Remembering What We Once Were

Having for the last one and a half chapters taught us that our salvation is not of ourselves, that it is of God, and that it has come to us on the basis of God's grace which has been given to us in Christ, and applied to our hearts and minds by the Spirit, Paul now wants to open up the fact that those who are saved, both Jews and Gentiles, are one spiritual body through Christ's work. He is going to take many verses opening this blessed truth up, and so it will be best for us if we can look at the various aspects of this great truth as they come to us from Paul's inspired analysis of it. Tonight I would like us to focus on the truth that we as Gentiles should remember what we once were. 1st – We Gentiles were once aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and thus knew no saving mercy. 2nd – We Gentiles were strangers from the covenants of promise, and thus we had no hope. And 3rd – We were far once afar off, but now we have been brought near by the blood of Christ.