00:00:00:54 – 00:00:25:05
Clint Loveall
Hey everybody happy Thursday. Thanks for joining us as we close out the week. And today as we close out the book of Ephesians, we’ve been through the text and we just thought we would offer a couple of thoughts. It’s interesting, Michael, to go through these books about slowly and hopefully carefully, and to see how they fit together again.

00:00:25:10 – 00:01:08:34
Clint Loveall
In many cases, books that I either haven’t taught or haven’t taught in a while. And so it’s I think it’s interesting at the end to reflect on, what it said to us, what struck us this time through, if we missed anything previously, just kind of, to spend a moment seeing what we might have gained. And I think as I went through Ephesians, you know, when you this is one of the benefit, I think, of going start to finish when you preach parts of Ephesians or even use them for devotionals or things, there clearly are themes, but I think when you go from start to finish, you see how interwoven those themes

00:01:08:34 – 00:01:48:45
Clint Loveall
are. And I think in this case, for me, the idea of reconciliation, the idea of unity, such an important word to the church. And I would even argue to society right now in a moment where, yeah, people seem divided on every front, primarily political, but not exclusively political in a time where social media and news outlets and YouTube videos and personalities, have an effect of being divisive, whether they intend to or not.

00:01:48:50 – 00:02:11:21
Clint Loveall
I found myself struck by the call to unity in Ephesians and the idea of being reconciled to one another, the language of being brought together, of being unified. I, there are lots of great things in this book, but by far that’s the one, I think, that stood out to me.

00:02:11:25 – 00:02:47:27
Michael Gewecke
I think it’s really fascinating if you want to give that preaching lunch, you could, in a sermon, read some of the later Ephesians stuff and find yourself talking about marriage. You can find yourself talking about parents and children relationships. These are very practical things. If you’re preaching a sermon earlier in the book, you could be preaching about the theology of Christ self-giving, and you could be talking about tearing down the walls that divide us, and the reality that God’s reconciling work in the world has done this, this thing I, I risk boring you when you’re with us here today.

00:02:47:27 – 00:03:14:48
Michael Gewecke
But but one of my big takeaways from this book is actually makes me smile. If you go to seminary or you go to a school where they’re going to teach theology, lots of educational institutions will have even departments, and one of those departments will be systematic theology, sort of the, the, the get down into the weeds ideas and some of the phrases and the ways that they interlink.

00:03:14:52 – 00:03:36:56
Michael Gewecke
And then that same institution will have what they’ll call practical theology. And, you know, that gets into pastoral care and and prayer and counseling and all these sort of on the ground ministries. Well, my takeaways from this book is the early church. Paul, if you give Paul is the writer of this book. That was no distinction there.

00:03:36:59 – 00:03:59:04
Michael Gewecke
There was no crossover. There was no here’s one thing. And now I’m going to do another thing. It was all one thing, right? Because Jesus did this, this is the practical effect it needs to have on the community. It is all at once thoughtful, and it’s rooted to the history of the church and the scriptures that the earliest church received.

00:03:59:09 – 00:04:24:23
Michael Gewecke
And it’s simultaneously quite a call to discipleship. It calls people to make sacrifices and really meaningful ways. It is neither over metaphorical, and nor is it so literalist that it doesn’t retain meaning. Of course I’m saying it’s in our scriptures. The early church knew that to be the case. They sensed it that it would be useful for generations to come.

00:04:24:37 – 00:04:37:48
Michael Gewecke
I just want to make the case. I think it’s fascinating that the best of Paul’s theology and the best of Paul’s, and so therefore do this, are combined in this book in a really powerful way.

00:04:37:52 – 00:05:19:28
Clint Loveall
I think relatedness, the idea that. As an outflow of what you’re saying, Michael, the idea that because of what Christ did, we have a new relatedness to one another and to the world, in the positive to one another, a bond to one another, that the world had not taught or had not recognized. So that where there were enemies there are now brothers and sisters that where there was separation and division, there’s now oneness, there’s cooperation and congregation.

