives peace. “My peace I give unto you--let not your
heart be troubled” (Joh_14:27). Or, as it is put here, “came and preached peace to
you who were afar off” (Eph_2:17).
III. He is “our Peace,” in that He promotes peace. “Who hath made both (Jews and
Gentiles) one” (Eph_2:14). This is ever the practical outcome of the rule of “The

49. Prince of Peace.” He promotes peace.
1. In the family, subduing the elements of strife and discord.
2. In the neighbourhood, as every successful missionary at home and abroad can
testify.
3. In the Church.
4. Among nations.
ote: These senses in which Christ is “our Peace” are progressive. He has made
peace for us, for all men, by His atoning work. He may be our peace, speaking peace
within, quieting the tumult of doubt and fear (Mat_11:28-30). And, if we are His, He
will promote peace through, and by means of us in every circle in which we move
and in every place in which we have influence. (Joseph Ogle.)
Peace already made
When a poor bricklayer who had fallen from a great height was lying fatally injured
he was visited by a minister in the neighbourhood. On entering the cottage he said,
“My dear man, I am afraid you are dying. I exhort you to make your peace with
God.” “Make my peace with God, sir! Why, that was made eighteen hundred years
ago, when my great and glorious Lord paid all my debt upon the cruel tree. Christ is
my Peace, and I am saved.”
Peace and comfort through the Atonement
There is no chance whatever of our finding a pillow for a head which the Holy
Ghost has made to ache save in the atonement and the finished work of Christ.
When Mr. Robert Hall first went to Cambridge to preach, the Cambridge folks
were nearly Unitarians. So he preached upon the doctrine of the finished work of
Christ, and some of them came to him in the vestry and said, “Mr. Hall, this will
never do.” “Why not?” said he. “Why, your sermon was only fit for old women.”
“And why only fit for old women?” said Mr. Hall. “Because,” said they, “they are
tottering on the borders of the grave, and they want comfort, and, therefore, it will
suit them, but it will not do for us.” “Very well,” said Mr. Hall, “you have
unconsciously paid me all the compliment that I can ask for; if this is good for old
women on the, borders of the grave, it must be good for you if you are in your right
senses, for the borders of the grave is where we all stand.” Here, indeed, is a choice
feature of the Atonement, it is comforting to us in the thought of death. (C. H.
Spurgeon.)

50. Peace in Jesus only
As the needle in a compass trembles till it settles in the north point, so the heart of a
sinner can get no rest but in Christ.
Peace through Christ
In the Pitti Palace, at Florence, there are two pictures which hang side by side. One
represents a stormy sea with its wild waves, and black clouds and fierce lightnings
flashing across the sky. In the waters a human face is seen, wearing an expression of
the utmost agony and despair. The other picture also represents a sea, tossed by as
fierce a storm, with as dark clouds; but out of the midst of the waves a rock rises,
against which the waters dash in vain. In a cleft of a rock are some tufts of grass and
green herbage, with sweet flowers, and amid these a dove is seen sitting on her nest,
quiet and undisturbed by the wild fury of the storm. The first picture fitly
represents the sorrow of the world when all is helpless and despairing; and the
other, the sorrow of the Christian, no less severe,. but in which he is kept in perfect
peace, because he nestles in the bosom of God’s unchanging love. (American.)
The partition wall removed
1. Every man by nature, in himself, and without Christ, is at war and enmity with
God, with His Church, and chiefly those in the Church who are truly regenerate.
2. This enmity could only be removed by Christ’s bloodshed and death.
3. The uniting of both Jew and Gentile in one Church is a branch of the peace which
Christ has purchased.
4. From the apostle’s designing the ceremonial law by a metaphor taken from
houses divided by a mid-wall, or from an orchard, garden, or inclosure, separated
from the outfield by a dyke or wall of rough stones, we learn several things relating
to the nature, use, and duration of the ceremonial law, which are the grounds of the
similitude. And first, as a wall is built by the owner of the enclosure, so the
ceremonial law was by God’s own appointment (Deu_32:8; Exo_25:40). Secondly, as
a rough wall is made up of so many hard, unpolished stones, not covered over with
lime or plaster; so the ceremonial law consisted of many ordinances (Heb_9:10), and
those very difficult to be obeyed, and an intolerable yoke (Act_15:10). Thirdly, as a
wall or hedge encloseth a piece of ground for the owner’s special use (which
therefore is more painfully manured), and separateth that enclosure from the
outfield which lieth about it; so the ceremonial law did serve to enclose the people of
Israel, as the Lord’s own garden and vineyard, for bringing forth fruit unto Himself
(Isa_5:7), and to separate them from all the world besides (Deu_4:7-8), as being a
worship wholly different from and contrary unto the superstitious rites and worship
used among the Gentiles (Deu_12:2), and containing strict injunctions unto the Jews

51. to avoid all conformity with the Gentiles in their garments ( um_15:38), cutting of
their hair (Lev_19:27), and such like. Fourthly, as a rough wall is but weak and
ruinous, as not being built with cement or mortar to make it strong, and therefore
but to endure for a season, until the owner think fit to enlarge his enclosure and
take in more of the open field; so the ceremonial law was not to last forever, but only
for a time, until Christ should come in the flesh, and take in the Gentiles within the
enclosure of His Church, who were before an open field, not possessed nor manured
by Him; after which there was no further use of the mid-wall.
5. So long as the ceremonial law did stand in force and vigour, the Jews and Gentiles
could not be united into one Church: for seeing by that law the chief parts of God’s
worship were restricted to the Temple at Jerusalem; therefore, though scattered
proselytes of the neighbouring nations did join themselves to the Church of the
Jews, and in some measure observed the way of worship then enjoined (Act_8:27),
yet there was a physical impossibility for the generality of many nations far remote
from Jerusalem to have served God according to the prescript of worship which
then was: besides, there was such an habituate and as it were a natural antipathy
transmitted from one generation unto another among the Gentiles against the
ceremonial worship, that there was little less than a moral impossibility of bringing
up the body of the Gentiles unto a cordial joining with the Jews in it: for the apostle
showeth the ceremonial law behoved to be abrogated, in order to a union betwixt
these two, while he saith, “Who hath made both one, and broken down the middle
wall of partition between us.”
6. Whoever would make peace betwixt God and himself, or betwixt himself and
others, he ought seriously to think upon those things which stand in the way of
peace, and set about the removal of them, if it be in his power, and chiefly those evils
in himself, of pride, vain-glory, self-seeking, and a contentious disposition, which are
great obstructions in the way of peace (Php_2:3-4); else, whatever, be his pretenses
for peace, he is no real follower of it: for, Christ intending to make peace betwixt
Jew and Gentile, did take away whatever might have impeded it; He even “broke
down the middle wall of partition between them.” (James Fergusson.)
Reconciliation through Christ
Themistocles having offended King Philip, and not knowing how to regain his
favour, took his young son, Alexander, in his arms, and so presented himself before
the king; and when he saw the boy smile on him, it very soon appeased the wrath
within him. So the sinner should approach God with His Son Jesus Christ within
him.
The need of reconciliation
Certainly a soul, sensible as to what the loss of communion with God is, counts it
hath not fulfilled all its errand, when it hath bare peace given it. Should God say,

52. “Soul, I am friends with thee, I have ordered that thou shalt never go to hell, here is
a discharge under My hand that thou shalt never be arrested for any debt more: but
as for any fellowship with Me, thou canst expect none: I have done with thee
forever, never to be acquainted with thee more.” Certainly the soul would find little
joy with such peace. Were the fire out as to positive torments, yet a hell would be
left in the dismal darkness which the soul would sit under for want of God’s
presence. A wicked heart seeks reconciliation without any longing after fellowship
with God. Like the traitor, if the king will but pardon and save him from the
gallows, he is ready to promise him never to trouble him at Court; ‘tis his own life,
not the king’s favour, he desires. (W. Gurnall.)
15
by abolishing in his flesh the law with its
commandments and regulations. His purpose was
to create in himself one new man out of the two,
thus making peace,
BAR ES, "Having abolished - Having brought to naught, or put an end to it -
καταργήσας katargēsas.
In his flesh - By the sacrifice of his body on the cross. It was not by instruction
merely; it was not by communicating the knowledge of God; it was not as a teacher; it
was not by the mere exertion of power; it was by his flesh - his human nature - and this
can mean only that he did it by his sacrifice of himself. It is such language as is
appropriate to the doctrine of the atonement - not indeed teaching it directly - but still
such as one would use who believed that doctrine, and such as no other one would
employ. Who would now say of a moral teacher that he accomplished an important
result by “his flesh?” Who would say of a man that was instrumental in reconciling his
contending neighbors, that he did it “by his flesh?” Who would say of Dr. Priestley that
he established Unitarianism “in his flesh?” No man would have ever used this language
who did not believe that Jesus died as a sacrifice for sin.
The enmity - Between the Jew and the Gentile. Tyndale renders this, “the cause of
hatred, that is to say, the law of commandments contained in the law written.” This is
expressive of the true sense. The idea is, that the ceremonial law of the Jews, on which
they so much prided themselves, was the cause of the hostility existing between them.

53. That made them different people, and laid the foundation for the alienation which
existed between them. They had different laws; different institutions; a different
religion. The Jews looked upon themselves as the favorites of heaven, and as in
possession of the knowledge of the only way of salvation; the Gentiles regarded their
laws with contempt, and looked upon the unique institutions with scorn. When Christ
came and abolished by his death their special ceremonial laws, of course the cause of this
alienation ceased.
Even the law of commandments - The law of positive commandments. This does
not refer to the “moral” law, which was not the cause of the alienation, and which was
not abolished by the death of Christ, but to the laws commanding sacrifices, festivals,
fasts, etc., which constituted the uniqueness of the Jewish system. These were the
occasion of the enmity between the Jews and the Gentiles, and these were abolished by
the great sacrifice which the Redeemer made; and of course when that was made, the
purpose for which these laws were instituted was accomplished, and they ceased to be of
value and to be binding.
Contained in ordinances - In the Mosaic commandments. The word “ordinance”
means, decree, edict, law; Luk_2:1; Act_16:4; Act_17:7; Col_2:14.
For to make in himself - By virtue of his death, or under him as the head.
Of twain one new man - Of the two - Jews and Gentiles - one new spiritual person;
that they might be united. The idea is, that as two persons who had been at enmity,
might become reconciled and be one in aim and pursuit, so it was in the effect of the
work of Christ on the Jews and Gentiles. When they were converted they would be
united and harmonious.
CLARKE, "Having abolished in his flesh - By his incarnation and death he not
only made an atonement for sin, but he appointed the doctrine of reconciliation to God,
and of love to each other, to be preached in all nations; and thus glory was brought to
God in the highest, and on earth, peace and good will were diffused among men.
The enmity of which the apostle speaks was reciprocal among the Jews and Gentiles.
The former detested the Gentiles, and could hardly allow them the denomination of
men; the latter had the Jews in the most sovereign contempt, because of the peculiarity
of their religious rites and ceremonies, which were different from those of all the other
nations of the earth.
The law of commandments - Contained in, or rather concerning, ordinances;
which law was made merely for the purpose of keeping the Jews a distinct people, and
pointing out the Son of God till he should come. When, therefore, the end of its
institution was answered, it was no longer necessary; and Christ by his death abolished
it.
To make in himself - To make one Church out of both people, which should be
considered the body of which Jesus Christ is the head. Thus he makes one new man -
one new Church; and thus he makes and establishes peace. I think the apostle still
alludes to the peace-offering, ‫שלום‬ shalom, among the Jews. They have a saying, Sephra,
fol. 121: Whosoever offers a peace-offering sacrifice, brings peace to the world. Such a
peace-offering was the death of Christ, and by it peace is restored to the earth.

54. GILL, "Having abolished in his flesh the enmity,.... The ceremonial law, as
appears by what follows,
even the law of commandments contained in ordinances; which consisted of
many precepts, and carnal ordinances; and is so called because it was an indication of
God's hatred of sin, by requiring sacrifice for it; and because it was an occasion of
stirring up the enmity of the natural man, it being a burden and a weariness to the flesh,
by reason of its many and troublesome rites; and because it was the cause of enmity
between Jew and Gentile: the Jews say (g), that Sinai, the mount on which the law was
given, signifies "hatred"; and that it is so called because from it descended ‫,שנאה‬ "hatred"
or "enmity" to the nations of the world: now this Christ abolished, "in his flesh", or by it;
not by his incarnation, but by the sacrifice of his flesh, or human nature, and that as in
union with his divine nature; but not until he had fulfilled it in himself, which was one
end of his coming into the world; and then he abolished it, so as that it ought not to be,
and so as that it is not, and of no use and service; and that because it was faulty and
deficient, weak and unprofitable, as well as intolerable; and because there was a change
in the priesthood; and because it was contrary to a spirit of liberty, the great blessing of
the Gospel; and that there might be a reconciliation and a coalition between Jew and
Gentile, as follows:
for to make in himself of twain one new man, so making peace; which explains
what is meant before by making both one; and expresses the strictness of the union
between Jew and Gentile, they became as one man; and points at the manner in which
they became so strictly united; and that is by being made new men, or new creatures, by
having a work of grace upon their souls, and so baptized into one body, and made to
drink of one and the same Spirit; the foundation of which union is in himself; for Jew
and Gentile, male and female, bond and free, are all one in Christ Jesus; he is the
cornerstone in which they all meet, and the head to which the whole body is joined.
JAMISO , "Rather, make “enmity” an apposition to “the middle wall of partition”;
“Hath broken down the middle wall of partition (not merely as English Version,
‘between us,’ but also between all men and God), to wit, the enmity (Rom_8:7) by His
flesh” (compare Eph_2:16; Rom_8:3).
the law of commandments contained in — Greek, “the law of the
commandments (consisting) in ordinances.” This law was “the partition” or “fence,”
which embodied the expression of the “enmity” (the “wrath” of God against our sin, and
our enmity to Him, Eph_2:3) (Rom_4:15; Rom_5:20; Rom_7:10, Rom_7:11; Rom_8:7).
Christ has in, or by, His crucified flesh, abolished it, so far as its condemning and
enmity-creating power is concerned (Col_2:14), substituting for it the law of love, which
is the everlasting spirit of the law, and which flows from the realization in the soul of His
love in His death for us. Translate what follows, “that He might make the two (Jews and
Gentiles) into one new man.” Not that He might merely reconcile the two to each other,
but incorporate the two, reconciled in Him to God, into one new man; the old man to
which both belonged, the enemy of God, having been slain in His flesh on the cross.
Observe, too, ONE new man; we are all in God’s sight but one in Christ, as we are but
one in Adam [Alford].
making peace — primarily between all and God, secondarily between Jews and
Gentiles; He being “our peace.” This “peace-making” precedes its publication (Eph_
2:17).

55. RWP, "Having abolished (katargēsas). First aorist active participle of katargeō, to
make null and void.
The enmity (tēn echthran). But it is very doubtful if tēn echthran (old word from
echthros, hostile, Luk_23:12) is the object of katargēsas. It looks as if it is in apposition
with to mesotoichon and so the further object of lusas. The enmity between Jew and
Gentile was the middle wall of partition. And then it must be decided whether “in his
flesh” (en tēi sarki autou) should be taken with lusas and refer especially to the Cross (Col_
1:22) or be taken with katargēsas. Either makes sense, but better sense with lusas.
Certainly “the law of commandments in ordinances (ton nomon tōn entolōn en dogmasin)
is governed by katargēsas.
That he might create (hina ktisēi). Final clause with first aorist active subjunctive
of ktizō.
The twain (tous duo). The two men (masculine here, neuter in Eph_2:14), Jew and
Gentile.
One new man (eis hena kainon anthrōpon). Into one fresh man (Col_3:9-11) “in
himself” (en hautōi). Thus alone is it possible.
Making peace (poiōn eirēnēn). Thus alone can it be done. Christ is the peace-maker
between men, nations, races, classes.
CALVI , "15.Having abolished in his flesh the enmity. The meaning of Paul’ words
is now clear. The middle wall of partition hindered Christ from forming Jews and
Gentiles into one body, and therefore the wall has been broken down. The reason
why it is broken down is now added — to abolish the enmity, by the flesh of Christ.
The Son of God, by assuming a nature common to all, has formed in his own body a
perfect unity.
Even the law of commandments contained in ordinances. What had been
metaphorically understood by the word wall is now more plainly expressed. The
ceremonies, by which the distinction was declared, have been abolished through
Christ. What were circumcision, sacrifices, washings, and abstaining from certain
kinds of food, but symbols of sanctification, reminding the Jews that their lot was
different from that of other nations; just as the white and the red cross distinguish
the French of the present day from the inhabitants of Burgundy. Paul declares not
only that the Gentiles are equally with the Jews admitted to the fellowship of grace,
so that they no longer differ from each other, but that the mark of difference has
been taken away; for ceremonies have been abolished. If two contending nations
were brought under the dominion of one prince, he would not only desire that they
should live in harmony, but would remove the badges and marks of their former

56. enmity. When an obligation is discharged, the handwriting is destroyed, — a
metaphor which Paul employs on this very subject in another Epistle. (128) (Col_
2:14.)
Some interpreters, (129) — though, in my opinion, erroneously, — connect the
words, in ordinances, with abolished, making the ordinances to be the act of
abolishing the ceremonies. This is Paul’ ordinary phrase for describing the
ceremonial law, in which the Lord not only enjoined upon the Jews a simple rule of
life, but also bound them by various statutes. It is evident, too, that Paul is here
treating exclusively of the ceremonial law; for the moral law is not a wall of
partition separating us from the Jews, but lays down instructions in which the Jews
were not less deeply concerned than ourselves. This passage affords the means of
refuting an erroneous view held by some, that circumcision and all the ancient rites,
though they are not binding on the Gentiles, are in force at the present day upon the
Jews. On this principle there would still be a middle wall of partition between us,
which is proved to be false.
That he might make in himself. When the apostle says, in himself, he turns away the
Ephesians from viewing the diversity of men, and bids them look for unity nowhere
but in Christ. To whatever extent the two might differ in their former condition, in
Christ they are become one man. But he emphatically adds, one new man,
intimating (what he explains at greater length on another occasion) that
“ circumcision, nor uncircumcision, availeth anything,” (Gal_6:15,)
but that “ new creature” holds the first and the last place. The principle which
cements them is spiritual regeneration. If then we are all renewed by Christ, let the
Jews no longer congratulate themselves on their ancient condition, but let them be
ready to admit that, both in themselves and in others, Christ is all.
(128) ᾿Εν δόγµασι — “ ∆όγµα is equivalent to the participial form — τὸ δεδογµένον,
and has its apparent origin in the common phrases which prefaced a proclamation
or statute— ἔδοξε τῷ λαῷ καὶ τὣ βουλὣ. In the ew Testament it signifies decree,
and is applied (Luk_2:1) to the edict of Caesar, and in Act_17:7, it occurs with a
similar reference. But not only does it signify imperial statutes; it is also the name
given to the decrees of the ecclesiastical council in Jerusalem. (Act_16:4.) It is found,
too, in the parallel passage in Col_2:14. In the Septuagint its meaning is the same;
and in the sense first quoted, that of royal mandate, it is frequently used in the book
of Daniel.” — Eadie.
(129) Theodoret, Theophylact, and others.
BI, "Having abolished in His flesh the enmity, even the law of commandments
contained in ordinances; for to make in Himself of twain one new man.

57. Christ abolishing the enmity
In this difficult passage it will be well first to examine the particular expressions.
1. The word rendered “to abolish” is the word often used by St. Paul for “to
supersede by something better than itself”--translated “to make void,” in Rom_3:31;
to “bring to nought,” in 1Co_1:28, and (in the passive) “to fail, to vanish away,” to
be done away,” in 1Co_13:8-10. ow, of the relation of Christ to the Law, St. Paul
says, in Rom_3:31, “Do we make void the Law? God forbid! Yea, we establish the
Law.” The Law, therefore, is abolished as a law “in ordinances”--that is, “in the
letter”--and is established in the spirit.
2. “The law of commandments in ordinances.” The word here rendered “ordinance”
(dogma)
properly means “a decree.” It is used only in this sense in the ew Testament (see
Luk_2:1; Act_16:4; Act_17:7; Heb_11:23); and it signifies expressly a law imposed
and accepted, not for its intrinsic righteousness, but on authority; or, as Butler
expresses it (Anal., Part 2, chap. 1)
, not a “moral,” but “a positive law.” In Col_2:14 (the parallel passage) the word is
connected with a “handwriting,” that is, a legal “bond”; and the Colossians are
reproved for subjecting themselves to “ordinances, which are but a shadow of things
to come”; while “the body,” the true substance, “is Christ” (see verses 16, 17, 20,
21).
3. Hence the whole expression describes explicitly what St. Paul always implies in
his proper and distinctive use of the word “law.” It signifies the will of God, as
expressed in formal commandments, and enforced by penalties on disobedience. The
general idea, therefore, of the passage is simply that which is so often brought out in
the earlier Epistles (see Rom_3:21-31; Rom_7:1-4; Rom_8:1-4; Gal_2:15-21, et al.),
but which (as the Colossian Epistle more plainly shows) now needed to be enforced
under a somewhat different form--viz., that Christ, “the end of the law,” had
superseded it by the free covenant of the Spirit; and that He has done this for us “in
His flesh,” especially by His death and resurrection.
4. But in what sense is thin Law called “the enmity,” which (see verse 16) was
“slain” on the cross? Probably in the double sense, which runs through the passage:
first, as “an enmity,” a cause of separation and hostility, between the Gentiles and
those Jews whom they called “the enemies of the human race”; next, as “an enmity,”
a cause of alienation and condemnation, between man and God--“the commandment
which was ordained to life, being found to be unto death” through the rebellion and
sin of man. The former sense seems to be the leading sense here, where the idea is of
“making both one”; the latter in the next verse, which speaks of “reconciling both to

58. God,” all the partitions are broken down, that all alike may have “access to the
Father.” Compare Col_1:21, “You, who were enemies in your mind, He hath
reconciled”; and Heb_10:19, “Having confidence to enter into the holy place by the
blood of Jesus, by a new and living way, which He hath consecrated to us, through
the veil, that is to say His flesh.” (A. Barry, D. D.)
Abolition of the ceremonial, but not of the moral, law
1. As God’s people, in covenant with Him, ought to be highly incensed against and
averse from any voluntary entire fellowship with those who neglect and contemn the
ordinances of worship prescribed by God in His Word; so those who are without the
Church, yea, and all unregenerate men, do look upon the ordinances of God’s
worship as base, ridiculous, and contemptible, and carry a kind of hatred and
disdain to all such as make conscience of them: for so the ancient worship,
prescribed in the ceremonial law, was the occasion of hatred and enmity betwixt the
Gentile, who contemned it, and the Jew, who made conscience of it. And, therefore,
is here called the “enmity”; “having abolished the enmity.”
2. As the moral law, contained in the Ten Commandments, was no part of that mid-
wall of partition between Jew and Gentile, seeing some of the drafts and lineaments
of that law are upon the hearts of all by nature (Rom_2:15); so there was no
necessity to abrogate this law at Christ’s death, in order to the uniting of Jew and
Gentile, neither was it at all abolished; for the law abolished was the law, not
simply, but “the law of commandments,” and these not all, but such commandments
as were “contained in ordinances,” to wit, the ceremonial law; “even the law of
commandments contained in ordinances,” saith he.
3. As God only hath power and liberty to prescribe what manner of worship He will
be served by, so He did once give a most observable evidence of this His power and
liberty, by changing that external way of worship which was prescribed by Himself,
under the Old Testament, unto another under the ew; although the internals of
His worship, to wit, the graces of faith, love, hope, joy in God, do remain the same in
both (Mat_22:37; Mat_22:39); for He “did abolish the law of commandments
contained in ordinances,” even all the ancient worship consisting in rites and
ceremonies, sensibly and fleshly observations, which God did then prescribe, not as
simply delighted in them, but as accommodating Himself to the childish condition of
the Church in those times; and hath now appointed a more spiritual way of
worship, as more suitable to the grown age of the Church (Joh_4:21; Joh_4:23).
4. It was Christ’s sufferings and death which put an end to the law of ceremonies,
and made the binding power thereof to cease; for seeing His sufferings were the
body and substance of all those shadows, they neither did nor could evanish until
Christ had suffered, but then they did; it being impossible that a shadow, and the
body, whereof it is a shadow, can consist in one and the same place; “Having
abolished in His flesh the law of commandments contained in ordinances.” (James

59. Fergusson.)
One new man in Christ
In this clause and the following verse the two senses, hitherto united, are now
distinguished from each other. Here we have the former sense simply. In the new
man “there is neither Jew nor Gentile,” but “Christ is all and in all” Col_3:12). This
phrase, “the new man” (on which see Eph_4:24; Col_2:10), is peculiar to these
Epistles; corresponding, however, to the “new creature” of 2Co_5:17; Gal_6:15; and
the “newness of life” and “spirit” of Rom_6:4; Rom_7:6. Christ Himself is the
“second man, the Lord from Heaven” (1Co_15:47). “As we have borne the image of
the first man, of the earth, earthy,” and so “in Adam die,” we now “bear the image
of the heavenly,” and not only “shall be made alive,” but already “have our life hid
with Christ in God” (Col_3:3). He is at once “the seed of the woman” and the “seed
of Abraham”; in Him, therefore, Jew and Gentile meet in a common humanity. Just
in proportion to spirituality or newness of life is the sense of unity, which makes all
brethren. Hence the new creation “makes peace”--here probably peace between Jew
and Gentile, rather than peace with God, which belongs to the next verse. (A. Barry,
D. D.)
Union in the Church
1. Union in the Church of Christ is a thing which ought to be prized by us highly,
and sought after earnestly; and so much, as there is nothing in our power which we
ought not to bestow upon it, and dispense with for the acquiring and maintaining of
it; for so much was it prized by Christ, that He gave His own life to procure it, and
did beat down all His own ordinances which stood in the way of it; “He even
abolished in His flesh the law of commandments contained in ordinances, for to
make of twain one new man.”
2. There are no divisions more hardly curable, than those which are about the
religion and worship of God, in so far as they engage not only the credit, but also the
consciences of the divided parties; hence one party, so engaged, doth pursue what
they maintain, as that wherein God’s honour and their own salvation are most
nearly concerned, and doth look upon the other party as an adversary, in so far at
least, to both of those; for the apostle, speaking of Christ’s uniting the Jew and
Gentile in one Church and religion, maketh use of a word which showeth this was a
task of no small difficulty, even such, that no less than creating power was required
to it, while He saith, “for to make in Himself (the word signifieth ‘to create in
Himself’) of twain one new man.”
3. So strict and near is that conjunction and union which is especially among true
believers in the Church, that all of them, how far soever dispersed through the

60. world, do yet make up but one man and one body; as being all, whatever be their
other differences, most strictly united, as members under one head, Christ (1Co_
12:27), and animated, as to the inward man, by the same Spirit of God residing and
acting in them (Rom_8:9); for the apostle showeth that all of them, whether Jew or
Gentile, were made, not only one people, one nation, one family, but one new man;
“For to make of twain one new man.”
4. As the essential unity of the invisible Church, without which the Church could not
be a Church, doth of necessity depend upon and flow from that union which every
particular member hath with Christ, as head, seeing the grace of love (whereby they
are knit one to another (Col_3:14) doth flow from faith (Gal_5:6), whereby they are
united to Him (Eph_3:17), so the more our union with Christ is improved unto the
keeping of constant communion and fellowship with Him, the more will be attained
unto of harmonious walking among ourselves, suitable unto that essential union
which is in the Church of Christ; for the apostle maketh the conjunction of Jews
and Gentiles in one Church to depend upon Christ’s uniting of them to Himself;
“For to make in Himself of twain one new man,” saith He.
5. The peace which ought to be, and which Christ calleth for in His Church, is not a
simple cessation from open strife, which may take place even when there remaineth
a root of bitterness in people’s spirit (Psa_55:21); but it is such an harmonious
walking together in all things as floweth from the nearest conjunction of hearts, and
the total removal of all former bitterness of spirits; for the peace which Christ did
make betwixt Jew and Gentile did follow upon His abolishing the enmity, and
making them one man; “so making peace,” saith he. (James Fergusson.)
The use of the law
The wife of a drunkard once found her husband in a filthy condition, with torn
clothes, matted hair, bruised face, asleep in the kitchen, having come home from a
drunken revel. She sent for a photographer, and had a portrait of him taken in all
his wretched appearance, and placed it on the mantel beside another portrait taken
at the time of his marriage, which showed him handsome and well dressed, as he
had been in other days. When he became sober he saw the two pictures, and
awakened to a consciousness of his condition, from which he arose to a better life.
ow, the office of the law is not to save men, but to show them their true state as
compared with the Divine standard. It is like a glass, in which one sooth “what
manner of man he is.”
16

61. and in this one body to reconcile both of them to
God through the cross, by which he put to death
their hostility.
BAR ES, "And that he might reconcile both unto God - This was another of
the effects of the work of redemption, and indeed the main effect. It was not merely to
make them harmonious, but it was that both, who had been alienated from God, should
be reconciled to “him.” This was a different effect from that of producing peace between
themselves, though in some sense the one grew out of the other. They who are reconciled
to God will be at peace with each other. They will feel that they are of the same family,
and are all brethren. On the subject of reconciliation, see the notes on 2Co_5:18.
In one body - One spiritual personage - the church; see the notes at Eph_1:23.
By the cross - By the atonement which he made on the cross; see Col_1:20; compare
the notes at Rom_3:25. It is by the atonement only that men ever become reconciled to
God.
Having slain the enmity - Not only the enmity between Jews and Gentiles, but the
enmity between the sinner and God. He has by that death removed all the obstacles to
reconciliation on the part of God and on the part of man. It is made efficacious in
removing the enmity of the sinner against God, and producing peace.
Thereby - Margin, “in himself.” The meaning is, in his cross, or by means of his cross.
CLARKE, "That he might reconcile both - in one body - That the Jews and
Gentiles, believing on the Lord Jesus, might lay aside all their causes of contention, and
become one spiritual body, or society of men, influenced by the Spirit, and acting
according to the precepts of the Gospel.
Having slain the enmity thereby - Having, by his death upon the cross, made
reconciliation between God and man, and by his Spirit in their hearts removed the
enmity of their fallen, sinful nature. Dr. Macknight thinks that abolishing the enmity is
spoken of the removal of the hatred which the Jews and Gentiles mutually bore to each
other, because of the difference of their respective religious worship; and that slaying the
enmity refers to the removal of evil lusts and affections from the heart of man, by the
power of Divine grace. This is nearly the sense given above.
GILL, "And that he might reconcile both unto God,.... This is another end of the
abrogation of the ceremonial law: the Jews had run up a long score against the
ceremonial law, as well as against the moral law; and Christ by fulfilling it for them, and
thereby abrogating it, reconciled them; and the Gentiles could not be reconciled together
with them, without the abrogation of it: and this reconciliation of them is made to God,

62. who was the person offended; and who yet first set on foot a reconciliation, in which his
glory is greatly concerned; and reconciliation with others depends upon reconciliation
with him: and this is made
in one body by the cross; by which "body" is meant, the human body of Christ, which
the Father prepared for him, and he assumed, and that in order to make reconciliation
for his people; and is said to be "one" body, because it was in one and the same body,
which he reconciled both Jews and Gentiles unto God, and in or by one sacrifice of that
body; reconciliation being so effectually made by it that there is no need of a reiteration:
or the sense is, he reconciled them into "one body"; into one mystical body, the church,
of which he is head; and this he did "by the cross", that is, by his blood shed on the cross,
or by his suffering the death of the cross; which shows that reconciliation is made in a
way of satisfaction to the law and justice of God, by Christ's bearing the penalty of the
law, and suffering the strokes of justice on the cross; and expresses the efficacy of his
blood and sacrifice, and the greatness of his condescension and love:
having slain the enmity thereby; the ceremonial law, as before; and the slaying it is
the same with abolishing it; unless the enmity between God and man is meant, which
was slain by removing the cause of it, sin; and which laid a foundation for the slaying of
it in the hearts of his people in regeneration, when sin is made odious to them, and they
are reconciled to God's way of salvation; hence being slain in both senses, peace with
God can never be broken.
JAMISO , "Translate, “might altogether reconcile them both in one body (the
Church, Col_3:15) unto God through His cross.” The Greek for “reconcile” (apocatalaxe),
found only here and in Col_1:20, expresses not only a return to favor with one
(catallage), but so to lay aside enmity that complete amity follows; to pass from enmity to
complete reconciliation [Tittmann].
slain the enmity — namely, that had been between man and God; and so that
between Jew and Gentile which had resulted from it. By His being slain, He slew it
(compare Heb_2:14).
thereby — Greek, “therein”; “in” or “by the cross,” that is, His crucifixion (Col_2:15).
RWP, "And might reconcile (kai apokatallaxēi). Final clause with hina understood
of first aorist active subjunctive of apokatallassō for which see note on Col_1:20, Col_
1:22.
Them both (tous amphoterous). “The both,” “the two” (tous duo), Jew and Gentile.
In one body (en heni sōmati). The “one new man” of Eph_2:15 of which Christ is
Head (Eph_1:23), the spiritual church. Paul piles up metaphors to express his idea of
the Kingdom of God with Christ as King (the church, the body, the commonwealth of
Israel, oneness, one new man in Christ, fellow-citizens, the family of God, the temple of
God).
Thereby (en autōi). On the Cross where he slew the enmity (repeated here) between
Jew and Gentile.

63. CALVI , "16.And that he might reconcile both. The reconciliation between
ourselves which has now been described is not the only advantage which we derive
from Christ. We have been brought back into favor with God. The Jews are thus led
to consider that they have not less need of a Mediator than the Gentiles. Without
this, neither the Law, nor ceremonies, nor their descent from Abraham, nor all their
dazzling prerogatives, would be of any avail. We are all sinners; and forgiveness of
sins cannot be obtained but through the grace of Christ. He adds, in one body, to
inform the Jews, that to cultivate union with the Gentiles will be well-pleasing in the
sight of God.
By the cross. The word cross is added, to point out the propitiatory sacrifice. Sin is
the cause of enmity between God and us; and, until it is removed, we shall not be
restored to the Divine favor. It has been blotted out by the death of Christ, in which
he offered himself to the Father as an expiatory victim. There is another reason,
indeed, why the cross is mentioned here, as it is through the cross that all
ceremonies have been abolished. Accordingly, he adds, slaying the enmity thereby.
These words, which unquestionably relate to the cross, may admit of two senses, —
either that Christ, by his death, has turned away from us the Father’ anger, or that,
having redeemed both Jews and Gentiles, he has brought them back into one flock.
The latter appears to be the more probable interpretation, as it agrees with a former
clause, abolishing in his flesh the enmity. (Eph_2:15.)
BURKITT, "1. Our apostle had declared in the foregoing verses, that one end of
Christ's death was, to make peace between Jew and Gentile; here he assures us, a
second end was to make peace between God and man, that he might reconcile both
Jew and Gentile, thus united, to an offended God. This he did by the sacrifice of
himself upon the cross; whereby he did destroy that enmity which was betwixt God
and man, by undergoing the punishment of sin, the cause of that enmity.
Learn hence, That in order to our reconciliation with God, and being at peace with
him, a price was paid by Christ upon the cross, to satisfy divine justice, and atone
divine displeasure.
Observe next, that Christ's having purchased peace, he came and preached peace to
both Jews and Gentiles; to the Gentiles, said here to be afar off, and to the Jews,
that were nigh.
But how did Christ preach to the Gentiles?
Ans. Though he did not in his own person preach peace to the Gentiles, yet he gave
commission to the apostles to preach to them, Mat_28:19-20, and they and their
successors, pursuant to such commission, did preach peace unto them, even to them
that were afar off, and to them that were nigh.
Learn hence, That when the ministers of Christ do come in his name, and by a

64. commission received from him, to preach peace, and offer terms of reconciliation
unto lost sinners, it is all one as if Christ himself did come and preach; he expects
the same readiness from them in receiving the message, as if it were delivered to
them from his own mouth; and will treat the despisers of his ministers, and the
contemners of their message, as if the affront were offered immediately to his own
person.
Observe, 3. The apostle's argument to prove that the Gentiles, as well as the Jews,
were effectually called, by the preaching of the gospel, to partake of peace and
reconciliation with God; because they had both equal access and liberty to approach
unto God in all holy duties, as unto a Father, by the manuduction of the Spirit:
Through him, that is, through Jesus Christ, we, both Jews and Gentiles, have access,
that is, liberty of approach, by one and the same Spirit, unto the Father.
Learn hence, That through Jesus Christ, all believers, of what denomination soever,
have access to God by the Spirit of grace.
Quest. What doth this access to the Father denote?
Ans. It supposes a distance between God and us, both a natural and a moral
distance, as creatures and as sinners: it denotes a propinquity and nearness unto
God, in opposition to this distance; and that our approach to God is free and
voluntary, friendly and complacential, peculiar and privilegeous, fruitful and
advantageous.
Quest. 2. In what respects have believers access to God as to a Father?
Ans. In this life they have access to the Father's heart and love, to the Father's ear
and audience, to the Father's care and protection; to his providing care, to his
guiding and counseling care, to his comforting and supporting care, but especially to
his sanctifying care.
Quest. 3. Through whom have we this access to God?
Ans. Through Jesus Christ, through his mediation and manuduction, we have access
to God's heart, to God's ear, to his fatherly care on earth, and to his gracious
presence in heaven.
Quest. 4. What influence gives the Holy Spirit unto this access unto the Father?
Ans. It is by his influence that they are at first brought home to the Father: he
prepares them for this access unto the Father: he stirs up holy affections, and
enkindles holy desires, in them after God, and helps them to make improvement, an
holy, fruitful, and advantageous improvement, of all their access unto God.

