Bite 45: Application of Ephesians 2:11-22

What Does Remember Look Like?

Before we get into the nuts and bolts of application, I was thinking about what a picture of remember might look like. As we get into our study today, we will see this word remember is important because of its place in grammar. Since it is important, how would I summarize it in a way that it would come to mind again in the future.

Have you heard of these microgreens? Regular garden seeds of lettuce, radish, kohlrabi, etc. grown indoors on these fibrous mats only until they are a few inches tall. Then you cut them off and eat them on salads, sandwiches, just wad them up and stuff them in your mouth. Mm. Fresh green morsels in the winter. It’s like a mouthful of spring.

But the life cycle of a mat of microgreens is about 2 weeks. Start to finish. I can take a photo (see up there, I did) and remember what the greens were just 10 days ago. Seeds. They were just seeds.

But then water came into the picture and they transformed. Going from unyieldingly hard and crunchy to crispy crunchy with zippy flavor.

This is one of the ways I will be able to remember what I once was. It’s a summary in photo of remember.

Why Do We Make Applications?

Thinking about how our time together has been going, I’ve become increasingly concerned that we spend a lot of time interpreting scripture but not a lot of time applying it. In reality, we can’t accurately apply it if we don’t know what it means. However, that doesn’t excuse us from spending an appropriate amount of time dwelling on the Word and then allowing it to marinate and change the flavor of our hearts.

Being surprised is not my favorite, so I’m letting you know (and not surprising you) that we are going to try to determine significance more during our time in a passage. Within passages are often sort of sub-passages. We will attempt to understand the meaning of the text and then apply with more frequency rather than leaving it all for the end.

For today, we are going to spend some time making plans for life decisions in this passage. Making plans because within every moment of our lives, I have opportunity to decide “obedience?” or “disobedience?” This is the root of all application, will I or won’t I? Even if I choose poorly, even if you choose poorly, it isn’t over. Because of the God by whom we are loved, repentance is part of our lives.

Knowing truth to be able to say, “My life and attitude needs to change _____” is the beginning. I think it starts in the head and travels to the heart. Let’s delight in the joy God has designed for us to learn and grow together. It is nicer with two.

What Does the Passage Mean?

As I sit here cogitating on how this passage applies to me, I want to both read through it again and recap for myself what I’ve learned. How did the original audience hear the text and what did they understand it to mean? Once that is established for myself, I am able to move comfortably from “what does this mean?” to “what does this mean to/for me?” Here is our text right in front of us.

¹¹ Therefore remember that at one time you Gentiles in the flesh, called “the uncircumcision” by what is called the circumcision, which is made in the flesh by hands— ¹² remember that you were at that time separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. 

¹³ But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. ¹⁴ For he himself is our peace, who has made us both one and has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility ¹⁵ by abolishing the law of commandments expressed in ordinances, that he might create in himself one new man in place of the two, so making peace, ¹⁶ and might reconcile us both to God in one body through the cross, thereby killing the hostility. 

¹⁷ And he came and preached peace to you who were far off and peace to those who were near. ¹⁸ For through him we both have access in one Spirit to the Father. ¹⁹ So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, ²⁰ built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone, ²¹ in whom the whole structure, being joined together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord. ²² In him you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit.

Ephesians 2:11–22 (ESV)

Summarization

This would be a great time to develop a one or two sentence summary for our passage. If we can distill the meaning down to a succinct nugget, we are well on our way to understanding.

My first attempt at writing a summary is as follows:

Paul called his audience to remember their former identity and who they now are in Christ. As the catalyst for all people being reconciled to God, Jesus' blood and his flesh and his cross make all of God's household at peace with one another.

Perhaps as I continue in the discipline of applying, I will come back and edit it. When we study, we need to remember that we are not writing in stone. As we learn and grow, we can change how we interact with the text. The text doesn’t change, but as we learn we’d better change!

