4For he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight. In love 5he predestined us to be adopted as his sons through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will— 6to the praise of his glorious grace, which he has freely given us in the One he loves. 7In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, in accordance with the riches of God's grace 8that he lavished on us with all wisdom and understanding. 9And he made known to us the mystery of his will according to his good pleasure, which he purposed in Christ, 10to be put into effect when the times will have reached their fulfillment—to bring all things in heaven and on earth together under one head, even Christ.
Dig Deeper
When I began my teaching career in Milwaukee I had a rare opportunity in that it was not only my first year as a teacher, it was the very first year of the high school. Everything that year was brand new and had to be started from scratch. Among those things was the basketball team. It had already been decided before the school was even officially approved and formed that there would be a team. In fact, uniforms had been ordered, a schedule had been made and I was hired to be the coach in addition to teaching history. The team was all set and all the plans had been made except for one thing. There was no one that was actually on the team. Even though the team itself had already been predestined, that did not mean that the individual players were chosen. That would come later.
This passage of Ephesians can easily be misunderstood if we read this passage from a Western Enlightenment perspective that exalts the individual as being of the primary importance, a perspective that would not have been shared in Paul’s day or even really considered. When we think only in terms of the individual while reading passages like this, it is easy to come up with doctrines like the predestination of the individual, a doctrine which teaches that individuals are chosen by God for either salvation or damnation with no opportunity to choose or change the fate for which they’ve been determined. The key in understanding this passage is to realize that Paul is speaking in terms of God’s people as a collective and His purposes in Christ (in fact, for this passage to really come alive in the way that it was intended, substitute "the people of God" wherever you see the words "us" or "we"). Just as the basketball team had been pre-determined but the players were not, so God has always foreordained that He would have a people that have entered into the life of His son, but that does not mean God chose those individuals with no free will of their own entering into the picture.
There are several different ways to examine the prayer of verses 3-14, but one interesting way is to view this section as Paul retells, subtly and just under the surface, the story of the Exodus of the people of God. Verses 3-6 are a retelling of the time when Israel, God’s people were freed and set apart from the world according to his pleasure and will. Verses 7-10 are a retelling of the Passover, when the people were redeemed through the blood of the lamb. Tomorrow as we examine verses 11-14, we will see shadows of the Israelites arriving in the promised land. The entire section, then, both clearly praises God as well as makes a connection between the timeless purposes of God for His people Israel and now for His new Israel, those in Christ.
The clear question here is what did God predestine before the creation of the world? That question is answered again and again in this passage. God chose to have a people that would enter into the life of Christ and be transformed into His image through love and grace. When he says it was before creation, Paul doesn’t mean that God decided upon this plan right before day one of creation, it means that it is part of the very nature and purpose of God. As surely as God exists, He would always reveal Himself to His human creation in the work and person of Jesus Christ, making that life available to all. Those who are in Christ, then, are holy and blameless in the sight of God because we are hidden in Christ (Col. 3:3), we have redemption (a word which means to buy back something or someone that was lost), we have forgiveness of sins, and we have God’s grace, wisdom, and understanding lavished on us.
It was only in the generation of Paul that this mystery had been made known. For us, mystery means something different than it did in Paul’s day. When Paul speaks of mystery he refers to the will of God that had been concealed but was now revealed. All of God’s actions throughout history had been revealed and made clear in Jesus Christ. He didn’t just send a Messiah that would be a great military leader, or even a powerful religious sage. He sent His son as a servant that would take the place of Israel, becoming Israel (there are many of examples of Jesus intentionally making that clear such as His facing temptation in the wilderness and calling Himself the true vine, which based on passages like Is. 5 had become a symbol for Israel), and take the punishment of the world upon Himself. The Messiah would then enter into the age to come and undergo the resurrection. What Israel had expected for all of God’s people at the end of time had happened to one man in the middle of history. That was hard to comprehend but now, says Paul, it all makes sense. The only way to inherit the glorious riches of God’s grace is not through anything that we can do of our own merit, but only by dying to self and entering into the life of the Messiah. This was God’s plan all along, to create a people in the Messiah that would share in the work of bringing all things in heaven and earth together in Christ.
The way the NIV has worded verse 10 makes it seem as though it focuses only on the end times, but in fact, what Paul is really saying is that Christ is the steward of the fullness of the ages (the age to come) and that all things are summed up in him. Theologian N.T. Wright suggest that verses 9-10 should read "He has made known to us the secret of his purpose, just as he wanted it to be and set it forward in him as a blueprint for when the time was ripe. His plan was to sum up the whole cosmos in the king – yes, everything in heaven and on earth, in him."
This all begs the question of why God did this. Why was this His plan. Paul says quite clearly that God has predestined us to be adopted as his sons through Jesus Christ because of love. Deuteronomy 7:7-9 says that love was precisely the reason that God chose the Israelites as His people. They did not earn their election as the people of God. Nor do we earn it in anyway. Because of His great love for humanity, God has chosen that He would have a people that were holy and set apart for His purposes. What this does not mean is that this somehow violates the free will that God gave us. That God would have an elect people in Christ, has been set and predetermined from the very beginning, but that does not mean that some are forced to be God’s people while others will never have the chance. Election only comes in Christ and through Christ. Individuals are not elected and then put into Christ. They enter into Christ and are therefore of the elect. This means that it would be incorrect to say that the elect are in Christ, we should rather say that those in Christ are the elect.
Devotional Thought
Paul writes while he was sitting in prison, of God lavishing the riches of His grace on all those in Christ. Take some time today to meditate about what kind of mindset and what kind of understanding of being in Christ that Paul had to be able to do that. Do you really understand the mystery and inheritance that has been revealed to us in Christ?
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