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they were not much by the standards of their day . Women, Children, some men enslaved and free . They were not people of status or nobility. Their reality was slave ocracy and empire. The household

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and the pagan temple, the governor and the emperor rising up meant death. Perhaps even death on a cross. Reality meant finding a way to survive. Not unlike the descendants living under Jim Crow in the

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southeast or their hoes and the hoes facing lynching on the borderlands of what we now call texas. These would have gathered to hear what today we call Ephesians . Lost to history is the name of the true

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writer and even the place to which these ancient words were written. And I imagine those gathering being unsurprised by the household codes. The wives obey, Children , obey, slaves obey of Ephesians. That was

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life. That was reality. That was expected behavior by those who were at most dependent and many of them enslaved human footed property. What would have surprised them are the words that precede the household codes,

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the words which include the assertion that christ is our peace and that there is one body and one spirit , one Lord, one faith and one baptism. Those words begin with what seems at first a very

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simple statement may the God and father of our Lord jesus christ be blessed. This statement strikes us as completely ordinary. Of course God is the father of our Lord jesus christ. Of course God is to

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be blessed but friends. That one phrase begins a sentence that goes on for another 10 verses, many as an editor and as this and as this incredibly complex sentence winds out, we hear a remarkable rehearsal

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of redemption, an assertion of manu mission adoption. Even on this day after reformation day, even an assertion of predestination. Indeed, this one sentence lays out such an a noble description of these humble non

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persons of the roman emperor empire, but it must have given them pause for the gathered community are author claims the status of those chosen in christ from the very foundation of the world, even before there was

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time, God knew and chose them. Moreover, this insignificant bunch really constitutes God's own Children, adopted into God's family and granted a divine inheritance. Children , women, enslaved people, people with no status

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and no real power in the overall scheme of roman life. Can't you just imagine the looks around the room, the raised eyebrows, the suppressed giggles, and without the slightest hint of irony, the preacher

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preaches on. We have been given the price of our manu mission, forgiveness of our offense is a manual mission perhaps not fully appreciated by those bodies who were actually enslaved. Still, the preacher continues,

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we have access to divine mysteries of God's plan for the fullness of time and all of this. As the preacher prepares us to live, just as the Levite have folded to live for the praise of God's

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glory. This is who we are, says the preacher. We not the temple priests, not the emperor and his diviner. We Children. Women, enslaved people. Yes. And he continues. In

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case you don't believe me, check the receipts. You have received the Holy Spirit. That is the down payment of all this greatness. That is ours as Children of God has divine heirs as keepers of

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the mystery. Children. Women enslaved people. Yes , after such an opening statement, after being called nothing short of Children of God. Can you blame our forebears for standing? Just a little straighter for

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holding their heads just a little higher. For walking , just a little taller than others. Outside of their illicit gathering. Yes, they were women, Children, enslaved people, but also Children of the

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most high God Ares of the covenant keepers of the mystery leaders of divine praise. Yes, they could be forgiven for hearing all of those things and thinking that the preacher is doing a wonderful it's a bit

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incredible job of spelling out to the unbelieving world just exactly who they are. Yeah, but that is not exactly what the preacher is doing. Remember the subject, May the God and father of our Lord

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, jesus christ be blessed, May God be blessed . The subject friends of the preacher's long and involved . Opening exhortation is not the community of faith. They are, if anything, the direct object those

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acted upon. They are chosen granted manu mission for given, given an inheritance prepared for God's praise, sealed with the spirit. Yes, all these things happen to them, but they are not the subject

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of the preacher's discourse, moreover, friends, not even jesus christ is the subject of the preacher's discourse . Jesus christ, of course, is the one through whom, By whom, With whom? Because

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of whom these insignificant people have status before God, jesus blood. And yes, in the ancient world , blood sacrifices, still a perfectly legitimate mode of divine interaction, Jesus blood becomes a price by which

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the people are man. You mated, jesus is the agent through which the community adoption takes place in jesus, the community has an inheritance, and ultimately , the preacher continues into jesus as the head of

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all creation, all will be drawn up, recapitulated , thumbed up, jesus is the means, and jesus is the agent. But for the preacher to the Ephesians, jesus christ is the indirect object.

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Remember the subject may God be blessed for the preacher , Jesus, life and death are only salvage it because God made them so for the preacher, even the one through who we are all saved, all

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named, All made new is not the subject. God is the subject. Friends. As we gather , like the earliest audience of Ephesians to hear again the preacher, we gather as the church have come

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a long way from our ignominious roots pastors, now , people of status, even in this post christendom age, christians are now at least somewhat respectable. Our gatherings are hardly illicit. If anything, they

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represent the power structures, the status quo, the source of respectability and honor, especially in the north american continent in this southern state that still considers itself to be the bible belt. Moreover, we come

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to this text on this all Saints Day with power , but our ancestors could not have imagined to ourselves . We take the power to acquire education, to change our class status, To share our political discourse

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. Yet without exaggeration in the least, to change our very world, we the Church long to be mission all to make a difference, to do good , to bring down heaven to Earth by our own

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force of will. Mhm. How much more do we need to take a deep breath on this All Saints Day and listen for the breaths of the ancestors ? How much more on this day of remembrance?

