9”.. making known to us the mystery of his will, according to his purpose, which he set forth in Christ 10 as a plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth.
New International Version he made known to us the mystery of his will according to his good pleasure, which he purposed in Christ,
God has now revealed to us his mysterious will regarding Christ—which is to fulfill his own good plan.
making known to us the mystery of his will, according to his purpose, which he set forth in Christ
NASB 1995 He made known to us the mystery of His will, according to His kind intention which He purposed in Him
Having made known to us the mystery of His will: Part of what belongs to us under the riches of His grace is the knowledge of the mystery of His will, God’s great plan and purpose which was once hidden but is now revealed to us in Jesus. Through the Apostle Paul, God called us to consider the greatness of God’s great plan for the ages and our place in that plan.
“In the New Testament sense a mystery is something which is hidden to the heathen but clear to the Christian.” (Barclay)
The idea behind the word dispensation also reflects a plan or a strategy. “The plan which the master of a family, or his steward, has established for the management of the family… it signifies, also, a plan for the management of any sort of business.” (Clarke)
That… He might gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven and which are on earth; in Him: God’s ultimate plan is to bring together — to ultimately resolve — all things in Christ, either through Jesus as a Savior or Jesus as a Judge; this will happen in the fullness of the times.
The word for gather together has the idea of “to unite” or “to sum up.” It was used for the process of adding up a column of figures and putting the sum up at the top. Paul’s idea is that God will make all things “add up” at the end, and right now He is in the process of coming to that final sum.
This shows that God wants to unify all things in our lives under Him. “It is a heresy of our times to divide life into sacred and secular.” (Foulkes)
This is the great resolution and deliverance that even the creation groans for (Romans 8:18-22), the day when every wrong will be righted and every matter resolved according to God’s holy love and justice.
Bruce on the fullness of the times: “When the time is ripe for the consummation of his purpose, in his providential overruling of the course of the world, that consummation will be realized.”
In Him also we have obtained an inheritance: For believers, Jesus is not a judge, but the One in whom we have an inheritance. Believers are predestined for this according to the counsel of His will — again, the reasons for His choosing reside in Him, not in us.
Being predestined according to the purpose of Him who works all things according to the counsel of His will: We see three aspects of God’s plan working together. It begins with His purpose, then the counsel of His will, and finally results in His work. God made His plan carefully according to an eternal purpose, taking counsel within the Godhead, and then He works with all wisdom.
“Our God is a God who not only wills; He works; and He works according to His will… The word counsel stands for deliberate planning and arranging, in which the ways and means of carrying out the will are considered and provided for.” (Morgan)
By the counsel of His will: “God doth all by counsel, and ever hath a reason of his will, which though we see not for present, we shall at last day. Meanwhile submit.” (Trapp)
That we who first trusted in Christ should be to the praise of His glory: God’s purpose in all this is so that those who have trusted Christ will exist to the praise of His glory. The goal of God’s ultimate plan is to glorify Him.
We who first trusted in Christ: This speaks of Jewish believers. The words you also in Ephesians 1:13 speak of Gentile believers. God’s great plan has a place for both Jew and Gentile, and it brings them both together in Jesus.
Having made known unto us the mystery of his will.–In the same connection we read in 1Corinthians 2:7, “we speak the wisdom of God in a mystery.” The word “mystery” properly signifies a thing which (see Ephesians 3:5; Colossians 1:27) “was hid from all ages, but is now made manifest.” So our Lord evidently uses it (in Matthew 13:11; Mark 4:11; Luke 8:10). For the rest, except in four passages of the Apocalypse (Revelation 1:20; Revelation 10:7; Revelation 17:5; Revelation 17:7), it is used by St. Paul alone, and by him no less than twenty-one times, of which ten belong to this Epistle and the parallel Epistle to the Colossians–always in connection with such words as “knowledge,” “declaration,” “dispensation.” The ordinary sense of the word “mystery”–a thing of which we know that it is, though how it is we know not–is not implied in the original meaning of the word; but it is a natural derivative from it. Reason can apprehend, when revealed, that which it cannot discover; but seldom or never can it comprehend it perfectly. In this verse the mystery is declared to be accordant to the good pleasure of God’s will, which (it is added) “He purposed in Himself.” In this seems to be implied that (see Ephesians 3:19) though in some sense we can know it, yet in its fulness “it passeth knowledge.” . . .
The word mystery (μυστήριον) appears prominently throughout Paul’s letter to the Ephesians, occurring six times in total, more than in any other New Testament (NT) book.
Meaning
The origin of μυστήριον is obscure.[3] By Paul’s time, it meant “a secret.”[4] Mounce says it was “a matter to the knowledge of which initiation is necessary; a secret which would remain such but for revelation.”[5] The word differs from the modern word mystery, which refers to a known but difficult problem that people try solve. The NT word refers to material wholly unknown unless God reveals it. Ryrie explains this as special, divine knowledge beyond the reach of humans.[6] Remarkably, Paul’s letter to the Ephesians, through the following six references, reveals such knowledge which would have remained unknown otherwise.
Ephesians 1:9
Knowledge of this mystery is a result of God’s grace to believers revealed to the church. It divulges a crucial aspect of God’s will, that he would form a new, comprehensive union from all kinds of people, Gentile or Jew (cf. 2:15-16).[7] This union would occur through the redemptive work of Christ and encompass the spiritual world.[8] Though the Old Testament (OT) revealed that Gentiles would share in God’s redemption (Gen 12:3; Isa 42:6-7), it did not reveal that Jews and Gentiles would form a new spiritual entity.[9]
Ephesians 3:3-4
God revealed this mystery to Paul and to other apostles and prophets as well (Eph 3:5), who would reveal it to the church (3:3). Thielman observes, “No amount of exegetical study of the Scriptures would have yielded this insight; God had to make it known to Paul personally.”[10] This mystery centered on Christ as the agent who would unite believing Gentiles and Jews through the gospel. As such, believers can abandon all “inferior and pseudo-mysteries – the rituals of the gods and goddesses they may have worshiped all their lives – and give their allegiance to Christ alone.”[11] This mission of Christ would was not revealed to previous generations, but God revealed to the church for the very first time.
