Far Off Brought Near

Oh me, you oh me, you know say God, I do not understand this world, everything is dying and broken.

Why do I see nothing much suffering?

God, I'm asking, could this be your plan?

Sin is taking hold of this soul land.

Will you not say anything else to me?

Where were you the day that I measured?

Sunk the base and stretched the line over all the earth and carved out its cornerstone.

Where were you the day that I spoke?

Turn the sun split the night open.

On the morning, gone with light to show.

All the time with the thunder.

Can you lose the clock?

Things too wonderful for me, although I had no right to ask.

My God now and answered me.

We're gonna take a minute here, we're gonna read uh together the Apostles' Creed.

Um just serving as a reminder, um, as you read this, uh this isn't just a rote recitation.

Um we're actually uh engaging with what we believe.

We're communicating what we believe with our mouths, we hear each other saying things or saying this thing together, um and in that belief may we be encouraged.

Uh the Spirit speaks through us when we speak truth.

So when we speak truth like these, uh there's edification to be had for the body.

So listen as well as you speak.

Um, would you read together with me what it is we believe?

We believe in God, the Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth.

We believe in Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord, who was conceived by the Holy Ghost, born of the Virgin Mary.

He suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died, and was buried.

He descended to Hades.

And the third day he rose again from the dead, he ascended into heaven and sits at the right hand of God the Father Almighty.

From thence he shall come to judge the quick and the dead.

We believe in the Holy Ghost, the Holy Catholic Church, the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body, and the life everlasting.

Amen.

Would you remain standing as James reads the text for this week?

Good morning.

Today's reading is from Ephesians chapter two, verses eleven to twenty two.

Says, therefore, remember that at one time you Gentiles in the flesh, called the uncircumcision by what is called the circumcision, which is made in the flesh by hands.

Remember that you were at that time separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world.

But now in Christ Jesus, you who were once far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ, for he himself is our peace, he who has made us both one, and has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility, by abolishing the law of commandments expressed in ordinances, that he might create in himself one new man in place of the two, so making peace.

And he might reconcile us both to God in one body through the cross, thereby killing the hostility.

And he came and preached peace to you who were far off, and peace to those who were near.

For through him we both have access in one spirit to the Father.

So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone, in whom the whole structure being joined together grows into a holy temple in the Lord.

In him you also are being built together into the dwelling place for God by the Spirit.

This is the word of the Lord.

Please be seated.

Thanks for joining us this morning.

My name is James Rathman.

I'm the pastor here at Redemption Church Denver.

We've uh been moving through Ephesians.

Uh and before we jump into today's text, got a quick announcement.

We are doing our second book club of the summer.

The first one has wrapped, and for the second one, we're gonna be meeting twice in July on the 14th and another time that's in the calendar, 28th, on the 14th and the 28th.

And uh we're gonna be reading this book together, which is called Gentle and Lowly by Dane Ortland.

This is a wonderful book.

This is about Jesus' heart.

That's the tagline.

Uh, the heart of Christ for sinners and sufferers.

Now, what I loved about this book is it's a direct look at Jesus himself.

And I I think that it inspired it's it's being like overwhelmingly received.

Have you heard of this book?

Has anyone heard of this book yet?

Yeah, it's like all over everywhere.

And I think it's being so overwhelmingly received because the truths about Christ we've heard so many times that he is gentle and lowly, describes himself as one who is approachable and accommodates himself to sinners.

But we don't really think that.

We settle into all sorts of other ways of thinking about Christ as harsh and demeaning.

And this book is this wonderful picture of who Christ is.

So buy the book, uh, come join us uh on uh July 14th for that first time together.

Okay, let's pray, and we'll get into the text for today.

Holy Father, we praise you for the work that you have done on the cross to create unity in humanity, in your church.

Lord, we pray that what we saw last week in your gospel for us personally, we might get to see this week its implications for us as a church and as a community.

Lord, we pray that you would attend this time and that your word would be effective to make real and tangible in our experience in the church what you have purchased for us on the cross.

Lord, we praise you for this community.

We praise you for the gathering of your saints together, the family that you offer in this, bringing us into your household.

Lord, I pray that that reality would change our hearts and teach us to love one another.

Lord, lift us up in Jesus' name.

Amen.

Okay, so this a couple weeks ago, the at the beginning of this month, uh was the first Friday of this month.

