No one can say, “Jesus is Lord,” except by the Holy Spirit. 1 Corinthians 12:3 To say “Jesus is Lord” is to confess faith in Him and His Lordship over us. This is the confession of God’s baptized people all over the world – through all the ages – who have received the gift of God’s Holy Spirit. It’s a shared confession; it’s a shared faith. So we have faith in Jesus in common – we share that, but we express our faith in many different ways. This week we will focus on our shared faith: the blessings, the central truths that belongs to all of us as Jesus’ family of faith. This will centre on the work that Jesus has done for all of us, especially as we read them in Ephesians 2:11-22. This will be about what ‘we’ believe concerning Jesus and what he has done for all the world – including us.
Shared Faith (Faith in Common)
18 July 2021 • Pastor Tim Klein
Bible Passage: Ephesians 2: 11-22
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11 Don’t forget that you are Gentiles. In fact, you used to be called “uncircumcised” by those who take pride in being circumcised. 12 At that time you did not know about Christ. You were foreigners to the people of Israel, and you had no part in the promises that God had made to them. You were living in this world without hope and without God, 13 and you were far from God. But Christ offered his life’s blood as a sacrifice and brought you near God.
14 Christ has made peace between Jews and Gentiles, and he has united us by breaking down the wall of hatred that separated us. Christ gave his own body 15 to destroy the Law of Moses with all its rules and commands. He even brought Jews and Gentiles together as though we were only one person, when he united us in peace. 16 On the cross Christ did away with our hatred for each other. He also made peace[a] between us and God by uniting Jews and Gentiles in one body. 17 Christ came and preached peace to you Gentiles, who were far from God, and peace to us Jews, who were near God. 18 And because of Christ, all of us can come to the Father by the same Spirit.
19 You Gentiles are no longer strangers and foreigners. You are citizens with everyone else who belongs to the family of God. 20 You are like a building with the apostles and prophets as the foundation and with Christ as the most important stone. 21 Christ is the one who holds the building together and makes it grow into a holy temple for the Lord. 22 And you are part of that building Christ has built as a place for God’s own Spirit to live.
Contemporary English Version (CEV) - for other versions see BibleGateway.com
