Sunday, January 5, 2025
/2 Christmas
Jeremiah 31: 7-14; Psalm 84; Ephesians 1: 3-6, 15-19a; Matthew 2: 1-12
The Rev. James M.L. Grace
In the Name of God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. AMEN.
This morning’s sermon is going to be focused on the epistle, which is our second reading. This morning’s epistle is from Ephesians. Epistle is simply a fancy Latin word for “letter,” and that is what we read earlier today – an excerpt from a letter to the Ephesians. “Ephesians” is a reference to the ancient Roman city of Ephesus.
Ephesus is located on the Western coast of Turkey, and if you were to visit it today, you would see an incredible archeological site consisting of ancient Roman roads, buildings, and an amphitheater carved into a hillside. It was at this amphitheater - which today you can visit -that a great riot took place against the ministry of the Apostle Paul.
Ephesus was the location of one of the seven great wonders of the ancient world: the temple of Artemis. Artemis was a goddess of the hunt, and in Ephesus, silversmiths made their livelihood selling silver shrines of Artemis. Paul’s ministry in Ephesus inhibited the silversmith’s profits from selling their silver shrines, because Paul had drawn away a considerable number of their customers because he said that gods made by human hands were not really gods after all.
The silversmiths rioted in the amphitheater at Ephesus, chanting “Great is Artemis of the Ephesians!” against those ministering with the Apostle Paul. You can read all about this encounter in your Bible in the book of Acts, chapter 19.
That is a little bit of history about the Apostle Paul and the ancient city of Ephesus, but I am afraid to say, however, that all of what I just said was rather…redundant. It was redundant because the letter to the Ephesians is likely not a real letter, nor was it written by the Apostle Paul, and neither was it addressed to people in Ephesus. Bummer, right?
Let me work backwards here: I will start with who Ephesians was written to, then who its author perhaps was, and finally address what these words are saying to us today. If Ephesians was not written to people living in Ephesus – Ephesians – who was it written to? If you open your Bible and look at chapter 1, verse 1, of Ephesians, you will find these words: “Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ by the will of God, to the saints who are in Ephesus and faithful in Jesus Christ.” It seems clear that Ephesians was both written by Paul and directed to the Ephesians. Why am I arguing those two points? For several reasons: 1) the earliest copies of “Ephesians” never mention Ephesians by name. Instead the, the earliest copies of Ephesians say “To the saints who are faithful in Christ Jesus.” The title “to the Ephesians” was added sometime in the second century, while the earliest versions of the letter date from the first century.
Who wrote it? Again not Paul, most likely. Why not? Scholars who have studied the epistles of the New Testament recognize that Ephesians differs from other Paul’s other confirmed letters in form, style, and grammar. In short we would say that the author of Ephesians is pseudonymous, which is a fancy way of saying “we have no idea.”
The verses we read today begin with an ancient Jewish prayer “Blessed be the God,” which identifies the author of the letter as well within the Jewish tradition. That is important because of what we encounter in later verses today. The verses in this letter introduce the theme of the whole letter, which is the place of the church in God’s plan. This is important, historically, because it shows a realization amongst early church communities that they were no longer thinking of themselves as distinct congregations meeting in homes or gathering halls, but were now part of a common whole – the body of Christ, which we really see in chapters 2 and 4 of Ephesians.
The author of Ephesians sees the church as a place of reunion and reconciliation between two groups of people: Jews and non-Jews (commonly called Gentiles). We see this clearly in chapter 2, verse 14 of Ephesians, where the author writes, and I quote, “For [Jesus] is our peace; in his flesh he has made both groups into one and has broken down the dividing wall, that is, the hostility between us.” In essence the author of Ephesians is saying that Christ’s physical body on the cross is the means of reconciliation between Gentiles and Jews and between both groups and God.
If the church is nothing else, it is, and must be, a place for union and reunification. It is, and must be, the place where Democrats and Republicans, atheists and evangelicals, drunks and teetotalers, conservatives and liberals come together. The church houses a congregation who are a group of people who under other circumstances would not likely gather together. People who may disagree with one another, but who can nevertheless be unified through Christ to one another. A church should be larger than anything which seeks to divide it.
But it is not enough for us to play nice with each other in church – even if we disagree theologically or politically with one another. Our work is to take the unity in Christ we experience in this place, and bring it into our homes and workplace. Can you go home today and not yell at your spouse, your kids, or your dog? Can you go to work tomorrow and be kind to the person who tests your patience the most? That is the place to start practicing unity – showing up as the same person you are today – here in church – as you will show up tomorrow in your home and to your employer.
Not much remains of the grand Temple of Artemis today – one of the seven wonders of the ancient world. Just one column, artificially pieced together from broken column parts and placed to mark the temple’s former footprint. It fell because of greed, because people wanted the treasures within it, and because people plundered its marble to fashion buildings of their own. It fell because of disunity. Nothing stands while disunity prevails. AMEN.