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­­­­LSB  Ephesians 3:1-13

1 For this reason I, Paul, the prisoner of Christ Jesus on behalf of you Gentiles— 2 if indeed you heard of the stewardship of God’s grace which was given to me for you; 3 that by revelation there was made known to me the mystery, as I wrote before in brief. 4 About which, when you read you can understand my insight into the mystery of Christ, 5 which in other generations was not made known to the sons of men, as it was now revealed to His holy apostles and prophets in the Spirit: 6 that the Gentiles are fellow heirs and fellow members of the body, and fellow partakers of the promise in Christ Jesus through the gospel, 7 of which I was made a minister, according to the gift of God’s grace which was given to me according to the working of His power. 8 To me, the very least of all saints, this grace was given, to proclaim to the Gentiles the good news of the unfathomable riches of Christ, 9 and to bring to light for all what is the administration of the mystery which for ages has been hidden in God who created all things; 10 so that the manifold wisdom of God might now be made known through the church to the rulers and the authorities in the heavenly places. 11 This was in accordance with the eternal purpose which He carried out in Christ Jesus our Lord, 12 in whom we have boldness and confident access through faith in Him. 13 Therefore I ask you not to lose heart at my afflictions on your behalf, which are your glory.

If you look down at verse 14, Paul repeats himself.  14 For this reason I bow my knees before the Father,

Paul had intended to proceed right into that prayer, but he writes a paranthesis and begins the prayer after the explanation we're looking at in vss. 1 - 13.  

1 For this reason I, Paul, the prisoner of Christ Jesus on behalf of you Gentiles—
14 For this reason I bow my knees before the Father,

Our normal response should be, when Paul says, "for this reason" we should stop and ask for what reason Paul.  What is the context here that we should already have in our minds that is the basis for what Paul is about to say.

If we just got delivery of this letter and were reading the entirety of it like anyone would read any letter, what is it that he just got through saying that is the context for him to say, "for this reason".  For what reason, Paul . . . .

And the context is all of chapter 1 and all of chapter 2.  You say, I already forgot what he said in chapter 1 and chapter 2.  Well, then, what he's going to say now isn't going to make much sense.  

It's good that we unpack this tremendous teaching little by little, precept by precept, doctrine by doctrine, here a little, there a little, but in so doing we need to stop often and restate the context as a whole picture to tie everything together.

In chapter one, Paul opens up the treasure chest and just dumps it out and we're gasping for air.  The depth of our riches in Christ are overwhelming.  God chose us out of this perishing world, He didn't tell us why, He just did it because He decided to lavish His love on us, and He rescued us from impending and deserved doom and punisment, and washed away our sins in His own Son's death on the cross, and then clothed us in His Son's righteousness, and adopted us into His family, and made us heirs of all creation.  Fellow heirs with Jesus, and Jesus owns everything.

We are wildly wealthy, in Christ.  And our wealth, our inheritance is secure, held in trust for us, in heaven.  Nothing can take it away.  It's written down in our accounts and kept for us.  With all the security of the promises of heaven.

And then in chapter 2 Paul explains what God did to cause us to come out of filthy rags and into riches.  We were helpless and hopelessly dead in our transgressions and sins, enemies of God, just bumping along in our spiritual darkness, blind and lost, some of us blithely so, and God caused us to hear the gospel, and then He quickened us from death to life, and we believed.

God literally calls us out of the authority to reign of Satan, the kingdom of Satan and sin and darkness that we were trapped in because of sin, into His kingdom, the authority to reign of His dear Son, the Lord, Jesus.  He is able to do that because His own Son's blood was shed in our place in order for us to be forgiven and cleansed of all our sins.  The trap is broken open.  Death becomes life, in Him.

We are quickened from death to life and transferred from a reign of terror to a reign of mercy and grace and love.  Transferred out of a family of walking dead and placed into a new family which are all members of Christ and members of each other.  All quickened to life from death.  All under the Lordship of our Saviour who died to purchase us.

And then in chapter 2 Paul introduces a problem.  We're gentiles.  We were without God, and without hope in the old economy.  We have no previous claim or identity with YahWeh, the God of Israel.

And that presents a huge challenge.  Because there are two groups within this brand new thing called christianity.  There are jews, who have an 1800 year history with YahWeh.  He chose them as a nation to be His own people.  He gave to them propets and kings.  