They come every month.

And uh we did a First Friday thing here on uh the street on Tennyson Street, and then my wife and I live just off of Santa Fe uh at the Santa Fe Arts District, and that first Friday is is crazy.

Um and so when you live in that area, the fun thing to do on First Fridays is to get together with your neighbors and then complain about it.

And so I was doing that.

I was looking for parking, and obviously we couldn't park, and so I was talking with my across the street neighbor, and uh actually met one of my across the street neighbors for the first time, and we were like, Oh, can you believe this?

Like, there's no parking, it's unbelievable, this is awful.

Really, we feel like the prettiest girl at the dance because all of Denver came to uh see us that night, so but we like to complain about it.

And uh I met uh one of my across the street neighbors, and he's uh just graduated from high school.

And so I was like, hey, didn't you just graduate from high school?

And I knew because he he had one of those signs out front that, like, congratulations, Isaiah, class of 2021 from West High School.

And uh talked talked to him, and I was like, Man, this had been a crazy time to be graduating and go through senior year.

And he just like poured his guts out.

You know, it was like we ended up talking for like an hour and a half, and it we were like 10 minutes in, and he was like, I've been depressed, I've been anxious, I've been so lonely.

And this is um oh i I think it I've heard that so much over this past year, just this recurring loneliness.

And I think we didn't even need this past year, this past year, although it probably accelerated things, to see this trend of loneliness.

We're uh when we're together, we're you know, kind of separate digitally, and then when we're separate, we pretend that we can get together digitally, but we can't.

Uh there's something about our being included in a community that we require for life.

We're just not autonomous things.

We're the type of things that need community.

Now, last week we saw this beautiful picture of the gospel in the first half of Ephesians chapter 2.

Ephesians 2 · chapter mention

And we are seeing uh this week how this gospel applies not just to us as individuals, but to us as a community.

And it must apply to us as a community, because there's no such thing as thriving as an individual outside of the context of a community.

We're just not that type of creature.

We can't exist, we can't even know ourselves without the context of a community.

And so we'll see how the gospel stretches from something that impacts our hearts as individuals to something that creates and renews the community.

So we're going to look at how that which was far off is brought near, and then how that thing that was brought near, which is us, is built up into a community.

Last week was personal, this week is social.

Okay, so ready to get started?

Ephesians 2, verse 11.

Ephesians 2:11

Therefore remember that at one time you Gentiles in the flesh were called the uncircumcision by what is called the circumcision, which is made in the flesh by hands.

Okay, so Paul's calling us right off the bat to remember something.

And he's saying, he's writing to a church in Ephesus, and he's writing to a group of Gentile Christians.

It means they were non-Jewish Christians.

And he's writing to them, and he's saying, remember that you used to be called the uncircumcision, that you used to be called outside of the people of God, outside of the body, you were looked down upon by the Jewish people who called themselves the circumcision.

And there was this being outside that you experienced.

You were outside the walls of the kingdom, you were outside the promises of God.

And that's something that as you become Christians, you must remember.

Now, that Gentile-Jew distinction is not something that we'd intuitively relate to anymore.

But we can remember this same thing of the time before we were Christians.

And we can remember what it was to be outside the promises of God, to not know the hope that we had in Christ.

And so Paul asks us to remember this formal state, and he brings us to this sort of archetypal picture of division in humanity.

And it's the most true, most real division that humanity has ever experienced, which is the division that came when God chose Abraham and chose to bless Abraham's offspring uniquely.

Now, at the same time, there is this incredible inclusion of Abraham by God.

But if we're thinking about it, then we see there's also this exclusion of the rest of the world, it seems, when the particular one was chosen through whom the blessing would come.

Now, there's this alienation that is experienced at all sorts of levels here.

There's the alienation from God, the alienation from people, and being outside of this particular community.

But look at the way that Paul describes this.

He says, Remember, Gentiles, you were called the uncircumcision by those who were called the circumcision, and this circumcision was made in the flesh by hands.

So he's saying, you're making a distinction amongst yourselves.

But notice this is a distinction that is made just amongst yourselves.

This is not a distinction that God is making.

Remember, the people of God were chosen not to be a blessing for themselves, but to be a blessing for the whole world.

But this vision in the Jewish people was forgotten.

And this chosenness by God, rather than being a means to compel them to bless those around them, instead became a means of retreat from those around them.

