A Separation Within

For He Himself is our peace, who has made both one, and has broken down the middle wall of separation...  Ephesians 2:14

Paul has some of the biggest sentences in all of scripture and this verse for today is one part of a three-verse sentence of his. The middle wall of separation has been broken down by the One who was Himself our peace. And like the reports in our own words back in the days of school, I just stated what Paul stated without making it a bit more clear. Yes, kind of like those school reports of yesteryear. In the rest of the story, Paul speaks of a middle wall separating the old person and our enmity toward the ordinances of the law. You know it and have felt it in what we call the flesh: that rebellion when someone quotes an ordinance to you and this enmity burbles up from the slime of our former selves. Paul claims here that Jesus broke down that wall between the old rebel and the new spirit of faith in Christ. 

And therefore now the new spirit of faith has full knowledge of what a sinful troll that old person of the flesh has been and still is. That doesn't sound very peaceful. Of course not! Paul clearly states that Christ is our peace, and not you or me. The middle wall is broken down, and now the old nature and the new spirit can go at it like two fighters caught up in hateful verbiage seeking to harm and kill the other. Wait, no. That does not sound very peaceful either. Put it more like this: the new spirit is constantly dragging the old flesh to the Lord Jesus in prayer to flee temptation, walk the way of love, and to live always in Christ. Closer maybe. Perhaps it is more like gaining a new brother or sister who always knows to do right and loves that other person very much who still likes the ways of the fallen world. 

It is a struggle against that old desire, take it to the Lord in prayer! 

Bucky