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"Unto me,
who am less than the least of all saints, is this grace given, that I
should preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ;
And to make all men see what is the fellowship of the mystery, which
from the beginning of the world hath been hid in God, who created all
things by Jesus Christ: To the intent that now unto the principalities
and powers in heavenly places might be known by the church the
manifold wisdom of God, According to the eternal purpose which he
purposed in Christ Jesus our Lord: In whom we have boldness and access
with confidence by the faith of him" (Eph. 3:8-12).
This is a big text; but it discusses a big subject. It takes a big
text to tell all Paul here tells about the subject the Holy Spirit
revealed through him. The subject matter was of God’s choosing, not of
Paul’s; it was given to Paul by revelation, not something he evolved
from his own reason. The messenger through whom God revealed His long
hidden wisdom on this subject was also of God’s choice. Paul was both
an object and a subject of God’s grace. Objectively he had been in
God’s purposes of grace a long time. From the ages he had been God’s
chosen instrumentality for the revelation of this long hidden mystery.
Subjectively he had been apprehended by God’s sovereign grace on the
road to Damascus and God’s purposes of grace for him unto all nations
and all times, revealed in part both to him and in him, before he
arose from the earth: "But rise, and stand upon thy feet: for I have
appeared unto thee for this purpose, to make thee a minister and a
witness both of these things which thou hast seen, and of those things
in the which I will appear unto thee; Delivering thee from the people,
and from the Gentiles, unto whom now I send thee, To open their eyes,
and to turn them from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan
unto God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins, and inheritance
among them which are sanctified by faith that is in me" (Acts
26:16-18). God’s purpose of grace included revealing Christ in him as
well as to him. No man ever knows Christ simply by what he hears.
Christ is revealed to him by the gospel of grace; but Christ is
revealed in him by the illumination of the Holy Spirit: "The hand of
the LORD was upon me, and carried me out in the spirit of the LORD,
and set me down in the midst of the valley which was full of bones,
And caused me to pass by them round about: and, behold, there were
very many in the open valley; and, lo, they were very dry. And he said
unto me, Son of man, can these bones live? And I answered, O Lord GOD,
thou knowest. Again he said unto me, Prophesy upon these bones, and
say unto them, O ye dry bones, hear the word of the LORD. Thus saith
the Lord GOD unto these bones; Behold, I will cause breath to enter
into you, and ye shall live: And I will lay sinews upon you, and will
bring up flesh upon you, and cover you with skin, and put breath in
you, and ye shall live; and ye shall know that I am the LORD. So I
prophesied as I was commanded: and as I prophesied, there was a noise,
and behold a shaking, and the bones came together, bone to his bone.
And when I beheld, lo, the sinews and the flesh came up upon them, and
the skin covered them above: but there was no breath in them. Then
said he unto me, Prophesy unto the wind, prophesy, son of man, and say
to the wind, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Come from the four winds, O
breath, and breathe upon these slain, that they may live. So I
prophesied as he commanded me, and the breath came into them, and they
lived, and stood up upon their feet, an exceeding great army. Then he
said unto me, Son of man, these bones are the whole house of Israel:
behold, they say, Our bones are dried, and our hope is lost: we are
cut off for our parts. Therefore prophesy and say unto them, Thus
saith the Lord GOD; Behold, O my people, I will open your graves, and
cause you to come up out of your graves, and bring you into the land
of Israel. And ye shall know that I am the LORD, when I have opened
your graves, O my people, and brought you up out of your graves, And
shall put my spirit in you, and ye shall live, and I shall place you
in your own land: then shall ye know that I the LORD have spoken it,
and performed it, saith the Lord" (Ezek. 37:1-14). Sinners are born
from above by the word and the Holy Spirit: "Jesus answered, Verily,
verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and of the
Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God" (John 3:5). The new
birth is miraculous and supernatural: "Now we, brethren, as Isaac was,
are the children of promise" (Gal. 4:28), "And what is the exceeding
greatness of his power to us-ward who believe, according to the
working of his mighty power, Which he wrought in Christ, when he
raised him from the dead, and set him at his own right hand in the
heavenly places, Far above all principality, and power, and might, and
dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this world, but
also in that which is to come" (Eph. 1:19-21). Paul is a pattern
believer in the super naturalness of the way his faith was wrought in
him: "Howbeit for this cause I obtained mercy, that in me first Jesus
Christ might shew forth all longsuffering, for a pattern to them which
should hereafter believe on him to life everlasting" (1 Tim. 1:16).