65. BI, "And that He might reconcile both unto God in one body by the Cross, having
slain the enmity thereby.
Reconciliation
1. Our reconciliation itself.
2. The order of it.
(1) Incorporate in Christ.
(2) Concorporate with His members.
3. To whom.
4. The cause.
(1) More remote--Himself crucified.
(2) More immediate--the abolishing of hatred in Himself.
I. By nature we are at enmity with God.
1. ote and bewail thy natural condition.
2. To become God’s friend, become a new creature.
II. In Christ is reconciliation made.
1. The removal of that which was hateful.
2. The love of God is procured.
3. The fruits of His love are communicated.
(1) Make sure of such reconcilement.
(2) Renew it after each breach.
III. We must be incorporated with Christ before we can be reconciled to God. This
incorporation is in the Church, which is Christ’s body. Let us take care that we have

66. it.
IV. Christ, by offering himself upon the cross, has made peace between God and us.
1. We see what we must look to, if the wrath of God stings us. Christ crucified is the
propitiatory sacrifice.
2. It confirms our faith, that the Lord Jesus will bring us to glory (Rom_5:10).
3. A ground of exhortation to all, that they seek to be reconciled. We make the blood
of Christ a vain thing, when we will not be reconciled to God. It is as if a traitor, in
prison for treason, should still plot and practise more villainy; and when the prince
has procured his pardon, should still conspire, and not listen to the benefit, nor set
his heart to return into the king’s favour. (Paul Bayne.)
The power of the gospel to dissolve the enmity of the human heart against God
Let us consider from this text, how it is that the gospel of Jesus Christ suits its
application to the great moral disease of man’s enmity to God. The necessity of some
singular expedient for restoring the love of God to the alienated heart of man, will
appear from the utter impossibility of bringing this about by any direct application
of authority whatever. For, do you think, that the delivery of the law of love in his
hearing, as a positive and indispensable enactment coming forth from the legislature
of heaven, will do it? You may as well pass a law making it imperative upon him to
delight in pain, and to feel comfort on a bed of torture. Or, do you think, that you
will ever give a practical establishment to the law of love, by surrounding it with
accumulated penalties? This may irritate or it may terrify; but for the purpose of
begetting anything like attachment, one may as well think of lashing another into
tender regard for him. Or, do you think, that the terrors of the coming vengeance
will ever incline a human being to love the God who threatens him? Powerful as
these terrors are in persuading man to turn from the evil of his ways; they most
assuredly do not form the artillery by which the heart of man can be carried. They
draw not forth a single affection, but the affection of fear. They never can charm the
human bosom into a feeling of attachment to God. And it goes to prove the necessity
of some singular expedient for restoring man to fellowship with his Maker, that the
only obedience on which this fellowship can be perpetuated, is an obedience which
no threatenings can force; to which no warnings of displeasure can reclaim; which
all the solemn proclamations of law and justice cannot carry; and all the terrors and
severities of a sovereignty resting on power as its only foundation can never subdue.
This, then, is a case of difficulty; and, in the Bible, God is said to have lavished all
the riches of His unsearchable wisdom on the business of managing it. o wonder
that to His angels it appeared a mystery, and that they desired to look into it. It
appears a matter of direct and obvious facility to intimidate man; and to bring his

67. body into a forced subordination to all their requirements. But the great matter was
how to attach man; how to work in him a liking to God and a relish for His
character; or, in other words, how to communicate to human obedience that
principle, without which it is no obedience at all; to make him serve God because he
loved Him; and to run in the way of all His commandments, because this was the
thing in which he greatly delighted himself. To lay upon us the demand of
satisfaction for His violated law could not do it. To press home the claims of justice
upon any sense of authority within us could not do it. To bring forward, in
threatening array, the terrors of His judgment and of His power against us could
not do it. To unveil the glories of that throne where He sitteth in equity, and
manifest to His guilty creatures the awful inflexibilities of His truth and
righteousness, could not do it. To look out from the cloud of vengeance, and trouble
our darkened souls as He did those of the Egyptians of old, with the aspect of a
menacing Deity, could not do it. To spread the field of an undone eternity before us;
and tell us of those dreary abodes where each criminal hath his bed in hell, and the
centuries of despair which pass over him are not counted, because there no seasons
roll, and the unhappy victims of the tribulation, and the wrath, and the anguish,
know, that for the mighty burden of the sufferings which weigh upon them, there is
no end and no mitigation; this prospect, appalling as it is, and coming home upon
the belief, with all the characters of the most immutable certainty, could not do it.
The affections of the inner man remain as unmoved as ever, under the successive
and repeated influence of all these dreadful applications. How, then, is this
regeneration to be wrought, if no threatenings can work it; if no terrors of judgment
can soften the heart into that love of God which forms the chief feature of
repentance; if all the direct applications of law and of righteous authority, and of its
tremendous and immutable sanctions, so far from attaching man in tenderness to
his God, have only the effect of impressing a violent recoil upon all his affections,
and, by the hardening influence of despair, of stirring up in his bosom a more
violent antipathy than ever? Will the high and solemn proclamations of a menacing
Deity not do it? This is not the way in which the heart of man can be carried. He is
so constituted, that the law of love can never, never be established within him by the
engine of terror; and here is the barrier to this regeneration on the part of man. But
if a threat of justice cannot do it, will an act of forgiveness do it? This, again, is not
the way in which God can admit the guilty to acceptance. He is so constituted, that
His truth cannot be trampled upon; and His government cannot be despoiled of its
authority: and its sanctions cannot, with impunity, be defied; and every solemn
utterance of the Deity cannot but find its accomplishment in such a way as may
vindicate His glory, and make the whole creation He has formed stand in awe of its
Almighty Sovereign. And here is another barrier on the part of God; and that
economy of redemption in which a dead and undiscerning world see no skilfulness
to admire, and no feature of graciousness to allure, was so planned, in the upper
counsels of heaven, that it maketh known to principalities and powers the manifold
wisdom of Him who devised it. The men of this infidel generation, whose every
faculty is so bedimmed by the grossness of sense, that they cannot lay hold of the
realities of faith and cannot appreciate them; to them the barriers we have now
insisted on, which lie in the way of man taking God into his love, and of God taking
man into His acceptance, may appear to be so many faint and shadowy

68. considerations, of which they feel not the significancy; but, to the pure and
intellectual eye of angels, they are substantial obstacles, and One mighty to save had
to travail in the greatness of His strength, in order to move them away. The Son of
God descended from heaven, and He took upon Him the nature of man, and He
suffered in his stead, and He consented that the whole burden of offended justice
should fall upon Him, and He bore in His own body on the tree the weight of all
those accomplishments by which His Father behoved to be glorified; and after
having magnified the law and made it honourable, by pouring out His soul unto the
death for us, He went up on high, and, by an arm of everlasting strength, levelled
that wall of partition which lay across the path of acceptance; and thus it is, that the
barrier on the part of God is done away, and He, with untarnished glory, can
dispense forgiveness over the whole extent of a guilty creation, because He can be
just, while He is the justifier of them who believe in Jesus. And if the barrier, on the
part of God, is thus moved aside, why not the barrier on the part of man? Does not
the wisdom of redemption show itself here also? Does it not embrace some skilful
contrivance by which it penetrates those mounds that beset the human heart, and
ward the entrance of the principle of love away from it, and which all the direct
applications of terror and authority, have only the effect of fixing more immovably
upon their basis? Yes, it does; for it changes the aspect of the Deity towards man;
and were men only to have faith in the announcements of the gospel, so as to see
God with the eye of his mind under this new aspect--love to God would spring up in
his heart as the unfailing consequence. Let man see God as He sets Himself forth in
this wonderful revelation, and let him believe the reality of what he sees, and he
cannot but love the Being he is employed in contemplating. And thus it is, that the
goodness of God destroyeth the enmity of the human heart. When every other
argument fails, this, if perceived by the eye of faith, finds its powerful and
persuasive way through every barrier of resistance. Try to approach the heart of
man by the instruments of terror and of authority, and it will disdainfully repel you.
There is not one of you, skilled in the management of human nature, who does not
perceive, that though this may be a way of working on the other principles of our
constitution--of working on the fears of man, or on his sense of interest, this is not
the way of gaining by a single hairbreadth on the attachments of his heart. Such a
way may force, or it may terrify, but it never can endear; and after all the
threatening array of such an influence as this is brought to bear upon man, there is
not one particle of service it can extort from him, but what is all rendered in the
spirit of a painful and reluctant bondage. ow, this is not the service which prepares
for heaven. This is not the service which assimilates men to angels. This is not the
obedience of those glorified spirits, whose every affection harmonizes with their
every performance; and the very essence of whose piety consists of delight in God,
and the love they bear to Him. To bring up man to such an obedience as this, his
heart behoved to be approached in a peculiar way; and no such way is to be found,
but within the limits of the Christian revelation. There alone you see God, without
injury to His other attributes, plying the heart of man with the irresistible argument
of kindness. There alone do you see the great Lord of heaven and of earth, setting
Himself forth to the most worthless and the most wandering of His children; putting
forth His own hand to the work of healing the breach which sin hath made between
them; telling him that His word could not be set aside, and His threatenings could

69. not be mocked, and His justice could not be defied and trampled on, and that it was
not possible for His perfections to receive the slightest taint in the eyes of the
creation He had thrown around Him; but that all this was provided for, and not a
single creature within the compass of the universe He had formed could now say,
that forgiveness to man was degrading to the authority of God; and that by the very
act of atonement, which poured a glory over all the high attributes of His character,
His mercy might now burst forth without limit and without control upon a guilty
world, and the broad flag of invitation be unfurled in the sight of all its families. (T.
Chalmers, D. D.)
Reconciliation through the Cross
I do not know whether there is any truth in the statement of a correspondent that
whatever part of the earth the lightning once strikes it never strikes again, but
whether it be so or not, it is certain that wherever the lightning of God’s vengeance
has once struck the sinner’s substitute it will not strike the sinner. The best
preservative for the Israelite’s house was this--vengeance had struck there and
could not strike again. There was the insurance mark, the blood streak. Death had
been there, it had fallen upon a victim of God’s own appointment, and in His esteem
it had fallen upon Christ, the Lamb slain before the foundation of the world. (C. H.
Spurgeon.)
Peace at the Cross
When the Mohawk Indians desired to be on friendly terms with the white man once
again, they sought an interview with the Governor of ew York, and their
spokesman began by saying, “Where shall I seek the chair of peace? Where shall I
find it but upon our path? and whither does our path lead us but unto this house?”
Is it not so that men come into the sanctuary and approach the throne of grace,
desiring peace, asking peace, and feeling that peace is to be found nowhere else but
there?
Christ’s Cross
Krummacher describes the mysterious Cross as a rock, against which the very
waves of the curse break: as a lightning conductor, by which the destroying, fluid
descends, which would have otherwise destroyed the world with its fire. And Jesus,
who mercifully engaged to direct the thunderbolt against Himself, does so while
hanging yonder in profound darkness upon the Cross. There He is, as the
connecting link between heaven and earth; His bleeding arms extending wide,
stretched out to every sinner: hands pointed to the east and west, indicating the
gathering in of the world of man to His fold. The Cross is directed to the sky, as the
place of His final triumph of the work in redemption; and its foot fixed in the earth

70. like a tree, from whose wondrous branches we gather the precious fruit of an
eternal reconciliation to God and the Father. (Caughey.)
17
He came and preached peace to you who were far
away and peace to those who were near.
BAR ES, "And came and preached peace - That is, the system of religion which
he proclaimed, was adapted to produce peace with God. This he preached personally to
those who “were nigh,” that is, the Jews; to those who were “afar off “ - the Gentiles - he
preached it by his apostles. He was the author of the system which proclaimed salvation
to both.
The word “peace” here refers to reconciliation with God.
To you which were afar off, ... - see the notes at Eph_2:13; compare the notes at
Act_2:39.
CLARKE, "And came and preached peace - Proclaimed the readiness of God to
forgive and save both Jews and Gentiles. See the note on Eph_2:13.
GILL, "And came and preached peace to you which were afar off,.... Which is
to be understood not of Christ's coming in the flesh; for when he came in the flesh, he
came only to the Jews that were nigh, and preached the Gospel in his own personal
ministry to them, and not to the Gentiles, who are the persons afar off; Eph_2:12 but of
his coming by his Spirit in the ministry of his apostles, to whom he gave a commission
after he had made peace and reconciliation by the blood of his cross, to go into all the
world and preach the Gospel to the Gentiles in the furthest parts of the earth; and on
whom he bestowed gifts, qualifying them for such service, and succeeded them in it by
his power and grace: and the subject of their ministry was peace, Christ who is our
peace, and peace made by his blood, and the Gospel of peace, which declares both these;
and it is the means of making persons of peaceable dispositions; its doctrines and
promises, when powerfully applied, give peace to distressed minds, and quiet to
doubting saints; and it shows the way to eternal peace:

71. and to them that were nigh; to the Jews, to whom the Gospel of peace was preached
in the first place, not only by Christ and his apostles, before his death; but by his apostles
after his resurrection, and after the commission was given to preach it to the Gentiles;
though they are mentioned last, because the apostle was speaking to Gentiles; and this
also verifies what Christ says, the first shall be last, and the last first: the Alexandrian
copy, some others, and the Vulgate Latin and Ethiopic versions, read "peace", in this
clause, as in the former; the apostle seems to have respect to Isa_57:19 a like description
and distinction of Jews and Gentiles may be observed in the writings of the Jews (h); so
they say,
"the Israelites are near unto the holy King, and the rest of the nations are far from him.''
JAMISO , "Translate, “He came and announced glad tidings of peace.” “He came” of
His own free love, and “announced peace” with His own mouth to the apostles (Luk_
24:36; Joh_20:19, Joh_20:21, Joh_20:26); and by them to others, through His Spirit
present in His Church (Joh_14:18). Act_26:23 is strictly parallel; after His resurrection
“He showed light to the people (‘them that were nigh’) and to the Gentiles (‘you that
were afar off’),” by His Spirit in His ministers (compare 1Pe_3:19).
and to them — The oldest manuscripts insert “peace” again: “And peace to them.”
The repetition implies the joy with which both alike would dwell again and again upon
the welcome word “peace.” So Isa_57:19.
RWP, "Preached peace (euēggelisato eirēnēn). First aorist middle of euaggelizō. “He
gospelized peace” to both Jew and Gentile, “to the far off ones” (tois makran) and “to the
nigh ones” (tois eggus). By the Cross and after the Cross Christ could preach that
message.
CALVI , "17.And came and preached peace. All that Christ had done towards
effecting a reconciliation would have been of no service, if it had not been
proclaimed by the gospel; and therefore he adds, that the fruit of this peace has now
been offered both to Jews and to Gentiles. Hence it follows, that to save Gentiles as
well as Jews was the design of our Savior’ coming, as the preaching of the gospel,
which is addressed indiscriminately to both, makes abundantly manifest. The same
order is followed in the second Epistle to the Corinthians.
“ hath committed to us the word of reconciliation. ow, then, we are ambassadors
for Christ. For he hath made him to be sin for us who knew no sin.” (2Co_5:18.)
Salvation through the death of Christ is first announced, and a description is
afterwards given of the manner in which Christ communicates to us himself and the
benefit of his death. But here Paul dwells chiefly on this circumstance, that Gentiles
are united with Jews in the Kingdom of God. Having already represented Christ as
a Savior common to both, he now speaks of them as companions in the gospel. The
Jews, though they possessed the law, needed the gospel also; and God had bestowed
upon the Gentiles equal grace. Those therefore whom

72. “ hath joined together, let no man put asunder.”
(Mat_19:6.)
o reference to distance of place is conveyed by the words afar off and nigh. The
Jews, in respect of the covenant, were nigh to God. The Gentiles, so long as they had
no promise of salvation, were afar off — were banished from the kingdom of God.
And preached peace; not indeed by his own lips, but by the apostles. It was
necessary that Christ should rise from the dead, before the Gentiles were called to
the fellowship of grace. Hence that saying of our Lord,
“ am not sent but to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.”
(Mat_15:24.)
The apostles were forbidden, while he was still in the world, to carry their first
embassy to the Gentiles.
“ not into the way of the Gentiles, and into any city of the Samaritans, enter ye not.
But go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.” (Mat_10:5,)
His apostles were afterwards employed as trumpets for proclaiming the gospel to
the Gentiles. What they did, not only in his name, and by his command, but as it
were in his own person, is justly ascribed to none other than himself. We too speak
as if Christ himself exhorted you by us. (2Co_5:20) The faith of the gospel would be
weak indeed, were we to look no higher than to men. Its whole authority is derived
from viewing men as God’ instruments, and hearing Christ speak to us by their
mouth. Observe here, the gospel is the message of peace, by which God declares
himself to be reconciled to us, and makes known his paternal love. Take away the
gospel, and war and enmity continue to subsist between God and men; and, on the
other hand, the native tendency of the gospel is, to give peace and calmness to the
conscience, which would otherwise be tormented by distressing alarm.
BI, "And came and preached peace to you which were afar off.
Christ preaching peace
This refers not merely to the time Christ lived as a Man upon earth, but also to His
preaching through the Spirit in all after ages.
1. Christ is so absent from us, that He has not quite forsaken us. Whenever His
Word is effectual, that is the entrance of Christ into the heart.

73. 2. What Christ purchased for us on the Cross, He applies to us by the ministry of
the Word. To enjoy Christ, make much of the gospel, which is news from heaven
touching righteousness and life eternal.
3. Christ is present, and has a part in preaching even when men preach.
4. Christ preaches to all, whether Jew or Gentile, to the end of the world.
5. After the death of Christ all are preached to.
6. The gospel of Christ, which He and His ministers preach, is a gospel of peace.
(Paul Bayne.)
Peace with God
When after His death on the Cross, by which He made peace between God and man,
and prepared the way for peace between man and God and man and man, did our
blessed Saviour come and preach peace? He came by His Holy Spirit as on the day
of Pentecost. So that we have within the limits of this text, with the light shed on it
by the immediate context--
I. Christ the procurer of peace with the Father. “He is our peace” (Eph_2:14).
1. By the removal of hindrances to our salvation. His atonement breaks down the
middle wall of partition between God and man, and thus also between Jew and
Gentile. Christ’s reconciliation is a scriptural fact.
2. By the removal of the enmity of the carnal mind if God is reconciled to man, man
must be reconciled to God. The love of Christ effects this.
3. By the substitution of a new law for “the law of commandments in ordinances.”
This new law is the all-inclusive law of love.
II. The Spirit the preacher of peace with God.
1. By His own immediate action on the soul of the child and of the man.
2. By His mediate action through the truths of the gospel. “We are witnesses of these
things, and so also is the Holy Ghost.”

74. III. Man--whether jew or gentile--the obtainer of peace with God. “We both have
our access,” etc.
1. By personal trust in the merits of Christ.
2. By daily approach through Christ by one Spirit. This describes the method of
prayer. (Clerical World.)
The Great Preacher
The peculiar force of this reference to the preaching of peace will be perceived as we
mark who the Preacher was. The Preacher to whom Paul in these words referred
was God.
I. First of all, let us notice how the purpose of the message of the Great Preacher is
here put--He “preached peace.” The purpose of it was then what it is now, and will
continue to be as long as there are ambassadors for Christ in the world. That peace
which is the great need of earth is the actual possession of heaven. Yonder in the
realms of bliss and order and perfection, there is, even amidst ceaseless activity,
serene unbroken peace--the peace of those who have found their true centre and
move in their proper orbits. It is what rests upon everlasting foundations. It stands
out in contrast to all counterfeit appearances that raise men with bright
expectations for a while, and then leave them in the end blasted with
disappointment--as we are told was the experience of a great man, a German poet,
who lived some years ago to old age, laden with honours and earthly blessings that
rarely fall to the lot of men, but who confessed that, looking back on his past life, he
could not remember a day in which he had found real happiness or true peace. That
a mind wondrously gifted with the power of rising to some of the loftiest conceptions
of what is noble and divine, should have been compelled at last to utter this terrible
confession, is indeed striking evidence of the need of a Divine provision for man’s
peace.
II. Observe, in the second place, where lay the special force and efficacy of the
Preacher’s message; it was in this--that He Himself embodied His own message. His
own Person and work were its theme. This gave it a reality and power which
characterise the preaching of no other messenger ever heard on earth. “He came
and preached.” And from whence, over what vast distance did He come? If a
narrative of travel from one who has explored an unknown country brings before
you the scenes through which he has passed with a vivid effect which it is impossible
for any other person to convey, how much more should the testimony of one who

75. has come from another world arrest your attention, and be in awful power and
import (as the words of Jesus were) unparalleled and alone. He preached peace
because He was--as He is--“our peace.” The angels at His birth had so proclaimed
Him in their song. But let us notice a little more closely that Jesus embodied His own
message by being Himself “our peace” with God. ot only was He God’s peace with
us, but from what He is, and by what He did for us, there is exactly that which can
make the peace already on God’s side available to us.
III. This brings us to notice, in the third place, the prominence here given to
preaching, as the channel through which God’s peace reaches us. The Saviour has
not deemed it enough for Him to do His work, and then allow it to speak for itself,
and appeal in silence to the consciences of men. o. He accompanies His work with
words--with a message designed to bring out His work in all His bearings; to
interpret the signs, and trace the issues of it; to unfold its preciousness, and make
unceasing application of it to the heart, according to the daily wants, and the endless
variety of the different circumstances of man’s lot. Preaching, therefore, is the
necessary accompaniment of God’s work. “He came and preached peace.”
IV. The urgent need of those to whom the message was addressed--“to you which
were afar off,” “and to them that were nigh.”
1. “To you which were afar off.” And “afar off” indeed were these Ephesians when
the message reached them, even in such hopeless estrangements from God, as
described in verses 11 and 12. The change was something much more than a social
transformation, a mere improvement in outward aspect and manners. Even their
escape from all the fascinations and enchantments of idol worship at Ephesus would
have availed them nothing had they not also been brought “nigh” to God “by the
blood of Christ.” To them the vastness of the change was m a changed eternity--a
glorious futurity “as fellow citizens with the saints and of the household of God.” It
was marked at the same time by such a change of heart as had turned their desires
toward Him who had come near to save, and had set their affections and hopes on
things above. But not merely to heathen converts do these words apply. To
converted souls in every age--to you, believing Christians, this message comes with
the same force now as it conveyed in the days of Paul.
2. It was preached also “to them that were nigh”--to Israel whom the ancient psalm
called “a people near unto Him.” So nigh in virtue of external privilege, that., to
them belonged “the adoption” and the glory, and the covenants, and the giving of
the law, and the service of’ God, and the promises, whose are the fathers, and of
whom as concerning the flesh, Christ came, who is over all, God blessed forever.”
And yet when He came, where were they? He came unto His own, and His own
received Him not. He was “near in their mouth, but far from their reins.”

76. 3. Preached “to them that were nigh,” the message must have included the true
Israel of God, who were “nigh” in the real and vital sense of the term. Is it then to be
preached still to those who are now at peace with God? Is there any point in their
journey at which they can afford to let this part of the gospel drop in order to “go
on unto perfection” through other truths, or by the use, it may be, of other means
than those of the gospel? ever with safety or continued health to their own souls.
ever, but by some subtle wile of the enemy, who, as an angel of light, would seduce
them from the continuance of their faith in this one secret of their true peace in
which their great strength lies. (R. S. Muir.)
Mercy waiting for applicants
Abraham Lincoln’s doorkeeper had standing orders from him, that no matter how
great might be the throng, if either senators or representatives had to wait, or to be
turned away without an audience, he must see, before the day closed, every
messenger who came to him with a petition for the saving of life. (Little’s Historical
Lights.)
The gospel preached
A band of missionaries and native teachers spent a night on Darnley Island, when a
project was formed to establish a mission on Murray Island. Some of the natives of
this island seemed specially intent on intimidating the teachers, and convincing them
that a mission there was perfectly hopeless. “There are alligators there,” said they,
“and snakes and centipedes.” “Hold!” said Tepeso, one of the teachers, “are there
men there?” “Oh yes,” was the reply, “there are men, but they are such dreadful
savages that it is no use your thinking of living among them.” “That will do,”
responded Tepeso. “Wherever there are men missionaries are bound to go.” (W.
Baxendale.)
Peace through Christ
In the reign of Henry VIII there was a young student at Cambridge, named Bilney.
He became deeply anxious about his soul. The priests prescribed fast, penance, and
other observances, but he grew worse and worse. He ultimately became possessed of
a copy of the ew Testament, and shut himself up in his room to study it. As he read
the book he came to the words, “This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all
acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners.” He laid down
the book, to think on what he had read. He thus states the result:--This one
sentence, through God’s inward teaching, did so rejoice my heart, being before
almost in despair, that I soon found peace. “Jesus Christ saves!” he cried; “yes,

77. Jesus Christ saves!” From that time he became a preacher of those “glad tidings,”
and at last he suffered martyrdom.
True peace only in Christ
Your peace, sinner, is that terribly prophetic calm which the traveller occasionally
perceives upon the higher Alps. Everything is still. The birds suspend their notes, fly
low, and cower down with fear. The hum of bees among the flowers is hushed. A
horrible stillness rules the hour, as if death had silenced all things by stretching over
them his awful sceptre. Perceive ye not what is surely at hand? The tempest is
preparing, the lightning will soon cast abroad its flames of fire. Earth will rock with
thunder blasts; granite peaks will be dissolved; all nature will tremble beneath the
fury of the storm. Yours is that solemn calm today, sinner. Rejoice not in it, for the
hurricane of wrath is coming, the whirlwind and the tribulation which shall sweep
you away and utterly destroy you. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
18
For through him we both have access to the
Father by one Spirit.
BAR ES, "For through him - That is, he has secured this result that we have
access to God. This he did by his death - reconciling us to God by the doctrines which he
taught - acquainting us with God; and by his intercession in heaven - by which our
“prayers gain acceptance” with him.
We both have access - Both Jews and Gentiles; see the notes at Rom_5:2. We are
permitted to approach God through him, or in his name. The Greek word here -
προσαγωγή prosagōgē - relates properly to the introduction to, or audience which we are
permitted to have with a prince or other person of high rank. This must be effected
through an officer of court to whom the duty is entrusted. “Rosenmuller,” Alt und neu
Morgenland, in loc.
By one Spirit - By the aid of the same Spirit - the Holy Spirit; see notes, 1Co_12:4.
Unto the Father - We are permitted to come and address God as our Father; see the
Rom_8:15, note 26, note.

78. CLARKE, "For through him - Christ Jesus, we both - Jews and Gentiles, have
access by one Spirit - through the influence of the Holy Ghost, unto the Father - God
Almighty. This text is a plain proof of the holy Trinity. Jews and Gentiles are to be
presented unto God the Father; the Spirit of God works in their hearts, and prepares
them for this presentation; and Jesus Christ himself introduces them. No soul can have
access to God but by Jesus Christ, and he introduces none but such as receive his Holy
Spirit. All who receive that Spirit are equally dear to him; and, whatever their names be
among men, they are known in heaven as children of God, and heirs of eternal glory.
GILL, "For through him we both have an access, That is, both Jews and Gentiles;
the Arabic version reads, "we both factions": being made one, and reconciled unto God,
and having the Gospel of peace preached to both, they have through Christ freedom of
access and boldness in it:
by one Spirit unto the Father: they may come to God as the Father of spirits, and of
mercies, who has made their souls or spirits, and bestowed his mercies on them in great
abundance; and as the Father of Christ, and as their God and Father in Christ: and the
rather they should consider him in this relation to them, in order to command in them a
reverence and fear of him; to secure a freedom and liberty in their approach to him; and
to encourage an holy boldness, and a fiducial confidence in him; and to teach them
submission to his will: and their access to him is "through" Christ, who has made peace
for them, and atonement for their sins; who has satisfied law and justice, and brought in
an everlasting righteousness for them; so that there is nothing lies in their way to hinder
them; and besides, he takes them as it were by the hand, and leads them into the
presence of his Father, and presents their petitions for them, on whose account they
have both audience and acceptance with God: and this access is also "by one Spirit"; the
"Holy Spirit", as the Ethiopic version reads; and who is necessary in access to God, as a
spirit of adoption, to enable and encourage souls to go to God as a father; and as a spirit
of supplication, to teach both how to pray, and for what, as they should; and as a free
spirit to give them liberty to speak their minds freely, and pour out their souls to God;
and as a spirit of faith to engage them to pray in faith, and with holy boldness,
confidence, and importunity; and he is said to be "one", both with respect to the persons
to and by whom access is had, the Father and Christ, for he is the one and the same
Spirit of the Father and of the Son; and with respect to the persons who have this access,
Jews and Gentiles, who as they make up one body, are actuated and directed by, and
drink into one and the same Spirit: hence this access to God is of a spiritual kind; it is a
drawing nigh to God with the heart, and a worshipping him in spirit; and is by faith, and
may be with freedom, and should be, with reverence, and ought to be frequent; and is a
peculiar privilege that belongs to the children of God; and who have great honour
bestowed upon them, to have access to God at any time, as their Father, through Christ
the Mediator, and under the influence, and by the direction and assistance of the Holy
Spirit: this is a considerable proof of a trinity of persons in the Godhead, of their deity
and distinct personality.
JAMISO , "Translate, “For it is through Him (Joh_14:6; Heb_10:19) that we have
our access (Eph_3:12; Rom_5:2), both of us, in (that is, united in, that is, “by,” 1Co_
12:13, Greek) one Spirit to the Father,” namely, as our common Father, reconciled to

79. both alike; whence flows the removal of all separation between Jew and Gentile. The
oneness of “the Spirit,” through which we both have our access, is necessarily followed
by oneness of the body, the Church (Eph_2:16). The distinctness of persons in the
Divine Trinity appears in this verse. It is also fatal to the theory of sacerdotal priests in
the Gospel through whom alone the people can approach God. All alike, people and
ministers, can draw nigh to God through Christ, their ever living Priest.
RWP, "Through him (di' autou). Christ.
We both (hoi amphoteroi). “We the both” (Jew and Gentile).
Our access (tēn prosagōgēn). The approach, the introduction as in Rom_5:2.
In one Spirit (en heni pneumati). The Holy Spirit.
Unto the Father (pros ton patera). So the Trinity as in Eph_1:13. The Three Persons
all share in the work of redemption.
CALVI , "18.For through him we both have access. This is an argument from the
fact, that we are permitted to draw near to God. But it may be viewed also as an
announcement of peace; for wicked men, lulled into a profound sleep, sometimes
deceive themselves by false notions of peace, but are never at rest, except when they
have learned to forget the Divine judgment, and to keep themselves at the greatest
possible distance from God. It was necessary, therefore, to explain the true nature of
evangelical peace, which is widely different from a stupefied conscience, from false
confidence, from proud boasting, from ignorance of our own wretchedness. It is a
settled composure, which leads us not to dread, but to desire and seek, the face of
God. ow, it is Christ who opens the door to us, yea, who is himself the door. (Joh_
10:9.) As this is a double door thrown open for the admission both of Jews and
Gentiles, we are led to view God as exhibiting to both his fatherly kindness. He
adds,by one Spirit; who leads and guides us to Christ, and “ whom we cry, Abba,
Father,” (Rom_8:15,) for hence arises the boldness of approach. Jews had various
means of drawing near to God; now all have but one way, to be led by the Spirit of
God.
BI, "For through Him we both have access by one Spirit unto the Father.
The doctrine of the Trinity
The doctrine of the Holy Trinity, which the apostle implies in these words, is the
centre of a group of Christian doctrines which may fairly be said not to have been
explicitly known antecedently to the teaching of our Saviour and His apostles. More
than even other doctrines, this had hardly been guessed at by heathen speculation,
hardly understood by Jewish inspiration. It stands in majestic isolation from other

80. truths, a vision of God incomprehensible, the mystery of mysteries. We can find
analogies and explanations of other doctrines in the world of nature, physical or
moral, but of this we can discover none. When we pass from the work to the Agent,
from the government of God to the nature of God, we are lost in mystery;
speculation is well nigh hushed before the overpowering glory of the Eternal. We
pass from the earth to the heaven, we enter the shrine of the Divine presence. We
contemplate in spirit the mystery hidden of old, the mystery of the trinal existence of
Him who is the source of all power, the first cause of all creation; Him who, in the
depths of a past eternity, existed in the mysterious solitude of His Divine essence,
when there was still universal silence of created life around His throne, and who will
exist ever in the future of eternity, from everlasting to everlasting, God. Speculation
is, on such a subject, vain; yet a reverent attention to that which has been made
known to us is our fitting duty. And nothing will more completely prepare us for
considering the subject in a proper temper than the reflection that this great
doctrine is not revealed to us in the Scripture to gratify our curiosity, but as a
practical truth deeply and nearly related to our eternal interests, not in its
speculative but in its practical aspects. Our Lord and His apostles taught that the
Divine nature consists of three distinct classes of attributes, or (to use our human
expression) three personalities; and that each of these three distinct Persons
contributes separate offices in the work of human salvation; God the Father
pardoning; God the Son redeeming; God the Holy Ghost hallowing and purifying
sinful men. The fact that this doctrine involves a mystery, is so far from constituting
a fair ground for its rejection, that it agrees in this respect with many of the most
allowed truths of human science. For the distinction is now well understood between
a truth being apprehended and its being comprehended. We apprehend or recognize
a fact when we know it to be established by evidence, but cannot explain it by
referring it to its cause; we comprehend or understand it when we can view it in
relation to its cause. A thing which is not apprehended cannot be believed, but the
analogy of our knowledge shows that we believe many things which we cannot
explain or resolve into a law. We know the law of attraction which regulates the
motions of the visible universe; but no one can yet explain the nature of the
attractive power which acts according to this law. Or, to add an example from the
world of organized nature, we may see the same truth in the animal or vegetable
kingdoms. We know not in what consist the common phenomena of sleep or of life;
and we are equally ignorant of the final causes which have led the Creator to lavish
His gifts in creating thousands of species of the lower orders of animals with few
properties of enjoyment or of use; or to scatter in the unseen parts of the petals of
flowers, the profusion of beautiful colours. In truth, the peculiarity of modern
inductive science is, that it professes to explain nothing. It rests content with
generalising phenomena into their most comprehensive statement, and there it
pauses; it in no case connects them with an ultimate cause. And if truths are thus
received undoubtingly in science when yet they cannot be explained, why must an
antecedent determination to disbelieve mystery in religion be allowed to outweigh
any amount of positive evidence which can be adduced to substantiate those
mysteries? We are to believe that the Divine nature exists under three entirely
distinct classes of relations, which, through poverty of language, we call existence in
three persons. We must be careful, however, when we assert this, not to reduce the

81. Divine nature to similarity with the human; not to commit, in fact, almost the very
error into which men of old fell in supposing that the God whom the heaven of
heavens cannot contain, is like to birds and beasts and creeping things. The Divine
Being is three persons; but by this we only mean that the personal element in man is
the analogy under which God has been pleased to convey to us ideas of His own
nature and of the relations which He sustains to us. Just as we do not attribute to
God a body or human passions, but merely mean that He acts to us as though He
possessed them; so when we attribute to Him thought or personality, we must not
narrow down the idea of His omniscient intuition by supposing it contracted within
the limits of inference which govern man’s finite intelligence, or gifted with that
limited independence which appertains to human personality. The discoveries of
science ought to teach us that we really can scarcely form any positive idea of God’s
nature. If we track the infinity of creation, we see that each increased power of our
instruments reveals to us illimitable profusion in creation; the telescope revealing
the troop of worlds stretching to an infinity of greatness, and the microscope a
world of more and more minute life, stretching to an infinity of minuteness; or when
we turn from the infinite in space to the infinite in time, if we look backward we see
written in the rocks of the world the signs of creative life stretching through ages
anterior to human history; or if we look forward, we can detect by delicate
mathematical calculation, an amazing scheme of Providence providing for the
conservation of harmony in the attractions of the heavenly bodies in cycles of
incalculable time in the distant future. And when, having pondered all these things,
we think of the Being that has arranged them by His providence and conserves them
by His power, what notion can we really form of His nature? What notion of the
wonderful originality evinced in the conception of creation, what of the profusion
shown in the execution of it, what of the power in its conservation? His nature is not
merely infinite, it is unlike anything human, and we must turn away with the feeling
that when we compare that infinite Being with man, and confine our ideas of His
illimitable vastness and His inscrutable existence by the notion of the narrow
personality which is delegated to us finite creatures who live but for a day on this
small spot of earth, lost amid the millions of worlds which glitter in creation, we
may be sure that the Divine nature as really transcends the earthly description of it,
as the universe exceeds this world; and though we may thankfully accept the
description of God as having three personalities as the noblest to which we can
attain as men, and as enough for our present wants in this world, yet let us never
doubt that really the Divine nature is vastly nobler; and let us bow with adoring
thankfulness in meditating on the idea which we are permitted to attain, imperfect
though it be, of that mysterious essence. Yet though the idea of God in three Persons
may be held to be thus speculatively imperfect, let us never forget that it is
practically all-sufficient for us. For it teaches us the great truth that He acts to us as
though He did literally sustain the characters of three wholly distinct persons, and
that He demands from us the duties which would belong to us if He were so. If we
are thus to believe of God, what is the lesson which this great doctrine that God
exists and acts to us as Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, ought to convey to us? It is
mainly the wondrous thought that this glorious Being is willing to stoop to be our
Friend, that He whose happiness is complete in its own infinity, is moved by His own
pure eternal love to win us to Himself. Restless (to speak after the manner of men) to

82. secure our happiness, all these blessed Persons of the glorious Godhead are engaged
to secure it. It is God the Father whom we have grieved by our sins; and yet He loves
us as a Father still; and to rescue us from our misery He has designed the great
scheme of salvation, and sent God the Son to dwell on this earth as a man, as a man
of sorrows and of poverty, to remove by His atoning death the impediments which,
secret perhaps to us, stand in the way of our salvation, and to exhibit the pattern of
a faultless human being, that we may follow His steps; and lastly, after God the Son
had withdrawn from the earth, God the Spirit, the ever blessed Comforter, has
descended to dwell constantly in the hearts of all men that invite His presence,
cheering their guilty spirits, stirring them up to the love of holiness, hallowing them
for a meetness for the inheritance of heaven. Behold what manner of love God has
shown to us! Behold the Triune God engaged in the salvation of each one of
ourselves! And can you delay to yield to Him your hearts, your wills, your
affections? If you have sinned, or are tempted to sin, either in deed, or word, or
thought, remember that it is not merely sin against a law, but that you are verily
grieving a loving father, even the Father, God; if you are living a careless, half-
religious life, remember that you are perpetrating the ingratitude of making the
sufferings of the Eternal Son void as regards your souls; if you are neglecting
prayer, neglecting earnest supplications to heaven for holiness, you are declining to
avail yourself of that unspeakable gift of the Spirit’s help which is for all that ask.
God the Father loves us, God the Son has redeemed us, and the Holy Spirit will, if
we will ask Him, turn us from sin, and doubt, and half-heartedness, to the love of
Himself, and will fit us for that heaven where, no longer trammelled by sin and
darkened by ignorance, we shall enjoy the beatific vision, and find our everlasting
happiness in communing with the Divine Being face to face. (Canon A. S. Farrar.)
A Trinity Sunday sermon
The doctrine of the Trinity is the description of what we know of God. We have no
right to say that it is the description of God; for what there may be in Deity of which
we have no knowledge, how can we tell? We are only sure that the Divine life is
infinitely greater than our humanity can comprehend; and we are sure, too, that not
even a revelation in the most perfect form, through the most perfect medium
conceivable, could make known to the human intelligence anything in God save that
which has relationship to human life. Man may reveal himself to the brutes, and the
revelation may be clear and correct so far as it can go, but it must have its limit.
Only that part of man can cross the line and show itself to the perception of that
lower world which finds in brutedom some point which it can touch. Our strength
may reveal itself to their fear; our kindness to their power of love; some part of our
wisdom, even, to their dim capacity of education; but all the while there is a vast
manhood of intellect, of taste, of spirituality, of which they never know. And so I am
sure that the Divine nature is three Persons, but one God; but how much more than
that I cannot know. That deep law which runs through all life, by which the higher
any nature is, the more manifold and simple at once, the more full of complexity and
unity at once, it grows, is easily accepted as applicable to the highest of all natures--

