The Messenger 3
Introduction
Perhaps it was one of those evenings when the sky was as black as ink and the bright stars seemed close enough to touch. As the psalmist gazed up at the starry sky and pondered the vastness of God’s creation he could not help but ask the question of God: “What is man that you are mindful of him, the son of man that you care for him?”
It is a thought that I am sure has popped into our minds as we too have surveyed the heavens on a dark, cloudless night. Against the backdrop of this vast, seemingly endless universe, with galaxies that span across billions of light years, why should God bother about us at all? Yet He does – and that astounding reality is reflected in the Scriptures again and again. And not only does God bother about us, but He has given us a unique place within His creation.
“You have made him a little lower than the heavenly beings and crowned him with glory and honour. You made him ruler over the works of your hands; you put everything under his feet: all flocks and herds, and the beasts of the field, the birds of the air, and the fish of the sea, all that swim in the paths of the sea” (Psalm 8:6-7).
As he began so the writer completes the psalm: “O Lord, our Lord, how majestic is they name in all the earth!”
Now as we continue our reflection on what Paul has called “the administration of God’s grace” that highlighted the uniqueness of God’s call on his life, and as we consider how it is meant to impact our thoughts about the Church, may we, in the words of the psalmist, be moved to acclaim: “O Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth.”
A mystery now revealed
Four times in chapter 3 Paul uses the word “mystery”. When one considers that of the 28 times this word appears in the New Testament 21 of those are in Paul’s letters, then it is obvious that for Paul the word held considerable significance.
Because our English translations of the New Testament do not always accurately convey the meaning of the Greek text, it is worth looking at how Paul would have intended that word to have been understood. W.E. Vine in his Expository Dictionary of New Testament Words explains the meaning of the word “mystery” in the New Testament thus:
In the New Testament the word ‘mystery’ denotes not the mysterious (as with the English word) but that which , being outside the range of unassisted natural apprehension, can be made known only by Divine revelation, and is made known in a manner and at a time appointed by God, and to those only who are illumined by the Spirit. Hence the terms especially associated with the subject are ‘made known,’ ‘manifested,’ ‘revealed,’ ‘preached,’ ‘understand,’ ‘dispensation.’
In an earlier reflection I referred to a quote by Hermann Cremer: “God never chose Israel because He rejected the other nations and wished to deny them salvation. He chose Israel to make salvation possible to other nations.” When Jesus said to the Samaritan woman at the well at Sychar that “salvation is from the Jews” He was affirming that salvation proceeds from God’s actions through His people Israel. All people are therefore indebted to Israel. In the coming of Jesus, in His commission to His followers, His death and resurrection, His ascension into heaven, the outpouring of the Spirit at Pentecost and the consequent spread of the Gospel, we see how God had brought salvation to the nations through Israel. It is in these divine actions that we begin to discover the unravelling of this mystery Paul was referring to.
So what then is this great mystery that Paul had been given the grace to understand and to declare to the Gentiles? Before we sum it up in the words of Paul in 3:6, take a few moments to read again chapter 2 to the end of the chapter. It provides us with a wonderful backdrop to those words in verse 6: “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.”
It is interesting, isn’t it, that that the man God chooses to share this mystery that had been hidden was someone who had grown up as a strict, orthodox Jew and who had been an arch-enemy of the Gospel? From our perspective a very unlikely choice for such an important commission, but then we are not God. Don’t ever think, then, whatever your background might be, that God cannot use you to fulfil His purposes. He does have a calling on your life. If you don’t know what it is, ask Him to show you.
As we draw this reflection to a close I want to highlight briefly three things about this mystery that Paul speaks about in chapter 3 and which he refers to as the administration of God’s grace that had been given to him.
Firstly, it had been hidden from previous generations (verse 5). We might catch some clues to this mystery in the Old Testament but the how and the when of God’s plan were things outside the knowledge of even the greatest of Old Testament prophets. If you think about it we are exceptionally privileged to be living in a dispensation when those things that had been hidden have now been revealed. Spoken in another context, these words of Jesus have a relevance for us: “For I tell you the truth, many prophets and righteous men longed to see what you see, but did not see it, and to hear what you hear, but did not hear it” (Matthew 13:17). What an immense privilege we have been given.
Secondly, in using the words “mystery of Christ” Paul has inseparably linked together the mystery and the One who has made known that mystery. In no other religion are the message and the one who brings the message so inseparably fused together. The mystery remains hidden without a revelation of the truth about Jesus. Jesus not only brings the message – He is the message, “the Word made flesh” (John 1:14).
Finally, notice(vs. 8) how Paul is humbled by God’s calling on his life to share this mystery. It wasn’t a sense of false modesty that led Paul to refer to himself as “less than the least of God’s people.” God’s grace shown to him never ceased to astound and humble Paul. Likewise, it should never cease to astound and humble us that we, who were also once God’s enemies, have been given the same incomparable privilege of participating in that grace of God and of having that mystery revealed to us.
Is there a thing beneath the sun
That strives with Thee my heart to share?
Ah, tear it thence, and reign alone
The Lord of every notion there!
Then shall my heart from earth be free
When it hath found repose in Thee
Gerhard Tersteegen
If you have a question or a comment about this series please feel free to write to me, Brian, at
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