Together We find peace
Ephesians 2:16-22
Back to Church Sunday
Week 1: Together We Find Peace ~ September 15, 2019
Good morning and welcome! We’re so happy to have you join us on this Back to Church Sunday. It’s great to see so many new and familiar faces with us here today.
We are excited to be participating and celebrating Back to Church Sunday as part of a national movement. This is a great opportunity for us to join with other parts of the body of Christ across the country to reflect on and reclaim the true nature of the church as a place and expression of love, peace, and hope for our friends, neighbors, communities, and world. As a church, we are the collective hands and feet of Christ, who reflect Him and do His work in the world as we grow in our relationships with Him and with each other.
I know that everyone here today has a personal story and experience with the church—some good and
Together is the theme of Back to Church Sunday, and as I thought about togetherness and what it means for us as followers of Jesus, I thought of . . . Legos.
Who could imagine that these pieces of plastic are worth billions of dollars? The Danish toy company that started in the 1930s has built a Lego empire around little building blocks that introduced in the 1950s.
Individually, Legos are just cheap pieces of plastic—and, I might add, the cause of great distress to parents who step on one on the floor. Despite their basic design, the magic is in the way they fit together. Legos are designed to be together. And together these pieces can be made into fantastic creations. Full-scale models of castles, cars, airplanes, spaceships have all been built from Legos. If you’ve ever been to one of the LEGOLAND theme parks, you’ve been treated to scaled replicas of the world’s most famous buildings and landmarks. It seems that Legos can be put together to create almost anything. They are just individual pieces of plastic but together they create something much bigger and better than the sum of their parts.
The church is like Legos—a collection of individuals of various sizes, shapes, and colors. Individually, we may not be much to look at, but when we come together the way God intended, we form the Church, which is a creation greater than the sum of its parts. God takes our chaos and, by His design, makes something spectacular and gives us purpose.
Legos make a fun example. But I hope you can see the correlation to the idea of togetherness. In real life, this concept is powerful, and
As we celebrate Back to Church Sunday, I hope that what we experience today is just the beginning—a taste of the belonging we can experience here, and an invitation to come back for more. Whether you’re a regular member, a first-time visitor, or on the fence about
- Together We Find Peace
- Together We Experience Love
- Together We Grow Stronger
- Together We Can Change the World
Let’s start this journey with a bit of a road map. The guide for our journey comes from the book of Ephesians. While in prison in Rome, the apostle Paul wrote a letter to a group of believers in the city of Ephesus about 30 years after Jesus’ death and resurrection; that letter is the New Testament book of Ephesians. It’s a short book of the Bible—just six chapters—but it’s beautiful and powerful. And togetherness is a theme Paul comes back to again and again.
In studying this book together, we’re doing what the original believers in Ephesus did. The people of Ephesus didn’t have smartphones, or the Internet, or even TV or radio. I remind you of this obvious fact because it’s easy to forget the original context and culture of the people of the Bible. And like all the early churches, the believers in Ephesus got their information in a communal way. Paul wrote them a letter and they gathered together and listened to the letter being read.
When it came to understanding what the letter meant, the people of Ephesus (and all of the early church) did so together. Together they listened and learned and shared and discussed and wrestled through the challenges of living out their faith in Christ in a culture that operated in a vastly different way. So, we will be following their lead in discussing and wrestling with the ways Christ invites us to live together with Him and together with one another.
Ephesus was in modern-day Turkey.
- It was a port city that was once considered the most important Greek city and an important trading center in the Mediterranean region.
- The Romans made it a provincial capital, and it was home to the Temple of Artemis—one of the seven wonders of the ancient world.
- Ephesus was big and bustling, with a lot of people coming and going to worship or do business or pass from one region to another.
- In the early history of the church, Ephesus was a place where the gospel spread quickly, and many people came to be believers.
Paul spent time in Ephesus as a missionary, so he knew the culture and the challenges this group of believers faced. He knew they were a multi-ethnic group, surrounded and challenged by other ideas, beliefs, and practices. Not unlike our church today, the church at Ephesus needed the strength of unity to grow and survive.
Paul wrote this letter to encourage and instruct the young church. And he set up the letter in a way that is easy to follow. Part one looks at the gospel story—how Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection changed the world. It describes God’s plan to bring humans together with Himself through Jesus. Part Two gets practical—how should we live in response to God’s grace, and how should we relate to each other? That second part focuses in on how the gospel changes our lives.
We will spend today and next Sunday looking at the peace and love given to us through the life and sacrifice of Jesus. Then in the next two weeks, we will look at how living in the light of the gospel can help us grow stronger together and impact our world.
Our world looks for peace in a lot of different ways. We look for peace among nations, peace in our cities, peace in our families, peace in our churches, and peace in our own hearts and minds. As we explore the concept that Together We Find Peace, let’s look at Ephesians 2:16-22 (The Message) —16-18 Christ brought us together through his death on the cross. The Cross got us to embrace, and that was the end of the hostility. Christ came and preached peace to you outsiders and peace to us insiders. He treated us as equals, and so made us equals. Through him, we both share the same Spirit and have equal access to the Father.
19-22 That’s plain enough, isn’t it? You’re no longer wandering exiles. This kingdom of faith is now your home country. You’re no longer strangers or outsiders. You belong here, with as much right to the name Christian as anyone. God is building a home. He’s using us all—irrespective of how we got here—in what he is building. He used the apostles and prophets for the foundation. Now he’s using you, fitting you in brick by brick, stone by stone, with Christ Jesus as the cornerstone that holds all the parts together. We see it taking shape day after day—a holy temple built by God, all of us built into it, a temple in which God is quite at home. (Ephesians 2:16-22, The Message)
As I move through this message, I want to share 3 things with you about peace: (1) there is peace in unity; (2) there is peace in God’s presence; and, (3) peace is always available.
