So, what is this great mystery? I'm sure you'll remember back in chapter 1, verses 9-10, Paul said that God "He made known to us the mystery of His will, according to His good pleasure that He planned in Him for the administration of the days of fulfillment—to bring everything together in the Messiah, both things in heaven and things on earth in Him," however, he never told us what that mystery was. He left that until now. He tells us several things about the mystery before actually stating what it is.
In verse 2, it is only described as "the administration of God’s grace," a phrase that doesn't really make sense, that is until we see what the mystery is in verse 6.
In verse 3, it was given to Paul by "revelation," meaning it came directly from God to Paul, through the Holy Spirit. It is possible that this happened when Paul met Jesus on the Damascus road, as recorded in Acts chapter 9, I believe, it possible that it came a bit later, however, regardless of when Paul received, it is clear that Paul intends us to know that revealing the content of the mystery is directly from God.
It was previously hidden, but has now been revealed, verse 5. "which in other generations was not made known to mankind, as it has now been revealed to His holy apostles and prophets in the Spirit.
Like a good mystery novel or movie, the clues have been there all along, but it is not until we get to the end, that we see how the various pieces all fit together.
So what is this mystery, exactly? In verse 6, he says "to be specific, that the Gentiles are fellow heirs and fellow members of the body, and fellow partakers of the promise in Christ Jesus through the gospel."
The mystery is the incredible unity of the church – that we are all one in Christ. The entire passage thus far comes to this point, that through the Gospel of Jesus Christ we are all one. Paul uses three terms to describe this unity: Heirs together, members together of one body, and shares together in the promise.
First, "heirs together." The Greek word is "sunklēronoma," meaning co-inheritor. As I'm sure most of you are familiar, you don’t earn an inheritance – it is a gift. Here, Paul is stating that together, we receive the inheritance of God. And, for the record, it is not the idea of God divvying up His riches and distributing a little here, and a little there. No, the idea is that together we receive the same thing. Together, we receive the gift of salvation. It is like leaving your house to your children. In which one doesn't get the upstairs and the other gets the basement. The inheritance is to them together, and therefore they need to work together, to receive the benefits of the inheritance.
Earlier, in chapter 1, we saw that the Holy Spirit is the guarantor of this inheritance, here, the emphasis Paul makes, is on the fact that we are joint heirs together.
Secondly, is "members together," or "sussōma," in the Greek, meaning both Jew and Gentile, belonging to the same body, one church.
Now, what I find to be most interesting, is Paul actually invents a word here. The word he uses, "sussōma," is found nowhere else in the Bible or in any other writings of the time; in order to make his point Paul invents this word that illustrates to us all joined together into one body. This is the theme he has been developing all along, that we all as Christians belong to the same body, the church of Christ, with Jesus as the head and that it is only us all together, that make up this body.
Next, "sharers together." This is the third great unifier, meaning that together we share in the promise. What promise? I believe this is a reference to the Holy Spirit, based on Ephesians 1:13.
"When you heard the message of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and when you believed in Him, you were also sealed with the promised Holy Spirit."
This then means that the third thing which brings us all together is the promise of the Holy Spirit. And the fact, that all who believe in Jesus, receive this precious gift of the Holy Spirit.
I'd like you to make note the key word in each of these three points – "together." In other words, we are not heirs alone. We are not exclusive members. We do not receive the Holy Spirit in isolation from one another. Rather, the point Paul is going to great lengths to make, even inventing a word to emphasis his point, is that the great mystery of God is that together, all Christians make up the church of God. That is the heart of this whole epistle, the concept of being in Christ, therefore the believer is indivisibly fused with Jesus Christ by faith, and so we are one with Christ.
Therefore, we had better be united as a body of believers, and that we had better be open to what God is doing in other areas of His kingdom. And if there are disagreements, discord or dissension, they had best be around areas that are significant and not trivial. For example, we had better not unite with people who deny that Jesus is the Son of God, and we better not divide with people who prefer a different music style than we do or would rather worship and witness at a different time.
In the second section in the passage, Paul talks about sharing this mystery. In verse 8, the first people with whom the mystery is shared are the Gentiles. In keeping with the purpose of the passage which is to share more of himself with his hearers, Paul mentions some of his personal experience in verse 7 and then explains that his job is to share this great mystery with the gentiles. I'd like to briefly point out just how Paul describes this in verse 8, it is a beautiful description, he says he is called to preach "the unsearchable riches of Christ." I love this illustration. Paul is telling us that God is like a reservoir so deep we can never find the bottom of it, we can never draw too much of it, we can never exhaust it's resources.
I pray that whatever you are facing, you are able to draw strength from this amazing truth! God’s resources are abundant and unlimited. They're never ending!
That's why we must share the mystery with everyone. Sharing of the mystery is not limited to the gentiles. Paul goes on to say in the next verse that he wants to make this plain "to enlighten all people." He wants all people to know that there is hope and unity for us together in Christ.
We're following along with him, we're understanding, then verse 10 and 11 catches us a bit by surprise. We’ve been following along, then Paul says that the third group with whom the mystery of God is shared is the spiritual realm, and that the existence of the church demonstrates this mystery.
"so that the multifaceted wisdom of God might now be made known through the church to the rulers and the authorities in the heavenly places. This was in accordance with the eternal purpose which He carried out in Christ Jesus our Lord"
I believe what this verse is teaching is that the unity of the church – a multi-racial, multi-ethnic grouping of people untied together in Christ, demonstrates to all the spiritual realm the incredible wisdom and plan of God.