00:05:19:33 – 00:05:48:02
Clint Loveall
And then, on the other hand, having been called out of the world, we find ourself related in a new way to it. We understand that the world, can be dangerous for the faith because it is broken. And the call to keep that brokenness out of our own lives, not to return to divided ness, not to give, to return to our old patterns and our old lifestyles.

00:05:48:07 – 00:06:21:37
Clint Loveall
And then, you know, ending with that call in chapter six to stand firm and put on the armor of God and and not allow the world to lead us in ways that are harmful to our faith and harmful to our relation to others. So, a new status in Christ that reaches both directions, inclusively to those others in Christ, even though we were once estranged from them and exclusively to the things of the world that don’t help us follow Jesus.

00:06:21:37 – 00:06:39:45
Clint Loveall
And I think that fundamental reorientation of our relationship with world and others and self and Christ, you know, that that that is eloquently woven throughout this book. And I think it made an impact.

00:06:39:50 – 00:07:09:11
Michael Gewecke
I think that one of the gifts of a book like this is it helps us understand that the faith has always had built into it challenge, because it’s always disrupted the social realities of the world in which it was born out. And I think every people group has had the temptation, and this includes us. We’re no exception to this.

00:07:09:16 – 00:07:41:06
Michael Gewecke
We basically think of the Bible as largely saying the things that we think about the world and sometimes correcting us where we go wrong. But where this book shines, I think, is in its ability to show us that the kingdom that Jesus Christ has inaugurated is the kind of kingdom you only gain the access to. If you die with Christ and rise with him.

00:07:41:06 – 00:08:15:25
Michael Gewecke
It’s a cataclysmic change. It’s not. You just wake up with a new idea one day, and that idea is enough to open this path before you know it is a life changing encounter. When one discovers the truth of Jesus Christ died and resurrected, it causes a kind of dying to self that enables the Spirit of God to work within you, to raise within you a new life in this world that is oriented differently to the world that you were born in.

00:08:15:30 – 00:08:38:38
Michael Gewecke
And you become this kind of immigrant in a human land bearing the gospel of Jesus Christ, who is inaugurate a new way of being in the world. That is a way, I think, that this does Clint push back against some of those tribal temptations of the present moment. It’s not to say that humanity hasn’t struggled with tribalism for thousands of years.

00:08:38:38 – 00:09:09:55
Michael Gewecke
We have. But in this moment, this book has something to say to us about the cost of division specifically, which is that we fail to live out the the body of Christ in the world that he has called us to serve. And that is a fundamental reorientation of the assumptions of the world in which we live. And so, therefore, I do believe that this has a clear call to action, which is undergirded to my previous point on the foundation of the faith.

00:09:10:01 – 00:09:23:06
Michael Gewecke
This isn’t just do better for the sake of doing better, it’s do better because Jesus Christ has lived and died and rose again. So therefore, as you live in his life, this is what it costs for you.

00:09:23:11 – 00:10:04:45
Clint Loveall
Yeah. Again, this is, like most of Paul’s writing, this is a book that’s. Packed with challenging thoughts and challenging implications. And I think maybe for me, Michael, that’s the final takeaway that I would have is just whenever I read Paul, particularly through the lens of Pastor, I’m, struck. I admire his ability to. Shine a light on hard things, difficult issues to encourage and rebuke.

00:10:04:49 – 00:10:41:06
Clint Loveall
Sometimes both at the same time, to constantly and consistently circle back around to highlight not the church, not an individual, not himself, but Jesus and his willingness and his commitment to again and again and again, push the cross and push the work of Christ to the center of faith and to the center of the church. It is it is just it’s humbling.

00:10:41:11 – 00:11:13:51
Clint Loveall
It’s inspiring. When you see Paul, the pastor, and watch his mind work and listen to him make an argument and, and make corrections and challenge and encourage and pray for and correct. It’s. That is no easy job. And yet he consistently in the midst of doing it, does it well enough that I find myself jealous and, impressed.