83. God. In the manifoldness of His being these three personal existences, Creator,
Redeemer, Sanctifier, easily make themselves known to the human life. I tell the
story of them, and that is my doctrine of the Trinity.
1. The end of the human salvation is “access to the Father.” That is the first truth of
our religion--that the source of all is meant to be the end of all, that as we all came
forth from a Divine Creator so it is into divinity that we are to return and to find
our final rest and satisfaction, not in ourselves, nor in one another, but in the
omnipotence, the omniscience, the perfectness, and the love of God. God is divine.
God is God. And no doubt we do all assent in words to such a belief; but when we
think what we mean by that word God; when we remember what we mean by
“Father,” namely, the first source and the final satisfaction of a dependent nature;
and then when we look around and see such multitudes of people living as if there
were no higher source for their being than accident, and no higher satisfaction for
their being than selfishness, do we not feel that there is need of a continual and most
earnest preaching by word and act, from every pulpit of influence to which we can
mount, of the divinity of the Father. Why, take a man who is utterly absorbed in the
business of this world. How eager he is; his hands are knocking at every door; his
voice is crying out for admittance into every secret place and treasure house; he is
all earnestness and restlessness. He is trying to come to something, trying to get
access, and to what? To the best and richest of that earthly structure from which his
life seems to himself to have issued. Counting himself the child of this world, he is
giving himself up with a filial devotion to his father. He is the product in his tastes
and his capacities of this social and commercial machinery which seems to be the
mill out of which men’s characters are turned. It is the society and the business of
the world that have made him what he is, and so he gives up all that he is to the
society or the business that created him. ow to such a man what is the first
revelation that you want to make. Is it not the divinity of the Father? This is the
divinity of the end. We come from God and we go to God.
2. And now pass to the divinity of the method. “Through Jesus Christ.” Man is
separated from God. That fact, testified to by broken associations, by alienated
affections, by conflicting wills, stands written in the whole history of our race.
Analogies, I know, are very imperfect and often very deceptive, when they try to
illustrate the highest things. But is it not as if a great strong nation, too strong to be
jealous, strong enough to magnanimously pity and forgive, had to deal with a colony
of rebels whom it really desired to win back again to itself? They are of its own
stock, but they have lost their allegiance and are suffering the sorrows and
privations of being cut off from their fatherland and living in rebellion. That
fatherland might send its embassy to tempt them home; and, if it did, whom would
it choose to send? Would it not take of itself its messenger? The embassy that is sent
is of the country that sends it. That is its value, that is its influence. The fatherland
would choose its choicest son, taking him from nearest to its heart, and say, Go and
show them what I am, how loving and how ready to forgive, for you are I and you
can show them. Such was the mission of the Messiah. The ambassador was of the
very land that sent Him, “God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God,
begotten not made, being of one substance with the Father.” My friend says God

84. sends Christ into the world, and therefore Christ is not God. I cannot see it so. It
seems to me lust otherwise. God sends Christ just because Christ is God. The
ambassador, the army is of the very most precious substance of the country that
despatches it. This is the meaning of that constant title of our Master. He is the Son
of God. The more truly we believe in the Incarnate Deity, the more devoutly we
must believe in the essential glory of humanity, the more earnestly we must struggle
to keep the purity and integrity and largeness of our own human life, and to help
our brethren to keep theirs. It is because the Divine can dwell in us that we may
have access to divinity. We and they must, through the Divine method, come to the
Divine end where we belong, through God the Son to God the Father.
3. And now turn to the point that still remains. We have spoken of the end and of
the method; but no true act is perfect unless the power by which it works is worthy
of the method through which and the end to which it proceeds. The power of the act
of man’s salvation is the Holy Spirit. “Through Christ Jesus we all have access by
one Spirit unto the Father.” What do we mean by the Holy Spirit being the power of
salvation? I think we are often deluded and misled by carrying out too far some of
the figurative forms in which the Bible and the religious experience of men express
the saving of the soul. For instance, salvation is described as the lifting of the soul
out of a pit and putting it upon a pinnacle, or on a safe high platform of grace. The
figure is strong and clear. othing can overstate the utter dependence of the soul on
God for its deliverance; but if we let the figure leave in our minds an impression of
the human soul as a dead, passive thing, to be lifted from one place to the other like
a torpid log that makes no effort of its own either for cooperation or resistance, then
the figure has misled us. The soul is a live thing. Everything that is done with it must
be done in and through its own essential life. If a soul is saved, it must be by the
salvation, the sanctification of its essential life; if a soul is lost, it must be by
perdition of its life, by the degradation of its affections and desires and hopes.
Conclusion: When this experience is reached then see what Godhood the soul has
come to recognize in the world. First, there is the Creative Deity from which it
sprang, and to which it is struggling to return--the Divine end, God the Father.
Then there is the Incarnate Deity, which makes that return possible by the
exhibition of God’s love--the Divine method, God the Son; and then there in this
Infused Deity, this Divine energy in the soul itself, taking its capacities and setting
them homeward to the Father--the Divine power of salvation. God the Holy Spirit.
To the Father through the Son, by the Spirit. If we recur a moment to the figure
which we used a while ago, God is the Divine Fatherland of the human soul; Christ
is like the embassy, part and parcel of that Fatherland, which comes out to win it
back from its rebellion; and the Holy Spirit is the Fatherland wakened in the
rebellious colony’s own soul. He is the newly living loyalty. When the colony comes
back, the power that brings it is the Fatherland in it seeking its own; So when the
soul comes back to God, it is God in the soul that brings it. So we believe in the
Divine power, one with the Divine method and the Divine end, in God the Spirit one
with the Father and the Son. This appears to me the truth of the Deity as it relates to
us. I say again, “as it relates to us.” What it may be in itself; how Father, Son, and
Spirit meet in the perfect Godhood; what infinite truth more there may, there must,
be in that Godhood, no man can dare to guess. But, to us, God is the end, the

85. method, and the power of salvation; so He is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. It is in
the perfect harmony of these sacred personalities that the precious unity of the Deity
consists. Let us keep the faith of the Trinity. Let us seek to come to the highest,
through the highest, by the highest. Let the end and the method and the power of
our life be all Divine. If our hearts are set on that, Jesus will accept us for His
disciples; all that He promised to do for those who trusted Him, He will do for us.
He will show us the Father; He will send us the Comforter; nay, what can He do, or
what can we ask that will outgo the strong and sweet assurance of the promise
which we have been studying today: Through Him we shall have access by one
Spirit unto the Father. (Phillips Brooks, D. D.)
The doctrine of the Trinity
In this text we have a declaration of the Holy Trinity; there can be no doubt as to
that. Here are all three Persons together: the Father, unto whom we have access or
introduction; the Son, by or through whom we are introduced; the Holy Spirit, in
whom, in whose communion, we enjoy that access. But what is remarkable about
the text is not the mere declaration of the three Persons, which is often to be met
with in St. Paul’s Epistles, but the practical nature of the declaration. “We both
have access,” says the apostle, “unto the Father”--and for this word “both” we may
substitute “all,” since the great distinction of that day between Jew and Gentile has
been obliterated, and only those numerous minor distinctions remain which race
and clime and colour make within the fold of Christ. We all have access unto the
Father--this is the great and blessed fact, the practical sum of our religion; and this
is the answer of the gospel to all the seeking and questing of the natural man since
the world began. He, who is both God and man--He, the daysman desired of Job--
He, who is equally at home both on earth and in heaven, who was in heaven--He,
who hath reconciled us unto God, and atoned us, making us one with God by vital
union with Himself;--He shall introduce us; by Him we shall have that long sought
for, long despaired of access to the Father of our souls--He shall take us (as He only
can) by the hand, and lead us (as He only may) into that dread presence. But, again,
there is a further questing and seeking of the natural man, when he longs and yet
dreads to find his way home to the Father. For after that first difficulty, “Who shall
lead us to the Father?” there comes another question quite as hard to answer, and it
is this: “If we attain unto Him, how shall we bear ourselves in His presence? how
shall we, defiled, stand in that holy place? how shall we, blear-eyed, face that
uncreated light? and even if we were safe through our Saviour from any wrath of
God, yet how could we escape the bitter sense of contrast, of unfitness, of intrinsic
distance intensified by outward nearness?” ow, the practical answer to such
questing of the natural man is the revelation of the Spirit. In Him, the Spirit of God,
who is also the Spirit of Jesus Christ, who ministers the gifts and graces and
perpetuates the life of Jesus within the Church--in Him, who proceedeth from the
Father and receiveth of the Son; who being one with the Father and the Son yet
dwelleth in us, in our inmost centre of life and thought, and influenceth the secret
springs of will and action--in Him, who, dwelling in all, bindeth all into one body

86. with the Son of God, and reproduceth the character of Jesus in the saints;--in Him,
the Lord, the Giver of life, the Sanctifier, shall we have true access unto the Father.
Taking these two things together, “by the Son,” “in one Spirit,” we see that they
leave nothing unprovided. Here is afforded us both outward approach to God and
inward correspondence with God; both the way to heaven and the power to traverse
the way; both the joy of our Lord and the capacity of entering into that joy. I
suppose that if man had never fallen, God would never have been known as the
Three in One. In the ages of the past each blessed Person lay undistinguished in the
brilliance of the Godhead until the eternal love moved them to come forth from that
obscurity of light for man’s salvation. We know the Son by finding Him in mortal
guise in our midst, displaying even amidst the cares and sufferings of a human life
the glory as of the only-begotten of the Father. We know the Spirit by perceiving His
presence in our own souls, by recognizing His abiding influence in the Church of
God. (R. Winterbotham, M. A.)
The nature and beauty of gospel worship
I. We obtain this privilege as a fruit, and upon account of the reconciliation made by
the blood of Christ (see Heb_9:8; Heb_10:19-22). Peter also gives us the same
account of the rise of this privilege (1Pe_2:4-5). That which is ascribed unto
believers is, that they offer up “spiritual sacrifices, acceptable unto God by Jesus
Christ.” That is the worship whereof we speak.
II. The worship of God under the gospel is so excellent, beautiful, and glorious, that
it may well be esteemed a privilege purchased by the blood of Christ, which no man
can truly and really be made partaker of, but by virtue of an interest in the
reconciliation by Him wrought. For “by Him we have an access in one Spirit unto
God.” This I shall evince two ways. First, Absolutely. Secondly, Comparatively, in
reference unto any other way of worship whatever. And the first I shall do from the
text. It is a principle deeply fixed in the minds of men, yea, ingrafted into them by
nature, that the worship of God ought to be orderly, comely, beautiful, and glorious.
1. The first thing in general observable from these words is, that in the spiritual
worship of the gospel, the whole blessed Trinity, and each Person therein distinctly,
do in that economy and dispensation, wherein they act severally and peculiarly in
the work of our redemption, afford distinct communion with themselves unto the
souls of the worshippers.
2. The same is evident from the general nature of it, that it is an access unto God.
“Through Him we have an access to God.” There are two things herein that set
forth the excellency, order, and glory of it.

87. (1) It brings an access.
(2) The manner of that access, intimated in the word here used, it is ðñïóáãùãḉ , a
manuduction unto God, in order, and with much glory. It is such an access as men
have to the presence of a king when they are handed in by some favourite or great
person. This, in this worship, is done by Christ. He takes the worshippers by the
hand, and leads them into the presence of God. There are two things that hence
arise, evidencing the order, decency, and glory of gospel worship.
1. That we have in it a direct and immediate access unto God.
2. That we have access unto God as the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, and ours in
Him. Before I come to consider its glory comparatively, in reference to the outward
solemn worship of the temple of old, I shall add but one consideration more, which
is necessary for the preventing of some objections, as well as for the farther clearing
of the truth insisted on; and that is taken from the place where spiritual worship is
performed. Much of the beauty and glory of the old worship, according to carnal
ordinances, consisted in the excellency of the place wherein it was performed: first,
the tabernacle of Moses, then the temple of Solomon, of whose glory and beauty we
shall speak afterward. Answerable hereunto, do some imagine, there must be a
beauty in the place where men assemble for gospel worship, which they labour to
paint and adorn accordingly. But they “err, not knowing the Scriptures.”
There is nothing spoken of the place and seat of gospel worship, but it is referred to
one of these three heads, all which render it glorious.
1. It is performed in heaven; though they who perform it are on earth, yet they do it
by faith in heaven.
2. The second thing mentioned in reference to the place of this worship is the
persons of the saints: these are said to be the “temple of the Lord” (1Co_6:19).
3. The assemblies of the saints are spoken of as God’s temple, and the seat and place
of public, solemn, gospel worship (Eph_2:21-22). Here are many living stones
framed into “an holy house in the Lord, an habitation for God by His Spirit.” God
dwells here: as He dwelt in the temple of old, by some outward carnal pledges of His
presence; so in the assemblies of His saints, which are His habitation, He dwells
unspeakably in a more glorious manner by His Spirit. Here, according to His
promise, is His habitation. And they are a temple, a holy temple, holy with the
holiness of truth, as the apostle speaks (Eph_4:24). ot a typical, relative, but a real
holiness, and such as the Lord’s soul delighteth in. Secondly, proceed we now in the
next place to set forth the glory and beauty of this worship of the gospel
comparatively, with reference to the solemn outward worship, which by God’s own
appointment was used under the Old Testament; which, as we shall show, was far
more excellent on many accounts than anything of the like kind; that is, as to
outward splendour and beauty, that was ever found out by men.

88. 1. The first of these was the temple, the seat of all the solemn outward worship of the
old church; the beauty and glory of it were in part spoken to before; nor shall I
insist on any particular description of it; it may suffice, that it was the principal
state of the beauty and order of the Judaical worship, and which rendered all
exceeding glorious, so far, that the people idolized it, and put their trust in it, that
upon the account of it they should be assuredly preserved, notwithstanding their
presumptuous sins. But yet, notwithstanding all this, Solomon himself, in his prayer
at the dedication of that house (1Ki_8:27), seems to intimate that there was some
check upon his spirit, considering the unanswerable: ness of the house to the great
majesty of God. It was a house on the earth, a house that he did build with his
hands, intimating that he looked farther to a more glorious house than that. And
what is it, if it be compared with the temple of gospel worship? Whatever is called
the temple now of the people of God, is as much beyond that of old as spiritual
things are beyond carnal, as heavenly beyond earthly, as eternal beyond temporal.
2. The second spring of the beauty of the old worship, which was indeed the hinge
upon which the whole turned, was the priesthood of Aaron, with all the
administrations committed to his charge. The high priest under the gospel is Christ
alone. ow I shall spare the pains of comparing these together, partly because it will
be by all confessed that Christ is incomparably more excellent and glorious; and
partly, because the apostle on set purpose handles this comparison in sundry
instances in the Epistle to the Hebrews, where anyone may run and read it, it being
the main subject matter of that most excellent Epistle.
3. The order, glory, number, significancy, of their sacrifices was another part of
their glory. And indeed, he that shall seriously consider that one solemn anniversary
sacrifice of expiation and atonement, which is instituted (Lev_1:1-17, will quickly
see that there was very much glory and solemnity in the outward ceremony of it. But
now, saith the apostle, “we have a better sacrifice” (Heb_9:23). We have Him who is
the high priest, and altar, and sacrifice all Himself; of worth, value, glory, beauty,
upon the account of His own Person, the efficacy of His oblation, the real effect of it,
more than a whole creation, if it might have been all offered up at one sacrifice. This
is the standing sacrifice of the saints, offered “once for all,” as effectual now any day
as if offered every day; and other sacrifices, properly so called, they have none. (J.
Owen.)
The true God is to be worshipped as existing in Three Persons
I. The unity of the deity. It is much easier to prove from the light of nature that
there is one God than to prove the impossibility of there being any more than one.
Though some plausible arguments in favour of the unity of the Deity may be drawn
from the beauty, order, and harmony apparent in the creatures and objects around

89. us, and from the nature of a self-existent, independent, and perfect Being, yet these
arguments fall far short of full proof or strict demonstration. To obtain complete
and satisfactory evidence that there is but one living and true God, we must have
resort to the Scriptures of truth, in which the Divine unity is clearly and fully
revealed. God has always been extremely jealous of His unity, which has been so
often disbelieved and denied in this rebellious and idolatrous world. He has never
condescended to give His glory to another, nor His praise to false and inferior
deities.
II. The one living and true God exists in three distinct persons. It is generally
supposed that the inspired writers of the Old Testament give some plain intimations
of a plurality of persons in the Godhead. But we find this, like many other great and
important doctrines, more clearly revealed by Christ and the apostles, than it had
been before by the prophets. Christ said a great deal about the Father, Son, and
Holy Ghost. He commanded His apostles and their successors in the ministry to
baptize visible believers in the name of this sacred Trinity. After His death, His
apostles strenuously maintained and propagated the same doctrine.
III. This leads us to inquire why we ought to address and worship the one true God,
according to this personal distinction in the Divine nature.
1. The first reason which occurs is, because we ought, in our religious devotions, to
acknowledge everything in God which belongs to His essential glory. Much of His
essential glory consists in His existing a Trinity in Unity, which is a mode of
existence infinitely superior to that of any other being in the universe.
2. We ought to address and worship God according to the personal distinction in the
Divine nature, because we are deeply indebted to each Person in the Godhead for
the office He sustains and the part He performs in the great work of redemption.
3. We ought to address and worship the true God according to the personal
distinction in the Divine nature, because this is necessarily implied in holding
communion with Him. It is owing to God’s existing a Trinity in Unity that He can
hold the most perfect and blessed communion with Himself. And it is owing to the
same personal distinction in the Divine nature that Christians can hold communion
with each and all the Persons in the Godhead.
4. We are not only allowed, but constrained, to address and worship the true God
according to the personal distinction in the Divine nature, because there is no other
way in which we can find access to the throne of Divine grace. This important idea is
plainly contained in the text. As it was Christ who made atonement for sin, so it is
only through Him that we can have access by one Spirit unto the Father. Sinful
creatures cannot approach to the Father in the same way that innocent creatures

90. can.
The holy angels can approach to the Father directly, without the mediation or
intercession of Christ.
1. This discourse teaches us that the doctrine of the Trinity is one of the essential
and most important articles of Christianity.
2. It appears from what has been said, that we ought to regard and acknowledge the
Father as the head of the sacred Trinity, and the primary object of religious
homage. The Father is the first in order, and the supreme in office; and for this
cause we ought to present our prayers and praises more immediately and directly to
Him than to either of the other Persons in the Godhead.
3. Since God exists in three equally Divine Persons, there appears to be good ground
to pay Divine homage to each Person distinctly. Though the Father is most generally
to be distinctly and directly addressed, yet sometimes there may be a great propriety
in addressing the Son and Spirit according to their distinct ranks and offices.
4. If we ought to acknowledge and worship the true God according to the personal
distinction in the Divine nature, then we ought to obey Him according to the same
distinction. We find some commands given by the Father, some by the Son, and
some by the Holy Ghost. Though we are equally bound to obey each of these Divine
Persons, in point of authority, yet we ought to obey each from distinct motives,
arising from the distinct relations they bear to us, and the distinct things they have
done for us. We ought to obey the Father as our Creator, the Son as our Redeemer,
and the Holy Ghost as our Sanctifier. This distinction is as easy to be perceived and
felt, as the distinction between creating goodness, redeeming mercy, and sanctifying
grace. ( . Emmons, D. D.)
Access to God
1. Access to God always follows the prevailing of the Word.
2. By Christ alone have we access with boldness to God.
3. It is the Spirit which enables us to come to God in prayer. (Paul Bayne.)
Access to God by Christ
I. earness to God the Father is the highest and sweetest privilege which any of the

91. human race can possibly enjoy. The word access in the text means liberty of
approach, as every one acquainted with its use in Scripture will admit. Sin alienates
the mind of man from Jehovah, and raises a bar in his way to blessedness. But a
method has been devised for bringing back those who are banished. We have access
to the Father! What a significant and endearing name! The first thing requisite for
us is access to the Eternal Father. This being granted, it must, I think, be manifest
that our happiness will increase just in proportion to our nearness to God. But could
the veil which hides the heavenly world be removed, how would this truth blaze
upon us with noontide splendour!
II. We can enjoy the privileges of access to the Father only through the mediation of
Christ, and by the agency and grace of the Holy Spirit.
1. Here, then, are we clearly taught that the mediation of Christ is the only means of
approach to and acceptance with God. This doctrine forms the grand distinguishing
peculiarity of the gospel. But to enter fully into the spirit of our text, Christ must be
contemplated in the character which He sustains as the great High Priest of the
Church. It is not enough to own that He paid down a ransom price, and offered an
atoning sacrifice of unspeakable value; but we must look to His perpetual and all-
prevailing intercession. early related both to the Father with whom He intercedes,
and to us for whom intercession is made; the nature of each is joined in His Person.
As a brother He has a lively sympathy with man, and as a prince He has power with
God and prevails.
2. We enjoy this high privilege by the agency of the Holy Spirit.
From the subject which has been brought before you, the following inferences may
be fairly drawn.
1. If nearness to God be the highest happiness, then distance from Him, or dislike to
His will, is the greatest misery.
2. If it is through Christ only that we find free approach to the Father, how thankful
ought we to be for such a Mediator. In Him all excellencies, human and Divine, are
united.
3. If the influence of the Holy Spirit is necessary to bring us into communion with
the Father, as we have shown, then this influence should be earnestly sought and
highly prized.
4. If the doctrine here taught is true, Christians of every name, nation, and tribe
have substantial grounds of union. In the Church there is neither Greek nor Jew,
circumcision nor uncircumcision, Barbarian, Scythian, bond nor free; but Christ is
all and in all. (Essex Congregational Remembrancer.)

92. Christian prayer a witness of Christian fellowship
The whole power and meaning of that glorious exclamation, “Ye are no more
strangers and foreigners,” depend on the truth expressed in the previous verse: “We
have access by one Spirit to the Father.” Paul has told the Gentile Ephesians that
they are no longer outcasts from the grand privileges of the Jew; he has asserted
that they are actually in fellowship with the prophets and apostles, and the universal
Church of the holy; but all the magnificence of the assertion rises out of the
principal fact that in Christ they come by one spirit to God. In short, he finds the
proof end pledge of Christian citizenship in the power and freedom of Christian
prayer. Our subject, then, becomes--The citizenship of the Christian: its foundation;
its nature; its present lessons.
I. Its foundation. In access to the Father--in the power of approaching Him in full,
free, trustful prayer--lies the foundation proof that we are “fellow citizens with the
saints, and of the household of God.” We have to see how that conviction rises in the
praying soul--how the very fact of Christian prayer contains the proof and pledge
that we are citizens of an eternal kingdom. In doing this let us glance at two
principles that are here involved.
1. Christian prayer is the approach of the individual soul to God as its Father. By
access to God, Paul means the approach to God in which the human spirit comes
near to Him as a real Divine Presence, to worship Him in full, free, trustful love;
hence it is evident that a man may often have prayed, and yet never have realized
this idea of prayer.
2. That prayer of the individual soul must lead it to the united worship of God’s
Church. “We come by one Spirit unto the Father.” Paul has been speaking of
atonement and reconciliation. He knew that these were individual; but he seems to
imply that until Greek and Jew were united in worship the worship was incomplete.
ote one or two facts on this point which are very significant. We cannot always
pray alone. God has so made us that our power of praying needs the help of our
brethren. There are times when the deep emotions of our nature will not utter
themselves, and we groan, being burdened. We need the help of some other soul that
has the divine gift of uttering the want we cannot utter, that it may bear us upon its
wings of holy sympathy towards the throne.
II. The nature of our citizenship. Taking the points we have just noticed, and
combining them, let us see how they point to a fellow citizenship with the Church of
all ages.

93. 1. Prayer a witness to our fellowship with the Church of all time. Realizing God’s
Fatherhood in the holy converse of prayer, we are nearer men. Our selfishness--our
narrow, isolating peculiarities begin to fade. In our highest prayers we realize
common wants. o man ever poured out his soul to God, under the sense of His
presence, who did not feel that he was nearer the family of the Father. To take the
most obvious illustration, is it not when the cries of confession, of unrest, of
aspiration, of hope, mingle in worship that we feel it? Are we not, then, fellow
pilgrims, fellow sufferers, fellow warriors? Then our differences vanish, and we
know, in some measure, how we belong to the “household of God.” But it stays not
there. The past claims kindred with us in prayer.
2. Prayer a witness to our fellowship with the Church of eternity. This is harder to
be realized, because of our earthliness--we see so dimly through the material veil.
But the “household of God” implies this fellowship.
III. Its lessons.
1. Live as members of the kingdom.
2. Expect the signs of citizenship. The crown of thorns; the Cross.
3. Live in hope of the final ingathering. Paul’s words point to this. From this hope
our efforts and aspirations derive their greatest power; and we feel that our fellow
citizenship is incomplete till we pass from the “earthly tabernacle” into the eternal
home of the Father. (E. L. Hull, B. A.)
Access to God
I. The great work of salvation in its process.
II. The greatness of the agency employed in the work of salvation.
III. The work of salvation in the universality of its law. The same course must be
trodden by all. (T. J. Judkin.)

94. Access to the Father, through the Son, by the Spirit
I. Access to the father. The access of the text is the access of reconciliation and
peace; all enmity is removed, all differences cleared up. But it is more than this--
access to the Father; He is seen. In the case of servitude, servants have access to
their master; but here is access, with boldness, of those led by the Spirit of God, who
are the sons of God. This is access of sons in “whom the Father is well pleased”--of
those who are made “heirs of God and joint-heirs with Jesus Christ”--of those who,
as you see in the nineteenth verse, are “fellow citizens with the saints, and of the
household of God.” This access, my brethren, is more than touching the golden
sceptre with the hand of faith; it is the mutual embrace with the arms of love; it is
the access of a loving son to a loving father.
II. But how can we obtain admission into the presence of the Father? Whence this
access? Here, by nature, practice, habit, disposition, we are far from our Father’s
land. We are “strangers and foreigners” (Eph_2:19). Who can tell if He is willing to
receive us? And if He will receive us, who is to bring us to Him? These questions are
answered by the expression in the text, “through Him,” that is, through Christ.
Without introduction, there is no admission; and he who introduces another is in
general answerable for the manner and conduct of the person introduced. ow, if
you look to the context, you will see how Christ introduces us to the presence of the
Father. You are “enemies,” “rebels”; the first thing, then, to be done is to make
peace. He has made peace, as you will see in the fifteenth verse; that is, He settled
the terms of peace; He abolished in effect the enmity which existed between us and
God. He slew that enmity upon the Cross. But then we were afar off, in a distant
country, strangers and foreigners: therefore He came, as you see in the seventeenth
verse, “to preach peace to you that were afar off.” He tells us what He has done,
both in the courts of heaven and upon the heights of Calvary.
III. The remaining expression in the text brings us to the work of the Holy Ghost.
By the Holy Spirit we have access to the Father, through Jesus Christ. Thus you see
we have the doctrine of the Trinity brought before us in this short verse. It is highly
important always to bear in mind that the three Persons in the Trinity are equally
concerned in the work of the sinner’s salvation. ow, how is it we possess the
privilege of access to the Father through the Son? We must recollect that would be
no privilege unless there were the capacity to enjoy the same. Bring a blind man to
the most attractive sight, and he is unable to behold or to enjoy it. Let heaven ring
with a concert of the most angelic music, and the deaf man will not be animated by
it. And give a man without the Spirit the privilege of access to the Father, and he has
no part in it; he is entirely incapable of appreciating the Divine enjoyments of His
presence; he would feel himself “afar off,” although he were brought very nigh.

95. Change of place is not enough; there must be a change of heart. ow here comes in
the work of the Spirit. Secondly: The Spirit teaches us how to behave ourselves in
the presence of the Father; He not only conducts, but teaches and instructs. Without
the Spirit’s teaching, we could never learn “Abba”; we should never frame our
speech aright. (G. A. Rogers, M. A.)
Bold access to the Father
It is the boldness of the little child that, unabashed by anyone’s presence, climbs his
father’s knee, and throws his arms around his neck--or, bursting into his room,
breaks in on his busiest hours, to have a bleeding finger bound, or some childish
tears kissed away; that says if any threaten or hurt him, I will tell my father; and,
however he might tremble to sleep alone, fears neither ghosts, nor man, nor
darkness, nor devils, if he lies couched at his father’s side. Such confidence, bold as
it seems, springs from trust in a father’s love; and pleases rather than offends us. (T.
Guthrie D. D.)
The confidence of children
I remember seeing a man in Mobile putting little boys on the fence posts, and they
jumped into his arms with perfect confidence. But there was one boy nine or ten
years old who would not jump. I asked the man why it was, and he said the boy was
not his. Ah, that was it. The boy was not his. He had not learned to trust him. But
the other boys knew him and could trust him. (D. L. Moody.)
SIMEO , "ACCESS TO GOD BY THE PRIESTHOOD
Eph_2:18. Through him we both have access by one Spirit unto the Father.
AS there is no question more important, so there is none more beyond the reach of
unassisted reason, than that which Balak put to Balaam, “Wherewith shall I come
before the Most High God?” Many are the expedients which have been devised for
obtaining acceptance with God: but there has been only one true way from the
beginning, namely, through the sacrifice of Christ. This has been gradually revealed
to man with increasing clearness; but was never fully manifested till the days of the
Apostles. The sacrifices of the Mosaic law threw considerable light upon this
interesting subject: yet, while they revealed, they tended also to obscure, it: for the
Gentiles were forbidden to enter into the sanctuary; and had a court assigned them,
called the court of the Gentiles [ ote: Eze_42:20.]. If they became proselytes to the
Jewish religion, they were, together with the Jews, received into the sanctuary, or
outer court of the temple. The priests and Levites were admitted into the inner
court; and the high-priest into the holy of holies; but that only on one day in the

96. year. ow the Apostle tells us, that by these distinctions “the Holy Ghost signified,
that the way into the holiest of all was not yet made manifest.” But in due time
Christ himself appeared; and by his death, both fulfilled and abrogated the
ceremonial law: since which period the difference between Jew and Gentile has no
longer subsisted; the partition wall was thrown down; and the vail of the temple was
rent in twain, in token that all, whether Jews or Gentiles, were henceforth to have
an equal access to God through Christ.
It is our present intention to shew,
I. The way of access to the Father—
The text contains a brief summary of all that God has revealed upon this subject: it
informs us that the way to the Father is,
1. Through the Son—
[The high-priest under the law was the mediator through whom the people drew
nigh to God: and by his typical mediation we see how we are to approach our God.
He entered into the holy place with the blood of the sacrifices, and afterwards burnt
incense before the mercy-seat; representing, by the former, the sacrifice of Christ;
and, by the latter, his prevailing intercession. Without the blood of Christ offered in
sacrifice for us, no man could ever have found acceptance with God. or would that
have availed, if he had not also gone within the vail to be “our advocate with the
Father, as well as the propitiation for our sins.” Even if we had been pardoned in
consideration of his death, our reconciliation with God would not have continued
long; we should soon have renewed our transgressions, and have provoked God
utterly to destroy us. But, by this twofold mediation of Christ, Divine justice is
satisfied for the offences we have already committed, and the peace that has been
effected is maintained inviolate. ow our Lord himself declares that there is no
other way to the Father but this [ ote: Joh_14:6.]: and St. Paul assures us, that, in
this way, we may all draw nigh to God with boldness and confidence [ ote: Heb_
10:19-22.].]
2. By the Spirit—
[We know not how to pray to God aright, unless the Holy Spirit help our infirmities
and teach us [ ote: Rom_8:26.]. We have no will to approach him, unless the Holy
Spirit incline our hearts [ ote: Son_1:4.]. Even in the regenerate there still remains
so strong a disinclination to prayer, that unless God draw them by the influences of
his Spirit, they find an almost insuperable reluctance to that duty. Moreover, we
have no power to exercise spiritual affections at a throne of grace, unless the Spirit,
as “a Spirit of grace and of supplication,” give us a broken and a contrite heart
[ ote: Zec_12:10.]. Without his aid, we are only like a ship, whose sails are spread
in vain, unless there be a wind to fill them. Even Paul, it should seem, had never
prayed aright till his conversion; and then it was said, “Behold he prayeth.” Lastly,
without the Spirit, we have no confidence to address the Majesty of heaven. We are

97. deterred by a sense of guilt; and are ready to think that it would be presumption in
us to ask any thing at his hands. The Holy Ghost must be in us as “a Spirit of
adoption, before we can cry, Abba, Father [ ote: Rom_8:15.]”. Yea, to such a
degree are the mouths of God’s dearest children sometimes shut by a sense of guilt,
that the Holy Spirit himself maketh intercession in them no other way than by sighs
and groans [ ote: Rom_8:26, latter part.]. Thus, as there is a necessity for the
mediation of Christ to remove our guilt, so is there also of the Spirit’s influence on
account of our weakness; since, without his assistance, we have no knowledge of our
wants, no will to seek a supply of them, no power to spread them before God, nor
any confidence to plead with importunity and faith.]
The path being thus clearly marked, let us consider,
II. The excellency of this way—
Waving many things whereby this topic might be illustrated, we shall content
ourselves with observing, that this way of access to God,
1. Gives us a wonderful discovery of God himself—
[What an astonishing view does this give us of the Divine nature! Here we see
manifestly the existence of three persons in the Godhead. Here we see the Father, to
whom we are to draw nigh, together with the Son, through whom, and the Spirit, by
whom, we are to approach him. These are evidently distinct, though subsisting in
one undivided essence. Moveover the offices of the Three Persons in the Trinity are
so appropriate, that we cannot speak of them otherwise than they are here declared:
we cannot say, that through the Spirit, and by the Father, we have access to Christ;
or that through the Father, and by Christ, we have access to the Spirit: this would
be to confound what the Scripture keeps perfectly distinct. The Father is the
Original Fountain of the Deity: Christ is the Mediator, through whom we approach
him: and the Spirit is the Agent, by whom we are enabled to approach him. That
each of these divine Persons is God, is as plainly revealed, as that there is a God:
and yet we are sure that there is but one God. It is not for us to unravel this
mystery; but with humility and gratitude to adore that God, who has so
mysteriously revealed his nature to us.
While we are led thus to view God as he exists in himself, we cannot but contemplate
also his goodness to us. What greater mark of it can he conceived, than that the
sacred Three should so interest themselves in our salvation? That the Father should
devise such a way for our acceptance with him; that the Son should open the way by
his meritorious death, and his prevailing intercession; and that the Holy Spirit
should condescend to guide us into it, and to keep us in it, even to the end! That
these offices should be sustained and executed for the salvation of such insignificant
and worthless, yea, such guilty and rebellious creatures, may well excite our wonder,
and furnish us with matter of endless praise and thanksgiving.]
2. Is calculated to produce the most salutary effects on the minds of men—

98. [What consideration can be more awakening than that which necessarily arises
from the subject before us? Was such a dispensation necessary in order to our
restoration to the Divine favour? Must the Father send his only Son to die for us?
Must the Son atone and intercede for us? Must the Holy Ghost descend and dwell in
our hearts? Can none of us be saved in any other way than this? How deep then
must have been our fall; how desperate our condition! And how inconceivably
dreadful must our state be, if we neglect so great salvation!
On the other hand, what can be more encouraging than to see that such abundant
provision has been made for us? What can a sinner desire more? What clearer
evidence can he have of the Father’s willingness to receive him? What firmer
ground of confidence can he desire, than the sacrifice and intercession of the Lord
Jesus? What further aid can he want, who has the Holy Spirit to instruct, assist, and
sanctify him? Surely none can despond, however great their guilt may be, or
however inveterate their corruptions.]
Address—
1. Those who never seek access to God in prayer—
[Our Lord told the Jews that “if he had not come and spoken to them, they had not
had sin; but that now they had no cloak for their sin.” How truly may this be said to
those, who refuse to come to God in the way pointed out for them! Surely they must
be without excuse, and, if they continue in their sin, without hope also: for in no
other way than this can we draw nigh to God; nor will God in any other way draw
nigh to us.]
2. Those who fear that they shall not find acceptance with God—
[There can be no ground for such fears, provided we really desire to go to God in his
appointed way. The more we consider the condescension and grace of God in
providing such means for our recovery, the more must we be persuaded that God
will cast out none that come unto him. Only let us “open our mouths wide, and he
will fill them.” We may “ask what we will in the name of Jesus, and it shall be done
unto us.”]
3. Those who enjoy sweet communion with God—
[This is the highest of all privileges, and the richest of all enjoyments. To have access
to the Father with boldness and confidence is a foretaste even of heaven itself. Let us
then abound more and more in the duty of prayer; for when we can say with the
Apostle, “Truly our fellowship is with the Father, and with his Son, Jesus Christ,”
we may also add with a full assurance, “And the blood of Jesus Christ his Son
cleanseth us from all sin.”]

99. 19
Consequently, you are no longer foreigners and
aliens, but fellow citizens with God's people and
members of God's household,
BAR ES, "Now therefore ye are no more strangers and foreigners - You are
reckoned with the people of God. You are entitled to their privileges, and are not to be
regarded as outcasts and aliens. The meaning is, that they belonged to the same
community - the same family - as the people of God. The word rendered “strangers” -
ξένοι xenoi - means “foreigners in state,” as opposed to citizens. The word rendered
“foreigners” - πάροικοι paroikoi - means “guests in a private family,” as opposed to the
members of the family. “Rosenmuller.” Strangers and such as proposed to reside for a
short time in Athens, were permitted to reside in the city, and to pursue their business
undisturbed, but they could perform no public duty; they had no voice in the public
deliberations, and they had no part in the management of the state. They could only look
on as spectators, without mingling in the scenes of state, or interfering in any way in the
affairs of the government.
They were bound humbly to submit to all the enactments of the citizens, and observe
all the laws and usages of the republic. It was not even allowed them to transact any
business in their own name, but they were bound to choose from among the citizens one
to whose care they committed themselves as a patron, and whose duty it was to guard
them against all injustice and wrong Potter’s Greek Ant. i. 55. Proselytes, who united
themselves to the Jews, were also called in the Jewish writings, “strangers.” All
foreigners were regarded as “strangers,” and Jews only were supposed to have near
access to God. But now, says the apostle, this distinction is taken away, and the believing
pagan, as well as the Jew, has the right of citizenship in the New Jerusalem, and one, as
well as another, is a member of the family of God. “Burder,” Ros. Alt. u. neu.
Morgertland, in loc. The meaning here is, that they had not come to sojourn merely as
guests or foreigners, but were a part of the family itself, and entitled to all the privileges
and hopes which others had.
But fellow-citizens with the saints - Belonging to the same community with the
people of God.
And of the household of God - Of the same family. Entitled to the same privileges,
and regarded by him as his children; see Eph_3:15.