God’s purposeful grace was revealed unto Paul in his salvation, in his
call into the ministry, in his call to the mission field and in his
call as God’s chosen steward through whom His mysteries of grace and
glory were to be revealed. God sought Paul: he was not seeking God.
God called him into the ministry: no man called him out. God’s call
was effectual through the effectual working of His power. God’s calls
are all effectual both unto salvation and the ministry. God called men
are thrust into the ministry: they do not go into it themselves,
neither are they called out by others. Paul was a minister by grace
and a foreign missionary by grace: both of which mean that men had
nothing to do with making him either a minister or a missionary. God’s
sovereign grace and power were not bestowed upon him in vain. This
grace was bestowed upon him unto all nations and that grace did not
fail to accomplish God’s eternal purpose in him. God’s grace always
works sovereignly and powerfully. "No man can stay his hand or say
unto him, What doest Thou." Paul’s call was very definite. It would
not have been of grace if it had not been. Grace leaves nothing to
man’s planning or choosing. There is no mixing of grace with any thing
of man. Grace and works do not mix: neither do reason and revelation:
neither do God’s unchangeable plans and men’s changeable ones. Grace
bestows all her gifts through faith: and faith excludes all works or
efforts or wisdom of men. Grace called Paul to a very definite work
preaching the gospel and revealing Christ. It was to a very definite
people the Gentiles the heathen. Grace was effectual in working out
every detail of God’s purpose for him, both in him and through him. He
finished God’s predestined course for him before the lion killed him.
"Notwithstanding the Lord stood with me, and strengthened me; that by
me the preaching might be fully known, and that all the Gentiles might
hear: and I was delivered out of the mouth of the lion" (2 Tim. 4:17).
The theme of this whole chapter is God’s sovereign and effectual
grace. God’s purposes never fail.
Having first of all seen something of God’s purposes of grace in His
chosen instrumentality for revealing His long hidden mysteries, let us
now turn to the text and find out, if we can, what this mystery,
hidden from creation, but revealed through Paul, includes.
I. What Is a Mystery?
A mystery isn’t something we cannot understand; but something that no
man can reason out. As used by the Gnostics and other secret cults in
Bible days it referred to the secrets of their orders, which only the
initiated knew. As used in the Scriptures it refers to previously
hidden truths, which the prophets and other wise men, desired to look
into and probably tried to fathom; but which no man knew then or knows
now except by divine revelation. In all of them there still remains
the supernatural element, notwithstanding what the Scriptures reveal
about them. The mysteries of the kingdom, of godliness, of the
translation of the living saints, of Israel’s blindness, of the
incarnate Christ as the embodied fullness of the Godhead, of the seven
stars and seven candlesticks and other Bible mysteries are still pried
into by curious minds: but no man knows anything about any of them,
except what is written. "Nothing beyond what is written" is true of
all Bible mysteries. We know only what is revealed and there is still
much about each of these mysteries that God has not seen fit to
reveal. Many questions arise about them in inquiring minds but there
is only the blackness of darkness, and no light at all, when we try to
go beyond what God has revealed. He has revealed all we need to know.
II. The Mystery of the Church.
The mystery revealed in the text was one that had been hidden since
the creation. God had hid it in Himself throughout all past ages. Paul
was His chosen steward through whom He would turn the light upon this
mystery. This mystery is as to His purpose and mission for a New
Testament church. The greatness of this mystery is seen in that even
after God has revealed it, men refuse to believe and try to make it
mean something entirely different from what God revealed. So contrary
is what God herein reveals to all human reason and human wisdom and
human plans, that men will not receive the truth, even after God has
revealed it to them. Many try to make the church, through which God’s
wisdom is revealed to three world’s a great compact visible hierarchy,
like the Roman Catholic or Greek Catholic or Lutheran or Episcopal or
Presbyterian or Methodist churches, with their compact organizations
and overlords and ecclesiastical courts and well greased machinery.