So that we were able to see that the cleanness on the inside of the people of God stayed away from the dirtiness on the outside of the people of God.

But there's this distinction here where he says, this was a division made in the flesh by hands.

And you can hear the whisper in the background of what's coming from Paul, which is there is a type of circumcision that is not done by human hands.

There is a type of division which is not established by humans amongst yourselves, and instead is established by God.

What we're looking forward to is somehow a way in which we can be included into Christ in a way that doesn't divide us.

How can that be?

It's easy for us to look at this narrative of the Jews given the promises of God and then them being uh just exclusive towards the Gentile people and say this was simply a problem of exclusion.

And what we need to do is we need to craft a society that rather than being based off of exclusion, is based off of inclusion.

But there's a problem there with having a culture that's just based around inclusion.

And the problem is inclusion necessarily entails exclusion.

When you're included and you get the members-only jacket, that jacket matters because not everyone else has it.

If you are or consider yourself not a citizen of any particular nation, but you're just a citizen of the world, that doesn't work when it's time to get your passport stamped.

If you are uh if you are someone who considers yourself uh just part of the brotherhood of all humanity, well then at your family reunions, when it's time to invite everyone, you'll notice no one comes.

See, in order to experience any sort of real inclusion where I'm actually brought into something, then there is necessarily an exclusion that takes place in that process.

Now, if we try and have inclusion without exclusion as a part of it, then there are two options for what we will receive in that process.

The inclusion will become either one, ineffectual and meaningless, or two, it will become tyrannical.

So uh one, it becomes ineffectual and meaningless, and this kind of sounds like this.

Do you remember, also speaking of last year, uh during the pandemic, do you guys remember that?

Yeah, I know.

Uh we at the beginning, especially, you would hear this refrain over and over again.

We're all in this together.

Do you remember when like all the celebrities were like, I can I have to only use my one hot tub or something?

We're all in this together.

It was it's so totally inclusive that it's like, yeah, but that it it it actually means nothing to me.

Now that we're all in this together, it's like I I don't even get to feel sad about how lonely I am because I just get to remember that we're all in this together.

It's so broad, it's so total, that the inclusiveness actually becomes completely ineffectual.

I feel like I'm brought into nothing.

Or the other side of this is that our our total value of inclusion becomes tyrannical.

Because what is any imperialist?

I'll flip it, what is any quest for world peace other than imperialism?

The only way to get total inclusion is to eliminate or swallow up whoever is on the outside.

Then we have total inclusion.

But at that point, the inclusion is just tyranny.

Do you see those two pitfalls?

It's either meaningless or it's tyrannical.

I think that they often hold hands.

So we've got this problem with circumcision, which is a division, that's made among ourselves just by hands.

And it's uh uh there's a third that we can see in this, which is to forget the inclusion part, of course, we see the dangers of, well, let's just double down on exclusion.

And that becomes these strange boundaries that we draw amongst ourselves that look like racism and look like sexism and look like all of these bizarre boundaries that we would draw just for the sake of gaining an identity by exclusion.

So, okay, what do we do?

Is there any hope of community that isn't ineffectual or tyrannical or like some miserable ism?

Oh, yes.

Yes, there is.

In order to prevent these pitfalls to form a real community, Paul calls us to remember the state that we were in before we were brought into the community of Christ.

And so, first, we have to remember the alienation that we ourselves experienced.

Ephesians 2.12 says it'll Paul will give three features of this alienation.

It says, remember that you were at that time separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world.

Okay, so Paul is going to describe the features of this exclusion.

You are alienated from Christ, from the people of God, and from the promises of God.

Alienated from Christ.

This means we had no hope of a savior.

We had no concept that God could be known.

This becomes more tragic in its context when we remember the promises of Ephesians 1, that in Christ we experience, we are given every heavenly blessing.

But that becomes absent.

Remember that you were alienated from Christ.

And remember that you were alienated from God's people, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel.

So we remember, as we've spent time in Genesis, that we see this particular group of people that were chosen.

They were chosen by God to be a kingdom of priests, to be a people holy to him.

And we see the glory of the covenant is shown in that he will be their God and they will be his people, that that ultimate of all relationships will be restored.

And then related to that, we see that we are alienated from God's promises.

Those are related because God gave his promises to this particular people.

And then here's the bitter conclusion: no hope and no God in the world.

