Ephesians - Lesson 18

In the outline that i'm working from that i've created for my own purposes i've Now moved into a section that will include chapter 3 verse 2 through verse 13 in ephesians And the reason why i'm starting with 3 2 to 13 Is because in chapter 3 verse 1 paul begins a prayer And then he picks up with that prayer in chapter 3 verses 14 through 21 So what i've done is i've broken off the prayer into a second section a fifth section of the letter And i'm focusing here in this fourth section on verses 2 through 13 in ephesians So if you notice for example In this section, I basically think paul is doing this. It's a long sort of description here that i've written down. He's giving us parenthetical statements Regarding the mystery revealed to him And the mystery is that gentiles Are fellow heirs and fellow members of the body of christ and fellow partakers of the promises of god in christ through the gospel with fellow jewish believers in christ I see this section operating in this way because in 3 1 if you notice paul says for this reason I paul A prisoner of christ jesus on behalf of you gentiles And then there's a break The break starts in verse 2 he gives us a parenthetical series of statements That continue until chapter 3 verse 13 And he picks back up with the prayer in verse 14 for this reason I bow my knees before the father so for our purposes here i'm focusing on the parenthetical statements that he makes in between the introduction to the prayer and the The prayer where he continues in verse 14 to talk about the mystery revealed So notice in verse 2 he says in chapter 3 verse 2 paul says assuming That you gentiles Have heard of the stewardship of god's Grace now, there's that word grace again.

Paul is a grace field man, this word grace as i've argued should be understood as Gift I once again will point you to john barclay's very important book Called paul and the gift and if you want to read the smaller version of that book He wrote a smaller version called paul and the power Of grace and I don't follow or agree with barclay on everything. He says in the book But I think he is basically right and what he says about understanding grace as a gift a gift that was given by god That bound the giver god and the recipient Jews and gentiles in christ to one another and that that gift namely the grace of the gospel expects to Expects a particular return an appropriate return that return is a life lived in devotion to god in service to the lord jesus christ And the gift of course for paul is the gift of the gospel and jesus is the gift But jesus is the good news and everything about jesus is This good news. So paul says having heard of the stewardship Of the management of god's gift and notice what he says.

It's a gift. Why do you how do you know? It's a gift. He says it was given to me The the grace is a gift because it was given to me for you.

It was given to paul for these Gentiles, let me just pause here for one moment And highlight something that we've talked about but let me be more specific about The the the point I want to make that paul's ministry and mission Did not exclude jews As we've said he went to jews First in the synagogue and he says the gospel is the power of god and the salvation for everyone who believes in romans 1 16 To the jew first and also to the greek but paul's ministry Largely was a gentile mission. In fact, he says in galatians chapter 1 verse 14 and 15 and 16 that god desired to reveal his son in him That he might announce jesus as the good news amongst the gentiles. The only reason why paul Was a missionary to the gentiles Was because god Revealed jesus christ to him who set him on a course to take the messianic gospel to these gentiles outside of the promises of god Given to the jewish people And he says here that god's grace that was given to me It was given to me for you.