100. CLARKE, "Ye are no more strangers - In this chapter the Church of God is
compared to a city, which, has a variety of privileges, rights, etc., founded on regular
charters and grants. The Gentiles, having believed in Christ, are all incorporated with the
believing Jews in this holy city. Formerly, when any of them came to Jerusalem, being
ξενοι, strangers, they had no kind of rights whatever; nor could they, as mere heathens,
settle among them. Again, if any of them, convinced of the errors of the Gentiles,
acknowledged the God of Israel, but did not receive circumcision, he might dwell in the
land, but he had no right to the blessings of the covenant; such might be called παροικοι,
sojourners - persons who have no property in the land, and may only rent a house for the
time being.
Fellow citizens with the saints - Called to the enjoyment of equal privileges with
the Jews themselves, who, by profession, were a holy people; who were bound to be
holy, and therefore are often called saints, or holy persons, when both their hearts and
conduct were far from being right in the sight of God. But the saints spoken of here are
the converted or Christianized Jews.
Of the household of God - The house of God is the temple; the temple was a type of
the Christian Church; this is now become God’s house; all genuine believers are
considered as being οικειοι, domestics, of this house, the children and servants of God
Almighty, having all equal rights, privileges, and advantages; as all, through one Spirit,
by the sacred head of the family, had equal access to God, and each might receive as
much grace and as much glory as his soul could possibly contain.
GILL, "Now therefore ye are no more strangers..... Alluding to the name ‫,נכרי‬ "a
stranger", by which the Jews called the Gentiles; meaning that they were not now
strangers to God, to the grace of God, the love of God, and communion with him, nor to
the throne of his grace; nor to Christ, to his person, his work and office, to his
righteousness, to his voice, and to believing in him; nor to the Holy Spirit, as an
enlightener, a comforter, the spirit of adoption, and as a seal and earnest of future glory;
nor to their own hearts, the corruption and deceitfulness of them; nor to the devices of
Satan; nor to the covenant of grace, its blessings and promises:
and foreigners: in the commonwealth of Israel, in the church of God;
but fellow citizens with the saints: the city they belong to is either the church
below, which is the city of God, of his building, and where he dwells, of which Christ is
the foundation, which is strongly fortified with the walls and bulwarks of salvation, is
delightfully situated by the river of divine love, and is endowed with various privileges;
or heaven above, which is a city of God's preparing and building also, and where he has
his residence, and which is the habitation of angels and saints; of this city in either sense
saints are citizens; such who are saints by separation, who are set apart by the Father's
grace, and by imputation, or through Christ's being made sanctification to them, and by
the regenerating grace of the blessed Spirit; and these, as they have a right to a name and
a place in the church on earth, have also their citizenship in heaven; and which they have
not by birth, nor by purchase, but by the free grace of God, which gives them both a right
and a meetness; and believing Gentiles are upon equal foot of grace and privilege with

101. believing Jews:
and of the household of God: and which is sometimes called the household of faith,
the church of God consisting of believers, the family in heaven and in earth named of
Christ; in which family or household God is the Father, Christ is the firstborn, ministers
are stewards; and here are saints of various growth and size, some fathers, some young
men, some children: and to this family all believers belong, whether Gentiles or Jews;
and which they come into, not by birth, nor by merit, but by adopting grace; and happy
are they that belong to this city and house! they are freed from all servitude and
bondage; they can never be arrested, or come into condemnation; they have liberty of
access to God, and share in the fulness of grace in Christ; they are well taken care of;
they are richly clothed, and have plenty of provisions; and will never be turned out, and
are heirs of a never fading inheritance.
JAMISO , "Now, therefore — rather, “So then” [Alford].
foreigners — rather, “sojourners”; opposed to “members of the household,” as
“strangers” is to “fellow citizens.” Phi_3:19, Phi_3:20, “conversation,” Greek,
“citizenship.”
but — The oldest manuscripts add, “are.”
with the saints — “the commonwealth of (spiritual) Israel” (Eph_2:12).
of God — THE FATHER; as JESUS CHRIST appears in Eph_2:20, and THE SPIRIT
in Eph_2:22.
RWP, "So then (ara oun). Two inferential particles (accordingly therefore).
No more (ouketi). No longer.
Sojourners (paroikoi). Old word for dweller by (near by, but not in). So Act_7:6,
Act_7:29; 1Pe_2:11 (only other N.T. examples). Dwellers just outside the house or family
of God.
Fellow-citizens (sunpolitai, old, but rare word, here only in N.T.), members now of
the politeia of Israel (Eph_2:12), the opposite of xenoi kai paroikoi.
Of the household of God (oikeioi tou theou). Old word from oikos (house,
household), but in N.T. only here, Gal_6:10; 1Ti_5:8. Gentiles now in the family of God
(Rom_8:29).
CALVI , "19. ow therefore ye are no more strangers. The Ephesians are now
exclusively addressed. They were formerly strangers from the covenants of promise,
but their condition was now changed. They were foreigners, but God had made
them citizens of his church. The high value of that honor which God had been
pleased to bestow upon them, is expressed in a variety of language. They are first
called fellow-citizens with the saints, — next, of the household of God, — and lastly,
stones properly fitted into the building of the temple of the Lord. The first
appellation is taken from the comparison of the church to a state, which occurs very
frequently in Scripture. Those who were formerly profane, and utterly unworthy to

102. associate with godly persons, have been raised to distinguished honor in being
admitted to be members of the same community with Abraham, — with all the holy
patriarchs, and prophets, and kings, — nay, with the angels themselves. To be of the
household of God, which is the second comparison, suggests equally exalted views of
their present condition. God has admitted them into his own family; for the church
is God’ house.
BURKITT, "Our apostle began this chapter with setting before the Ephesians the
horror and dread of the heathenish state before converted to Christianity: here he
closes the chapter with an account of that glorious and blessed state, which the
Christian religion, embraced by them, had translated them into: ow ye are no
more strangers, but fellow-citizens, & c.
Where observe, 1. Their present happy condition is set forth both negatively and
positively:
negatively, by showing what they were not, neither strangers nor foreigners, but
freemen and fellow-citizens, & c. Where it must be remembered, that all the nations
of the world, except the Jews, were called strangers to the God of Israel; but the
Jews were called propinqui, his neighbours, or near ones: but, says the apostle,
there is now no such difference; for the believing Gentiles are equally admitted with
the believing Jews to the privileges of the new Jerusalem, and are fellow-citizens
with one another; they are no longer aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, but
free men.
Observe, 2. The apostle sets forth their happy condition positively, under a three-
fold similitude; namely, that of a city, that of an household or family, and that of an
edifice or building.
ote, 1. Our apostle compares the Christian church (of which the Ephesians now
were members) to a city; and shows, that themselves, as believing Gentiles, had a
right to all the privileges and immunities of that city, as well; as the Jews, who
accounted themselves the only free members of it. Ye are fellow-citizens with the
saints; that is, the patriarchs and prophets, and all other members of the church of
the Jews; ye are free denizens, burgesses, and infranchized citizens, with the rest of
that holy society; ye are all members of the holy catholic church.
ote, 2. Our apostle compares the Christian church to an household or family: Ye
are fellow-citizens with the saints, and of the household of God. ow, this metaphor
intimates a greater degree of nearness to, and communion with, the church, than
what the former metaphor did imply, there being a straiter tie of familiarity and
friendship between the members of a city.
Whence we learn, That the church of Christ under the gospel, is God's great
household or family, in a peculiar manner admitted to an intimate communion with
him, in a special way provided and cared for by him; and every sincere Christian

103. becomes a member of this blessed family, and enjoys all the privileges thereof: Ye
are all fellow-citizens with the saints, and of the household of God.
ote, 3. St. Paul proceeds yet farther, and compares the church of Christ to an
edifice or stately building: Ye are built upon the foundation of the apostles and
prophets, & c. ow this similitude holds forth unto us a still farther degree of
nearness to, and communion with, God and his church, than the former. What can
be more closely united, and more strictly joined together, than stones in a building?
And our apostle calling the church an holy temple, seems to allude to Solomon's
temple, which was a type of the Christian church, as the tabernacle was of the
Jewish church. The tabernacle was ambulatory and changeable, made of decaying
and corruptible materials, and so fitly typified the Jewish dispensation, which was
temporary and transient; but the temple was made of durable rich materials, and
thereby a proper type of the Christian church, which is called a kingdom that
cannot be shaken.
But observe further, How our apostle doth describe this stately edifice, this spiritual
building, the Christian church, these several ways:
1. By its foundation which it stands upon, namely, the apostles and prophets; that is,
upon the doctrine of the prophets and apostles, not upon their persons: Christ
himself being the personal foundation and chief corner-stone.
Learn, That though Christ himself be the builder of, and the chief corner-stone in,
his church, yet he employs his ministers now, as he did the prophets and apostles of
old, to lay the foundation, and carry on the superstructure, and no one apostle had a
privilege in this above another; and therefore for the pope, as St. Peter's successor,
to style himself, "the foundation of the Catholic church," is an impudent
presumption; for no more is here said of Peter, than is said of all the apostles and
prophets.
2. The church as a spiritual building or temple, is here described by the unity and
compactness of its parts: in whom all the building fitly framed together; that is, all
the members of the church are by faith firmly joined to Christ as the foundation,
and to one another by love, and their unity is both their strength and their beauty.
3. This building is described by its worth and perpetual increase, it groweth unto an
holy temple. The church groweth two ways, by an addition of new and particular
converts, and by an addition of new graces in every particular convert.
Where remark, how this spiritual edifice, the church of Christ, differs from all other
buildings; both the whole of it, and all the individual parts of it, are endued with
life, a life flowing from Christ the foundation, a life far from a state of perfection, in
whom all the building groweth; all a Christian's life and spiritual growth flow from
his union and communion with Christ; in him all the building groweth.
4. This building, namely, the Christian church, consisting both of Jews and Gentiles,

104. is here described by the end and design of Christ in erecting this growing edifice;
namely, to be an holy temple unto God, wherein now (as in the material temple of
old) he may manifest his gracious presence, and be perpetually worshipped,
glorified, and served. The whole church, or collective body of believers jointly, and
each believer severally and apart, are a spiritual and holy temple unto the Lord, in
and by whom all spiritual sacrifices of prayer and praise are offered up, and all the
duties of new and sincere obedience acceptably performed.
GREAT TEXTS BY HASTI GS
The Commonwealth of Christ
So then ye are no more strangers and sojourners, but ye are fellow-citizens with the
saints, and of the household of God.—Eph_2:19.
1. These words were addressed to Christians of Gentile birth who had been brought
out of the darkness of paganism into Gospel light. The Apostle reminds them that in
the days of their ignorance they had no part in God’s promises or in the hope of
Israel. They were separated by a great wall from the elect people. The Jews were
God’s household, and the Gentiles were outside. But now the cross of Jesus has
broken down the dividing wall and brought Jew and Gentile together. The Heavenly
light shines equally on the faces of both. Faith makes all races of one kin and kind.
We are all alike fellow-citizens with the saints and of the household of God.
2. St. Paul had to labour strenuously and continuously against Jewish exclusiveness.
The last thing that the Jews would think of was to admit the Gentiles to equal rights
with themselves. One has smiled, rather sadly, to see men whose desperate eagerness
to keep hold of some small privilege they had got was even exceeded by their
desperate terror lest anybody else should get hold of anything like it. ow St. Paul
set himself to put this selfish and jealous littleness down. So far, he has quite
succeeded. For though human beings do yet try to keep worldly advantage and
privilege to themselves, excluding others, it is ages since any professed Christian
thought to keep God’s grace or Christ’s mercy so. Everybody knows that there is no
more certain mark of really being within the Fold than the earnest desire that all we
know and care for should be brought into it likewise. o Christian can even be
imagined as desiring to keep this great possession to himself, or as grudging any
human being his entrance. We have the believer’s feeling on this matter in
memorable words once spoken by him who wrote this Epistle—words which, when
and where they were said, combined well the grace which comes of high culture with
the heartiness of Christian kindliness—“I would to God, that not only thou, but also
all that hear me this day, were both almost, and altogether such as I am, except
these bonds.”
I heard Dr. Alexander Whyte, of Edinburgh, speak recently about the great
Puritans John Owen and Thomas Goodwin. He bade us read them; he told us of his

105. own debt to them. “Thomas Goodwin and John Owen, and Richard Baxter and
Matthew Henry, they are all upon my shelves. But not they alone! Side by side with
the Puritans stand the works of great Catholics and great Anglicans. It is not with
the Puritans alone I hold fellowship; I hold fellowship also with those other
Christians between whom and the Puritans there seemed to be a great gulf fixed. I
hold fellowship with Augustine, and pour out my soul in the words of his
Confessions. I hold fellowship with À Kempis, while he teaches me the Imitatio
Christi. I hold fellowship with William Law while he addresses to me his Serious
Call, and with Jeremy Taylor while he discourses about Holy Living and Holy
Dying. I hold fellowship with ewman and with Robertson, as I read their
sermons—two men sundered far from each other, and both of them ecclesiastically
separated from me. In my study every day of my life I enjoy the ‘Communion of
Saints.’ ”1 [ ote: J. D. Jones, Things Most Surely Believed, 178.]
I
The Disabilities of Aliens
1. The Gentiles hitherto had been in the position of strangers and sojourners. As
aliens they had no rights of citizenship, and all they could look for was temporary
hospitality. They had no real standing within the commonwealth. Gentiles and Jews
stood apart in their agelong traditions and customs. The Apostle has expressed in
strong, emphatic language the ancient separation between the two. He has spoken of
the Greeks as “alienated from the commonwealth of Israel,”—as those “that once
were far off,”—of the “middle wall of partition” to be broken down; and no words
could picture too strongly the great gulf that had divided these families of men. The
descendant of Abraham—conscious of the election of his race to stand alone among
men, as the people of Jehovah; exulting in the noble train of lawgivers and prophets
who had come forth from the secret place of God to proclaim the final glory of the
Jew; trained to believe in one great Invisible, of whom there was no likeness “in the
heaven above or in the earth beneath”—had learned to look with hatred or
contempt on the outcast, lawless Gentile, with his image of God in every valley and
on every hill. And the Greek—living as the free child of nature; having no law but
the darkened light of conscience; feeling in heaven and earth to find the presence of
an Infinite Beauty, whose Image he tried to carve in grace and majesty in snowy
stone—had come to look with philosophic pride on the stern land of the Hebrew,
and in philosophic scorn on his strange, exclusive loneliness. But not only were they
at enmity with each other, they were both at enmity with God, and tried painfully
by ceremony and sacrifice to avert His eternal wrath.
2. The chasm that divided the one from the other seemed almost impassable. There
were deep and seemingly irreconcilable differences between them. Those differences
did not vanish even when Jew and Gentile both turned Christian; they continued to
subsist, as any reader of the ew Testament may discover for himself. It is no
exaggeration to say that there was, in the early days of Christianity, a Jewish
Church and a Gentile Church. And yet “in Christ” the differences were solved, and
Jew and Gentile might greet one another as brethren. “So then,” cries the Apostle,

106. exulting in the effects of the reconciling work of Christ, “ye are no more strangers
and sojourners, but ye are fellow-citizens with the saints, and of the household of
God.”
The alienation of Gentiles from the Divine covenant was represented in the
structure of the temple at Jerusalem by a beautifully worked marble balustrade,
separating the outer from the inner court, upon which stood columns at regular
intervals, bearing inscriptions, some in Greek and some in Latin characters, to warn
aliens not to enter the holy place. One of the Greek inscriptions was discovered a
few years ago, and is now to be read in the Museum of Constantinople. It runs thus:
“ o alien to pass within the balustrade round the temple and the enclosure.
Whosoever shall be caught so doing must blame himself for the penalty of death
which he will incur.”1 [ ote: C. Gore, The Epistle to the Ephesians, 104.]
II
The Widening of the Commonwealth
1. Every race had looked forward to some hoped-for better society.—The Jews had
for generations, often with the fiercest impatience, expected the coming of the
Messianic kingdom. The Greeks had been encouraged by their teachers and
philosophers to aim at creating the perfect city and perfect state. Plato himself had
not only written his wonderful book on the ideal Commonwealth, but had for a time
acted as Prime Minister to a despot who was willing to make such laws as the
Athenian statesman might suggest. The Spartans, the Athenians, and the
Macedonians had each in turn tried to build up the ideal state, and the bloody and
treacherous history of the Greeks in general is not without nobility when we watch
it as a tragic effort at making a really Godlike state. Far more impressive than the
Greek history had been the Roman patriotism and the Roman imperialism. This
forced itself upon the world as something gigantic and irresistible, that bound
together nations and religions the most diverse in one mighty whole. Here in the
Roman empire that Stoic doctrine of the brotherhood of man spread far and wide,
and made many hope that better things were in store.
2. Christ came to found an ideal society.—How did He do it? He selected a few men
who had the faculty of believing. They were not men of great imagination, or talent,
or culture. They were men who could believe in the unseen. These men He trained,
until at last one of them uttered the faith that had been growing in the hearts of all,
and said to Jesus, “Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God.” Immediately
Jesus saw that His long and arduous task was on the way to completion. He saw that
He had in this little group of men the lever with which He would turn the world
upside down. He was filled with exultation and delight. He was beginning already to
see of the travail of His soul and be satisfied, and He cried out, “Blessed art thou,
Simon Bar-Jonah.… I also say unto thee, that thou art Peter, and upon this rock I
will build my Church; and the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it.” The great
word was out now and the great idea launched upon the world. One confused
fisherman, with a few men of like mind of whom he was the leader, formed the

107. solitary rock in the midst of a world of shifting sand, and upon this rock Jesus
would build His Church—a society embodying His spirit, living according to His
laws, steadfastly administering His principles to the whole world, little by little
leavening the lump, the society of the meek who should inherit the earth!
The Roman Empire had in Paul’s time gathered into a great unity the Asiatics of
Ephesus, the Greeks of Corinth, the Jews of Palestine, and men of many another
race; but grand and imposing as that great unity was, it was to Paul a poor thing
compared with the oneness of the Kingdom of Jesus Christ. Asiatics of Ephesus,
Greeks of Corinth, Jews of Palestine, and members of many another race could say,
“Our citizenship is in heaven.” The Roman Eagle swept over wide regions in her
flight, but the Dove of Peace, sent forth from Christ’s hand, travelled farther than
she. As Paul says in the context, the Ephesians had been strangers, “alienated from
the commonwealth of Israel,” wandering like the remnants of some “broken clans,”
but now they are gathered in. That narrow community of the Jewish nation has
expanded its bounds and become the mother-country of believing souls, the true
“island of saints.” It was not Rome that really made all peoples one, it was the
weakest and most despised of her subject races.
What the early Christians felt when they embraced Christ and joined the little
churches in their own cities, was that they had become members of a new race, a
new and heavenly community, which was their proper and eternal home. Until now
they had thought themselves mere human beings, born into a very strange and often
cruel world, without any definite or trustworthy knowledge as to their destiny,
plagued with toil and hardship, I disease and the fear of death. But now suddenly
their whole perspective was altered. Instead of being citizens of this world they were
citizens of heaven, and only sojourners and strangers in the earthly life. Instead of
being units in a confused and wearisome life that soon went out into nothingness,
they were members of a blessed and everlasting family of which God was the Father,
and Jesus Christ the loving herald of His purposes.1 [ ote: . H. Marshall.]
Foremost and grandest amid the teachings of Christ were these two inseparable
truths—There is but one God; all men are the sons of God; and the promulgation of
these two truths changed the face of the world, and enlarged the moral circle to the
confines of the inhabited globe. To the duties of men towards the Family and
Country were added duties towards Humanity. Man then learned that wheresoever
there existed a human being, there existed a brother; a brother with a soul immortal
as his own, destined like himself to ascend towards the Creator, and on whom he
was bound to bestow love, a knowledge of the Faith, and help and counsel when
needed.1 [ ote: Mazzini.]
3. Salvation comes to the individual through society.—The salvation in the Bible is
supposed usually to reach the individual through the community. God’s dealings
with us in redemption thus follow the lines of His dealings with us in our natural
development. For man stands out in history as a “social animal.” His individual
development, by a Divine law of his constitution, is rendered possible only because
he is first of all a member of some society, tribe, or nation, or state. Through

108. membership in such a society alone, and through the submissions and limitations of
his personal liberty which such membership involves, does he become capable of
any degree of free or high development as an individual. This law, then, of man’s
nature appears equally in the method of his redemption. Under the old covenant it
was to members of the “commonwealth of Israel” that the blessings of the covenant
belonged. Under the new covenant St. Paul still conceives of the same
commonwealth as subsisting and as fulfilling no less than formerly the same
religious functions. True, it has been fundamentally reconstituted and enlarged to
include the believers of all nations, and not merely one nation; but it is still the same
commonwealth, or polity, or church; and it is still through the Church that God’s
“covenant” dealings reach the individual.
It is for this reason that St. Paul goes on to describe the state of the Asiatic
Christians, before their conversion, as a state of alienation from the “commonwealth
of Israel.” They were “Gentiles in the flesh,” that is by the physical fact that they
were not Jews; and were contemptuously described as the uncircumcised by those
who, as Jews, were circumcised by human hands. And he conceives this to be only
another way of describing alienation from God and His manifold covenants of
promise, and from the Messiah, the hope of Israel and of mankind. They were
without the Christian society, and therefore presumably without God and without
hope.
A lonely faith is an undeveloped, undiscovered, untested, unedified faith. Like a
man cast on a desert island, it does not know what is in it; it cannot open out its
natural germs. It is through the slowly realized recognition of its part in the
manifold and multitudinous kingdom of which it has become a member that it
discloses its increasing capacities.1 [ ote: H. Scott Holland, God’s City, 35.]
The devout meditation of the isolated man, which flitted through his soul, like a
transient tone of Love and Awe from unknown lands, acquires certainty,
continuance, when it is shared-in by his brother men. “Where two or three are
gathered together” in the name of the Highest then first does the Highest, as it is
written, “appear among them to bless them”; then first does an Altar and act of
united Worship open a way from Earth to Heaven; whereon, were it but a simple
Jacob’s-ladder, the heavenly Messengers will travel, with glad tidings and
unspeakable gifts for men.2 [ ote: Carlyle, Miscellanies, iv. 11.]
It is so easy in happy family life, in absorption in one’s special work, to forget the
duties of a citizen, to avoid the fret and stress, may-be the hardships and the danger,
of politics and social duty. But it is not enough for men to be “kind towards their
friends, affectionate in their families, inoffensive towards the rest of the world.” The
true man knows that he may not decline responsibility for those whom God has
made his fellow-citizens. And higher still, higher than family or country, stands
Humanity; and no man may do or sanction aught for either, which will hurt the
race. Ever before Mazzini stood the vision of the cross, Christ dying for all men, not
from utilitarian calculation of the greatest number, but because love embraces all.3
[ ote: Bolton King, Mazzini, 266.]

109. III
The Privileges of Citizens
1. They were now citizens—no more strangers, that is, outside the Kingdom of God
entirely; nor even sojourners, that is, resident foreigners, such as were found in
most ancient States, enjoying some measure of protection and privilege, but not the
full rights of citizens. Such was the position of proselytes in Israel. But now, Paul
says to his Gentile readers, ye are no longer in any inferior position, but fellow-
citizens with the saints, i.e. the people whom God has separated to Himself out of the
world. Ye have all the privileges which these enjoy; nay, ye have them in common
with them, so that there is absolutely no difference, since all alike now have these
privileges on the same ground, that of the reconciling work of Christ. Ye have,
through Him, an even more blessed position than the saints under the old covenant
had, ye are “of the household of God”—not merely citizens of the Kingdom of God,
but children of His family. This flows from the access to God as Father asserted in
Eph_2:18.
Roman citizenship was in many respects a unique thing. At least there is nothing in
the modern world quite like it. When you speak of a citizen of Leicester or of
London, you think of one who has either been born or has spent the best years of his
life there, who has home, friends, and interests centred in its activities. Roman
citizenship did not mean that. It was an imperial privilege rather than local. London
indeed gives its freedom to a few honoured strangers, and that bears a faint
resemblance to the Roman practice. The Roman citizenship was conferred upon a
few persons all over the empire, persons who, had never set foot in the great city. It
was given to them for some service they had done, and descended to their children.
Paul did not see Rome until he was an old man, but he was all his life a Roman
citizen. And it meant in brief three things:—First, it was a grand Freemasonry. It
brought a man into companionship and brotherhood with Romans everywhere. It
gave him entrance to the best society. It made him one of a superior race, and put
upon him a mark of nobility. Secondly, it conferred upon him certain legal rights. It
was an aegis of protection over him. Roman law and all Rome’s power were behind
him. He could not be tried, condemned, or punished save by Romans, and if ever he
was wronged, misjudged, falsely accused, he had the privilege of carrying his cause
to the highest court, and appealing to Cæsar himself. And thirdly, there was his
responsibility. Wherever he lived, in Tarsus or Ephesus, he remembered that he was
a Roman, that Roman manners were expected of him, that his conduct must be that
of an imperial race, and that he must try to fashion the place of his abode and the
things of daily life as far as possible after Rome’s best models.1 [ ote: J. G.
Greenhough, Christian Festivals and Anniversaries, 159.]
In the time of the Apostle when the mass of the population were slaves, the goods
and chattels of their masters, lying at their absolute disposal for life or death, to be a
Roman citizen was a distinction the value of which those who know nothing of
slavery but the name can only very inadequately estimate. To be a citizen was to be

110. a man, an integral part of a commonwealth. It was to be identified with its glory: it
was to be shielded and armed with the majesty of its influence. In the very name
there was a power that commanded the instant reverence of all that could not boast
the privilege, and the sympathy of all that did. Hence the alarm of Lysias upon
discovering that Paul was a Roman, and the deference which he, who had only
purchased his freedom, could not help paying to the man who could declare himself
freeborn. But what is mere civil freedom in comparison with spiritual freedom—
freedom “from the law of sin and death”; freedom from the curse and tyranny of
evil and the evil one; the freedom conferred by “the perfect law of liberty”; freedom
to obey the instincts and impulses of our spiritual and immortal nature, and to enter
into communion with the Invisible and the Eternal. “He is the freeman whom the
truth makes free, and all are slaves besides.”2 [ ote: J. H. Smith, Healing Leaves,
410.]
2. They now belong to the fellowship of the saints.—They are citizens in the holy
state—the commonwealth of the people consecrated to God—citizens with full rights
and no longer strangers or unenfranchised residents. The idea of the chosen people
all through the Old Testament is that they are as a whole consecrated to God.
Priests and kings appointed by God to their several offices may indeed fulfil special
functions in the national life, yet the fundamental idea is never lost, that the entire
nation is holy, “a kingdom of priests.” It is because this is true that the prophets can
appeal as they do to the people in general, as well as to priests and rulers, as sharing
altogether the responsibility of the national life. ow the whole of this idea is
transferred, only deepened and intensified, to the Christian Church. That too has its
divinely-ordained ministers, its differentiation of functions in the one body, but the
whole body is priestly, and all are citizens—not merely residents but citizens, that is,
intelligent participators in a common corporate life consecrated to God.
To the Apostle Paul every Christian was a saint. Turn to the inscriptions of his
letters. This is the kind of address we find: “Paul and Timothy, to all the saints in
Christ Jesus which are at Philippi.” “Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus, to the saints
and faithful brethren in Christ which are at Colossae.” “Paul, unto the church of
God which is at Corinth, even them that are sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be
saints.” It is quite obvious the references here are to living men and women, the men
and women who formed the membership of these various churches. These were
Paul’s “saints.” And, further, he does not confine the term to a select few in each
church, conspicuous for their special piety. The people whom Paul addresses as
“saints,” we soon discover, were very far from being perfect people. They were,
indeed, full of faults and imperfections and failings. Think of the people at Corinth
with their quarrellings and excesses and sensualities! And yet Paul thinks and
speaks of them as “saints”! It is not simply that in these faulty and imperfect
Christians he sees the promise of the glorified saint, just as the naturalist may see
the giant oak in the tiny acorn! Faults and all, these Christians were “saints,” in this
sense, that they were consecrated to God, and had given themselves to Christ. For
that is the ew Testament meaning of the word “saint”; it means one dedicated, set
apart, to the will of God. And, in spite of all their shortcomings and sins, these early
Christians had given themselves to Christ; the deepest thing in them was the love

111. they bore to Christ; the life they lived, they lived in the faith of Christ. And every
one of whom that can be said, according to the Apostle’s teaching, is a “saint.”1
[ ote: J. D. Jones, Things Most Surely Believed, 169.]
After being in China more than twenty years Griffith John said to young
missionaries, “Preach the Gospel, and take time to be holy as the preparation.” In
the Mission Conference in Shanghai, in 1877, he said, “The missionary must above
everything be a holy man; the Chinese expect it of him. I am persuaded that no
minister can be a great spiritual power in whom this is not in good measure seen. He
must be more than a good man; a man who takes time, not only to master the
language and the literature of the people, but to be holy.… Brethren, this is what we
need if this empire is to be moved by us. To this end the throne of grace must be our
refuge; the shadow of the Almighty must every day and every hour be our dwelling,
we must take time to be filled with His power, we must take time to be holy.”2
[ ote: A. Murray, Aids to Devotion, 47.]
3. More intimately still, they belong to the family or household of God.—A
household is a place where a family is provided for, where there is a regular and
orderly supply of ordinary needs. And the Church is the Divine household, in which
God has provided stewards to make regular spiritual provision for men, so that they
shall feel and know themselves members of a family, understood, sympathized with,
helped, encouraged, disciplined, fed. But there is another idea which, in St. Paul’s
mind, attaches itself strongly to the idea of the “divine family.” It is that in this
household we are sons and not servants—that is, intelligent co-operators with God,
and not merely submissive slaves. It is noticeable how often he speaks with horror of
Christians allowing themselves again to be “subject to ordinances,” or to “the weak
and beggarly rudiments,” the alphabet of that earlier education when even children
are treated as slaves under mere obedience. “Ye observe days, and months, and
seasons, and years. I am afraid of you.” “Why do ye subject yourselves to
ordinances? Handle not, taste not, touch not.” It is perfectly true to say that what St.
Paul is deprecating is a return to Jewish or pagan observances. But this is not all.
He demands, not a change of observance only, but a change of spirit.
The prominent characteristic of a family is mutual affection. A family is held
together by love. There is the love of the father for each and all, and there is the love
of all for him and for each other. And so it is in the Divine family. “God is love”;
pure, infinite, eternal love. This, as it is the glorious summary of His perfections, the
grand resultant expression of all His attributes, is the characteristic of every
individual member of His spiritual family. “We love him because he first loved us”
and “This commandment have we from him, that he who loveth God love his
brother also.” That, however, which the Apostle seems to have had more
particularly in view is the high privilege which attaches to this Divine relationship.
“Ye are no more strangers and sojourners, but fellow-citizens with the saints, and of
the household of God”: that is—as children of God, born of His Spirit, and genuine
members therefore of His spiritual family, you have a peculiar interest in His love
and care. He, the Father of all men, is emphatically your Father. Others He regards
indeed with the love of benevolence, but you He regards with the love of

112. complacency. Others participate in His universal goodness, but you are the objects
of His special solicitude. A child has a certain right to the consideration of his father
which no stranger to the family possesses: and so you, as members of God’s family,
have a claim upon His affection which none but His spiritual children can allege.
Having received from Him not “the spirit of bondage again to fear,” not the spirit of
a slave, which shuns His presence and quails before His eye, but “the spirit of
adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father,” so He privileges and encourages you to
come before Him lovingly and trustfully, with all the freedom and confidence of a
child, casting all your care upon Him, and looking for all things in that boundless
love which has pledged all His attributes and excellences, all His treasures of grace
and glory, for your perfection and blessedness.
Sin brings separation from God. The word “depart” uttered to the workers of
iniquity is not an arbitrary one. It voices a law of God that runs through all His
moral realm. Sin pushes the prodigal away from his home and friends, his property,
his pleasures, his reputation, his character, even his clothes and his food. The law of
the word “depart” has driven him away from everything that was beautiful and of
good report. Behold him in his rags and loneliness—feeding swine. Think it not
strange, if that man is driven from God and goodness who yields himself to sin. By a
changeless law of moral repulsion, he is pushed away. Is it hopeless? Yes, as long as
his back is turned toward God. But let him “come to himself,” let him feel his sin
and degradation, let him long for home, for forgiveness, for his Father’s face, and
the law of changeless love takes hold of him.1 [ ote: M. D. Babcock, Thoughts for
Every-Day Living, 77.]
4. The higher status involves a heavier responsibility.—The enfranchised must do
credit to their citizenship; they must live as becometh saints, and manifest the spirit,
not of slaves, but of sons. Christian citizenship must begin with the thought of our
individual life and purpose. The truly good citizen is made out of the truly good
man. The common life is made of our individual lives, and the whole cannot be
better than the constituent parts. If, then, our citizenship is to be a Christian
citizenship, we must first of all be Christian men. The first thing that the Spirit of
Christ does for every one who is in any real and vital sense a disciple, or, as we say
in our modern phrase, a Christian man, is to lay hold of the spirit, breathing into it
new aspirations, creating, as St. Paul would have said, the new man; and the new
man in Christ thus born of the Spirit finds his heart aglow with new aims and new
ambitions, new purposes and ideals of conduct. He is illuminated with new thought
and with new conceptions of duty and of happiness.
God knows if I could in any way, by preaching that great part of the Communion of
Saints, make men generally feel how they are living one in another, and how every
single soul has his share of responsibility for his fellows, and every single soul his
blessing from undertaking that responsibility, and how any single soul receives a
blessing from the fellowship of his fellows in everything that he undertakes—if I
could impress that upon my countrymen generally, I would be content to do nothing
more in all my life than to preach this greatest of all Christian doctrines.1 [ ote:
Frederick Temple, Archbishop of Canterbury, ii. 312.]

113. As Paul waited in his Roman prison, he had all around him soldiers and civilians,
high and low, men of various types and kinds, most of whom claimed, we may
suppose, Roman citizenship, and, moreover, nearly all of whom were members of
the household of Cæsar; and we can imagine the discussions of which these great
texts in his letters are the echo. Yes, he says, you claim to be citizens of this great
Empire of Rome, you are members of the household of Cæsar, and you are very
proud of it all; but do you also remember that you have to think of your real calling
as something deeper and broader and higher and more enduring than all of these, if
you are to be in the best sense good citizens of the Roman Empire and good
members of the Imperial household; why, then you must bear always in mind that
you are called of God to live as members of the commonwealth of Christ, to
remember in all circumstances that you are fellow-citizens with the saints and of
God’s household.2 [ ote: Bishop J. Percival.]
The ation some time ago gave the story of a business man, the inheritor of an
honoured name and honourable business traditions, who had a temptation put in
his way to abandon the old methods of his firm, and join a great trust that cared
more for its dividends than the welfare of its workmen. There was money in it, and
the man was sorely tempted. But on the night in which the decision was to be taken,
he fell into a reverie in front of his fire, and he seemed to behold his old father
looking at him, with such concern in his eyes; and at the sight of his father’s face the
temptation lost its power; he must act as his father’s Song of Solomon 3 [ ote: J. D.
Jones, Things Most Surely Believed, 184.]
BI, "Fellow citizens with the saints, and of the household of God.
The communion of saints
The Church at Ephesus was a mixed community of Jewish and Gentile converts.
The old feuds between them had not passed away. The Jew refused to let go the
claim of his nation to some religious superiority over the Gentile, and thought the
latter ought to stand afar off and worship in some outer court. But the great design
of Christianity, argues the apostle, is to abolish these enmities, to break down these
partition walls, to bring these separated worshippers both nigh to each other, and
nigh to God. Christ, he declares, is both our peace and our peacemaker. In Himself,
and by Himself, He made of the twain one new man and one new society; not
strangers one to another, still less enemies one to another, but one large family,
joined together in the ties of spiritual brotherhood, fellow citizens with the saints,
and members of the household of God.
I. There is the communion of saints with the holy trinity (1Jn_1:3; Joh_17:21-23;

114. 2Pe_1:4). Deity is in some sense grafted into the stock of our regenerate and
renewed humanity. Between God and the souls of His elect there is as much of
oneness and communion as there is between a vine and its branches, or a body and
its members, or a temple and the stones of which it is composed. The tabernacle of
God is with men. The incarnation of Christ has made our nature an ennobled thing;
the power of the Holy Ghost makes it a spiritual and sanctified thing; and the two
together make the communion perfect. There is bestowed upon us a new moral
nature, and in virtue of this God may speak with man, walk with man, dwell with
man, may suffer to flow towards man the rich tide of His beneficent sympathies, and
conclude with man the terms of a holy and everlasting friendship.
II. The communion of saints with the whole body of the Church militant here on
earth.
1. The communion of spiritual life. The saints of God, however scattered, have the
same Word to guide, the same sacraments to refresh, the same essential doctrines as
their ground of trust, and the same Holy Spirit to uphold their souls in life. Born
under the same curse, inheritors of a common feebleness, and exposed to like
temptations, they look forward to the same bright consummation of glory and
honour and immortality (1Co_12:12-13).
2. Communion of aim and object and united interest.
3. Communion of help and sympathy and fellow feeling with one another’s trials
(Gal_6:2).
4. Communion in prayer. Mutual intercession is the life of the Church (1Ti_2:1;
Php_1:19).
III. Communion of saints on earth with saints in paradise--the Church militant with
the Church expectant. Death makes no difference in the mystical union which is
betwixt Christ and His Church; i.e., makes no difference in the nature of that union.
It will give a demonstration to its evidence, a lustre to its glory, an elevation to its
bliss; but the union itself is just what it was in life--a joining of the soul to the Lord
by one Spirit. Our communion with departed saints is--
1. A communion of hope.
2. A communion of esteem.
3. A communion of imitation.
We walk in the same light, we live by the same Spirit, we are looking forward to the

115. same peaceful blessedness which they enjoy who are fallen asleep.
IV. Communion with the angels that stand around the throne. They are our fellow
servants, and our fellow citizens. Conclusion: What a field of high and ennobling
thought does this subject open up! Into what boundless relations does the human
spirit branch out; how mysterious is the tie which binds it with all being, with all
intelligence, with all worlds! We say unto corruption, thou art my father; to the
worm, thou art my mother and my sister; and yet, notwithstanding this, we are one
with all the society of the blessed; with the martyrs, a noble army; with the
prophets, a goodly fellowship; with the apostles, a glorious company; with the
angels, a radiant host. ay, this bond of saintly sympathy rests not here; it is
interlinked with things divine--with the sanctities of the Spirit, with the glorified
humanity of Christ, with the covenant love of God. How important the question for
us all--How shall these glorious ties be preserved unbroken, and wherein lies this
great strength? The strength of this union of saints lies in their separation from all
sinful thoughts and sympathies. We have a name, a character, a calling, and we
must be consistent therewith. The world and the Church must have an intelligible
partition somewhere. The life of saintship must be saintliness of life. Communion,
whether with Divine or created natures, must have its foundation in similarity of
moral character. To see God we must be like Him. (Daniel Moore, M. A.)
Saintly citizenship
1. Believers are fellow citizens.
(1) Bound to seek each other’s good.
(2) Bound to conform to the customs of their city.
(3) This teaches us our happiness when we are brought to believe, and should
stimulate our faith.
(4) Citizens of Bethel must not communicate with Babylon.
2. Believers are conjoined as members of one family. This is a stricter bond than the
former, and should serve to increase love. We being confined within one family, a
common roof under which we all live and board, we must be all of one heart, at
peace and unity; and the God of love and peace will be with us.
3. It is God’s family.
(1) Therefore we must live to Him. The household is bound to obey its master.

116. (2) How dishonouring to God are the sins of those who profess to be His!
(3) The Lord will make due provision for His household.
(4) Those who have servants under them, should learn from this to be kind and just
to them; for they and we are all fellow servants in the family of God. (Paul Bayne.)
Fellow citizens
“It is not good for man to be alone.” There are few things more terrible than to be
utterly friendless and alone in the world. One of the most awful forms of
punishment is solitary confinement, and many a poor prisoner has grown gray and
old in a few years, or has gone mad, because he was not allowed to see, or speak to, a
fellow creature. In days gone by, we read that one of these unhappy captives
actually made friends with a spider, finding the company of an insect better than
absolute solitude; and that another captive devoted all his thought and affection on
a prison flower. Quite lately I read of a prisoner in one of our gaols who had tamed
a rat as a companion, and who became almost mad when his only friend was taken
from him. We have all heard of the sufferings of those who have been cast away in
shipwreck upon lonely islands, with no companion to share their exile. But let
Christ’s servant be where he will, on lonely island, in solitary prison, among crowds
of strangers, he is never alone, because he believes in the communion of saints.
I. Fellowship with the martyrs. We need not die for Christ in order to be His
martyrs. St. Paul would have been a martyr if he had died quietly in his bed, and
never felt the sword of the Roman headsman. His years of patient suffering in
Christ’s service, his bold preaching in the face of persecution and death, made him
the faithful martyr of Jesus. And so now, those of us who are trying to do their duty
where God has put them, doing what is right at any cost, bearing loss, trouble,
insult, it may be, rather than commit sin, they are Christ’s martyrs, no matter how
lowly and obscure their lives may be.
II. Fellowship with the prophets. But you may say, “How can I do the work of a
preacher or prophet like Elijah, or Jonah, or Ezekiel, or the rest?” You need not be
preachers as they were, yet you can be like them. They were not afraid to speak the
truth, they were not too timid to rebuke vice wherever they saw it. They defended
the honour of God and His Church at all times, and never thought of their own
safety. ow you, my brothers, can be brave for Jesus; show that you are not
ashamed of your Master, or your Christian calling.

