Wednesday
(Ephesians 2:11-16) Feeling like an outsider is one thing (some people get a charge from rebellion) but being excluded is even worse. Paul paints a bleak picture of the Gentile reality face to face the calling of Israel and Israel’s God. They were living “without God and without hope.” That’s Paul’s summary. The Gentiles believed in gods, but according to the Creator God of Israel, the gods were nothing but lifeless idols and demonic. If their gods were their source of hope, then they were without any genuine hope. All this left them excluded from the Jewish Messiah, promises, and worship of the True God. It saddens me that we have gone full circle in our Western culture. Many live life trusting in self, science, politics, and progress to help them flourish. We celebrate our idols of power and they leave us with a fleeting hope that lasted for a moment. Like then, it will take the power of the Gospel and Holy Spirit to break our Western spell.