God gave paul the gift of the gospel to give to these gentiles And in verse 3 he's going to unpack for us a bit what that gift looks like in real time It's a gift that's related to the mystery verse 3 how the mystery was made known to me and notice this word by a Revelation this word That's translated as revelation here in the esv Is is one reason we talk about paul's understanding of salvation as as apocalyptic now in pauline theology There's a whole school of thought that is identified as apocalyptic and I do not agree with Everything that school says but one thing that that school does say which I do think is correct Is that god did in fact break in to this present evil age in this invasive way in paul's life and reveal to him the the revelation of god about jesus and that and that one aspect of that revelation is is that jesus is is god's invasive plan by which he is going to Emancipate the cosmos from the the principalities and powers of the air. We've seen some of that already In galatians in my view, however when paul talks about the good news of the gospel it it includes this aspect of delivering creation And and conquering the principalities and powers of the air, but it also talks about more than that And that more than that relates to the fact that That this mystery was made known to paul That i'm going to jump down a bit here in verse four When they read it You can perceive my insight into this mystery Which was not made known to the sons of men and other generations As it has now been revealed to his holy apostles prophets and prophets by the spirit So we talked about the the meaning of the word mystery When paul talks about mystery as we've said before he doesn't talk about something that one It cannot understand But he's talking about something that's now been revealed when in in the times past it had been previously hidden So the mystery that's been revealed to paul is not something that he has to figure out. It's something that god has revealed to him And we know he revealed it to him on the damascus road, but paul says This he says it has now been revealed to his holy apostles and prophets I think he's probably talking about new testament prophets here in the context of his prophetic ministry Because he links it to the spirit and we all we know that the the prophets in the old testament talk about a day joe, for example chapter 2 When the spirit will be ushered in throughout the messianic age And it seems to me that the apostles and the prophets here are linked with the age of the spirit, which is an age that comes when the messiah Come so god revealed things that were previously hidden to the old testament prophets to him and the other prophets and apostles by the spirit so one thing I want to say before we move into his definition of the mystery in verse 6 is Is that notice that paul's gospel is bound? With the spirit linked with the spirit That jesus is anointed isn't he as the messiah and and think about jesus's ministry that that jesus is conceived by the supernatural power of the spirit the the work of god and mary is a work of the spirit the gospels tell us and We see jesus is baptized and that is baptism that that god the father says this is my beloved son and the spirit descends upon jesus as a dove and we see jesus in the gospel of luke praying in the spirit and And being led by the spirit And we also see that the gospels say that if you reject that jesus is the jewish messiah, you are blaspheming the holy Spirit so the spirit here is linked directly with the messianic age And directly with the fact that jesus is the jewish messiah This is important because remember all of the spiritual blessings that jews and gentiles have they have them in christ And just keep remembering that in christ.

Yes refers to union with christ But it also assumes that the messianic age is here. The time has changed it is now christ Time i'm a chicago bulls 90 90s. Chicago bulls basketball fan michael jordan era And in that era, I remember growing up before they would go out to play a game They would get in their huddle.

They'd put their hands in and somebody on the team would ask this question What time is it and the answer would always be it's game time and then out they'd go To play and demolish at least the 95 and 96 most teams That they play that 95 96 team is the greatest team in the history of in my view nba basketball Contrary to the celtics contrary to the celtics and the lakers and the warriors Lakers Well for paul the time is christ time because it's the time in which the spirit has been ushered in and when the spirit comes in He comes in to fill the hearts of these jews and gentiles in christ because messiah Has shown up to bring about this redemption promise in the yoke testament to jews and gentiles. So this prophecy or this this Mystery has been revealed by the holy Spirit now he's going to define what that mystery is verse 6 and following This mystery is That the gentiles Are fellow heirs Members of the same body partakers of the promise In christ jesus through the gospel Now there's a question I do have About his definition of the mystery If in fact The old testament prophets And the law of moses as well are pointing us to a day When god would fulfill all of his redemptive promises for jews and gentiles by means of the messiah How then can he describe the mystery? As Gentiles being fellow heirs members of the same body so on and so forth Because if we think about the gospels, let's just step back and think about the promises to abraham Or stick step even farther back and think about genesis 3 15 God promises to crush the seed of the serpent by means of the seed of the woman To restore everything that adam and eve lost in the garden And then we see the story progressing genesis 12 and the promises echo throughout genesis narrative He's promised to bless abraham with land and seed and universal blessing and through abraham All the families of the earth will be blessed. That is what god promised in the old testament and then we see god's promise coming closer to realization with the the giving of the law and then we They're headed toward a promised land and you have david coming along and once again I want to just remind us of second samuel 7 promise regarding seed an eternal king who will receive an eternal kingdom And then the whole prophetic witness this isaiah is so important a good exercise would be to read isaiah beside of ephesians sometimes to see the similarities In in things that that paul says in ephesians that he they that he is he's he's getting from his reading of isaiah So my question that is is how can paul say? That the mystery is gentile participation membership with jews So my question relates to the fact really what is the core essence of this mystery? it seems to me that the core essence of this mystery here is is certainly it will include the The gentiles or fellow heirs and members of the same body partakers of the promise Certainly that's a part of the mystery because he said this mystery is that and he gives you what the that is But I think the accent in the mystery ought to be placed on In christ jesus in other words the good news that isaiah proclaimed in His prophecy That god is going to bring about this Liberation and deliverance and restoration of israel The good news that isaiah talked about regarding how beautiful are the feet of the one who announces good news Now isaiah is saying that good news is realized by means of that suffering servant isaiah 53, but who is this servant? Paul says it's jesus Who is the christ? one reason why I think The accent in the statement might need to be placed upon christ.