117. III. Fellowship with the apostles. The name apostle means one who is sent forth; the
first apostles of Jesus were sent to preach the gospel to every creature. We, as
Christian men and women, are all, in one sense, apostles. The pure man, the honest
man, the faithful man, is an apostle of Jesus; his life is a gospel, a sermon on purity,
honesty, faith. The temperate man is a preacher; his example is the best lesson on
self-control. (H. J. Wilmot-Buxton, M. A.)
The relation of the members to the heed of the household
The phrase now before us, “the household of God,” is but a reflection of the ever-
recurring reference in the teaching of Christ to God as the Father, both of Himself
and of men. The idea of a household grows out of Christ’s idea of God as Father,
just as the idea in the word citizen in the previous part of the verse grows out of
Christ’s conception of the kingdom of God. It is to this idea of the Christian society
as a household we now give our attention. In another place, regarding it, not in the
light of its head, but of the spirit which binds us to this head, he calls it “the
household of faith.” ow what are the essentials of a household? A household is a
society marked by diversity in unity. It is like light, which is composed of the many
colours of the spectrum, each colour having a character of its own, but when all are
combined forming the pure white light by which we see and work. So a household is
a combination--a unity of different characters under one head. And this is the true
conception of the Christian society we call the Church. Without the diversity it
would be as uninteresting as the grains of wheat in the garner--which are all alike;
without the unity it would not be a society at all. Let us see what each involves:
I. Of the diversity.
1. A household is not an institution founded on identity of thought. Each member of
it may have ideas of his own. Such diversity grows naturally out of the variety of
character and mind of its members. It is only another side of the same truth to say--
2. in a household identity of experience as not essential. There is as great a variety of
inward life as of mental thought in the members of a family, The differences of
feeling are as great as those of intellect.
II. Of the unity of the household. In what does it consist? Unmistakably in loyalty to
its head. Loyalty in a home is only another name for love. The children may have
different conceptions of the head of the family; they may regard him in different
ways; but if they be loyal, loving, they are a real part of the household. Within this
limit there is room for almost endless diversity. One child may understand one part

118. of his father’s character, and another may understand another part. The boys may
appreciate best the business capacity of their father, and the girls may best discern
the tenderer home side of that character. One may appreciate his intellectual
qualities, and another his practical ability. But all belong to the household who look
up to and trust him as the head. So it is in the household of God--one mind may be
compelled by its very nature to grapple with the problems of the Divine ature;
another may be able to believe without attempting to prove. One may need
definitions and theories, another may quietly rest in the Lord. But the central,
essential thing is to be loyal to the Head. And closely connected with, yea, a part of
such loyalty, is, obedience to the Head. Obedience is loyalty in action. Works are the
fruit of faith. (W. G. Herder.)
The relation of the members of the household to one another
Sonship is one side of the home relationship, brotherhood is the other. o one can be
a good son unless he be a good brother. The true parent cares as much for right
feeling among his children as for right feeling to himself. It is perhaps more difficult
to be loyal to our brethren than it is to be loyal to the head. Where the head is
concerned the idea of authority comes in, but where the members are concerned the
relationship must be even more spontaneous. The child may be afraid to offend his
father, but that feeling does not arise in relation to those who are his brothers or
sisters. The father will probably not put so severe a strain on the loyalty of his
children as they may do one to another. Rivalry is not so likely to spring up between
child and parent as between brothers and sisters. Age, which naturally wakens
deference to the parent, is not present to the same degree to waken it between those
whose years are more on an equality. For these, and many similar reasons, it is more
difficult to keep unity in the household than between the household and its head.
But the ew Testament is quite as insistent on the one as on the other. There should
be room for all diversities of character, that by contact and converse they may
modify and balance one another, the solemn moderating the merry, the merry
brightening the solemn, the poetic elevating the practical, the practical steadying the
poetic, the guileless quickening faith in the calculating, the calculating preserving
the guileless from being deceived. This is a part of the Divine method of education
for our life. We are members one of another, so that no one may say to another: “I
have no need of thee.” The peace of a family is gone if any one member seek to
dominate the rest, and always have his own way. Many a household has been ruined
by self-will. And more than aught beside, this has rent asunder the household of
God. Closely connected with such--indeed, lying at the root of self-will--is the idea of
infallibility. Such a confidence in our own opinions that all others are regarded as
erroneous. The learned Dr. Thompson, late Master of Trinity College, once said
“ one of us are infallible, not even the youngest.” othing is more irritating--
nothing is more likely to disturb the unity of the home or of the Church, than some
one member who poses as an oracle. This is but the negative side of the matter.
These are the things to be avoided. There is a positive side: things to be done. The
true conception of a household is of a company in which the resources of each of the

119. members are at the service of all the rest. It should be a ministering company. The
joy of one should be the joy of all. The sorrow of one should be the sorrow of all. A
company in which the strong bear the infirmities of the weak, and not please
themselves. Those on the hilltop of faith moving down to those in the valley of
doubt, to lead them to the height of vision. The glad and merry bearing some of the
sunshine of their nature to the morbid and gloomy. In such ministries, prompted of
love, the home consists, whether it be of man or of God. Indeed, the home is but the
miniature of the greater household of God. A home is not made by those who live
and eat and sleep under the same roof. It may be a hotel, it is not a home. The home
does not begin to be until it is a place of mutual ministries, inspired of love. And the
household of God is not constituted by men and women who hold the same creed,
repeat the same prayers, join in the same sacraments--these are but the form, the
letter; not until the spirit of love, reaching out to mutual help, arises, is it worthy of
the name of a household of God. (W. G. Herder.)
Fellow citizens with the saints
In the text, St. Paul sets forth the privileges of the Gentile state, that is, of our state,
by a very intelligible figure, by a figure especially understood in that day. The
inhabitants, or rather I should say, the actual and acknowledged and free members,
of particular cities, then enjoyed particular rights and benefits, to a greater extent
than is usually found amongst us; and this was particularly the case with regard to
the city of Rome, the then mistress of the world; of which city the apostle himself
was a free-born citizen, and found the benefit of his birthright on several occasions.
While strangers and foreigners then were disowned, and often unprotected and
despised, the citizen was regarded and honoured and cherished wherever he went.
And the Church of God is here compared, in this respect, to a city, of which the
Israelites had formerly been the only true members, had alone enjoyed the
blessings; the rest of mankind being in the situation of strangers and foreigners. But
circumstances are now totally altered: the Gentile believers are no longer excluded
from the privileges of the people of God; they are become fellow citizens of the
spiritual and heavenly Jerusalem. ow, let us first inquire what is the nature and
extent of this city, of which we are made the privileged members? what the family
into which we are admitted? It is the whole body of Jehovah’s accepted people
throughout the universe: the whole family of the blest, wherever they are to be
found. But it is not to the present race of mortals that our fellowship is confined: we
have communion also with the saints at rest, with all that ever lived and died, from
Adam to the present generation. The new dispensation is united with the old; they
are both one; we may say one gospel; being parts of that same grand scheme of
redemption, which was framed and declared from the beginning, for the recovery
and salvation of mankind. But, indeed, we have not yet surveyed the length and
breadth of that community, into which we have been received as members. The
angels, the highest angels, form a part thereof; we are one with them; our city is
theirs, and our Lord is theirs. Of the blessed Jesus, “the whole family in heaven and
earth is named.” (J. Slade, M. A.)

120. The communion of saints
He that walks in communion with the saints, travels in company: he dwells in a city
where one house sustains another, to which Jerusalem is compared. (H. G. Salter.)
The best fellowship
The Rev. James Owen, of Shrewsbury, being asked on his deathbed, whether he
would have some of his friends sent for to keep him company, replied, “My
fellowship is with the Father, and with His Son Jesus Christ; and he that is not
satisfied with that company doth not deserve it.”
ISBET, "
LIFE REALISED I FELLOWSHIP
‘ ow therefore ye are no more strangers and foreigners, but fellow=citizens with the
saints, and of the household of God.’
Eph_2:19
We maintain that the undenominational principle is wrong, from the standpoint not
only of education, but also of religion—nay, that it not only fails to interpret, but it
reverses, the method of Christ Himself, the Divine Teacher. Was it His method to
lay down certain truths and maxims, and to leave individuals to make of them what
they pleased, and afterwards, according to their own taste and temperament, to join
themselves with others who shared their opinions? We know that to the ordinary
crowd of persons who listened to the teaching of Jesus He could not commit that
deeper truth which was to be the salvation of the world. Before He could find an
entry for that vital truth He must prepare a body in which it could live and act upon
the world, and be preserved through all the fluctuating generations of men.
The Church of the Lord Jesus Christ was a compact body of men holding together
in the midst of the world, and visible to the eyes of all; and it was through
membership in this body that they were to realise the great gifts of union with
Himself and fellowship with one another. There they were to be united to Him so
that together they could share the merits of His atoning death, receive together the
grace of His redeeming life, and work together in the one fellowship for the
salvation of the world.
I. That great conception—that the Christian life can only be realised in fellowship—
is the basis of all Apostolic teaching.—From the isolation of merely individual life

121. and opinion, from all the sundering forces of human distinctions of class and creed,
men were to be gathered together into the one fellowship, regenerated by its life, fed
by its holy food. They were to be no longer ‘aliens and sojourners, but fellow-
citizens with the saints, and of the household of God.’ Thus, my brethren, it would
be true to say that the very object of Christ’s teaching of religion—nay, of His very
mission from the Father—was to attach men to a body. May we not even dare to
say—you will not misunderstand the words—that Christ came to make a man a
Churchman?
II. Why is it that we find it so hard here in England to take to our living experience
this essential truth of the Gospel?—It is partly because of our national
temperament—so dull to all ideas which make demands upon thought and
imagination. But it is also partly due to the circumstances of our national and our
religious history. We have exaggerated and misinterpreted the great Protestant
conception that a man’s religion is a matter of individual relationship between him
and God. In the same way we have exaggerated and misinterpreted our great
heritage of political freedom, so that an Englishman comes almost to think that his
nation exists for the purpose of advancing his interests, protecting his commerce,
and extending his resources. Thank God, we are beginning to outgrow the
tendencies of this spirit. We are realising, and trying to teach in our schools, that a
man’s life is bound up with his nation, that as he shares its blood, so he must be
equal to all the demands for sacrifice which it makes upon him.
III. ow, does religion stand apart from this great principle, that life can only be
realised in fellowship?— ay, rather in religion—in the Christian religion—it is
raised to its highest form and to its greatest power, so that we may say that the
brotherhood of men with one another in the Church—with one another and with
Christ—is to become more and more, in a sense which it has not been in the past, a
light set before the eyes of men, from which, in the whole sphere of national and
common life, they may learn what brotherhood and fellowship mean. Is this, then,
the time in which we can settle the religious education of our children on a principle
which entirely neglects and passes over this great conception of the Christian life—
which teaches that religion is an affair of man’s own opinion, and that fellowship
with Christ with other Christian men in the life of the body is only a matter of
subsequent taste and temperament? Rather must we teach our children from the
very first that they are related to God and to one another, because they are members
of a great body knit together in a living fellowship—‘fellow-citizens with the saints,
and of the household of God.’ Would God, indeed, that that conception could be
realised through the life of one single all-embracing Church. So it was meant to be
by the Lord Jesus, Who purchased His Church with His own Blood; but, alas! as it
has passed down the ages it has been torn into many fragments, and the vision of
one single Christian body is no longer what it was meant to be—a living fact—but
only a distant hope. But is the principle itself in abeyance? Has it been withdrawn?
Are we to take out great passages of the teaching of the ew Testament? Has the
principle been suspended until these distant hopes can be fulfilled? ay, rather we
are still called to act upon the principle that our Christian life is impossible without
the reality of Christian fellowship.

122. —
Archbishop Lang.
Illustration
‘I have been the undenominational man. I know the attractions of its convenience, of
its plausible liberalism, of its specious charity. But, thank God, I have come to know
also how powerless it is to vitalise the religious aspirations of a man’s soul or to
strengthen his will; and, once into the life of the Christian there has come the vision
of that great fellowship descending from our Lord Himself through all the ages and
binding men together into one communion and fellowship with Himself and with the
saints, then ever afterwards one of his passwords must be “If I forget thee, O
Jerusalem, let my right hand forget its cunning.” We cannot be “disobedient to the
heavenly vision”; and therefore we cannot, without disloyalty to our Lord Jesus
Christ and to His own method of teaching, come to any other principle than this:
that the object of the religious teaching of our children in the schools must be to
attach them to a religious denomination.’
SIMEO , "THE EXALTED PRIVILEGES OF TRUE CHRISTIA S
Eph_2:19-22. ow therefore ye are no more strangers and foreigners, but fellow-
citizens with the saints, and of the household of God; and are built upon the
foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner
stone; in whom all the building fitly framed together groweth unto an holy temple in
the Lord: in whom ye also are builded together for an habitation of God through the
Spirit.
IT is well for Christians to contemplate their high privileges. But, in order to
estimate them aright, it is necessary that they should bear in mind the state in which
they were, previous to their embracing the Gospel. The difference between the Jews
and Gentiles was great; yet scarcely greater than that between the nominal and the
real Christian. The nominal Christian, though possessed of many external
advantages, is, with respect to the spiritual enjoyment of them, on a level with the
heathen; or rather, I should say, below the heathen, inasmuch as his abuse of those
advantages has entailed upon him the deeper guilt. We may therefore apply to the
unconverted Christians what St. Paul speaks of the Ephesians in their unconverted
state; “They are without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and
strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope, and without God in the
world [ ote: ver. 12.].” From this state however they are delivered, as soon as they
truly believe in Christ. They are then, as my text expresses it, “no more strangers
and foreigners, but fellow-citizens with the saints, and of the household of God.”
The exalted state to which they are brought is represented by the Apostle under two
distinct metaphors: they are made,
I. The people of God, amongst whom he dwells—

123. They are “fellow-citizens with the saints”—
[Bodies that are incorporated, whether in cities, boroughs, or societies of any kind,
have their peculiar privileges, to which others who belong not to them are not
entitled. Thus it is with the saints, who are formed into one body in Christ, and have
the most distinguished privileges confirmed to them by a charter from the court of
heaven. That charter is the Gospel, in which all their immunities and all their claims
are fully described. What externally belonged to the Jewish nation at large, is
internally and spiritually made over to them: “to them belong the adoption, and the
glory, and the covenants, and the giving of the law, and the service of God and the
promises [ ote: Rom_9:4.]:” yes, all that God has revealed in his Gospel, all that he
has promised to his believing people, all that he has engaged to them in his
everlasting covenant, all that Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob enjoyed on earth, and all
that they now possess in heaven, all without exception is theirs; “All things are
theirs when they are Christ’s.” They are “citizens of no mean city,” seeing that
“they are come to Mount Zion, the city of the living God [ ote: Heb_12:22.]:?” and
whatever pertains to that is the lot of their inheritance.]
They are also “of the household of God”—
[As in the days of old there was an outer court for the Gentiles, and an inner court
into which the native servants and children of Jehovah were privileged to enter, so
now believers have access to God as his more immediate children and servants.
They go in and out before him with a liberty unknown to the natural man; they hear
his voice; they enjoy his protection; they subsist from day to day by the provision
which he assigns them: the family to which they belong comprehends “an
innumerable company of angels, and the general assembly and Church of the first-
born which are written in heaven,” together with myriads who are yet on their way
to Zion: but all regard him as their common Head, their Lord, their Master, their
Father and their Friend.]
Exalted as this privilege is, it is far surpassed by that which is contained under that
other metaphor,
II. The temple wherein he dwells—
The whole body of true believers is the temple of the living God—
[Their foundation properly is Christ. But, in the text, the Church is said to be “built
on the foundation of the Apostles and Prophets,” because they with one voice
testified of Christ; and on their testimony the Church is built. This is the import of
what our Saviour said to Peter; “Thou art Peter, and on this rock will I build ray
Church:” he did not mean, that he would build it on the person of Peter, but on the
testimony of Peter just before delivered, namely, that “Jesus was the Christ, the Son
of the living God [ ote: Mat_16:16-18.].” Of the Church Christ is also “the chief
corner-stone,” which, whilst it supports the building, connects the parts of it

124. together, and gives it stability through the whole remaining superstructure.
The building raised on this foundation consists of “living stones [ ote: 1Pe_2:4-5.],”
all selected by sovereign grace, and with unerring wisdom “fitly framed together,”
so as mutually to confirm and strengthen one another, and collectively to constitute
an edifice for the Lord. Various degrees of labour are bestowed on these, according
to the situation they are to occupy. Some, which are designed for a more
conspicuous place in that building, have many strokes: others, which have a less
honourable place assigned them, are sooner and more easily brought to the measure
of perfection which is necessary for them.
But, in all, this work is carried on silently, and in a way unnoticed by the world
around them. As in the temple of Solomon, “every stone was made ready before it
was brought thither, so that there was neither hammer, nor axe, nor any tool of
iron, heard in the house while it was in building [ ote: 1Ki_6:7.];” so it is in this
spiritual building: every stone is fitted in secret: the work is carried on in each,
without attracting the notice and observation of men: but all will at last be found so
precisely fitted for their respective stations, as to demonstrate the infinite skill and
unerring wisdom of the Divine Architect.]
The end for which this structure is raised, is, the inhabitation of the Deity—
[For this end fresh converts are “added to the Church daily, even such as shall be
saved.” For this end the work is carried on and perfected in the heart of every
individual believer. For this end all the means of grace, like the scaffolding, are
continued, till the whole shall have received its final completion. For this end the
Holy Spirit is imparted to all, so that all are compacted together, standing firm on
the one foundation, and united to each other by indissoluble bonds. And at last the
Deity shall take possession of it, as he did in the days of Solomon, when by the
bright cloud he filled the house, so that the priest could no longer stand to minister
before him [ ote: 1Ki_8:10-11.].
In all this honour every saint partakes. Every one, even in his individual capacity, is
a temple of the Lord [ ote: 1Co_6:19.], and has the Spirit of God dwelling in him
[ ote: Joh_14:17; Joh_14:23.]. “In his heart Christ dwells by faith [ ote: Eph_
3:17.]:” and, through the effectual operation of the Holy Spirit, “he grows
continually, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ.” Yes, this
honour has the Church at large; and this honour have all the saints of every
successive age.]
Reflections—
1. How thankful should we be for such inestimable privileges!
[Believers, whoever ye are, ye were once lying in the quarry, as insensible as any
that are still there. It was not by any agency of yours, no, nor for any superior
goodness in you, that ye were taken thence; but purely by God’s power, for the

125. praise of the glory of his own grace. He it is that has made the difference between
you and others, between you also and your former selves. O! “look unto the rock,
whence ye have been hewn, and to the hole of the pit, whence ye have been digged.”
ever forget what ye once were, or what ye would still have continued to be, if God,
of his own good pleasure, had not brought you thence, and made you what ye now
are.
Be thankful also for the means which God, of his own infinite mercy, is yet using
with you, to carry on and perfect his work in your souls. If ye have many strokes of
the hammer, complain not of it: you have not one too many, not one that could be
spared, if you are to occupy aright the place ordained for you. Lie meekly and
submissively before your God; and let him perfect his work in his own way.
And contemplate the end for which you are destined, even “to be an habitation of
God, through the Spirit,” to all eternity! Shall not this prospect make you “joyful in
all your tribulation?” Shall so much as an hour pass, and you not give praise and
thanksgiving to your God? Look forward to the end, even to “this grace that shall
be given you at the appearing of Jesus Christ;” and beg of your God and Saviour
not to intermit his work one single moment, till you are rendered completely meet
for the station you are to hold, and the honour you are to enjoy in the eternal
world.]
2. How studious should we be to walk worthy of them!
[This improvement of our privileges we should never overlook: it is the use which
the inspired writers continually teach us to make of them. Are we the temples of the
Holy Ghost? we must be far removed from all connexion with ungodly men [ ote:
2Co_6:16-17.] — — — and from all hateful and polluting passions [ ote: 1Co_3:16-
17.] — — — And in us must be offered up continually the sacrifices of prayer and
praise [ ote: 1Pe_2:4-5.]; from which “God will smell a sweet odour,” and by which
he will eternally be glorified. Surely “holiness becomes God’s house for ever;” and
“this is the law of the house,” that every part of it, and its very precincts, even to “its
utmost limits, should be holy [ ote: Eze_43:12.].” Labour then for this. Consider
“what manner of persons ye ought to be in all holy conversation and godliness:”
and, as every vessel of the sanctuary was holy, so let your every action, your every
word, your every thought, be such as becometh your high calling and your heavenly
destination.]
20

126. built on the foundation of the apostles and
prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the chief
cornerstone.
BAR ES, "And are built upon the foundation - The comparison of the church
with a building, is common in the Scriptures: compare the notes at 1Co_3:9-10. The
comparison was probably taken from the temple, and as that was an edifice of great
beauty, expense, and sacredness, it was natural to compare the church with it. Besides,
the temple was the sacred place where God dwelt on the earth; and as the church was the
place where he delighted now to abide, it became natural to speak of his church as the
temple, or the residence of God; see the notes at Isa_54:11-12. That building, says Paul,
was permanently founded, and was rising with great beauty of proportion, and with
great majesty and splendor.
Of the apostles - The doctrines which they taught are the basis on which the church
rests. It is “possible” that Paul referred here to a splendid edifice, particularly because
the Ephesians were distinguished for their skill in architecture, and because the
celebrated temple of Diana was among them. An allusion to a building, however, as an
illustration of the church occurs several times in his other epistles, and was an allusion
which would be everywhere understood.
And prophets - The prophets of the Old Testament, using the word, probably, to
denote the Old Testament in general. That is, the doctrines of divine revelation, whether
communicated by prophets or apostles, were laid at the foundation of the Christian
church. It was not rounded on philosophy, or tradition, or on human laws, or on a
venerable antiquity, but on the great truths which God had revealed. Paul does not say
that it was founded on “Peter,” as the papists do, but on the prophets and apostles in
general. If Peter had been the “vicegerent of Christ,” and the head of the church, it is
incredible that his brother Paul should not have given him some honorable notice in this
place. Why did he not allude to so important a fact? Would one who believed it have
omitted it? Would a papist now omit it? Learn here:
(1) That no reliance is to be placed on philosophy as a basis of religious doctrine.
(2) That the traditions of people have no authority in the church, and constitute no
part of the foundation.
(3) That nothing is to be regarded as a fundamental part of the Christian system, or as
binding on the conscience, which cannot be found in the “prophets and apostles;” that is,
as it means here, in the Holy Scriptures. No decrees of councils; no ordinances of
synods; no “standard” of doctrines; no creed or confession, is to be urged as authority in
forming the opinions of people. They may be valuable for some purposes, but not for
this; they may be referred to as interesting parts of history, but not to form the faith of
Christians; they may be used in the church to express its belief, but not to form it. What
is based on the authority of apostles and prophets is true, and always true, and only true;
what may be found elsewhere, may be valuable and true, or not, but, at any rate, is not to

127. be used to control the faith of people.
Jesus Christ himself being the chief cornerstone - see the note at Isa_28:16;
Rom_9:33, note. The cornerstone is the most important in the building.
(1) Because the edifice rests mainly on the cornerstones. If they are small, and
unstable, and settle down, the whole building is insecure; and hence care is taken to
place a large stone firmly at each corner of an edifice.
(2) Because it occupies a conspicuous and honorable place. If documents or valuable
articles are deposited at the foundation of a building it is within the cornerstone. The
Lord Jesus is called the “cornerstone,” because the whole edifice rests on him, or he
occupies a place relatively as important as the cornerstone of an edifice. Were it not for
him, the edifice could not be sustained for a moment. Neither prophets nor apostles
alone could sustain it; see the notes at 1Co_3:11; compare 1Pe_2:6.
CLARKE, "And are built upon the foundation - Following the same metaphor,
comparing the Church of Christ to a city, and to the temple, the believing Ephesians are
represented as parts of that building; the living stones out of which it is principally
formed, 1Pe_2:4, 1Pe_2:5, having for foundation - the ground plan, specification, and
principle on which it was builded, the doctrine taught by the prophets in the Old
Testament, and the apostles in the New. Jesus Christ being that corner stone, or
ακρογωνιαιος, the chief angle or foundation corner stone, the connecting medium by
which both Jews and Gentiles were united in the same building. Elsewhere Jesus Christ
is termed the foundation stone. Behold I lay in Zion a foundation stone, a tried stone, a
precious corner stone, Isa_28:16; but the meaning is the same in all the places where
these terms, foundation and corner stone, occur; for in laying the foundation of a
building, a large stone is generally placed at one of the angles or corners, which serves to
form a part of the two walls which meet in that angle. When, therefore, the apostle says
that Jesus Christ is the chief corner stone, it means such a foundation stone as that
above mentioned.
GILL, "And are built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets,....
The prophets of the Old Testament, and the apostles of the New, who agree in laying
ministerially the one and only foundation, Jesus Christ; for not the persons of the
apostles and prophets, nor their doctrines merely, are here meant; but Christ who is
contained in them, and who is the foundation on which the church, and all true believers
are built: he is the foundation of the covenant of grace, of all the blessings and promises
of it, of faith and hope, of peace, joy, and comfort, of salvation and eternal happiness; on
this foundation the saints are built by Father, Son, and Spirit, as the efficient causes, and
by the ministers of the Gospel as instruments: these lie in the same common quarry with
the rest of mankind, and are singled out from thence by efficacious grace; they are
broken and hewn by the word and ministers of it, as means; and are ministerially laid on
Christ the foundation, and are built up thereon in faith and holiness; yea, private
Christians are useful this way to build up one another:
Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner stone; which cements and knits
together angels and men, Jews and Gentiles, Old and New Testament saints, saints
above, and saints below, saints on earth, in all ages and places, and of every
denomination; and which is the beauty and glory, as well as the strength of the building,
which keeps all together; and Christ is the chief, the headstone of the corner, and who is

128. superior to angels and men. This phrase is used by the Jews to denote excellency in a
person; so a wise scholar is called ‫פינה‬ ‫,אבן‬ "a cornerstone"; (i) see Psa_118:22. It may be
rendered, "the chief cornering-stone"; it being such an one that is a foundation stone, as
well as a cornerstone; and reached unto, and lay at the bottom of, and supported the
four corners of the building; for the foundation and corner stone in this spiritual
building, is one and the same stone, Christ: it is said of the temple of Latona, at Buto, in
Egypt, that it was made, εξ ενος λιθου, "of one stone", as Herodotus (k) an eyewitness of
it, attests.
JAMISO , "Translate as Greek, “Built up upon,” etc. (participle; having been built
up upon; omit, therefore, “and are”). Compare 1Co_3:11, 1Co_3:12. The same image in
Eph_3:18, recurs in his address to the Ephesian elders (Act_20:32), and in his Epistle to
Timothy at Ephesus (1Ti_3:15; 2Ti_2:19), naturally suggested by the splendid
architecture of Diana’s temple; the glory of the Christian temple is eternal and real, not
mere idolatrous gaud. The image of a building is appropriate also to the Jew-Christians;
as the temple at Jerusalem was the stronghold of Judaism; as Diana’s temple, of
paganism.
foundation of the apostles, etc. — that is, upon their ministry and living example
(compare Mat_16:18). Christ Himself, the only true Foundation, was the grand subject
of their ministry, and spring of their life. As one with Him and His fellow workers, they,
too, in a secondary sense, are called “foundations” (Rev_21:14). The “prophets” are
joined with them closely; for the expression is here not “foundations of the apostles and
the prophets,” but “foundations of the apostles and prophets.” For the doctrine of both
was essentially one (1Pe_1:10, 1Pe_1:11; Rev_19:10). The apostles take the precedency
(Luk_10:24). Thus he appropriately shows regard to the claims of the Jews and Gentiles:
“the prophets” representing the old Jewish dispensation, “the apostles” the new. The
“prophets” of the new also are included. Bengel and Alford refer the meaning solely to
these (Eph_3:5; Eph_4:11). These passages imply, I think, that the New Testament
prophets are not excluded; but the apostle’s plain reference to Psa_118:22, “the head
stone of the corner,” proves that the Old Testament prophets are a prominent thought.
David is called a “prophet” in Act_2:30. Compare also Isa_28:16; another prophet
present to the mind of Paul, which prophecy leans on the earlier one of Jacob (Gen_
49:24). The sense of the context, too, suits this: Ye were once aliens from the
commonwealth of Israel (in the time of her Old Testament prophets), but now ye are
members of the true Israel, built upon the foundation of her New Testament apostles
and Old Testament prophets. Paul continually identifies his teaching with that of Israel’s
old prophets (Act_26:22; Act_28:23). The costly foundation-stones of the temple (1Ki_
5:17) typified the same truth (compare Jer_51:26). The same stone is at once the corner-
stone and the foundation-stone on which the whole building rests. Paul supposes a stone
or rock so large and so fashioned as to be both at once; supporting the whole as the
foundation, and in part rising up at the extremities, so as to admit of the side walls
meeting in it, and being united in it as the corner-stone [Zanchius]. As the corner-stone,
it is conspicuous, as was Christ (1Pe_2:6), and coming in men’s way may be stumbled
over, as the Jews did at Christ (Mat_21:42; 1Pe_2:7).
RWP, "Being built upon (epoikodomēthentes). First aorist passive participle of
epoikodomeō, for which double compound verb see note on 1Co_3:10; 2Co_2:17.

129. The foundation (epi tōi themeliōi). Repetition of epi with the locative case. See note
on 1Co_3:11 for this word.
Of the apostles and prophets (ton apostolōn kai prophētōn). Genitive of apposition
with themeliōi, consisting in. If one is surprised that Paul should refer so to the apostles,
he being one himself, Peter does the same thing (2Pe_3:2). Paul repeats this language in
Eph_3:5.
Christ Jesus himself being the chief corner stone (ontōs akrogōnianiou autou
Christou Iēsou). Genitive absolute. The compound akrogōniaios occurs only in the lxx
(first in Isa 28:16) and in the N.T. (here, 1Pe_2:6). Lithos (stone) is understood. Jesus
had spoken of himself as the stone, rejected by the Jewish builders (experts), but chosen
of God as the head of the corner (Mat_21:42), eis kephalēn gōnias. “The akrogōniaios here
is the primary foundation-stone at the angle of the structure by which the architect fixes
a standard for the bearings of the walls and cross-walls throughout” (W. W. Lloyd).
CALVI , "20.And are built. The third comparison illustrates the manner in which
the Ephesians, and all other Christians are admitted to the honor of being fellow-
citizens with the saints and of the household of God. They are built on the
foundation, — they are founded on the doctrine, of the apostles and prophets. We
are thus enabled to distinguish between a true and a false church. This is of the
greatest importance; for the tendency to error is always strong, and the
consequences of mistake are dangerous in the extreme. o churches boast more
loudly of the name than those which bear a false and empty title; as may be seen in
our own times. To guard us against mistake, the mark of a true church is pointed
out.
Foundation, in this passage, unquestionably means doctrine; for no mention is made
of patriarchs or pious kings, but only of those who held the office of teachers, and
whom God had appointed to superintend the edification of his church. It is laid
down by Paul, that the faith of the church ought to be founded on this doctrine.
What opinion, then, must we form of those who rest entirely on the contrivances of
men, and yet accuse us of revolt, because we embrace the pure doctrine of God? But
the manner in which it is founded deserves inquiry; for, in the strict sense of the
term, Christ is the only foundation. He alone supports the whole church. He alone is
the rule and standard of faith. But Christ is actually the foundation on which the
church is built by the preaching of doctrine; and, on this account, the prophets and
apostles are called builders. (1Co_3:10.) othing else, Paul tells us, was ever
intended by the prophets and apostles, than to found a church on Christ.
We shall find this to be true, if we begin with Moses; for “ is the end of the law,”
(Rom_10:4,) and the sum of the gospel. Let us remember, therefore, that if we wish
to be reckoned among believers, we must place our reliance on no other: if we wish
to make sure progress in the knowledge of the Scriptures, to him our whole
attention must be directed. The same lesson is taught, when we consult the word of

130. God as contained in the writings of the prophets and apostles. To shew us how we
ought to combine them, their harmony is pointed out; for they have a common
foundation, and labor jointly in building the temple of God. Though the apostles
have become our teachers, the instruction of the prophets has not been rendered
superfluous; but one and the same object is promoted by both.
I have been led to make this remark by the conduct of the Marcionites in ancient
times, who expunged the word prophets from this passage; and by that of certain
fanatics in the present day, who, following their footsteps, exclaim loudly that we
have nothing to do with the law and the prophets, because the gospel has put an end
to their authority. The Holy Spirit everywhere declares, that he has spoken to us by
the mouth of the prophets, and demands that we shall listen to him in their writings.
This is of no small consequence for maintaining the authority of our faith. All the
servants of God, from first to last, are so perfectly agreed, that their harmony is in
itself a clear demonstration that it is one God who speaks in them all. The
commencement of our religion must be traced to the creation of the world. In vain
do Papists, Mahometans, and other sects, boast of their antiquity, while they are
mere counterfeits of the true, the pure religion.
Jesus Christ, himself is the chief corner-stone (130) Those who transfer this honor to
Peter, and maintain that on him the church is founded, are so void of shame, as to
attempt to justify their error by quoting this passage. They hold out that Christ is
called the chief corner-stone, by comparison with others; and that there are many
stones on which the church is founded. But this difficulty is easily solved. Various
metaphors are employed by the apostles according to the diversity of circumstances,
but still with the same meaning. In writing to the Corinthians, Paul lays down an
incontestable proposition, that “ other foundation can be laid.” (1Co_3:11.) He does
not therefore mean, that Christ is merely a corner, or a part of the foundation; for
then he would contradict himself. What then? He means that Jews and Gentiles
were two separate walls, but are formed into one spiritual building. Christ is placed
in the middle of the corner for the purpose of uniting both, and this is the force of
the metaphor. What is immediately added shews sufficiently that he is very far from
limiting Christ to any one part of the building.
(130) According to that ancient prophecy, (Psa_118:22,) ‘ stone, which the builders
refused, is become the head-stone of the corner.’ The strength of buildings lies in
their angles; and the corner-stone is that which unites and compacts the different
sides of them; the chief cornerstone is that which is laid at the foundation, upon
which the whole angle of the building rests, and which therefore is the principal
support and tie of the whole edifice.” — Chandler.
GREAT TEXTS BY HASTI GS
Spiritual Architecture

131. Being built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself
being the chief corner stone; in whom each several building, fitly framed together,
groweth into a holy temple in the Lord; in whom ye also are builded together for a
habitation of God in the Spirit.—Eph_2:20-22.
1. St. Paul was a Jew, and the Jewish temple had the same fascination for his
thought and the same powerful hold upon his imagination as in the case of other
Jews. St. Paul had indeed ceased to worship there, but his attachment to the ideas
that the temple represented was so strong that it became with him a favourite image
and illustration of the Christian Church. ow as a building that temple was one of
the most beautiful in existence; and as the chosen residence of Jehovah it was sacred
in the mind of the Apostle. And yet one can hardly think that St. Paul was referring
here to the temple at Jerusalem, for he was writing not to Jews but to the men and
women of Ephesus, men and women who, for the most part, had never seen the
temple at Jerusalem, and could neither appreciate its beauty nor understand the
allusion. But then Ephesus had its temple too. Paul and the Ephesians were brought
together on one occasion in very severe contest about the merits of this temple, the
glory of their city, the temple of the great Diana of the Ephesians. That building was
one of the wonders of the world. We are told that when it was erected all the
architects of celebrity joined in constructing the plan, that it was reared of the most
costly materials, and that after it had been burnt down by the hand of a madman or
a fanatic equal care was exercised in the reconstruction of it. Every woman of
Ephesus brought all that was costly and splendid to aid in the rebuilding of the
favourite temple. It was a saying that the sun never shone upon a finer edifice than
the temple of Diana at Ephesus. This structure was quite familiar to the Ephesian
Christians; they had ceased indeed to be worshippers at the shrine, but they had not
ceased to admire the building. Hence the singular appropriateness with which the
Apostle points to it as a beautiful illustration of the church or the building of which
he was about to speak.
2. What the Apostle is about to speak of is not any material structure or
ecclesiastical organization, but the great spiritual fellowship of the redeemed in
Jesus Christ. It is a Church in which living men are the materials, of which God
Himself is the Architect and the Builder. Its foundation has been laid with His own
hand on the ruins of the fallen temple of humanity. It has been in process of
construction ever since; its advancement has never been interrupted; it is still rising,
this grand spiritual edifice! One day the glorious structure will be completed. That
is the Church of which St. Paul writes—no earthly structure, no ecclesiastical
organization, but this spiritual Church, built upon the foundation of apostles and
prophets.
If you liken human life and development to a dwelling, the lower story is on the
ground, and made of clay. How roomy, and how full of men that live next to the
dirt! Above that, however, is a story of iron. There are men of energy, and of a
ruling purpose irresistible, seeking and gaining their ends at all hazards; and this
story is populous, too. The next story is dressed in velvet and carved wood, and here

132. are they that dwell in their affections, and are brought together by the sympathy of
a common gentleness and kindness—but on the lower levels of life. Above that is a
room of crystal and of diamonds, and there are but few that dwell in it. From its
transparent walls one may behold the heaven and the earth. Out of it men may see
the night as well as the day—men who live a life so high, so pure, and so serene that
they may be said to dwell at the very threshold of the gate of heaven itself.1 [ ote:
Henry Ward Beecher.]
I
The Materials of the Building
The Temple of God is made up of “the blessed company of all faithful people,” the
apostles and prophets being the foundation, and Christ Himself the chief corner-
stone. This is that one body into which we are all baptized by one spirit. This is the
society for which Christ prayed that they might be “all one.”
A few years ago I spent an evening at a meeting called for the purpose of deepening
the spiritual life. It was a meeting of great power and blessing. That same night a
dream came which fixed itself vividly on my mind. I stood on a rocky promontory
overlooking a terrible chasm. Spanning the chasm, from one rocky side to the other,
was a bridge of the most dazzling beauty, exquisite in design and workmanship, and
built of the most costly material. As I stood in awe and wonder, I exclaimed, “How
glorious!” o sooner had I spoken than a voice at my side, in tones of reproach,
said: “You see only its beauty. Look again and see its size. That bridge is large
enough to carry across in safety the entire human race.” Again I looked, and lo! the
bridge, albeit the most beautiful thing my eyes had ever seen, was so wide and so
strong that the whole race might have crossed over it.1 [ ote: C. B. Keenleyside,
God’s Fellow-Workers, 31.]
1. Where do the materials come from? The stones for this building are dug out of
that vast quarry of sinful humanity of which Ephesus formed a part. “In whom ye
also are builded together for a habitation of God in the Spirit.”
A quaint old legend runs thus: Proceeding from a pile of material which had been
left as rubbish, after a great building had been erected, a voice was heard shouting,
“Glory! glory!” A passer-by, attracted by the rejoicing, stopped to know the cause;
and found that the voice came from a mass of marble half covered with dust and
rubbish. He brushed away the dirt, and said—
“What are you shouting for? There is surely little glory to you in the rubbish heap.”
“ o,” said the marble, “not much glory now, that is true; but Michael Angelo has
just passed by, and I heard him say, ‘I see an angel in that stone.’ And he has gone
away for his mallets and chisels, and he is coming back to carve out the angel.”
And the stone went off again in an ecstasy, shouting, “Glory! glory! glory!”

