Ephesians 2:11-13

Rachel Workman: ¹¹ Don’t forget that you Gentiles used to be outsiders. You were called “uncircumcised heathens” by the Jews, who were proud of their circumcision, even though it affected only their bodies and not their hearts. ¹² In those days you were living apart from Christ. You were excluded from citizenship among the people of Israel, and you did not know the covenant promises God had made to them. You lived in this world without God and without hope. ¹³ But now you have been united with Christ Jesus. Once you were far away from God, but now you have been brought near to him through the blood of Christ.

This is every one of us before we believed. We lived apart from Christ, excluded. Without God and without hope. I am so grateful for the sacrifice Christ made

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Pat Bell: Thank you Jesus for the peace in my soul. 

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John Burnett:  ⁸ For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, ⁹ not a result of works, so that no one may boast. ¹⁰ For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.  Verse 8 makes it clear that there is nothing we do to be saved.   The gift of God is a saving faith that he gives to us by His Grace.  We don’t deserve it and cannot earn it because we are dead in our sins.  When I see or hear of a person walking the aisle and proudly proclaim with a smile they have accepted Jesus and the Pastor declares that they are saved.  God resist the proud and gives grace to the humble.  To be saved, one would be remorseful to the point of weeping for the punishment that Jesus took on our behalf.

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.  This is a great passage for us as gentiles as we now have a way to saved through Christ Jesus.

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Tomorrow’s reading for Ephesians 2:14-18.

¹⁴ For Christ himself has brought peace to us. He united Jews and Gentiles into one people when, in his own body on the cross, he broke down the wall of hostility that separated us. ¹⁵ He did this by ending the system of law with its commandments and regulations. He made peace between Jews and Gentiles by creating in himself one new people from the two groups. ¹⁶ Together as one body, Christ reconciled both groups to God by means of his death on the cross, and our hostility toward each other was put to death.

¹⁷ He brought this Good News of peace to you Gentiles who were far away from him, and peace to the Jews who were near. ¹⁸ Now all of us can come to the Father through the same Holy Spirit because of what Christ has done for us.