Ephesians Devotionals
Bob Morris
Reconciliation (Ephesians 2:15b-16)
His purpose was to create in himself one new humanity out of the two, thus making peace, and in one body to reconcile both of them to God through the cross, by which he put to death their hostility.
Reconciliation with God; Peace with each other
In his autobiography To End All Wars, Ernest Gordon, a British Army officer captured by the Japanese during World War II, recounts what he called “miracle on the River Kwai.” He and other prisoners of war were assigned to build the Burma-Siam railway through swampland in Burma.
Eventually 80,000 prisoners died of disease, exhaustion or death at the hands of Japanese guards. The whole camp seethed with hatred and an animal reflex to survive at any cost. It was every man for himself. But one event changed things dramatically. A Japanese guard discovered a shovel missing and threatened to kill everyone, unless the thief confessed. As he raised his rifle to kill the first men, one prisoner stepped forward and said, “I did it.” He was killed immediately by the guard. Later that day, it was discovered that a mistake had been made: no shovel was missing. The verse that came to mind was, “Greater love has no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.” (John 15:13).
Soon a whole different attitude permeated the camp. Men started looking out for each other and caring for one another. The camp was so completely changed that when the men were finally liberated, the prisoners treated even their tormenting guards with kindness. Philip Yancey, commenting on this account wrote, “The miracle on the River Kwai was no less than the creation of an alternate community, a tiny settlement of the Kingdom of God taking root in the least likely soil.”
This is what Jesus did on a far grander scale through his death on the cross. The ending of any hostility between ethnic groups comes at great cost, often through the death of someone. Jesus’ goal was to create peace between two radically different communities, and at the same time create peace for them both with God. Is there any alternative known to humans that ends horizontal animosity (person to person, community to community) and vertical alienation (people from God)? There is only one redeemed humanity now; there is no distinction between them; all come to the Father on the same basis – “in himself/in Christ” - and in so doing find fellowship with others of every community who trust Christ to make them a new creation, a new humanity.
William Barclay points out that there are two words for “new” that Paul could have used. One means new simply in point of time, such as a new pencil which was produced in a factory this week, but there already exist millions of pencils exactly like it. But Paul uses a word which means new in the sense of quality. This “new” is new “in the sense that it brings into the world a new kind of thing, a new quality of thing, which did not exist before.” The new humanity is greater than anything that existed previously. It is a humanity which preserves individuality and ethnicity but simultaneously makes universal fellowship possible – with each other and with God. There is nothing else like it! It is the church.
When we are in mission, we do well to remember that this new humanity is as diversified as God’s creation. Gentiles need not become Jews to relate to God, nor does anyone else have to become North American to do so. Our new humanity is one “in Christ”, quite independent of the race, gender, culture, or nationality that give us our earthly identity. We are not intended to create cultural clones of ourselves, but invite people to the new humanity that Jesus has created.
Loving Father, thank you for this great new creation – one new humanity that in one fell swoop removes our hostility to each other and to you. Help me to live each day proving it to be a reality.
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