Recap and Background

As we continue in Episode Five, we are in chapter 3 of Ephesians. We are looking at the way that Paul is developing his teaching about the Church. This teaching in the first half of the book of Ephesians is one of the most wonderful teachings about the Church in the whole New Testament. Paul has specially focused on trying to help the Ephesian church understand how amazing God’s plans are for the Church - not just amazing plans for individual salvation, but amazing plans for countless people to be saved over the whole period of Church history.

In the last episode, he particularly focussed on the issue of God building a multi-racial, multicultural, international community of faith in the Church. The family of God embraces every nation in the world. This brings glory to God that people from all parts of the world, and all racial backgrounds join in worshipping Jesus Christ as Lord and Saviour. This was something that thrilled Paul, and he wrote about it extensively here. It thrilled him partly because he was called to bring this about; he was called to be an apostle to the Gentiles, to go away from his own people - not to spend his time with the Jewish people, which he could easily have done, but to go to other groups of people to reach across the ethnic divide and draw them into the Kingdom of God and the community of the Church. He called this plan of God to bring together people from all races a ‘mystery’ and what he meant by a ‘mystery’ is that in past generations, this idea was not known, but when Christ came, suddenly God’s plan became clear.

Paul – A Prisoner

In this episode, Paul develops these ideas even further.

“For this reason, I, Paul, the prisoner of Christ Jesus for the sake of the Gentiles –“

Ephesians 3:1, NIV

He didn’t even finish the sentence but paused there. We are going to pause there too, because there is something we need to think about.

I mentioned in earlier episodes that Paul was writing from prison, but now I want to talk about Paul’s experiences in prison. In the modern church, in many parts of the world, there is persecution, suffering, martyrdom sometimes, and imprisonment. There are countless thousands of believers today who are imprisoned for their faith. We need to keep that in mind as we go back to the early church, and find that some of the apostles experienced the same kinds of trials and tribulations. Paul experienced prison. He said that he was a ‘prisoner for the sake of the Gentiles’. When we look back over his life, we find that whenever he ended up in prison, it was because he was advancing the gospel to the Gentiles. Sometimes it led to his imprisonment. The first time this happened was when he arrived in the Macedonian, or northern Greek, city of Philippi, as described in Acts 16. You can study this incident when you look at The Spreading Flame on Word Online, the study of the book of Acts. When Paul arrived for the first time in the gentile city of Philippi to preach the gospel, there was a controversy which developed into a very fierce argument. (Acts 16: 23) As a result, the magistrates had the apostle severely flogged, and then thrown into prison. The jailer was commanded to guard Paul and Silas carefully. When he received these orders, he put them in the inner cell and fastened their feet in stocks. This is the first time we know of Paul going to prison. They were put together in the inner cell, the most secure cell. His attempt to reach the gentiles in Philippi led to imprisonment. In this incident, there was a miraculous event in the middle of the night. While they were praising God in the inner cell of the prison, there was an earthquake, and the prison doors opened. The next day Paul was released from prison.

The next time we find Paul in prison, it was in the city of Jerusalem. His visit to Jerusalem caused great anger to many of the Jewish people, because they didn’t like the fact that he was preaching the Christian message to the gentiles. He ended up in a military prison first, in the military fortress in Jerusalem and then was transferred to the city of Caesarea, the Roman military headquarters in the country of Judea. He spent two years there. Then, at the time that he was writing this letter, he was in prison again. This time in Rome. He was trying to preach the gospel in Rome. He had been wanting to get to Rome for many years. Rome was the capital of the Empire - a place of influence - and Paul wanted to make sure there was a strong church in the capital city of the Roman Empire. This time he was under house arrest for two years, guarded by Roman soldiers. So, when Paul says he was a prisoner for the sake of the gentiles, he means exactly what he says. The only reason he is in prison is because he was trying to preach the gospel to the gentiles, because God had called him to do that.