And He revealed Himself, for all time, in words.  Logos.  Revelation.  Things defined in words that are impossible to find out, unless God tells us.  Revelation.  He revealed Himself, in words, to the jews, through their prophets.  Moses and the prophets.

For 1800 years, through the patriarchs like Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, and Jacob became Israel, and Israel had 12 sons who became the fathers of the 12 tribes of Israel, and they became a people group.  Unique in all the world.  Chosen by God to be His vehicle for revelation.  His plan for redemption would come through the jewish nation.  Messiah comes through Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, the tribe of Judah, King David.  The lineage to Messiah is from the Jews, by God's design.  Just as He promised to Abraham.

Layers and layers of important history where God spoke and acted and revealed Himself to men.  From Job to Malachi, God speaking to and through chosen vessels, in words.  We know about God because He revealed Himself in words, through the jewish nation.  The canon's of the Old Testament are the very inspired Words of God.

And then one day, Paul or some other evangelist, walks into some place in Asia minor, and speaks the good news that YahWeh sent his Son to die in our place, on a cross.  He was sinless and so He was able to make the payment for my sins, in my place.  

Then He rose again from the grave and returned to His Father in heaven.  And because He did that my enmity because of sins, can be reconciled into friendship, sonship, by believing and embracing the finished work of Jesus, in my place.  The wages of sin was death for me, but the blood of Christ paid for my sins, removed the cause of spiritual death, and God quickened me to life.

Paul walks into some place like Ephesus, and preaches the gospel of peace, and gentiles who don't have a clue in the world about YahWeh, believe and repent and are quickened to life, and become sons (with a small "s") adopted sons of God of very God.  

You bypass that whole 1800 years of chosen nation, and walk right in.  Just like that.  And find out, all of that revealed truth, all of the scriptures, the whole old testament, is the Word of God, for you.  Just like that.  Heathen yesterday with no clue, no hope, on your way on the wide road to hell, didn't even know there was a God or heaven or hell, and you hear the gospel and believe and BAM.  

You're instantly transferred from darkness to light.  From enmity to friendship.  From rags to riches.  From filthy soiled rags to white garments.  Out of Satan's authority and into Christ's authority.  Transfer of ownership.  Yesterday you belonged to Satan.  He held you captive because you, like all of us, are a sinner.  Today, the sin is removed and you no longer belong to Satan, you belong to Christ.  He is your new master.  He purchased you with blood.

And all of that happened without you having a clue about 1800 years of jewish history.  You were as far removed from that as it was possible to be.  But now you're a christian.  And then a problem arises.

If you're a jew, you're saying to yourself, how did these foreigners, rank gentiles, up in Satan land, far far away from God, no clue about the One True God, you're going to tell me, hear a message and believe, and they're in.  Just like that.  Come right on in the back door.  Skip 1800 years of jewish history, just believe in Jesus and come right on in???!!!

Let's add to the layers of the problem.  These guys who get to come waltzing in the back door, they're the same guys who hate us and persecute us and wage wars against us.  They're the folks who would have cleansed us from the earth if possible.  These anti semites who hate us.  Them???!!  Waltz right on in the back door and our God will adopt them???  And make them heirs and equals with us????  These guys who wanted me dead last week are my brothers this week???

It was a hard sell.  An impossible sell.  And who does God choose and task with the job.  A fanatic jew who is a christian killer.  You have to admit one thing.  Only God could come up with a plan like that.  God created humor and it's evident He has a good sense of the irony of humor.

Ananias, the cowering fearful christian next on Saul's list, in Damascus, is sent to get Saul and he's like, there must be some mistake, he's on his way here to kill us.  And God says;  "15b “Go, for he is a chosen instrument of Mine, to bear My name before the Gentiles and kings and the sons of Israel; 16 for I will show him how much he must suffer for My name.”

Paul was the emissary from Jewish religion and nation of Israel to go round up all the christians and stamp that whole mess out.  Imprison them and kill them if necessary.  And Paul is a rising star in Judaism because he's stamping out the christians.  Everywhere.  That's Paul's identity.  Christian removal.  Paul was leading an ethnic cleansing.  Of christians!

And then God stops him in his tracks and sends him all over the known world to make more christians!  And not just christians, but gentile christians who completely side step judaism and waltz right into the kingdom of God, scott free.  No strings to judaism attached.  At all!  Except of course the scriptures are now the words of God to these gentiles too.

