Ephesians 3
The “mystery of the gospel” and the “eternal purpose of God” presented in Ephesians 3 reveal the meaning of the redemption and the significance of the Gentile disciples in the kingdom.
Bottom Line Up Front
Why is God claiming Gentiles in His name?
A large part of the “mystery of the gospel” is God’s self-revelation and vindication before all creation — both heavenly and earthly.
In other words, redemption isn’t just about saving individual souls; it’s about God sanctifying His name among both men and divine beings (“the rulers and authorities in the heavenly places,” Eph. 3:10).
This directly echoes the purpose of the Exodus:
“I will get glory over Pharaoh… and the Egyptians shall know that I am the LORD” (Ex. 14:4).
In the same way, the redemption of the nations through Yeshua is not simply a rescue mission — it’s a declaration of divine supremacy. It proclaims to all the spiritual powers that Adonai alone rules, that He is reclaiming what belongs to Him.
Thus, the “mystery” Paul speaks of is not new in concept but new in unveiling — that through the Messiah’s suffering, resurrection, and exaltation, God is reclaiming the nations from their false rulers.
How did the Jewish people view the Gentiles fitting into the redemptive narrative prior to Jesus?
From the beginning, Israel’s election was missional, not exclusive.
God told Abraham:
“In you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.” (Genesis 12:3)
Israel was chosen as a priestly nation (Exodus 19:5–6) — a mediating people through whom the nations would come to know the God of heaven and earth.
Thus, ancient Israel understood that the Gentiles were always part of the plan, but through Israel’s mediation. The nations would come to Zion to learn God’s ways (Isaiah 2:2–4; Micah 4:1–3), worship the God of Israel (Zechariah 8:20–23), and abandon idolatry (Isaiah 45:20–23).
Most Jewish writings anticipated that when Messiah came and established God’s kingdom, the nations would turn to Israel’s God. They would either:
Become worshipers of YHWH (without becoming Israelites), or
Join Israel through conversion (becoming proselytes).
Isaiah 56:6–8 is key:
6 “And the foreigners who join themselves to the Lord, to minister to him, to love the name of the Lord, and to be his servants, everyone who keeps the Sabbath and does not profane it, and holds fast my covenant— 7 these I will bring to my holy mountain, and make them joyful in my house of prayer; their burnt offerings and their sacrifices will be accepted on my altar; for my house shall be called a house of prayer for all peoples.” 8 The Lord God, who gathers the outcasts of Israel, declares, “I will gather yet others to him besides those already gathered.””
So, Gentiles were welcomed, but the expectation was that they would join themselves to Israel’s covenantal life — Torah observance, Temple worship, and allegiance to YHWH as Israel’s God.
In Second Temple Judaism, this process became formalized: Gentiles could convert to Judaism through circumcision and commitment to Torah. Once converted, they were considered full members of Israel.
Non-converted Gentiles could still be “God-fearers” (like Cornelius in Acts 10) — worshipers of Israel’s God who respected Torah but were not full converts.
So before Yeshua, Gentile inclusion was understood in terms of Israel’s centrality — the nations had to come to Israel, often by becoming part of Israel, in other words, by becoming Jewish.
Paul’s “mystery” wasn’t that Gentiles could be saved — the prophets already foresaw that. The mystery was how it would happen.
a. Without Becoming Jews
Paul saw that through Yeshua’s death and resurrection, and the outpouring of the Spirit, Gentiles were being made full participants in the covenant blessings — without converting to Judaism.
This was radical. It broke the old expectation that Gentiles had to become Israel to be included. Instead, through the Spirit, they were being joined to Israel’s Messiah — becoming co-heirs, not replacements.
“This mystery… that the Gentiles are fellow heirs, members of the same body, and partakers of the promise in Messiah Yeshua through the gospel.” (Ephesians 3:6)
b. Unity Without Uniformity
In Paul’s world, the word mystērion means something that was always true in God’s plan, but hidden until now.
You can say:
“Paul isn’t describing a brand-new religion; he’s describing a revelation of what God was doing all along.”
The “mystery” is:
“That the Gentiles are now fellow heirs, members of the same body, and sharers in the promise in Messiah Jesus.” (Eph. 3:6)
So instead of God rejecting Israel and choosing a new people, Paul is saying:
“God is now inviting the nations into the same family He promised to bless through Israel.”
Gentiles are not replacing Israel; they are being grafted in (Romans 11 imagery fits beautifully here).
This is why Paul constantly speaks about “one new man” (Eph. 2:15). Not a single homogeneous identity that erases Jewish distinction, but a reconciled family of Jews and Gentiles united in Messiah — distinct yet one.
It’s an eschatological fulfillment of the prophetic vision where the nations are joined to Israel’s God in worship, but now accomplished through the indwelling Spirit rather than geographic or ethnic conversion.
How is the story of the Exodus of Israel out of Egypt seen as the pattern for redemption?
This text rightly sees the Exodus as the pattern for all redemptions — what the rabbis call keitz ha’rishon keitz ha’acharon (“as the first redemption, so the last”).
Israel’s exodus: God redeems His people from the “gods” of Egypt, showing His supremacy.
The nations’ exodus: Through Messiah, God redeems all humanity from the spiritual powers that ruled over them (cf. Eph. 2:2; Col. 1:13).
Just as Israel passed through the waters, leaving Pharaoh behind, the Gentiles now experience their own “Red Sea moment” — being transferred from darkness to light, from the dominion of idols to the living God.
This pattern gives continuity to the entire biblical story:
From Egypt → Sinai → Messiah → Kingdom — the purpose remains the same: God’s name sanctified among all creation.
What does Paul mean by “God be made known through the church to the rulers and the authorities in the heavenly places?
