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This weekend we celebrate the anniversary of the adoption of our Declaration of Independence, a statement that boldly stated that tyranny would no longer be tolerated and that we had the right to be free and independent states. It took years for our nation to form and for our citizenship to have any formal meaning. Paul writes of a citizenship that is real for every person who is alive "in Christ" no matter one's country of origin or country of residence. It is our privilege to be a part of the greatest nation on earth, the family of God. It is our responsibility to live out this citizenship to the honor and glory of God.

Expedition Ephesians
Excursion 2: Hope in Darkness

July 3/4: Our True Citizenship
Rev. Dr. Pat Smith

Ephesians 2:19-22

To this day, some people believe the story to be real, but it was a fictional piece published in Atlantic Monthly magazine in 1863. In a time when the nation was torn in two by civil war and her future as the United States of America was in doubt, Edward Everett Hale wrote about a man who turned his back on his country. In the story, a young US Army lieutenant is put on trial for suspected treason. Before the military tribunal, Lt. Philip Nolan, in a fit of petulant frustration bitterly renounces his nation, curses his country and angrily announces, “I wish I may never hear of the United States again!" When the judge reads the verdict, he is found guilty. In his sentencing, the judge icily grants Nolan his wish: he is to spend the rest of his life in exile on warships of the United States Navy, he is never again to set foot on U.S. soil, and explicit orders are given that no one is to ever mention his country to him again. This sentence is fulfilled to the letter of the law. He becomes “The Man Without a Country”.

Deprived of a homeland, Nolan slowly and painfully learns the true worth of his country. After fifty-five years at sea, he lies on his deathbed. A visitor, the first invited to his berth in all those years, finds "a little shrine" of patriotism. Around a picture of George Washington the US flag is draped. An eagle has been painted over Nolan’s bed. A decades old map of the United States is displayed at the end of his bed. Nolan smiles at his visitor and says through raspy voice, “Here, you see, I have a country!” With great emotion, he says, “. . . There is not in this ship . . . there is not in America,—God bless her!—a more loyal man than I. There cannot be a man who loves the old flag as I do, or prays for it as I do, or hopes for it as I do.” He pleads with his visitor to tell him about his country since he last heard it named over half a century before. Nolan is profoundly gratified by every word. Worn out, he asks the one attending him to read from his Presbyterian Book of Public Prayer. It is a prayer for the nation. Then Nolan, who has come to value his country like no other, dismisses his friend in peace.

When I first read this story in grade school, I was deeply moved by what this character experienced. He so easily cast aside the loyalty he should have had to his nation. His sentence struck me as one that was horrifyingly just. The painful path of the return of his gratitude for his country and his longing to enjoy full citizenship once again was a powerful testimony to me as a boy about patriotism and allegiance. That was precisely the intent of the author. Hale, great nephew of Nathan Hale of Revolutionary War fame, was an ardent unionist. His short story was written to appeal to people north and south to consider the value of citizenship.

On this Fourth of July weekend, we celebrate the anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence. That declaration, an act of treason against the British crown, eventually led to the formation of our nation, the United States of America as a separate entity, free and independent. It is in the spirit of that declaration that we affirm once again the freedom we have, the freedom for which we stand, “one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.” Two hundred thirty-four years after the signatures were placed on the declaration we are still learning how to be faithful citizens fulfilling those words from our pledge of allegiance.

Fictional character Philip Nolan longed for a country to which he could never return. That is not our story. We were exiled from God’s peace in Eden because of the mutiny of Adam and Eve. All people on earth have been provided the way to get back to the peace that was lost, the life for which we have always longed. It is a life of spiritual peace and rest, of faith and trust, of intimate relationship with God and the opportunity to live out relationship with each other that brings value and significance. Our longing for country, for home, is satisfied in Jesus. This has always been God’s plan. Many of us here today have surrendered to God through Jesus and accepted the gift of peace that is offered to all who would believe. The question that begs to be answered at this point is, “Now what?”

The answer to this question begins in our text today and runs through the rest of the book of Ephesians. In your bibles, please turn with me to chapter two starting at verse nineteen. In this series, we encourage you to bring your own bibles to worship. We also encourage you to memorize these words so they can constantly compel you to consider who Jesus is and who you are in him.

