| Brothers and Sisters, (Ephesians 3:6) That the Gentiles should be fellowheirs, and of the same body, and partakers of his promise in Christ by the gospel: As we continue to look in the book of Ephesians this morning, here in chapter 3 we see that Paul refers to the Gentiles as being “fellowheirs”. Prior to Jesus coming to this earth, the Jews referred to Gentiles as “dogs”. Gentile people were pretty much despised by the Jewish people, but now in Christ we have been made “fellowheirs”. What does this mean? To understand this term, we have to go all the way back to the book of Genesis where God made a promise to Abraham and established the covenant with his descendants. (Genesis 12:1) Now the LORD had said unto Abram, Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father’s house, unto a land that I will shew thee: And I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee, and make thy name great; and thou shalt be a blessing: And I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee: and in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed. Abram as he was called back then was called by God and left his family in Ur of the Chaldees. Abram took his wife Sarai and all his possessions and followed God not knowing where they were going. Because of Abraham’s faith, God accounted it to him for righteousness. (Galatians 3:6) Even as Abraham believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness. God eventually changed his name from Abram to Abraham which means “father of many” and told Abraham that his seed would be as the stars of the sky or the sands of the sea. The promise and covenant that God made with Abraham was confirmed with his descendants Isaac and Jacob. Abraham and his family were just pilgrims and strangers dwelling in tents and tabernacles. They were in search of the land God had promised them. Now look at what the book of Hebrews tells us. (Hebrews 11:13-16) These all died in faith, not having received the promises, but having seen them afar off, and were persuaded of them, and embraced them, and confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth. For they that say such things declare plainly that they seek a country. And truly, if they had been mindful of that country from whence they came out, they might have had opportunity to have returned. But now they desire a better country, that is, an heavenly: wherefore God is not ashamed to be called their God: for he hath prepared for them a city. Hebrews also tells us that by faith Abraham was in search for that city which hath foundations whose builder and maker is God. (Hebrews 11:10) For he looked for a city which hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God. Abraham was in search of what we call “Heaven”, the eternal city. Now think about what Paul is saying in our text verse, That the Gentiles should be fellowheirs, and of the same body, and partakers of his promise in Christ by the gospel: Paul is letting us know that everyone who is now in Christ Jesus are “fellowheirs” and partakers of God’s promise he made to Abraham and his descendants. The true church of the living God is now made up of both Jews and Gentiles and we are one body in Christ. Like Abraham, we are just strangers and pilgrims in this world and one day soon we’ll be moving out of here into that beautiful land of promise.
Bro. Rick | |