Psalm 82 and Daniel 10 form the background for Paul’s language about rulers and authorities in the heavenly realms. These are not metaphorical “forces of evil” but actual spiritual beings — lesser elohim, princes of nations, assigned in the divine council.
In Jewish thought, after Babel, God “divided up the nations” under the rule of seventy spiritual princes (Deut. 32:8 LXX; 4QDeut), while He took Israel as His own inheritance.
When Paul speaks of “principalities and powers,” he’s drawing on this worldview:
The nations were under hostile rulership — but through Messiah, God is reclaiming them.
Thus, the mystery is that through Yeshua, God is disinheriting the “gods of the nations” and re-inheriting all peoples under His own sovereignty.
Psalm 82 ends with:
“Arise, O God, judge the earth, for You shall inherit all the nations.”
Paul sees that verse being fulfilled through the gospel.
In this frame, Gentile disciples are not simply “added members” to Israel’s covenant — they are living trophies of God’s victory. Their very existence as redeemed worshipers of Israel’s God demonstrates that the spiritual powers have lost their claim on the nations.
This fulfills Isaiah 49:6:
“It is too small a thing that You should restore Jacob… I will make You a light to the nations.”
So Paul’s mission isn’t an “innovation.” It’s the eschatological expansion of Israel’s purpose — that through Abraham’s seed, all nations would be blessed (Gen. 12:3; Gal. 3:8).
When Gentiles, once enslaved to idols, now confess Yeshua as Lord — that is, “there is no God like You among the gods, O LORD” (Ex. 15:11) — they are bearing witness to the same revelation as the Exodus.
It is the universalization of the Song of the Sea.
What is God’s Eternal Purpose?
The “eternal purpose” (Eph. 3:11) isn’t a new covenant that replaces Israel’s; it’s the outworking of the same purpose from creation — that God would be all in all (1 Cor. 15:28).
That purpose unfolds in three dimensions:
Israel’s redemption — the visible manifestation of God’s faithfulness.
The nations’ redemption — the reclamation of the rest of humanity.
The judgment of the gods — the final vindication of God’s name before all cosmic powers.
The Gentile believers in Messiah are the firstfruits of this universal restoration — living evidence that God’s kingdom is breaking into the dominion of darkness.
The Eternal Purpose of God
God has taken his place in the divine council; in the midst of the gods he holds judgment. (Psalm 82:1)
The seventh day of Passover is the aniversary of the day that the children of Israel crossed the Red Sea, which the sages liken to their immersion into a mikvah. Through the Red Sea, the children of Israel passed through a purification, washing away the filth of Egypt, and they underwent a transformation, a change in status, from slavery to freedom. On the far side of the water, they sang praises to God most high who had revealed himself in such manifest glory, and they declared, "Who is like you among the gods, O LORD? Who is like You, majestic in holiness, awesome in glorious deeds, doing wonders?" (Exodus 15:11).
In the daily liturgy of the Jewish people, this declaration is repeated twice a day, in conjunction with the blessing of redemption that comes between the Shema and the Amidah. This pride of place reflects the importance of these ideas in Jewish thought.
The question, "Who is like you among the gods, O LORD? Who is like You, majestic in holiness, awesome in glorious deeds, doing wonders?" is a rhetorical question with an obvious answer: There is none among the gods like the LORD. There is none majestic in holiness like the LORD. There is none so fearsomely worthy of praises and acclama-tion. None works such powerful wonders.
That's the point of the entire story of the exodus from Egypt. That's what the whole affair was all about: God demonstrating his supremacy over the so-called gods of the nations.
God Declares His Name
Perhaps that wasn't clear to the common Hebrew slave suffering in Egypt. I imagine that if we were enslaved people in Egypt, we wouldn't see the big picture of a contest between the gods. We'd be more concerned about our own situation and how the world-shaking cataclysm of the ten plagues affected us personally.
As individuals in the middle of this unfolding drama, concerned only with our own little lives, our personal redemption, and our personal salvation, we might not see the bigger picture of what is happening around us. We might never stop to ask ourselves, "Why should God Almighty care to redeem us from Egypt anyway?" Though we, as mere escaping slaves, might not have the wherewithal to ask the question, God answers it anyway. It is a matter of reputation- his reputation.
The exodus from Egypt was God's opportunity to "declare his Name." He used the redemption of Israel to establish his reputation:
The Egyptians shall know that I am the LORD. (Exodus 7:5)
That you many know that there is no one like the LORD our God. (Exodus 8:10)
That you may know that I am the LORD in the midst of the earth. (Exodus 8:22)
To show you my power, so that my name may be proclaimed in all the earth. (Exodus 9:16)
That you may tell in the hearing of your son and of your grandson. that you may know that I am the LORD. (Exodus 10:2)
On all the gods of Egypt I will execute judgments: I am the LORD. (Exodus 12:12)
I will get glory over Pharaoh and all his host, and the Egyptians shall know that I am the LORD. (Exodus 14:4)
Why did God do all this in Egypt? Why the big display of power? Why the contest? Why did he redeem Israel? To show his power and to proclaim his name through all the earth.
Judging the Gods of Egypt
For the LORD, the contest of the gods is a demonstration of his sover-eignty. Through the events of the Exodus story, God is establishing his name in the earth. He is making his entrance onto the stage of world history. In redeeming Israel, God sends a clear message to the whole world: "I exist; I am God; there is none like me!" He sends a message to the false gods of the world. He demonstrates that he alone is God, and there is none other:
I will pass through the land of Egypt that night, and I will strike all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, both man and beast; and on all the gods of Egypt I will execute judgments: I am the LORD. (Exodus 12:12)
The Jewish people are his victory trophies, as he says, "You shall be my treasured possession among all peoples" (Exodus 19:5). The word translated as "treasured possession" is segulah, a word that refers to the trophy treasure a conqueror takes from his vanquished foe.