133. Humanity was like that stone in the rubbish heap—broken, unclean, useless; but the
great Sculptor saw it, and He wondered that there was no one to help. As Angelo
saw the angel in that stone, so God sees the image of His Son in the human wreck.
Jesus would not have died for us had it been otherwise. To His eye, the flower is in
the bud, the fruit in the blossom, the butterfly in the grub, the saint in the sinner,
and the hero in the rustic. The grace of God carved a Müller out of the family
scapegrace, a Pastor Hsi out of the ruined opium fiend, a John B. Gough out of the
bar-room wreck.1 [ ote: C. B. Keenleyside.]
Exclusive of animal decay, we can hardly arrive at a more absolute type of impurity
than the mud or slime of a damp, overtrodden path in the outskirts of a
manufacturing town. I do not say mud of the road, because that is mixed with
animal refuse; but take merely an ounce or two of the blackest slime of a beaten
footpath on a rainy day, near a large manufacturing town.
That slime we shall find in most cases composed of clay (or brickdust, which is
burnt clay) mixed with soot, a little sand, and water. All these elements are at
helpless war with each other, and destroy reciprocally each other’s nature and
power, competing and fighting for place at every tread of your foot—sand squeezing
out clay, and clay squeezing out water, and soot meddling everywhere and defiling
the whole. Let us suppose that this ounce of mud is left in perfect rest, and that its
elements gather together, like to like, so that their atoms may get into the closest
relations possible.
Let the clay begin. Ridding itself of all foreign substance, it gradually becomes a
white earth, already very beautiful; and fit, with help of congealing fire, to be made
into finest porcelain, and painted on, and be kept in kings’ palaces. But such
artificial consistence is not its best. Leave it still quiet to follow its own instinct of
unity, and it becomes not only white, but clear; not only clear, but hard; nor only
clear and hard, but so set that it can deal with light in a wonderful way, and gather
out of it the loveliest blue rays only, refusing the rest. We call it then a sapphire.
Such being the consummation of the clay, we give similar permission of quiet to the
sand. It also becomes, first, a white earth, then proceeds to grow clear and hard, and
at last arranges itself in mysterious, infinitely fine, parallel lines, which have the
power of reflecting not merely the blue rays, but the blue, green, purple, and red
rays in the greatest beauty in which they can be seen through any hard material
whatsoever. We call it then an opal.
In next order the soot sets to work; it cannot make itself white at first, but instead of
being discouraged, tries harder and harder, and comes out clear at last, and the
hardest thing in the world; and for the blackness that it had, obtains in exchange the
power of reflecting all the rays of the sun at once in the vividest blaze that any solid
thing can shoot. We call it then a diamond.
Last of all the water purifies or unites itself, contented enough if it only reach the

134. form of a dew-drop; but if we insist on its proceeding to a more perfect consistence,
it crystallizes into the shape of a star.
And for the ounce of slime which we had by political economy of competition, we
have by political economy of co-operation, a sapphire, an opal, and a diamond, set
in the midst of a star of snow.1 [ ote: Ruskin, Modern Painters (Works, vii. 207).]
2. The Foundation has been laid by apostles and prophets. They are our spiritual
progenitors, the fathers of our faith. We see Jesus Christ through their eyes; we
read His teaching, and catch His Spirit in their words. Their testimony, in its
essential facts, stands secure in the confidence of mankind. or was it their words
alone, but the men themselves—their character, their life and work—that laid for
the Church its historical foundation. This “glorious company of the apostles”
formed the first course in the new building, on whose firmness and strength the
stability of the entire structure depends. Their virtues and their sufferings, as well
as the revelations made through them, have guided the thoughts and shaped the life
of countless multitudes of men, of the best and wisest men in all ages since. They
have fixed the standard of Christian doctrine and the type of Christian character.
At our best, we are but imitators of them as they were of Christ.
If a man is to be a pillar in the temple of his God by and by, he must be some kind of
a prop in God’s house to-day. We are here to support, not to be supported. o one
can be a living stone on the foundations of the Spiritual House, which is God’s
habitation, without being a foundation to the stones above him.2 [ ote: M. D.
Babcock, Thoughts for Every-Day Living, 7.]
3. Christ is the chief Corner-stone.
The idea of the corner-stone, so repeatedly alluded to in Scripture, can be
understood only by reference to the buildings of remote ages. We must imagine a
massive stone, like one of those at Stonehenge, cut to a right angle, and laid in the
building so that its two sides should lie along the two walls, which meet at a corner,
thus binding them together in such a way that neither force nor weather could
dissever them. This term does not necessarily signify that it would be put at the top
or at the bottom of a building; it only means that it occupied a very important
position, which it would have if it lay a few courses above the lowest, so as to act by
its weight on those below, and to serve as a renewed basis to those above. A corner-
stone bound together the sides of a building. Some of the corner-stones in the
ancient work of the Temple foundations are seventeen or nineteen feet long, and
seven and a half feet thick. At ineveh the corners are sometimes formed of one
angular stone. A corner-stone must, then, be of great importance; hence, more than
once in Scripture great princes or leaders of a nation are called by this name of
corner, or corner-stone (Jdg_20:2; 1Sa_14:38; Isa_19:13). In A.V. they are called
the chief, or the stay, of their people; in the original, the word is “corners,” or
“corner-stones.”
But in a sense far higher, far beyond that in which any earthly prince can be called

135. by this name, may we apply it to our Lord Jesus Christ. He so applied it to Himself,
when speaking the parable of the Householder on the last week of His public
teaching, as recorded by St. Matthew, St. Mark, and St. Luke (Mat_21:42; Mar_
12:10; Luk_20:17). It was so applied by St. Peter when, confronting the Sanhedrin,
he boldly charged them with being the murderers of Christ: “This is the stone which
was set at nought of you builders, which is become the head of the corner.”
Christianity is not one truth, but many; it is a whole system of truth, and yet is there
not one truth in the system that is prominently majestic, as is the sun in the solar
system? It is the truth that centres in Jesus Christ. There are many precious truths
on which the Church is built; there is one truth on which the Church reposes, as
upon the corner-stone. There is one truth on which our hopes and prospects all
depend. There are many bright and glorious hopes which we gain from this Bible,
but there is one which is more prominent than all the others—it is Jesus Christ, the
Saviour of sinners and the King of men. There are many stones in the foundation of
our hopes for the future; there is one corner-stone, that is Jesus Christ.1 [ ote: R.
Vaughan Pryce.]
The plain historic truth in regard to the Christian Church is this, that from the
beginning the Christian Church has held an attitude towards Jesus that absolutely
forbids His classification with other men, that absolutely lifts Him above all that
have ever trodden the earth before or since, and pays to Him such honour as can
justly be given only to the perfect incarnation of the eternal God. The very first
record that we have tells us that the early Church used to sing a hymn to Christ as
God early in the morning; and it was for that that He was ever worshipped.1 [ ote:
H. van Dyke.]
Christ is made the sure foundation
And the precious corner-stone,
Who, the two walls underlying
Bound in each, binds both in one,
Holy Sion’s help for ever,
And her confidence alone.
All that dedicated City,
Dearly loved by God on high,
In exultant jubilation

136. Pours perpetual melody;
God the One and God the Trinal,
Singing everlastingly.
To the temple, where we call Thee,
Come, O Lord of Hosts, to-day;
With Thy wonted loving-kindness
Hear Thy people as they pray,
And Thy fullest benediction
Shed within its walls for aye.
Here vouchsafe to all Thy servants
What they supplicate to gain;
Here to have and hold for ever
Those good things their prayers obtain,
And hereafter in Thy glory
With Thy blessed ones to reign.
Laud and honour to the Father,
Laud and honour to the Son,
Laud and honour to the Spirit,
Ever Three and Ever One:
Consubstantial, coëternal
While unending ages run.2 [ ote: Angularis Fundamentum, Latin Office Hymn,

137. translated by J. M. eale.]
II
The Design of the Building
The plan of the Spiritual Temple was drawn by the hand of the Master Architect,
who threw up the over-arching dome of the skies and scattered it full of worlds; and
taught all architects how to design and all builders how to build. The plan bears on
its face the Divine imprint. o human mind could have conceived it, and no human
hand could have drawn it. It is inherent in the nature of the Infinite. It is not an
afterthought of man, but a forethought of God; not a human accident, but a Divine
plan. In beauty it as far exceeds anything that man could draw as the blue sky or the
star-studded arch of the heavens exceeds in beauty the highest triumph of human
skill. As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are God’s thoughts higher than
our thoughts, and God’s ways than our ways.
There is a story of an old mason whose work day by day was the mixing of the
mortar for use in the erection of a beautiful building. It was this old man’s custom
to contemplate the plan of the finished building as displayed outside the contractor’s
office. He said it helped him to mix his mortar so much better if he could keep
before his mind the lovely thing that the architect had planned. The Bible is the rule
of Faith, the character-builder’s “Vade mecum.” It pictures the Perfect Temple,
Christ Jesus. It says that we shall be like Him. And he that hath this hope in him,
purifieth himself even as He is pure.1 [ ote: E. J. Padfield.]
The greatest European painter of the past fifty years Was probably Arnold
Boecklin. He has influenced modern painting abroad more, perhaps, than any other.
How? When a young man in Florence his soul was filled with an ideal of painting
which was quite other than that of any of his contemporaries, and he laboured to
put this ideal upon canvas. At first no one would buy his pictures, and he nearly
starved to death. But he laboured on because he loved his art. By and by when he
became known, his work, it might almost be said, produced a revolution in the art
world. It was not this revolution, however, that he had striven for, but the beauties
his soul had seen. So with the Church. The Church will reform the world, not by
making that reform her object, but by fixing her gaze and desire upon the ideal
which has been set before her by her Lord, the ideal of the “Holy Catholic Church.”
1 [ ote: . H. Marshall.]
1. There is unity in the design.—The building is not a heap of stones thrown
carelessly together. It has a marvellous symmetry. It is fitly framed together. The
idea in the Apostle’s mind seems to be a temple, with a number of courts all being
built at the same time. At first there seems to be but very little connexion between
them, but as the building proceeds, every several building grows into a holy temple.
How lovely it is to trace the gradual growth of this building, the simple devotion of
the first believers, the brotherly love of the Pentecostal Church, the missionary
ardour of St. Paul and his companions, the faith and constancy of the early martyrs,

138. who loved not their lives to the death; the steadfast devotion to truth of Waldenses,
and Lollards, the Huguenots, and our own Reformers; the consistent godliness in
some unknown cottage home, and the brilliant services of Christian philanthropists,
who have overthrown gigantic evils by the power of the cross of Christ. And for all
this building the chief corner-stone is Jesus Christ, but if He is the chief corner-
stone, we also are to be corner-stones, joining together what would otherwise run
counter to one another.
The image is that of an extensive pile of buildings, such as the ancient temples
commonly were, in process of construction at different points over a wide area. The
builders work in concert, upon a common plan. The several parts of the work are
adjusted to each other; and the various operations in process are so harmonized that
the entire construction preserves the unity of the architect’s design. Such an edifice
was the apostolic Church—one, but of many parts—in its diverse gifts and
multiplied activities animated by one Spirit and directed towards one Divine
purpose.
St. Peter and St. Paul carried out their plans independently, only maintaining a
general understanding with each other. The apostolic founders, inspired by one and
the self-same Spirit, could labour at a distance, upon material and by methods
extremely various, with entire confidence in each other and with an assurance of the
unity of result which their teaching and administration would exhibit. The many
buildings rested on the one foundation of the Apostles. “Whether it were I or they,”
says our Apostle, “so we preach, and so ye believed.” Where there is the same Spirit
and the same Lord, men do not need to be scrupulous about visible conformity.
Elasticity and individual initiative admit of entire harmony of principle. The hand
may do its work without irritating or obstructing the eye, and the foot run on its
errands without mistrusting the ear.
As Hooker lay dying, he was observed to be held in an ecstasy of contemplation; and
on being asked what might be the subject of his thoughts, he replied, that he was
admiring the wondrous order which prevails throughout all the distinctions and
multitudes of the heavenly world. “Without which order,” he added, “peace could
not be in heaven.” If on earth, which is “without the gate,” we find so much
regularity and order, what may we imagine to be the order and fitness of all things
in the house of our Father’s glory?1 [ ote: J. Pulsford, Christ and His Seed, 84.]
Unity in itself, especially unity conditioned upon a common catechism, is not an
object. either is it a thing to be compassed by any direct effort. It is an incident,
not a principle, or a good by itself. It has its value in the valuable activities it unites,
and the conjoining of beneficent powers. The more we seek it, the less we have it.
Besides, most of what we call division in the Church of God is only distribution. The
distribution of the Church, like that of human society, is one of the great problems
of Divine wisdom; and the more we study it, observing how the personal tastes,
wants, and capacities of men in all ages and climes are provided for, and how the
parts are made to act as stimulants to each other, the less disposed shall we be to
think that the work of distribution is done badly. It is not the same thing with

139. Christian Unity, either to be huddled into a small inclosure, or to show the world
how small a plat of ground we can all stand on. Unity is a grace broad as the
universe, embracing in its ample bosom all right minds that live, and outreaching
the narrow contents of all words and dogmas.2 [ ote: Horace Bushnell, Preacher
and Theologian, 62.]
Himself the staunchest champion of the existing union of Church and State, Stanley
practised his own precept of making “the most of what there is of good in
institutions, in opinions, in communities, in individuals.” And this sympathy was
neither a strategic union, nor an armed truce, nor the tolerance of indifference. It
was the real fellow-feeling which springs from the power, and the habit, of
descending into those deeper regions of thought and emotion where conflicting
opinions find a point of union. To the Baptists he was grateful for the preservation
of “one singular and interesting relic of primitive and apostolic times”; to the
Quakers, for “dwelling, even with exaggerated force, on the insignificance of all
forms, of all authority, as compared with the inward light of conscience”; to the
“Dissenting Churches” generally, for keeping alive “that peculiar force of devotion
and warmth which is apt to die out in light of reason and in the breath of free
inquiry.” Religion, he told his American hearers, could ill afford to lose even “the
Churches which we most dislike, and which in other respects have wrought most
evil.”1 [ ote: R. E. Prothero, The Life of Dean Stanley, ii. 242.]
2. The design has holiness written upon it.—In what sense do we speak of the
Church as “holy”? The word as applied to the ancient Jewish Church, from which it
was inherited by the Christian Church, meant “set apart for God’s service,”
“consecrated to Him.” It implied the election of the nation by God for His purposes;
as it is said in Deuteronomy, “Thou art an holy people unto the Lord thy God: the
Lord thy God hath chosen thee to be a peculiar people unto himself.” These
covenant privileges the Apostles regarded as being carried on to the Christian
Church, and accordingly St. Paul speaks habitually of the members of the Christian
society as “holy,” the word which our Version renders “saints”; and St. Peter
similarly quotes and applies to the Church the declaration, “Ye are an elect race, a
royal priesthood, a holy nation”—holy because elect.
But both St. Peter and St. Paul invariably explain that this Holiness in the sense of
consecration implies a demand for holiness in the sense of purity of life. “Ye are the
temple of God,” says St. Paul, “and the Spirit of God dwelleth in you. If any man
defile the temple of God, him shall God destroy.” And so St. Peter, “As he which
hath called you is holy, be ye yourselves also holy in all manner of living.” Your
holiness must not be merely “separation for God’s service,” it must be conformity to
God’s! nature. It must be holiness in the sense in which God can be spoken of as
“holy,” i.e. perfect, sinless. “Be ye perfect, as your Father in heaven is perfect.” The
condition of this freedom from sin is abiding in Christ and His Spirit, and this is not
only possible, but a growing reality which will one day be actual fact of experience.
The Tabernacle was holy because it was indwelt by God. Of course there is a sense
in which all places are indwelt by God. “Do not I fill heaven and earth? saith the

140. Lord.” But in a very special sense God chose to make the Tabernacle in the
Wilderness, for the time being, His local habitation. There it was He manifested
Himself, as He manifested Himself nowhere else, to man. There it was He held
converse with those whom He had appointed as the representatives of man. There it
was He accepted the sacrifices which prefigured the great Sacrifice which was to be
offered in the end of the world. The Tabernacle was holy because it was indwelt by
God. The Church of Christ is holy because she is indwelt by God the Holy Ghost.
“The Lord (says the Prophet) shall suddenly come to his temple.” May we not say
that there was at least one great fulfilment of that prophecy on the day of Pentecost,
when God the Holy Ghost suddenly came, and by coming laid the first stones of that
great Temple of the living Church of Christ which is the Holy Habitation of the
Most High?
God occupied, if one may say so, but part of the Tabernacle. God the Holy Ghost
occupies every part of the Christian Church. At first sight that seems a truism, but it
contains a momentous question for every one of us. If God the Holy Ghost occupies
every part of the Christian Temple, if the Church of Christ is filled in every corner
by God the Holy Ghost, the question arises, Does God the Holy Ghost dwell in me?
If not, then I am not part of that holy temple and I am not part of the Church of
God. Let there be no possible mistake; nothing but the indwelling of God the Holy
Ghost can make us parts of the true Church of Christ, of that holy temple which is
built up of living stones.1 [ ote: W. M. Hopkins, The Tabernacle and its Teaching,
92.]
“Ye are in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you. ow if any man
have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his. And if Christ be in you, the body is
dead because of sin; but the Spirit is life because of righteousness.” Wonderful
equivalence and exchange! The Lord leaves not His disciple orphaned; He comes to
him; He is in him; He manifests Himself to him, and abides in him. And yet it was
expedient that He should go away; for otherwise the Paraclete would not come. The
Paraclete comes; and behold He mediates and makes for the Christian’s soul and
self a Presence of the Lord which somehow is better—far better—for the man in this
his pilgrimage and tabernacle than even the joy and glory, if it were granted, of his
Saviour’s corporeal proximity—shall I dare to say than his Saviour’s personal
indwelling as the Son of Man outside the vehicle of this Presence of the Spirit?
This sacred mediation of the heavenly Spirit, this conveyance through Him of every
blessing of the vital Union, appears everywhere in the subject. In the imagery of the
Building it is “in the Spirit” that the saints, compacted into their Corner Stone, are
“being builded together to be the habitation of God.” “Where that Spirit is”—if I
may quote words of the Dean of Llandaff—“where that Spirit is, there is the Body,
and only there.” And so it is when the exercises and actions of the spiritual life—
which life is Christ—are spoken of at large. It is “in the Spirit” that the saint—that
is to say, the genuine Christian here below—“has access” in Christ unto the Father.
It is those who are “led by the Spirit” who “are” in truth and deed, not in a certain
sense, but in reality and nature, “the sons of God” in His Son. It is “by the Spirit”
that they “mortify,” that they continuously do to death, “the deeds of the body,” in

141. the power and name of Christ. It is “by the Spirit” that they “walk” in Christ. It is
“because of the Spirit dwelling in them” (a truth full of significance as to the nature
of the body of the resurrection) that “their mortal body shall be quickened,” in the
day when their Lord from heaven shall change it into likeness to His own. Of that
harvest the indwelling Spirit is the Firstfruits. Of that inheritance He is the Earnest.
So the Sevenfold One is sent forth into all the earth, as the Eyes, as the Presence, of
the exalted Lamb of the Sacrifice. It is by Him, and by Him alone, that that presence
is in the Church, and is in the Christian.1 [ ote: Bishop H. C. G. Moule, All in
Christ, 171.]
3. The actual is ever approximating to the ideal.—The work keeps moving on. Just
as, when any great building is being erected, you see here and there the different
workmen engaged with the particular portion which devolves upon them, so it is
with the holy temple St. Paul speaks of in the text. The ministers and stewards of
God’s mysteries are doing their work in the particular part of the spiritual building
assigned to them. One may have his work to do in a part of the building where a
skilled and superior workman is required; another in a more humble place, though
it too is necessary for the perfection of the whole; some have to chisel wealth into
stones meet for the Master’s use; some to chip off the excrescences of intellect, in
order that the stones may fit into the walls of God’s building; some have, with ruder
hands, to blast the rocks of ignorance and prejudice, and to be content to leave the
polished corners of the temple to more experienced hands. But you see, all the while
the building is growing; it is rising higher and higher; and as we see more activity,
more zeal, more earnestness in the cause of this building of God, we know that
Satan trembles; because every living stone in the spiritual building, which is
precious in the eyes of the great Architect of the Universe, is a stone rescued from
the ruins of the world, destined to have its final place amongst those of which the
Lord speaks, when He says, “They shall be mine, when I make up my jewels.”
We did not speak of the “higher life,” nor of a “beautiful Christian,” for this way of
putting it would not have been in keeping with the genius of Drumtochty. Religion
there was very lowly and modest—an inward walk with God. o man boasted of
himself, none told the secrets of the soul. But the Glen took notice of its saints, and
did them silent reverence, which they themselves never knew.1 [ ote: Ian Maclaren,
Beside the Bonnie Brier Bush.]
We call to mind the beautiful description by Tennyson of that mysterious city which
Gareth and those with him beheld through the mist. They pronounced it “a city of
enchanters,” and it was told them concerning its builders—
They came from out a sacred mountain-cleft
Toward the sunrise, each with harp in hand,
And built it to the music of their harps.

142. For an ye heard a music, like enow
They are building still, seeing the city is built
To music, therefore never built at all,
And therefore built for ever.
III
The Use of the Building
1. It is to be “a habitation of God in the Spirit.”—God is to be the occupant of the
Temple. Here is the eternal destiny of the true Church of God. It is not only that it is
to be “saved in Christ for ever,” ineffable as is the wonder of that fact. It is not only
that it is “to enjoy God fully for ever,” though that amazing prospect is so amply
and definitely revealed. It is to be a holy Sanctuary, a Shrine, a Divine Presence-
Chamber, a permanent Habitation of God. In measure, the wonderful fact has
already begun to be; already He dwells in His people, and walks in them; already
the eternal Son resides in the very heart of the true member of the Church, by faith.
But all this is as when some building, planned already by the master in its final
glory, is slowly rising, and beginning to show, amidst fragments and dust and the
noise of the workmen, some hints and outlines of what it is to be; the owner, the
intending dweller in it, walks in and out amidst the vast beginnings, and perhaps
rests and shelters himself under the unfinished walls and roofs. It will be otherwise
when the last stone is in place, and the last splendid equipment of the chambers is
completed, and he receives his admiring friends in the banquet-chamber, and shines
out amidst the shining of his palace, himself the central splendour of it in all his
dignity of wealth and welcome. So it is with the saints, and with their common life as
the Church of God. Wonderful are the beginnings. Amidst all the apparent
confusions of the field where the building is in progress, its form and scale begin to
show themselves, across the perspective of centuries and continents. And when the
stones already in place are scrutinized, it is found that each of them is a miniature of
the whole; a shrine, a home of the presence of the Lord, by faith. But a day of
inauguration is drawing on when “we shall see greater things than these.” Then the
Divine indwelling in each “living stone” will be complete and ideal, “for sinners
there are saints indeed.” And as for the community, it will cohere and be one thing
with a unity and symmetry unimaginable now.
There all the millions of His saints
Shall in one song unite,
And each the bliss of all shall view
With infinite delight.

143. Paul seems to say to these Ephesians: “You have in your city a magnificent temple,
the wonder of the world, the temple of Diana. It bears witness to man’s need of
worship. But you know that that temple is not really a habitation of God. The
eternal Spirit of God dwells not in temples of stone and marble. The one real temple
of the Divine Spirit is the human heart. Ye are the habitation of God.” Socrates,
indeed, and the Stoics had taught this, but St. Paul’s thought goes far beyond that of
Socrates and the Stoics. It is not only the individual human heart, says St. Paul, that
is the temple of God—it is a Society. “Ye are builded together,” he says, “in Christ
into an habitation of God in the Spirit.” Here is the originality of the conception—a
new conception of a Society so filled with the life of Christ that it may be said to be
“in Him”; built up, like some cathedral, into a glorious unity of idea, with infinite
diversity in its members—a conception then new, now so familiar, of a Church, a
continuous embodiment on earth of the Spirit of Christ. And this new conception,
this dream, has been realized; it took form; it became a living organism; it lives to-
day; it is the Church of Christ.1 [ ote: J. M. Wilson in The Guardian, May 29,
1911, p. 725.]
2. The Church should reveal the power of the indwelling God.—It is a “habitation of
God in the Spirit.” This is what no other society is or can be. The Church possesses
Divine gifts and powers, because it is the abode of a Divine presence. It is a spiritual
Society. The world looks on the Church and sees only a great organization, with
much that is imperfect, much perverted, much incomplete. The Divine origin of the
Church, the Divine presence with the Church, have never saved it, were never
pledged to save it, from the consequences of human wilfulness or error. The world
knows nothing of the indwelling Spirit which gives to the Church its essential
character. How could it? For we are speaking of that “Spirit of truth, whom the
world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him; but ye know
him for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you.” Yes; the very meaning and
purpose of the existence of the Church is that it is the area, the clothing, the
environment, the casket, of the supernatural. If it is not this, it is nothing; it is a
mere human society, graceless, giftless, powerless. If it is this, it is verily “the fulness
of him that filleth all in all.”
In accomplishing the conversion of the world, the Church has two points to prove
and testify—first, that Christ is alive and at work now to-day on earth, and that He
can be found of them that believe, and manifest Himself to those that love Him; and,
secondly, that He is so by virtue of the deed done once for all at Calvary—by which
the prince of this world was judged, and the world was overcome, and man given
access to God. What proofs can the Church offer for these two points? It has three
proofs to give. First, its own actual life. This is its primary witness, that Christ is
now alive at the right Hand of God the Father. This is the cardinal testimony.
“Christ is alive, otherwise I should not be alive as you see me this day.” And then
this personal life of Christ in His Church verifies and certifies to the world the
reality of that old life on earth, of that Death on Calvary, of that Resurrection on
Olivet. The fact that the man at the Beautiful Gate has this perfect soundness in the
presence of all, the very man whom they knew and saw so lame,—this makes it

144. certain that God did send His Son Christ Jesus to be a Prince of Life. And,
therefore, the living Church bears a book about with it, the Gospel book, the
Apostolic witness, the witness of those who so beheld, tasted, handled, the Word of
Life, of those who were actually there all the time in which “the Lord Jesus went in
and out among us, beginning from the baptism of John, unto that same day that he
was taken up from us.” And again, the body carries with it a third witness; not only
the Apostolic record, but the Apostolic rite, the act commanded by the dying Christ
to be done for ever as a memorial and a witness until His coming again. Ever that
society rehearses this deed of the new covenant, that deed which is the seal and
pledge to men for all time, of the one covenant sealed with Christ’s blood once for
all, even on the night of His betrayal. Ever this rehearsal continues until Christ
comes again, and every such rehearsal verifies, to all who take and eat the bread,
that great sacrifice which the Lord offered when in the upper chamber among the
Twelve, “he took bread, and blessed it, and brake.”1 [ ote: H. Scott Holland, Helps
to Faith and Practice, 94.]
Dr. Dale was spending a summer holiday at Grasmere, and had walked over to
Patterdale to spend the day with Dr. Abbott, the headmaster of the City of London
School, an able and prominent Broad Churchman. In the early evening his friend
started with him to set him on his way home, still intent on the questions, religious
and ecclesiastical, which they had discussed for many hours. “We were walking
together from the head of Ullswater up towards the foot of Grisedale tarn, and he
asked me, with an expression of astonishment and incredulity, whether I really
thought that if the shepherds of Patterdale—a dozen or score of them—determined
to constitute themselves a Congregational church, it was possible for such a church
to fulfil the purposes for which churches exist. To such a question there could be but
one answer. Great natural sagacity, high intellectual culture, however admirable,
are not essential: ‘It is enough if, when they meet, they really meet in Christ’s
name—but no man can say that Jesus is the Lord but by the Holy Ghost.’ ” Christ’s
presence with the shepherds of Patterdale would be a sufficient reply to all who
challenged their competency to discharge the functions of church government.
Whatever gifts and endowments might be necessary for the development of religious
thought and life in their full perfection, the Divine presence was its one and its only
essential condition.1 [ ote: Life of R. W. Dale, 247.]
3. Each individual life should be a shrine of the Spirit.—Union with Christ, and a
consequent life in the Spirit, are sure to result in the growth of the individual soul
and of the collective community. That Divine Spirit dwells in and works through
every believing soul, and while it is possible to grieve and to quench It, to resist and
even to neutralize Its workings, these are the true sources of all our growth in grace
and knowledge. The process of building may be and will be slow. Sometimes lurking
enemies will pull down in a night what we have laboured at for many days. Often
our hands will be slack and our hearts will droop. We shall often be tempted to
think that our progress is so slow that it is doubtful if we have ever been on the
foundation at all or have been building at all. But “the Spirit helpeth our
infirmities,” and the task is not ours alone, but His in us. We have to recognize that
effort is inseparable from building, but we have also to remember that growth

145. depends on the free circulation of life, and that if we are, and abide, in Jesus, we
cannot but be built “for a habitation of God in the Spirit.”
Till man has personal relations with God, it is hard to conceive of his having any
corporate relations. It would be a monstrous unreality to conceive of a society which
God could make His abode, in no single member of which was the presence of the
Spirit of God. A whole cannot be utterly diverse from its parts. The presence of the
Spirit of God and of the life of God in the soul of man must be presupposed before
we can even approach the subject of the corporate life of the Church, or, in other
words, of the building up of the Christian Society as a habitation of God in the
Spirit. There is no doubt there was at one time a great danger of over-individualism
among religious people in this land. It was not an uncommon thing to hear people
say, “A man’s religion lies between himself and his God.” Why, half the Bible is
straight against that! Possibly there may be some little danger the other way now.
Man is a temple either for God or His opposite. It is for us to choose whom we will
have to live within. The secret of power is the recognition of the all-loving, me-
loving, God. All-holy, and therefore never resting, cost Him what it may, till we are
holy too. Away with the austere man! Enter and abide, thou striving Spirit of Love!
It is a wonderful thing, that consciousness of the Indwelling Jesus. I only lately
became positively conscious of this. How, I do not know, of course; but it was so,
and He abides. When over us and in us there is One greater and holier, and more
filled with love for us than our furthest thought, and we know it and walk in the
light of it, there is power and sweet influence.1 [ ote: F. W. Crossley, in Life, by J.
Rendel Harris, 70.]
In the days of Trajan there lived a Saint of God named Ignatius, who sealed his
testimony with his blood. Ignatius was commonly known as Theophoros—or the
Bearer of God. I imagine that there was such a pre-eminent holiness, such a
supernatural sanctity in his character that he seemed to be a kind of incarnation of
the Divine life. The title given to Ignatius is one to which every Christian who is
faithful to his calling may in some degree humbly lay claim. He is a Theophoros, a
God-bearer. Christ dwells in him and he dwells in Christ. Christ is “in him the hope
of glory.”2 [ ote: S. C. Lowry, The Work of the Holy Spirit, 20.]
We all live in the sublime. Where else can we live? That is the only place of life. And
if aught be lacking, it is not the chance of living in heaven, rather it is watchfulness
and meditation, also perhaps a little ecstasy of soul. Though you have but a little
room, do you fancy that God is not there, too, and that it is impossible to live therein
a life that shall be somewhat lofty? If you complain of being alone, of the absence of
events, of loving no one and being unloved, do you think that the words are true? Do
you imagine that one can possibly be alone, that love can be a thing one knows, a
thing one sees; that events can be weighed like the gold and silver of ransom?
Cannot a living thought—proud or humble, it matters not; so it come but from your
soul, it is great for you—cannot a lofty desire, or simply a moment of solemn
watchfulness to life, enter a little room? And if you love not, or are unloved, and can
yet see with some depth of insight that thousands of things are beautiful, that the

146. soul is great and life almost unspeakably earnest, is that not as beautiful as though
you loved or were loved? And if the sky itself is hidden from you, “does not the
great starry sky,” asks the poet, “spread over our soul, in spite of all, under guise of
death?”1 [ ote: Maeterlinck, The Treasure of the Humble, 179.]
Our souls go too much out of self
Into ways dark and dim:
’Tis rather God who seeks for us,
Than we who seek for Him.
Yet surely through my tears I saw
God softly drawing near;
How came He without sight or sound
So soon to disappear?
God was not gone: but He so longed
His sweetness to impart,
He too was seeking for a home,
And found it in my heart.2 [ ote: F. W. Faber.]
BI 20-22, " ow therefore ye are no more strangers and foreigners, but fellow
citizens with the saints, and of the household of God; and are built upon the
foundation of the apostles and prophets.
The Christian Church
I. The apostle represents the Church under the figure of a city and a household.

147. 1. A Church must resemble a family or city, in respect of order and government; for
without these a religious society can no more subsist, than a civil community or a
household.
2. In a city or household all the members have a mutual relation, and partake in the
common privileges; and, though they are placed in different stations and conditions,
they must all contribute to the general happiness.
3. In a city, and also in a family, there is a common interest.
4. In a well-ordered city or household there will be peace and unity: so there ought
to be in a Christian Church.
II. The manner in which it is founded. The mediation of Christ is the foundation of
our faith and hope.
III. This spiritual house must be united with and framed into, the foundation.
IV. As the spiritual house must rest on the foundation, so the several parts of it must
be framed and inserted into each other.
V. It must be continually growing. (J. Lathrop, D. D.)
God’s temple: its foundation, building, and consecration
I. The foundation laid.
1. The foundation is Jesus Christ--the foundation of the apostles and prophets, i.e.,
which they laid. It was laid in the promises, types, and prophecies of the Old
Testament, and the witness of apostles and evangelists in the ew (Joh_3:14; 1Co_
10:4; Mat_16:16).
2. The foundation of the Church must be the foundation of each member of the
Church. The essence of a foundation lies in its strength. The foundation in
individual character is truth. Truth is a Person--“I am the Truth.” The foundation,

148. therefore, is the truth concerning Jesus Christ believed, loved, and lived. The gospel
thus received becomes a principle which forms the mainspring of a new life.
II. The building rising.
1. Look abroad upon the face of the world, and note the advances which the Church
is making in all parts. The very hindrances to missionary work prove its success, for
the more active the servants of God are, the more active the agents of Satan will be.
2. The building must rise in each heart. Growth is almost the only proof of life. The
growth of the temple is due to the operation of the Spirit.
3. In most forms of life there is an exquisite symmetry. We see something of it in this
temple: “fitly framed together.” As there is a beautiful proportion in the doctrines
of the gospel, so, though God’s servants are many and their gifts various, their aim
is one; and through their united wisdom and love and effort, all the building
groweth into a holy temple in the Lord.
III. The temple consecrated.
1. We may refer the consecration to the end of the age, because consecration usually
follows upon completion.
2. But even now there is to a certain extent a consecration of this building (1Co_
3:16; 2Co_5:16). How shall I know this?
(1) By self-consecration. Yield yourselves unto God (Rom_6:13), not simply your
brain, pen, money, influence, but “yourselves.” God wants the man--the whole man.
(2) By God-consecration. He who gives himself to God will surely find God giving
Himself to him, consecrating His temple by His presence, and indicating that
presence by holy aspirations and a Christ-like disposition, by meekness and
gentleness, by self-denial and zeal. He who is spirit taught and spirit wrought will be
such a temple as the great God of heaven will not despise. (W. J. Chapman, M. A.)
The Church, a building
Like a building, the Church of God has been going on to the present day, and will
do to the end of time. The honour and stability of this building.
1. As built upon Christ.

149. 2. As wrought by the Spirit.
3. As an habitation of God. “Why leap ye, ye high hills? this is the hill which God
desireth to dwell in,” etc. (Psa_68:16). “In Salem also is His tabernacle, and His
dwelling place in Zion (Psa_76:2). This denotes--
(1) His knowledge of them.
(2) His concern for them.
(3) Their access to Him.
(4) His readiness to help them.
“God is in the midst of her; she shall not be moved,” etc. (Psa_46:5). Each member
in Christ has his state and office in the Church by God’s appointment, for
promoting the good and glory of the whole. “And He gave some, apostles; and some,
prophets,” etc. (Eph_4:11, etc.). “But now hath God set the members every one of
them in the body,” etc. (1Co_12:18). o spiritual life and salvation without being
united to Christ by faith. (H. Foster, M. A.)
The Church
I. The unbelieving state of the Gentile Church. “Strangers.”
1. Strangers to God. To Father, Son, and Holy Ghost (Eph_2:12.
2. Strangers to the Word of God (Psa_119:158).
3. Strangers to the Church of God (1Jn_3:1).
4. Strangers to themselves (Rev_3:17).
5. Strangers to the enjoyments, fears, duties, privileges, persecutions, and prospects
of a Christian (1Co_2:11).
“Foreigners.”
1. aturally of another race (Psa_51:5).
2. Under the authority of another prince (2Co_4:4).

150. 3. Of a totally different complexion (Jer_13:23).
4. Speaking another language (Psa_58:3).
5. Seeking other interests than God (Php_2:21).
6. At an infinite distance from the celestial kingdom, where only true happiness rests
(Eph_2:13).
II. Their adopted or privileged condition. “Fellow citizens,” etc. The city they belong
to is either the Church below, or the Church above.
1. It is the city of God (Heb_12:22).
2. Of God’s building (Psa_127:1).
3. Where He dwells (Psa_68:16).
4. Which is strongly fortified (Isa_26:1).
5. It is delightfully situated by the river of God’s love (Psa_46:4).
6. Endowed with various privileges (1Co_3:21-23).
7. Peopled with high-born inhabitants (Joh_1:13).
The Church of God above.
1. This is a city of God’s preparing (Joh_14:2-3).
2. There He has His more especial residence (1Co_13:12).
3. The inhabitants are angels and saints (Heb_12:22-23).
4. Of this city we are also citizens (Gal_4:26).
5. Set apart by the Father’s grace (Jud_1:1).
6. By the work of Christ in their behalf (Heb_10:14).
7. And by the agency of the Holy Ghost (Rom_5:5).
8. And having a right to a name and a place in the Church on earth; so have they
their citizenship in heaven (Job_16:19).

151. 9. This they have not by birth, nor purchase, but by the free grace of God, which
gives them both a right and meetness (2Ti_1:9).
10. And believing Gentiles are here made equal with the Jews in the blessings of
salvation (Eph_2:14).
“And of the household of God.”
1. The Church of God consisting of believers (Act_5:14).
2. This family is named after, and by Christ (Eph_3:14-15).
3. Of this family God is the Father (Joh_20:17).
4. Christ is the first-born (Rom_8:29).
5. Ministers are stewards of this house (1Co_4:1).
6. To this family all believers belong (Act_4:32).
7. ot by birth, nor merit, but by adopting grace (Eph_1:5).
8. The members of this family are freed from all bondage (Rom_8:15).
9. They can never be arrested or condemned (Rom_8:1).
10. They have liberty of access to God (Eph_2:18).
11. Share in the fulness of Christ’s grace (Eph_3:19).
12. Are well taken care of (Psa_145:20).
13. They are richly clothed (Isa_61:10).
14. They have plenty of provisions (Psa_36:8).
15. And are heirs of a never-fading inheritance (1Pe_1:4-5).
III. The foundation and cornerstone are Christ. “And are built upon the foundation
of the apostles and prophets.”
1. The Father saved them designedly in Christ (2Ti_1:9).
2. The Son saved them positively in Himself (Heb_10:14).