Ephesians 3:9
Paul was charged with enlightening everyone possible, “all” (πάντας), about this new revelation. He had a crucial administrative role (οἰκονομία) in propagating this message of the “ethnically inclusive nature” of God’s new spiritual creation, which is the church. Hoehner says, “Paul’s mission [had] no place for secrecy; it [was] to be openly shared.”[12] In doing so, he shared something that had been hidden from previous generations entirely.
Ephesians 5:32
Paul reveals a profound (“great”) correlation between the intimate union of a husband and wife and the union of Christ with the church (cf. Gen 2:24).[13] Apart from Paul making this connection, we would never have considered it.[14] In fact, he “goes beyond analogy” by claiming “we are (ἐσμέν) members of [Christ’s] body (Eph 5:30).”[15] This underscores the profound spiritual closeness and union we share with Christ and one another in the church.
Ephesians 6:19
Despite Paul’s privileged role in publicizing the mystery, he had been imprisoned for his gospel activity. Therefore, he requested prayer from the Ephesian believers that he would discharge his mission with clarity and confidence. This request pertained not to the gospel in general, but to the “mystery,” which was a key component and result of the gospel.[16] Though this message enabled true social reconciliation, it was not always well received.
Conclusion
The word mystery in Ephesians highlights a special message revealed to Christians through Paul and the apostles, who received it as revelation from God. This insight into God’s eternal redemptive plan had never been disclosed before. It revealed that God, through Christ, would join believing Jews and Gentiles into a new spiritual entity called the church. This union together with Christ would be profoundly intimate and widely publicized. In response to this reality, believers should “submit to one another” (5:21) as we learn to submit ourselves to Christ in the church (Eph 5:22-24). This mindset will enable us to manifest our spiritual reconciliation with Christ and one another in a practical, visible way. It will also show all people that the gospel of Christ is the means of genuine ethnic and social reconciliation.
[1] Paul used this word twenty-one times in his NT writings (Rom 11:25; 16:25; 1 Cor 2:7; 4:1; 13:2; 14:2; 15:51; Eph 1:9; 3:3-4,9; 5:32; 6:19, Col 1:26-27; 2:2; 2 Thess 2:7; 1 Tim 3:9; 3:16). It appears even times elsewhere in the NT (Matt 13:11; Mark 4:11; Luke 8:10; Rev 1:20;10:7; 17:5, 7).
[2] “The NT concept of the mystery is most fully developed in Ephesians. While in Paul’s other epistles the mystery focuses on Christ’s redemption that includes Gentiles, in Ephesians the mystery is that believing Jews and Gentiles are now one in the body of Christ.” Hoehner, Harold W. Ephesians, Kindle ed. (Grand Rapids: Baker, 2002), loc. 8977-8979.0
[3] Arthur G. Patzia, “Mystery,” ed. Ralph P. Martin and Peter H. Davids, Dictionary of the Later New Testament and Its Developments (Downers Grove: InterVarsity, 1997), 782.
[4] James Swanson, Dictionary of Biblical Languages with Semantic Domains: Greek (New Testament) (Oak Harbor: Logos Research Systems, 1997).
[5] William D. Mounce, Mounce’s Complete Expository Dictionary of Old & New Testament Words (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2006), 1215.
[6] Charles Caldwell Ryrie, Basic Theology (Chicago: Moody, 1999), 463.
[7] Hoehner, Ephesians, loc. 8986-8987.
[8] Peter T. O’Brien, “Mystery,” ed. Gerald F. Hawthorne, Ralph P. Martin, and Daniel G. Reid, Dictionary of Paul and His Letters(Downers Grove: InterVarsity, 1993), 622.
[9] Ryrie, Basic Theology, 463.
[10] Thielman, Frank. Ephesians, Baker Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic,2010), 194.
[11] Clinton E. Arnold, Ephesians, Zondervan Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament (Grand Rapids: Zondervan,2010), 188.
[12] Hoehner, loc. 8951-8952.
[13] Arnold, Ephesians, 397.
[14] Hoehner, 8956-8958.
[15] Arnold, 396.
[16] Hoehner, 8952-8954.
God’s Plan for the Ages – Ephesians 1:8b-10
“God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life.” Most of us recognize that sentence as the familiar Law One of the Four Spiritual Laws. It is true, of course: God does love you and He has a wonderful plan for your life.
Having said that, however, I must add that God’s actual plan for your life and your idea of God’s plan for your life may not be one and the same! Your idea of God’s wonderful plan for your life may be a comfortable home in the suburbs, a good job, a happy, healthy family, and a good church where you have many Christian friends. God’s actual wonderful plan may include financial pressures, a difficult marriage, a debilitating illness, children who rebel, or other unforeseen trials.
Or, God’s actual wonderful plan may be that you move to a difficult part of the world that is entrenched in a non-Christian religion, to take the gospel to these people. You will have to learn a difficult language and adapt to a strange culture. You may have to endure corrupt and ineffective government, daily power outages, undrinkable water, pollution, the lack of modern medical facilities, and opposition from the local people. You will face the difficulty of rearing and educating your children in a non-western culture. And, although you are serving God in a difficult situation, you and your family are not exempt from disease and other trials.
