The Secret of His Purpose

Chapter 9: Fellowship and Witness

The latter section of chapter three is taken up with another great prayer in which Paul gathers together what he has already said and prays for its fulfilment in the Ephesian assembly.

All that has already been explained may appear to be so humanly impossible, yet if it is impossible today it was no more possible in the times of the apostles. 'The riches of His glory' (v. 16) provided an inexhaustible supply to meet every spiritual need. Is God, who has lavished grace and mercy upon His hapless and hopeless creation in order to bring them back from the dead, going to allow them to flounder forever in the confusions and uncertainties of a spiritual adolescence? Not at all. He longs to 'make known the riches of His glory' (Romans 9:28). Full stature is the Lord's aim, and He has made every provision for spiritual growth that we might be 'strengthened with power through His Spirit in the inner man,' v. 16.

Spiritual health means spiritual renewal. The physical body has a remarkable capacity for renewing itself. Why this renewing process ultimately slows down and the body dies is a phenomenon for which medical science has been able to discover no adequate natural reason, and it is to this capacity that the body owes its span of continued vitality. In the spiritual realm, however, there need be no such decay. "Though our outward man is decaying, yet our inward man is renewed day by day," says Paul to the Corinthians (II Corinthians 4:16), and no less in the spiritual realm is our spiritual freshness dependent on this constant renewing work of the Holy Ghost. So Paul again draws attention to the need of development which is a factor so vital to the whole life of the church. Not a past experience but a present consciousness of God's moving within is the key that unlocks the door into the fullness of God's purposes.

This spiritual renewal must manifest itself in two ways: in individual stability, and in a love and concern which is the root of our relationship in the assembly into which we have been brought through grace. Personal loyalty and obedience to Christ is the prelude to His dwelling in our hearts through faith (v. 16). "If a man love Me he will keep My Word, and My Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode with him (John 14:23). Nothing can take the place of that inner devotion to Christ through which the course of our lives remains settled and established in Him. A life bereft of communion with the Lord must be an unspiritual life, joyless, empty and barren.

Already in Paul's prayer of chapter one we have heard his thanksgiving that the Ephesians were a people of personal faith and love to the saints. It is the establishment of these same two things which forms the subject of his intercession in ch. 3 v. 17. God's people must be wedded in their devotion to the church, not bound by a loyalty so frail as to snap at the slightest provocation. Whatever the trials, the difficulties, the adjustments, the church is our place. It is the one means through which God desires to reveal Himself to us and to the world; He has bound us together in the assembly and we are committed to it even as to God Himself. In the strength of that devotion to the Lord and to His people we are made ready to 'be strong to apprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length, and height and depth' (v. 18).

Just as Paul concluded his argument in chapter one with the fullness of Christ, so again here he reminds us that a comprehension of that fullness will be entered into only 'with all the saints.' The context makes it perfectly clear that 'all the saints' were those whom God had gathered together in a particular locality, in this case Ephesus, to form a working relationship in the local church, or those, of course, whom the Lord should bring into their midst in the course of the ministry and from whom the assembly could receive practical profit. This is further substantiated in the great ascription of praise with which the chapter concludes: "Unto Him be the glory in the church." The only church known upon the earth to the New Testament was the local body of believers. Where allusion is made to more than one company, the plural 'churches' is used, as when Paul addresses the churches of Galatia: "Unto the churches of Galatia: grace to you and peace from God the Father and our Lord Jesus Christ" (Galatians 1:2-3). The word 'church' is never used as it so commonly is today, to denote the sum total of all who profess allegiance to Christ. Whatever the end may be for which Paul prays, it is an end to be realised wherever people meet in relationship and faithfulness to Christ.

Why is the assembly so important for the revelation of the fullness of the Lord? There are two main reasons. Firstly, no one individual, however saintly, can contain the glory of God. One day, Scripture tells us, we shall be like Him, but that day is not yet. The limitations of human nature are all too evident even in those most advanced in the way of truth. It is not in one individual but in the company of saints that we can see all the graces of God.

Secondly, and most important, however, is that any of the virtues of the indwelling Christ we may possess through the Spirit's work of regeneration can only be expressed in our relationship with other people. If God by His grace has, in regeneration, imparted the nature of Christ to His people, that nature can never be revealed in isolation. The grace and truth that filled our Lord were expressed in His relationship with those amongst whom He lived and walked, and pre-eminently in His relationship with His disciples, for in them He found not only a willing acceptance, but also a response to the grace and truth which flowed out from Him to them. Suppose some believer, anxious to devote his life to the things of God, were to cloister himself in some mountain cave and spend his years in solitary meditation, it were meaningless to call him either gracious or truthful. Neither has he anyone upon whom to bestow his grace nor anyone whom his words of truth can edify. Whatever his inner nature may be, all his good qualities are left without the possibility of expression. They remain hidden, because he is cut off from all relationship with others. Drawn together with the family of God in the fellowship of the assembly, the varying needs make their different demands upon the nature of Christ imparted to us. Forming the background of this opportunity for the expression and development of the spiritual life is a unity and sense of responsibility to one another which is impossible in the foreignness of any worldly association, and which fosters the response and joy of a full-orbed family relationship.

