Church Growing in Spirituality
Series Title: Who We Are
Scripture: Ephesians 2:18–20
John Son
18 For through him we both have access in one Spirit to the Father. 19 So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, 20 built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone,
Introduction
As we come to our passage today, I want us to notice how beautifully Paul brings together the two dimensions of Christian spirituality that we talked about earlier.
Christian spirituality is fundamentally relational. It is about being brought into a relationship with God, and then living out of that relationship with the people God has placed around us. And in these few verses, Paul gives us a beautiful picture of both.
He begins in verse 18: “For through him we both have access in one Spirit to the Father.”
What an incredible statement. Through Christ, we have access to the Father. We are no longer distant from God or separated from Him. Through Jesus, and by the Spirit, we have been brought near. We have been welcomed into a relationship with the living God as our Father.
And then Paul continues in verse 19: “So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God.”
There is a movement here that is easy to miss. Paul moves from access to the Father to belonging to the household of God. We are brought near to God, and in being brought near to Him, we are also brought into a new relationship with one another.
We are no longer strangers. We are no longer outsiders. We belong. We have been made part of God's household.
And I think these two realities are important for us to hold together because it is very easy to grow in one while neglecting the other.
For some of us, it may be easier to focus on our personal relationship with God — prayer, Scripture, worship, and our own walk with Christ — while remaining somewhat disconnected from the people God has placed around us.
But it can also go the other way. We can build a warm and close-knit church community — good friendships, genuine belonging, people we enjoy being around — and yet, somewhere along the way, our relationship with the Father can become secondary. We can begin to mistake our closeness with brothers and sisters in the church for our closeness with God.
And if we're not careful, over time we can become well-churched and well-connected, but remain spiritually immature.
That’s why I think Paul’s picture here is so important. Christian spirituality is not simply about having a strong personal relationship with God, nor is it simply about being deeply connected to the people of God. It is about knowing the Father and belonging to His family.
So today, I want us to slow down and look at these two realities together.
First, what does it mean that through Christ, we have access to the Father? What does that tell us about our relationship with God?
And then, what does it mean that we are members of the household of God? What does that tell us about our relationship with one another?
Because these are not two separate parts of the Christian life. They belong together. The God who brings us near to Himself also brings us into a family. So let's begin with Paul's first statement: We have access to the Father
1. We Have Access to the Father
Let’s look at verse 18 again: “For through him we both have access in one Spirit to the Father.” There is something beautiful about this verse. Paul shows us the work of the Triune God — we come through the Son, by the Spirit, to the Father. Our relationship with God is not something we could have made possible on our own. The Father opened the way, the Son made the way possible through His blood, and the Spirit brings us into the Father’s presence.
The word “access” here in the original Greek was used in Paul’s day for being ushered into the presence of a king. It's the word for the kind of introduction you'd need before you could stand before royalty. You didn't just walk into a king's throne room. You needed someone to bring you in, to vouch for you, to grant you an access.
And that's exactly what Christ has done for us. Just a few verses earlier, in verse 13, Paul says that we were once “far off,” but now we have been “brought near by the blood of Christ.” We were far from God, but Jesus has brought us near. Through His death on the cross, He opened the way for us to come into the presence of God.
And we see this so clearly in what happened at the moment of Jesus’ death. Matthew 27 tells us that “The curtain of the temple was torn in two, from top to bottom” (Matthew 27:51a). That curtain was the veil that separated the Holy of Holies — the place that represented the very presence of God — from the rest of the temple. It was a physical reminder that sinful humanity could not simply enter into God’s presence.
But when Jesus died, that veil was torn from top to bottom. It wasn't torn from the bottom up, as if we were somehow reaching our way toward God. It was torn from the top down because God Himself opened the way. Through the death of His Son, the barrier was removed, and we were brought near.
That is what Paul is talking about when he says, “We have access… to the Father.” The way into God's presence is no longer closed to us. Christ has opened it.
And there is one more important detail in what Paul says. He doesn't simply say that we have access to “God” in some general sense. He says we have access to the Father. This is familial language. We are not approaching a distant judge's bench, hoping he'll be in a good mood. We are coming home to our Father's house, welcomed by the Son, carried in by the Spirit.
And this is where Romans 5:2 helps us see something more. Paul says - 2 Through him we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God.
We talked about this last week — that we don't simply exist because of the gospel; we now live in the gospel, standing in the grace of God that we did not earn and cannot lose.
So the access Christ gives us is not simply about being allowed into God's presence. It is about the new place in which we now stand. We have been brought near to the Father, and we now live every day standing in His grace.
That means we don't come to God trying to earn our place before Him. We don't come hoping that our prayers, our Bible reading, or our spiritual disciplines will somehow make us acceptable to Him. We come because Christ has already brought us near, and we stand in the grace He has already given us.
