In this Epistle, God is declaring Himself, unfolding His counsels and purposes regarding His own Beloved Son, as Head over all things, and Head of His body the assembly; and in what He in sovereign grace chose to do for those who are called to be companions for His Son in making them like Him, in grace that wrought through Him for them, suiting them for His high glory. The glory of God's grace, and the beauty of Christ displayed in them.
Verse 1. "Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ by the will of God." Called and sent by Christ in glory, he writes to all the saints,-all who believe on the Lord in sincerity, spoken of here as "the faithful in Christ Jesus.”
Verse 2. "Grace to you, and peace, from God our Father, and from the Lord Jesus Christ." This is the desire of the Lord for their happiness and peace, the portion for all the saints of this present day of grace.
Verse 3, begins with worship which expresses our relationships, and our blessings. The God of our Lord Jesus Christ is our God. What He is to Christ as a man, such also He is to believers, as men. The Father of our Lord Jesus Christ is our Father (compare John 20:17). What the Son, His Beloved Son, is to the Father, such also are we, through grace. We are through redemption thus associated with Him. Wondrous grace! We are now blessed with all spiritual blessings (not one lacking), in heavenly places in Christ.
First, we are quickened in new creation life, and are thus suited with this new life, to God's character and nature.
Second, we are led by the Spirit into the intimacy and love of the Father to His children, after the pattern of the Son, who ever dwelt in the bosom of the Father. It is the privilege of believers now to share all the blessedness that flows from these relationships, and also from the blessed truth, that we are members of the body of Christ our glorified Head.
“Blessed with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ," is the Christian's land of promise, of which we have now a view and a foretaste of its heavenly fruit, though still on our journey. Like Eschol's grapes and figs and pomegranates, brought to us by the Holy Spirit, making us long for the time when we shall be with Him. The Holy Spirit takes care to remind us of where our path leads, not into temporal or earthly mercies, but spiritual and heavenly blessings; and in the glorified Christ is where our blessings are found. The best blessings, in the best place, and in the best Person.
Verse 4. According as He hath chosen us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love." The name of God is connected with this verse; He chose us as individuals, and fitted us according to His own nature and character to be before Him holy and blameless and in love. For this He must therefore impart to us the new life, and it was before the foundation of the world that He chose us. It is a life different from what is in the world, and will exist after the fashion of the world has passed away.
God has done this altogether apart from any circumstances of our own, and therefore perfectly suited us to Himself with a life that hates darkness and evil, and loves light and good. This is His sovereign love to us, which cannot be explained by anything in or about us. We bow and worship Him whose wisdom and ways exceed all human thought!
Verses 5, 6 speak of Him as Father. "Having predestinated (marked out beforehand) us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to Himself." Here all the privileges of sons are ours, and it is "According to the good pleasure of His will." Since we possess this new life in Christ, and the relationship and intimacy of dear children, sons with the Son, these united in us have fitted us to delight in God our Father, and to see also that He delights in us, thus brought near to Himself. These are our precious relationships, marvelous to us! but according to His eternal counsels and thoughts, told out to us, and "to the praise of the glory of His grace, wherein He hath made us accepted (brought us into favor) in the Beloved." All its fullness reveals itself in His ways toward us, the purposes of God which have no other source than His own heart, in and by which He reveals Himself and glorifies Himself by their accomplishment.
It is in "the Beloved" the object above all of His affections, that we are brought into favor, thus bringing Him in a special way before us in this grace bestowed upon us in Him, connecting our blessing with what is dearest to His own heart, for it was "according to the good pleasure of His will, and to the praise of the glory of His grace." The Son who satisfies and delights the Father's heart, is the One in whom we are accepted. He has unfolded this to us that we too might be filled with this fullness.
It was when there was no world, outside of all that regards ourselves, that He chose us in His
Son according to the good pleasure of His will. There is no mention yet of the condition in which this grace found us. It is all the purposes of heavenly blessing, of a heavenly people, who are to the praise of the glory of His grace (our condition previously is found from next verse).
Verse 7 "In whom we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins according to the riches of His grace." Here it comes before us that we were slaves of sin, alienated from God, sinners against Him, and now thoughts of Jesus, the Lamb of God, crowd into our minds. "He gave Himself for our sins." "We are reconciled to God through the death of His Son," "washed in His blood," perfected forever by that one offering, and it is all according to the riches of His grace! God had to be glorified about the sin question before we could be fitted for His presence.
All this and much more is assumed here, and now we are "in Christ," and in "the Beloved;" "the righteousness of God," and "the love of the Father" is our blessed and eternal portion. We see the glory of His grace in the wonderful heights to which we are brought in heavenly places "in Christ." And we see the "riches of His grace" that stooped so low to lift us up out of "the hole of the pit," from whence we were digged.
The woman at the well in John 4, and the woman as the bride, in Gen. 24, are through grace the same. It is "the riches of His grace," that met our low estate; it is "the glory o His grace" that puts us with Christ in glory. We think of our blessing here, not according to our need, but according to the riches of His grace.
Verses 8 to 11. In this same grace and intimacy, God reveals to us His thoughts respecting the glory of Christ Himself. We are made to know, in wisdom and intelligence, the settled purpose of His counsels with regard to His Son as Head over all things in heaven and on earth.
It has pleased Him to make known unto us the mystery of His will, according to His good pleasure which He hath purposed in Himself. This is an immense favor granted us, as interested in the glory of Christ, in whatever way it comes, and here we are seen in the intimacy of friends to whom He can confide what His glory is to be, a glory in which we shall share, not only the love known in the Father's House, but also the glory of the Kingdom in its widest range. Christ Himself its Head and Center, and in Him also we have obtained an inheritance. This begins in the reign of Christ, and when He reigns, we shall reign with Him.
It is the good pleasure of God to unite all heaven and earth in one, with Christ as center, as the administrator, and He shall reign till every enemy is put under His feet, and we are to be with Him in it. What can we do but praise Him for all this grace!
.We are also marked out for this beforehand, so that it does not depend on our greatness or otherwise, but all shall be disposed according to the will of the Father and the Lord Jesus, "King of kings and Lord of lords." We are "heirs of God, and joint heirs with Christ." It is all "according to His good pleasure which He hath purposed in Himself.”
(To be continued)
“MY MEDITATION OF HIM SHALL BE SWEET”
An old Scotch lady, who was alone for the greater part of the day, was asked,
“What do you do during the day?" She answered,
“Well, I get my hymn book, and I sing a little hymn of praise to the Lord, then,'' she added, "I get my Bible and let the Lord speak to me. When I am tired reading, and I get done singing, I just sit still, and let the Lord love me.''
Do you ever sit still in the presence of your Savior and hear Him say, "I do love thee, I have loved thee, I shall love thee to the end!”