Ephesians: Abounding Riches of Grace

“In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of our transgressions, according to the riches of His Grace, which He caused to abound to us in all wisdom and insight, making known to us the mystery of His will, according to His good pleasure which He purposed in Him for an administration of the fullness of the times, that is, the summing up of all things in Christ, things in the heavens and things on the earth in Him” (Eph. 1:7-10).

Paul tells us in the first chapter of Ephesians about the purpose and the nature of the Grace of God: “which He caused to abound to us in all wisdom and insight.” Christ does not give us these riches meagerly, but He causes them to abound to us, and as the English Standard Version says, He “lavishes” them upon us.

The word for “abound” is a word in Greek that means to superabound, to be in excess, and to excel. Christ has superabounded or excelled in the riches of His Grace to us; He has not given just enough Grace to cover our sins, but He has overflowed us with Grace. He has immersed us and overflowed us in a river of Grace.

I love how this is expressed in the hymn “Grace Greater Than Our Sin,” where in the first stanza the writer proclaims: “Marvelous Grace of our loving Lord, Grace that exceeds our sin and our guilt.” In Romans, Paul proclaims that where sin abounded, Grace did much more abound (Rom. 5:15, Rom. 5:20).

Sinner, do you think that you have sinned so greatly and so deeply that there is not enough Grace for you? There is no such thing as not enough Grace for a sinner. Just ask Paul, who knew from personal experience the overflowing abundance of the Grace of God in forgiving his great sin: “It is a trustworthy saying and deserving of full acceptance: that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, among whom I am foremost” (1 Tim. 1:15). God did this “in all wisdom and insight.”

This wisdom regards how to regulate one’s relationship with God, denoted by the Greek term “Sophia,” and understanding, denoted by the Greek term “phronesis,” which is the knowledge of how to regulate one’s relationships and dealings with other people. Being a Christian is more than mere head knowledge or intellectual knowledge concerning God and knowing doctrine: wisdom concerns our relationship with Him, our walk with Him, and our growth in Grace and holiness.

We have been saved ultimately to be conformed to the image of Christ (Rom. 8:29), so the Grace of God has been lavished upon us to save us and to teach us in wisdom how we might do that. “For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation to all men, instructing us that, denying ungodliness and worldly desires, we should live sensibly, righteously, and godly in the present age” (Titus 2:11-12).  The Grace of God has been given to us to teach us how we are to behave and live in relationships with other people, especially in the Church. The Corinthian church is an example of not learning or knowing how to do that; they were all seeking selfish fulfillment in the church and were not seeking the good of others. “For you are still fleshly. For since there is jealousy and strife among you, are you not fleshly and are not walking like men?” (1 Cor. 3:3).

Paul teaches later on in this letter about the nature of agape love, and what that looks like in the Church: “Love is patient, love is kind, is not jealous, does not brag, is not puffed up; it does not act unbecomingly, does not seek its own, is not provoked, does not take into account a wrong suffered” (1 Cor. 13:4-5). The superabundant Grace of God has been given to us to know how we might love another in the body of Christ, as well as how we give deference toward and walk humbly with respect to other believers. Paul admonishes “with humility of mind regarding one another as more important than yourselves.” That is why a lot of Grace is given: so that we might have an understanding of how to do that.

Paul continues by noting that this Grace, wisdom, and insight is, “making known to us the mystery of His will, according to His good pleasure which He purposed in Him for an administration of the fullness of the times, that is, the summing up of all things in Christ, things in the heavens and things on the earth in Him” (Eph. 1:9-10). So what is it that God has made known to us? It was a mystery, something hidden in the past, but now God has revealed and is revealing what this mystery is.

Looking at the context of Scripture, we understand first of all that Paul is revealing what God has done for us: what God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit purposed before the foundation of the world, prophesied by the Old Testament prophets, brought about in reality by the death and resurrection of Christ, and then culminated in the coming and baptism of the Holy Spirit upon the Church. We are speaking of God’s plan of salvation revealed in this passage.

Paul speaks of the revealing of this mystery later in Ephesians, saying that the mystery has been revealed to him, and he reveals the mystery to the Ephesian believers and to the other churches in Asia Minor. With respect to this mystery, Paul writes, “We speak God’s wisdom in a mystery, the wisdom which has been hidden, which God predestined before the ages to our glory” (1 Cor. 2:7). This mystery which Paul is revealing to them has been hidden since before time began, and now God is revealing it through Paul (Gal. 1:11-12).

This mystery is for our glory, all those who were chosen in Christ before time started. It is for our benefit and our eternal good that God is doing this work. These Gentiles, who had no hope of partaking in the promises of God, are now brought near ‘in Christ’ (Eph. 2:12-13).

All of what Paul discusses in the first chapter of Ephesians is made manifest in the body of Christ, the Church, and the uniting into one body of Gentile and Jew, free and slave alike. The mystery is not only about the Jews but is about Jews and Gentiles alike reconciled to God through Jesus Christ. It is no longer a mystery because Paul is now revealing it, thereby illustrating how God works.

He does not reveal this wisdom, this mystery of His truth to only the learned and the elite, but to those who are small and of no worth in the eyes of the world. “But to us God revealed them through the Spirit, for the Spirit searches all things, even the depths of God” (1 Cor. 2:10). Paul makes the same note in the first chapter of Colossians, informing believers that the mystery now revealed is that through the Gospel, the Gentiles and Jews are of the same body, the Church.

This is the grand purpose of God, fulfilled or “set forth in Christ” as the means for “the fullness,” or the fulfillment, of this purpose and plan of God. There were prophecies from the Old Testament that spoke of this, but now we stand on the other side of their fulfillment. They are no longer hidden or mysterious.

Did Abraham understand this mystery? Did Isaiah? Did Amos? They understood some spiritual truth and believed, but they did not know the mystery and the fullness because they had not been revealed until now.

For the redeemed Jews, those who did believe in Christ, think about what this truth must seem like to them. In the tenth chapter of Acts, we have an account of how God showed Peter that He had a people from among the Gentiles. Peter, as you recall, went and preached in the house of Cornelius and many were saved, revealing the truth that God has broken down through Christ the divide between Jew and Gentile, and the veil of the temple was torn in two (Matt. 27:51), signifying the ending of the Old Covenant and the beginning of the New Covenant that includes both Jew and Gentile alike as “one body,” as well as gives access into the presence of God the Father Himself, with the Son now interceding for us as our Great High Priest (Heb. 2:17, Heb. 4:14).

Jesus Christ rules now from heaven, but there will be a uniting of the Church and Christ when our Lord comes again. He bears all authority now, but there is coming a day when, “every knee will bow, of those who are in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and that every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father” (Phil. 2:8-11).

What a great revelation of the mystery of God! This is the plan of God: in the “fullness of time,” God will unite all things in Christ, and it will be brought to a consummation and completion when our Lord returns again.