How do you think this is received, back home in Jerusalem, with the jews who were paying his way to kill christians.  He goes and multiplies the problem times a thousand.  They hate Paul.  

And sadly, the christians at jerusalem who have come out of judaism and gotten saved, they don't like Paul much better than the fanatic jews who want christians gone.  Jewish and christians, we can make the leap.  Gentile christians, not so much.  You don't just shed the exclusivity of 1800 years of jewish ethnic history overnight.

So Paul's job is to make all of this hatred into one big happy family.  The jews who have become christians in Jerusalem who can't fathom gentile christians who bypassed judaism and just came right into the throne room of their God.

And the apostles in Jerusalem are some help, but they're pretty sympathetic to the whole jewish thing.  They haven't completely let go.  Although at the big conference in Acts 15, the true apostles did come up with the right answer, thank goodness, but if it hadn't been for Paul, we were on our way to 2 christianities.  One for gentiles, and one for hebrews.  Separate from each other.  Separate but equal???  Scary to think about, right.

But God has put it into Paul's heart, not to allow this to happen, and Paul has a plan to try to get the two disparate groups to come together.  The christians in Jerusalem, the real ones, are experiencing deep poverty.  Probably for all the same reasons Paul was on the road trying to stamp them out.

They are hated and excluded from the life of Israel. by their families and countrymen.  Rejected by their own culture.  Apostates of judaism.  Defectors.  Expatriats.  

That was the cost of having Jesus as Lord.  And one can suppose there are different levels of compromise in order to throttle some of that rejection.  But the poverty is real.

And Paul has a deep love, a real heart for his fellow jews, and especially for the ones who have become christians.  So, Paul has an idea.  He will collect a go-fund-me for the christians at Jerusalem and the gentile christians will send some relief for their christian brothers at Jerusalem.  

So Paul has been taking up this collection for the relief of the destitute jewish christians and it's coming out of love, from the gentile christians, and Paul is going to hand carry this economic relief package, from the gentiles, to the jewish christians as a real show of love, gentile brothers for jewish brothers.  What could possibly go wrong, right?

That's Paul's conciliatory plan.  A tangible show of love from the gentile christians to the jewish christians in Jerusalem.  So Paul finally gets to Jerusalem in Acts 21 and I'll read a little bit of what happens.  

17 And after we arrived in Jerusalem, the brothers welcomed us gladly. 18 And the following day Paul went in with us to James, and all the elders were present. 19 And after he had greeted them, he began to relate one by one the things which God did among the Gentiles through his ministry.

20 And when they heard it they began glorifying God; and they said to him, “You see, brother, how many thousands there are among the Jews of those who have believed, and they are all zealous for the Law; 21 and they have been told about you, that you are teaching all the Jews who are among the Gentiles to forsake Moses, telling them not to circumcise their children nor to walk according to the customs.

22 What, then, is to be done? They will certainly hear that you have come. 23 Therefore do this that we tell you. We have four men who are under a vow; 24 take them and purify yourself along with them, and pay their expenses so that they may shave their heads. Then all will know that there is nothing to the things which they have been told about you, but that you yourself also walk orderly, keeping the Law.

25 But concerning the Gentiles who have believed, we wrote, having decided that they should keep from meat sacrificed to idols and from blood and from what is strangled and from sexual immorality.” 26 Then Paul took the men, and the next day, purifying himself along with them, went into the temple giving notice of the completion of the days of purification, until the sacrifice was offered for each one of them.

27 Now when the seven days were almost over, the Jews from Asia, upon noticing him in the temple, began to throw all the crowd into confusion and laid hands on him, 28 crying out, “Men of Israel, help! This is the man who teaches to everyone everywhere against our people and the Law and this place; and besides, he has even brought Greeks into the temple and has defiled this holy place.”

29 For they had previously seen Trophimus the Ephesian in the city with him, and they supposed that Paul had brought him into the temple. 30 Then all the city was stirred, and the people rushed together, and taking hold of Paul they dragged him out of the temple, and immediately the doors were shut. 31 While they were seeking to kill him, a report came up to the commander of the Roman cohort that all Jerusalem was in confusion.

