Now we started looking at Ephesians
a few weeks ago and we've considered a lot about spiritual blessings
and the extreme blessed state in which sinners are brought
in believing the Lord Jesus Christ and we saw last week what I called
the anatomy of salvation in those first ten verses of Ephesians
chapter two were brought from such depths of depravity, dead
in trespasses and sins, children of wrath even as others. That's
each and every one of us by nature, and yet mired as we are in what
the Psalms call that pit, that miry pit. The thing about a miry
pit, if you ever go, if you go to Morecambe Bay and you don't
know what you're doing and you walk out when the tide's out,
I guarantee you will come across quicksand and you will start
to sink. And the more you struggle to get out, the tighter it will
pull you down until it drowns you unless somebody come and
rescue you. You cannot. I don't care how strong you are,
how good a swimmer, you will drown. Well, that's the miry
pit that the Psalms talk about. That's what we are by nature.
None can redeem himself or his brother. None. The price is too
great. You haven't got the resources, you haven't got the currency,
you've got nothing with which to do it. But by grace, by grace
which comes out of, what's the cause of grace? It's the love
of God. His great love wherewith he loved
his people. I have loved you, he says. You
know, we talk about the love between a man and a woman, that
tender, tender love. Well, God says to his sweetheart
people, he says, I have loved you with an everlasting love. And because of that love, He
must find a way. He must find a way to still be
God, for God is just and can in no wise countenance sin. He can't overlook it. He must
punish it. How is God going to save from their just condemnation
the sinners whom he loved in Christ before the beginning of
the world? How is he going to do that without violating his
justice? He comes in the person of his
son and he takes that sin which has so offended his law. And
what does the law require? The soul that sins, it shall
die. And what did Christ come to do?
To die in the place of his people. He came to die in the place of
his people. And in his dying, he purchased
redemption. He purchased the price that satisfied
the justice of God. And he set, as it were, our feet
upon a rock. taken out, rescued out of that
miry clay, and he put our feet, believer, he put our feet on
the rock which is Christ, a solid rock, an anchor for the soul,
that the storms and billows of this life and this universe and
everything that happens, nothing can shake that which he has done. He will take his people to eternal
glory, for it is appointed to man to die. Once, and then the
judgment. And we all must stand before
the judgment seat of Christ. And how are we going to stand
in that day? Ah, Christ, my Lord, has paid all my debt. He has
paid the penalty for my sin. On account of what He has done,
the law has no case to require of me. None whatsoever. Come
to the court. Where's the guilty person in
the dock? Right, where's the... It says in the scriptures, they
looked for the iniquity of Jacob, meaning the people of God, and
they found none. Are these not the most wonderful
words of comfort? No wonder the psalmist says,
I can lay me down and sleep in peace. Why? Because God's told
him these things of salvation. It is well with my soul. When
I die, I will pass straight. This day, you shall be with me
in paradise, said the Lord Jesus Christ to the thief on the cross. Even him, guilty of crimes worthy
of death in those days, and he's being crucified next to Christ.
Lord, have mercy on me. All who labour and are heavy
laden. The other one, wasn't heavy-laden with his sin. He
was just furious, he was angry, he was joining the crowd in shouting
at Christ. But this one in a moment, God's
Spirit opened his eyes. Lord, be merciful to me, a sinner.
Lord, consider me. Think of me when you come this
day. This day. Yes, surely. Are you
going to die today? I don't know. You might. I might.
None of us know. But he knew he was. He was nailed
to a cross. This day you shall be with me in paradise. What
a glorious thing. What a wonderful thing. This
is salvation. This is the anatomy of salvation.
He's raised us up together. He's made us sit together in
heavenly places in Christ Jesus. He's showing us the riches of
His grace in His kindness toward us. He's shown us His grace and
that it's all of Him and not of works. Oh, praise God, it's
not of works. Do you have good intentions?
Do you know, every single day I have the best of intentions,
and every single day my best of intentions are shattered by
this flesh, which is weak and sinful and depraved. But we are
his workmanship in Christ, created in Christ, unto good works, which
God hath before ordained that we should walk in them. Wherefore,
verse 11, remember, Wherefore, remember, remember, remember. It's good to remember. You know,
whatever you are. You think of those that are suddenly
made very rich. I utterly despise the concept
of the lottery, but never mind. Let's take it as... read that it's there and people
that have got nothing people that have got nothing you know
they put a couple of pounds on and they buy a ticket and this
one in fourteen million or whatever it is chance comes up and all
of a sudden they go from people who have nothing to people who
have twenty five million pounds let's say that twenty five million
pounds right And most of them completely forget what they were.
