But now in Christ Jesus, ye who sometimes were afar off are made nigh by the blood of Christ. For He is our peace …” Ephesians 2:13, 14 KJV
But now in Christ Jesus you who formerly were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. For He Himself is our peace… Ephesians 2:13-14 NASB
Almost rivaling the magnificent intrusion of God in verse 4 of this chapter, is the “but now” of verse 13. Verses 11 and 12 depict our hopeless and estranged condition in ourselves. We were outside the politics, promises, prospects, and purposes of God. There was an impenetrable wall that we could not penetrate. There was, not by God’s intention, an enmity which we could not abolish.
“But now!” Everything has changed. Just as God moved in verses 1-10, consistent with His character of mercy, love, and grace, so here the spotlight turns on our Lord Jesus Christ and what He has accomplished.
Catalogue all that has come to us through Him: we are made nigh by His blood, He is our peace, and He has broken down the middle wall which separated Jew and Gentile. He has created One New Man. It is through Him we have an introduction in the Spirit to the Father.
Flowing from His work is the privilege of citizenship with the Jewish believers and members in God’s household. Privilege after privilege is detailed in the Ephesian epistle:
- they spring from the heart of God,
- are based upon the work of Christ, and
- have been made good to us by the Spirit of God.
Time and again in Ephesians the entire Godhead is seen in its activity to bless those who were once rebels, dead in our sins.
The Spirit of God draws attention to the means by which all of this has come about. He stresses for us the basis, the cost of these blessings by employing a number of different expressions. “Abolished in His flesh,” “by the cross,” and “made nigh by the blood of Christ.”
“His flesh” tells us the manner in which He suffered. He was a real man with a real body. His suffering was real and not a symbolic suffering. He felt all that Calvary meant. He “tasted” death for us. There may be other doctrinal reasons for the mention of “His flesh,” but we cannot escape the thought of the reality of His suffering.
“By the cross” tells of the method by which He suffered. This cruel, barbaric Roman method of execution was His portion from His own creatures.
“The blood of Christ” tells us of the measure, the cost of His suffering. He gave all. It required death to not only put away our sins, but to “put us away” and all we were in Adam. In so doing, a New Man was formed in which Jew and Gentile have equal footing before God. We can now move in the very precincts of the Father’s throne (v18), acceptable as divine love and precious blood can make us.
Consider:
Trace the time markers in chapter 2: times past (vv 2, 3, 11, 12), but now (v 12), at that time (v 12), no longer (v 19), the ages to come (v 7).