Ephesians 2:17–18

Notice how He preaches peace. He does not come and say to man, You have to make your peace with God. He preaches peace. He does not preach a peace to be made — a peace that is not made. He preaches peace, a made peace. He has "made peace by the blood of His cross." He has sat down at the right hand of God, with the whole work finished. He comes to Jew and Gentile, no matter to whom, and preaches peace — not a progressive work, but a peace completely made.

Peace has been made by the blood of Christ. So He can now, through His servants, proclaim peace to all who will receive the good news of His finished work of atonement. And note the words "preaching peace." God offers peace to those who hear the message, without money and without price. He offers it as His own gift of grace to guilty sinners.

The verse presents Christ as a Preacher to Gentiles and to Jews after the cross — that is, in resurrection. Yet Scripture never tells us of any unconverted person seeing or hearing Him since He hung dead on the cross. He did appear in resurrection to His disciples and speak peace to them. But when did He preach peace to either Jews or Gentiles? The only answer we can give is — never at all in person. He only did it by means of the apostolic preaching, or in other words, by proxy.

All is credited to Him, because it rests on the cross. And it is Christ, by the Holy Spirit, who now proclaims this heavenly peace. He proclaims it to the Gentiles once far off, and to Israel, favoured until now.

The special privilege of Israel was nearness to God: "You yourselves have seen what I did to the Egyptians, and how I bore you on eagles' wings and brought you to myself" (Exodus 19:4). Compared with all the nations around them, this placed Israel in a priestly standing before God.

Those who were far off were Gentiles, and those who were near were Jews. This appears to be a quotation from Isaiah 57:19, "Peace, peace, to the far and to the near," says the LORD. Notice how He puts the Gentile before the Jew even in Isaiah. All through this chapter in Ephesians the Gentile comes before the Jew. At the start of the apostle's service the order is "to the Jew first and also to the Greek." But here he no longer puts the Jew first. He writes from the Roman prison, where the Spirit is using him to explain the truth of the mystery.

We can understand why the preaching is introduced at this point in a passage that speaks of the formation of the church. The Apostle has just spoken of the cross. Without the cross there could be no preaching, and without the preaching there could be no church. Christ is looked at as the Preacher, though others are the instruments who proclaim the Gospel He preaches.

Christ has been down into death, and this on behalf of sinners. At Calvary the storm of divine judgement broke upon His holy head... But the storm has spent itself now. He is now righteously able to preach peace to men everywhere. The peace He proclaims is not a mere painkiller for the conscience. It is the blessed knowledge that His atoning blood has settled every question justly. And so every storm cloud has been cleared away for ever.

The word "access" only occurs in two other passages in the New Testament, both in the Epistle to the Ephesians... Other places use the verbal form of the same word with the sense of bringing someone into the presence of another. Peter speaks of the work of Christ as introducing us to the presence of God. He writes: "Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring us to God" (1 Peter 3:18).

In the old system, in the tabernacle or the temple, the veil was there. It showed that there was no free access into the presence of God. Only a privileged few, the priests, could go in and worship God; everyone else was shut out. The Gentile could not even enter the court; he had only a special place of his own. So there was no free access. But now every believer in Christ has access into the Father's presence, through Christ and in the power of the Spirit.

The word "one" occurs for the fourth time in verse 18. It is clear that the word carries special emphasis. Verse 14 states that we are one. Verse 15 adds that it is as one new man. Verse 16 shows that we are one body. Verse 18 completes the story: God gives us both one Spirit, and by Him we have access to the Father. How clear it is, then, that in the Christian circle all distinction between Jew and Gentile is completely gone.

It is to guard against the idea that the Jew may have a right of access that a Gentile does not have. Both have access by the same power, "one Spirit".

The distance is not only removed on God's side; it is also removed on our side. By the work of Christ on the cross, God can draw near to us preaching peace. By the work of the Spirit in us, we can draw near to the Father. The cross gives us our title to draw near. The Spirit enables us to use that title and draw near to the Father in practice. If access is by the Spirit, then clearly there is no room for the flesh. The Spirit excludes the flesh in every form. It is not by buildings, or ritual, or organs, or choirs, or through a special class of men that we gain access to the Father.

Note that it is not to God only in sovereign grace above sin, saving the most guilty and wretched. It is to the Father as such. In this access is that relationship of grace which the Son has always known in His own right and title... How wonderful that we should come to the Father, His Father and ours, His God and ours! All glory to Him and His work of redemption, through which alone it could be to us who believe!

In this verse we see the way in which we draw near to God, the order of the Spirit in the heart being the reverse of that of grace. The Father acts by the Son, the Son in us by the Spirit, and since we now have the Spirit, it is by the Son that we address the Father. I cannot pray to God without the truth of the Trinity showing itself. It is not an abstract doctrine. It enters into the practical relationships of every day.

Both have access, but neither of them in his own name or on his own account. Jewish supremacy has no place in the Father's house. And in the peace and gladness of God's adoption, the Gentile's old distance is remembered no more. Christ alone is naturally welcome there, and by Him all who through faith are made bold to draw near.