Also, you may be plagued by a lack of adequate support from the comfy Christians back in the homeland, who are enjoying all of the latest gadgets and conveniences that the American dream provides. While they are building equity in their homes and retirement portfolios so that they can cruise America’s National Parks in their RV’s, you will not own a home or have a retirement portfolio of any substance. This may be God’s actual wonderful plan for your life! Although it may not sound inviting, in truth you will enjoy God’s true blessing, because you are living your life in light of His eternal plan for the ages.
The apostle Paul is enumerating some of the spiritual blessings that God has graciously bestowed on us in Jesus Christ. He has mentioned God’s choosing us in Christ before the foundation of the world, that we would be holy and blameless before Him (1:4). He tells us that in love, God predestined us to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the kind intention of His will (1:5). He says that in Christ, we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of His grace which He lavished on us (1:7).
Some scholars link the next phrase, “in all wisdom and insight,” with the preceding phrase, meaning that God gave us wisdom and insight to understand our redemption and forgiveness. Or, it may (as in the NASB) point ahead to the next blessing, that God has given us wisdom and insight to understand the mystery of His will, or His plan for the ages. In 1:8b-10, Paul’s message and its application are,
Because God’s plan for the ages is to sum up all things under Christ, we should submit ourselves to Jesus as Lord.
Rick Warren’s The Purpose-Driven Life is phenomenally popular, and as long as you understand it properly, from God’s perspective, the message is valid. If you tweak the message into an Americanized version, where you use God to help you reach your goals, you have perverted the biblical message. But, if you understand that God’s purpose is to be glorified through your submitting all of your life to the lordship of Jesus, then the message is valid.
If you want your few years on this earth to count for eternity, you must bring your life under Christ’s lordship and in line with God’s purpose for the ages, which is to bring all things into one harmonious whole under Jesus Christ as Lord. Note four things:
1. God has a plan for the ages.
It is only reasonable that an all-wise, all-knowing, all-powerful God would have a comprehensive plan for the world that He spoke into existence and that He would have the ability to carry out that plan.
A. God has a plan and He has the ability to carry it out.
Many Scriptures affirm this evident truth. For example, Job 42:2 declares, “I know that You can do all things, and that no purpose of Yours can be thwarted.”
Psalm 103:19 rejoices that, “The Lord has established His throne in the heavens, and His sovereignty rules over all.”
Psalm 115:3 states, “But our God is in the heavens; He does whatever He pleases.”
In Isaiah 46:9-10, God declares, “For I am God, and there is no other; I am God, and there is no one like Me, declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times things which have not been done, saying, ‘My purpose will be established, and I will accomplish all My good pleasure.”
In Daniel 4:34-35, the humbled Nebuchadnezzar blesses, praises, and honors the Most High, who lives forever, “For His dominion is an everlasting dominion, and His kingdom endures from generation to generation. All the inhabitants of the earth are accounted as nothing, but He does according to His will in the host of heaven and among the inhabitants of earth; and no one can ward off His hand or say to Him, ‘What have You done?’”
Or, as Paul comprehensively states in Ephesians 1:11, we have “been predestined according to His purpose who works all things after the counsel of His will.”
Some deny that God is sovereign over all that happens, because they think that it would make Him the author of evil. But, the Bible is clear that God decreed beforehand what will happen in history, including such evil events as the crucifixion of Christ (Acts 2:23; 4:27-28) and the rise of the Antichrist (2 Thess. 2:8-10; Rev. 13). Yet, at the same time, God is not the author of evil or responsible for it (1 John 1:5). God declares (Isa. 45:7) that He is “the One forming light and creating darkness, causing well-being and creating calamity; I am the Lord who does all these.” Or, Amos 3:6 asks rhetorically, “If a calamity occurs in a city has not the Lord done it?” God declares to the prophet Habakkuk that He is raising up the evil Chaldeans to discipline His people Israel. In that context, the prophet rightly declares of God (Hab. 1:13), “Your eyes are too pure to approve evil, and You can not look on wickedness with favor.” God is sovereign even over evil, yet He is not the author of evil and is not responsible for it. The Bible is clear that He has a plan and He can and will carry it out.
B. God’s plan is according to His own good pleasure.
Paul states (Eph. 1:9) that God’s will is “according to His kind intention which He purposed in Him.” “Kind intention” is a single Greek word that means “good pleasure” (the same word is in 1:5). Jesus used this word in Luke 10:21, when He said, “I praise You, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that You have hidden these things from the wise and intelligent and have revealed them to infants. Yes, Father, for this way was well-pleasing in Your sight.” It refers to the fact that God does what He does simply because it pleases Him to do so. In other words, He does not determine His plan based upon anything outside of Himself. He did not look down through the corridors of time and then make up His plan after He saw who would choose Him. He did not base His choice on any merit or worthiness that He foresaw in us.
John Calvin (Sermons on Ephesians [Banner of Truth, 1973], p. 58) points out that Paul uses this word to “put away and shut out all opinion which men might conceive of their own worthiness.” Then he adds, “For God’s good pleasure can have no place unless men are barred from all deserving and come to him utterly empty.” So, God’s plan to save us (which is Paul’s subject in the context here) is totally because of His grace and good pleasure.
C. God carries out His plan according to His sovereign timetable.
Paul says (1:10) that God’s purpose is “with a view to an administration suitable to the fullness of the times….” “Administration” (New KJV = “dispensation”) here refers to God’s “comprehensive arrangement and administration of [His] plan according to … [His] decree” (John Grassmick, unpublished class notes, Dallas Theological Seminary). “The picture is that of a great household of which God is Master and which has an orderly system of management controlled by Him.” It means that “God orders everything in its full time and in sovereign wisdom orders the time of all things” (ibid.).