32 At once he took along soldiers and centurions and ran down to them; and when they saw the commander and the soldiers, they stopped beating Paul. 33 Then the commander came up and took hold of him, and ordered him to be bound with two chains; and he began asking who he was and what he had done.

34 But among the crowd some were shouting one thing and some another, and when he could not find out the facts because of the uproar, he ordered him to be brought into the barracks. 35 And when he got to the stairs, he actually was carried by the soldiers because of the violence of the crowd; 36 for the multitude of the people kept following them, shouting, “Away with him!”

You can go read the rest in Acts 22 and following.  Paul addresses the people the next day and gives testimony that he was stopped on the road to Damascus by Jesus, the Lord, and how he was sent to the gentiles, and when he mentions gentiles, the whole place erupts in pandemonium.  The jews are throwing dirt in the air shouting for his death.  Such is the love of jews for gentiles.

Then the romans take him in and stretch him out with leather ropes and prepare to beat him and he says, umm, guys, is it lawful for you to beat a Roman citizen before he is tried.  And upon finding out he's a legit Roman citizen, ultimately, long story short, he ends up in Rome, in prison.

Which is where he writes this letter to the Ephesians.  Which is why he begins this section with the words;  

1 For this reason I, Paul, the prisoner of Christ Jesus on behalf of you Gentiles—

Paul is in prison, because of Christ Jesus, and because he was sent to bring the good news of salvation to the gentiles.  

What's our application for this morning?  Be obedient to Christ and carry out your ministry in His power perfectly, and wind up in prison.   Maybe.  It was God's plan for Paul in any case.  

And guess what.  Paul wrote the letters in prison that we base most of our doctrine of christianity upon.  Including this letter to the Ephesians that we are studying together.  Prison made the word of God concerning the doctrines of the chruch, available to us.  

And guess what else.  We didn't end up with a jewish church and a gentile church separated from each other.  We ended up with one body, in Christ, members of each other, whether jew or gentile, male or female, slave or free.  All of the brand modifiers are meaningless compared to being simply a christian.  Listen to the doctrine that came out of that prison cell;

4 There is one body and one Spirit, just as also you were called in one hope of your calling; 5 one Lord, one faith, one baptism; 6 one God and Father of all who is over all and through all and in all.  Eph. 4.  We'll get there.  Have faith.

So Paul is literally the prisoner of Christ.  Hey, without Christ and gentiles and jews and all of the potential problems that explosive mixture creates, there's no reason for Paul to be in prison.  Paul was a free law abiding jewish Roman citizen.  Christ + jews + gentiles was a volatile mixture.  But Paul didn't get to make the rules.  He only got to obey the Lord's commands.  

So, off to prison for Paul.  And honestly, if the Romans hadn't taken him into captivity, the jews would have killed him.  That's where they were headed.  So the Romans are dis-interested by-standers trying to keep a modicum of peace where all these explosive elements are getting poured together.

But Paul is almost as easily side tracked as I am.  And having begun his prayer with;  1 For this reason I, Paul, the prisoner of Christ Jesus on behalf of you Gentiles— well, his mind says, wait, we need to say a bit more about that.

And so, before beginning his prayer for them, he launches into more doctrine.  This is the doctrine of the mystery of the church.  Let's look at it briefly and see how far we can get this morning.  I don't want to interrupt any super bowl parties, although this doctrine is about a trillion times more important than that!  

2 if indeed you heard of the stewardship of God’s grace which was given to me for you; 3 that by revelation there was made known to me the mystery, as I wrote before in brief.

I've decided that for this morning, we won't get much further than a definition of some terms in this opening statement.

stewardship,  grace,  revelation,  mystery.  Books have been written about the depths of those four words.  

Paul says, I've got something important to say, in fact so important, it isn't me who is going to say it.  Paul is really claiming, in these two simple verses, not hard to understand, very basic simple words, but they add up to this;

What Paul is going to tell us, indeed, all of what Paul has already told us and will tell us in the future also applies to what he says here, Paul is God's mouthpiece to us.  Paul understands that he is writing down the revelation of God under the inspiration of God.  What Paul tells us has full authority of God behind it.  This is verbal plenary inspired authoritative words of God, flowing through Paul's pen, to us.  

stewardship,  grace,  revelation,  mystery.  That's going to be the title of my book when I write it.  Listen to what I'm about to say, because I think it may be important.

