Ephesians rises to the highest truths in Scripture, which have to do with the mystery and the deep things of God.
The saints and the faithful are the same persons. It is a matter of having faith; the saints have this.
Paul speaks of grace from both Christ and the Father. This was never known in the Old Testament. This is all new and full.
God finds joy in the anticipation of having Christ as Man in the highest place surrounded by His saints, His body. We are blessed with every blessing in the heavenlies in Christ. Before the foundation of the world He chose us in Christ, to be holy and without blame before Him in love.
God is the God of Christ when Christ is Man. He is the Father of Christ looked at as the Son of His love. We enjoy this relationship with the Father in the same way as Christ does.
We stand in relationship with God as our God, with the Father as our Father and with Christ as His bride, the one body. We stand in this grace. Our state here is not mentioned, only the blessed relationship and blessing in the Father and Christ. This is nearness to God and simplicity, in which His ways are unfolded in blessing.
It is in relationship with the Father that we stand in all the blessings of which the Father is the source. Nearness to God in a moral way and communion with Him bring enlargement in the knowledge of His ways and blessings.
We learn good and evil by judging self. Christ gives us to feel our need and then fills it. By walking with God, apart from grieving the Spirit, we are maintained in communion. Then we can enter into His counsels, glory, and goodness in the person of Christ. The enlargement of the heart comes about by what or who occupies it.
Paul was given a gift to convey these precious truths to our hearts by revelation. Our blessings are built upon the sure foundation, Christ, we are blessed with Jesus Himself, and we are loved as Christ is loved. This will be made manifest to the world in the day of Christ. The believer is in Christ here in Ephesians; in Colossians it is "Christ in you, the hope of glory."
We are children of God by adoption, chosen in Christ to Himself. How near we are to God. What a response there should be from our hearts, and what an effect upon our ways.
Redemption is mentioned as the means by which we are brought into the blessings and favor of God, but the subject is God as the author of the blessings. Our portion is that we are accepted in the Beloved. Whatever place Christ has before God as a Man, that is our place, fully accepted.
We are the objects of God's favor in Christ. What joy to our hearts. It is from this joy that we can go out to others in love and compassion.
It is perfect happiness to know that we are in the presence of God, Christ the object and measure of divine affection. We are chosen to be blessed in the presence of God. Happiness is not to be found in another.
We are before God as sons, and our adoption is to Himself. It is the Father Who chooses to have us with Himself as sons. We belong to a heavenly family according to the counsels of God, a manifestation of His love and grace.
God brings glory to Himself when he reveals Himself. His thoughts are from no other than Himself. What God saw good to do was the glory of His grace.
What He has done for sinners is according to the riches of His grace. We do not judge by our need but by His riches of grace.
God would have us in the good of the glory of Christ, His Son, for our interest is with His glory as well as our being blessed by Him. All things in heaven and earth will be united in Him, that is, all redeemed creation and the universe. We are made depositaries of these counsels. His glory will be universally manifested for the administration of the fullness of times.
The inheritance in which we will be manifested will be the display of His glory made visible and seen in us, the fruit of His grace. Paul was a Jew, and before the nation would come into blessing, Paul pretrusted.
God has sealed us by the gift of the Holy Ghost. The sealing is for our being His possession, the earnest for our joy as we anticipate the entire blessing, the inheritance. God loves us now as He will in heaven.
Paul's prayer, based upon the intelligence already obtained through revelation, follows. God is the Father of Christ viewed as Man. The apostle addresses God in his prayer as the "Father"-the author and source of glory.
God has raised Christ from the dead to sit on His right hand. Christ is far above all angels and every name that is named.
God's glory will be seen in a coming day in the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints. This inheritance takes in all created things when filled with the glory of God, the universe. The inheritance applies to created things which will be below us in that day when we are on high with Christ in the highest place in heaven.
He also speaks in his prayer of the power that raised Christ from the dead. This mighty power will raise us up from among the dead and will place us with Christ far above angels and every name that is named. We are quickened together with Christ.
Christ will be visibly Head over all things to the Church, His body. Redemption, His work, is completed, but He also fills all things. The bride is spoken of in this way, because she is the complement, the fullness, who completes the body of the One who fills all things. This is the mystery in all of its parts.