Jesus is because that's where he emphasizes the means by which God is working out his redemptive promises in the doxology That is In christ is where the emphasis is made. God chose us in christ In love before the foundation of the world. He predestined us unto adoption in christ We have redemption and you have this in whom and in christ mentioned multiple times throughout the doxology And even beyond the doxology we see once again that in christ union with christ This is so important that we are seated with christ or in christ in the heavenly places So for paul, it seems to me that the mystery certainly is that jews And gentiles are sharing in this unity, but the prophets promise that That there's coming a day when the gentiles are going to stream into jerusalem There's coming a day when god is going to do something universal and cosmic That god is going to bless all the families of the earth through abraham the prophets and the law anticipate that Jesus in fact says that that of the law the law and the prophets are anticipating these things to be But jesus says that these things are anticipated to be fulfilled In him, that's what luke's gospel emphasizes after the resurrection It seems to be what paul emphasizes here is that this mystery that all these things are realized for jews and gentiles is In christ jesus through the gospel.

What's isaiah's gospel pointing to the messianic age? In which jesus christ brings about these promises to jews and gentiles Let's say a few words about the gospel here practically and think about What the gospel is there's a lot of conversations Today about what is the gospel a lot of conversations in scholarship And often when I when I talk about the gospel and when christians talk about the gospel, I think we often mean We want to tell someone how to become a christian so we'll say things and rightly we'll say I want to share the gospel with this person And when we say that we don't mean we're going to explain everything there is to know about the good news of jesus But we mean we're going to tell them the basic core message of how they can Have their sins forgiven and so we rightly will emphasize things like Jesus's substitutionary death for our sins first corinthians 15 language that god raised him from the dead for our sins and that That by faith in jesus we can be saved if we repent turn from our sin and trust in christ. We can have our sins Forgiveness that we have we generally talk about a gospel presentation. I think that's good and right to do so but we have to remember when we think about defining The word gospel and defining the the word to announce the good news Is that the gospel doesn't begin in matthew? or in romans It begins in genesis according to paul in galatians He says in galatians chapter 3 that the scriptures Announced the gospel beforehand to abraham saying In you all the families of the earth will be blessed the verb paul uses there in galatians 3 is a a greek verb That is not used elsewhere, but it it talks about announcing as good news It's a form of that word uangaliza, which paul does use but has a prefix attached to it Which takes it back to something that was announced beforehand in the time of abraham So when god is promising abraham, he's going to bless him He's announcing the abraham good news and and isaiah uses the same verb that paul uses in In ephesians when he talks about announcing the good news and the noun form here here gospel is simply a noun That's cognate with the verb, uh to announce his good news.

And what is that good news? It's everything That god promised to do for jews and gentiles and for the world through jesus christ. That's what the good news is So then when we think about the gospel we have to ask ourselves What do we say and to whom are we saying it because the gospel includes how individual sinners Can have their sins forgiven how sinners can be made right with god jesus died on the cross for our sins and god raised him from the dead so that we can be exonerated in the judgment and have A relationship with god through christ right now. I i've written a book called paul's gospel in romans Vertical horizontal and cosmic dimensions In which I think through about I think through ways that paul discusses the gospel in his letter To the romans When we think about them the gospel is this very massive Announcement of good news from genesis to revelation that god has finally brought all of these promises realized in jesus christ But when we share the gospel with individuals We must explain the basic message of what god has done for them to have their sins forgiven And explain to them what their response must be to experience that personal conversion experience and I am an evangelical In the good old sense of the term that believes in the personal the personal experience conversion experience of sinners who turn from their sins and every person must have a personal conversion experience and and They must confess and believe that jesus is lord They have to believe the right things about who god is and and they must Trust that jesus died on the cross for their sins and god raised him from the dead for their sins so that they can be Saved But paul's gospel includes all sorts of other good news such as fellow heirs members of the same body partakers of the promise in christ through the good news About jesus Number seven is going to talk a bit more about the gospel.

