Ephesians 2:11-12 ESV
Therefore remember that at one time you Gentiles in the flesh, called “the uncircumcision” by what is called the circumcision, which is made in the flesh by hands— remember that you were at that time separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world.
Both Adventist and Evangelical Protestant commentators emphasize the importance of the Gentiles remembering their former state. However, there seems to be a considerable difference in what is being remembered. The Clear Word says, “You were called ‘uncircumcised’ and ignorant by those who were circumcised and claimed to know God.”
While the Gentiles being called “uncircumcised” is certainly true, and it was used in a derogatory manner, The Clear Word is changing the emphasis in this passage. A plain reading of the passage in the ESV (or other actual translation) emphasizes that the Gentiles should be remembering their separation from God. The Clear Word is asking the Gentiles to remember the derogatory remarks of the Jews. Scripture emphasizes that the Gentiles were strangers to the covenant and to Israel and were without God in direct contrast to the Jews who had a covenant with God.
Importantly, the emphasis of Scripture is that Gentiles should remember their separation from God, not the insults of the Jews. This is particularly true in understanding what it means to have broken down the “wall of hostility”. The Clear Word presents a hostility based on the attitude of the Jews rather than on the laws given by God on Sinai. This shift drastically changes the understanding of the passage.
While the Seventh-day Adventist Bible Commentary (SDABC) skips over the issue of Gentiles being called uncircumcised only describing uncircumcision as a term referring to Gentiles, it does describe the “hostility” as an attitude of the Jews (more on this below). It further makes the claim that the reason why Gentiles were strangers to the covenant is that the Jews “failed to carry out God’s plan” and didn’t “invite (Gentiles) to participate in the worship of the true God.” This is why The Clear Word paraphrases “strangers to the covenant” as “you didn’t know about the covenant of promise that God had made with His Son to save us from sin.”
The Clear Word and SDABC make significant additions and alterations to the content of the passage. This is a stark contrast to an evangelical Christian explanation of the passage found in the New International Commentary on the New Testament (NICNT) that the “religious privileges inherited by the Jews were substantial…From all of the privileges the Gentiles had been cut off. They were foreigners, not members of the chosen people.” This is similar to the description in the Expositors Bible Commentary (EBC), “The Gentiles were not entitled to the benefits accruing to the covenantal community. In this respect they were in the position of aliens who could not claim the prerogatives of nationals.”
The reason that Adventists have to depart from the straightforward language of this passage in paraphrasing (Clear Word) or explaining (SDABC) Ephesians 2:11-12 ultimately boils down to a mis-understanding of the covenant between God and Israel. The Clear Word plainly illustrated the confusion that SDAs have between the old covenant and the new covenant when it paraphrases the passage as “you didn’t know about the covenant of promise that God had made with His Son to save us from sin.”
There are so many errors in this Clear Word statement that it is hard to know where to begin:
- There is no record in Scripture of a covenant between the Father and the Son to save us from sin. This alteration of Scripture is based solely on a vision from Ellen White.
- The old covenant was not given to everyone; it was specifically given to the Jews. It is the new covenant that includes all people.
- The promise of the old covenant wasn’t salvation from sin, but temporal blessings for obedience to the Law and temporal curses for disobedience to the Law.
The Clear Word, like Adventist theology in general, fabricates a covenant based solely on the writings of Ellen White and uses that fabricated covenant to replace both the old and new covenants in Scripture. Furthermore, the fabricated old covenant is made to be the same as the fabricated new covenant; therefore Adventism fails to grasp the significance of the change in covenants.
Ephesians 2:13-16 ESV
But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. For he himself is our peace, who has made us both one and has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility by abolishing the law of commandments expressed in ordinances, that he might create in himself one new man in place of the two, so making peace, and might reconcile us both to God in one body through the cross, thereby killing the hostility.
In light of what we have seen so far in this study, there is a big question about how the “blood of Christ” brings us near. All three commentaries mentioned previously discuss the reconciliation and redemption associated with Christ’s blood, but the SDABC adds a couple of unique elements:
- In the SDABC, a specific mention is made of the Gentiles being brought near because “the gospel was preached to the Gentiles”. At first glance there is no cause for concern. Faith comes through hearing; how else were the Gentiles to learn about Jesus if the Gospel wasn’t presented to them? However, when we link this back to the Adventist assertion that the reason that the Gentiles were “strangers to the covenant” was that Israel failed to proclaim it to them, we begin to witness a parallel universe being created by Adventism. This parallel universe shares a basic topography with our world, but it is filled with some very different details. Apparently, the Adventist logic here is that Christ’s death launched the church; the church proclaimed God to the whole world, thereby completing the mission that Israel failed to do; and, as a result, the Gentiles were brought near to God. In this Adventist paradigm, Christ’s death isn’t directly responsible for bringing Gentiles near to God. His death provided the reconciliation and redemption for all (Jews and Gentiles), but the only specific way that His death impacted Gentiles was that God’s love was now being proclaimed to them as it should have been all along.