God’s Reputation
The redemption from Egypt serves God's purpose, which is to establish his name. The redemption of the Jewish people is part of something much bigger than just getting out of making bricks; it's part of a plan to reveal God's eternal glory to "gods" and men. The Jewish people are to be like trophies of victory in the banquet hall of the King as a testimony to the nations.
For example, consider the reaction of Moses' father-in-law Jethro. This man was considered the high priest of Midian. The midrash says he worshiped all the gods. He was a connoisseur of deities. He put the "poly" in polytheism. But when he heard about how God had delivered the Jewish people from Egypt, he said, "Blessed be the LORD, who has delivered you out of the hand of the Egyptians and out of the hand of Pharaoh and has delivered the people from under the hand of the Egyptians. Now I know that the LORD is greater than all gods" (Exodus 18:10-11). Jethro becomes the first convert.
Rahab, the Canaanite innkeeper of Jericho, also converts and for the same reason. She says, "The fear of you has fallen upon us, and that all the inhabitants of the land melt away before you. For we have heard how the LORD dried up the water of the Red Sea before you when you came out of Egypt" (Joshua 2:9-10).
Any Other God?
Moses summarizes the entire matter with another rhetorical question:
Has any god ever attempted to go and take a nation for himself from the midst of another nation, by trials, by signs, by wonders, and by war, by a mighty hand and an outstretched arm, and by great deeds of terror, all of which the LORD your God did for you in Egypt before your eyes? (Deuteronomy 4:34)
Again, it's a rhetorical question. He supplies the answer: "To you it was shown, that you might know that the LORD is God; there is no other besides him" (Deuteronomy 4:35).
According to this idea, the declaration of monotheism is the central thrust of the story of the exodus from Egypt and the whole redemption. The entire drama was intended to bring us to the realization that God alone presides over heaven and earth, that he transcends all other spiritual beings, that he is the one God, that "the LORD is God; there is no other besides him." That's the purpose of the redemption.
When the Scriptures tell us "there is no other," this is true on more than one level. Understand it this way. One might object by saying, "There certainly are other gods—those that the nations worship." How-ever, though they call themselves gods, those spiritual entities are not at all on the level of the LORD. They are lower beings, part of the created order, and in comparison with the LORD, they are as if they are nothing-nonexistent. Ultimately, God is the Aleph and the Tav, the beginning and the end; from him, all things have come into being, and ultimately, all things will be reconciled into him, and apart from him, there is nothing that exists. Currently, that reality of the universal oneness of God is necessarily concealed within this world so that "others" like ourselves can exist. However, that concealment creates the illusion that other gods also exist and that we ourselves are independent of God, as Satan said to Eve, "You will be like God" (Genesis 3:5).
The Future Redemption
The ultimate redemption of the future will be like the first redemption. In the future redemption, God will again rescue his people from the nations:
Therefore say to the house of Israel, Thus says the LORD God: It is not for your sake, O house of Israel, that I am about to act, but for the sake of my holy name, which you have profaned among the nations to which you came. And I will vindicate the holiness of my great name, which has been profaned among the nations, and which you have profaned among them. And the nations will know that I am the LORD, declares the Lord GOD, when through you I vindicate my holiness before their eyes. (Ezekiel 36:22-23)
The LORD declares that he will redeem Israel from exile for the sake of his reputation. The prophecy goes on to explain that he is going to gather his people from the four winds, spiritually purity them with the sprinkling of clean water, invest into them a new spirit and a new heart, resurrect them from the dead, unite them in the land of Israel, rebuild his Temple, and shepherd them as one flock under the Davidic Messiah King in the Messianic Kingdom. That is the future redemption. All this he summarizes by saying, "I will sanctify my great name."
When we pray the Master's prayer, "Our Father in heaven, may your name be sanctified (hallowed be thy name)," we are supposed to have this prophecy in mind. We are asking God to bring the final redemption and establish the Messianic Kingdom so that "the nations will know that I am the LORD."
The Gods of the Nations
In the days of the Bible, there were only two types of people in the world: the Jewish people and the nations. The Jewish people belonged to God. The nations belonged to the other gods. Every nation had its gods. You didn't choose your gods the way we choose a religion in today's world. Instead, you were born into a people, and your people had certain gods. Or rather, the gods owned your people.
Jewish angelology explains the situation like this. God presides over a Sanhedrin of seventy angels. Each of the seventy nations has its own specific guardian angel. The angels are called "princes"" and their domains are the principalities. For example, in the book of Daniel, the angels Gabriel and Michael contend with the Prince of Persia, the angelic prince over the Persians (Daniel 10:13, 20). These angelic entities present themselves to the nations as divine beings, as gods, and they enjoy the adoration of their subjects.
The Midrash Rabbah explains that the angelic prince over the Egyptians was called Mitzrayim (the Hebrew word for Egypt) and that when the Torah says in Exodus 14, "Mitzrayim pursued the people of Israel" and "the people of Israel lifted up their eyes, and behold, Mitzrayim was marching after them," it refers to this angelic prince, of whom Pharaoh was an agent, just as Moses was an agent of the LORD. So the contest between the gods (between God and Mitzrayim) was finally settled at the Red Sea. God prevailed, defeated the angel Mitzrayim, and took the Hebrews away from him. "For they are my slaves, whom I brought out of the land of Egypt; they shall not be sold as slaves" (Leviticus 25:42).
The name of the God of Israel is profaned among the nations when his people fall into the possession of other gods. It looks like the other gods are more powerful than him. After all, if he were more powerful, why couldn't he protect his people? To rectify this misconception, God redeemed his people, and in so doing, he sanctified his name.