How I Take Notes for Application

I Want to Notice Imperatives

Studying this passage, we haven’t talked too much about what kinds of verbs we have. An important type to keep an eye out for is an imperative. In terms of grammar, this type of verb is the command type. When the author uses one, he is directing his audience to some kind of action. Even if the action is “be still,” what they are told to do is just that. Be still. Scouring our passage, the only one I found was at the beginning.

“Remember.”

That is the command Paul had for the recipients. See what I mean that sometimes the action isn’t really an action? Granted, you can remember while you’re out on a run, but the activity of remembering itself is a relatively sedentary activity.

As part of my notes, I jotted that there is only one imperative. Therefore as part of my application process, I want to include statements that incorporate “I will remember.”

What Did I Learn About God?

One of the two primary questions I ask of any text I study is “What did I learn about God?” The Bible is an ancient text that is about God and how he interacts with his people. Therefore, as he moves and interacts, he is revealing his character and nature.

In the process of applying, I get to identify how God interacts with others and from that I can discover implications about how God interacts with me. First, I find the paradigm or pattern of meaning with regard to the original audience and then I can see from the paradigm what it means to me.

In answer to this question I want to see what God’s character and nature is. How does he relate to his people? How does he relate to those who are not his people? Basically, what does God say about himself through his human spokesmen?

What Did I Learn About Man?

The other question I frequently ask of the text is “What did I learn about man?” When I consider that God is the one who created man, doesn’t it make sense to ask the creator of the artwork what it means? What is the artwork for? What are the drawbacks to the art? Are there any strengths? What does God reveal about man through the human author?

Once I learn about man in general, I can narrow the focus to myself. How does the truth of what I see in the text apply to me myself?

What kind of a list of significance can you determine from our passage? See what you will decide to do.

A Caution

There is another question that I wrestle with when interpreting and applying scripture that is moderately controversial in some circles. This is the question of “Why did the author write this?” Some might say that we cannot get into the mind of the author to know what he was feeling, experiencing when he wrote, and this is true. But that does not eliminate the ability to read what Paul said and see within the words he shared, his intention for teaching.

For example, in Ephesians, there is not a clear “I wrote the book for this reason” like there occasionally are in other books. However, there are topics that Paul wanted every believer to focus on. I think we have that as a reason why Paul wrote Ephesians, predominantly. As Dr. Stein teaches,

Not every command or prohibition need reflect a present problem in the church; not every teaching need reflect a present doctrinal issue. Rather, they may serve prophylactic and preventative purposes, reflecting common problems and issues in life or encountered in Paul’s ministry elsewhere.¹

Paul had one main sermon topic: the gospel. Variations on that theme were all he wanted to say. Our passage is not an exception.

Actually Making Application

Application Around the Imperative

Fascinating to me, the only imperative I could find until Paul changes gears from a theological bent to a didactic bent was this one, remember. In my head, having one charge given for 3 chapters makes the charge pretty important.

Applying this imperative to my life, there are quite a few different directions I can go. As always, I want to keep what I’ve learned from Dr. Zuck in mind (you can see where it all began here).

Determining Significance for my Life

• I will remember that as a pre-believer, I was on the outside of God’s household. I was opposed to God and not at peace with anyone. Remembering inspires thankfulness and worship.
• As I speak to pre-believers, I will remember that they have no hope and will be sympathetic to their plight.
• When I have opportunity to share the good news, I will remember that those with whom I share do not have God in their world. They only have lifeless gods who require service from their worshipers unlike the One True God who serves his worshipers. How foreign is that?

In writing some applications here, I employed the “opposite is true” trick. Did you see that? I understand that I am now in God’s family, I’m reconciled to God, and I have Christ as my peace. Before Jesus moved, none of that was true. Paul didn’t need to say the same things backwards and forwards, but I can. Especially if it helps me to understand the author’s meaning.

I’m not sure those are specific enough, although I don’t know that I have names or certain instances when I will do these things. Perhaps being specific isn’t the correct concern in this case. The applications I have laid out here are functionally heart-changes. Attitudes that will be altered starting intellectually in my head and over time will reshape my heart.