Paul uses a similar phrase in Galatians 4:4-5 with reference to the incarnation: “But when the fullness of the time came, God sent forth His Son, born of a woman, born under the Law, so that He might redeem those who were under the Law, that we might receive the adoption as sons.” In other words, God brought the Savior into the world in His perfect timetable. He promised to send a Savior to Adam and Eve after they fell into sin (Gen. 3:15). But at least 2,000 years went by before God chose to call Abraham out of Mesopotamia. God promised to give Abraham a son and the land and to bless the nations through His descendant, Jesus Christ.
But, Abraham’s descendants had to spend 400 years in captivity in Egypt, while the world waited for the Savior. Then there was about 1,000 years of Israel’s mostly disobedient history, including the Babylonian captivity. There were 400 more silent years, with no prophetic word from God. Finally, at least 4,000 years after Adam and 2,000 years after Abraham, God sent His Son into this world.
Was God late? Perish the thought! Although we may wonder why God waited so long, while millions of people down through the centuries died in their sins, God sent His Son at precisely the right moment, from His divine plan. He is in charge of the events of history, and no evil tyrant or disobedient nation can thwart God’s plan.
This truth gives us encouragement and hope, especially when we see frightening international events unfolding, such as the threat of militant Islamic terrorists who are determined to destroy our nation. It also applies to our individual history, when tragedies hit or things seem to be spinning out of control. God is still in charge and He does not allow anything to disrupt His sovereign plan.
2. God has graciously given us wisdom and insight to know His plan for the ages.
“All wisdom and insight” (1:8b) refers to the wisdom and insight that God has graciously given to us so that we can know “the mystery of His will.” We need to understand several terms. Wisdom is a general term that refers to understanding the true nature of things, whereas insight refers to practical discernment that results in right action in daily life. In the context here, the idea is that God has given us the wisdom we need to apprehend His gracious eternal plan of salvation and the practical outworking of it in our daily lives. William Barclay put it (cited by Grassmick, ibid.), “Christ gives to men the ability to see the great ultimate truths of eternity and to solve the problems of each moment of time.”
Paul says (1:9) that God “made known to us the mystery of His will….” Mystery does not refer to a closely guarded secret that only those in the secret inner circle understand. (It was used in this way in the “mystery” religions of the first century.) Nor does it refer to something vague, nebulous, and indefinite. Rather, it means something that was previously unknown, but now has been revealed. God has graciously revealed to us what we never could have figured out by ourselves, namely, His sovereign will or plan for the ages, to sum up everything in Christ.
Paul uses this idea of God revealing the mystery of His will, in other places. In Romans 16:25-26, he writes, “Now to Him who is able to establish you according to my gospel and the preaching of Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery which has been kept secret for long ages past, but now is manifested ….” Or, in 1 Corinthians 1, Paul contrasts the wisdom of the world, through which they could not come to know God, with the wisdom of God as displayed at the cross. Then, in 2:6-7, he explains, “Yet we do speak wisdom among those who are mature; a wisdom, however, not of this age nor of the rulers of this age, who are passing away; but we speak God’s wisdom in a mystery, the hidden wisdom which God predestined before the ages to our glory.” He goes on to explain how God has to reveal this wisdom to us, because the natural man is incapable of understanding it (2:14).
Even though God has given us wisdom and insight into the mystery of His will, such wisdom and insight is not automatic! We have to study the Scriptures diligently, asking God to give us such wisdom and insight, so that we might walk in His ways. As Proverbs (2:2-4) tells us, we must seek for wisdom as silver and search for her as for hidden treasures.
Thus, God has a plan for the ages and He has graciously given us wisdom and insight to know this plan.
3. God’s plan for the ages is to sum up all things under Jesus Christ as Lord.
The Greek verb translated “summing up” means to bring together or to gather up in one. It implies that things were before in disharmony or disarray (because of the fall), but now they will be brought together in unity. Sam Storms explains (http://www.enjoyinggodministries.com/article/17-14), “The idea is that the discordant and disintegrating elements in the creative realm will be renewed and unified under the Lordship of Jesus. Everything will be brought into submission to his will and subservience to his glory.” The Greek scholar, J. B. Lightfoot concludes (Notes on Epistles of St. Paul [Baker, 1980 reprint], ed. by J. R. Harmer, p. 322), “Thus the expression implies the entire harmony of the universe, which shall no longer contain alien and discordant elements, but of which all the parts shall find their centre and bond of union in Christ.”
Paul explains “all things” by adding, “things in the heavens and things on the earth.” This is a figure of speech that expresses comprehensiveness. It includes the restoration of the fallen creation (Rom. 8:18-23); the salvation and perfect sanctification of all of God’s elect (Eph. 1:4); and, eternal rest from conflict for the elect angels (1 Tim. 5:21), whose ministry to us engages them in battle with the forces of Satan (Daniel 10:12-13; Rev. 12:7-9).
God’s summing up all things in Christ (reconciling all things to Himself in Col. 1:20) does not mean, as some erroneously teach, that eventually everyone (including Satan!) will be saved! The Bible is clear that Satan and his evil demonic forces, will be forever subdued and confined to the lake of fire, along with all who die without believing in Christ (Rev. 20:11-15). But, every knee will someday bow before Jesus and acknowledge Him as Lord, either willingly or forcibly (Phil. 2:9-11).
Paul will go on (in Eph. 2 & 3) to emphasize that the church is now the prototype of God’s ultimate plan of reunification. Specifically, the mystery that God has now revealed is that the Jews and the Gentiles (who were about as discordant groups as you could find!) are now fellow members of the one body of Christ (see 3:4-6). Thus in chapter 4, he emphasizes strongly the need for practical, demonstrable love and unity in the church.