One who travels soon finds that there is a glory and fellowship amongst the Lord's people which is to be found nowhere else, and from this quality of divine life has little difficulty in distinguishing what is the church from what is not. Wherever one may go, even amongst people of different race, language and custom, the child of God who has learned to appreciate the fellowship of the saints will always feel at home in the church. Down through the ages men have sought to formulate statements of belief and practice in order to define the church, but leaving all these aside, there is an indefinable witness of the Spirit which immediately draws together those who are in Christ, and immediately separates those who are not. It is a witness that seldom errs, and does so only when some human factor is brought in to confuse dependence upon God. "The Spirit Himself beareth witness with our spirit that we are children of God" (Romans 8:16).

The end of this relationship in the assembly is two-fold, as Paul points out in v. 19: to know the love of Christ which passeth knowledge, and to be filled unto all the fullness of God.

Love of one another is but a prelude to our entering into a deeper appreciation of the love of God. The love of God must win a response in the hearts of His people. "We love because He first loved us," says John (I John 4:19). Here is probably the greatest of all reasons for the existence of the church: that God should find a response to His love which will be returned to Him again. Without such a response, love is incomplete. God loved the world, but that of itself is not the end; it cannot be. If it were, it would be a love which accomplishes no purpose and is joyless and static. Parents may love a rebellious son, but their love is received with coldness and no return of affection. Their love, therefore, brings not joy and satisfaction, but sorrow and frustration. It is so far purposeless for it has found no response in the one upon whom it is lavished. Only when it has found that response will it be full and joyous. Such also is the love of God. It cannot remain defeated, and it finds its victory, its response, in the church, where God reproduces His love in the hearts of His own people and it is returned to Him again. In the assembly the Lord finds a place where He and His people dwell together, where both love and are loved. To describe this relationship in the assembly Paul has, as it were, to go beyond the bounds of words. "Which passeth knowledge," he says (v. 19), giving but another indication of a quality of life which is so far beyond the attainment of this world but is possible in the Spirit.

What has been said of God's love and its finding a response in the assembly is true also of every other spiritual grace. Every virtue, unless it be purposeless, must find a response by reproducing itself in the lives of those to whom it is shown. The fruit of the Spirit, therefore, finds in the association of the assembly not only a means of giving expression to itself but also ground in which it can reproduce itself. The means of expression it may find in its relationship to the world, but the ground of response it can find only in the church. It is here alone that every spiritual quality can find its consummation, and the glory of God can be revealed.

The second aim of the assembly, as we have already noticed in v. 19, is that we 'may be filled unto all the fullness of God.' To whatever heights Paul may take us, he never takes us beyond the need of further spiritual progress. The church may reflect the glory of God, but it is a glory which requires to be reflected ever more perfectly. To the Corinthians Paul writes, "but we all, with unveiled face reflecting as a mirror the glory of the Lord, are transformed into the same image from glory to glory, even as from the Spirit which is the Lord" (II Corinthians 3:18 marg.). A mirror will reflect the light of the sun, but if the glass is soiled it will do so very imperfectly. Given a cursory rub it will reflect light a little better, washed the reflection will be brighter still, polished the sun's rays will be reflected with yet greater intensity. The church is in a very similar position. At times its reflection of the Lord's glory is very poor indeed, yet the Spirit is never absent from His cleansing and polishing work. The assembly, as it progresses in divine things under the hand of God's Spirit, must reflect the image of Christ from glory to glory, till one day, when the last spot and blemish is removed, the fullness of the Lord will shine forth in all His greatness.

The chapter closes with Paul's great and familiar ascription of praise. He is quite aware that after the great and lofty purpose which he has set before us we might be tempted to fall back in despair, so he presents us to 'Him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us' (v. 20). What he has told us may be more than we would care to ask or even dream to be possible, but after all, are our lives still dictated by the powerless power of man, or are they under the control of God? If He worketh in us, is He unable to fulfil His purposes, or are all our protestations of faith but empty words? Wrote Paul to the Colossians, "I labour also, striving according to His working, which worketh in me in power" (Colossians 1:29). We have seen over and over again how one of the salient features of Paul's life was his humility and dependence upon the Lord. Yet the realisation of his own weakness never engulfed the working of God in him. God's power dominated his thinking and stirred him up to labour alongside his invincible Master. A powerless vessel, he did not pull into land, but thrust himself into the stream of the power of God which would carry him on to the goal.