God’s Promise

“Surely you have heard about the administration of God’s grace that was given to me for you, that is, the mystery made known to me by revelation, as I have already written briefly. In reading this, then, you will be able to understand my insight into the mystery of Christ, which was not made known to people in other generations as it has now been revealed by the Spirit of God, to God’s holy apostles and prophets. This mystery is that through the gospel the Gentiles are heirs together with Israel, members together of one body, and sharers together in the promise in Christ Jesus.”

Ephesians 3:2-6, NIV

What is this promise? The promise that Paul has in mind is something that God said to Abraham at the very beginning of the calling of the Jewish people. Paul was aware that something God had said to Abraham, the forefather of the Jewish people, was now being fulfilled in the Church. He described this as ‘the promise’.

Abraham was called miraculously. God told him to go from where he lived, a journey of several thousand kilometres, to the promised land of Israel, and to form a people there. Abraham is the forefather, or the founder, of the Jewish people. In Genesis 12: 2 and 3, this is what God said to Abraham,

“I’ll make you into a great nation and I will bless you. I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you and whoever curses you, I will curse. And all peoples on earth will be blessed through you.”

Abraham was given three promises by God. First, he was promised a name. This meant a successor, a son to carry on his name. At that time, he and his wife Sarah were infertile; they couldn’t have children. But miraculously, Isaac, their son, was born some years later. Secondly, God promised him a nation; from Isaac, his miraculous son, would come a tribal group, or a nation, who would find a land - the Jewish people. It is the third promise that we are interested in in this context. The third promise that God gave to Abraham was, ‘All peoples on earth will be blessed through you.’ That is remarkable. Through the Jewish people, every single ethnic group in the world was going to be blessed. This is what Paul calls here, in Ephesians 3, ‘the promise’. It was something he thought about a lot. In Galatians 3:14 he wrote, “He redeemed us in order that the blessing given to Abraham might come to the Gentiles through Christ Jesus, so that by faith we might receive the promise of the Holy Spirit.”

Abraham’s descendant, the Jewish descendant, Jesus, was going to be the means by which all the nations of the world were going to be blessed. Abraham was the forefather of Jesus, and Jesus brought about salvation through his death on the cross. This is freely offered to the nations of the world. Salvation has come from the Jewish background, from Abraham. It wasn’t just through Abraham as a person, but through his successors - his descendants - and through his final significant descendant, Jesus the Messiah, who was the Son of Abraham. Jesus enables every single nation in the world to experience salvation. That was never possible before. God spoke to the Jewish people, but he didn’t offer salvation to all the nations of the world. But now he does - through Jesus Christ. This is what Paul was thinking about here. He was amazed that in his day, suddenly salvation was opening up and thousands of people were coming to believe in Jesus from all sorts of different ethnic groups - Romans and Greeks and all sorts of others who heard the gospel. This is exactly what Jesus had commanded his disciples to do, in Matthew 28: 18, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore, go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you.” All nations. Notice that phrase. The gospel was never intended for the Jews only. The Jews were the servants of the nations. Their job was to release the word. Paul knew that. He, as a Jewish apostle, was giving his life, literally laying down his life, for the Gentile nations, such that he was willing to die and to be imprisoned. He had already been in prison several times. He was in prison again and he may not get out alive. He was willing to die for this cause. Jewish people were laying down their lives in the first century, so that the nations of the world could receive the gospel.

The Global Church

2000 years later, we can thank God for the work of the apostles in the first generation of the Church, because they all, in different ways, opened the door of the gospel to the nations of the world. It has taken 2000 years of Church history for the gospel to reach all parts of the world. It has taken remarkable missionaries from different nations to go from one place to another. Now, at the beginning of the 21st century, we truly have a global Church. The Church has strong communities in all parts of Asia, including closed countries, like China. It has significant communities in India, the Hindu nation with a vast population. There are significant Christian communities across the Islamic world, all the way across the Americas, North, Central and South, in sub-Saharan Africa, and all the way across Europe. Everywhere you look in the world, you see the Church has been planted. In some cases, it is doing well. In some cases, the Church might be small and struggling, but it is there in all the nations of the world. The very thing that Paul started to do in the first century in places like Ephesus, is bearing fruit across the world in a remarkable way 2000 years later, because the Church continues to grow as we welcome people from the different nations into the Church community.