But here he is laying the theological foundation for such behavior, namely, that the church is the first glimpse of what God ultimately plans to do. His plan for the ages is to reunite in Christ everything that has been torn apart and alienated through sin. There will be no strife or rivalry or selfishness or jealousy or tyranny of one person over another in the future kingdom of Christ. While we wait for that great day, we must labor to preserve the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace (Eph. 4:3). The bottom line of Paul’s theology here is:
4. When we understand God’s eternal purpose, it will lead us to submit to Jesus Christ as Lord of all.
If all things will be subject one day to Jesus Christ as Lord and if all of His subjects will dwell together in the unhindered harmony of heaven, then it follows that we now should bring every area of our lives and every relationship under His sovereign lordship. God has told us that His plan for the ages is to sum up or reunite all things in one harmonious whole under Jesus Christ. We know that God will do as He purposes to do. It is certain that He will accomplish all His good pleasure (Isa. 46:10). Every knee will bow before Jesus as Lord, either willingly or under force. It is far better to bow willingly now than to bow under force at the judgment, when there will be no chance for repentance!
To submit to Jesus as Lord begins with your thought life. You must be transformed by the renewing of your mind (Rom. 12:1-2). When sinful thoughts pop into your mind, you must turn from them and enthrone Jesus as Lord. As Paul puts it (Rom. 13:13-14), “Let us behave properly as in the day, not in carousing and drunkenness, not in sexual promiscuity and sensuality, not in strife and jealousy. But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh in regard to its lusts.” Behavior always comes from the heart (Mark 7:21-23), so you must begin there.
Submitting to Jesus as Lord also requires that you bring your priorities and values in line with His Word. He commanded us (Matt. 6:33), “But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.” In the context, “all these things” refers to the things that unbelievers eagerly seek, especially material things. How we manage the money that the Lord entrusts to us is a litmus test of our faithfulness to the Lord (Luke 16:10-13).
Enthroning Jesus as Lord also means that we bring our schedules under His lordship. We all are given a certain amount of time on this earth. Many hours each day are taken up with necessary activities, such as sleeping, eating, personal grooming, and work. But, how do we spend the other hours? Do we make spending time alone with God a priority? Do we hunger and thirst to know Him? Or, do we fritter it away with useless pastimes?
Living under Christ’s lordship also means that we order our relationships according to His Word. We must learn truly to love others, even as He has loved us. We must speak kindly to one another. We must put away selfishness and strife. As Paul wrote (Col. 3:12-14), “So, as those who have been chosen of God, holy and beloved, put on a heart of compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience; bearing with one another, and forgiving each other, whoever has a complaint against anyone; just as the Lord forgave you, so also should you. Beyond all these things put on love, which is the perfect bond of unity.”
Conclusion
The outcome of history is certain and God has revealed it to us in advance. He is going to sum up all things under the lordship of Jesus Christ. Knowing that outcome, you’d be a fool to bet your life on anything else. God wants each of us to submit now to Jesus as Lord and to spend our lives furthering His kingdom purposes. In light of His revealed sovereign purpose, that’s the only wise way to invest your life!
The Mystery of Unity
Today, in the first chapter of Ephesians, we will be examining a great question with which men continually wrestle in our day, as they have all through history: The question of whether or not there is a purpose in the universe. Do the events of history make any sense? Is the record of human events — with its concatenation of tragedy and happiness and misery and heartache and joy — to any real effect, is it moving toward any one goal?
Or is life, as Shakespeare once described it, “a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing”? There are many people today who say that is a true description. They agree with Shakespeare. There are many voices saying that there is no purpose for the universe, and they are respected voices. Many historians, scientists, and others, looking at life around us, at the human story, say that no plan is evident, no purpose discernible, through all the strange mixture of history.
I was reading the commentary on the Bible by William Barclay this week. He cites several English voices in this respect: Oscar Wilde, in one of his epigrams, said, “You give the criminal calendar of Europe to your children under the name of history.” That is all he could see in history, a criminal calendar. G. N. Clark, in his inaugural lecture as president of Cambridge University, said, “There is no secret and no plan in history to be discovered. I do not believe that any future consummation could make any sense of all the irrationalities of preceding ages. If it could not explain them, still less could it justify them.”
And in the introduction to his A History of Europe, H. A. L. Fisher writes, “One intellectual excitement has been denied me. Men wiser and more learned than I have discovered in history a plot, a rhythm, a predetermined pattern. But these harmonies are concealed from me. I can see only one emergency following another, as wave follows upon wave, only one great fact with respect to which, since it is unique, there can be no generalization, only one safe rule for the historian — that he should recognize in the development of human destiny the play of the contingent and the unforeseen.” And Andre Maurois said, “The universe is indifferent. Who created it? Why are we here upon this puny mud heap, spinning in infinite space? I have not the slightest idea, and I am quite convinced that no one else has the least idea.”
For he has made known to us in all wisdom and insight the mystery of his will, according to his purpose which he set forth in Christ as a plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth. In him, according to the purpose of him who accomplishes all things according to the counsel of his will, we who first hoped in Christ have been destined and appointed to live for the praise of his glory. (Ephesians 1:9-12 RSV)
That is another of the vast and complicated statements in which the apostle crams together truth which relates to one great, central theme — the purpose of God in what is happening today. It is here that we begin to understand the world around us and the course of history as it rolls on. In order to understand it we must take this statement apart. I find four major divisions in it.
There is, first, the secret itself, “the mystery of his will,” the hidden purpose of God. You notice that Paul describes it as a mystery. A mystery, as we have seen in previous messages, is a secret which only God understands, and which men desperately need to know, but about which they can never find out except through the disclosure of God. Mysteries are the answers to the great questions which continually throb in the human heart. But you never can find them by any ordinary human enterprise. No course of instruction, no curriculum of a university, no scientific investigation, will ever reveal these secrets. You cannot find them out in any other way; God must tell us the answers. This is the sort of mystery spoken of here.