That kind of a church would reveal human wisdom, but not the wisdom of
Him, who said: "My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your
ways my ways." And other great and wise men say: "No, the church is
not a great, compact organization like that, with its intricate
machinery." But they in their wisdom imagine that it is an invisible,
universal institution, composed of all the saved of all ages and
climes. That would be Satanic wisdom, but not divine wisdom. Satan has
just such a compact organization of spirit beings and forces. It may
be referred to in the text by "principalities and powers." "For we
wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities,
against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world,
against spiritual wickedness in high places" (Eph. 6:12)
"Principalities and powers" do refer to the forces of evil under
Satanic control, with whom the Christian has to wrestle and war. "To
the intent that now unto the principalities and powers in heavenly
places might be known by the church the manifold wisdom of God" (Eph.
3:10). If we interpret (Eph. 6:12), the "principalities and powers"
referred to not only may mean but must mean the invisible spirit
forces of the god of this age, with the most compact organization of
super lords, called "the rulers of the darkness of this world," at
work in the air all about us, trying to defeat God’s purposes and
plans. Wherein would God’s wisdom be revealed to men and demons and
angels, if the church here referred to was an invisible, universal
organization of spiritual forces? Satan has an exact counterpart of
that and better organized. If there is such a thing as an invisible,
universal church, it is badly divided in every way. It has no unity as
to plans, as to headship, as to its mission, as to methods, as to ends
to be accomplished or as to program. Wherein would the manifold wisdom
of God be shown by such confusion worse confounded in His ranks? Satan
has an invisible, universal, compact organization of spirit forces to
fight the gospel and the saints. The idea of an invisible, universal
church being the church here spoken of would not be a mystery: for
Satan had just such an organization at work before God revealed His
mystery to Paul. A big, invisible universal organization of any kind
does not fit the text. It was not hidden from creation: Satan had one
of his own. It was not a mystery that men could know only by
revelation. And as B. H. Carroll well says, such an institution would
lack the two essential features of being an ekklesia, or church. In
his discussion with W. J. McGlothlin as to the meaning of the word
ekklesia some years ago, B. H. Carroll said: "The proposed new sense
(that is, making ekklesia refer to an invisible universal body)
destroys the essential ideas of the old word, namely, organization and
assembly, and would leave Christ without an institution, an official
business body on earth. How can there be a body of disciples apart
from organization and assembly? Miscellaneous, scattered, unattached
units do not constitute a body."
The church referred to in the text was neither a universal nor a
universal invisible institution. It was the local Baptist church at
Ephesus, to which Paul was writing.
III. Baptist Church Reveals God’s Manifold Wisdom
Men can take great, compact organizations with their super lords and
intricate details and do things. Satan organizes his limitless forces
of evil spirits, with their rulers of darkness and accomplishes
wonders. God’s "exceedingly various, multiform, multifarious,
manifold, immense and infinite" wisdom is seen in that He has no great
compact organization of any kind to accomplish and carry on His
purposes and will. His only organizations (assemblies) are little,
independent, local democracies, with no super lords and no centralized
power of government. Through them He will carry out His commission and
make His gospel known to the ends of the earth.
First, it should be borne in mind, that this was hidden in God from
creation until New Testament days. Nothing like a Baptist church was
ever heard of until Jesus Christ came and organized out of the
material prepared by the first Baptist preacher, John the Baptist, the
first Baptist church. To this church He gave His world wide
commission: but unto Paul was reserved the privilege, as a steward of
this long hidden mystery, of revealing that the only organization God
would have for carrying His gospel to the ends of the earth, would be
these Independent local assemblies. In Old Testament days He had
centralized governments, patriarchal, then tribal, then a theocracy,
then judges and then kings. Nothing like these little, independent
democracies was ever heard of until the Lord Jesus established the
first one. God’s mystery, hidden in Himself, was now revealed by His
chosen steward, the first great foreign missionary, who put into
practice what is herein revealed.
Paul went out without any centralized power or organization behind him
depending upon God and these little, independent democracies to
support him in his world wide missionary activities. All this is said
in the text and fits only in and with God’s missionary activities
through Baptist churches in New Testament days, with no centralized
head, government or power.