I feel a bit strange using this next example, but it's really fresh in my mind.

And to be honest, I feel kind of down in remembering it.

I performed a funeral last yesterday for a real tragedy.

A non-Christian young dad who passed away.

And there wasn't there was not a Christian presence in the in this family, and yet death was sitting at the front of the room.

And there was there was no hope.

It was just gone.

There was no God in the world to bring meaning into this.

No hope, no God in the world.

You have to remember the alienation in order to grasp the inclusion.

Listen to this.

But now, in Christ Jesus, you who were once, who once were far off, have been brought near by the blood of Christ.

We were alienated from Christ.

Now we have been brought near by the very blood of Christ.

No longer alienated.

We are brought in.

We are no longer alienated from God's people.

As it continues on, Ephesians 2, verse 14, it says, For he himself is our peace, who has made us both one, and has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility.

Ephesians 2:14

Now the temple was built in Jerusalem, and it's kind of like concentric squares.

In the middle is this cube that's the holy of holies.

It's the place where God dwells.

It was only entered into once a year on the Day of Atonement.

Then outside of that, more common sacrifices were performed.

And then outside of that, there's a place for gathering of Jewish people, and then beyond that, there's another wall which was to divide Jew and Gentile.

So the Gentiles were not allowed to go within that outer wall.

So when he says the wall of hostility, he's not being metaphorical.

There is a place where God was said to dwell, and the Gentiles could not walk in there.

And we actually have excavated pieces of that wall with inscriptions written on them saying if a Gentile walks beyond this, their death is on their own head.

So if a Gentile moves into the place where God was, their death is just on them.

They were to be killed.

He himself is our peace, who has made us both one and has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility.

How did Jesus do that?

Jesus was God.

Welcome to church.

He entered the temple and is treated like a Gentile.

He's cast out, executed.

His death is on his own head.

Executed not in the temple as a sacrifice just for the Jewish people, but outside of the temple, as a sacrifice for the world.

And all of a sudden the temple's meaning changes.

When the ultimate sacrifice is made outside the walls for all people, that dividing wall of hostility is made obsolete.

It doesn't make any sense anymore.

When Paul is writing this, the temple still stands.

It won't be destroyed for likely another thirty years.

And yet he says now the dividing wall of hostility is gone.

Because Jesus, because God himself was treated like an outsider, you who were outsiders are brought in.

And he has made us all one new people.

How are we one new people?

Because for Jew and for Gentile, there is one person who makes atonement.

And that is Christ.

There is only one person's blood who pays the sacrifice, and that is Christ.

And so we are one new people, no longer alienated from God.

Ephesians 2, 15 through 16 describes how we are no longer separated from the covenant.

It says, by abolishing the law of commandments expressed in ordinances, that he might create in himself one new man in place of the two, so making peace, and might reconcile us both to God in one body through the cross, thereby killing the hostility.

Now this is a strange verse.

Because it says, by abolishing the law of commandments expressed in ordinances.

Now it's strange because Jesus says, I have not come to abolish the law, but to fulfill the law.

Do you see why it's strange now?

But this says that Jesus, by abolishing the law of commandments expressed in ordinances, created in himself one new man.

That's how he creates this unity between Jew and Gentile.

It's the unity of God's people.

So what is Paul articulating here?

He's articulating the same truth that Jesus was, but from a different perspective.

Jesus says, I did not come to abolish the law, but to fulfill the law.

Jesus fulfills the law, which means he accomplishes the requirements of the law.

And when the requirements of the law are accomplished, then they are no longer binding on us.

They have been fulfilled in him.

So he's able to look back and say, Do you see these ceremonial cultic laws that we had in place, demonstrating the sacrificial system and these boundaries around the temple that we had laid out?

Those were all pointing towards this ultimate sacrifice which would be made by Christ alone.

And once the real thing has come, the shadow of what these laws represented can be put aside.

And instead, they are, in a sense, abolished in the way that they were binding on us.

And he creates in place of these civil and ceremonial laws one new humanity, which is based on the law of Christ.

He reconciles us both to God through the cross, therefore the hostility is killed.

This is the important thing to see.

There's a circumcision that's made by hands.

That's the divisions that we make among ourselves.

You know, pick them.

Socioeconomic, people that you choose to include in your life or exclude in your life.

Race.

These are the divisions that we make among ourselves.

Circumcision made by hands.