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Do we need to remember? The subject to remember ? The subject is to embrace the and not we ourselves of the psalmist. It is to confess that we and our persons do not save ourselves man unit

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ourselves, claim ourselves as Children of God, Grant ourselves an inheritance or set ourselves up for the praise of God. It is to confess that we and our persons do not grant ourselves salvation, secure our

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own adoption or seal ourselves with the Holy Spirit and that all things are not gathered up summed up, recapitulated in us. It is remembering the subject and in remembering the subject, we to whisper in all

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the benediction of the preacher passed down to us through the breaths of our ancestors. May God be blessed , May God be blessed, May the God and father of our Lord, jesus christ be Blessed see

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? But the author of Ephesians is doing in these two long sentences is spinning out of vision, an apocalyptic vision of a not as yet achieved reality poured forth among the marginalized of the roman empire. The

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gathered community comprised those who even had they desired to do so could not have revolted realistically from the sexist , misogynistic imperial slave ocracy into which they were born . There was not yet an argument about the rights

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of human beings separate and apart from the community as a whole. No thomas, Jefferson had yet declared all men. Well, let's be honest, all free non black landowning biological males to be equal.

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No Universal declaration of human rights had been issued out of a not yet even considered United Nations. Neither the preacher nor the community likely could envision a present reality of justice and freedom. Still, they dare

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to look toward an s scatological hope, hope in which they were no longer insignificant non persons, but Children of God inheritors of the kingdom, lead by its of an S scatological temple, chosen by lot

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with one goal, the praise of God's glory. Now our ancestors in the first century could not imagine our calls for justice. Neither could I later ancestors . Those who persecuted their jewish forebears, and those

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who let inquisitions, those who committed acts of genocide in the name of the new Jerusalem in the Kingdom of God and those who invoking moses and Joshua stole the land and resources out from under the indigenous nations

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who have lived here for millennia. Sometimes sometimes they might have gotten a glimpse of what we now understand as God's divine call for justice. But many, many of our ancestors who call jesus Lord had hoped

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in his divine providence lee just didn't get it. They built churches and preached on behalf of slavery. They built seminaries and held them segregated. They did missions and stripped the people of land and culture.

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They were horrific and depressive and sealed. Yes and radically and amazingly. Saints. Uh huh. So too were those who did rise up the prophets who led movements for freedom but who too were imperfect and

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sometimes deeply ignoble people. These all of these surround us on this all ST today, enslaved and slaveholder colonized and colonizer in every language and from every time and in the sound of their whispering breaths, we

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come to remember that ultimately they are not the subject of our worship. Remember the subject, The subject of our worship is God and God is God is God is God is God is God is God is

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god? Not only is God the subject. God is also the tell us the goal for just as God is the actor bringing forth this eschatological hope. So also the praise of God is to tell us

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the end of all that God has got done. God continues to bring our manu mission to completion and in the end, God, God alone is to be praised. God is to be praised for those

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Saints, women, men, and all other Children of God who tried to be faithful while inextricably tied to and trying to survive in systems of injustice over which they had no control. And when those Saints

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, women, men, and all of the Children of God who were complicit in systems of injustice received welcome into the inheritance of God. God is to be praised that they too are set free man.

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You omitted from sin, restored to their full humanity . Just as are those they oppressed. God is to be praised for those Saints, women, men and all other Children of God who received the prophetic

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call and stood into it even when it costs them their lives, God is to be praised for those saints, women, men and all other Children of God who removed by that seal and down payment of

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our own manu mission to work for the man, you mission and full humanity of every single made in God's image, Child of God. And we and we who like our ancestors, are the direct objects

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of God's good grace. We gathered here at christ table, we gather at the table surrounded by the breaths of our ancestors, manu mated slaves, redeemed sinners. We gather at this table of the one

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into whom God has begun to and will finally and completely gather up all things them and us, the past and the future, the entire created order, things present and things to come. In the end

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, we gather at this table at which are slave price was paid in human suffering. Walking forward as over a way that with tears have been watered, treading our path through the blood of the slaughtered.

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We gather here not to praise the saints, but to praise the God of the Saints, the God of our Manu mission. And there's the God of our predestination and there's the God of our adoption and

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there's the God of our hope and there's and even of the whole creation to let us remember God the subject and tell us of our being and existence and gathered into one with all the saints of every age

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, past, present and future. Let us begin as we will one day end praising God the Lord be with you, lift up your hearts. Let us give thanks to the Lord our God. Yeah