A Mystery Revealed

Ephesians 3:1-12 Several years ago I read an essay entitled “Strangers in a Strange Land.”  The author talked about growing up in Quebec in the 1950’s in what was then a profoundly Catholic culture.  He said that during those years attendance at mass was 90%.  Catholic education, health care, and social services were the backbone of daily life.

Today attendance at mass is 6%.  Only 9% of high school age people identify as Catholics.  There are 38 abortions for every 100 live births.  In one generation Quebec has gone from being one of the most Christian places on earth to one of the most pagan.

The same is happening all over the west.  In England there are more people who attend worship service in a mosque than in a church.  In the heart of the Reformation countries, church attendance is in the single digits.  The same trend can be observed here in the United States.

Those kinds of seismic changes taking place in the heart of the Christian west can’t help but disturb us and worry us and even lead us to despair over the future of the church.  What will become of the church?  Is there a future for Christianity? 

The answer to that question is in the five billion people on this planet right now who don’t know Jesus as their Lord and Savior—1.4 billion in China, 1.2 billion in India, 1.1 billion in Africa.  Billions of potential new Christians waiting in darkness for the light of Jesus Christ on them. 

On this Epiphany Day we are reminded that the love of God in Jesus Christ extends to all people—even the most unlikely of people-- and that his ability to save is still mighty and powerful.  Paul wrote:

For this reason I, Paul, a prisoner for Christ Jesus on behalf of you Gentiles—assuming that you have heard of the stewardship of God's grace that was given to me for you, how the mystery was made known to me by revelation, as I have written briefly.

            Paul was in prison for his own protection.  When preaching the Gospel of Jesus Christ at the temple in Jerusalem, he was almost killed by a Jewish mob.  And so what was his crime?

Paul dared to teach that the love of God was not just to the Jews also for the Gentiles—that all people could come to God through faith in Jesus—and that he had been called by the resurrected Christ to reveal the great mystery of God’s saving work in the world.  And so what was that mystery?  Paul wrote:

When you read this, you can perceive my insight into the mystery of Christ, which was not made known to the sons of men in other generations as it has now been revealed to his holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit. This mystery is that the Gentiles are fellow heirs, members of the same body, and partakers of the promise in Christ Jesus through the gospel.  

            The great mystery of God’s saving work in the world is that from the very beginning of time, God planned for people to be reconciled to him in only one way and that is through faith in his Son Jesus—that irrespective of race or gender or place in society, all people could have a life with God through faith in his Son.

This Good News was a mystery in the sense that it had to be reveled and manifested and made known to the world. 

No one could reason their way into the knowledge of God’s salvation:  that God himself would take on flesh and become part of his creation; that the Savior of the world would live in obscurity; that eternal life would come through his terrible death on the cross; and that people would enter into heaven by hearing that message of the Gospel. 

That mystery must be revealed to those who know nothing of the things of God like the Gentiles of Paul’s day and the unbelievers in our day.  It must be revealed to those who know something of God and his ways because they know the Old Testament and the Ten Commandments like the Jews of Paul’s day and Muslims in our day. 

But the natural knowledge of God and the moral knowledge of God are insufficient for salvation.  It is Jesus who must be known if there is to be a life with God. 

That is why Jesus commissioned and sent the apostles into the world:  to reveal the mystery of God’s saving will for all people.  It is why Jesus met Paul on the Road to Damascus and sent him to the Gentiles—because the Good News of God’s love extends to even the most unlikely of people.  Paul wrote:

Of this gospel I was made a minister according to the gift of God's grace, which was given me by the working of his power. To me, though I am the very least of all the saints, this grace was given, to preach to the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ,

            Paul counted himself a servant of the Gospel.  That’s what that word “minister” means—not clergyman, not priest, not pastor—but servant. 

He was who he was solely as the result of an undeserved gift.  He knew that he was, by nature, the least of all the believers for he had persecuted Christ.  And yet God forgave him and gave him an opportunity to tell others about Jesus.

So it is for us.  We are to count ourselves servants of the Gospel first—before being a teacher or homemaker or student or farmer or businessperson or retired person or pastor.  We are God’s servants because of his undeserved gift of a Son—called by God in the context of our daily life to proclaim the blessings that we have in Jesus. 

How necessary this is:  that we see ourselves as servants of the Gospel--that we stand in awe of the riches of Christ--because the mystery of God’s saving purpose still needs to be revealed to the people around us!  Paul wrote that we have a responsibility:

To bring to light for everyone what is the plan of the mystery hidden for ages in God who created all things, so that through the church the manifold wisdom of God might now be made known to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly places.

            The same God who called the world into being and perfectly ordered his entire creation also has a plan to save the world in his Son. 

In the Bible we can trace how that plan unfolded so that at just exactly the right moment in history the Savior was born.  We can look back upon our own lives and see how God was patiently working to bring us to the knowledge of the truth. 

It is through us, believers in Christ, the church-- that the amazing, wonderful plan of God is made known in our own day and time—to bring to light the love that God has for all people in Jesus.  That is the mission of the church!

Over one hundred ago, there were people from all across this country who gave to the work of missions so that a missionary could be sent to the west Texas—to people that they had never met and never would meet until they got to heaven.  They didn’t know them from Adam-- but they wanted to make sure that people in west Texas knew about the unsearchable riches of Jesus Christ.

And here we are tonight, 90 years later, with the call of Jesus on our own lives to do all that is within our power to make him known to people that we will never meet until we get to heaven. 

This is the wisdom of God that is revealed in nowhere else but the church: that life with him is for all people—not matter their past—no matter their skin color—no matter their language. 

That vision is revealed in the pews of Christian churches throughout the world that are filled with all kinds of people-a vision that even the angels of heaven delight to see.  Paul says that:  through the church the manifold wisdom of God might now be made known to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly places.

            From the very beginning of creation the angels gazed upon the work of God.  They saw the various parts of creation come into being.  But something happened when man was created.  Part of the heavenly angels rebelled against God’s purpose and attacked mankind while the holy angels looked on with sorrow.

From that moment on an unseen, spiritual battle raged.  Over salvation history God used the good angels as his messengers.  They announced the coming Savior.  They sang at his birth.  They comforted Jesus in the desert and in the garden in the hours before his death.  The Bible says that they longed to look into God’s plan of salvation.

It is when they gaze upon the church that they see the mystery of God’s saving plan revealed:  that through faith in Jesus Christ, we have been restored to what God always planned for us to be:  his sons and daughters, members of his family with whom he desires the closest fellowship.  Paul wrote that:

This was according to the eternal purpose that God has realized in Christ Jesus our Lord, in whom we have boldness and access with confidence through our faith in him.

            Every news article I have read and every news story I have seen on TV is filled with fear and trepidation about the New Year.  What will happen to the economy?  What about North Korea and Iran?  What about the price of oil?

            But far above these temporal concerns is a God with an eternal, saving purpose that he wisely, graciously accomplished in his Son Jesus Christ.  And you are a part of that plan.  You are the object of his redeeming love and you are his servants, called to be a part of his saving plan in someone else’s life. 

Through faith in Jesus Christ, it is not fear and trepidation that fills our heart but boldness and confidence as we take our place and fill our role in God’s saving plan!  Amen.