00:11:13:51 – 00:11:40:42
Clint Loveall
And so I, I, I don’t think I ever read a Pauline text without at some level gaining even deeper and deeper appreciation for this man who played such a significant role in establishing churches and helping this fledgling faith. On its initial steps toward growing into something that we now that we now find our place in.

00:11:40:46 – 00:12:13:35
Michael Gewecke
I think that this is related to a previous point, but one of the things that’s striking to me, Clint, is you can read a section of Ephesians and you can take it to mean things that are completely outside the scope of the whole book. And I think this book exemplifies that. You can read the section near the end talking about the relationship between slave and masters, and argue that that’s a prescriptive statement which is intended for all generations of the church.

00:12:13:46 – 00:12:31:28
Michael Gewecke
And we know that can be done because it has been done historically. Yeah. My point is, Christians did it. If you read this book from start to end and friends, you can do it. This is six chapters long. You in one sitting, you could sit down and you could read this from verse one all the way to the end.

00:12:31:33 – 00:13:03:32
Michael Gewecke
And in that one sitting, if you came upon that section, I don’t know whether you’re a skilled reader, whether you’ve done significant study, whether you got your study Bible right there with you or not. I think, you know, straight, straightforward narrative reading of the text. You’re going to see that these themes of unity and self-giving, the importance of the community, the way that we live out our faith, is an illustration of even the reality of what Christ wants to do for the world.

00:13:03:45 – 00:13:25:51
Michael Gewecke
If you see this theme in a crimson thread, just run through the entire book. It has a way of curbing against some of the worst readings that we’ve had of a book like this. I think when you come to the practical sections and you think that they say the thing that you want them to say at any point in history, and you’ve not read the whole thing that goes with it.

00:13:26:04 – 00:13:48:48
Michael Gewecke
I think what you do is you find yourself in danger of making it sound a lot like you and not like the scriptures. And here, this book I just think is a really good example. This is also true of the other books. It’s an example, just an illustration here. But because this book is not that long, I think the challenge here is read the whole thing again.

00:13:48:50 – 00:14:20:40
Michael Gewecke
We’re at the end of this study. Sit down tomorrow. Tomorrow morning, read all six chapters. If you’re a slower read it reader, it might take you an hour and a half or two hours, but read through it, start to finish and and see if that’s true for you that that scene comes out, whatever the theme is, and you can see how it’s all bound together, because the more troubling parts of the text, whatever those were to you in this study, I suspect they’ll be informed by the other things and that that will shed a significant light on what they’re trying to say to us.

00:14:20:45 – 00:14:53:33
Clint Loveall
I think maybe another way to say that, Michael, is just that it’s unfortunate that we have taken a book that so richly presents the idea of righteousness and relationship, and we have pulled pieces out of it and tried to make them rules. Wives obey and kids obey, and slaves and masters. And I think this is a book to your point, that very much resists piecemeal in this.

00:14:53:38 – 00:15:22:39
Clint Loveall
This is a book that is consistent in the thread that runs all throughout, from start to finish. And when we tear out parts of it and say it means this, and we sort of treat that one piece as a, as a cattle prod or a club, boy, I don’t think the book I think you’re exactly right. I don’t think the book as a whole will let us do that.

00:15:22:39 – 00:15:26:55
Clint Loveall
And I think we have to be very, very careful using it. That way.

00:15:27:00 – 00:15:51:48
Michael Gewecke
I appreciate this reading. I appreciate this time with Paul. Appreciate the time together. Want just give you a quick PSA. We’re going to be off for the live study for the next week. So we will be back, week from Monday, and we will return with a new study, which means, if you watch this within the next seven days or listen to this in the next seven days, reach out, tell us what you would like to study, and we’d love to hear from you as we make a plan for the next step.

00:15:51:48 – 00:15:54:50
Michael Gewecke
Otherwise, we will see you, in two weeks.

00:15:54:52 – 00:15:55:33
Clint Loveall
Thanks, everybody.