- The SDABC also finds in this passage that the “blood of Christ is the vindication of God’s good name and the proof of His love.” Again, this is a uniquely Adventist doctrine based on Ellen White’s visions and writings regarding the Great Controversy. This is the core of the Adventist theology of the blood of Christ. In the Adventist paradigm, Christ’s death is about clearing the Father from the accusations of Satan rather than paying the penalty for sin and establishing a new covenant. If what happened on the cross is seen as the foundation for the Christian Church, then Adventist teaching is built on something a little different.
Still, we haven’t come to the biggest differences between Adventism and Evangelical Christianity. The understanding of the phrase “broken down in his (Jesus’) flesh the dividing wall of hostility” is where the difference starts becoming far more apparent. The Clear Word and SDABC hinted at this difference earlier, but now it is addressed head-on. The Clear Word paraphrases this as:
“Christ died for all of us and by so doing, He brought peace between the Jews and Gentiles, between races and nationalities. He broke down the wall of hostility that separated us…having put to death our hostility towards each other at the cross.”
The SDABC describes it as “in Him (Christ) all the divisions of mankind are to be abolished.” In The Clear Word and the SDABC, the “dividing wall” is the antagonism between people of different backgrounds. In Scripture, this dividing wall is the old covenant itself that was made between God and one small nation.
The passage goes on to describe this dividing wall as “the law of commandments expressed in ordinances”. Perhaps looking at the parallel between the phrases will help make this more obvious:
- has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility
- by abolishing the law of commandments expressed in ordinances
“Abolishing” is the breaking down; “the law of commandments expressed in ordinances” is the source of “the dividing wall of hostility”. This brings us to a major question; what is this “law of commandments”?
The Clear Word would have us believe that it was a mis-interpretation of ceremonial laws: “He did away with the requirements of the ceremonial law which we had used to separate us.” The SDABC is even more clear in espousing this position, “It is true that the ceremonial law came to end at the cross, but it should be remembered that the ceremonial system as God gave it did not create the enmity Paul here describes. It was the interpretation the Jews placed on it, the additions they made to it, and the exclusive and hostile attitudes they adopted as a result that were the basis of the hostility.”
The general Christian view is that this dividing wall actually exists in the Laws given by God on Mt. Sinai. For example, the NICNT points specifically to circumcision, to the food laws (see for example Acts 10:28 in regards to the barrier that food laws could have created for Peter dining with Cornelius), and to the wall between the inner and outer courts of the Temple separating Jews and Gentiles.
The NICNT describes the law that is done away with as:
“It is not the law as a revelation of the character and will of God that has been done away with in Christ. In that sense of the term the question and answer of Rom 3:31 remain valid: ‘Do we then overthrow the law by this faith? By no means. On the contrary, we uphold the law.’ The righteousness required by the law of God is realized more fully by the inward enabling of the Spirit—in Jew and Gentile alike—than was possible under the old covenant. But the law as a written code, threatening death instead of imparting life, is done away with in Christ, as Paul argues in 2 Cor 3:6-15. And when the law in that sense is done away with, the barrier between Jews and Gentiles is removed.”
The EBC presents a very similar view:
“The barrier between Jews and Gentiles was overthrown when Christ effectively disposed of the old law with its meticulously defined sanctions enshrined in its innumerable decrees. Paul explains elsewhere that in itself the law is right and good but that unregenerate man is incapable of complying with its demands (Rom 3:19-31; 7:7-12; 8:2-4)…(some) think that Paul has in mind especially the ceremonial law, but its application would appear to include the totality of the law considered as a moral burden. It was in his crucified flesh that our Lord accomplished the annulment of the law ‘so that he might bring into existence’ the new humanity of which he himself as the second Adam is head.”
Because the law was such a substantial part of this section, I relied more heavily than usual on quotes from evangelical Christian commentaries in order to make clear the point that the disagreement with the Adventist teaching on these verses is not limited to former Adventists. These very mainstream commentators present very similar positions to each other and to the understanding put forward by many former Adventists. The question that I would challenge each person to prayerfully consider is which explanation is most consistent with a straightforward reading of the passage?
Therefore remember that at one time you Gentiles in the flesh, called “the uncircumcision” by what is called the circumcision, which is made in the flesh by hands— remember that you were at that time separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world.But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. For he himself is our peace, who has made us both one and has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility by abolishing the law of commandments expressed in ordinances, that he might create in himself one new man in place of the two, so making peace, and might reconcile us both to God in one body through the cross, thereby killing the hostility. (ESV)
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