And most of them start to live as if they've always been rich
and privileged. And they completely forget. I
guess there have been one or two wise ones. The wise ones,
if there are any, I don't know. I imagine there are. I guarantee
you they have not forgotten what they were. You who are saved,
don't forget what you were saved from. Don't forget it, you know,
that the light is ever clearer when you place it against the
background of the darkness, the contrast. Don't ever forget. Remember that ye being in time
past Gentiles in the flesh, What does he mean by that? Well, you
know, Jews and Gentiles, Jews, Israel, the people of God, the
Jews thought they the circumcision, those that those that were the
descendants of Abraham by the flesh. Those those they were
the people of God. They were God's symbolical people
in this earth, and though they fell, they always contained the
true people of God. And everybody else, everybody
else, were Gentiles. For Gentiles, you could put non-Jews,
non-people of God. Now, Whatever you are, whether
you were a Jew before or not is irrelevant. But you were not
the people of God. Remember that you, in time past,
you were not the people of God in the flesh. You were just like
everybody else. And those that were, those that were the historical,
symbolical people of God, the Jews, who were called the circumcision
because of the right of circumcision, you know, from the days of Abraham,
that God gave that sign, that sign that marked out the people
of God from the rest, that there was this removal of a symbol
of the defilement of the flesh, and they used to look down on
the Gentiles as being the uncircumcision. You know, that word has got a
lecturer at university. My vocabulary was not very good,
and I remember being intrigued by this lecturer who used to
keep saying, this has got pejorative connotations. What? It's got what? It's got pejorative
connotations? What on earth are they? Have
you got any pejorative connotations? Shall I tell you what it means?
A connotation is a twist, a twist to it, a side to it, a meaning,
and pejorative means negative, nasty, not good. When they used
to say, oh, look at the uncircumcision, they weren't going, oh, look
at the uncircumcision. They were going, oh, look at the uncircumcision. Pejorative connotations, you
know? You were not the people of God. You were Gentiles. And
you were called not the people of God. You were called the uncircumcision
by those who regarded themselves as the circumcision. But it was
that which was only outward in the flesh. It wasn't that of
the heart. It wasn't inward of the heart.
But never mind. He says, remember what you were,
not the people of God. And he tells them what they're
coming into. They were aliens from the Commonwealth
of Israel, etc, etc. And he's going to go on and tell
us about bringing them into a new nation, into a new family, into
a new household, into a new building, which is the temple of the living
God. You see, Politicians are constantly
trying to achieve a harmonious society, a fair and a prosperous
and a racially integrated society, aren't they? That's what they're
all trying to do. And political correctness has arisen. I don't
think 30 years ago I would have known what the term meant, but
we all know what it means now. Politically correct. There's
a way that's acceptable to say something, and there are ways
that are completely unacceptable. Political correctness has established
unwritten rules and regulations that must be obeyed. You see
it in the media, don't you? As soon as somebody accidentally
steps out of line, oh boy, how everybody else, all the media
jump on them and pull them to shreds for what they've just
said. And the things that are forbidden are racism, you know,
discriminating on the grounds of people being of different
race, sexism, you know, men versus women, women versus men, oh,
homophobia, oh gosh, no, we mustn't do that, must we? And everything
is condemned with hypocritical self-righteousness. Don't you
find that? That's what galls me. Hypocritical
self-righteousness. You see it in the non-serious
press. Gosh, they jump up and down with
moral indignation and yet all the time the very underlying
reason for their being is gutter press. It's sin and scandal and
outrage and gossip. You see, the thing is, by nature,
we're all naturally racist. That's the honest thing, isn't
it? By nature, we are. We are. You know, we've got... I mean, I hope you don't mind
me using you as an example, Marguerite, but we've got Marguerite, a dear
lady who originates from Germany. Do you know, 50 years ago, in
this country, most British people really didn't like... And you
came about that time, didn't you? And it was difficult for
you, wasn't it? Very difficult, yeah. But, you know, there have
been times when one race absolutely hates another. Even in this country. Let's not stick to one race to
another. Do you know, in the country of
Britain, I could take you to places in the north of England,
and I could find you people, I guarantee you, they hate Southerners. people from southern England,
they hate them for no other reason that they come from southern
England. They don't have any other rational reason for hating
them. They hate them for that reason. You see, what political
correctness in our politicians strive to impose, they fail at
it. But this is the point. The gospel
achieves it in perfection. The Gospel achieves it in absolute
perfection. Paul is writing to believers,
the saints that are at Ephesus, the faithful in Christ Jesus.
