Ephesians 2: Metaphors for the Body of Christ

This week, my off-lectionary church will be considering the second chapter of Ephesians. As I read this chapter several times, I was drawn to the imagery at the end of the chapter. Notice the language of building a structure: Christ is the cornerstone, and the prophets and apostles are the foundation. It’s a very different image from ones we might be used to hearing.

It wasn’t too long ago that we were thinking about the body of Christ, and how all of the body parts need to work together. You might be the eyelash of the body, which seems like an insignificant part. But if you didn’t have eyelashes, you’d constantly get dust in your eyes and have trouble seeing.

We’ve also been used to agricultural metaphors. If Christ is the vine, and we are the branches, what does that mean? If that vine bears fruit, what kind of fruit are we? We may think of the withered fig tree and what can be done.

Now we have a different metaphor, but it teaches us the same sort of lesson. We need a good foundation for a building to last through the decades and the centuries. But a good foundation isn’t enough.

A wall standing by itself is not a building that will shelter us. We need the presence of other walls to finish the building.

A roof without proper support won’t last long. Some of us are called to be the rafters, while others might be hardware (nails, screws, hurricane strapping) that keeps the frame holding together. All of that work won’t last long without something to protect the wood: tar paper, shingles, tiles, concrete.

The last verses of the chapter give us a building that functions as a metaphor on several levels. The church is made of members, much like a building is made of joists and beams and rafters and all of the elements that hold it all together. Ideally, the church is built on good foundational elements: Christ, ancient teachings, the wisdom of those who have studied intensely, the creative practices of those who delve deeply.

But the building also works as a metaphor for us as individuals. We are called to be church together, but this chapter also reminds us that God dwells in us, and as such, we can be temples for God.

It’s an interesting idea, the individual as a mobile temple by which God moves in the world. Here, too, we can be temples with a solid foundation, pilings of Christ and the apostles and the prophets. With a solid foundation, we won’t be destroyed by all the storm forces that will damage a flimsy structure.

I’m cautious about this metaphor because we live in a time where we’re told we need to look out for ourselves (and our nation) first and let the others fend for themselves. But history has told us over and over again that we are stronger when we stand together.

This message winds throughout this chapter from Ephesians. We are stronger when we stand together. When we stand together, we are so much more than a wall. We are a structure that prevails.