And from that place, we can continually grow in our relationship with the Father.
So let me ask you directly: are you actually using this access? Because it's possible for us to believe, doctrinally, that we have access to the Father, and still functionally live at a distance from him — treating prayer as a box to check, treating the Word as information to gather rather than a voice to hear, treating “quiet time” as one more task on a to-do list instead of an actual appointment with the living God.
So the question is not simply whether we have access to the Father, but whether we are actually living out of that access. Are we cultivating that relationship with Him? Are we making room to know Him, to hear from Him, and to grow in our relationship with Him?
And that is at the heart of what it means to pursue spirituality as a church. We want to be a church that continually grows deeper in our relationship with the Father.
Prayer, the Word, worship, and the spiritual disciplines we practice are not ends in themselves. They are means of cultivating our relationship with God — knowing Him more deeply and becoming more like Christ.
In Christ, we have been given access to the Father, and because we have that access, we can continually grow in our relationship with Him.
And from this relationship with the Father, Paul now moves to our relationship with one another.
2. We are members of the household of God
See what Paul says next in v.19 - “So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God.”
Now, those two words, “strangers and aliens,” originally describe the Gentiles’ relationship to God. They were people outside the covenant, separated from God, and without a place among God’s people. They were strangers and aliens to God.
But in Christ, that has completely changed.
And Paul takes it even further. He is not only saying that you are no longer strangers and aliens to God. He is saying that you are no longer strangers and aliens to one another.
In other words, because of what Jesus has accomplished on the cross, the barriers have come down in both directions. We are no longer strangers and aliens to God, and we are no longer strangers and aliens to each other.
If you look just a few verses earlier in v.14, Paul says - 14 For he himself is our peace, who has made us both one and has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility. The gospel is not just the bridge that gets us to God; the gospel is also a sledgehammer that tears down walls that separate us.
And that means that our differences no longer have the final word. It doesn’t matter where you’re from, where you grew up, or where you live now. It doesn’t matter the color of your skin, your ethnicity, your background, how much money or education you have or don’t have. In Christ, we belong to the same household as brothers and sisters!
And yet, my brothers and sisters, if we’re honest, the reality of many churches today is that the people of God continue to live as if we’re strangers and aliens to one another.
We call each other brothers and sisters. But in true reality, and functionally, apart from the group of friends you hang out with, we often live as strangers and aliens. That's the reality of so many churches in the world today!
And as much as I want to say that's not our reality at New Hope, we need to ask ourselves - do we really functionally relate to each other as brothers and sisters? or do we functionally relate to each other as strangers and aliens?
Yes, we see each other every Sunday. Yes we might pray for one another from time to time. But are we truly brothers and sisters functionally?
What the Lord is reminding us today is that - God has opened up a new reality for us - that we are now brothers and sisters that belong to the same family. And no matter how difficult or inconvenient it is for us to relate to one another for all kinds of reasons, that doesn't change this profound truth that we are still family.
So then the question is, even in light of this new reality, why is it that we still live as strangers and aliens? Why is it that we have a hard time with this notion that we are a family?
Well, maybe for some of us - maybe you've been hurt by the church. So you don't want to relate as family.. because you've been hurt. And you say - I know what it's like to move up close to someone and I know what it's like to be hurt. So I'd rather treat you as a stranger or alien, lest you hurt me again.
Or perhaps for some of us, your purpose in coming to church is centered around ‘what you can get out of it’, rather than ‘how you can build it’ - that what you look for in a church is – whether it provides a certain quality of worship experience and certain programs that you can appreciate.
Now, I’m not saying that these things are not important. They are important and the church must strive for excellence in all that we do whether it be in preaching or in teaching or in praise or in fellowship. The church must not settle for what is mediocre but always aim for the best of what we can offer up to God.
But what we need to remember is that the church is not an event, it's not a location, it's not a product, and it's not an experience. If this is how you see the church, it's only a matter of time that you hop from one church to the next because once you think you got everything you can get out of it, there is no reason to stick around anymore. And it becomes so easy for you to treat people you meet at church as strangers and aliens, especially if you find them to be different from you or uninteresting.
But God is speaking His word of truth over all of us today - that we are to be more than just strangers and aliens. We are to be a family, a family that bears the name of Christ, a family belonging to the household of God.
Yes there could be people in the church who might hurt you and get under your skin. And there could be people who are different from you, who don't see things the same way you do. But that doesn't negate the fact that God has brought us together into the same household through the same spirit.
And as Jesus destroyed the barrier that separates, as Jesus brought down that diving wall of hostility, people who were once estranged and hostile toward each other has been joined in Him, and a new human family has been created.
Application
So then, the question is - How do we live this out? How do we live out this reality?
I'm going to close by offering some practical ways for us to move forward as the family of God at New Hope Fellowship. I’m sure there are many ways but I’ll just be sharing three.
