God’s Eternal Purpose Deals with the Church
The eternal purpose of God is revealed in Ephesians and it’s the book showing us why God did everything…His purpose and intention. Ephesians tells us what God had on His heart when He created everything. This was in His mind at the beginning — it’s related to the Church and it is the manifestation of the “multifarious wisdom of God through the Church”– putting God’s wisdom on display. God chose to put on a display of His wisdom in eternity past and the vehicle through which such wisdom is put on display is called the Church.
The Church is not just a parenthesis in history, or a side note because the Jews fell out of favor. God didn’t just extend His mercy to the Gentiles while He was waiting for the Jews get their act together. No, what many thought was a “parenthesis” turns out to be the main focus. I find it amazing that God had this secret in His heart when He created the universe. He knew exactly how everything would play out and He made covenants with this group of people called Israel. Yet, the people who were not His people, the people who were totally disregarded by Israel, ended up being the focus of His desire from eternity past.
The Church, consisting primarily of Gentiles central role in what God intended from eternity past. This role is even higher than the Jews and higher than the angels. This is what God had on its heart before He created the angels, before He created the universe, before He created man, before man fell, before He began calling people out of the fallen human race, before He brought Israel forth, before He gave Israel the covenants, and before they brought forth Christ as the seed. God intended to display His multifarious wisdom to the principalities (which are the angels) through the Church, which again is largely comprised of Gentiles.
Paul, a Jew, who was a Benjamite and a “Pharisee of the Pharisees”, who excelled beyond all others in his Jewish religion, became the minister (or the prisoner) of Jesus Christ for the Gentiles (Gal 1:14;Eph 3:1). He had to be taken away from his will and away from his background…he had to be carried off to a foreign land to be able to announce the unsearchable riches of Christ to a people considered unclean.
To the angels, it’s bad enough that you’re human, a clay vessel. As reflected in Psalms, “What is man, that thou art mindful of Him? And the son of man, that thou visitest Him? For thou has made Him a little lower than the angels, and hast crowned Him with glory and honour. Thou madest Him to have dominion over the works of thy hands; though has put all things under his feet…” Psalm 8:4-6 KJV. According to Hebrews, this was spoken by an angel. Angels are mystified that God would have anything to do with man. Then out of the people of God created, He brought out the seed of Abraham and the Jews thought they were special. The Jews are special, but they thought the Gentiles were unclean, given over to their lusts, and completely foolish and backward – the worst of the worst. Jonah didn’t even want Nineveh to repent. God’s prophets had no regard for the Gentiles, and yet Paul was made a prisoner of Jesus Christ for the Gentiles!
Paul was given the dispensation of the grace of God for the Gentiles (Eph 3:2). This is a new dispensation, new economy, new household order. We tend to say that we’re currently in the “dispensation of grace”. It’s technically not true. There has always been grace. It is more accurate to say that we are in the dispensation of the grace for the Gentiles. Though it’s always been grace, this grace is unique. The dispensation given to Paul was the revelation of a mystery (Col 1:26; Eph 3:3-4,9)
Paul wants you to understand what he sees about the mystery of Christ (Eph 3:4). What is the mystery of Christ? It’s the Church. This is the mystery…the eternal purpose of God that was hidden in God from before the world began. The mystery is that there is a group of people who are His children that the Father foreknew and chose in Christ, before the world began and predestinated them unto sonship through Jesus Christ to the praise of His glory (Eph 1:4-5). These people He foreknew are not only Sons of God in glory, but He made them members of the Body of Christ. Ephesians 1 says this is the fullness of Christ — the Church is “His Body, which is the fullness of Him who fills all in all” (Eph 1:23)
God made Christ to be the head over the Body through His resurrection. The Body is comprised of all of us…mostly Gentiles, but some Jews. Once we’re part of the Body, we’re no longer Jew or Gentile because we’ve been reconciled through the blood of Jesus Christ and made into one Body and this Body is called the Church. The Church is literally the Body of Christ because we all have His life and He’s the head and we are His members. It is one entity before God (1 Cor 12:12).
Jesus said, “As the Father knoweth me, even so know I the Father: and I lay down my life for the sheep.” John 10:15 KJV. God’s love for the Son is tied up in His love for us. It’s very mysterious. This is the purpose of God from the beginning. It was always there. “Eternal purpose” means outside of time. It is the purpose of the I AM. Everything is with Him now. He is the self-existing one with no beginning and no end. An aspect of this is His eternal purpose…the council of His will. The secret motivation of His heart is related to the Church, which is the many Sons of God who are the brothers of Christ and members of the body of Christ. The Church is “bone of His bone and flesh of His flesh”. This group is called the “new man” in Ephesians 2:14-16 and these members are enthroned with Christ, seated in the heavenlies with Him. In the ages to come, God will show forth the exceeding riches of His grace and kindness towards them in Christ (Eph 2:6-7). They are the household of God and the habitation of God …the temple of God in spirit. This is what God is building (Eph 2:19-22). This is called the mystery of Christ and this is what God intended in Christ.
These children, gathered from among the Gentiles, are those He foreknew from the foundation of the world. He chose them before the foundation of the world to be held without blame before Him, in love, having predestinated them to sonship (Eph 1:5; Romans 8:28-29). Predestination is the sovereign movement of God in history — the arrangement of all events and circumstances in time and space to make this happen. This is the reason the stars move the way they move. This is why the earth turns the way it turns. This is why we have the seas and the oceans. This is why everything exists. It all moves according to the council of God’s eternal purpose…according to His will to produce the Church, the mystery He revealed to Paul (Eph 1:11).
We’ve been predestinated according to the good pleasure which He purposed in Himself. He’s going to gather up all things in Christ and, in Him, we’ve obtained an inheritance. “In whom also we have obtained an inheritance, being predestinated according to the purpose of him who worketh all things after the counsel of his own will.” Ephesians 1:11 KJV. All things are working by God’s sovereign hand. Every detail in history, in the nations, among the peoples, are to put into motion the events necessary to bring many sons to glory.
This is how significant we are and this was known in God’s heart before He did anything. You were known in God’s heart before He did anything, not just because of the moment you chose to believe, but because He foreknew you. I’ve emphasized this a few times with the following example — I don’t know my son simply because I know the moment he was conceived. I know him because of the seven years I’ve spent with Him and I’ve enjoyed that time.
God has already spent the ages to come with us. He knows us. He knows you. You don’t know Him, but He knows you. You were just one of the people among the Gentiles. The angels considered you just insignificant clay. The Jews considered you to be totally unclean and worthless to the point where you shouldn’t even touch them or eat with them for surely you would defile them. And yet God made Paul a prisoner for the Gentiles, to make known the economy of the mystery. The mystery is the Church, which is the Body of Christ, His fullness, through which He will fill all things with Himself.
The Church is the habitation of God in spirit. It is the masterpiece of God. According to Ephesians 2, the Church is the poema. We are His workmanship, His masterpiece (Eph 2:10). It’s not you as an individual, it’s the church as a collective. We are His masterpiece, created for good work, which He prepared beforehand for us to walk in. These aren’t just your works during your life in this age. Your life in this age is a vapor. This is just an incubator — we’re still in the womb. No, Paul is talking about the ages to come — the things, the exploits you will do in Christ, with Christ as a co-regent and a co-heir, as the dwelling place of God Himself. God will be putting His multifarious wisdom on the display for the ages to come — all the aspects of who He is and what He is. The angels will watch in awe as we put Him on display (Eph 3:10).