There's no other physical distinction between them. Whether they're
black or white or yellow or brown is irrelevant. Whether they speak
this language or that language as their native tongue is irrelevant.
All, without exception, are supremely spiritually blessed. You didn't
read anything in these first two chapters of Ephesians about
the blessings of the gospel being reserved for one race as opposed
to another. No, not at all. From the pit
to the rock is where every one of them have been taken. The
pit of sin to the rock which is Christ. All of God's grace,
all of them God's workmanship, including you if you believe
Christ. Wherefore remember, look at this,
look at verse 11. Remember that ye in time past
were Gentiles in the flesh, called the uncircumcision by that which
is called the circumcision in the flesh made with hands, verse
12. that at that time you were without Christ. You were living
your life without Christ. You who believe now, there was
a time when you were living your life without Christ. And as such,
you were aliens. Aliens. You know, you used to
arrive in America. You fly into an American airport.
and to go through immigration, there used to be a big sign up
that said, are you an alien? Meaning, are you not a citizen
of the United States? And if you didn't have a US passport,
you had to join the queue, the line, as they say, you had to
join the line of the aliens. You were aliens, being aliens,
but this is aliens from what? Aliens from the Commonwealth
of Israel. Israel, who's Israel? Not a nation
in the Middle East today. That's not what we're talking
about. Not at all. We're not talking about Palestine.
We're not talking about a geographical area. We're talking about the
people of God. Who is Israel? Was Jacob. Jacob? The cheat. You know, the
son of Isaac. The one who cheated Esau's brother
out of his birthright. Jacob, the cheat. The swindler. The scoundrel. The underhand. The deceitful. And he's made,
by God, Israel. What's Israel? A prince with
God. Wow. That's the pit of sin to
the rock of salvation, isn't it? Israel, princes with God. But you were aliens from it. You were foreigners from it.
You were strangers from it. You know, if you move to a new
town, I guess if you've lived where you live now for quite
a while, you're quite comfortable with where you live. You walk
around, you folks that live in Nebworth, you walk around, you
see people that you know, you're familiar with what's where, but
you go to a completely new town where you've never been. Maybe
you move there and you wander around and wow, do you feel like
a stranger. Nobody knows you. You don't know
anybody else. You don't know where things are.
Everything is new to you. You're strangers in that situation. Well, he says, without Christ,
you were strangers from the covenants of promise. And being strangers,
those covenants of promise were to do with your salvation, your
eternal salvation. Being strangers, you had no hope
because you were without God. You were walking through this
world on your own, without God, and therefore you were without
hope. because you were without God in this world. Look at verse
13. Now in Christ Jesus, ye who sometimes
were far off, you were far off. You were far away. You weren't
even close to the kingdom of God. Nicodemus came to Jesus
and said, we know that you're a teacher from God. And Jesus
said to him, except you be born again, you can't even see the
kingdom of God. Nevermind. Talk about it or know
anything about it. You're far off Nicodemus as you
are. You call yourself a Jew. You
call yourself the circumcision. You're far off. You're far off
for the, from the covenants of promise. But you're made nigh
by the blood of Christ. Look down at verse 17. Verse
17. He came and preached peace to
you which were afar off. That's it again. That's what
you were. You were afar off. Verse 19. Now therefore, now therefore,
verse 19. Now therefore, you are no more
strangers and foreigners. You were strangers and foreigners
from the kingdom of God, from the people of God, from the things
of God, from the Christ of God, from the salvation of God. That's
what you were. To truly appreciate the blessings
of salvation, never forget from what you've been saved. Never
forget it. You've been made a new creature
in Christ. all things have passed away all
things have become new you've been spiritually do you know
if you were We have some friends who moved to Australia about
16 or 17 years ago and they settled there and after a few years they
decided to become naturalized Australians. They decided to
take on Australian citizenship and they went, they had to attend
a course or two and all the things that it meant to be an Australian
and then they took the vow to become Australians and now they're
Australian. They're Australian citizens.
They have Australian passports. That's their naturalized home.