This is to remind us that our faith and our witness is not merely a human thing, it is a spiritual thing. And therefore, we should expect spiritual forces to discourage, dissuade and distract us from making the mystery known like Paul did. To rob us of the energy and urgency, to sidetrack us with non-essential issues. Later, in chapter 6, we see Paul’s prescription for dealing with this reality. However, for now, the point is one of hope. God created the church, He united us in Christ, and this very existence of the church demonstrates to all the wisdom of God.
Then, we come to verse 12, "in whom we have boldness and confident access through faith in Him."
This is the climax of the passage. Have you ever had the experience the need to see someone or talk to
someone, feeling desperate about it, feeling a great deal of
urgency, like "I must get in touch with them NOW! Only to find
that they are unavailable. “I can book you an appointment in one month;”
“I’m sorry, so-and-so is out of the office but I'll let them know you called, I'm sure they will return
your call later;" or my personal favorite, the what appears to an eternal busy signal, followed by just moments later, no answer. The phone was busy, you can't get through, and now, they've gone.
It is not that way with God. He is never busy. You’ll never get a voicemail message that says "Hi, you've reached God. I am currently out of the office or temporarily away from my desk." You’ll never get a angel who tells you that He may be able to squeeze in a brief moment for a week from Thursday.
Oh, the contrary, beloved! God is waiting for you. His door is open. His line is clear. His personal attention is ready and available to you to use, whenever YOU need it! God is accessible, open, free, and even more, He is inviting you and I to talk with Him. Try getting that kind of attention from the C.E.O of Apple! Yet, the Creator of the entire Universe is awaiting for you to reach out to Him.
Let's look at verse 12 again, "confident access through faith in him" – the Him here is Christ, that is clear from the last part of verse 11. It is because of Jesus Christ, that we have this confident, continuous access to God the Father.
It is because we have been made into one new person in Christ, that we can come before God at any time. Note the role of faith. of placing our hope and trust in Jesus as our Lord. Part of this means we have faith that God will hear our cry; and part of it means that we will have the faith to accept God’s response as what is best for us. Through Jesus :we may approach God."
What a profound truth!
Through Jesus we have access to God - what an incredible statement of truth. We, who are in our old nature corrupt, rebellious and sinful, who were the objects of God’s wrath, are suddenly, miraculously, invited into God’s presence. Anytime we want!
We have the privilege of bringing our case before the almighty God, the Creator of the entire universe. God Himself waits us, with open arms to welcome us into His presence. Paul goes on, instructing us to enter God’s presence with "boldness and confidence." This implies courage in the face of intimidating circumstances.
The point of Paul's usage of these two words is to encourage us to come to God, even when we are feeling a bit afraid, shy or feel to ashamed. We need not be tentative, we need not sneak in ashamedly, we instead come before God with the abandon of children in love. Through Jesus Christ, we can approach God the Father, and be confident that He will welcome us with open arms, hear the cries of our hearts, and answer us with what is best for us.
In Closing....
As much as there is a danger in us being too shy to approach God, I think there is also a danger of us trivializing this incredible privilege. Of feeling like we can barge in on God, tell Him what He needs to do, and then storm back out just as quickly. That maybe describes our prayers more often than being too shy to approach God! So how do we come to God? We need to do so humbly, and we need to be real. We don’t butter God up with flowery statements about how great He is, so that He will look favorably on our requests – then we just pour our hearts out to Him.
You know exactly what I'm talking about! We must abandon the "You look great, have you lost weight? Is that a new outfit? Did you do something different with your hair? You look AMAZING!" garbage.
Our worship and praise each week needs to flow from what we
believe about God, about who He is and what He has done. And it needs to
be genuine. Real. From the heart. It needs to be authentic, or else I
believe it is insulting to God. After all, He already knows what's in your heart. You can't fool Him!
Paul has reminded us repeatedly of who God is in his letter to the Ephesians, and he expects us to remember that as we come to God in worship and in prayer, and that is why he encourages us to come before Him with boldness and confidence. God is GREAT. God’s love is POWERFUL.
The riches of the gospel of freedom and forgiveness are "unsearchable," to borrow the word Paul uses in verse 8. And our response needs to honor Him by our coming into His presence and offering ourselves to Him with humbleness, with boldness and confidence.
The mystery is that in Christ we are all one. This mystery needs to be shared. And the result of this, the climax, is that we can now approach God with boldness and confidence.
God gives graciously. In I Corinthians chapter 9, Paul says "But I have used none of these rights, and I have not written this to make it happen that way for me. For it would be better for me to die than for anyone to deprive me of my boast! For if I preach the gospel, I have no reason to boast, because an obligation is placed on me. And woe to me if I do not preach the gospel!"
In other words, "Don't commend me, I am not commended in the ministry because of something I did. I didn't do anything to deserve this!" Given Paul's previous history, I bet this was difficult for him to deal with. He was used to earning his way, all his commendations, he earned. And now God says, "Hey Paul, you're in the ministry, like it or not. Oh by the way, don't mess up, because if you do, you're in a lot of trouble. And you know that."
Beloved, is there something that you need to approach God with, but for whatever reason, you've been holding back? Is there is an area of your life you haven’t given Him control in. Approach Him today.
Or, maybe you have never approached Him, you've felt too ashamed, you've been reluctant to turn your life over to Him, to receive Christ as your Lord and Savior. Today is that day, Answer His call. His door is open, you don’t need to be ashamed, you don't need make an appointment, just start the conversation and be real with Him. Pour your heart out to Him. He promises to hear you.
May it be so...
the Lord make His face shine upon you,
And be gracious to you;
The Lord lift up His countenance upon you,
And give you peace.
Now and forever, in Jesus' name
Amen