He didn't do it merely for the sake of the Jewish people. He did it for the sake of his name and the sake of the nations so that "the nations will know that I am the LORD." Or, to put it in our Master's words, "That the world may know" (John 17:23).
Mystery of the Gospel
So when we are asked whether or not it is appropriate for a Gentile disciple to participate in the Jewish Passover, we should remember that it was specifically for the sake of the nations that the Jewish people were redeemed in the first place, and it will be specifically for the sake of the nations that the Jewish people will be redeemed in the future.
This is what Paul refers to in Ephesians 3 as "the mystery of the gospel." To put it another way, "the mystery of the gospel" is the hidden secret behind the good news about the kingdom of heaven. Paul says he received insight into this mystery through a revelation. The revelation to which he refers occurred when, in the Temple in Jerusalem, he was caught up to the third heaven and saw a vision of the Master, who said to him, "Go, for I will send you far away to the Gentiles" (Acts 22:21). The mysterious secret behind the good news of the gospel, Paul explains, is the redemption of the nations.
The Eternal Purpose
In Ephesians 3, he explains that the mysterious hidden secret behind the good news about the kingdom of heaven was according to God's eternal purpose, which is to say that the redemption of the nations was the whole plan all along:
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, and 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. This was according to the eternal purpose that he has realized in Christ Jesus our Lord. (Ephesians 3:8-11)
By redeeming the nations along with Israel, God intended to sanctify his name before the nations and before their gods, "the rulers and authorities in the heavenly places," which Paul refers to a few chapters further on as "the rulers ... the authorities... the cosmic powers over this present darkness ... the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places" (Ephesians 6:12).
In the coming messianic redemption, God will sanctify his name by taking the nations away from the gods of the nations. This is the "eternal purpose" the redemption of humanity. Not just Israel but all of humanity will be swept up into this final redemption. Then the adversary will be chained, thrown into a pit, and sealed in it for a thousand years "so that he might not deceive the nations any longer" (Revelation 20:3). Then God's name will be sanctified, and all the nations will know that there is no god like the LORD, the God of Israel.
This is what we declare through the days of the Counting of the Omer (the fifty days between Passover and Shavu'ot) in the recitation of Psalm 67:
That your way may be known on earth, your saving power among all nations. (Psalm 67:2)
Let the nations be glad and sing for joy, for you judge the peoples with equity and guide the nations upon earth. Selah (Psalm 67:4)
God shall bless us; let all the ends of the earth fear him (Psalm 67:7)
That's the sweeping drama of redemption: a universal redemp-tion, the mystery of the gospel, and the eternal purpose of God. The Messiah comes not just for Israel but for all the sons and daughters of Adam. This inspiring revelation drove the Apostle Paul to reach out to the nations. He saw Gentile disciples of Yeshua as the first fruits of this final redemption, just as the Jewish disciples were the first fruits of the redemption of Israel.
Paul's Epistle to the Ephesians reveals a plan for universal domin-ion, a plan by which God intends to take over the world. Gentile believers are God's tokens and trophies of victory in an ancient struggle against darkness and concealment. The eternal purpose of God is the redemption of the whole world.
Pattern of Redemption
The exodus from Egypt set the pattern. When God took the Israelites out of Egypt and away from Pharaoh and the gods of Egypt, he established his superiority over all those gods. Israel was his trophy of victory. He used the exodus from Egypt to establish his name. It foreshadowed a second, greater exodus-an exodus begun under the blood of a greater lamb. This second exodus is the redemption of the nations. As he redeems the nations, God is repeating the exodus from Egypt over and over again, and there is nothing Pharaoh or the gods of Egypt can do about it. The spiritual powers and principalities of the Gentile nations can only watch in dismay as their brick-makers slip away through the Red Sea.
Our salvation is a demonstration of God's wisdom and sovereign power to rulers and authorities in the heavenly realms. Which of them, what other god, has ever tried to take for himself every nation? Which god of the nations has done anything like it? Which god of the nations can do anything to stop it? To Paul, the mystery of the gospel is the salvation of the whole world. "For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son" (John 3:16). That's what we are talking about when we speak about the kingdom of heaven being revealed on earth and when we ask God to sanctity his name and bring his kingdom.
Too Small a Thing
The point of the redemption is God's final victory over the so-called gods of this world. It's the revelation of his name as one within this world of concealment in which it appears that he is not one and not sovereign. The picture is much bigger than just the individual disciple and his or her personal salvation. It is bigger than the liberation from Egypt. It is bigger than the salvation of the Jewish people. God's eternal purpose is that his wisdom should be made known to the rulers and authorities in heavenly realms by means of taking away their people and their property and redeeming a people out of every tribe, tongue, and nation on earth.
Before the foundation of the earth, the LORD said to the soul of King Messiah:
It is too light a thing that you should be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob and to bring back the preserved of Israel; I will make you as a light for the nations, that my salvation may reach to the end of the earth. (Isaiah 49:6)
The scope of Messiah's work is not limited to the restoration of the tribes of Israel. That purpose is too small when compared with the greater purpose God has in mind. The eternal purpose of God is that Messiah should carry the LORD's salvation to the Gentiles, even to the ends of the earth.
The Gentiles Isaiah spoke of are the same Gentiles to whom Paul was writing in the book of Ephesians. They were formerly strangers and aliens, far off, strangers to the promises, without God and without hope. They were the ones upon whom God intends to shine the light of Messiah. This is in keeping with God's eternal purpose-that the manifold wisdom of God should be made known to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly realms. God's salvation must go to the ends of the earth so that through the seed of Abraham, all the families of the earth should be blessed.
Then all humanity will declare, "There is none like you among the gods, O LORD." In that day, the idols will be cut off and toppled down, as it says in the Aleinu prayer: "Every knee will bend and every tongue confess. And in that day, the LORD will be one, and his name will be one" (cf. Zechariah 14:9).