You remember that, in First Corinthians 4, Paul reminds us that we Christians have been made stewards of the mysteries of God, dispensers of them. It is up to us to grasp them, understand them, and speak out about them. What is wrong in the world of our day is the fact that the church has not been speaking about the mysteries which belong to it, and, therefore, the world is in confusion and darkness. So it is up to us to tell these forth.
The second division, a very important one, is the way by which the mystery of God’s will was made manifest. Paul brings this out in this passage. The third is the time in which it is to be fully manifested. And the fourth is the part which we will play in accomplishing it — our part in this tremendous procedure. That is our course of study this morning. First let’s look at the great secret which Paul sets before us, found in the latter part of Verse 10:
…to unite all things in him [Christ], things in heaven and things on earth. (Ephesians 1:10b RSV)
That is what God is doing in history. He is working to unite all things in Christ. But that is rather an amazing statement, because, when you look at history, it looks as if exactly the opposite is occurring, as if things are falling apart. Paul has an answer for that — we’ll come to it in just a moment — but first he wants us to understand that this is the direction in which God is moving, this is what he is going to do. He is going to unite all things in him.
When Paul says “all things,” he means all things. In fact, he amplifies it: “things in heaven and things on earth.” That is, things in the invisible realm of reality, heaven, the forces which are at work in our lives right now, but which we can’t see or taste or touch or feel, both evil and good, the evil principalities and powers struggling with the angels and the forces of good, all things in heaven, and all the visible forces on earth, the struggles between nations, the strife among individuals — all these shall cease and be united together, brought to a head, is the idea. The Greek word for unite means “to head up,” i.e., to relate to Christ as a body relates to its head. Then he will be the director, the supreme operator, of all things, both in heaven and on earth.
Remember how Paul puts that in his letter to the Philippians. The process first was one of disglorification. Our Lord emptied himself of the glory that was his when he was equal with God, took upon himself the form of a servant, and was born in the likeness of man. Then he humbled himself and became obedient unto death, even death on a cross. “Therefore,” Paul writes, “God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name which above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father,” (Philippians 2:9-11 RSV). That is where God is moving. That is what he is here to do in this time and space continuum in which we live.
You and I know that it doesn’t look that way, does it? Men are living in a divided world, and it is evident on every side. We are out of step with nature, divided from nature. Something has come between us and the animals — they hate us, fear us, run from us. We destroy them, eliminate them gradually but steadily from the face of the earth. We pollute the rivers and darken the skies and build garbage heaps around us that we don’t know what to do with. We know we are doing this, but we don’t know how to stop it, because this is a divided world. Something is at work to keep us from being in harmony with the world of nature in which we live. We are at war among ourselves, with nation against nation, class against class. Struggle and strife and division are taking place on every side. Our newspapers are full of it, as you know. And each one of us is a walking civil war! Aren’t we? We fight within ourselves. We want to do something good, but at the same time we want to do exactly the opposite. We want both to have our cake and to eat it too, and we struggle constantly in this way.
Now, the great thought which Paul drops on us in this passage is that Jesus has come to stop all that. He has come to heal that division, to end it, to heal the broken relationships, to end the strife, to still the bitter, angry, hateful words that men say to one another. He has already started. He has begun healing, binding up, bringing all the divisions to a close. He himself said, “He who is with me gathers; he who is against me scatters,” Matthew 12:30, Luke 11:23). He has come as a healing force into the world to mend all the damage and bind up all the broken hearts. Paul makes a point of that. He says that the way this great fact was made known to us is by the life of Jesus. As he puts it,
For he has made known to us in all wisdom and insight the mystery of his will, according to his purpose which he set forth in Christ … (Ephesians 1:9 RSV)
It is very important to see that, because you will never understand the purpose unless you understand the way it was made known. There is something very remarkable hidden in this statement. You see, this is the way we can come to understand what is happening in the world of our day, the events of today. If you understand what this way is, and how it works, you can make sense of the events which otherwise don’t make sense at all.
This next week we will be observing the Republican convention in Miami Beach. How do you understand it, how does it fit in with what God is doing? “Well,” you Democrats say, “of course, it doesn’t!” — but it is necessary that you ask that question. How does the Vietnamese war fit in with what God is doing? You must never read your newspaper as unrelated to what God is doing. He is working in this world. Every event is brought about, and finds its meaning, because it fits into the plan that he has. So what part does it play? How do you understand it? Where does it fit? That is exactly what Paul is dealing with here — how to read your newspaper intelligently, how to see where these current events fit into the program and the working of God in the affairs of men.
This has been made known to us, he says, “in all wisdom and insight.” These two words, sophia and phronesis, were well understood by the Greek world. Sophia was the passion of the philosophers. They loved to try to find the secrets of life and to seek after wisdom. Phronesis was the common-sense, practical application of these to the problems of life. So Paul says that this mystery of God’s will came to us through wisdom and insight made known, or set forth, in Jesus Christ. There is your clue. It is in Christ that you see how this works.
If you think through the ministry of Jesus, you can see what he is getting at. The end results of the ministry of healing which Jesus came to do are visible in his works. This was why he did his miracles. There is that beautiful passage in Isaiah 35 where Isaiah predicts that God shall come to us. And what does he say will be the results? Why, the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf unstopped, the lame man shall leap like a deer, the tongue of the dumb shall sing for joy, and there will be healing manifest in nature on every side (Isaiah 35:5-7).
And that is what happened when Jesus came. He began to heal. He opened blind eyes and touched lame men and made them well. He mastered nature, stilled the storm, walked on water, changed water into wine. He mastered these forces. He delivered the oppressed from the realm of Satan. He set men free, he liberated them, and healed the hurt of their life. This was just the visible demonstration that the end result of his work, which he began then, would finally and ultimately be seen everywhere. So you see it in his works.
