Ephesians: Tear Down These Wallsنموونە

From 1961–1989, the Berlin Wall stood as a monument of the political division that existed between East and West Germany. 

But on 9 November 1989, after a chain reaction of global events, people began to tear the wall down. With hammers and picks, the peoples of East and West Germany destroyed sections of the wall, eventually reaching through, even climbing through the wall to the other side. A united Germany soon emerged.

Walls don’t have to be physical. Invisible walls are often created between people of different ethnicities, classes, religions, and political affiliations. Sadly, some of these divisions even exist in the church. 

The metaphor that Paul uses to describe Jesus’s work is that of tearing down the wall (2:14). Formerly, the Gentiles (anyone not ethnically Jewish) were outside of God’s promise-receiving people, strangers to God’s commitment to them, without God and without hope. 

But Jesus has taken a pick axe to the wall of division by putting an end to the system of law, and initiating a system of grace. The old divisions are done.

More than that, Jesus has created a new humanity, one new race, a new people no longer defined by traditional divisions, but united together by their union with Jesus! 

The church, at its best, is a beautiful mosaic of God’s grace. It is a foretaste of the age to come as people from every tribe, nation, language, and tongue gather around the throne.

The overflow of our vertical “peace with God” is horizontal “peace with each other”. This means we are a people of peace. Agents of peace and unity in a divided world. 

We are called to be peacemakers as we live out our gospel identity in an increasingly tribal world. It means racism and xenophobia have no place. Sexism has no place. Class-ism has no place.

What walls exist in our church(es), or in the Christian sub-culture that we need to take the pick-axe of the gospel to and tear down?