But in the second place do these little independent democracies reveal
the "multiform and exceedingly varied" wisdom of God? If they do, we
ought to be able to see that wisdom; for Paul said that God’s purpose
was through him to throw light upon how this mystery makes known God’s
many colored wisdom. Has God’s wisdom been revealed through these
little, independent churches through the centuries, and if so, how?
First, God’s infinite wisdom has been revealed through the centuries
in that He has perpetuated them from Christ’s day until the present.
Alexander Campbell said that "public monuments of their existence in
every century can be produced." Ypeij and Dermout, Dutch Reformed
historians, said: "On this account the Baptists may be considered as
the only Christian community which has stood since the apostles, and
as a Christian society, has preserved pure the doctrine of the gospel
through all ages." Sir Isaac Newton said: "The Baptists are the only
body of Christians that has not symbolized with the Church of Rome."
Prof. William Duncan, University of Louisiana, said: "Baptists do not,
as do most Protestant denominations, date their origin from the
Reformation of 1520. By means of that great religious movement,
indeed, they were brought forth from comparative obscurity into
prominent notice. . . . They did not, however, originate with the
Reformation, for long before Luther lived, nay, long before the Roman
Catholic Church herself was known, Baptists and Baptist churches
existed and flourished in Europe, in Asia and in Africa."
Both God’s wisdom and God’s power have been seen in the perpetuity of
Baptist churches: for Satan’s compact organization of spirit forces,
all the powers of Rome, the last mistress of the world, and the
compact ecclesiastical organizations of both the Roman and Greek
Catholic churches have all spent their utmost strength and combined
powers to stamp out and destroy these little, independent democracies.
Only the infinite wisdom and omnipotent power of our sovereign God
could have prevented three such mighty and universal forces as these
from accomplishing their aim. But Satan and his rulers of darkness;
temporal Rome and her armies and fagots and stakes; and ecclesiastical
Rome, with her intrigue, her bans, her councils and her conspiracies,
have all failed to stamp out the Baptists. Thus have three worlds been
forced to know and confess the manifold wisdom of God.
But again, not only have the preservation and perpetuity of Baptist
churches, with their simple faith and lack of central control, against
the three most compactly organized powers in the universe, namely,
satanic spirits, ecclesiastical Rome and Rome, the mistress of the
world, demonstrated God’s manifold wisdom and mighty power; but His
method of doing it has also revealed His matchless wisdom. He has
never fought the devil with fire. He has not matched force against
force. He has never raised any armies. Though always persecuted and
hunted into the dens and caves and mountain fastnesses of the earth;
yet Baptists have never been persecutors. His method of their
preservation has always been by a Book, the Baptist Book, the Bible,
the infallible and inerrant Word of God. God’s Book and God’s Spirit
have preserved the Baptists and Baptist churches. Presbyterians and
Episcopalians thrive and grow on education. Methodists and the so
called Holiness cults live on emotionalism. Catholics blossom and
reach their glory and power where ignorance abounds and force has
sway. Baptists, even under bitterest persecution, multiply and fill
the earth, wherever the Bible is read, and obeyed. Again, God’s
multifarious wisdom is seen, in the remarkable unity of these little
independent democracies. Bound neither by creeds nor tradition, nor
oaths, nor ritual, nor centralized ecclesiastical authority, yet the
rank and file of our Baptist churches are more nearly one in faith and
practice than any other people on earth. Others with their
ecclesiastical courts and centralized government marvel at the unity
of our Baptist hosts and can neither understand nor explain it. A few
educated leaders, obsessed with their own importance and infected with
germs of unionism or modernism, imbibed in the vitiated atmosphere of
rationalized "kultur," may give us a good deal of notoriety at times:
but the great body of common people, that compose the overwhelming
majority of Baptist churches, are sound at heart and one in faith on
the great historic truths of God’s Word. The secret of their unity is
found in their reading the same book the world over and obeying it.