Look at verse nineteen. You’ll notice that the first word is “consequently”. Whenever we see this word or something similar like “so then” or “therefore”, we must look back to get the context for what we are getting ready to read. I could take us all the way back to the beginning of the letter. In fact, it would help us immensely if we were to take a few minutes tonight before we go to bed to read the first two chapters of this letter as a way of review and reminder at this point in our study. For right now, I’m going to read the immediate context starting back at verse thirteen. This is God’s holy word. [Read Ephesians 2:13-18.]

Now, we come to our text for today, starting at verse nineteen. Please stand with me and let us give voice to this part of God’s word together. [Everyone read Ephesians 2:19-22.] Every time we read God’s word, he wants us to grow in our understanding. I pray that is true for each of us today.

These words inform us we are a kingdom, a family and a building. Paul makes it quite clear how this comes about. If you have been with us very long at all in this series, you should be ready to declare that the answer to most every question that could be asked concerning Ephesians can be answered in two words: “in Christ”. Just so today. How do we come into this kingdom and this family? How do we get to be a building? It is in Christ. In verse twenty: “with Christ Jesus himself”; in verse twenty-one: “in him” and “in the Lord”; verse twenty-two: “in him”. It is only in Jesus that we find ourselves truly home. It is only by Jesus that we can be all that God intends us to be as kingdom, family and building.

In previous messages, Glenn has encouraged us to understand that while we are in Indiana, in car, in the doctor’s office, in neighborhood and in this room we who are Jesus followers are also in Christ. It is in verse nineteen that we see this most clearly in this letter. Here Paul helps us celebrate that we who have yielded to Jesus as Messiah have a citizenship that is beyond all earthly allegiances. We are “fellow citizens with God’s people”, the faithful Jews who trust in God by faith in Messiah Jesus. Once we, as gentile non-Jesus followers, were foreigners and aliens, outside the blessings of God. We were always the outcasts, the visitors, the non-residents spiritually speaking. Israel had the citizenship. We did not. But, now Paul assures us we are citizens of God’s kingdom.

On Friday in Indianapolis, ninety people became naturalized citizens of the United States of America. A few months ago, a man named David Chen was one of nine hundred people who experienced that same ceremony in Lowell, Massachusetts. That evening he posted his thoughts about becoming a US citizen after a twenty year process.

There are many words that I think sum up what citizenship means to a former non-citizen, but the ones I keep returning to are Opportunity and Freedom.

Opportunity is having the option to vote in local and national elections, to engage in our collective polity, and to do your part to shape our country and the world. It is the chance to make a difference, to take control, to take ownership of your fate, and the fate of the place that you live. It is self-determination in its purest form.

Freedom means being able to settle down here, to live here, to have a home here, without worrying that one day you'll be asked to leave this place you have contributed so much to. In the end, freedom is, perhaps counter-intuitively, a sense of permanence.

Today, I am a citizen of the United States of America. And it means everything.

These words of Mr. Chen, now US Citizen Chen, give us opportunity to consider how seriously we take our national citizenship and what it means to be part of a nation that provides opportunity and freedom at levels for which most of the world can only dream.

But we do not stop there. The more important question is ‘What does citizenship in Christ’s kingdom mean to us?’ To be a citizen of his kingdom imbues us with privilege and rights and power beyond compare, today, right now. We don’t wait for heaven. We, who live in the Jesus way, from every part of the globe and every way of life, experience the kingdom now. We have the promises of God. We have forgiveness. We have peace. We have fellowship with God. We have fellowship with every Jesus follower everywhere. We have God’s presence by his Spirit and by Christ who lives in us. We have the joy of growing in the character of Jesus. We have the privilege of living in obedience to our King. What a great life this is as full citizens of heaven every single moment! Wow! What a privilege to be citizens with God’s people!

Look again at verse nineteen. We are “members of God’s household”. We are part of God’s family, the best family of all. No matter how good or bad your family upbringing was or your family situation is now, as a follower of Jesus, you are part of a great family. You may remember verse five of chapter one in this very letter, where Paul writes “In love, God predestined us for adoption to sonship through Jesus Christ”. It is this adoption imagery that brings this forward best. We who once were not part of the family of God’s household now are members of that household. We are fellow children of the king. We are fellow heirs of the grace of life. The apostle John exclaims in one of his letters, “See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God!”