That's where they live. That's their country. That's
where they're from. You have a spiritual naturalization into
the kingdom of God. And in that, you have true unity. Look at verse 13. You were a
far off, but you're made nigh. You're made near. Near to what?
To the kingdom of God. to the people of God, to the
throne of God. to the ruler of the universe.
And what are you made nigh by? What is it that's made you near
when you were afar off? There's only one thing that has
made you near. It's not your own efforts. You've
not turned over any new leaf. You've not resolved to be a better
person. That hasn't brought you near. You haven't gone and sung
the words of a mass and God's decided to be merciful to you. Not at all. There's only one
thing that has made you near. It's the blood of Christ. Because
only the blood of Christ can satisfy the demands of God for
offended justice. You're made nigh, verse 19, your
fellow citizens with the saints. Our friends in Australia who
were British are now as Australian as all their neighbours are Australian.
They're as Australian as Australians that were born in Australia.
They're naturalised. You who have been brought to
Christ in faith. You who have believed the gospel
by his grace are fellow citizens with the saints. You're of that
nation. You're of that kingdom. And not
only that, you're of the household of God. My heart really goes out, when
I hear accounts in the news of homelessness and they interview
people on the streets, people who've been homeless, they've
got nowhere they can call home. They sleep in sleeping bags under
arches and in shop doorways and such like. Your heart goes out
to them, doesn't it? How to get into such a state.
What a comfort it is to be a member of a household. You boys, you
know, you've got a loving household that you go home to after school.
It's your comfort zone. It's the place where you sleep.
It's the place where you're fed. It's the place where your mum
and dad look after you. Well so it is, believer. You're
a member of the household of God. And what a well run, there
are some very dysfunctional households in this world. But oh, what a
good household is this household of God. The household of God. Your fellow citizens with the
saints and of the household of God. For God is the head of the
household. Our Lord Jesus Christ is the
master, the older brother. He is the one. were members of
that household, were brought in from the outside, and were
given, were granted all the family privileges, and all the blessings
of a well-run household. But not only that, look at verse
20. Look at verse 20. And you're built. Now the picture
changes. Now the picture changes. You see, it was citizens of a
kingdom, members of a household, but you're not only members living
in the household, which is the habitation of God, But you're
bricks in the wall. You're stones that are built
into the wall. You're built upon the foundation
of the apostles and prophets. Jesus Christ himself being the
chief cornerstone. You see, you're brought in. You always were in the eternal
purposes of God. You see, it's not anything that
you have done. that has made this happen. In
the eternal purposes of God, in his love for his people, his
unconditional love, his grace for his people, you were always
in his electing love. It was an everlasting love. There
was never a moment of time when God did not love you, even when
you were children of wrath, even as others. But before the Holy
Spirit came, before you had repentance and faith, you had no awareness
of that love wherewith God had loved you. And without faith,
you would never come into the good of it. It's a bit like,
let's say, a foreigner comes into this country and lives as
a foreigner. doesn't know anything about citizenship
of this country, and then an old legal document is found proving
that that foreigner has the right to British citizenship. Is that
not what it's like? When faith comes, you discover
by faith that which was always true. that God had put you in
Christ before the foundation of the world. And he's building
you, along with all the other citizens of his kingdom, into
a temple, into a building wherein God dwells. The temple in Jerusalem
was a picture of where God dwells with his people. That picture
has gone. It is no more. Is it not historically
significant, that when the Romans destroyed that temple in A.D.
70, it has never been rebuilt. However much people might have
tried, however much resources would be put to it, it has never
been rebuilt, and the sacrifice of animals which went on there,
in the Jewish tradition, has never been restored. Never, never,
never. And it never will be. Because
Christ did away with all of that. There is now no need for that
because the reality has come. Christ has died, his blood has
been shed, and the temple in which our God lives now is not
a stone-built temple in Jerusalem, the temple in which our God lives
is his church. And the stones of which his church
is built are living stones, who are people, who are built upon
the foundation of the apostles and of the prophets. That foundation. It's not that they're built on
the apostles and the prophets, Oh no, don't make the error of
the Roman Catholic Church. No. When Jesus said, you are
Peter, and upon this rock will I build my church, Jesus wasn't
meaning Peter was the rock. Not at all. Peter's a little
stone. No, he said, your name is a little stone, but on this
rock will I build my church. What's the rock on which he will
build his church? Look, you're built upon the foundation,
which is Christ Jesus himself, the chief cornerstone, not Peter,
the Pope. Rubbish. He never was the Pope.