Church Growth – a Sign to Demonic Powers

“I became a servant of this gospel by the gift of God’s grace given me through the working of his power. Although I am less than the least of all God’s people. This grace was given to me to preach to the Gentiles the boundless riches of Christ, and to make plain to everyone the administration of this mystery, which for ages past was kept hidden in God who created all things. His intent was that now, through the Church, the manifold wisdom of God should be made known to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly realms, according to his eternal purpose that he accomplished in Christ Jesus our Lord. In him, and through faith in him, we may approach God with freedom and confidence. I ask you, therefore, not to be discouraged because of my sufferings for you, which are for your glory.”

Ephesians 3:7-13, NIV

Paul introduced an astonishing new idea. Not only is the Church to be the Church of all nations, but God planned that the growth of the Church should be a visible sign to the demonic powers in heaven, that their power was weakening in its control over the human race. This is a remarkable idea. Through the Church, “the manifold wisdom of God should be made known to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly realms”. This is a reference to the demonic powers that we discussed in an earlier episode, at the beginning of chapter 2. We noticed that the unbelievers were under the control of the spiritual powers in the heavenly places. Now we see that Paul is expecting the growth of the Church to show that their power is weakening. That is incredible and wonderful. Throughout human history, demonic powers have sought to oppress humanity: to make humanity suffer; to be consumed by conflict; and to be distracted away from the gospel so that salvation doesn’t come to people. But God’s desire is that salvation should come.

In Paul’s thoughts, when Jesus died on the cross something amazing happened spiritually. He wrote in Colossians 2:15 “And having disarmed the powers and authorities, he made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross.” The cross disarmed the principal authorities and powers. The demonic powers no longer have the same influence over humanity, now that the gospel has come. That is what Paul’s theology tells us. We don’t always feel it. We don’t always experience it in an immediate sense, but since Jesus’ death on the cross the grip of evil powers on humanity is weakening.

It is rather like in a military campaign, when one side is losing, and the other side is gradually winning, there can come moments when one side is decisively weakened. This is what happened in Europe in the Second World War, when the German Nazi forces controlled most of Europe. The Western Allies, based themselves in Britain, and formed a huge army with naval and air forces, and invaded the country of France in order to overthrow the Nazi Germans in central and northern Europe. When they entered Europe on the 6th of June in 1944, it was called D-Day. The largest, seaborne invasion and military force ever assembled in history, and they established a foothold in Europe during those next few days. That D-Day experience was like when Christ died on the cross. It established a foothold in humanity. Many of the Germans knew from that day onwards that it was only a matter of time before they lost the war and they lost the war within 12 months of that moment, as the western forces and the eastern forces of the Russians moved towards Germany and gradually destroyed their military power.

Sometimes a key event happens that changes the spiritual dynamic. Paul saw the death of Christ as that key moment. Now, a multitude of gentiles were going to believe, and no demonic forces were going to prevent the Church spreading to all the nations of the world. That was the faith that Paul had. Now, 2000 years later, we see the reality of it. We see the incredible numbers of Christians around the world, and the Church is still growing.

What we learn is that, although the Church experiences setbacks and problems - which it certainly does - these will all be overcome if we are faithful to God. Let me give you one example from the book of Acts. Chapter 12 describes a king who came to power during the time the Church was growing who was totally opposed to the Church; he tried to stop the Church entirely. His name was King Herod Agrippa, a descendant of Herod the Great, who was the ruler when Jesus was born in Judea. Herod Agrippa hated the Church, and he tried to destroy it. He tried to arrest the apostles and did manage to arrest and kill James, the brother of John, one of the twelve apostles. James was the first apostle to be killed. King Agrippa even arrested Peter, hoping to kill him as well, but Peter escaped miraculously. When this happened, it was a real setback for the Church, a real discouragement. One of the top leaders had been killed, and the armies of King Herod Agrippa were there to try and capture Christians and close Churches all the way across Judea and beyond. It was a dreadful moment for the Church. The Church in different countries has these terrible experiences, but going through Acts 12, we notice that although James was killed, but Peter miraculously escaped from prison. Angels came and the prison doors opened, and he managed to get out of prison. Absolutely miraculously. The enemy was trying to destroy the Church, but God had a way of preserving his Church. When we get to the end of that chapter, we find a summary statement:

“But the Word of God continued to spread and flourish.”