Psalm 82, the psalm that begins with the words "God has taken his place in the divine council; in the midst of the gods he holds judg-ment, then concludes with the hopeful petition, "Arise, O God, judge the earth; for you shall inherit all the nations!"
Fellow Heirs
What does it mean to be a "fellow heir" with Israel and part of "the commonwealth of Israel"? Paul uncovers the role of the Gentile disciples in the "mystery of Christ, which was "hidden in God" for ages past.
God redeemed the Jewish people from Egypt not for their own sake but to make known his name sud reputalion - that the Egyptians might know, that the Israelites might know, and the ends of the earth might know that he is God and that there is none else. He used the redemption from Egypt to discredit the false gods of the world's greatest superpower, showing himself to be supreme above the powers and principalities and spiritual forces of this present darkness.
When the Jewish people fall into the hands of foreign powers, it profanes his name because it appears that the gods of the nations are more powerful than he is. For this reason, he says to the exiles of Egypt, "You have profaned my name among the nations." In the final redemption, he will again redeem his people from the nations, spiritually cleanse them, resurrect the dead, bring the exiles back to the land of Israel, give them a new spirit, unite them under the government of King Messiah, rebuild his Temple in their midst, and restore his presence among them to sanctify his name. He says, "Then the nations will know that I am the LORD" (Ezekiel 37:28).
In the process of redeeming Israel, he will turn the tables on the false gods of the nations by taking their people away from them. The cosmic heist of the nations has been his secret objective the entire time.
Apostle to the Gentiles
For this reason I, Paul, a prisoner of 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. (Ephesians 3:1-3)
Paul looked for a day when God's kingdom would include not just Israel but also all nations as a universal revelation to humanity. That's why Paul insisted on distinction between Jews and Gentile disciples and dissuaded Gentile disciples from becoming Jewish. Every Gentile who confessed faith in the God of Israel and allegiance to the Messiah of Israel was a step closer to realizing that vision, but every Gentile disciple who forsook his nation and converted to become Jewish was a step further from realizing that vision. If all the Gentile disciples were to become Jews, then the Messianic redemption would not reach to all nations; it would be limited to Israel. Such a prospect ran counter to the whole eternal purpose of God's redemptive work. Hence Paul's rule of distinction for all the churches (1 Corinthians 7:18-20).
James, the brother of the Master, made the same argument when he handed down the Apostolic Decree in Acts 15. When the apostles decided that Gentile disciples need not become Jewish, James justified the decision by quoting a prophecy from Amos 9 about how in the kingdom, the nations would also be called by God's name:
With this the words of the prophets agree, just as it is written, 'After this I will return, and I will rebuild the tent of David that has fallen; I will rebuild its ruins, and I will restore it, that the remnant of mankind may seek the Lord, and all the Gentiles who are called by my name, says the Lord, who makes these things known from of old." (Acts 15:15-18)
Paul spoke to the Gentile disciples in Ephesus with authority because he considered himself the official "apostle to the Gentiles." He had been imprisoned in Rome solely on account of his association with Gentile disciples. That's what got him in trouble with the authori-ties, and that's how he ultimately ended up waiting for a trial before Nero in Rome. He considered himself the official apostle to the Gentiles because the Messiah himself commissioned him through a revelation he received while worshiping in the Temple. Caught up to the third heaven in a state of altered consciousness, he saw a vision of Yeshua saying to him, "Go, for I will send you far away to the Gentiles" (Acts 22:21). That revelation sent him on a quest to understand God's purpose for the nations and how the good news of the gospel might apply to them. This is the "mystery ... made known to me by revelation."
The Mystery of Christ
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. (Ephesians 3:4-5)
The apostle spoke of his "insight into the mystery of Christ." On the surface, this sounds like some sort of theological or Christological idea-penal substitutionary atonement through Christ's blood, the efficaciousness of his vicarious suffering, the fellowship of the eucha-rist, or some other sacramental language. However, these ideas are not in view. Instead, Paul refers to the same topic the rest of the epistle is about-namely, Gentile inclusion. The "mystery" is the redemption of the nations, something concealed from previous generations but now revealed through the apostolic authorities. The "mystery" is that the Gentile disciples are fellow heirs, members of the same body, and par-takers of the promise of the kingdom and the World to Come by means of the good news of the Messiah Yeshua. The "mystery," now revealed, is that this is what the Messiah was meant to accomplish all along.
Members of the Same Body
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. (Ephesians 3:6)
The Gentile disciples are to be considered fellow heirs with Israel. However, an overly broad interpretation here can lead to confusion. To be a fellow heir does not mean that one attains identical status or sameness. It does not mean that the Gentile disciples share the same calling, responsibilities, and privileges as the Jewish people. It does not mean "equal heir."
To be a fellow heir with Israel does not mean that I, as a Gentile disciple, share the same biblical obligations and privileges as Israel.
But it does mean that I share in Israel's inheritance. The image is that of a father dividing his estate among his sons. According to the Torah's inheritance laws, all of his sons receive a single portion in the same inheritance except the firstborn, who receives a double portion.
What is the inheritance? Paul explained it in the first chapter of the epistle as the hope of the Jewish people:
In him we the Jewish people] have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to the purpose of him who works all things according to the counsel of his will, so that we who were the first to hope in Christ might be to the praise of his glory. (Ephesians 1:11-12)
In the Messiah, the Jewish disciples obtained the inheritance that God promised to the children of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. The inheritance consists of the promises that came through the Torah and were amplified by the prophets: the blessings and promises of Abraham, the land, the redemption, the kingdom, and even eternal life in the resurrection and the World to Come. This is the inheritance passed down from the fathers to the sons. Paul explained that this inheritance was predestined according to the will and purpose of God to come through the Messiah so that the Jewish people "who were the first to hope in the Messiah might be to the praise of his glory."