152. 3. The Spirit saves them apprehensively in Christ (Tit_3:5).
4. Christ, then, is the foundation of the Church (Mat_16:18).
5. He is the foundation of all covenant blessings (Eph_1:3).
6. Of faith (Act_20:21).
7. Of hope (Col_1:27).
8. Of peace (Eph_2:14).
9. Of joy (Rom_5:11).
10. Of comfort (2Th_2:17).
11. Of glory (Jud_1:25).
12. The stones of this building are hewn out by the Word, and the ministers of the
gospel (2Co_4:7).
“Jesus Christ Himself being the chief cornerstone.”
1. He joins together Old and ew Testament saints (Eph_2:14).
2. Saints above and saints below (Heb_12:23).
3. Saints in all parts of the world (Joh_11:52).
4. This stone is refused by many (Psa_118:22).
5. Yet a durable and precious stone (Isa_28:16).
6. It is a foundation cornerstone, reaching under the whole building to the four
corners (1Co_3:11).
IV. The perfection of the building. “In whom all the building fitly framed together.”
1. All the building--The universal Church of Christ (Act_4:12).
2. Fitly framed--Is of a spiritual nature (Col_2:19).
3. It consists of various parts as a building does (Rom_12:4-5).
4. Fitly or closely joined to Christ by living faith (Gal_2:20).

153. 5. Banded to each other by Christian love (1Jn_4:7).
6. These are all set in the Church in exact symmetry and proportion (1Co_12:12-31).
“Groweth into a holy temple in the Lord.”
1. It grows by the accession of elect souls, newly called by Divine grace (Act_2:47).
2. It is not yet openly and visibly completed, but it will be in the calling of the Jews
and the fulness of the Gentiles (Rom_11:25-26).
“Holy temple”; alluding to the temple at Jerusalem.
1. Whose stones were prepared before they were brought into the building.
2. Whose magnificence and beauty were very great.
3. A place of holy worship (2Co_6:16).
“In the Lord.”
1. There is no salvation, blessing, or holiness but in the Lord (Col_3:11).
V. The design of this temple. “In whom ye are builded together.” Then it appears
from what has been said, that God is the builder, Christ the foundation, and
believers are the materials of this temple.
1. The door of entrance is faith in Christ (Heb_11:6).
2. Ministers of the gospel are pillars (Gal_2:9).
3. The ordinances are its windows (Exo_20:24).
4. Its provisions are large and entertaining (Psa_132:15).
It denotes--
(1) Agreement.
(2) Combination.
(3) Strength.
(4) Perpetuity.

154. “For a habitation of God through the Spirit.”
1. God dwells in the Church in the person of Christ (2Co_6:16).
2. The Church dwells in God by her union to Christ (1Jn_4:13).
3. It is a spiritual dwelling that is here intended, both of God in us, and of us in God
(Rom_8:9-10). (T. B. Baker.)
The true foundation
When the immense stone piers of the East River bridge were begun, three or four
years ago, the builders did not attempt to manufacture a foundation. They simply
dug down through the mud and sand, and found the solid bedrock which the
Almighty Creator had laid there thousands of years ago. It is a wretched mistake to
suppose that you need to construct a foundation. “Other foundation can no man lay
than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ.” Your own merits, however, cemented by
good resolutions, will no more answer for a solid base than would a cart-load of
bricks as the substratum of yonder stupendous bridge. God has provided for you a
cornerstone already. (T. L. Cuyler, D. D.)
Jesus our Rock
For a whole week, riot only bishop but all the priests and friars of the city (Exeter)
visited Bennet night and day. But they tried in vain to prove to him that the Roman
Church was the true one. “God has given me grace to be of a better Church,” he
said. “Do you know that ours is built upon St. Peter?” “The Church that is built
upon a man,” he replied, “is the devil’s Church, and not God’s.”… At the place of
execution he exhorted with such unction, that the sheriff’s clerk exclaimed, “Truly
this is a servant of God!” Two persons, going up to the martyr, exclaimed in a
threatening voice, “Say, ‘Precor sanctam Mariam et omnes sanctos Dei.’” “I know
no other advocate but Jesus Christ,” replied Bennet. (J. H. M. D’Aubigne, D. D.)
A new and physical metaphor
In these verses there is a sudden change from a political to a physical metaphor,
possibly suggested by the word “household.” The metaphor itself, of the Church as
“a building of God”--frequently used in the ew Testament reaches its full
perfection in this passage.

155. 1. It starts, of course, from the words of our Lord (Mat_16:18), “On this rock I will
build My Church”; but in the use of it sometimes the prominent idea is of the
growth by addition of individual stones, sometimes of the complex unity of the
building as a whole.
2. The former idea naturally occurs first, connecting itself, indeed, with the still
more personal application of the metaphor to the “edification” of the individual to
be a temple of God (found, for example, in 1Th_5:11; 1Co_8:1; 1Co_10:23; 1Co_
14:4; 2Co_5:1; 2Co_10:8). Thus in 1Co_3:9, from “ye are God’s building,” St. Paul
passes at once to the building of individual character on the one foundation; in 1Co_
14:4-5; 1Co_14:12; 1Co_14:26, the edification of the Church has reference to the
effect of prophecy on individual souls; in 1Pe_2:5, the emphasis is still on the
building up of “living stones” upon “a living stone” (Comp. Act_20:32).
3. In this Epistle the other idea--the idea of unity--is always prominent, though not
exclusive of the other (as here and in Eph_4:12-16). But that this conception of unity
is less absolute than that conveyed by the metaphor of the body will be seen by
noting that it differs from it in three respects first, that it carries with it the notion of
a more distinct individuality in each stone; next, that it conveys (as in the “grafting
in” of Rom_11:17) the idea of continual growth by accretion of individual souls
drawn to Christ; lastly, that it depicts the Church as having more completely a
distinct, though not a separate, existence from Him who dwells in it. (On this last
point compare the metaphor of the spouse of Christ in Eph_5:25-33.) Hence it is
naturally worked out with greater completeness in an Epistle which has so
especially for its object the evolution of the doctrine of “the one Holy Catholic
Church.” (A. Barry, D. D.)
Living temples
My brethren, it becomes of the utmost importance to inquire, Have we a place in
this spiritual building? Are we daily striving, as St. Jude exhorts us, to “pray in the
Holy Ghost,” and to “build up ourselves on our most holy faith”?
I. That we may know what our state is, what our hope towards God, let us, first, ask
ourselves, Am I resting on the sure foundation? St. Paul tells us what it is: “Other
foundation can no man lay than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ.”
II. Again: let us ask ourselves, Do we bear always in mind that we are called to be “a
holy temple in the Lord,” “an habitation of God through the Spirit”?
1. A temple gives us the idea of dedication. Do we look upon ourselves as those who

156. are set apart unto holiness, and ought not to be conformed unto this world, but to be
transformed by the renewing of our mind, that we may prove what is that good and
acceptable and perfect will of God?
2. A temple also gives us the idea of God’s immediate presence (1Co_3:16; 1Co_
6:19). This is a thought full of awe, and full of comfort. God is present in the hearts
of them that believe, not as He appeared of old in the Temple at Jerusalem, shining
above the mercy seat in a cloud of glory such as man’s eye could see (Joh_14:23).
And how should we regard our mortal body, if we believed it to be the temple of the
Spirit of God?
3. A temple gives us the idea of continual service.
4. That the work of grace ought to be advancing in us. For what says St. Paul?
“Growing unto an holy temple in the Lord.” (E. Blencowe, M. A.)
The Christian temple
Temples have always excited feelings of the deepest interest in the human race. They
generally contain within themselves, and in the materials with which they are
constructed, much that is beautiful and grand. They form a kind of middle step
between earth and heaven, where faith and sense meet and unite to indulge in
contemplations suited to their varied powers and capacities. The Greeks and the
Romans were perhaps the most superstitious people in the world, they covered their
land with the most bewitching forms of their idolatry; their temples were of the
most costly and splendid description. Among all the temples of antiquity, none were
equal to the temple at Ephesus dedicated to Diana. It was the boast of ancient
Greece, and one of the wonders of the world. Upwards of two hundred years elapsed
during its construction, many sovereigns assisted in its progress with no small
portion of their revenues. And it was considered peculiarly sacred in consequence of
the figure of Diana which it possessed; and which popular report ascribed to Jupiter
as his donation. To check the enthusiasm, and in some degree to extinguish the
admiration which, notwithstanding the power of Christianity, still lingered in the
minds of some members of the Ephesian Church, it is supposed that the apostle used
the words of our text in his Epistle to that Church. He there places in contrast to the
temple of Diana another fabric in every respect infinitely superior--the Church of
God: while the former temple was built upon wooden piles driven into the earth, the
latter rests upon the writings of the apostles and prophets; while the materials of the
former were all earthly, the materials of the latter are, by the grace of God in the
regeneration of the human mind, spiritual and Divine; while the former was devoted
to the rites of idolatry and superstition, the latter is sacred to the service of the true
and living God; while the former could only boast of the image of its goddess, the
latter has the presence, the indwelling presence of its own Maker--the Creator of the
world. Other persons, however, imagine that the allusion here made is not to the
temple of Diana, but to that more sacred fabric erected by Solomon upon Mount

157. Zion. This was heavenly in its design, gorgeous in its material; it was the residence
of Jehovah, and the type of the Christian Church. The Church, then, in this passage
is set forth under the figure of a temple; we shall consider--
I. Its foundation. Prophets and apostles are here associated, Their theme was the
same. The prophets predicted the Messiah who was to come, and the apostle
recorded the history of the Messiah who had come; the one foretold the redemption
to be accomplished, the other wrote of redemption finished and complete. And thus
together they form a magnificent communication made from the invisible to the
visible world; they resemble together the cherubim upon the ark of the covenant,
turning their faces towards each other, and both together towards the mercy seat.
II. The superstructure of this temple. It often happens in the history of human
affairs and transactions that men lay the foundation without being able to raise the
superstructure; not so, however, with God. The building will rise and it will be
equal to the basis.
1. We shall consider the nature of the material of which the superstructure is to be
composed. The Apostle Peter has a very beautiful description of it in the second
chapter of his first Epistle, at the fourth and fifth verses, “To whom coming as unto
a living stone, disallowed indeed of men, but chosen of God and precious.” “Living
stone.” The superstructure resembling the foundation, the foundation equal to the
superstructure.
2. We will notice the symmetry of the building: “fitly framed together”; not a heap
of misshapen ruins huddled together into a mass of inextricable confusion; not a
clumsy fabric raised by joiners and masons without skill; everything is arrayed in
beautiful order, all the parts dove-tailed into each other, everything is fitly framed
in its proper place, and rightly connected.
III. I come now, in the third place, to the design of the building. It was to be “an
habitation of God through the Spirit.” ow let us consider the presence of God in
the Church--in this building. It is an invisible presence, there is no sound of thunder
like that which indicated His dwelling upon Sinai; no cloud of glory like that which
indicated His presence with Israel is here; He is spiritual. He is a Spirit and must
have a spiritual house. But it is a real presence, and here is the real presence in the
Church. (J. A. James.)
Truth--a strong foundation

158. You will observe that the historical order--which is the order of time--is inverted,
and the “apostles” are placed before the “prophets.” And for this reason: because,
in the sentence, we are descending the “foundation.” The “apostles” are laid on the
“prophets,” and the “prophets” are laid on “Christ.” This is the way that our faith
touches God. The Bible rests on God--we rest on the Bible: so we reach God. It will
not be out of place if I take occasion to say here to you what I often say to those
whom I have under instruction--what are the four great proofs of inspiration?
1. The presumptive proof, of which I have been speaking--that we should expect
that, when God has made such a creature as man, He would give to that creature
some revelation of Himself.
2. The internal evidence. The authorship of the books of the Bible spreads over a
period of nearly sixteen hundred years. There is one pervading current of thought.
How could that agreement be, unless it had been dictated by some one Master-
mind? And what could that Master-mind be, but God?
3. The external evidence. This book--from beginning to end--is full of prophecy.
Could any human mind, unassisted, have done that? Could any but God do that?
Then God wrote the Bible.
4. The experimental evidence. The book exactly fits the heart. I feel it when I read it;
whoever made my heart made that book. The two must have one origin, and that
origin must have been God. Thus, then, I arrive at the firm conviction that “the
apostles and prophets” are a “sure foundation” on which to build our creed and our
salvation, being themselves built on “the chief cornerstone.” We get, then, at the
“foundation” of “truth,” “truth” in its two-fold strength--“prophetic truth,”
“apostolic truth”; “prophetic truth” representing the Old Testament,--“apostolic
truth” representing the blew Testament--and both on Christ. What is “prophetic
truth”? Taken in its broad outline, it is this: the affairs, the destinies of this world
all under the one watchful eye, and the one superintending hand, of Almighty God.
To Him, all time is one unbroken now. And “apostolic truth” is this. This world has
been the scene of a great mission. Christ, the Son of God, has been here, and He
hath been careful to extend and perpetuate the knowledge of His mission, and all its
benefits by missionaries, whom He hath sent to all the world. (J. Vaughan, M. A.)
Thy spiritual building
1. Faith makes us lean on Christ, as a building on a foundation. Our faith must not
be a swimming conceit, but an assurance, making us stay on our God.
2. The Church is built on Christ. The firmness of the house is according to the
sureness of the foundation. How impregnable, then, is the Church! (Mat_16:19;
Psa_125:1).

159. (1) The standing of Christians is sure.
(2) How insecure is the condition of wicked men.
3. The gospel builds us on no other foundation than that which was laid by the
prophets from the beginning. The first preaching differs from the last not in
substance but degree; we believe through our Lord Jesus Christ to be saved, even as
they. There never was but one way of salvation. The sun rising, and at noon, differ
not in substance. Christ is the kernel of both Testaments; blossom and ripe fruit.
4. Whatever is to be believed, must have prophetic and apostolic authority.
(1) Be not deluded with traditions.
(2) Stand not too much on the authority of men.
(3) Praise God for the fulness of Scripture.
5. We must rely on Christ for a sure foundation to uphold us. As one would cling by
a rock, so must we by Christ. Peter and others are builders: Christ alone is the
foundation. Let there be no mistake as to this. (Paul Bayne.)
The foundation of the apostles and prophets
In spite of much ancient and valuable authority, it seems impossible to take “the
prophets” of this verse to be the prophets of the Old Testament. The order of the
two words and the comparison of Eph_3:5; Eph_4:11 appear to be decisive--to say
nothing of the emphasis on the present, in contrast with the past, which runs
through the whole chapter. But it is more difficult to determine in what sense “the
foundation of the apostles and prophets” is used. Of the three possible senses, that
(1) which makes it equivalent to “the foundation on which apostles and prophets are
built,” viz., Jesus Christ Himself, may be dismissed as taking away any special force
from the passage, and as unsuitable to the next clause. The second
(2), “the foundation laid by apostles and prophets”--still, of course, Jesus Christ
Himself--is rather forced, and equally fails to accord with the next clause, in which
our Lord is not the foundation, but the cornerstone. The most natural interpretation
(3), followed by most ancient authorities, which makes the apostles and prophets to
be themselves “the foundation,” has been put aside by modern commentators in the
true feeling that ultimately there is but “one foundation” (1Co_3:11), and in a
consequent reluctance to apply that name to any but Him. But it is clear that in this
passage St. Paul deliberately varies the metaphor in relation to our Lord, making

160. Him not the foundation, or both foundation and cornerstone, but simply the
cornerstone, “binding together,” according to Chrysostom’s instructive remark,
“both the walls and the foundations.” Hence the word “foundation” seems to be
applied in a true, although secondary sense, to the apostles and prophets; just as in
the celebrated passage (Mat_16:18) our Lord must be held at any rate to connect St.
Peter with the foundation on which the Church is built; and as in Rev_21:14, “the
foundations” bear “the names of the twelve apostles of the Lamb.” It is true that in
this last passage we have the plural instead of the singular, and that the passage
itself, is not, as this is, a dogmatic passage. But these considerations are insufficient
to destroy the analogy. The genius, therefore, of this passage itself, supported by the
other cognate passages, leads us to what may be granted to be an unexpected but a
perfectly intelligible expression. The apostles and prophets are the foundation; yet,
of course, only as setting forth in word and grace Him, who is the cornerstone. (A.
Barry, D. D.)
Christ the cornerstone
The metaphor is drawn, of course, from Psa_118:22 (applied by our Lord to Himself
in Mat_21:42; Mar_12:10; Luk_20:17; and by St. Peter to Him in Act_4:11), or
from Isa_28:16 (quoted with the other passage in 1Pe_2:6-7); in which last it may be
noted that both the metaphors are united, and “the tried cornerstone” is also “the
sure foundation.” In itself it does not convey so obvious an idea of uniqueness and
importance as that suggested by the “keystone” of an arch, or the “apex stone” of a
pyramid; but it appears to mean a massive cornerstone, in which the two lines of the
wall at their foundation meet, by which they were bonded together, and on the
perfect squareness of which the true direction of the whole walls depended, since the
slightest imperfection in the cornerstone would be indefinitely multiplied along the
course of the walls. The doctrine which, if taken alone, it would convey, is simply the
acceptance of our Lord’s perfect teaching and life, as the one determining influence
both of the teaching and institutions, which are the basis of the Church, and of the
superstructure in the actual life of the members of the Church itself. By such
acceptance both assume symmetry and “stand four-square to all the winds that
blow.” (See Rev_21:16.) That this is not the whole truth seems to be implied by the
variation from the metaphor in the next verse. (A. Barry, D. D.)
Jesus Christ Himself
I. With Jesus Christ Himself we begin by saying, first, that Jesus Himself is the
essence of His own work, and, therefore, how readily we ought to trust Him. Jesus
Himself is the soul of His own salvation. How does the apostle describe it? “He loved
me, and gave Himself for me.” Because of this, the Lord Jesus Christ Himself is the

161. object of our faith. “Look unto Me,” “Come unto Me.” How very simple, easy,
natural, ought faith to be henceforth!
II. “Jesus Christ Himself” is the substance of the gospel, and therefore how closely
should we study Him. While He was hero He taught His disciples, and the object of
His teaching was that they might know Himself, and through Him might know the
Father. Whatever else they may be ignorant of, it is essential to disciples that they
know their Lord. His nature, character, mind, spirit, object, power, we must know--
in a word, we must know Jesus Himself.
1. This, beloved, is the work of the Holy Spirit. “He shall glorify Me: for He shall
receive of Mine, and shall show it unto you.” The Holy Ghost reveals Christ to us
and in us.
2. Because Jesus is the sum of the gospel, He must be our constant theme. Put out
the sun, and light is gone, life is gone, all is gone. The more of Christ in our
testimony, the more of light and life and power to save.
III. Jesus Christ Himself is the object of our love, and how dear He should be. The
love of a truth is all very well, but the love of a person has far more power in it. We
have heard of men dying for an idea, but it is infinitely more easy to awaken
enthusiasm for a person. When an idea becomes embodied in a man, it has a force
which, in its abstract form, it never wielded. Jesus Christ is loved by us as the
embodiment of everything that is lovely, and true, and pure, and of good report. He
Himself is incarnate perfection, inspired by love. We love His offices, we love the
types which describe Him, we love the ordinances by which He is set forth, but we
love Himself best of all.
1. Because we love Him, we love His people, and through Him we enter into union
with them. We are at one with every man who is at one with Christ. So warm is the
fire of our love to Jesus that all His friends may sit at it, and welcome. Our circle of
affection comprehends all who in any shape or way have truly to do with Jesus
Himself.
2. Because we love Himself we delight to render service to Him. Whatever service we
do for His Church, and for His truth, we do for His sake; even if we can only render
it to the least of His brethren we do it unto Him.
IV. Jesus Christ Himself is the source of all our joy. How ought we to rejoice, when
we have such a springing well of blessedness. What a joy to think that Jesus is
risen--risen to die no more: the joy of resurrection is superlative.

162. V. Jesus Christ Himself is the model of our life, and therefore how blessed it is to be
like Him. As to our rule for life, we are like the disciples on the Mount of
Transfiguration when Moses and Elias had vanished, for we see “no man save Jesus
only.” Every virtue found in other men we find in Him in greater perfection; we
admire the grace of God in them, but Jesus Himself is our pattern. It was once said
of Henry VIII, by a severe critic, that if the characteristics of all the tyrants that had
ever lived had been forgotten, they might all have been seen to the life in that one
king: we may more truly say of Jesus, if all graces, and virtues, and sweetnesses
which have ever been seen in good men could all be forgotten, you might find them
all in Him: for in Him dwells all that is good and great. We, therefore, desire to copy
His character and put our feet into His footprints.
VI. Lastly, He is the Lord of our soul. How sweet it will be to be with Him. We find
today that His beloved company makes everything move pleasantly, whether we run
in the way of His commands, or traverse the valley of the shadow of death. A poor
girl, lying in the hospital, was told by the doctor or the nurse that she could only live
another hour. She waited patiently, and when there remained only one quarter of an
hour more, she exclaimed: “One more quarter of an hour, and then.” She could not
say what, and neither can I; only Jesus Himself hath said, “Father, I will that they
also, whom Thou hast given Me, be with Me where I am, that they may behold My
glory.” And as He has prayed, so it shall be, and so let it be. Amen and Amen. (C. H.
Spurgeon.)
Jesus Christ Himself the proof of the gospel
The religion of our Lord Jesus Christ contains in it nothing so wonderful as
Himself. It is a mass of marvels, but He is the miracle of it; the wonder of wonders is
“The Wonderful” Himself. If proof be asked of the truth which He proclaimed, we
point men to Jesus Christ Himself. His character is unique. We defy unbelievers to
imagine another like Him. He is God and yet man, and we challenge them to
compose a narrative in which the two apparently incongruous characters shall be so
harmoniously blended--in which the human and Divine shall be so marvellously
apparent, without the one overshading the other. They question the authenticity of
the four Gospels; will they try and write a fifth? Will they even attempt to add a few
incidents to the life which shall be worthy of the sacred biography, and congruous
with those facts which are already described? If it be all a forgery, will they be so
good as to show us how it is done? Will they find a novelist who will write another
biography of a man of any century they choose, of any nationality, or of any degree
of experience, or any rank or station, and let us see if they can describe in that
imaginary life a devotion, a self-sacrifice, a truthfulness, a completeness of character

163. at all comparable to that of Jesus Christ Himself? Can they invent another perfect
character even if the Divine element be left out? They must of necessity fail, for
there is none like unto Jesus Himself. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
Jesus Christ Himself the marrow and essence of the gospel
When the Apostle Paul meant that the gospel was preached he said, “Christ is
preached,” for the gospel is Christ Himself. If you want to know what Jesus taught,
know Himself. He is the incarnation of that truth which by Him and in Him is
revealed to the sons of men. Did He not Himself say, “I am the Way, the Truth, and
the Life”? You have not to take down innumerable tomes, nor to pore over
mysterious sentences of double meaning in order to know what our great Teacher
has revealed, you have but to turn and gaze upon His countenance, behold His
actions, and note His spirit, and you know His teaching. He lived what He taught. If
we wish to know Him, we may hear His gentle voice saying, “Come and see.” Study
His wounds, and you understand His innermost philosophy. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
Home symbols
Did you ever think how every part of your house can remind you of the great truths
which Jesus Christ taught about Himself? The cornerstone says, “Christ is the
cornerstone”; the door, “I am the door”; the burning candle, “I am the Light of the
world”; the corridor, “I am the Way.” Look out of the window, and the sight of the
starry sky bids you turn your eyes to “the bright and morning Star.” The rising sun
speaks to you of the “rising of the Sun of Righteousness with healing on His wings.”
The loaf on your table whispers of “the Bread of Life,” and the water that quenches
your thirst, “I am the Living Water,” “I am the Water of Life.” When you lie down
you think of Him that “had not where to lay His head,” and when you get up, you
rejoice that He is “the Resurrection and the Life.” (Sunday Teacher’s Treasury.)
Growth in holiness
When I was at Mr. Spurgeon’s house he showed me the photographs of his two sons,
who were twins, and whose photographs had been taken every year since they were
twelve months old until they were seventeen years old. For the first two years they
did not seem to have grown much, but when we compared the first with those of the
age of seventeen they seemed to have grown amazingly. So it is with the children of
God--they grow in grace. (D. L. Moody.)

164. Growth and permanence
“What is the use of thee, thou gnarled sapling?” said a young larch tree to a young
oak. “I grow three feet in a year, thou scarcely as many inches; I am straight and
taper as a reed, thou straggling and twisted as a loosened withe.” “And thy
duration,” answered the oak, “is some third part of man’s life, and I am appointed
to flourish for a thousand years. Thou art felled and sawed into palings, where thou
rottest and art burnt after a single summer; of me are fashioned battle-ships, and I
carry mariners and heroes into unknown seas.” The richer a nature, the harder and
slower its development. (T. Carlyle.)
ecessity of holiness
There is no heaven for us, without fitness for heaven. As the official at the Bank of
England said to me about some sovereigns I wished to change into notes, “If we take
them in here they must be tested.” (B)
The spiritual temple
I. The foundation.
1. Prophets--the Old Testament. Apostles--the ew Testament. Jesus Christ--the
Divine Being in whom both dispensations are united.
2. This foundation is stable, sure.
3. It gives dignity to the building.
4. It is the only foundation.
II. The superstructure.
1. It will be a united building.
2. It is a progressive building.
3. It is a sanctified building.

165. III. The materials.
1. Believers in every age and clime.
2. otice the stones in their natural state.
3. They are derived from different sources.
4. They are in different stages of preparation.
5. They must all be fashioned after the manner of the chief cornerstone.
6. Here is a text by which you may each know whether or not you are in the
building.
7. These stones are bought with a price. (A. F. Barfield.)
Christ a builder
Christ builds on through all the ages. For the present, there has to be much
destructive as well as constructive work done. Many a wretched hovel, the abode of
sorrow and want, many a den of infamy, many a palace of pride, many a temple of
idols, will have to be pulled down yet, and men’s eyes will be blinded by the dust,
and their hearts will ache as they look at the ruins. Be it so. The finished structure
will obliterate the remembrance of poor buildings that cumbered its site. This
Emperor of ours may indeed say, that He found the city of brick and made it
marble. (A. Maclaren, D. D.)
The temple of the faithful
1. There is a special wisdom required in those who are to dispense the doctrine of
faith; they must proceed by line and order. We do not entrust a piece of work of any
importance but to those who are masters of their craft. Much more does the
spiritual building require workmen who labour as they need not be ashamed (2Ti_
2:15). And this teaches people how they should submit themselves to be framed and
squared according as the ministry requires. Before a rough stone can be
conveniently laid, it must be hewed by the mason, polished, and planed, and so
brought to the rest of the building. So it is with you: you must be smoothed and
planed before you can come to lie in this building. If ye be God’s building, ye must
be squared to His model.
2. The faithful have a close union with Christ and one another. As in a house the

166. building, all of it, “must be fitted to the foundation, and every part of it suit one with
another, so in this building, which we are, there must be a straight coupling with the
foundation, and correspondence one with another. In the material temple (the type
of the spiritual) the walls or rows of stone that were in it were so squared that one
piece did not bulge out above the other, but being laid together a man would have
thought them one entire stone. So all the other things were so contrived, that
window answered to window, door to door, chamber to chamber; there was a
pleasant proportionableness in everything. In like manner must the multitude of
believers be all laid on one foundation, and all of them so even that they seem as one
living stone, and every one answering most commodiously to another. And thus it is
with the faithful in their union with Christ and with one another. Love makes the
saints each seek the good of the other, and be serviceable each to other.
3. True believers grow up from day to day. Even as it is in great buildings, which
are not at once begun and perfected, So do the stones of the spiritual temple go on
growing till they come to perfection. Where we cease to grow, there we decline; he
that wins not, loses. Leave off endeavour to be better, and you will soon cease to be
good.
4. Believers are a temple for God’s habitation.
(1) A great dignity.
(2) Defile not the temple of God. To do so is sacrilege.
(3) Avoid all profanation of it.
5. Believers must be sanctified throughout.
6. Believers grow by the power of Christ. The Church still goes forward, in spite of
heresies, persecutions, all scandals of life, all the gates of hell, because God is its
builder.
(1) Let us look to Him for spiritual edification.
(2) It should comfort us to know that in due time we shall be finished.
God will make up all the breaches and ruins of our sinful nature, and build us up a
glorious temple for Himself, wherein He will dwell forever. (Paul Bayne.)
The building
1. Observe the term “groweth,” intimating that the Church is ever enlarging her
borders and adding to her members, either by the admission of the children of her
members to the waters of baptism, or by the conversion of the heathen, and leading

167. them to the same. And so it will continue, growing and increasing, until the
consummation of all things: and God shall have accomplished the number of His
elect.
2. Observe the expression, “fitly framed together,” showing the order and
subordination of the different members. ot a confused mass of building materials,
without shape and order; but set in their several stations, by the great Master of the
universe.
3. Observe how the whole glory of this is ascribed not to man, but to our Lord Jesus
Christ. In Him the building is framed; in Him it groweth and increaseth; the power
to do so coming from Him. (A. P. Perceval, B. C. L.)
The growth of the new kingdom
The growth of the body, on Christ’s part, is spontaneous, and on man’s,
consentaneous. “In whom all the building fitly framed together, groweth unto a holy
temple in the Lord.” It grows from Christ, but it grows in unity with our consenting
affections. Christ never violates human freedom, but works in it, with it, and by it.
“What wilt thou that I should do unto thee? Ask, and ye shall receive.” “According
to your faith be it unto you.” He would open and develop in us much more of His
purity and truth, goodness and beauty; but He waits for our desire, and by
processes of wondrous wisdom and gentleness He seeks to beget in us that desire. If
the spirit of the flesh in us be ardent, or the spiritual affections be lukewarm, the
growth of the new nature will be retarded, or suspended. If it be necessary to receive
Christ, in order to salvation, it is equally necessary to walk in Him, in a spirit of
watchfulness and prayer, in order to growth. Inasmuch as “all the building is
growing in the Lord,” and according to His order, it will, in the end, not only be a
glorious temple of humanity, but marvellously adapted for the indwelling and
manifestation of God. “I will dwell in them, and I will be their God, and they shall
be My people.” I will fill them, and they shall represent My fulness. “The whole
building,” the redeemed of every generation, growing more and more into unity
with each other, and with Christ, and through Him with all the hidden powers of
the Godhead, is a work which is every way worthy of all Almighty Father. To what
glory, to what beauty, will the kingdom grow? to what wisdom will its members
attain? what will be their powers? what their fellowship? what their individual
freedom of action? what their service and end, as one empire in the Son, and in the
Father? At present there is much in human souls, much in the constitution of
nature, and very much in the strife of the great spirit world, to hinder the full
development of God’s purpose in Christ. But all hindrances have their appointed
limit. In due time, they will all be overmastered or removed; and God and the
redeemed race will come into perfect relationship. (John Pulsford.)

168. The growth of the structure
The structure is in process of growth. It is not finished--the copestone has not been
put upon it. The scaffolding occasionally disfigures it; yet even in its immature state,
and with so much that is undeveloped, one may admire its beauty of outline, and its
graceful form and proportions. Vast augmentations may be certainly anticipated;
but its increase does not mutilate its adaptations, for it grows as “being fitly framed
together.” A structure not firm and compact is in the greater danger of falling the
higher it is carried; and “if it topple on our heads, what matter is it whether we are
crushed by a Corinthian or a Doric ruin?” But this fabric, with walls of more than
Cyclopean or Pelasgian strength and vastness, secures its own continuous and
illimitable elevation. Provision is thus made for its increase, and without breach or
delapidation it rises in height. (J. Eadie, D. D.)
Christian unity
All the redeemed are one body--many members, but still one great incorporation.
“Ye are builded together for an habitation of God, through the Spirit.” The
materials of a house form no place of abode, while they lie scattered and separated.
In the ancient tabernacle, the glory of the Lord did not appear till it was compacted
and set up. The Divine presence rested not upon the stones and timber of the
Temple till they were framed into the edifice. We may hence infer, that if we would
enjoy the promised blessing, we should avoid strifes and divisions, and follow after
peace, and the things whereby one may edify the other. (Anonymous.)
The tabernacle of the Most High
I. The Church is a building. ot a heap of stones shot together, but a building. Of
old her Architect devised her. Methinks I see Him, as I look back into old eternity,
making the first outline of His Church. “Here,” saith He, in His eternal wisdom,
“shall be the cornerstone, and there shall be the pinnacle.” I see Him ordaining her
length, and her breadth, appointing her gates and her doors with matchless skill,
devising every part of her, and leaving no single portion of the structure unmapped.
I see Him, that mighty Architect, also choosing to Himself every stone of the
building, ordaining its size and its shape; settling upon His mighty plan the position
each stone shall occupy, whether it shall glitter in front, or be hidden in the back, or
buried in the very centre of the wall. I see Him marking not merely the bare outline,
but all the fillings up; all being ordained, decreed, and settled, in the eternal
covenant, which was the Divine plan of the mighty Architect upon which the
Church is to be built. Looking on, I see the Architect choosing a cornerstone. He
looks to heaven, and there are the angels, those glittering stones--He looks at each

169. one of them from Gabriel down; but, saith He, “ one of you will suffice. I must have
a cornerstone that will support all the weight of the building, for on that stone every
other one must lean. O Gabriel, thou wilt not suffice I Raphael, thou must lay by; I
cannot build with thee.” Yet was it necessary that a stone should be found, and one
too that should be taken out of the same quarry as the rest. Where was he to be
discovered? Was there a man who would suffice to be the cornerstone of this mighty
building? Ah, no! neither apostles, prophets, nor teachers would. Put them all
together, and they would be as a foundation of quicksand, and the house would
totter to its fall. Mark how the Divine mind solved the difficulty--“God shall become
man, very man, and so He shall be of the same substance as the other stones of the
temple; yet shall He be God, and therefore strong enough to bear all the weight of
this mighty structure, the top whereof shall reach to heaven.” I see that foundation
stone laid. Is there singing at the laying of it? o. There is weeping there. The angels
gathered round at the laying of this first stone; and look, ye men, and wonder, the
angels weep; the harps of heaven are clothed in sackcloth, and no song is heard.
They sang together and shouted for joy when the world was made; why shout they
not now? Look ye here, and see the reason. That stone is imbedded in blood. The
first is laid; where are the rest? Shall we go and dig into the sides of Lebanon? Shall
we find these precious stones in the marble quarries of kings? o. Whither are ye
flying, ye labourers of God? “We go to dig in the quarries of Sodom and Gomorrah,
in the depths of sinful Jerusalem, and in the midst of erring Samaria.” I see them
clear away the rubbish. I mark them as they dig deep into the earth, and at last they
come to these stones. But how rough, how hard, how unhewn. Yes, but these are the
stones ordained of old in the decree, and these must be the stones, and none other.
There must be a change effected. These must be brought in, and shaped and cut and
polished, and put into their places. I see the workmen at their labour. The great saw
of the law cuts through the stone, and then comes the polishing chisel of the gospel. I
see the stones lying in their places, and the Church is rising. The ministers, like wise
master builders, are there running along the wall, putting each spiritual stone in its
place; each stone is leaning on that massive cornerstone, and every stone depending
on the blood, and finding its security and its strength in Jesus Christ, the
cornerstone, elect, and precious. ow open wide your eyes, and see what a glorious
building this is--the Church of God. Men talk of the splendour of their
architecture--this is architecture indeed; neither after Grecian nor Gothic models,
but after the model of the sanctuary which Moses saw in the holy mountain. Do you
see it? Was there ever a structure so comely as this--instinct with life in every part?
There is no house like a heart for one to repose in. There a man may find peace in
his fellow man; but here is the house where God delighteth to dwell--built of living
hearts, all beating with holy love--built of redeemed souls, chosen of the Father,
bought with the blood of Christ. The top of it is in heaven. Part of them are above
the clouds. Many of the living stones are now in the pinnacle of paradise. We are
here below. The building rises, the sacred masonry is heaving, and, as the
cornerstone rises, so all of us must rise, until at last the entire structure, from its
foundation to its pinnacle, shall be heaved up to heaven, and there shall it stand
forever--the new Jerusalem, the temple of the majesty of God.
1. The Divine Architect makes no mistakes. When our eyes shall have been

170. enlightened, and our hearts instructed, each part of the building will command our
admiration. The top stone is not the foundation, nor does the foundation stand at
the top. Every stone is of the right shape; the whole material is as it should be, and
the structure is adapted for the great end, the glory of God, the temple of the Most
High.
2. Another thing may be noticed--her impregnable strength. This habitation of God,
this house not made with hands, but of God’s building, has often been attacked, but
never taken. What multitudes of enemies have battered against her old ramparts!
but they have battered in vain.
3. And we may add, it is glorious for beauty. There was never structure like this.
One might feast his eyes upon it from dawn to eve, and then begin again. Jesus
Himself takes delight in it. God joys over it with singing (Zep_3:17).
II. But the true glory of the Church of God consists in the fact that she is not only a
building, but that she is a habitation. There may be great beauty in an uninhabited
structure, but there is always a melancholy thought connected with it. Who loves to
see desolate palaces? Who desireth that the land should cast out her sons, and that
her houses should fail of tenants? But there is joy in a house lit up and furnished,
where there is the sound of men. Beloved, the Church of God hath this for her
peculiar glory, that she is a tenanted house, that she is a habitation of God through
the Spirit. How many Churches there are that are houses, yet not habitations! I
might picture to you a professed Church of God; it is built according to square and
compass, but its model has been formed in some ancient creed, and not in the Word
of God. There are too many churches that are nothing but a mass of dull, dead
formality; there is no life of God there. A house is a place where a man solaces and
comforts himself. Our home is the place of our solace, our comfort, and our rest.
ow, God calls the Church His habitation--His home. Oh, how beautiful is the
picture of the Church as God’s house, the place in which He takes His solace! “For
the Lord hath chosen Zion; He hath desired it for His habitation. This is my rest
forever: here will I dwell; for I have desired it.”
2. Furthermore, a man’s home is the place where he shows his inner self. There are
sweet revelations which God makes in His Church, which He never makes anywhere
else.
3. A man’s home is the centre of all he does. Yonder is a large farm. Well, there are
outhouses, and hay ricks, and barns, and the like; but just in the middle of these
there is the house, the centre of all husbandry. o matter how much wheat there
may be, it is to the house the produce goes. It is for the maintenance of the
household that the husband carries on his husbandry. ow, God’s Church is God’s
centre. Why doth God clothe the hills with plenty? For the feeding of His people.
Why is providence revolving? Why those wars and tempests, and then again this
stillness and calm? It is for His Church. ot an angel divides the ether who hath not

171. a mission for the Church. It may be indirectly, but nevertheless truly so. All things
must minister and work together for good for the chosen Church of God, which is
His house--His daily habitation.
4. We love our homes, and we must and will defend them. Ay, and now lift up your
thoughts--the Church is God’s home; will He not defend it?
III. The Church is, by and by, to be God’s glorious temple. It doth not yet appear
what she shall be. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
Believers God’s habitation
1. Believers have the Lord to dwell with them.
(1) Grieve not, but please this guest.
(2) See the blessedness of all the faithful.
2. By being built on Christ, we come to be a dwelling for God.
3. The Spirit of sanctification makes us a fit habitation for God. (Paul Bayne.)
The spiritual building
I. The materials.
1. Their nature.
2. Their diversity.
3. Their number.
4. Their circumstances.
5. Their value.
II. The basis and plan.

