Ephesians 1:1-2
As many of you know, for the last few years we lived in the former Soviet Union. I remember one morning a young man came up to me, wanting me to translate a letter from Russian to English for him. He had some acquaintance in an English speaking country and he wanted me to translate this letter for him. Now it was a year or two ago, so I dont remember exactly what the letter said, and I dont remember the names, but I have reconstructed below something like what his letter was like.
Дорогой друг Джон в нашем любимом Иисусе Христе, который за нас умерил на кресте,
Поздравляю тебя с глубокой радостью в сердце и хочу выразит глубокое уважение,
Бог благослови тебя!!!
С уважением твой брат а друг в нашем спасителе Христе Иисусе,
Владимир.
So I set to the task of translating it for him. And literally translated, it came out as something like:
Dear friend John in our beloved Jesus Christ, who died on the cross for us,
Greetings to you with deep joy in the heart and I wish to express my deep respect,
God bless you!!!
With respect, your brother and friend in our Saviour Christ Jesus,
Vladimir
Hmmm how does that sound to our English speaking ears? A bit flowery? Somewhat over the top? We just dont greet each other like that do we? I told this fellow Vladimir that his greeting didnt really translate well into English. John would be quite confused if he got a letter like this. So Vladimir asked me to translate the general meaning, how we would say it in English. So I did that for him and this is how it came out, when I reduced the flowery Russian language to how we say it in English.
POWERPOINT TYPED LETTER
Dear John,
God bless you!
Vladimir
His whole page letter had become 6 words in English.
In the English speaking world, we are not into flowery greetings, at least when we write to each other. But the Russians are. And so was the Greek speaking ancient world. We can see this in the greetings in Pauls letters in the New Testament. When we see Pauls greetings in the New Testament we tend to see them as flowery. As superfluous. Our natural instinct is to compress them.
Lets have a look for instance at the greeting in Ephesians, the book we will be exploring over the next few months.
Please open your Bibles and read with me.
Eph 1:1-2
EPH 1:1 Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, To the saints in Ephesus, the faithful in Christ Jesus: EPH 1:2 Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. (NIV)
When we read these verses too often we skip over them. We translate in our minds: From Paul to the Ephesians. After all, its just a greeting, and we jump into verse 3 where the real stuff starts.
But lets take another look at Vladmirs letter to John. In reality, this letter is much more than, Dear John, God bless you! Vladimir. The letter speaks of a shared relationship in Jesus Christ. It mentions Vladimirs faith in Christ. We also see some of Vladimirs theology of why Christ died. We also read of his emotions in writing the letter and his respect for John.
So too even more so we can see that Pauls introduction to the Ephesians is much more than a greeting.
Over next few months we will be looking at Ephesians. It is a wonderful book with so much in it. Ephesians deals with the fundamental problem of our time. In fact, of all times. We live in our world wracked with problems.
Ephesians deals with these sorts of problems. It deals with racism, sin, breakdown in family relationships, marriage, bringing up children, work. It deals with them the only way they can be treated in Christ.
Ephesians speaks of our relationship with Christ. It speaks of our need our utter hopelessness without Christ and how God has redeemed us in Christ. It speaks of how God has redeemed us in order to change us to be holy and to do good works.
Ephesians speaks of the church and its role in Gods plan. Through the church that is, the community of Gods people, God brings Jews and non-Jews together into one people. The church is Gods instrument for bringing about His purposes not just here on Earth but also in the heavenlies.
And we will be exploring these things in depth in the coming months. Now the first two a preview of the book as a whole. An introduction if you like.
Lets look at them.
Firstly Paul introduces himself.
Eph 1:1 Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God.
Paul firstly establishes the basis on which he writes this letter. He is an apostle - that is, a sent one, of Jesus Christ. This is not through his own will, or his own choice, but by the will of God. Ephesians is a God centred book. Notice in first two verses God is mentioned 2 times, and Jesus Christ is mentioned three times, giving a total of 5 times.
Our problem is that we think everything should revolve around us. A number of years ago there was an advertising campaign that went something like For the most important person in the world YOU! The world tries to address its problems by starting with me and you. But we need to start with God. The theme of Ephesians is God - not ourselves. As we go through Ephesians we will see this.
The first chapter of Eph talks about spiritual blessings. The second chapter talks about our separation from God and what God did to reconcile us to Him. Only then does Paul go onto specific practical issues later in the book. The reason is that everything starts with God. We need to get our relationship with God right before we can tackle other issues.
Paul is not an apostle by his own choice but because of Gods choice. We will see Gods direction over the affairs of the world and over the lives of people, more as we go through the book. Paul was in prison when wrote Ephesians, yet he still new God was in control despite his circumstances.
We will see even that our salvation my salvation, your salvation - is not through my will or your will, but ultimately from Gods will.
Next, Paul states to whom he is writing.
Eph 1:1b To the saints in Ephesus, the faithful in Christ Jesus.
Paul addresses one group of people but uses two names for them. That is, they are the saints in Ephesus and the faithful in Christ Jesus.
The saints - who are they? When we think of saints we might think of really special people. For example Mary McKillop is set to become Australias first saint! Even if we are not Catholic, we often think saints are super-Christians. But this is not what the word really means. The Greek word here, (αγιοι hagioi) means holy ones. Ones set apart for God. Is that only some Christians? Super Christians? Well lets see what else Paul calls the people he is writing to: He calls them the faithful in Christ Jesus. If you have the NIV there is a footnote here which says the word can also mean believers. The Greek word (πιστοι) means, believing, trusting and faithful.
The word for belief in the Greek has a much wider meaning than our word Belief. For us belief is a head word. For example, I believe 2+2 =4. I believe today is Sunday. But the Greek word also means trust. We are to believe and trust in Jesus Christ. Thats why in the NIV it says faithful in the footnote. Belief, in the NT sense, is something active in our lives. It is not just head knowledge, but effects every area of our lives. So Paul is addressing his letter to those who believe and trust in Jesus Christ. The faithful. Do you believe and trust in Jesus Christ?
And so, going back to the word saints, we see that the saints are the same as those who are the faithful, the same as those who are believers. That is, if you are a believer in Christ, you are a saint.. Or more literally, you are a holy one. A holy one who is one set apart for the Lords use.
So can you see the picture already. Paul, who is an apostle by Gods will. It is all about God. He is writing to those set apart for God, those consecrated for God. That is, to those who believe, who trust in Jesus Christ.
Now notice there are some qualifiers
Paul doesnt just write To the saints, the faithful ones.
He writes, To the saints in Ephesus, the faithful in Christ Jesus.
In one sentence he captures the tension that exists in all of our lives. We are in the world, but we are not of it. He writes to the saints who live in Ephesus a particular city. Now, Ephesus is just a ruin overrun with tourists. But in Pauls time it was a major trading city and the capital of the province. An estimated to million people lived there. Although Paul probably didnt found the church there, he spent 2-3 years there in Acts 19, which was one of his longest stays anywhere. Ephesus had a synagogue and Jews whom he first preached to (Acts 19.8) for 3 months before leaving the synagogue and preaching in a public lecture hall to both Jews and non-Jews (Acts 19.9). So Ephesus had both Jews and Gentiles, and both were in the church. In chapter 2 we will see Paul talk about unity between these two groups who in normal circumstances didnt like each other.
It was also in Ephesus that Paul eventually had to leave because of a riot in the theatre which started because the Christian message was radically changing society for the better, but not everyone was happy about that.
And Ephesus is later mentioned in Revelation as one of the seven churches to whom letters were written in chapter 2.
But the important thing for us now is that Ephesus was a city. A worldly city. A city like Gympie or anywhere else. It was not off in the heavenlies, but a real, down to earth city. And it was a city of the world, full of sin and sinful people, just like Gympie.
So Paul addressed a group of people living in a particular city in the world people having to contend with living in that city. But these people were also in Christ.
And here we see the tension that every Christian experiences for their whole life until they go to glory. That is, being in the world, but not of it. Although we live in Gympie or Curra or Goomborian or wherever, we are not of these places. We are in Christ Jesus.
There is much material in Ephesians about us being in Christ.. But what does this mysterious terminology mean to be in Christ.? Think about it is it not a strange term, to be in Christ? And indeed, Paul spends much of Ephesians talking about what it means to be in Christ. And he calls it a mystery! A mystery that is now revealed! So over the next few months we will join Paul on this adventure as we learn the wonders of what it is to be in Christ! We will get a taste next week as we look at the next section which starts with EPH 1:3 Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ.
So we see that Paul wrote to a people who were in Christ. In some mysterious but wonderful sense they were in Christ, yet still rooted in their own time and culture and place. Just like us here in Gympie.
So we can see in verse 1, Paul has already set the stage for much of what the rest of the letter will discuss. Paul, called of God and recognizing Gods control over his life. Paul who was writing to Christians, who are also saints. That is, to those wonderfully in Christ yet still living in their worldly city of Ephesus.
And now in verse 2 he gives them a blessing that summarizes his letter and indeed summarises the Christian faith.
EPH 1:2 Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
Such a short blessing, but again Paul here deals with major theology.
Again we see a reference to God the Father and to Jesus. And we see that grace and peace come from them both. They come from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ thus putting Jesus on the same level as God.
And those things we are blessed with grace and peace just about sum up the Gospel.
What is grace? What is peace? Dr Martyn Lloyd-Jones wrote of this verse:
Grace is the beginning of our faith; peace is the end of our faith. (pg 36). What did Dr Martyn Lloyd Jones mean? Or more to the point, what do the scriptures mean?
What is Grace? While I was growing up I thought grace was the prayer that we said before we eat meals. And that was all. But it is much more than that. Grace is unmerited favour. It is the process whereby someone who has something turns graciously to another who is in need. If I go to the shops, and buy a loaf of bread for $2, then I have paid money for it. If I go to the shops, and I have no money, but the shop owner gives me the bread without having to pay for it that is grace.
He gets nothing for it and loses something in being generous to me.
In chapter 2 Paul talks of our sin. He speaks of our utter hopelessness because of our sin. That we were so bound up in our sins that we are dead in them (Eph. 2.1). Our sin separated us from God. That sin not only separated us from God it separated us from other people. It is that sin that is the root cause of evil in the world today. It is that sin that is responsible for wars, for terrorism, for marriage breakdowns, for domestic violence, for sexual abuse. You name it, whatever is wrong with this world and there is lots wrong, has its roots in our sin. This sin leads to separation from God and disharmony between people.
Grace is that wonderful act of God, whereby through Jesus Christ, he dealt with our sin on the cross. He rescues us from sin. In doing so he gives us peace. Peace with God and peace with others.
But what is peace? When we think of peace, we think of absence from war. Thats true, but it is more than that. The early Christians took a lot of the Jewish meaning of the Hebrew word for peace. You may have heard of the Hebrew word for peace - Shalom. Jews today still use it as do Arabs and others in the Middle East with the similar word Salaam. It means peace in the sense of lack of war, but it means far more than that. You see, when we say peace, we say that there is peace between the USA and China, or the USA and Russia but it doesnt mean they actually like each other that much! We see peace as the absence of conflict. But the biblical idea goes much further.
It means reconciliation. It means relationship. It refers to a positive relationship between God and between people. It refers to a feeling of rest, the state of reconciliation between God and people, and between different people. It refers to the salvation and well being of the whole person.
And this peace is the result of Gods grace to us.
So Paul blesses the Ephesian church with grace and peace. How wonderful!
Lets now recap todays message and apply it.
These couple of verses are no mere greeting. It is more like a Russian greeting than and Australian one! It is packed with information that Paul will later develop in the epistle.
Remember
1. Its all about God. In 2 verses, the name God is mentioned twice, and Jesus Christ 3 times; 5 times in total.
2. Its written for believers saints those who trust in Jesus Christ, those who are set apart for Him, devoted to Him. Those who are in Christ, yet remain in the world but are not of this world.
3. The blessing forms the summary statement of the epistle grace and peace. Through His grace we are saved from our sins in order to receive His peace peace with God and peace with each other!
To take home:
The main thing I want you to take home today is to get excited about Ephesians and what it tells us about God, about us, and how we are to live for Him in this world.
Read Ephesians this week, and get ready for our series through the book. As you read look for those key themes: grace and peace. See what the book says about them.
And if you are not a Christian consider the message of Ephesians. Have you noticed the lack of peace in the world? In your own life? Have a read through Ephesians and consider what it is saying to you. That through Christ you can receive this grace from God.
And for us all:
You can see that in only a few words the first two verses of Ephesians already introduce us to the major themes in the book. But today we only touched on these things. Over the next few months we will explore these things in more detail. These things that form the very foundations of the Christian faith. And we will look at the impact they have on our everyday practical lives.
For Ephesians is a treasure trove of information about
- our relationship with Jesus.
- About reconciliation with God and with each other.
- About the mystery of salvation in Christ
- About the mystery of the church
- About unity in the body of Christ unity in the church
- And about how the church ought to function very practical.
- About how this grace and peace helps us to live holy lives
- And do good works
- About how it forms the basis for family relations.
- - husbands and wives, children,
- work relationship.
- And finishing with a great passage about the armour of God in ch 6.
I am excited about the things we will learn about God, about us and about how to live as Christians as we study this book over the next few months.
