The Far Away Are Brought Near - Ephesians 2 - DTS011

Without God, there is no hope.  History has lead the world as a whole towards chaos and destruction.  It is characteristic of pagan philosophers and other religions to offer no hope for a better future, giving nothing certain to look forward to.  But now, in Christ Jesus, all of us who were far away from God have been brought near by His blood.  In Christ, all barriers have been broken down so that the same gospel applies to all people.  All who are saved, are saved through Christ, and so are made members of God's household.   We are, therefore, given hope and a future with the living God as one people, regardless of where we come from or who we are. Ephesians chapter 2 continues as chapter 1 left off, describing our salvation in Christ.  The first three verses describe what we were without Christ, verses four through six talk about what God has done about that, and verse 7 tells us why He did it.  In love, he has shown us mercy and the incomparable riches of His grace.  Verses eight through ten summarize everything up to this point.  We are saved by grace, though not apart from Christ's atonement for us.  The following verses, 11 through 22, then show what comes out of that.  Because we are saved by grace through the blood of Christ, we are made citizen's of God's house, having a sure foundation and a unified future as one people under Him.There is some microphone bumping at a couple of places, and around the 31:02 mark there is a blank spot where the tape was flipped during recording.  However, I hope you can forgive those flaws in the recording and enjoy this teaching from the book of Ephesians, recorded in January of 1980 at the First Baptist Church in Ballinger, Texas.This is the fourth of six expository messages on the book of Ephesians.  The first was an introduction, the second covered verses 3 through 14 of chapter 1, and the third covered verses 15 through 23 of chapter 1.  This message covers all of chapter 2.  The following episode of Delivered to the Saints will cover chapter 3, and the sixth and final message in this series will cover chapters 4 through 6.