The idolatrous Gentile nations, on the other hand, were at the time "separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world" (Ephesians 2:12). In Messiah, however, individuals from those nations who were formerly "far away" have been brought near and receive a portion in the same inheritance along with the people of Israel. They are no longer strangers to the covenants of the forefathers, separated from the Messiah, and without hope or God in the world. Instead, they have been brought into the commonwealth of Israel.
The Commonwealth of Israel
At this point, we should discuss the concept of the "commonwealth of Israel. In the previous chapter, Paul states that the Gentiles outside of a relationship with the Messiah are "alienated from the commonwealth of Israel." Gentile disciples of Yeshua, however, are no longer alienated from the commonwealth. As with the concept of "fellow heirs"" there are wrong ways to understand a Gentile disciple's inclusion in the commonwealth of Israel. The replacement-theology interpretation understands this to mean that the church has replaced Israel. The one-law interpretation goes so far as to say that since Gentile disciples are included in the commonwealth of Israel, that makes them Israelites, giving them the same status as proselytes, that is, Jews not of Jewish birth. That's not what it means.
Paul's concept of "commonwealth" is undoubtedly based on his experience within the Roman Empire as a Roman citizen. The Greek word translated as commonwealth (politeia) could be understood as "a citizenship." It's closely related to the word for citizen (polites). Paul himself was a Roman citizen and therefore was part of the commonwealth (citizenship) of Rome, though he was neither Roman nor Italian. He was a Jew from Tarsus who had never been to Italy until his arrest.
As the Roman Empire expanded to encompass most of the known western world, it became evident that they could not control all their holdings by sheer military force. Revolutionary wars on multiple fronts would quickly overtax the Roman legions and spread them too thinly. Instead of ruling by sheer brute force, the Romans introduced the concept of obtaining Roman citizenship, giving their subjects something to aspire toward other than independence from Rome. What's even better than throwing off the Roman yoke? Becoming a Roman!
The Romans extended the privilege of being a Roman citizen to loyalists and sold it to the wealthy. One's children could inherit the coveted status. It was also possible to become a Roman citizen through manumission. This was by far the most common way to acquire citizenship in the empire. If you served as a slave in a Roman citizen's household and your owner granted you freedom, he could adopt you into his household and thereby grant you citizenship. Paul's forefathers in Tarsus might have obtained their citizenship in that manner, as did many other Diaspora Jews, who took on the title "freedmen." Elsewhere, Paul explains to the Gentile disciples, "So you are no longer a slave, but a son, and if a son, then an heir through God" (Galatians 4:7).
Roman citizens had political privileges and protections that noncitizens did not, but they were not the same as Romans. In the analogy, Paul spoke of Gentile disciples obtaining kingdom citizenship in Israel. The citizenship Paul sees for non-Jews is not citizenship in the nation of Israel proper, which he elsewhere refers to as "Israel according to the flesh," just as he refers to his readers as "you Gentiles in the flesh." The citizenship enjoyed by the Gentile disciples remains tied to the future kingdom of Israel, which is the kingdom of God. That "commonwealth of Israel" extends to all disciples of King Yeshua.
With this kind of language, Paul intended to communicate the distinction between Israel and the nations in a physical sense while indicating inclusion through Messiah in the spiritual sense and in the future political reality. The commonwealth of Israel belongs to the future when King Messiah will annex all nations under the empire called the kingdom of God. The Gentile disciples will be citizens of the kingdom, not just vanquished and conquered peoples. The disciples of Yeshua will rule along with him, occupying positions of spiritual authority, judging angels, presiding over principalities and authori-ties, and replacing the corrupt spiritual government of the prince of this present darkness.
Paul’s Gospel
Paul summarizes all these concepts as "my gospel," a term he uses to differentiate it from the good news proclaimed only to Israel. He considered himself called by God to steward and transmit this good news for Gentiles:
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, and 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 ekklesia the manifold wisdom of God might now be made known to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly places. (Ephesians 3:7-10)
Paul considered himself to be the vessel of enlightenment to the world on this matter of Gentile citizenship in the kingdom. Throughout the Epistle to the Ephesians, he presumed himself to represent Israel, the Jewish people, the "apostles and prophets" as he transmits revelation to the nations. The special revelation that he had received pertained to the destiny of the nations, namely, that they, too, will be swept up in the final redemption under King Messiah. Paul's Gentile disciples are the first fruits of that future redemption: "This was according to the eternal purpose that he has realized in Christ Jesus our Lord" (Ephesians 3:11). This was God's plan from the outset.
Sometimes when describing our relationship with Israel, the Gentile disciples use the self-deprecating term "second-class citizen," implying that while the Jewish people are first-class, our citizenship is more of an honorary status. That's actually true if we are talking about citizenship in the nation of Israel. But it's not at all true if we are talking about citizenship in the kingdom. In either case, we have learned that the nations are not second-string in God's arrangements or an afterthought on his agenda. Instead, the objective behind Israel's redemption is the redemption and salvation of the nations. The objective behind Messiah's mission is not just the redemption of Israel. Rather, that objective can be rightly understood as a means toward an end, that end being the redemption of humanity, as the Gospel of John says, "For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him" (John 3:16-17, emphasis mine).
Such was the eternal purpose of God.
Identity in Messiah
In the previous chapter, while working through Ephesians 3, we discovered the eternal purpose of God. That seems significant. We learned that Paul brought the world a revelation that for ages past had remained concealed. He called it the "mystery of Christ" and the "mystery of the gospel He referred to it as the "manifold wisdom of God" and the "eternal purpose of God." He differentiated it from the gospel proclaimed exclusively to the Jewish people by referring to it as "my gospel" because he believed God had commissioned him to transmit this revelation to the world. What was the revelation? That God is redeeming the nations through Yeshua the Messiah and salvaging the human race to reveal his glory and discredit the false gods of the world. Paul said that this was the plan all along, but only now has the plan been made public. The Gentile disciples from the nations are the first fruits, the forerunners, of the full redemption of the nations.