Now listen carefully: The principles by which this healing would take place in men’s spirits, as well as their bodies, are set forth in his words, in the words of Jesus. That is why it is so important to listen to the words of Jesus. The Gospel records of the messages and sermons of Jesus are so vitally important because there we have declared to us the radical approaches to life, the revolutionary principles, which will produce a new creation, and are producing it right in the midst of the destruction of the old. That is what is going on in life.
Have you ever really seriously listened to the words of Jesus? Take the Beatitudes, for instance: “Happy,” Jesus said, “are the poor in spirit,” Matthew 5:3). Do you ever feel that way? When you get poor, impoverished, in spirit, when you feel as if you have nothing left, feel that you have been drained dry and have no riches of spirit remaining to you at all — are you happy? Do you go around rejoicing and singing, “Oh, how great it is that I’m so poor in spirit!”? No. We say we’re depressed, and oftentimes we react with bitterness. But listen! Jesus says that is a golden moment. “Blessed [happy] are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven,” (Matthew 5:3 RSV). At that point, at that place, you are in a position to receive riches from a different source and by a different process than you could get at any other place, any other point of your life. There you are able to take them, nowhere else. “Happy are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted,” (Matthew 5:4). Do you ever think of yourself that way? Are you happy when you’re sad? It sounds almost contradictory, doesn’t it? But Jesus said that you are happy when you are mourning. Why? Well, because then you can learn about a source of comfort which is otherwise so incredible, so beyond human experience that no human being can give it to you. But you can have it at that point, and at no other place. “Blessed are they that mourn, for they shall be comforted,” (Matthew 5:4 RSV). “Happy are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth,” (Matthew 5:5).
He goes on saying these radical, transforming things. And we listen to them and recite them and say that they are wonderful words, but we never take them seriously. Yet that is what Paul is talking about, these healing, unifying principles revealed in Christ which will transform lives. Do you live by those principles? Or do you live by the world’s interpretation of them? J. B. Philips, in his book, When God Was Man, gives the usual parody of the Beatitudes:
Happy are the pushers, for they get on in the world.
Happy are the hard-boiled, for they never let life hurt them.
Happy are they who complain, for they get their own way in the end.
Which do you live by? Which do I live by?
Happy are the blasé, for they never worry over their sins.
Happy are the slave drivers, for they get results.
The entire world of business is built on that one, isn’t it?
Happy are the knowledgeable men of the world for they know their way around.
Happy are the trouble makers, for they make people take notice of them.
These are exactly contrary to the words of Jesus. Notice how Jesus, when he is dealing with his disciples, takes these men of the world, with all their conventional approaches, and constantly, gently, and graciously corrects them. When they are arguing which is the greatest among them, he sets a child in their midst and says, “Look, you’ll never be great until you learn to be like this child. When you stop trying to be great, when you quit your struggling and manipulating and, in simple, childlike facing of life, trust God, then you can be great. But you never will make it otherwise,” (Matthew 18:1-4).
The mother of James and John comes to him and asks for positions of privilege and favor at his right and left hand for them when he comes into his glory. And Jesus says, “You don’t know what you’re asking. My kingdom isn’t run that way. No, that will be given by my Father to those for whom it is prepared.” And he goes on to tell what prepares us for it: “Unless you drink the cup that I drink of, and are baptized with the baptism with which I’m going to be baptized, you cannot understand or grasp or have that kind of position of privilege and favor,” (Matthew 20:20-23). By that he means the cross and the resurrection — the cross, with its denial, its setting aside of all the old ways, the ways the world operates, and its affirming of a wholly new process, a wholly new way of life, resurrection life — that, he says, will bring you to readiness for it. Nothing else will.
In Jesus’ parables you have so many revelations of a new way of life. The principles by which the new creation is going to come into being are revealed. How many of you men who work have ever wrestled with the parable of the laborers in the vineyard? How many of you have ever tried to justify in your thinking Jesus’ words that it was right for the man who owned that vineyard to pay those laborers the same amount of money, no matter whether they had worked the whole day long or only for an hour? Have you ever struggled with that? Why, the A F of L would shut that vineyard down within ten minutes if they ever heard of anything like that! They would never accept that as a way of operating. And yet Jesus says that is right. The owner of the vineyard has the right to be gracious above measure to some whom he chooses, and not to others. That is right. But that confounds us, confuses us, bewilders us, baffles us. We don’t understand that kind of thinking.
But that is what Paul means when he says that this plan which is working out right now in life was set forth in Christ. In the wisdom and insight of the Scriptures, you will find it, and only there. And yet there is a strange thing about that. When you read of the ministry of Jesus, you find that he himself announces that he came to be a peacemaker. He came to heal, to save, to deliver, to liberate. Yet he also said, “I have not come to bring peace, but a sword. For I have come to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law; and a man’s foes will be those of his own household,” (Matthew 10:34-36). The strange thing is that at the beginning he seems to make things worse rather than better. He increases the division and the strife. He offended the rulers when he spoke. His disciples said to him many times, “Lord, don’t you realize that you offended those men?” (Matthew 15:12). “What you said made them angry. You are never going to make it as king if you don’t learn how to handle your public relations a little better!” He offended and baffled his own disciples. He hurt them at times by what he said to them. He sent people away instead of trying to get them to join his cause. And it all ended at last in the hurt and heartache and blood of the cross. But out of that hurt and destruction there came ultimate joy and blessing. That is what Paul is getting at here. And that leads on to the time when all this is going to be fully manifest. He says it will be:
…a plan for the fullness of time [or, literally, “unto the administration of the completeness of the seasons”], (Ephesians 1:10a RSV)
The seasons that he mentions here are the cycles of history. Any historian will tell you that history moves in cycles. There are times of peace and prosperity which move at last into apathy and lethargy, and this foments disquiet and uncertainty and then finally rebellion and revolution which brings about a change which results in peace and prosperity which, in turn, move into apathy and lethargy, etc. You can trace those cycles throughout history again and again and again. Those are what the Bible calls the seasons. Paul says that there is a time coming when all these seasons, which have been working on incessantly toward a great goal, will be fulfilled — the completeness of the seasons. Someday they will be ended. And then we will know that God has succeeded in tearing down the old creation, destroying it utterly, and at the same time has built up the new. Now here is a remarkable thought that Paul is conveying to us. When I started this summer to build an addition to my home the first thing we had to do was to tear off part of the roof. (I helped by falling through the ceiling!) The roof had to be destroyed first, eliminated. We had to destroy the old before we could build the new.