All of us long for love and significance in the eyes of others. Our king has called us into his kingdom. So, we can know he loves us and values us. Being family means we also have the privilege of loving and valuing each other. We know how important that is within each of our households. It does not take any imagination at all to know how important it is for us as brothers and sisters in Christ. We are to relate to each other in kingdom honoring ways. Some of those ways are going to capture our attention as we move into the rest of our study in the months ahead. It is for this purpose, in fact, that Paul will next start a prayer for his readers, a prayer that we will be strengthened by God’s power, that Christ will live vibrantly in us so that we will experience his love and “be filled to the measure of all fullness of Christ”. God’s family loves one another. God’s family values one another. We are family!

Finally, we are a building. In fact, we are the temple of God. Each of the temple structures built in Jerusalem as the house of God was erected like any other building meant to stand the test of time. There was a foundation. There was a cornerstone; not just a ceremonial one, but a true cornerstone, one to which all other parts of the building relate each one finding its true position from the absolutely true placement of the cornerstone. From the one stone, the “whole building is joined together” and rises to be rock solid, lasting, a building that fulfills the purpose of its architect. It is to the temple that Paul points in this text. But, amazingly, his focus is not on the stones in faraway Jerusalem. His focus is on the new temple.

This temple is us. We are the temple. Look at verse twenty. We are “built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets”. This phrase refers to those to whom the testimony of Jesus was first entrusted after Jesus’ death, resurrection and ascension. These teachers first made the good news of Jesus known. They spoke and wrote about the life we know as the way of Jesus. These are the people to whom Jesus entrusted his mission. The building is not built on them as people but on what they taught. Just as the phrase the “law and the prophets” meant all of God’s words of our Old Testament, the Jewish bible, so this phrase, the “apostles and prophets” means all of our New Testament including this letter of Ephesians.

Paul tells us Jesus is the “chief cornerstone” in verse twenty. Then in verse twenty-one he writes, “In him the whole building is joined together and rises to become a holy temple in the Lord.” Everything hinges on Jesus. Everything hinges on our being correctly aligned with Jesus. It is clear that God is the active agent in building this building made up of each one of us. And it is equally clear that we are interconnected in a way that the Lord is present in us as his temple like he once resided in the physical temple in Jerusalem. This is a continuing process, happening in every single moment according to verse twenty-two where we read “you, too are being built together to become a dwelling in which God lives by his Spirit.” We are the temple!

What an amazing ending to this part of this letter! We have walked through months of study to get to this point. We have been exposed to truth after truth as we sit in the presence of God so that we can understand who God is, who Jesus is and who we are in Christ. The words of this letter have drawn us to this incredibly important reality. We are citizens of God’s kingdom with all its rights and privileges. We are the family of God with all its acceptance and significance. We are the temple of God centered in worship and built so all the people of the earth will look on us, see God in us and come back to him through Jesus.

Today we celebrate our country and all it stands for and rightly so. Today we also celebrate our heavenly country and all it stands for and rightly so.

Let us live up to our citizenship! Let us live up to our family commitment! Let us live up to our role as the temple of God!

The rest of Ephesians is going to give us plenty of details. For right now, let me invite you to purposefully repeat daily, “I am a citizen of Jesus’ kingdom. I am part of Jesus’ family. I am the house of God.” That affirmation will encourage, strengthen, humble and embolden you to stand strong in Christ to God’s glory.

What of fictional character Philip Nolan, once a young US Army lieutenant who was convicted of treason? His sentence kept him from country, family and buildings on dry land. His final request to his friend was to look in his bible after he died. “It will open to the right place,” he said. The place marked was Hebrews 11:16. “They were longing for a better country—a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God.” A note was found as well. In it, Nolan asked to be buried at sea and that a marker be placed on the soil of his beloved country with the following words beneath his name: “He loved his country as no other man has loved her.”

Could this be true of us today in terms of our spiritual country? Do you love your heavenly citizenship more than anyone has ever loved her? As God’s children, let us live as faithful citizens of the greater kingdom, the greater family and the greater temple following in the way of Jesus with every breath we take.