And then the marvelous wisdom of God is manifested through Baptist
churches to the world and to Satan’s organized forces of evil in
forces He uses. It is still true as it was in New Testament days that
He uses "unlearned and ignorant men" (Acts 4:13). He not only uses
that kind, but He actually chooses that kind. "For ye see your
calling, brethren, how that not many wise men after the flesh, not
many mighty, not many noble, are called: But God hath chosen the
foolish things of the world to confound the wise; and God hath chosen
the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty;
And base things of the world, and things which are despised, hath God
chosen, yea, and things which are not, to bring to nought things that
are: That no flesh should glory in his presence" (1 Cor. 1:26-29). And
therein is the Scripture fulfilled, which says: "The foolishness of
God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men"
(1 Cor. 1:25). A Sunday School Board expert at the recent Southern
Baptist Convention sensed God’s methods and God’s plans rightly when
he said: "Thirty years from now eighty per cent of the First Churches
in all our cities will have backwoods, country boys for their pastors,
just as now." Rural and backwoods churches furnish nearly all of the
worthwhile laymen and preachers for all positions of responsibility
and trust, either in church or denominational life. Satan doesn’t do
it that way. He goes to the colleges and universities and selects the
mighty and noble and wise. God’s much varied wisdom is seen in that He
chooses the weak and the foolish and the base and the despised and the
noughts and with them confounds the wise and mighty and noble.
Lastly, God has given a demonstration of His immense and much varied
wisdom to kings and councils and hierarchies and ecclesiastical courts
and satanic cabals, through little, independent, Baptist democracies
in His choice of preaching for the spread of His truth. The wisdom of
this world magnifies schools or social service or organization or
money or publicity. The Bible doesn’t. "It pleased God by foolishness
of preaching to save them that believe" (1 Cor. 1:21). Baptists thrive
in the country because it is there that they depend upon preaching.
Preaching and teaching the Bible are God’s two chosen agencies for the
salvation of the lost and the edification and confirmation of the
saved. Many churches are organized to death. Some churches are lodged
to death and some are clubbed to death and some are societyized to
death and some are organized to death and some are starved to death
and some are entertained to death and some are sung to death (but not
with spiritual Songs) and some are hugged to death by the world and
some are unionized to death and some are lectured to death and some
are ritualized to death: but you never heard of a Baptist church being
preached to death.
Baptist churches thrive and prosper and grow and multiply by the
preaching of the Word of God. Satanic wisdom puts the emphasis on
organization and show. Worldly wisdom puts the emphasis on education
and social service. God’s marvelous and manifold wisdom puts the whole
and sole emphasis upon preaching the Word. Information, inspiration,
evangelization and indoctrination are the four corner stones on which
Baptist growth and enlargement and spirituality and consecration and
liberality rest. Preaching is God’s one ordained method for
evangelization and indoctrination: and preaching and Bible study are
God’s only prescribed agencies for information and inspiration. God’s
favorite preacher told his favorite son in the ministry that the Bible
would "thoroughly furnish or equip him for every good work." This same
preacher wrote to the church of which this favorite son of his was the
pastor and told them "And he gave some, apostles; and some, prophets;
and some, evangelists; and some, pastors and teachers; For the
perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the
edifying of the body of Christ: Till we all come in the unity of the
faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man,
unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ:" (Eph.
4:11-13).
The pastor by preaching and teaching the Bible can bring every member
of his church, who will hear and obey the Word, to perfection in
character and service, like unto his Lord’s.
Baptist churches from the foundation of the world in God’s hidden
purpose are His chosen agencies through which to demonstrate to earth,
heaven, and hell, His infinite and many colored wisdom. This
demonstration is two fold. He will demonstrate through them His wisdom
and power in choosing them as His agencies for carrying His
commission, to the ends of the earth and carrying out His purposes to
the end of the age. And then He will demonstrate through them His
manifold wisdom in perfecting the individual members in life and
character and service like unto the image of their Lord. And as the
climax of this demonstration, He will show the depths of His
measureless wisdom by perfecting redeemed men and women in the
likeness of their glorious Lord (the most beautiful likeness in all
the universe of God) by the foolishness of preaching and teaching just
one Book, God’s Book, the Baptist Book, The Bible. Therefore, Brother
Pastor, as most highly honored of all God’s workmen, in heaven or
earth, preach and teach the Bible.
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