And the man who claims to be the Pope today is no leader of
the Church. Nonsense. No. Jesus Christ is
the chief cornerstone. That's the foundation. Jesus
Christ and Him crucified is the only foundation of the Temple
of God. The Living Temple of God. The
Church of God. Isaiah 28, 16. Therefore, thus
saith the Lord God, Who's speaking? God. I lay in
Zion for a foundation, a stone. God's laying a stone down, a
tried stone, a precious cornerstone, a sure foundation. He that believeth
shall not make haste. What does that mean? He that
believeth shall be stable, shall be fixed, shall not be dashing
around here and there willy nilly, shall be fixed, shall be certain.
1 Corinthians 3 verses 10 and 11. According to the grace of
God which is given unto me as a wise master builder, this is
Paul speaking, I have laid the foundation. What's the foundation? Well we'll see in a minute. I
have laid the foundation and another buildeth thereon. He's
talking about preaching. But let every man take heed how
he buildeth thereon. For other foundation can no man
lay than that is laid. And what is that foundation?
Jesus Christ. We have no other foundation.
Do you know I've said it so many times. In fact, it became such
a problem that when on holiday we stopped going to churches
that had a name, because every time we went there, we used to
hear how we ought to be living, we used to hear what the law
required of us, we used to hear no end of stuff. But in churches
that called themselves evangelical reformed churches, we hardly
ever heard the gospel of Jesus Christ. I determined, said Paul,
to know nothing else among you except Jesus Christ and Him crucified. But surely, Paul, there's more
to this. Shouldn't you go and preach the whole counsel of God?
Paul says, I did preach the whole counsel of God. He said to the
Ephesian elders on the beach at Miletus, he said, I haven't
shunned to declare to you the whole counsel of God. So what
have you preached to them, Paul? And he told them how they ought
to live. No, I've preached nothing other than Jesus Christ and him
crucified. Because if you know Jesus Christ
and him crucified, everything else falls into place. Our gospel
precepts have no concern. Of course they're of concern.
But if you preach them outside of Christ, You preach them in
vain. They will have no effect. They
only have an effect, not by law snapping at the heels of believers,
but by the love of Christ constraining believers. That's how it works.
The apostles and prophets alike declared the foundation that
God had laid, Jesus Christ, and him crucified. No other foundation
None is able to support God's spiritual temple of living stones. Religious folks, religious organisations,
religious builders, secular society, they all reject that foundation
stone. Anything other than that foundation
stone. You talk to them, anything other
Psalm 118 verse 22, the stone which the builders refused. Oh,
we're not having that one. No, no, no, no. We'll put together
our religious organization like this, but we're not having Jesus
Christ and him crucified. No, no, no. We won't have that.
The stone which the builders refused is become the headstone
of the corner. In ancient building techniques,
you needed the cornerstone. The cornerstone was not only
the biggest, most solidly based stone, it was the one on which
the whole structure of the rest of the building derived its integrity
from it, derived its strength from it. As everyone traced its
path down to that foundation, that's how it held firmly in
place. But the religious world, the
secular world, they all reject that chief cornerstone, but that's
the cornerstone which God has laid. Believers have diverse
natural backgrounds. Believers have diverse nationality,
diverse parentage, diverse status in this life. But in Christ,
all natural distinctions are irrelevant. They are, they truly
are. Because we're all leveled, can
I say leveled? No, raised to the same plateau. A blessing in the Lord Jesus
Christ. Galatians 3, 26 to 29. Ye are
all, you believers, not people in general, ye are all the children
of God by faith. Are you a child of God? By faith,
yes. For as many of you as have been
baptized into Christ have put on Christ, there is neither Jew
nor Greek. Jew or Gentile. There is neither
bond, that's a slave, nor free. Makes no difference. Yes, there
are slaves, but in Christ it makes no difference. There is
neither male nor female. Do we have different roles? Of
course we do. Men and women have completely different roles, yes.
And what this society is trying to do in removing those differences
is diabolical. I mean that literally, diabolical.
