Ewald Schmidt

“When you believed, you were marked in him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit…” Ephesians 1:13b (NIV)

Every person who has put their trust in Jesus Christ as Lord and Saviour has become part of God’s family. This is the wonderful promise that the Gospel has given to people all over the world. It is sad that this wonderful news is not acceptable to all who say they believe in Christ. In the first century, through the proclaiming of the Gospel through Asia Minor and Europe, more people came to Christ who were not of Jewish descent than the Jews who believed in Christ. This created doctrinal problems for the mother church in Jerusalem.

Some Jewish Christians, who were Pharisees before they met Christ, were adamant that the non-Jewish Christians should also be circumcised, and were expected to obey the Law of Moses. They would not have been welcome in the church otherwise. This tension in the church led to a very important meeting of church leaders in Jerusalem, with the discussion point: What is expected of Christians who are not Jews? What do they need to do to belong to the church of Christ? Peter stated in Acts 15:8-9 “God, who knows the heart, showed that he accepted them by giving the Holy Spirit to them, just as he did to us. He did not discriminate between us and them, for he purified their hearts by faith.”

Even today God’s children can spend so much time arguing about who should be accepted as God’s children, and who should be excluded from the church. That first church meeting in Jerusalem, attended by many apostles, and the teaching of Paul in so many instances echo the message of verse 13: The Holy Spirit is the seal that we are God’s family. How do we know if somebody has received the seal of the Holy Spirit? According to 1 Corinthians 12:3 one of the first signs will be that someone confesses that Jesus Christ is his or her Lord and Saviour.

We can have such huge differences of opinion about our interpretation of the Word of God. Let’s rather celebrate the joy that the Holy Spirit has sealed us as children of God, through our faith that Jesus Christ is Lord!

Prayer: Spirit of God, you have brought us to the point where we have met Jesus as our Lord and Saviour. Through faith your presence is the seal of authenticity that we belong to God. Will you please guide us, and teach us to become what we were created for, to do the good works that will show the world that Jesus is Lord. Amen