But then there's the reality of the situation.

And the reality of the situation is how we relate to God.

What does God see when he sees us?

God does not honor these distinctions that we make among ourselves.

Because he's saying, like, look, I gave you this, I placed my image in you.

And then the distinction that you have amongst yourselves, amongst yourselves, is ownership of property, which will burn up.

So he has this incredible harshness when we neglect the poor.

Because instead of relying on the distinctions that God makes, we're choosing to just rely on the circumcision made by hands.

What are these little temporal things that we can use to create this false inclusion by excluding others?

But this says we are both reconciled to God in one body through the cross, thereby killing the hostility.

What hostility is he talking about there?

Both.

The hostility between us and God was killed on the cross.

But because we are all reconciled to God through the same means, which is the cross, the hostility between us is killed.

Because what is the reality of the distinction now?

There is no distinction between Jew or Gentile, male, female, Scythian, slave, free.

All of those categories of people, however, you decide to break, however, we decide to break ourselves up, all stand before God, related either through the cross or on their own account.

So we are all related to Christ through the cross.

And so what is the distinction among humanity?

We don't get to rely on those anymore to create our inclusion or our exclusion.

See how this creates an entirely new type of community.

It creates a community.

Well, we'll keep going because Paul will explain.

This is how we're built up into this new community.

He came and preached peace to you who were far off and peace to those who were near.

For through him we both have access in one spirit to the Father.

A community, in order to maintain its identity, must not preach peace to those who are far off.

It can preach peace to those who are near, but in order to hold on to its own communal identity, it must demonstrate hostility to those who are far off.

We see this, our culture is obsessed with inclusion, right?

This is the month of inclusion of sexual identities.

It's not the Noaic Covenant.

That's why you're seeing all the rainbows all around.

It's about inclusion of sexual identities.

But that necessitates hostility towards a traditional sexual identity, towards a norming of a traditional sexual identity.

Because you have to, in order to preach peace to those who are close, there are real enemies against this idea out there, so we have to preach hostility to those who are far off.

But what if the exclusion that unites our community was not among ourselves, circumcision made by hands?

But what if God Himself excluded Himself, took on our exclusion, so that we relate to Him, we're reconciled to Him, and then among ourselves, Jesus can call us to do things like love our enemies.

Do you see how the shape of the Christian community, because it's Christ who is cut off, we don't have to cut off those people that are outside the boundaries of the church, but instead we preach peace to those who are near in the church, and we preach peace to those who are far off outside the boundaries of the church?

Because how were we reconciled to God?

Was it by our purity in the church?

Was it by our holiness that we brought before God and then he said, I will now reconcile you to myself?

No.

It is by the cross that we are reconciled to God.

And so what is the hope of someone who is outside of the church?

It is the same as our hope.

It is that they, in their state of sin, might be reconciled to God by the same cross that reconciled us.

Why is it so important that Paul caused us to remember our former alienation?

Because if we don't remember our alienation, then we will operate as though we deserve to be in the position with God that we are in.

And so then we will start to treat those on the outside with hostility.

Does that make sense?

Is this making sense?

The shape of this?

This is there's this is why the Christian community formed by the cross is so unique in all the world, of all communities.

Because of this absurd phrase, he preached peace to you who were far off, and peace to you who were near.

Why?

For through him we both have access in one spirit to the Father.

This is why we can really say that we're included in the church.

But it is not an inclusion based on our exclusion of others.

It is an inclusion based on the exclusion of Christ.

It is Christ who unites us.

That's why we can preach peace to one another, and we can preach peace to those who are far off.

We can love those who are far off.

Verses 19 to 20.

So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus Himself being the cornerstone.

Okay.

Paul always does this thing where he's like, I gave you a really good thing, right?

Good news.

I'm gonna make it way better.

And that's what he keeps doing.

He just can't stop riffing on this amazing idea.

Remember, you were strangers and aliens, but now, uh, we already kind of went through this.

You're strangers and aliens, but now you're a part of that commonwealth of Israel.

You have the promises of God.

But look, it it's pretty cool to be a part of a country, you know.

It would be pretty neat to be, uh, I don't, this is the only royalty I can think of.

It'd be pretty cool to be British, right?

Because like peaky blinders and stuff, but it wouldn't, uh but you're not just finding out you're British, you're finding out your royalty.