1 – There is Peace in Unity
Have you ever wanted a place to belong? Have you ever wanted to be part of something bigger than yourself? Where can you find such a sense of belonging? Believe it or not, Paul says that the body of Christ—the church—is supposed to be that kind of place. Unfortunately, it hasn’t always worked that way.
Pastor and author Chuck Swindoll shares the story of running into a buddy from his days in the marine corps. His buddy told him that since he’d become a Christian, he didn’t have a place to admit his faults and talk about his battles. He said he missed their time at the tavern when they were in the service.
Not long after that encounter, Chuck was reading and came across these words: The neighborhood bar is possibly the best counterfeit that there is to the fellowship Christ wants to give his church. It’s an imitation, dispensing liquor instead of grace, escape rather than reality-but it is a permissive, accepting, and inclusive fellowship. It is unshockable. It is democratic. You can tell people secrets, and they usually don’t tell others or even want to. The bar flourishes not because most people are alcoholics, but because God has put into the human heart the desire to know and be known, to love and be loved, and so many seek a counterfeit at the price of a few beers. With all my heart…I believe that Christ wants his church to be unshockable, a fellowship where people can come in and say, ‘I’m sunk, I’m beat, I’ve had it.’ Alcoholics Anonymous has this quality…our churches too often miss it.[1]
The church is supposed to be a place to for folks to belong—a place where nobody can claim a higher position or status than anyone
By coming to save the world, Jesus broke down the deepest divisions between God and man and the deepest divisions of between people. In doing so, He brought peace—real, lasting, ultimate peace. Through Jesus’ death and resurrection, the door to peace is open to all of us.
Listen, we find peace in unity, but that does not mean uniformity. The church at Ephesus was diverse, and the goal was not to change this. The goal was unity in the midst of diversity. It’s the same goal for us today.
We don’t find peace by separating ourselves from others, but by leaning into the grace and unity that Jesus brings. What would happen in our lives and community if the church was a place where we come together and allow God to remove the divisions between us?
Let’s be people of unity. Let’s be people of grace. Let’s be people of peace.
2 – There is Peace in God’s Presence
It’s easier to say we want to be people of peace than it is to actually do it, isn’t it? We live in a world that feels like it’s full of discord and anxiety. News stories demonstrate every day that we struggle with anxiety, depression, and isolation. Headlines trumpet divisions and conflicts of all sorts, from personal disagreements to political wars. We need peace!
Paul is crystal clear 14 that Christ Himself is our peace.
- Peace is not a thing, it’s a person.
- We find peace—both individually and together—in relationship with Jesus.
- We experience it as a fruit of God’s Spirit living in us and through us.
- Peace isn’t something we can create in ourselves; the Holy Spirit brings peace and enables us to live it out.
Being part of God’s family does not mean that our differences and struggles magically disappear. However, it does mean that together we can experience peace in the midst of those differences and
So, what does peace look like in our lives? I can tell you what it doesn’t look like—it does look like everyone in God’s family
Peace is not an image to uphold or a feeling
Peace is the presence of God in His people. His presence through the Holy Spirit allows us to experience peace and to remind each other and the world around us that He is the source of all peace.
3 – Peace is always available
Wouldn’t it be nice if we could find peace once and be done with it? The trouble is that peace isn’t a one-time event. When faced with a lack of peace in a world that lacks peace, Jesus invites us to come to Him and to each other again and again. The prophets who foretold the coming of Christ gave Him the name Prince of Peace. And through His death and resurrection, He made the way of peace available to each of us. When we surrender to Him and accept His offer of salvation, we embrace the way of peace.
But what about the fact that peace seems so temporary and fragile? It seems that peace can be interrupted or destroyed in an instant. The peace we see in the world never seems to last. The good news is that as believers our peace goes beyond a circumstance or a feeling. In fact, our peace is the never-changing, always-present Spirit of God. Jesus knew the hardships His disciples would face, and He promised them peace. He told them in John 14:27 (NLT), “I am leaving you with a gift—peace of mind and heart. And the peace I give is a gift the world cannot give. So don’t be troubled or afraid..” Just as Jesus promised, the Holy Spirit is always with us and is our source of peace.
But we all need reminders. We all need encouragement and support…and that’s where the church should come in.
Like those Legos we talked about earlier, we fit together to form the church—the dwelling place of the Holy Spirit—and the Holy Spirit fills us with the peace of Christ and empowers us to live in that peace and to share with it others.
In gathering here, (1) we come together to live and worship in unity, (2) to collectively focus on Jesus, (3) to experience the peace he gives, (4) and to offer that peace to those who desperately need it.
- Together we are so much greater than the sum of our parts.
- Together we encourage and support each other when we are weak.
- Together we reflect the love and grace of God.
- Together, we find peace in unity.
- Together, we find peace in God’s presence.
- Together, we remind each other that peace is always available.
If you are here this morning and you know that you need peace in your life, let me tell you again that peace is not a thing, it’s a person.
- Peace is not the absence of conflict in your life; peace is Jesus.
- Peace is not having the amount of money you want; peace is Jesus.
- Peace is not everything in life going your way; peace is Jesus.
- Peace is not the report from the doctor being what you want it to be; peace is Jesus.
- Peace isn’t life happening on your terms in your time; peace is Jesus.
If you want to know real, lasting peace, I invite you to know Jesus. (Response and prayer)
Thank you for being here on this Back to Church Sunday. I hope you’ll come back to church next Sunday as we continue this journey together.
[1] Charles Swindoll, “Lessons from a Tavern,” Leadership Journal, 1983. https://www.christianitytoday.com/pastors/1983/winter/83l1027.html
Series Information
How does the idea of togetherness affect our lives and our impact in the world?