What culminating set of images does Paul use in Ephesians 2:11-22 to signal unity between Jews and Gentiles in the church?
Reviewing Ephesians 2:1-22, we recall that verses 1-10 teach that we live in solidarity with Jesus, while verses 11-22 teach that we live in solidarity with others as part of His church. Jesus’ death has both vertical benefits in establishing our relationship with God (Ephesians 2:1-10) and horizontal ones in cementing our relationships with others (Ephesians 2:11-22).
Image © Rolf Jansson from GoodSalt.com
Through the Cross, Jesus demolishes all that divides Gentile believers from Jewish ones, including the misuse of the Law in order to widen the gulf (Ephesians 2:11-18). Jesus also builds something — an amazing, new temple composed of believers. Gentiles, once excluded from worship in the sacred places of the temple, now join Jewish believers in becoming a new temple. We all become part of God’s church, “a holy temple in the Lord” (Ephesians 2:19-22, ESV) and are privileged to live in solidarity with Jesus and our brothers and sisters in Christ.
How does Paul’s use of the metaphor of the church as a temple in Ephesians 2:19-22 compare with the uses in the following passages? 1 Corinthians 3:9-17; 2 Corinthians 6:14-7:1; 1 Peter 2:4-8.
Paul employs the metaphor of the church as temple as a culminating image for the full inclusion of Gentiles in the church. Once banned from worship in the “Court of Israel” in the temple, they now not only gain access (Ephesians 2:18) but themselves become building materials for a new temple designed as “a dwelling place of God in the Spirit” (Ephesians 2:22, NKJV).
New Testament authors employ the temple metaphor to visualize the sanctity of the church, God’s role in founding and growing the church, and the solidarity of believers within the church. The metaphor is used in conjunction with biological language (see Ephesians 2:21-22, where the temple “grows”), and the process of building is often accentuated (see , “you also are being built together,” ESV). Rather than a static image, the church is able to acknowledge its identity as “the temple of the living God” (2 Corinthians 6:16, NKJV).
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