But the marvel of God is that he does both at the same time, and by the same process! Do you grasp the implications of that? You see, the heartache, the hurt, the suffering, the injustice, the misery, is the way he is tearing down the old. But that same heartache and hurt and suffering is the way he is building the new. That is what the Scriptures tell us. That is the amazing revelation, the amazing thought of God which is dropped upon us. And that is why we have references all the way through Scripture to our part in this — the fact that we are called upon not only to believe in Christ and follow him, but also to suffer for his name’s sake as part of the process. God is doing both at once. By means of the hate and the hurt and the suffering he is building the new creation. And when the old is destroyed, the new emerges, all finished, complete, and at the same time. That is the administration of the fullness of time. What is our part? Well, Paul has put it in one phrase:
…we who first hoped in Christ have been destined and appointed to live for the praise of his glory. (Ephesians 1:12 RSV)
That is our part. But this translation softens it to a degree that we miss a bit of what is said. What Paul literally says is, “We have been made his inheritance.” We saints are the inheritance of Christ, his heritage. In Verse 18 of this same chapter Paul refers to “the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints.” It is necessary to understand what that means. There is a double inheritance in the Christian life. We inherit Jesus. He is our inheritance. He is our resource from which we draw. If you receive an inheritance you live on that basis. You use your inheritance to enrich yourself. And Jesus is our inheritance. We can enrich ourselves with him at any moment. He is our power, our strength, our love, our life, our wisdom, our truth. He is what we live by. Christ is our life.
But, and this is the wonderful thing, we are his inheritance. He draws on us. He takes us and uses us. He has prepared us. Our bodies and souls, our full humanity, are to be his to use to manifest the new creation in the midst of the destruction of the old. That is his inheritance in the saints. All that produces riches, not only in our life but in the lives of others, and in the world in general — the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints.
What does that mean in practical terms? Well, that means that you and I must not complain any longer about what life hands us. It is the Father who has made that choice. He has chosen to put us where we are, and to put us into the situations where we find ourselves, and to give us the problems that we have, in order that, in the hurt and the heartache and the suffering, and in the joy and the blessing and the riches, whatever they may be, the life of Jesus may be released in that situation. By that means he destroys the old and brings in the new. And as we make ourselves available to him moment by moment, in the shop, in the office, in the home, in the backyard, wherever we are, and as we respond with joy and love and acceptance to the situation in which we find ourselves, God is glorified. Christ receives his inheritance. He finds riches of delight and enjoyment in that. The old is torn down, and the new is built in its place, all in one great, tremendous operation.
I don’t fully understand that, but I know it works. I know that is the way God is working. And therefore there is no escape from the heartache and hurt and suffering. It is going to be there for us. But it is an opportunity, never an obstacle! Let me give you an illustration which perhaps will involve you as well as me. In my mail yesterday was a thick envelope from the City of Palo Alto. I opened it and found a letter enclosing a petition signed by one hundred fourteen people who live right near this church asking the city to revoke our use permit and to restrict our operations as a church. My first reaction was anger. Why should they do this? Why should they try to stop what is happening here, what God is doing among us? Why should this resistance and opposition arise? I was resentful and felt defensive immediately. Don’t they know what’s happening in terms of changed lives? Don’t they understand that youths are being redirected, and older people revitalized, that homes are being blessed and marriages saved, that life is coming alive in new ways as never before to scores and hundreds of people?
But, of course, I immediately realized that they don’t know that. Most of them, probably, have never been inside; they’ve been only outside. And they’re upset. They are annoyed by people who park in such a way as to block their driveways. They are fed up with exhaust fumes because it takes so long for us to get out of our crowded parking lot. They have had enough of noise at night, and of lights that shine into their homes in the middle of the night, and a lot of other things which may seem small to us but which to them are irritations and aggravations.
And then I began to see what this is about. This is God’s opportunity given to us to demonstrate a real, genuine, loving spirit of appreciation and thoughtfulness to our neighbors. This is his opportunity for us to say “I’m sorry for hurt that we’ve caused, unwittingly to be sure, but inconvenience and annoyance and irritation nevertheless,” and for us to respond not in defensiveness but in love, to curtail the annoyances as much as possible, to return good for evil, to invite them to come and see what is happening, and to welcome them to share with us the joys as well as the irritations of what goes on. And, if God grants it, we hope that response will be received by our neighbors in a spirit of relief and acceptance.
I had said to myself, at first, “Why should this intervene? Why do we have to take time out to deal with these petty little problems?” But, of course, the answer is that these aren’t petty problems. They constitute a great opportunity, a glorious chance to know our neighbors, to break down barriers that we, unknowingly, have erected. It is a chance for the whole congregation to show some love and understanding, and to be extra careful not to annoy those around us, and to apologize when we have, and to renew relationships with these people whom God loves. That is why God sent it. And, in the process, he will bring in the new, and break down the old.
One of the funniest cartoons I ever saw showed a lawyer reading a client’s last will and testament to a group of greedy relatives. The caption read: “I, John Jones, being of sound mind and body, spent it all!”
Proud to be TJ's man 