Over-familiarity with the New Testament makes it easy to read over a passage like Ephesians 3 and miss the main point about the redemption of the nations. It's also normal to read through a passage like this and take for granted the amount of deep Jewish mysticism at work in apostolic theology. As we conclude our commentary on Ephesians 3, we should slow down enough to appreciate the vastness of thought that Paul marshals to express his ideas. The best way to do that will be to compare his statements with similar concepts in Jewish mysticism.
Boldness and Confidence
This was according to the eternal purpose that he has realized in Christ Jesus our Lord, in whom we have boldness and access with confidence through our faith in him. (Ephe-sians 3:11-12)
In the previous chapter, we saw how Paul used an analogy from Roman life to illustrate the relationship between Yeshua and his disciples. Roman laws concerning the manumission of slaves, adoption into a family, and consequent inheritance of citizenship are still in view. He compared the disciples to household slaves in a Roman home. In this analogy, Yeshua is the owner of the slaves. The disciples are compared to household slaves set free by the Son and adopted into the family as children.
Under Roman law, a Roman citizen had the legal right to grant his slaves freedom. This was called manumission. But doing so was no great favor because a freed slave had no rights, status, money, place, or standing. Therefore, the Roman householder who wanted to grant his trusted slave his freedom would often adopt that slave into his family, lending him his family name. This is how the prisoner of war Joseph ben Matthias became Flavius Josephus. The Flavian family of Vespasian, Titus, and Domitian adopted him into their household and gave him their name. When a Roman citizen adopts a child (that is, an adult child), that child is eligible for Roman citizenship. In Paul's anal-ogy, Yeshua is the householder who frees his slave, elevates him to the status of a son, and grants him citizenship. You who were previously alienated from the commonwealth of Israel (i.e., citizenship) have now been elevated to the level of sons who inherit citizenship in the kingdom: "If the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed" (John 8:36).
Elsewhere, Paul says to his Gentile readers, "Because you are sons, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, 'Abba! Father!' So you are no longer a slave, but a son, and if a son, then an heir through God" (Galatians 4:6-7), and, "For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, 'Abba! Father!" (Romans 8:15). Yeshua enjoys a unique and unprecedented relationship with God, intimately knowing the Father as only the Son knows him. For this reason, the disciple of Yeshua enjoys access to God, confidently approaches him as a loving father, and prays with boldness in the manner of a child speaking with a father.
Do Not Lose Heart
So I ask you not to lose heart over what I am suffering for you, which is your glory. (Ephesians 3:13)
Having heard about Paul's imprisonment, the Gentile disciples in Asia Minor might have felt discouraged and disheartened. Their faith, prac-tice, and self-identity depended on his gospel message. They might have feared that without Paul to reinforce their identity and represent their interests in the apostolic community, they would lose their participation in the community of Yeshua. Paul encourages them to consider his tribulations on their behalf to be a badge of honor. He did not hesitate to suffer for the sake of his message to the nations.
Every Family in Heaven and on Earth
For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named. (Ephesians 3:14-15)
He concludes these thoughts about the revelation of the eternal purpose of God with a prayer and doxology, addressing God as "the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named." Biblical Hebrew sometimes refers to a family unit as a beit av, i.e., "house of a father." Paul's language implies a vast universalism in which God is presented as the First Cause. We might paraphrase, "The Father who is the origin of every category of things in the universe." God seeks to redeem not just Israel but every family. Everything has its source in God, and all things belong to God, so there should be no objection to the redemption of the Gentiles who are called by God's name.
The Indwelling Messiah
What is the petition that Paul presents in prayer on bended knee before the Father of all families? Here's his prayer on behalf of the Gentile disciples in Ephesus:
That according to the riches of his glory he may grant you to be strengthened with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. (Ephesians 3:16-17)
Paul prayed that they would be strengthened in their inner being, that is to say, that God's Spirit should strengthen their spirits (neshamot) so that the Spirit of Messiah "may dwell in your hearts"" much as the Shechinah (God's Dwelling Presence) took up its dwelling in the Tabernacle and the Logos (Word) of God was made flesh and tabernacled in the physical person of Yeshua of Nazareth. Paul wants the Holy Spirit to quicken our transcendent inner being (the nesha-mah) so that we might become a receptacle for the Spirit (neshamah) of the Messiah.
This is not the only place the apostle speaks of this concept of the Messiah taking residence within the consciousness and within the person of his disciples. In Galatians 2:20, he says, "It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me." In Romans 8, he says, "The Spirit of God dwells in you. Anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him. But if Christ is in you ... he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit who dwells in you" (Romans 8:9-11).
This is in keeping with our Master's prayer, "I in them and you in me, that they may become perfectly one, so that the world may know that you sent me and loved them even as you loved me" (John 17:23).
Ibbur
Let's dwell on this point for a moment because it comes at the conclusion of this entire discussion about the status of the Gentile disciple, the redemption of the nations, and the eternal purpose of God. We should ask ourselves, "What's the connection between the redemption of the nations and this mystical and utterly personal experience of Messiah's being, which, in some ineffable spiritual sense, is taking up dwelling within the individual?" How does Paul's discussion of the eternal purpose of God connect to Jesus in my heart?