To live as the family of God means that:
1. Life is Shared
Family is the place where we are known, and family is the place where we know others. It's the place where we share our hopes and our hurts. It's a place where we care for one another.
It's often the case that people go to large churches to remain anonymous. And even though we are not a huge church here at New Hope, it's relatively easy to stay under the radar if you wanted to.
But that's not how God wants you to participate in the church. He wants you to be fully present as a member of His family, where you are known by other members and you know them and we share our lives with one another.
Now I'm not suggesting that this kind of shared life happens automatically as soon as you step foot in our ministry. Sharing life is a gradual flow that requires time. But the question is - are you moving along that spectrum where you are known by others and others know you?
Everyone here today, Let me ask you - Are you known? Do people know your background? Do people know your current struggles? Do people know your anxieties and your fears? And do you know these things of other brothers and sisters in our church?
The invitation for us as we move forward as a family is that our lives would be increasing the shared with one another.
[Secondly, To live as the family of God means that]
2. Conflict does not have the last word.
To be a family means that from time to time conflict will arise. Because there is no family that’s free from conflict. In fact, conflict happens all the time within a family. And that's normal!
But conflict does not have to have the last word.
To be a family means that disagreement and conflict will come up and it's important to normalize that in the family of God.
Because this is what often happens within church settings -
There are three phases that people go through when they come into a church:
- at first there is an idealism that takes place. You've been at the church for a month and and it feels like it's the best Church you’ve ever been in. Everyone is so loving and welcoming. Everyone is so happy. You like the pastor and you like the sermons, everything is great - so there is this idealism, an illusion that we project. So it’s like the honeymoon phase.
- But then what inevitably happens is that - if you stay around for a little while, your idealism gives way to certain disappointments – that little by little you begin to see the gaps that exist in the church – this is the point when people consider leaving!
We get so caught up in an ideal that when disappointment comes, we say - I don’t know if I want to stay at this church. This church is no different than the other churches I’ve left.
But you know what? At the end of the day, there is no such thing as a perfect church.. at least not until Jesus comes back to fully restore it. The church is where the broken people gather to be restored in the Lord. The church is where sinners gather to be cleansed by the blood of Jesus. But when disappointment comes, that’s all we can see.
But it's at this point where we need to move past our disappointment to having a sense of covenant hope.
And if you last long enough in a community, you will see that members of the community are neither saints nor devils, but people... each with mixed-bag of darkness and light, of good and bad - that we are all mixed-bag.
Ron Rolheiser, who is a theologian and a priest, said that "Church is a place to help others carry their pathologies and to have them help carry mine."
This is what it means to be in the family of God – to know that - yes, we may have conflicts. But conflict does not have the last word.
[And finally, here's the last thing I want you to hold on to: We are not just people who share lives, we are not just people who look past and rise above conflicts and disappointments...]
3. We, as a church family, carry each other to God.
And that's what a family does. We carry each other to God! that our lives are to be marked by mercy and forgiveness and grace and intercession. And we are invited to be a people that carry each other to God.
In a world that is increasingly marked by division, hostility and hatred, the world needs the church to show what's possible with God. The church needs to be the hope that the world cannot find on its own.
My brothers and sisters, our bond as a family is not through our blood. When I look at New Hope downtown, I see great diversity amongst us.
People from many different backgrounds, ethnicities and generations. And yet! We are one family!
And what joins us together is not OUR blood.. What joins us together is the blood of Jesus Christ running in our spiritual veins that bonds us together. And what God is inviting us into is a new human family that the world has never seen - that instead of treating each other like strangers and aliens, we would be the family of God, bound by the blood of Jesus Christ, sharing our lives with one another, bearing with one another even in times of conflict and disappointments, and carrying one another and helping one another to grow in deeper intimacy with God.
May this be the kind of spirituality that we pursue here at New Hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.
Conclusion
So this is what it means to live out our spirituality: we have access to the Father, and we belong to his family. These are not two separate pursuits competing for our attention. They flow from the same gospel, the same cross, the same Spirit. You cannot have real closeness with the Father and stay distant from his people. And you cannot have real closeness with his people while neglecting the Father who called you into being his child in the first place.
So my prayer for us as a church is that we would be a people who actually use our access — who come to the Father in prayer and in the Word, not out of obligation but as sons and daughters — and who then take that same nearness and extend it to one another, as brothers and sisters bound not by blood, but by the blood of Jesus Christ.
Reflection and Response
Let's take a moment to reflect and respond to what God has said to us today.
Where has your relationship with God become more of a routine than a relationship? What would it look like this week to actually come to the Father, using the access Christ has given you?
Where have you been relating to people at church as strangers and aliens rather than family — keeping your distance, staying anonymous, or holding people at arm's length?
Who is one person God is calling you to carry to him this week — in prayer, in presence, or in an act of care?