He says in verse seven of this gospel I was made A minister or or a servant that's actually the word there servant in verse seven According to here's the word for gift again the gift of god's grace. I mean that's emphatic The word gift means gift But the word grace is gift and there are two different words for gift here one is a word that Is one greek term and the other one is the term translated grace But he's basically saying the gift of god's gift. I was made a minister according to the guilt of god's gift And notice something here that paul says it's very important verse 37 paul became a minister Because god gifted him with the gospel So everyone everyone who Is in christ Is in christ because of god's gift And did you notice in chapter 3 verse 7 that paul says because he received the gift He gave the appropriate response The appropriate response was he was made a minister And he yielded his life to god Who gave him the gift of god's gift? And notice this in verse 7 which was given me by the working of his power So basically he mentions give three times the gift of god's gift, which was gifted to me by the working of god's Power what what power paul? well the same power That he displayed when he raised jesus from the dead which he mentioned at the end of chapter one the power that god displayed when he showed his manifold riches toward us the power that he displayed when he Raised jesus from the dead.

That was the same power that he displayed in paul's life when he Made him a minister of the gospel So you think about what paul is saying here paul did not have a moment in his life When he woke up and said yeah, I I think i'm smart enough now To become a follower of jesus as the jewish messiah But god made him a minister As a gracious gift Practically this is true of every christian though. We don't have the same story as paul Every christian is a christian because of god's gift and his saving power And he gives us the privilege to be a Servant of the gospel. That's what the word minister here means paul doesn't hear this carefully paul doesn't mean i'm thinking practically now Paul does not mean here that he was ordained to be a preacher In the in the traditional sense of the term by this word minister.

He means that god made him a servant of christ Ordination is great. I'm an ordained baptist minister. I'm licensed into the gospel Ministry, but he means that god Set him apart Gave him the gift of the gospel Counted him worthy to be a servant of christ of the gospel Every believer has been given the gift of salvation Not for the purpose of sitting around and just thinking about how saved we are But for the purpose of being a servant Of that gospel we are servants of the gospel Of our lord jesus christ and that doesn't mean everybody goes into the ministry It's not what that means in a vocational sense that means no matter where you work or live or worship and play If you are a follower of jesus We have a responsibility ability to think in a christian way about our vocation Whatever that vocation might be and how we can utilize and use ours our resources and our gifts for the service of the kingdom and how we can Use our social networks for the purpose of yes doing good work.

Yes Creating a world in which people can flourish. Yes But also thinking carefully about how can I let people know that jesus? Can give them salvation by means of the spaces How can I do that by me in the spaces in which I live work worship? and play It takes wisdom and prayer and patience To figure out how we can do that But as ministers of the gospel servants of the gospel, we've been given a gift to give that gift to other people Now verse eight he's going to elaborate a bit more upon the gifts effect upon him To me look at this language here. I love this Though I am the very least of all the saints.

I do not think that's false humility You know those christians sometimes i'm like this those christians where when someone gives you a compliment Because they enjoyed the sermon Or they enjoyed the the lecture they'll say thank you for your lecture it really meant a lot to me and and we sometimes can be Falsely humble and say oh not me but the lord Or woe is me. I'm just a sinner when it's perfectly fine for us to to recognize if we're gifted You know, we're gifted and when someone says to us I really enjoyed that lecture or that sermon we can say well praise the lord I'm, so thankful. I worked hard on that.

I prayed about that. I'm so thankful. We don't have to be falsely humble When someone gives us a good compliment, well paul here is not being falsely humble He is being honest.

He viewed himself the very least of all the saints I don't have any evidence hard evidence to prove this but I wonder if one reason why he senses this Is because of the havoc that he brought upon the church Before he came to faith in jesus You know, it gives me chills as we're thinking about the unifying power of the gospel How many lives paul perhaps Destroyed before his faith in christ families That were perhaps separated Because he wanted to drag men and women off to jail because of their faith in jesus Think about the family members who were broken when stephen was stoned because of his faith in christ These are real people they're not just Fictive characters created. They're real people who lived And they had real stories and real pain and when stephen was stoned to death martyred for his faith in jesus There was a funeral no doubt after that There was lament after that and and saul of tarsus agreed with the stoning Of stephen and you even see Hints of the effects of this when paul's converted And The disciples try to bring him in contact with other disciples and they're scared Because of the havoc he's brought upon the church Perhaps paul carried with him his whole ministry memories Of the pain he caused the christian community in dishonor of jesus before he came to faith in christ I can't prove that with hard facts with beyond the data that I just gave you to perhaps sort Support the point that i'm making But it seems to me. It's a reasonable point to make That he viewed himself the least of the saints.