172. 1. The foundation is Christ.
2. The chief cornerstone is Christ.
3. The whole building is constructed by Christ.
4. The excellencies of Christ will be the beauty of the building.
III. The instruments and agency by which this building is constructed and carried
on. The Holy Spirit.
1. The vastness of the work requires a universal presence.
2. The difficulty of the work demands infinite resources.
3. The time needed to carry on the work requires a perpetual agency.
IV. The design to be accomplished in this work. “For an habitation of God.” (Isaiah
Birt.)
Believers are temples
If there be anything common to us by nature, it is the members of our corporeal
frame; yet the apostle taught that these, guided by the Spirit as its instruments, and
obeying a holy will, become transfigured; so that, in his language, the body becomes
a temple of the Holy Ghost, and the meanest faculties, the lowest appetites, the
humblest organs, are ennobled by the Spirit mind which guides them. Thus he bids
the Romans yield themselves unto God as those that are alive from the dead, and
their members as instruments of righteousness unto God. (F. W. Robertson, M. A.)
Inhabited by the Holy Spirit
I am sitting, on a summer’s day, in the shadow of a great ew England elm. Its long
branches hang motionless; there is not breeze enough to move them. All at once
there comes a faint murmur; around my head the leaves are moved by a gentle
current of air; then the branches begin to sway to and fro, the leaves are all in
motion, and a soft, rushing sound fills my ear. So with every one that is born of the
Spirit. I am in a state of spiritual lethargy, and scarcely know how to think any good

173. thought. I am heart empty, and there comes, I know not where or whence, a sound
of the Divine presence. I am inwardly moved with new comfort and hope; the day
seems to dawn in my heart, sunshine comes around my path, and I am able to go to
my duties with patience. I am walking in the Spirit, I am helped by the help of God,
and comforted with the comfort of God. And yet this is all in accordance with law.
There is no violation of law when the breezes come, stirring the tops of the trees;
and there is no violation of law when God moves in the depths of our souls, and
rouses us to the love and desire of holiness. (James Freeman Clarke.)
The rival builders
The story of Rowland Hill preaching against the first Surrey Theatre is very
characteristic. The building of Surrey Chapel was going on simultaneously with that
of the theatre. In his sermon he addressed his audience as follows:--“You have a
race to run now between God and the devil; the children of the last are making all
possible haste in building him a temple, where he may receive the donations and
worship of the children of vanity and sin! ow is your time, therefore, to bestir
yourselves in the cause of righteousness, and never let it be said but what God can
outrun the devil!” (Clerical Anecdotes.)
MACLARE , "‘THE CHIEF COR ER-STO E’
Eph_2:20
The Roman Empire had in Paul’s time gathered into a great unity the Asiatics of
Ephesus, the Greeks of Corinth, the Jews of Palestine, and men of many another
race, but grand and imposing as that great unity was, it was to Paul a poor thing
compared with the oneness of the Kingdom of Jesus Christ. Asiatics of Ephesus,
Greeks of Corinth, Jews of Palestine and members of many another race could say,
‘Our citizenship is in heaven.’ The Roman Eagle swept over wide regions in her
flight, but the Dove of Peace, sent forth from Christ’s hand, travelled further than
she. As Paul says in the context, the Ephesians had been strangers, ‘aliens from the
commonwealth of Israel,’ wandering like the remnants of some ‘broken clans,’ but
now they are gathered in. That narrow community of the Jewish nation has
expanded its bounds and become the mother-country of believing souls, the true
‘island of saints.’ It was not Rome which really made all peoples one, but it was the
weakest and most despised of her subject races. ‘Of Zion it shall be said,’ ‘Lo! this
and that man was born in her.’

174. To emphasise the thought of the great unity of the Church, the Apostle uses here his
often-repeated metaphor of a temple, of which the Ephesian Christians are the
stones, apostles and prophets the builders, and Christ Himself the chief corner-
stone. Of course the representation of the foundation, as being laid by apostles and
prophets, refers to them as proclaiming the Gospel. The real laying of the
foundation is the work of the divine power and love which gave us Christ, and it is
the Divine Voice which proclaims, ‘Behold I lay in Zion a foundation!’ But that
divine work has to be made known among men, and it is by the making of it known
that the building rises course by course. There is no contradiction between the two
statements, ‘I have laid the foundation’ and Paul’s ‘As a wise master-builder I have
laid the foundation.’
A question may here rise as to the meaning of ‘prophets.’ Unquestionably the
expression in other places of the Epistle does mean ew Testament prophets, but
seeing that here Jesus is designated as the foundation stone which, standing beneath
two walls, has a face into each, and binds them strongly together, it is more natural
to see in the prophets the representatives of the great teachers of the old
dispensation as the apostles were of the new. The remarkable order in which these
two classes are named, the apostles being first, and the prophets who were first in
time being last in order of mention, confirms this explanation, for the two co-
operating classes are named in the order in which they lie in the foundation. Digging
down you come to the more recent first, to the earlier second, and deep and massive,
beneath all, to the corner-stone on whom all rests, in whom all are united together.
Following the Apostle’s order we may note the process of building; beneath that, the
foundation on which the building rests; and beneath it, the corner-stone which
underlies and unites the whole.
I. The process of building.
In the previous clauses the Apostle has represented the condition of the Ephesian
Christians before their Christianity as being that of strangers and foreigners,
lacking the rights of citizenship anywhere, a mob rather than in any sense a society.
They had been like a confused heap of stones flung fortuitously together; they had
become fellow-citizens with the saints. The stones had been piled up into an orderly
building. He is not ignoring the facts of national, political, or civic relationships
which existed independent of the new unity realised in a common faith. These
relationships could not be ignored by one who had had Paul’s experience of their
formidable character as antagonists of him and of his message, but they seemed to
him, in contrast with the still deeper and far more perfect union, which was being
brought about in Christ, of men of all nationalities and belonging to mutually hostile

175. races, to be little better than the fortuitous union of a pile of stones huddled together
on the roadside. Measured against the architecture of the Church, as Paul saw it in
his lofty idealism, the aggregations of men in the world do not deserve the name of
buildings. His point of view is the exact opposite of that which is common around us,
and which, alas! finds but too much support in the present aspects of the so-called
churches of this day.
It is to be observed that in our text these stones are, in accordance with the
propriety of the metaphor, regarded as being built, that is, as in some sense the
subjects of a force brought to bear upon them, which results in their being laid
together in orderly fashion and according to a plan, but it is not to be forgotten that,
according to the teaching, not of this epistle alone, but of all Paul’s letters, the living
stones are active in the work of building, as well as beings subject to an influence. In
another place of the ew Testament we read the exhortation to ‘build up yourselves
on your most holy faith,’ and the means of discharging that duty are set forth in the
words which follow it; as being ‘Praying in the Holy Spirit, keeping yourselves in
the love of God, and looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ.’
Throughout the Pauline letters we have frequent references to edifying, a phrase
which has been so vulgarised by much handling that its great meaning has been all
but lost, but which still, rightly understood, presents the Christian life as one
continuous effort after developing Christian character. Taking into view the whole
of the apostolic references to this continuous process of building, we cannot but
recognise that it all begins with the act of faith which brings men into immediate
contact and vital union with Jesus Christ, and which is, if anything that a man does
is, the act of his very inmost self passing out of its own isolation and resting itself on
Jesus. It is by the vital and individual act of faith that any soul escapes from the
dreary isolation of being a stranger and a foreigner, wandering, homeless and
solitary, and finds through Jesus fellowship, an elder Brother, a Father, and a home
populous with many brethren. But whilst faith is the condition of beginning the
Christian life, which is the only real life, that life has to be continued and developed
towards perfection by continuous effort. ‘Tis a life-long toil till the lump be
leavened.’
One of the passages already referred to varies the metaphor of building, in so far as
it seems to represent ‘your most holy faith’ as the foundation, and may be an
instance of the doubtful ew Testament usage of ‘faith,’ as meaning the believed
Gospel, rather than the personal act of believing. But however that may be, context
of the words clearly suggests the practical duties by which the Christian life is
preserved and strengthened. They who build up themselves do so, mainly, by
keeping themselves in the love of God with watchful oversight and continual

176. preparedness for struggle against all foes who would drag them from that safe
fortress, and subsidiarily, by like continuity in prayer, and in fixing their meek hope
on the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life. If Christian character is
ever to be made more Christian, it must be by a firmer grasp and a more vivid
realisation of Christ and His truth. The more we feel ourselves to be lapped in the
love of God, the more shall we be builded up on our most holy faith. There is no
mystery about the means of Christian progress. That which, at the beginning, made
a man a Christian shapes his whole future course; the measure of our faith is the
measure of our advance.
But the Apostle, in the immediately following words, goes on to pass beyond the
bounds of his metaphor, and with complete indifference to the charge of mixing
figures, speaks of the building as growing. That thought leads us into a higher
region than that of effort. The process by which a great forest tree thickens its boles,
expands the sweep of its branches and lifts them nearer the heavens, is very
different from that by which a building rises slowly and toilsomely and with
manifest incompleteness all the time, until the flag flies on the roof-tree. And if we
had not this nobler thought of a possible advance by the increasing circulation
within us of a mysterious life, there would be little gospel in a word which only
enjoined effort as the condition of moral progress, and there would be little to
choose between Paul and Plato. He goes on immediately to bring out more fully
what he means by the growth of the building, when he says that if Christians are in
Christ, they are ‘built up for an habitation of God in the Spirit.’ Union with Christ,
and a consequent life in the Spirit, are sure to result in the growth of the individual
soul and of the collective community. That divine Spirit dwells in and works
through every believing soul, and while it is possible to grieve and to quench It, to
resist and even to neutralise Its workings, these are the true sources of all our
growth in grace and knowledge. The process of building may be and will be slow.
Sometimes lurking enemies will pull down in a night what we have laboured at for
many days. Often our hands will be slack and our hearts will droop. We shall often
be tempted to think that our progress is so slow that it is doubtful if we have ever
been on the foundation at all or have been building at all. But ‘the Spirit helpeth our
infirmities,’ and the task is not ours alone but His in us. We have to recognise that
effort is inseparable from building, but we have also to remember that growth
depends on the free circulation of life, and that if we are, and abide in, Jesus, we
cannot but be built ‘for an habitation of God in the Spirit.’ We may be sure that
whatever may be the gaps and shortcomings in the structures that we rear here,
none will be able to say of us at the last, ‘This man began to build and was not able
to finish.’
II. The foundation on which the building rests.

177. In the Greek, as in our version, there is no definite article before ‘prophets,’ and its
absence indicates that both sets of persons here mentioned come under the common
vinculum of the one definite article preceding the first named. So that apostles and
prophets belong to one class. It may be a question whether the foundation is theirs
in the sense that they constitute it, an explanation in favour of which can be quoted
the vision in the Apocalypse of the new Jerusalem, in the twelve foundations of
which were written the names of the twelve apostles of the Lamb, or whether, as is
more probable, the foundation is conceived of as laid by them. In like manner the
Apostle speaks to the Corinthians of having ‘as a wise master-builder laid the
foundation,’ and to the Romans of making it his aim to preach especially where
Christ was not already named, that he might ‘not build upon another man’s
foundation.’ Following these indications, it seems best to understand the preaching
of the Gospel as being the laying of the foundation.
Further, the question may be raised whether the prophets here mentioned belong to
the Old Testament or to the ew. The latter alternative has been preferred on the
ground that the apostles are named first, but, as we have already noticed, the order
here begins at the top and goes downwards, what was last in order of time being
first in order of mention. We need only recall Peter’s bold words that ‘all the
prophets, as many as have spoken, have told of the days’ of Christ, or Paul’s sermon
in the synagogue of Antioch in which he passionately insisted on the Jewish crime of
condemning Christ as being the fulfilment of the voices of the prophets, and of the
Resurrection of Jesus as being God’s fulfilment of the promise made unto the
fathers to understand how here, as it were, beneath the foundation laid by the
present preaching of the apostles, Paul rejoices to discern the ancient stones firmly
laid by long dead hands.
The Apostle’s strongest conviction was that he himself had become more and not
less of a Jew by becoming a Christian, and that the Gospel which he preached was
nothing more than the perfecting of that Gospel before the Gospel, which had come
from the lips of the prophets. We know a great deal more than he did as to the ways
in which the progressive divine revelation was presented to Israel through the ages,
and some of us are tempted to think that we know more than we do, but the true
bearing of modern criticism, as applied to the Old Testament, is to confirm, even
whilst it may to some extent modify, the conviction common to all the ew
Testament writers, and formulated by the last of the ew Testament prophets, that
‘the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy.’ Whatever new light may shine on
the questions of the origin and composition of the books of the Old Testament, it will
never obscure the radiance of the majestic figure of the Messiah which shines from
the prophetic page. The inner relation between the foundation of the apostles and
that of the prophets is best set forth in the solemn colloquy on the Mount of
Transfiguration between Moses and Elias and Jesus. They ‘were with Him’ as

178. witnessing to Him to whom law and ritual and prophecy had pointed, and they
‘spake of His decease which He should accomplish at Jerusalem’ as being the vital
centre of all His work which the lambs slain according to ritual had foreshadowed,
and the prophetic figure of the Servant of the Lord ‘wounded for our transgressions
and bruised for our iniquities’ had more distinctly foretold.
III. The corner-stone which underlies and unites the whole.
Of course the corner-stone here is the foundation-stone and not ‘the head-stone of
the corner.’ Jesus Christ is both. He is the first and the last; the Alpha and Omega.
In accordance with the whole context, in which the prevailing idea is that which
always fired Paul’s imagination, viz. that of reconciling Jew and Gentile in one new
man, it is best to suppose a reference here to the union of Jew and Gentile. The stone
laid beneath the two walls which diverge at right angles from each other binds both
together and gives strength and cohesion to the whole. In the previous context the
same idea is set forth that Christ ‘preached peace to them that were afar off
{Gentiles} and to them that were nigh {Jews}.’ By His death He broke down another
wall, the middle wall of partition between them, and did so by abolishing ‘the law of
commandments contained in ordinances.’ The old distinction between Jew and
Gentile, which was accentuated by the Jew’s rigid observance of ordinances and
which often led to bitter hatred on both sides, was swept away in that strange new
thing, a community of believers drawn together in Jesus Christ. The former
antagonistic ‘twain’ had become one in a third order of man, the Christian man.
The Jew Christian and the Gentile Christian became brethren because they had
received one new life, and they who had common feelings of faith and love to the
same Saviour, a common character drawn from Him, and a common destiny open to
them by their common relation to Jesus, could never cherish the old emotions of
racial hate.
When we, in this day, try to picture to ourselves that strange new thing, the love
which bound the early Christians together and buried as beneath a rushing flood
the formidable walls of separation between them, we may well penitently ask
ourselves how it comes that Jesus seems to have so much less power to triumph over
the divisive forces that part us from those who should be our hearts’ brothers. In
our modern life there are no such gulfs of separation from one another as were filled
up unconsciously in the experience of the first believers, but the narrower chinks
seem to remain in their ugliness between those who profess a common faith in one
Lord, and who are all ready to assert that they are built on the foundation of the
Apostles and prophets, and that Jesus Christ is from them the chief corner-stone.

179. If in reality He is so to us, and He is so if we have been builded upon Him through
our faith, the metaphor of corner-stone and building will fail to express the reality
of our relation to Him, for our corner-stone has in it an infinite vitality which rises
up through all the courses of the living stones, and moulds each ‘into an immortal
feature of loveliness and perfection.’ So it shall be for each individual, though here
the appropriation of the perfect gift is imperfect. So it shall be in reference to the
history of the world. Christ is its centre and foundation-stone, and as His coming
makes the date from which the nations reckon, and all before it was in the deepest
sense preparatory to His incarnation, all which is after it is in the deepest sense the
appropriating of Him and the developing of His work. The multitudes which went
before and that followed cried, saying, ‘Blessed is He that cometh in the name of the
Lord.’
21
In him the whole building is joined together and
rises to become a holy temple in the Lord.
BAR ES, "In whom - That is, “by” whom, or “upon” whom. It was in connection
with him, or by being reared on him as a foundation.
All the building - The whole church of Christ.
Fitly framed together - The word used here means “to joint together,” as a
carpenter does the frame-work of a building. The materials are accurately and carefully
united by mortises and tenons. so that the building shall be firm. Different materials
may be used, and different kinds of timber may be employed, but one part shall be
worked into another, so as to constitute a durable and beautiful edifice. So in the church.
The different materials of the Jews and Gentiles; the people of various nations, though
heretofore separated and discordant, become now united, and form an harmonious
society. They believe the same doctrines; worship the same God; practice the same
holiness; and look forward to the same heaven.
Groweth unto an holy temple in the Lord - see the 1Co_3:17 note; 2Co_6:16
note.

180. CLARKE, "In whom - By which foundation corner stone, Christ Jesus, all the
building, composed of converted Jews and Gentiles, fitly framed together,
συναρµολογουµενη, properly jointed and connected together, groweth unto a holy temple
- is continually increasing, as new converts from Judaism or heathenism flock into it. It
is not a finished building, but will continue to increase, and be more and more perfect,
till the day of judgment.
GILL, "In whom all the building fitly framed together,.... This building is to be
understood of all the saints, and people of God; of the whole universal church, which is
God's building; and is a building of a spiritual nature, and will abide for ever: and this is
fitly framed together; it consists of various parts, as a building does; some saints are
comparable to beams, some to rafters, others to pillars, &c. and these are joined and
united to one another, and are set in an exact symmetry and proportion, and in a proper
subserviency to each other; and so as to make for the good, the strength, and beauty of
the whole. And it all centres in Christ; he has a great concern in this building; he is the
master builder, and the foundation and cornerstone; and it being knit together in him,
groweth unto an holy temple in the Lord: it grows by an accession of new stones,
or of souls called by grace, and added to it; for this building is not yet openly and visibly
completed, as it will be; in order to which the ministry of the word, and administration
of ordinances are continued; and this will be in the latter day, when the number of God's
elect, among Jews and Gentiles, shall be gathered in: and this growth may be understood
also of an increase of those, who are openly laid in the building; of their spiritual growth
into their head, Christ; and of an, increase of grace in them; which the word and
ordinances are means of, under a divine blessing: and this building grows unto an "holy
temple", the Gospel church state, called a "temple", in allusion to the temple at
Jerusalem; whose materials were stones made ready and hewn, before they were
brought thither; and whose magnificence, beauty, and glory, were very great; and it was
the place of public worship, and of the divine abode, and was a very significant emblem
of the church of God; see 2Co_6:16, which is an "holy" one, set apart for holy uses, and
internally sanctified by the Spirit of God; and which is discovered by external holiness of
life, and conversation in the members of it: and this is said to be "in the Lord"; which
phrase may refer to the word "groweth", and denotes that growth and increase, both of
persons and grace, the church has in, and from the Lord Jesus Christ; or to the word
"holy", and intimates, that the holiness of the church, and every member of it, is also in
and from the Lord; or to the word "temple", which is built for him to dwell in.
JAMISO , "In whom — as holding together the whole.
fitly framed — so as exactly to fit together.
groweth — “is growing” continually. Here an additional thought is added to the
image; the Church has the growth of a living organism, not the mere increase of a
building. Compare 1Pe_2:5; “lively stones ... built up a spiritual house.” Compare Eph_
4:16; Zec_6:12, “The Branch shall build the temple of the Lord,” where similarly the
growth of a branch, and the building of a temple, are joined.
holy — as being the “habitation of God” (Eph_2:22). So “in the Lord” (Christ)
answers to “through the Spirit” (Eph_2:22; compare Eph_3:16, Eph_3:17). “Christ is
the inclusive Head of all the building, the element in which it has its being and now its
growth” [Alford].

181. RWP, "Each several building (pāsa oikodomē). So without article Aleph B D G K
L. Oikodomē is a late word from oikos and demō, to build for building up (edification) as
in Eph_4:29, then for the building itself as here (Mar_13:1.). Ordinary Greek idiom here
calls for “every building,” not for “all the building” (Robertson, Grammar, p. 772),
though it is not perfectly clear what that means. Each believer is called a naos theou
(1Co_3:16). One may note the plural in Mar_13:1 (oikodomai) of the various parts of the
temple. Perhaps that is the idea here without precise definition of each oikodomē. But
there are examples of pās without the article where “all” is the idea as in pāsēs ktiseōs (all
creation) in Col_1:15.
Fitly framed together (sunarmologoumenē). Double compound from sun and
harmologos (binding, harmos, joint and legō), apparently made by Paul and in N.T. only
here and Eph_4:16. Architectural metaphor.
Into a holy temple (eis naon hagion). The whole structure with all the oikodomai.
Another metaphor for the Kingdom of God with which compare Peter’s “spiritual house”
(oikos pneumatikos) in which each is a living stone being built in (1Pe_2:5).
CALVI , "21.In whom all the building groweth. If this be true, what will become of
Peter? When Paul, in writing to the Corinthians, speaks of Christ as a “” he does
not mean that the church is begun by him and completed by others, but draws a
distinction arising out of a comparison of his own labors with those of other men. It
had been his duty to found the church at Corinth, and to leave to his successors the
completion of the building.
“ to the grace of God which is given to me, as a wise master-builder, I have laid the
foundation, and another buildeth on it.” (1Co_3:10.)
With respect to the present passage, he conveys the instruction, that all who are fitly
framed together in Christ are the temple of the Lord. There is first required a fitting
together, that believers may embrace and accommodate themselves to each other by
mutual intercourse; otherwise there would not be a building, but a confused mass.
The chief part of the symmetry consists in unity of faith. ext follows progress, or
increase. Those who are not united in faith and love, so as to grow in the Lord,
belong to a profane building, which has nothing in common with the temple of the
Lord.
Groweth unto an holy temple. Individual believers are at other times called “ of the
Holy Ghost,” (1Co_6:19; 2Co_6:16,) but here all are said to constitute one temple.
In both cases the metaphor is just and appropriate. When God dwells in each of us,
it is his will that we should embrace all in holy unity, and that thus he should form
one temple out of many. Each person, when viewed separately, is a temple, but,
when joined to others, becomes a stone of a temple; and this view is given for the

182. sake of recommending the unity of the church.
22
And in him you too are being built together to
become a dwelling in which God lives by his
Spirit.
BAR ES, "In whom - In Christ, or on Christ, as the solid and precious foundation.
Ye also are builded together - You are built into that, or constitute a part of it. You
are not merely “added” to it, but you constitute a part of the building.
For an habitation of God - For the indwelling, or the dwelling-place, of God.
Formerly he dwelt in the temple. Now he dwells in the church, and in the hearts of his
people; see the notes at 2Co_6:16.
Remarks On Ephesians 2
1. We were by nature dead in sin; Eph_2:1. We had no spiritual life. We were
insensible to the calls of God, to the beauty of religion, to the claims of the Creator. We
were like corpses in the tomb in reference to the frivolous and busy and happy world
around them. There we should have remained, had not the grace of God given us life,
just as the dead will remain in their graves forever, unless God shall raise them up. How
humble should we be at the remembrance of this fact! how grateful that God bas not left
us to sleep that sleep of death forever!
2. Parents should feel deep solicitude for their children; Eph_2:3. They, in common
with all others, are “children of wrath.” They have a nature prone to evil; and that nature
will develope itself in evil for ever, unless it is changed - just as the young thornbush will
be a thorn-bush, and will put forth thorns and not roses; and the Bohon Upas will be a
Bohon Upas, and not an olive or an orange; and as the lion will be a lion, and the panther
a panther, and not a lamb, a kid, or a gazelle. They will act out their nature, unless they
are changed: and they will not be changed, but by the grace of God. I do not mean that
their nature is in every sense like that of the lion or the asp; but I mean that they will be
as certainly “wicked,” if unrenewed, as the lion will be ferocious, and the asp poisonous.
And if so, what deep anxiety should parents feel for the salvation of their children! How
solicitous should they be that, by the grace of God. the evil propensities of their nature
may be eradicated, and that they become the adopted children of God!
3. The salvation of sinners involves all the exercise of power that is put forth in the
resurrection of the dead; Eph_2:5. It is not a work to be performed by man; it is not a

183. work of angelic might. None can impart spiritual life to the soul but he who gave it life at
first. On that great Source of life we are dependent for our resurrection from spiritual
death; and to God we must look for the grace by which we are to live. It is true that
though we are by nature “dead in sins,” we are not in all respects like the dead. Let not
this doctrine be abused to make us secure in sin, or to prevent effort. The dead in the
grave are dead in all respects. We by nature are dead only in sin. We are active in other
things; and indeed the powers of man are not less active than they would be if he were
holy. But it is a tremendous activity for evil, and for evil only. The dead in their graves
hear nothing, see nothing, and feel nothing.
Sinners hear, and see, and feel; but they hear not God, and they see not his glory,
anymore than if they were dead. To the dead in the grave, no command could with
propriety be addressed; on them, no entreaty could be urged to rise to life. But the sinner
may be commanded and entreated; for he has power, though it is misdirected; and what
is needful is, that he should put forth his power in a proper manner. While, therefore, we
admit, with deep humiliation, that we, our children, and friends, are by nature dead in
sin, let us not abuse this doctrine as though we could be required to do nothing. It is
with us willful death. It is death because we do not choose to live. It is a voluntary
closing our eyes, and stopping our ears, as if we were dead; and it is a voluntary
remaining in this state, when we have all the requisite power to put forth the energies of
life. Let a sinner be as active in the service of God as he is in the service of the devil and
the world, and he would be an eminent Christian. Indeed, all that is required is, that the
misdirected and abused energy of this world should be employed in the service of the
Creator. Then all would be well.
(See the supplementary notes, Rom_8:7; Gal_5:17, note. Whenever it is said the
sinner has power, the kind of power should be defined. Certainly he has not moral
power. This, indeed, the author allows, but for want of distinct definition of what he
understands by “power,” both here and elsewhere, the reader is apt to misapprehend
him.)
4. Let us remember our former course of life; Eph_2:11-12. Nothing is more profitable
for a Christian than to sit down and reflect on his former life - on his childhood, with its
numerous follies and vanities; on his youth, with its errors, and passions, and sins: and
on the ingratitude and faults of riper years. Had God left us in that state, what would be
now our condition? Had he cut us off, where had been our abode? Should he now treat
us as we deserve, what would be our doom? When the Christian is in danger of becoming
proud and self-confident, let him remember what he was. Let him take some period of
his life - some year, some month, or even some one day - and think it all over, and he will
find enough to humble him. These are the uses which should be made of the past:
(1) It should make us humble. If a man had before his mind a vivid sense of all the past
in his own life, he would never be lifted up with pride.
(2) It should make us grateful. God cut off the companions of my childhood - why did
he spare me? He cut down many of the associates of my youth in their sins - why did he
preserve me? He has suffered many to live on in their sins, and they are in the “broad
road” - why am I not with them, treading the path to death and hell?
(3) The recollection of the past should lead us to devote ourselves to God. Professing
Christian, “remember” how much of thy life is gone to waste. “Remember” thy days of
folly and vanity. “Remember” the injury thou hast done by an evil example. “Remember”
how many have been corrupted by thy conversation; perverted by thy opinions; led into
sin by thy example; perhaps ruined in body and soul forever by the errors and follies of
thy past life. And then remember how much thou dost owe to God, and how solemnly
thou art bound to endeavor to repair the evils of thy life, and to save “at least as many as”

184. thou hast ruined.
5. Sinners are by nature without any well-founded hope of salvation; Eph_2:12, They
are living without Christ, having no belief in him, and no hope of salvation through him.
They are “aliens” from all the privileges of the friends of God. They have no “hope.” They
have no wellfounded expectation of happiness beyond the grave. They have a dim and
shadowy expectation that “possibly” they may be happy; but it is founded on no evidence
of the divine favor, and no promise of God. “They could not tell on what it is founded, if
they were asked;” and what is such a hope worth? These false and delusive hopes do not
sustain the soul in trial; they flee away in death. And what a description is this! In a
world like this, to be without hope! Subject to trial; exposed to death; and yet destitute of
any well-founded prospect of happiness beyond the tomb! They are “without God” also.
They worship no God: they confide in none.
They have no altar in their families; no place of secret prayer. They form their plans
with no reference to the will of God; they desire not to please him. There are multitudes
who are living just as if there were no God. Their plans, their lives, their conversation,
would not be different if they had the assurance that there was no God. All that they have
ever asked of God, or that they would now ask of him, is, “that he would let them alone.”
There are multitudes whose plans would be in no respect different, if it were announced
to them that there was no God in heaven. The only effect might be to produce a more
hearty merriment, and a deeper plunge into sin. What a world! How strange that in
God’s own world it should thus be! How sad the view of a world of atheists - a race that
is endeavoring to feel that the universe is without a Father and a God! How wicked the
plans which can be accomplished only by laboring to forget that there is a God; and how
melancholy that state of the soul in which happiness can be found only in proportion as
it believes that the universe is without a Creator, and moves on without the
superintending care of a God!
6. The gospel produces peace; Eph_2:14-17.
(1) It produces peace in the heart of the individual, reconciling him to God.
(2) It produces peace and harmony between different ranks and classes and
complexions of people, causing them to love each other, and removing their alienations
and antipathies. The best way of producing friendship between nations and tribes of
people; between those of different complexions, pursuits, and laws, is, to preach to them
the gospel. The best way to produce harmony between the oppressor and the oppressed,
is to preach to both of them the gospel of peace, and make them feel that they have a
common Saviour.
(3) It is suited to produce peace among the nations. Let it spread, and wars will cease;
right and justice will universally prevail, and harmony and concord will spread over the
world; see the notes at Isa_2:4.
7. Let us rejoice in the privileges which we now have as Christians. We have access to
the Father; Eph_2:18. None are so poor, so ignorant, so down-trodden that they may not
come to God. In all times of affliction, poverty, and oppression, we may approach the
father of mercies. Chains may bind the body, but no chain can fetter the soul in its
contact with God. We may be thrown into a dungeon, but communion with God may be
maintained there. We may be cast out and despised by people, but we may come at once
unto God, and he will not cast us away. Further. We are not now strangers and
foreigners. We belong to the family of God. We are fellow-citizens with the saints; Eph_
2:19. We are participants of the hope of the redeemed, and we share their honors and
their joys. It is right that true Christians should rejoice, and their joy is of such a
character that no man can take it from them.

185. 8. Let us make our appeal on all doctrines and duties to the Bible - to the prophets and
the apostles; Eph_2:20. On them and their doctrine we can build. On them the church is
reared. It is not on the opinion of philosophers and lawgivers; not on creeds, symbols,
traditions, and the decisions of councils; it is on the authority of the inspired book of
God. The church is in its most healthy state when it appeals for its doctrines most
directly to the Bible. Individual Christians grow most in grace when they appeal most to
this “book of books.” The church is in great danger of error when it goes off from this
pure “standard” and makes its appeal to other standards - to creeds and symbols of
doctrine. “The Bible is the religion of Protestants;” and the church will be kept pure from
error, and will advance in holiness, just as this is made the great principle which shall
always govern and control it. If a doctrine is not found in the “apostles and prophets” - in
some part of the Bible, it is not to be imposed on the conscience. It may, or may not be
true; it may, or may not be suited to edify a people; but it is not to be an article of faith,
or imposed on the consciences of men.
9. Let us evince always special regard for the Lord Jesus; Eph_2:20. He is the precious
cornerstone on which the whole spiritual temple is reared. On him the church rests.
How important, then, that the church should have correct views of the Redeemer! How
important that the true doctrine respecting his divine nature; his atonement; his
incarnation; his resurrection, should be maintained. It is not a matter of indifference
whether he be God or man; whether he died as an atoning sacrifice or as a martyr;
whether he be the equal of God, or whether he be an archangel. Everything depends on
the view which is held of that Redeemer - and as people entertain different opinions
about him, they go off into different systems as wide from each other as the poles:
Everything in the welfare of the church, and in the individual peace of its members,
depends on proper views of the Lord Jesus.
10. The church is designed as the place of the special residence of the Holy Spirit on
earth; Eph_2:21-22. It is the beautiful temple where be dwells; the edifice which is
reared for his abode. How truly should that church be; how pure should be each
Christian to be an appropriate habitation for such a guest! Holy should be the heart
where that Spirit dwells. With what anxious care should we cherish the presence of such
a guest; with what solicitude should we guard our conduct that we may not grieve him
away! How anxious we are so to live that we may not grieve away our friends from our
dwellings! Should an illustrious guest become an inmate in our abode, how anxious
should we be to do all that we can to please him, and to retain him with us! flow much
more anxious should we be to secure the indwelling of the eternal Spirit! How desirous
that be should make our hearts and the church his constant abode!
CLARKE, "In whom ye also are builded - The apostle now applies the metaphor
to the purpose for which he produced it, retaining however some of the figurative
expressions. As the stones in a temple are all properly placed so as to form a complete
house, and be a habitation for the Deity that is worshipped there, so ye are all, both
believing Jews and Gentiles, prepared by the doctrine of the prophets and apostles,
under the influence of the Spirit of Christ, to become a habitation of God, a Church in
which God shall be worthily worshipped, and in which he can continually dwell.
1. Many suppose that the apostle in the preceding chapter alludes to the splendor of
the temple of Diana at Ephesus, which was reputed one of the wonders of the
world. But to me this opinion does not seem sufficiently founded. I believe he has
the Jewish temple continually in view; for that temple, above all in the universe,

186. could alone be said to be a habitation of God. Both in the tabernacle and temple
God dwelt between the cherubim; there was the symbol of his presence, and there
was the worship performed which himself had prescribed. After the model of this
was the spiritual temple, the Christian Church, constructed; and God was to dwell
in the one, as he had dwelt in the other. This simile, drawn from the temple at
Jerusalem, was alone worthy of the apostle’s design; to have alluded to the temple
of Diana would have disgraced his subject. And as many at Ephesus were Jews,
and well acquainted with the temple at Jerusalem, they would both feel and
venerate the apostle’s simile, and be led to look for the indwelling of God; that
which distinguished the Jewish temple from all others on the face of the earth.
2. The Church of God is very properly said to be a most noble and wonderful work,
and truly worthy of God himself.
There is nothing, says one, so august as this Church, seeing it is the temple of God.
Nothing so worthy of reverence, seeing God dwells in it.
Nothing so ancient, since the patriarchs and prophets labored in building it.
Nothing so solid, since Jesus Christ is the foundation of it.
Nothing more closely united and indivisible, since he is the corner stone.
Nothing so lofty, since it reaches as high as heaven, and to the bosom of God
himself.
Nothing so regular and well proportioned, since the Holy Spirit is the architect.
Nothing more beautiful, or adorned with greater variety, since it consists of Jews
and Gentiles, of every age, country, sex, and condition: the mightiest potentates,
the most renowned lawgivers, the most profound philosophers, the most
eminent scholars, besides all those of whom the world was not worthy, have
formed a part of this building.
Nothing more spacious, since it is spread over the whole earth, and takes in all
who have washed their robes, and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.
Nothing so inviolable, since it is consecrated to Jehovah.
Nothing so Divine, since it is a living building, animated and inhabited by the Holy
Ghost.
Nothing so beneficent, seeing it gives shelter to the poor, the wretched, and
distressed, of every nation, and kindred, and tongue.
It is the place in which God does his marvelous works; the theater of his justice,
mercy, goodness, and truth; where he is to be sought, where he is to be found, and
in which alone he is to he retained.
As we have one only God, and one only Savior and Mediator between God and
man, and one only inspiring Spirit; so there is but one Church, in which this
ineffable Jehovah performs his work of salvation. That Church, however scattered
and divided throughout the world, is but one building, founded on the Old and
New Testaments; having but one sacrifice, the Lord Jesus, the Lamb of God that
takes away the sin of the world.
3. Of this glorious Church every Christian soul is an epitome; for as God dwells in the
Church at large, so he dwells in every believer in particular: each is a habitation of
God through the Spirit. In vain are all pretensions among sects and parties to the
privileges of the Church of Christ, if they have not the doctrine and life of Christ.
Traditions and legends are not apostolic doctrines, and showy ceremonies are not
the life of God in the soul of man.

187. 4. Religion has no need of human ornaments or trappings; it shines by its own light,
and is refulgent with its own glory. Where it is not in life and power, men have
endeavored to produce a specious image, dressed and ornamented with their own
hands. Into this God never breathed, therefore it can do no good to man, and only
imposes on the ignorant and credulous by a vain show of lifeless pomp and
splendor. This phantom, called true religion and the Church by its votaries, is in
heaven denominated vain superstition; the speechless symbol of departed piety.
GILL, "In whom you also are builded together,.... As the church universal, so
every particular church is a building that is compact together, in and upon Christ, as the
church at Ephesus was: God is the builder of it; Christ is the foundation; true believers
are the proper materials; the door, or entrance into it, is Christ, and faith in him; the
ministers of the Gospel are pillars in it; the ordinances are its windows; its furniture is of
various sorts, there are vessels of small, and of great quantity; and its provisions are
large and entertaining. A church is a building compact together; it consists of many
parts; and these are joined together, by agreement, and are knit and cemented in love;
and being thus joined together, they are designed for social worship, and their great
concern should be to edify one another. The phrase, "in whom", may either refer to the
holy temple before spoken of, the church universal, of which a particular church is a
part; or to Christ, who is the master builder, by whom they are built together, and the
foundation on whom they are built, and the cornerstone in whom they meet and are
united. And the end of their being thus built together is, for an habitation of God
through the Spirit; which may be understood of God the Father, since he is
distinguished from Christ, in whom, and from the Holy Spirit, through whom, they are
built for this purpose, though not to the exclusion of either of them; for a particular
church is an habitation of Father, Son, and Spirit: and it being the habitation of God,
shows his great grace and condescension, and the great value and regard he has for it;
and this makes it a desirable, delightful, and pleasant habitation to the saints; and hence
it is a safe and a quiet one, and they are happy that dwell in it; and hither should souls
come for the enjoyment of the divine presence: and whereas it is said to be such through
the Spirit; hence it appears, that the Spirit is concerned with the other two persons in
the building of it; and that hereby it becomes a spiritual house; and is, through his grace,
a fit habitation for the holy God to dwell in; and that God dwells in his churches by his
Spirit.
JAMISO , "are builded together — Translate, “are being builded together.”
through — Greek, “in the Spirit.” God, by His Spirit in believers, has them for His
habitation (1Co_3:16, 1Co_3:17; 1Co_6:19; 2Co_6:16).
RWP, "Ye also are builded together (kai humeis sunoikodomeisthe). Ye Gentiles
also. Present passive indicative (continuous process) of common old verb sunoikodomeō,
to build together with others or out of varied materials as here. Only here in N.T. In 1Pe_
2:5 Peter uses oikodomeisthe for the same process.
For a habitation (eis katoikētērion). Late word (lxx), in N.T. only here and Rev_

188. 18:2. From katoikeō, to dwell, as Eph_3:17. Possibly each of us is meant here to be the
“habitation of God in the Spirit” and all together growing (auxei) “into a holy temple in
the Lord,” a noble conception of the brotherhood in Christ.
CALVI , "22.In whom ye also are builded together, or in whom also Be Ye Builded
together. The termination of the Greek verb , συνοικοδοµεῖσθε like that of the Latin,
cooedificamini, does not enable us to determine whether it is in the imperative or
indicative mood. The context will admit either, but I prefer the latter sense. It is, I
think, an exhortation to the Ephesians to grow more and more in the faith of Christ,
after having been once founded in it, and thus to form a part of that new temple of
God, the building of which through the gospel was then in progress in every part of
the world.
Through the Spirit. This is again repeated for two reasons: first, to remind them
that all human exertions are of no avail without the operation of the Spirit; and
secondly, to point out the superiority of the spiritual building to all Jewish and
outward services.