But in Christ, There is no such distinction. Yes, we have different
roles, but there's no such distinction. For ye are all one in Christ
Jesus. And if you be Christ's, then,
Jews and Gentiles, then you are Abraham's seed. If you're Christ's,
you're Abraham's seed and heirs according to the promise. I just
want to finish this by going back to where we were at the
start about political correctness and striving for racial unity
to note that in the words that we have here in terms of what
God has done for us in Christ and how he's building us together
and how he's brought us in from being aliens into being citizens
of his kingdom the gospel achieves perfectly that which all that
political correctness strives to achieve but always fails to
achieve it always will Constantly, Christless politics and political
correctness is striving to break down walls of petition between
peoples, and failing. But the Gospel accomplishes it
independent of human efforts. Isn't it constantly trying, all
the time, trying to break down walls of division between tribes
and nations and languages and colours and classes of society? Constantly fails. Constantly
fails. Constantly fails. Constantly. But the gospel accomplishes it,
independent of human efforts. This is the kingdom of God. You
know, the kingdom of God has one centre, one cornerstone.
Let's change the description. You've heard it before. But imagine
Christ at the hub of a wheel, at the centre of a wheel. What
do the individual members need to do to come together? You go
out on the spokes of a wheel and come down towards the center.
What do you do? You come together. Those that
were far apart on the spokes a long way off, the nearer they
come to the hub, the closer together they come. In Christ, all human
walls of division are broken down. Contrast that with the
kingdom of Satan. I've been, you know we did our
Ephesians, sorry, our Revelation series, and I always said, because
people ask me, that I would write up the sermons in the form of
a book, and I'm progressing with that, and I've just been writing
the chapters the last couple of days that are very much rung,
chimed with what we're looking at here. The kingdom of Satan,
all of its efforts at Christless worldwide unity. You know, Satan
always wanted a united world that didn't need Christ. That's
what he wanted. And the wickedness became such
that God sent the flood and saved Noah. But then the sin was still
in the world and the descendants of Noah, one of them sometime
later was Nimrod and there were lots of people again on the earth
and he was a great rebel. He built a tower, the Tower of
Babel. And what was he trying to do, and what were all the
peoples trying to do? Reach to heaven. How are they going to
get to heaven? You can only get to heaven by the blood of Christ.
We don't want that. They were trying to get to heaven. A heaven
of their own making. A heaven which is a false heaven.
A heaven which is a phony, counterfeit heaven. Trying to get there by
their own efforts. And God confounded their languages.
and made them separate nations. And when they were separate nations,
there were wars and conflict. God's red horse, the seals and
the trumpets and the vials of Revelation, all were sent out
to confound Satan's purposes. Satan strives to take down national
barriers and bring people together, always without Christ and without
justice being satisfied. He always does it. He did it
with the ancient empires of Babylon and Greece and Rome. He does
it right the way, with force of arms, up to today. We could
look at the Hitler's Third Reich of the last century, the Soviet
Union. Today, the things that we have,
maybe not with force of arms, but the European Union and the
United Nations, all striving to remove international borders,
but note the underlying agenda, all without Christ. All without
anything to do with Christ. Satan's kingdom constantly fails
to do. Christ's kingdom has achieved. We're planning to go, those of
us that can make it, to Merton next Sunday afternoon for a joint
service. We've had several of these, and
it's quite a struggle getting there, but when you can get there,
there's about 35, I guess we might have had 40 at times, but
there are British, there are people of West Indian origin,
there are people of African origin, I think there was an Iranian
once, certainly somebody with Swedish background. All of us
in perfect harmony. Oh, Pakistan, of course, Harry.
Harry, his dad's Pakistani. All these different races. Does
race matter? Not in the slightest. Does the
colour of skin matter? Not in the slightest. Makes absolutely
no difference. were all stones built into the
church of the living God were all hewn by God from the quarry
of humanity and cut to shape and fitted into the temple look
at verses 21 and 22 in whom all the building fitly framed together
groweth into an holy temple in the Lord in whom ye also are
built together for an habitation of God through the Spirit all
standing firm all standing on that chief cornerstone, truly
a habitation of God through the Spirit. Communion is about remembering. We're going to have the bread
and wine shortly, to remember, to remember the basis, the basis
for our common citizenship, the basis for our common citizenship
in the kingdom of God, in the temple of God, that which We've
brought from and to. And the purpose of communion
is to remind us, as oft as you do this, as oft as you eat this,
do it in remembrance of Christ, because it's the soul, the common
basis for our citizenship, is what it speaks of. And that is
the work of Christ, his broken body and his shed blood, to satisfy
the justice of God. Because true unity True unity,
that which the world strives for and fails, is only achievable
if God's justice is satisfied. And God's justice is only satisfied
in the broken body and the shed blood of Christ. So that's why
what we do now. Amen.