Application Around Who is God

On the surface, it seems like determining significance for myself–deciding what I will do–with regard to what I learned about God is weird. How can I decide something about God? He doesn’t change; I change. But as I mull over the list on my blue sticky, I’ve come to recognize that is just what is needed. More heart change. Even a glimmer more recognition of the magnitude of who he is because that will in turn affect how I see man generally and myself specifically.

Ugh. Do you see all the feels? Well, having them out in the open like that, at least I can look them in the eye and deal with them. These applications remind me of the idea I learned a few years ago that I need to preach the gospel to myself every day. I need to remember these truths in the painful moments when my mind lies to me. Preaching the gospel to myself is the same thing–when lies swirl, choose to remember truth.

Application Around Who is Man

Were you successful at making a list for yourself? Because what is significant for me and the state of my heart is not necessarily true for the state of your heart. What will your volition decide?

This is a real thing. Have you met people who say things like “you must be baptized in order to be saved”? Or “you must be baptized in order to take communion.” Really, any time there is this paradigm, “You must _______ in order to be accepted by God,” this is imposing legal demands. In reality, what is happening is that someone is declaring you must perform in some way to be right with them.

Seriously, who died and made them God?

I may have a soap box that suddenly appeared under my feet. Sorry about that. These are significant for me and not for someone else. And yet, if someone is placing rules and regulations on YOU and telling you that your salvation or right standing with God is dependent on something YOU do, please walk in the freedom that Christ bought for you. Jesus is our peace.

Reflection

What we can realize in a general sense though, is that Paul recognizes that as a whole unit, man likes laws, rules, ordinances. When mankind can hold laws over the heads of others, he feels superior and as if he has power and control.

It bears repeating since it is such a good quote. Dr. Stein says this about possible intentions of biblical writers.

Not every command or prohibition need reflect a present problem in the church; not every teaching need reflect a present doctrinal issue. Rather, they may serve prophylactic and preventative purposes, reflecting common problems and issues in life or encountered in Paul’s ministry elsewhere.¹

Without Paul saying so directly, we can’t definitively say what his purpose was for writing this passage. However, knowing mankind a little, excluding people based on their heritage, based on their religious background, and based on their (religious) performance are all common situations among humans. Paul very well could have been serving “prophylactic and preventative purposes” by making it clear that in Christ there is one new mankind. (If you wonder why I say this, read this Bite here.)

Realizing that application and significance is me making a decision about what I personally will do, whether I will choose obedience or disobedience, I also think there is an opening for application for how I will behave as a member of the new mankind. Here is what I mean.

Determining Significance as a Member of a New Mankind

• I will be careful to study scripture, pray for discernment, and not add burdens to anyone’s back that God did not intend for us to carry.
• As much as I am allowed, I will actively help my brothers and sisters take burdens off their backs that God never intended them to carry.
• When I walk alongside a brother or sister, I will mimic Paul and call them to remember where they’ve been and even more importantly where they are now. They are brought near by the blood, Jesus is their peace, and through Jesus they have access to God.

Wrap Up

As our Bible Study Bite for today, I would like to emphasize the value of summarizing. True confessions, I have a hard time distilling down the whole of any subject in a succinct and meaningful manner. Aren’t all the words necessary?

Well, yes, but in order to be able to grasp the meaning within a passage, we need a manageable handle. When we are able to put the passage into hors d’oeuvre size bites, we have been able to filter out the main idea(s) and reword it for ourselves.

In a way, summarizing is like sentence diagramming. It is a method for holding onto the text and seeing how it fits together. Holding onto the big ideas will help us stay close to the rest of the scripture and rely on context.

It’s also like finding something real in the world and recognizing that microgreens can represent where I’ve been and what I’m becoming. A summary in photograph.

1. Stein, R. H. (2011). A Basic Guide to Interpreting the Bible: Playing by the Rules (Second Edition, p. 206). Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic.