The Mystery of the Church
Ephesians - Live Like You Really Are
Chuck Sligh
September 2, 2012
TEXT: Please turn in your Bibles to Ephesians 3.
INTRODUCTION
We live in a world of unsolved mysteries.
• Being something of a history buff, I’ve always been intrigued by what might have happened to the lost colony of Roanoke in the 1500s, which to this day is still a mystery.
• It still remains a mystery as to who really were Jack the Ripper and the Zodiac killer.
• Why an unusually high number of planes and boats have gone missing in the Bermuda Triangle is a continuing mystery…and I could give scores of other mysteries in this life.
Something in human nature is drawn to mysteries.
• That’s why the mystery novel remains one of the best-selling genres of fiction: Think Sherlock Holmes, Agatha Christie, the Hardy Boys, Grisham and Larsson.
• Mysteries are still one of television’s most enduring staples.
> Perry Mason was so popular because it was always a mystery who the real killer was until the very end of the show when the real killer—the one you least expected—finally spilled the beans under Perry Masons withering cross examination…and the guilty always admitted it right on the witness stand…every week!
>Even today, one of the most popular TV shows is C.S.I., a team of criminal science experts unraveling the toughest of crimes, a series so popular that there is not ONE C.S.I. show, but THREE—C.S.I. Las Vegas, C.S.I. Miami and C.S.I. New York.
Now here’s something surprising: Did you know that the Apostle Paul was a mystery writer? Well, his mystery writing wasn’t fiction, but Paul used the word mystery, which is the Greek word mustērion, no less than twenty times in his writings. What mystery did Paul about?
Let’s unravel that mystery in Ephesians 3:1-12.
I. NOTICE FIRST OF ALL, A MYSTERY REVEALED IN VERSES1-6.
• Now remember that chapter 3 is a continuation of one LONG thought of Paul which begins back in chapter 1, verse 22 and goes all the way though chapter 3, verse 12.
• So to get Paul’s flow in chapter 3, let’s review what he had taught up to this point:
‣ In chapter 1, verses 22-23, Paul says that Christ was the head of the body, which he identifies as the Church.
‣ In chapter 2, He delineates three vast people groups: sinful mankind as a whole; Israel, God’s special chosen people nationally; and a totally new corporate entity, the Church, which came into existence through the work of Christ.
‣ This new entity, the Church, made up of both Jews and Gentiles, is referred to by Paul as “one new man” in verse 15—that is, a new humanity, a new spiritual people of God.
• With that background in mind, we can now examine chapter 3:
Paul begins the chapter with these words, “For this cause I Paul, the prisoner of Jesus Christ for you Gentiles, 2 If ye have heard of the dispensation of the grace of God which is given me to you-ward: 3 How that by revelation he made known unto me the mystery; (as I wrote afore in few words.”
Paul says in verse 1 that he was the prisoner of Jesus Christ for the Gentiles sake.
In verse 2 he said that he’d been given a special dispensation, which means stewardship, or responsibility of God’s grace on behalf of the Gentiles. That is, he had a special responsibility for them; a special ministry. When describing his conversion to King Agrippa in Acts 26, Paul said on the very day he was saved, God called him to preach the Gospel to the Gentiles. So it’s no wonder that in various places in the New Testament, Paul refers to himself “the apostle of the Gentiles” and “the minister of Jesus Christ to the Gentiles” in Romans; and “a teacher of the Gentiles in Galatians.”
In verse 3 Paul tells us that he received special revelation about a special mystery. Now understand that mustērion, the word translated mystery here, means something slightly different from our modern word mystery, which has more the idea of a “whodunit” or something seemingly inexplicable in life or nature. The Greek word mustērion in the New Testament meant a previously hidden truth not knowable by human means, revealed by God in His perfect timing.
What is this mystery, this formerly hidden, but now revealed truth Paul refers to in this passage?
He explains it in verses 4-6 – “Whereby, when ye read, ye may understand my knowledge in the mystery of Christ) 5 Which in other ages was not made known unto the sons of men, as it is now revealed unto his holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit; 6 That the Gentiles should be fellow-heirs, and of the same body, and partakers of his promise in Christ by the gospel.”
Paul says in verses 4-5 this mystery was not made known to anyone until the New Testament apostles and prophets. – So it was a true mustērion in the New Testament sense: something not previously known, knowable only by revelation.
In verse 6 Paul says that this new revelation was that Gentile believers and Jewish believers would be incorporated together into one new spiritual entity, the Church.
This is essentially what Paul had taught in chapter 2, but Paul uses three terms to describe a vital unity between Jewish and Gentile believers:
• First, he says they became fellow heirs of God’s inheritance.
The idea is that God doesn’t divide some of his inheritance with Gentile believers and some of it with Jewish believers. The ethnic divide is eliminated. No, all equally share Christ’s inheritance for the saints.
Illus. – For example, if you died and left your house as an inheritance to your children, the whole inheritance is theirs TOGETHER, not one getting the upstairs, one getting the main floor, one the basement, and the baby of the family only getting the front porch!
The point is that both Jews and Gentiles are united and share all the blessings of Christ equally.
• Second, he says Gentile believers are members of the same body of Christ as the Jews. There are not two separate groups—Jewish believers and Gentile believers. There’s only one body—the body of Christ with Christ as the head.
• Third, he says Gentiles partake of the same promise given to the Jews. – The promise referred to here was the Holy Spirit and the fact that just as Jewish believers were baptized with the Holy Spirit into the body of Christ, so were Gentile believers.
Paul’s point is that the great previously unrevealed truth of God is that ALL believers together make up Christ’s body regardless of their race or ethnicity. In other words, the Gospel and Christ and His Church are, and always were meant to be—UNIVERSAL in scope; it’s for EVERYBODY; it’s inclusive; there’s room for ALL who will bow to Christ and trust Him as Savior. Beloved, there’s NO ONE God does not want us to reach out to in love.
This whole idea of the universality of the Gospel was settled way back in the first century when the Gospel went out to the whole world. It never WAS God’s intention that the Jews see themselves as somehow the special ones God loved to the exclusion of others. It was ALWAYS His purpose to reach out to the WHOLE world; to all people; to all races; to all people groups; to all nations.
II. NOTICE SECOND, IN VERSES 7-12 WE SEE A MINISTRY RECEIVED.
Paul said in verse 7 – “Whereof I was made a minister, according to the gift of the grace of God given unto me by the effectual working of his power.” – Paul says here he was given a ministry.
At the beginning of verse 8 he says, “Unto me, who am less than the least of all saints, is this grace given…”
Paul invents a whole new word when he said he was “the least of all saints” which linguistically is impossible but roughly translates into “the leastest of the saints.” Knowing what a spiritual giant Paul was, it’s easy to think this is false modesty. But Paul really felt this way. He never forgot the damage he caused to the Church and people’s lives before he was saved and had persecuted the church. In 1 Corinthians 1:9-10a he said, “For I am the least of the apostles, that am not meet to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. 10 But by the grace of God I am what I am.”
So Paul was not being disingenuous. He ever marveled that someone so religiously misguided and selfishly ambitious as he had been before meeting Christ could not only be forgiven of all his sin, but be made an apostle on top of that, and the “apostle of the Gentiles” to boot to whom most of the mysteries of the Jewish-Gentile union would be entrusted.
What a marvelous reminder of the wonderful grace of Jesus. You too can receive the full pardon for all your sins by trusting in Jesus Christ. And like Paul, God will bless you beyond anything you could ever deserve, despite your past sins. That’s what grace is: undeserved favor.
Beginning at the end of verse 8, Paul says his ministry was targeted in three directions:
• First, in verse 8b, he said “that I should preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ.”
Beloved, what people need to hear first and foremost is Christ. When sharing Christ with your friends and neighbors, don’t waste your time talking about issues or whether this or that activity is right or wrong. In 1 Corinthians, Paul teaches they can’t understand God’s way anyway.
No, what the lost needs to hear is the “unsearchable riches of Christ.” Christ and the blessings in Him was Paul’s only message to the lost. He said in 1 Corthinthians 1:23 – “But we preach Christ crucified…” and in chapter 2, verse 2, describing his message when he first came to Corinth, he said “For I determined not to know any thing among you, save Jesus Christ, and him crucified.”
The Greek phrase translated “unsearchable riches” is interesting. It literally means “riches that cannot be tracked.” In other words, they’re so vast, infinite and inexhaustible that they cannot be valued, tracked or accounted for. Kent Hughes, summing this up, says, “What are the implications of this? Primarily that Christ always enriches life….Christ never subtracts from life.; he always enriches it with untrackable riches.” (Kent Hughes, Ephesians: the Mystery of the Body of Christ, p. 108.)
• In verse 9 Paul reveals his second focus: to inform EVERYONE about the fellowship of the Church. – “And to make all men see what is the fellowship of the mystery, which from the beginning of the world hath been hid in God, who created all things by Jesus Christ.”
Paul felt it his ministry to enlighten everyone of the great mystery of the joining of the Gentiles into the Church to create the body of Christ. This seems ho-hum to us today, but it was earth shaking in Paul’s day. A good portion of the book of Acts is taken up with the church grappling with the integration of the Gentiles into the Church; and several major portions of Paul’s letters deal with it.
You might say that Paul was successful in getting this message out, for in writing about these things in his letters, he informed the whole world.
But in fact, the idea of the kind of fellowship Paul is talking about actually has never been fully realized by the church as a whole, thought it has in pockets. We’re still separated sometimes by racial and ethnic lines, by socio-economic boundaries, and by nationalism.
The major distinguishing mark of the early church was its intense love for one another; love that flowed beyond ethnic, racial and socio-economic boundaries. In fact, there was a saying throughout the whole Roman Empire: “Behold how they love one another.”
Maybe we here at Grace can’t change the world; maybe we can’t change Christendom; but we can affect our church and our community. May we be infused with a spirit of love that knows no bounds or boundaries.
• The third direction of Paul’s ministry may surprise you. Look at verses 10-11 – “To the intent that now unto the principalities and powers in heavenly places might be known by the church the manifold wisdom of God, 11 According to the eternal purpose which he purposed in Christ Jesus our Lord. 12 In whom we have boldness and access with confidence by the faith of him.”
Paul says that the mystery of the fellowship of Gentiles and Jews in one body is being watched with wonder by heavenly powers; that is: angels. Angels are not all knowing, and even they were not privy to this mystery. Several places in Scripture teach that the angels do not know God’s complete plan for history and redemption, and they observe us to learn about it.
As they do that, Paul says they see the “manifold wisdom of God.” The Greek word translated “manifold” here means “many-colored,” used in the Septuagint to describe Joseph’s coat of many colors. One commentator said, “The multi-colored fellowship of the Church, the variegated third race of Jews and Gentiles—multicultural and multiracial—shows the many-shaded wisdom of God.” (Ibid, p. 109) As the angels watch, they must marvel at God’s manifold wisdom.
CONCLUSION
Like everything so far in Ephesians, we’re confronted with many deep issues. God never intends His book to become a textbook of dry facts to just know. He wants truth to impact our lives, to affect our behavior; to change us; transform us. What are some practical applications we can take away from this message today?
• Well, first of all, just as Paul had a ministry of sharing the mystery of Christ, we too have that same ministry.
Paul said in 2 Corinthians 5:18 that God has given to ALL believers the “ministry of reconciliation.” This is the ministry of sharing with our friends, neighbors, co-workers and loved ones that though everyone is a sinner before God, facing His judgment, they can be reconciled to God through Jesus’s death on the cross for their sins. You don’t have to be a pastor to be in the ministry; ALL believers have the ministry of reconciliation.
Are you ministering by inviting people to church; talking to people about their eternal destiny; sharing with them the unsearchable riches of Christ? If not, maybe it’s because you feel inadequate or not prepared enough for it. If so, I would like to invite you to attend our six-week Sunday night study, Becoming a Contagious Christian, followed by a four-week study, Share Jesus without Fear.
The first is designed to help you learn how to integrate Christ into your daily relationships in a way that is contagious; that draws people to Christ. The second teaches how to share the Gospel with someone with little prior knowledge of the Bible, and to have the confidence that the Holy Spirit will use your witness to reach people for Christ. I hope you will attend every single study of that two-series evangelism study.
• Second, I want to ask you: Have you discovered the unsearchable riches of Christ?
I didn’t ask if you’ve been religious, or attended church, or given to the needy. What I want to know is, Are you saved? Have you experienced complete forgiveness by putting your faith in Christ alone as your only hope of salvation?
If not, you’re missing out on the most wonderful blessing of all. As Kent Hughes said “Christ never subtracts from life; he always enriches it with untrackable riches.”
If you’ve never come to a place where you realized your need for Christ’s forgiveness and eternal life, I invite you to pray a simple prayer by faith this morning and in that prayer admit to God that you have sinned and confess your trust in Jesus and His sacrifice on the cross for you. Jesus said in John 6:47, “Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believeth on me hath everlasting life.” Will you claim that verse today and experience the untrackable, inexhaustible riches of Christ?
