Ephesians 1:1, 2

One preacher described Paul’s letter to the Ephesians as a ‘pearl’. He pointed out that a pearl is formed when an irritation, a piece of grit, gets into an oyster. The oyster then secretes a substance that becomes a pearl. This Bible teacher described ‘Ephesians’ as a ‘pearl’ formed through the irritation of imprisonment (for Paul).

I see this letter as the ‘Switzerland’ of the New Testament. There is so much (theological) grandeur, majesty and beauty crammed into a relatively small space! We certainly scale doctrinal heights, and yet, at the same time, we walk in practical depths. What we see from the top of the mountain, we have to live out on the valley floor.

You may be aware that this letter divides into two halves. Chapters 1-3 deal with belief and chapters 4-6 are about behaviour. The structure of the book says, ‘Doctrine then duty; creed then conduct; preaching then practice.’ What God has joined together must not be put asunder by man. Eugene Peterson writes wonderfully about this pattern in his introduction to Ephesians in The Message: ‘’What we know about God and what we do for God have a way of getting broken apart in our lives. The moment the organic unity of belief and behaviour is damaged in any way, we are incapable of living out the full humanity for which we were created. Paul’s letter to the Ephesians joins together what has been torn apart in our sin-wrecked world. He begins with an exuberant exploration of what Christians believe about God, and then, like a surgeon skilfully setting a compound fracture, ‘’sets’’ this belief in God into our behaviour before God so that the bones – belief and behaviour – knit together and heal.’’

In the best manuscripts, the words ‘’in Ephesus’’ do not appear in (1). That part is left blank. A popular theory has emerged that Ephesians was originally a ‘circular letter’, and that it was sent to a number of churches in an area in which Ephesus was the chief city. So, over time, the name of Ephesus became associated with it. But as it was taken from church to church, each individual congregation could fill in the blank with their own name. It certainly is true to say that this letter doesn’t seem to have the particularities of other Pauline letters in which he is dealing with specific issues in local churches. (You think for example of the matters addressed and questions answered in 1 Corinthians).

Saul of Tarsus did not expect to become ‘’an apostle of Christ Jesus’’ (1). Nothing was further from his mind that day as he set off for Damascus (Acts 9). His business was eradicating Christianity. He did not intend to speak for Jesus, but to work against Him. But, looking back, he recognised that he had been caught up in the sovereign purpose of ‘’God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ’’ (2); an eternal plan he goes on to write about so eloquently in this first chapter. Everything God had done for him in Christ (and has done for us all), stems from ‘’grace’’ (His undeserved favour) and results in ‘’peace’’. We can take heart that God still takes ‘Saul’s’ and turns them into ‘Pauls’. That person you pray for regularly, but they seem the least likely individual in your world to respond positively to Jesus, do not doubt that God can do for them what He did for Saul. Peterson writes about Ephesians that ‘’the energy of reconciliation is the dynamo at the heart of the universe’’ . That ‘’energy’’ had invaded Paul’s life and totally altered his career path! The ‘’will of God’’ is stronger than man’s will, and it radically altered the trajectory of his life.

Prayer: Lord, I bring ­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­_________ to you today. Please do in them what you did for Saul.