This is the perspective that Paul had on the Church. When there are setbacks, it does not mean that God’s purposes will fail. What it does mean, is that there is a spiritual battle, and there are real opponents. Some of you in different countries of the world listening to this, will know exactly the type of spiritual battles that you are experiencing in your country. Sometimes Churches are closed, sometimes Christian leaders are put in prison or killed, sometimes Christians are forced out of their jobs and become very poor, and sometimes Christian communities have to leave their town or area and go to another place because of the extent of the persecution. These are very real, terrible and difficult sufferings that we go through. These happened in the early church. Paul knew what it was like to have his life under threat, and to see fellow Christians martyred and killed. Yet, he believed that these setbacks would always be less than the advances of the gospel. He believed that the advance of the gospel would show the demonic powers that their days are numbered; their power has been restricted by the death of Jesus, opening up the way of salvation to the gentile people. Paul was passionate and convinced about this.

We need to use these scriptures to give us perspective on times of suffering and difficulty in the Church. I want you to be encouraged by this wider perspective that Paul has. The ultimate destruction of all demonic evil powers will only come when Christ returns. Satan will be bound, placed in the abyss according to the Book of Revelation, and ultimately destroyed, judged and excluded from the new creation. We are on the side of victory, just like those soldiers who fought in the D-Day campaign in Europe in the 1940s were on the victorious side, but some of them died in that campaign. There was much suffering, much loss, much injury and much death. We are in a great spiritual battle. Paul was in a great spiritual battle as he was imprisoned there in Rome, not sure what was going to happen to him, not sure what was going to happen to his churches, but he knew that whatever happened to him, God’s ultimate plan would not fail. That is why we are here 2000 years later, celebrating the growth and the development of the Church. Despite the harshest possible experiences that churches have gone through at different stages. Consider, for example, the greatest miracle of the modern church, which is the development of the Church in China. We know from history books how the Chinese leader Mao Tse Tung, who took over China in 1949 and ruled in to the until the mid 1970s, instigated great persecution against the church. His plan was to destroy all religion in China - whether it was Islam, Christianity, Confucianism, Buddhism or anything else. He wanted to destroy all spiritual values. Many Christians lost their lives. Many churches closed. But with what remained, God brought the church to life again very quickly in the 1980s and the 1990s and all the way through to now, where we see an enormous development of house church movements in China, so that it has a vast church numbering many millions of people today. Paul knew that these kinds of things would happen; his confidence was in God’s ultimate purposes. He said at the end, “I ask you therefore not to be discouraged because of my sufferings for you which are for your glory.” When we see Christians suffer, let us not be discouraged. It is painful but let us not be discouraged concerning the ultimate plans of God. He will bring his Kingdom, whatever the strength of the human and demonic opposition to the Kingdom of God.

Reflections

The first reflection is that God’s main strategy for advancing his Kingdom is having effective, Spirit filled, Bible-believing churches everywhere in the world. His main strategy is the local church. Your local church is a key part of God’s strategy in the world, and so the best thing you can do is to invest in your local churches.

As far as the spiritual battle goes, which is mentioned here, the best thing you can do, is to also invest in your local churches, because they are going to be the most effective means of carrying forward the message of the gospel into the future.

Thirdly, and finally, this passage is helpful to get a good perspective on suffering. Our suffering is real and painful, but it is temporary; it won’t ultimately prevent God’s Kingdom advancing. It is often a sign of the spiritual battle that we are involved with.

In conclusion, let me say again we are on the winning side. Christ has disarmed the powers of darkness, and one day that presence, and the influence and power, will be totally destroyed when Jesus comes again. In the meantime, there is a battle to fight. There is a Kingdom to advance. There is a gospel to preach. There is a church to support. I invite you through this message to become really active in your discipleship and in your commitment to serve God wholeheartedly, with a really positive perspective on what he is doing in your life and in our generation.