"Unto Him be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus unto all generations for ever and ever" (v. 21). The church transcends the ages. There is something in the relationship of the assembly which is timeless; it is never going to pass away. What we see on earth may be a faint glimmer of what will be revealed in heaven, but it is light nevertheless, and it is the fullest light of the glory of God that this world can know. Our Lord Himself prayed that the oneness of His people might be the witness to Him in the world (John 17:22-23) and it is in the assembly that that oneness is expressed.

In modern Christianity the scriptural concept of the church has largely been replaced by denominationalism and sectarianism, a great, mixed multitude of religious professors very far removed from the assembly we have been considering in this epistle. While some children of God are fully aware of the difference between the true and the false and how far the present systems are a departure from the simplicity of the Scripture, yet they feel that, rather than see God bring the church together as He did in New Testament times, the main responsibility of those who are born again is to remain as a savouring influence within the systems which have a name to live but are dead. How shall they receive the witness of the gospel otherwise, runs the argument, and cannot the Lord use the testimony of His people to bring life where there is death? With such reasoning, the church as revealed in the Word is relegated to a place of little importance, as something impractical in the present age, and the individual believer is established as the Lord's sole means of witness to the world.

A cursory review of church history would show that while there have certainly been revivals within established Christianity, these have burned brightly for a time, usually a comparatively short time, and have died down again, leaving everything much as it was before, with little permanent effect on the groups in which they originally took place. The general principle of God's working has been different, nearly always involving a separation from the 'church' which has fallen into declension, and it is through this continually separated testimony down through the ages that one can trace the main stream of God's purposes. The church separated may have lacked the spectacular effect of revival outpourings, but, on the other hand, it has been characterised by a solidity and consistency of testimony through which countless numbers have been brought into a deep and lasting experience of regeneration, an experience which has gone on to reproduce itself in others. Separation is a very unpopular word these days, but as we have seen amply demonstrated already in this epistle, if the church contains the life of Christ it cannot be other than different from everything else around it, and if organised Christianity is so far divorced from the Spirit of our Lord that it demonstrates only the ingenuity of man to popularise himself in a godless world, then the church must be separate from that also.

That the individual believer is meant to be a vital witness to his Lord is a fact that no true child of God will dispute. Yet the Scripture gives a very special place to the church as the supreme testimony to Christ in the world. Why this is so has just been the subject of our examination. That this should so largely cease to have been recognised and the so-called church become, as in the majority of cases it has, simply a field of evangelism, can only be regarded as a most serious loss to the whole cause of Christ. Organised Christianity is, no doubt, a very needy field for the proclamation of the gospel, but that is not what the church was ever intended to be. The church is the spiritual powerhouse from which the whole impetus of evangelism in the world is to be directed; it is itself the light and witness of God's power and God's order, and nothing else can take its place.

That the vast and needy field of organised Christianity would remain untouched by the witness of the gospel should the people of God feel the urge of the Spirit gathering them together in the fellowship of the assembly is borne out neither by history nor by present-day facts. This would certainly be so if the church were only a comfortable little clique living unto itself, but this is just what the church is not, as we have seen clearly from what we have already considered of the Ephesian epistle.

It is recorded of our Lord, "And He could not be hid" (Mark 7:24). Spiritual life cannot hide itself. It will have an inevitable effect on its surroundings. This is abundantly clear in the life of the early church as we read through the Acts of the Apostles. It is clear also from the history of the church down through the ages. The voice of Martin Luther was not silenced because he at times stood alone, a renegade from the Roman system to which he had once owed allegiance. The early followers of John Wesley did not at once lose their witness when they were ostracised from the established 'church.' A small group of godly men who met quietly round the Lord in an insignificant little room in the city of Dublin early in the last century did not remain long in obscurity. The life of the Spirit was in their midst, and it spread like a fire throughout the country and ultimately throughout the world. The life of the Spirit cannot be hid, and the testimony of brethren dwelling together in unity has a potency and an effect which can reach behind doors most securely closed against the gospel of redeeming grace. The same can be demonstrated today in not a few parts of the world.

Man, even regenerated man, alas, may recoil at the thought of being ostracised by those who give lip-allegiance to Christ, yet our Lord suffered outside the religious camp of His day, and we are called upon to follow Him there, bearing His reproach. His separation unto the will of God brought about the triumph of the gospel. Our separation unto the will of God will be the road to a like victory. The principle of the Lord remains, "Unto Him be the glory in the church."

Next: Chapter 10: Principle and Pattern