It's probably not the best monarchy to choose.

It seems like when people choose that, they want out.

But imagine in the most fairy tale sense, this is why we have those fairy tales.

Imagine in the most fairy tale sense, because this is closer to the reality, that you find out I am not just a citizen, I am a member of the household of the king.

That's what Paul is saying to us.

And this household, he moves back into the temple metaphor, is built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets.

That's the way of saying the Bible.

We have it written down now.

In Christ Jesus himself is the cornerstone of this building.

21 to 22, in whom, in Christ, the whole structure being joined together grows into a holy temple in the Lord.

In him You also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit.

Before Christ, there's a wall of hostility around the temple.

And what is the purpose of the temple?

It is the place where God dwells.

After Christ, he brings us together into one body under him, overcoming all of the distinctions that we make among ourselves by our hands.

And brings us into one body from every tribe, tongue, nation, and people.

And as we are brought into that one body, the dividing wall of hostility is torn down, and this community, based on Christ, becomes the place where God dwells.

This is how the church fits into this cosmic story of redemption.

The temple is the dwelling place of God.

That means that Eden in the beginning was a temple.

In this edenic temple where God dwelled with humanity to give them blessing.

When sin enters the world, the temple, the temple becomes more located.

It's as though God himself says, If God will live, if my people will live in a tent, I will do likewise, and I will live in a tent with them.

And then the temple itself is built under King Solomon, and God moves in and inhabits this temple.

Then it's destroyed, and then it's built again.

Temple that Paul's talking about here is one that's built again.

But then that temple is destroyed and it's replaced with this new dwelling place of God in the world.

And that's his church.

God inhabits his church.

And then we stretch forward into the future.

And what does the temple look like?

Remember that cube in the middle, the Holy of Holies?

In Revelation, it's described as coming down from heaven, this giant cube that measures like 14,000 stadia by 14,000 stadia.

I don't know what it means, you don't know what it means.

It's big, but the point is that the Holy of Holies comes and encapsulates, dwells on the whole earth so that we all have this immediate access to God.

Well, that's what we have in Christ now.

And what is the people of God?

It is those people who say to one another and to those who are far off, the most important aspect of my identity is Christ crucified.

It is in Christ crucified where I remember my alienation.

I see by his great love I've been brought in.

And my heart preaches peace to those who are close, and peace even to those who are far off.

Yeah, it's it's today's, it's it's uh, you know, Pride Month, right?

So, like as Christians, it's a it's a rally of our enemies, right?

What do we preach?

Peace.

Peace.

Enemies compared to what?

Up past us?

Alienated compared to what?

Compared to the way we were alienated from Christ.

Do you see this dynamic?

Do not get duped, do not get shoehorned into a ordinary way of thinking of the divisions of humanity.

See what Christ has accomplished.

It must repaint the whole world for you.

To preach peace to those who are far off and peace to those who are near.

Okay.

Any questions today?

No questions.

Really?

All right.

That either means I preached too long or uh we covered it.

One of the symbols of our unity as a community in Christ that we've been given is this table fellowship.

And that's what we practice when we practice communion each week.

We all come to the same table.

Now, when you look around, you're all coming from different weeks, different places in life, all these different situations.

And yet, uh one way that I like to think about it is all of our lives are all these different questions, but they all have the same answer.

The answer is Christ, Him crucified, his blood poured out for us.

And that's what we partake in this morning.

Come to the table fellowship of the Lord.

Discover a unity that is only possible in Him.

Paul writes, For I received from the Lord what I also delivered to you.

That the Lord Jesus on the night when he was betrayed took bread, and when he gave thanks, he broke it and said, This is my body which is for you, do this in remembrance of me.

In the same way also he took the cup after supper, saying, This cup is the new covenant in my blood.

Do this as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.

For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until he comes.

Holy Father, we pray that you would bless this meal.

We pray that you would uh remind us of the unity that we have that is found in you.

Lord, help us to repent of the divisions that we make among ourselves, of the reasons that we uh wouldn't uh relate or or uh enjoy or speak peace to certain people in our lives because of these divisions that we've created.

Lord, let us see the dividing line that creates our unity as you cast out.

Holy Father, let us uh come to this table as former aliens who now eat alongside the King.

We praise you for that, Lord.

We pray that you would make us into that type of community that lives out of that reality.

We lift this up in Jesus' name.

Amen.