The church, universal, christendom if you will, the big umbrella, wants to find a loop hole that will enable it to make peace with the demands of our current cultural moment.  

You all know I'm talking about the multiple insanities, plural, of so-called gay marriage, lgbtq+++ inclusion, gay rights, gender confusion, social justice, and some other things I probably haven't thought of, like womens liberation and female egalitarianism that are in conflict with the clear written word of God.

Paul's words in every case I've mentioned above, are crystal clear.  And so Satan doesn't really bring his big game saying it isn't clear what the Bible says, Satan brings his big game saying, Yes, Paul and the other apostles are crystal clear on all of these issues, but the book isn't ispired.  The book doesn't have authority to make the final absolute decision.  

God didn't really write the book.  The book is full of errors.  The book is full of human biases.  The book is only as strong as it's weak human authors.  Therefore the book has no authority to speak to these modern issues.  It's claim to be the very words of God is false.  

That's really the only way to wiggle all of the insanity into the church.  Not because the doctrines are not crystal clear, they are.  But because the doctrines are not inspired.  Written by fallible humans.  Full of errors.  Therefore, not authoritative.  Not the final word.

stewardship,  grace,  revelation,  mystery
2 if indeed you heard of the stewardship of God’s grace which was given to me for you; 3 that by revelation there was made known to me the mystery, as I wrote before in brief.

Paul is here claiming verbal plenary infallible and innerrant inspiration for the words he received.  And with that comes authority.  God spoke.  He used His servant Paul.  Paul wrote down God's words.  If you reject them, you've rejected God, not Paul.  Take them or leave them.  But understand what you're doing.

In order to accomodate our current blasphemous sinful godless culture, you will need to reject God, not Paul.  God is not mocked.  Call it what it is and get on with it.  The words are clear.  The words are from God.  Don't like what it says, fine, get rid of it.  Go do as you please.  But be honest enough to own what you're doing and get out of the church.  

But no, we want the religiosity.  We want to be included in christianity.  We demand to have our sin and go to heaven too.  Good luck with that.

2 if indeed you heard of the stewardship of God’s grace which was given to me for you; 3 that by revelation there was made known to me the mystery, as I wrote before in brief.

God graciously gave to Paul, the awesome responsibility, that's what stewardship means, it's the responsibility to carefully transfer something you don't own and distribute it to whom the true owner wants it given to.

Paul considered that awesome responsibility, that stewardship, as grace.  Truly!  Of all the people God could have chosen to distribute His previously hidden truths, (that's what mystery means here.  Truths hidden in times past, now revealed).  Of all the people God could have used for that awesome stewardship, he picked me???!!!!  Paul considered that grace upon grace.

Me, the chief of sinners.  He picked me for this.  Grace.  Pure grace, that to me, the chief sinner, He gave the job, of revelation.  New revelation.  Information from God.  Logos.  Words.  Communication from God.  With all the authority of God of very God behind the words.

Dismiss God's revealed truth, at your peril.  Own your rebellion if that's what you decide to do.  Don't try to conciliate sin by turning God's words into useless non authoritative mush.  God is not mocked.  Judgement is pending.

God delivered His authoritative revealed truth by the pen of Paul.  No one is more astonished about that . . . than Paul himself.  What grace.  What responsibility.  What stewardship!  God's hidden truths revealed.

Four words in those two verses;  stewardship,  grace,  revelation,  mystery,  add up to authority of God clearly given through Paul to us.  New information.  And I'll finish with one final word;

3 that by revelation there was made known to me the mystery, as I wrote before in brief.

Paul wrote the words down.  They are passed on intact.  To us.  The written words.  We have God breathed words.  Paul wrote them.  We believe God Himself preserved those authoritative words, intact, from that day, to this.

That's a whole area of christian study.  Transmission.  If you study how God oversaw the transmission of His words, given to His slave and prisoner, Paul, written down, and then copied and copied and copied.  There were no printing presses.  

Hand copied words.  And we find bits and pieces of the ancient documents from all over the 2nd third fourth century world, and they all say the same thing.  God revealed the mysteries.  The apostles wrote them down.  And we believe God oversaw the transmission of His words, intact, to us, this day, in 2024.

Next week, if God is gracious and allows us the privilege, we'll unpack some of the mysteries that God revealed to Paul.  Meanwhile, I hope your team wins.  As for me, I can't even tell you who's playing.