When I was a kid growing up under the Evangelical worldview, we often spoke of having "Jesus in your heart." We referred to conversion as "accepting Christ" and praying to "invite Jesus to come into our hearts." To be "born again" meant to "receive Jesus into your heart." My Swedish grandmother expressed her dismay over the medical innovation of heart-transplant surgery lest she receive a used heart without Jesus in it. In all honesty, I never really understood the concept of having Jesus in my heart until I encountered a similar idea in Jewish mysticism.
The teaching of the Jewish mystics transmits a similar idea called ibbur, which literally means "impregnation" or "pregnancy." It's one of the genuinely spooky ideas that, when misunderstood, give Jewish mysticism and kabbalistic literature a bad name. It can be misconstrued to sound like some creepy occult thing. The idea is that the soul of a deceased person might be sent to assist a living person in the performance of a mitzvah (good deed or commandment) or to complete a task, especially if it is a task that this particular soul has a personal interest in completing.
For example, suppose you were an orphan and raised without parents and therefore never had the opportunity to fulfill the mitzvah of honoring your father and mother. Judaism considers it a personal tragedy never to have an opportunity to fulfill a mitzvah. After death, you might receive the opportunity to go as an ibbur to assist someone who is having difficulty with that particular mitzvah. By doing so, you participate with the person in the mitzvah and accrue some of the merit for the mitzvah. You would accomplish this in the form of an ibbur, that is, a spiritual impregnation of a small and subtle portion of your soul's identity incarnated into the person performing the mitzvah so as to assist in the effort.
It's an idea.
I'm not vouching for whether or not there is any substance to that concept whatsoever, nor am I endorsing Lurianic mysticism. But one could certainly describe the living Messiah's relationship with his living disciples in similar language. The apostles teach that the Spirit of the Messiah dwells within his disciples in order to continue his work-the work of the kingdom and the will of the Father on earth. This happens through the agency of the Holy Spirit-that same anointing Spirit of God that rested upon Yeshua and now rests upon his disciples and impregnates them (so to speak) with a portion of the Spirit of Messiah, as the angel Gabriel said to Miriam, "The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born will be called holy—the Son of God" (Luke 1:35).
Ibbur means impregnation. Spiritually speaking, the identity of the Messiah is planted within his disciples like a pregnancy (i.e., a person within a person), whether they are Jewish or Gentile, to carry out his work on earth. This is why Paul could say, "It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me" (Galatians 2:20).
The apostles believed that this spiritual ibbur of Messiah within us should transform our lives—at least, this is how it is supposed to work. There is supposed to be a new life in us, a resurrected life in us, such that we are no longer pursuing our own interests but the interests of the Messiah. We no longer rely on our own sense of self, ego, and identity. Instead, we are supposed to have died to that identity, finding our identity instead in the indwelling Messiah.
What has this got to do with the Jewish-Gentile questions Paul has addressed? It goes back to the concern he raised at the end of chapter 1 when he prayed that the eyes of his readers' hearts might be enlightened to know the hope of our calling and the immeasurable greatness of God's power toward us with Messiah as the head over the ekklesia, "which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all" (Ephesians 1:23).
The Body of Adam Kadmon
Because each disciple of Yeshua is invested with this identity (ibbur of Messiah), the disciples share membership in a larger corporate messianic identity. Corporately, the disciples of Yeshua form a collective entity that the apostles refer to as "the body of the Messiah." This is probably Paul's favorite metaphor to describe the relationship between Israel and the Gentile disciples. Earlier in the chapter, Paul alluded to the "body of Messiah" metaphor when he said, "This mystery is that the Gentiles are fellow heirs, members of the same body, and partak-ers of the promise in Christ Jesus through the gospel" (Ephesians 3:6).
He will return to the concept in the next chapter, where he says, "We are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ, from whom the whole body, joined and held together by every joint with which it is equipped, when each part is working properly, makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love" (Ephesians 4:15-16).
He invokes the image of the body of Messiah in several places in his epistles. Like the concept of ibbur, it also has an analog in Jewish mysticism, specifically, the description of the Heavenly Adam (Adam Kadmon). According to that idea, every human spirit, every neshamah, has its origin in a single human being, the original prototype. Together, all human beings comprise that single human being who was made in the image of God.
The Bible tells us that Adam was made "in the image of God" (Gen-esis 1:27), but what is the image of the transcendent and unseen God? Before creating Adam, God first created an image of himself, a reflection of himself, so to speak. According to this idea, all humanity comprises a single human being— a divine human being —who should be the image and reflection of God. Sin obscures and corrupts that image, but if we knew who we truly were on the soul level, we would realize that there is no real separation between us. We are all of the same stuff, differentiated only for the sake of this lifetime, but ultimately destined to be reunited in perfect love for one another, which is God's own love. That's one explanation of the mystical idea of the Heavenly Adam.
Paul elsewhere compares the Master to Adam (Romans 5:12-19; 1 Corinthians 15:42-49), referring to the Master as a sort of heavenly Adam or spiritual Adam. Paul's teaching about the "body of Messiah" is similar. In his metaphor, Yeshua is at the head of the body, and all his disciples comprise various body parts. The parts are different, and they have different functions in the body, but all of them are essential components of the body. It would be inappropriate for one body part to be jealous of another. Thus there can be distinction and differentiation within the body of Messiah. The eye is not jealous of the foot, nor is the foot jealous of the ear. We all belong to the same body:
He put all things under his feet and gave him as head over all things to the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all. (Ephesians 1:22-23)
I would summarize the thrust of the argument like this. The idea that the Messiah dwells within each person and that together we corporately form the body of the Messiah should utterly transcend our simple ideas of who is who, of human labels and egoic identity, of gender, rank, caste, clan, national standing, prestige, and honor in the eyes of men. It should make the question of who is Jewish and who is from the nations irrelevant. (It is relevant in the flesh and in this current world, but not on the level of true spiritual identity.) Our spiritual rebirth as Messiah on earth is so much more significant than those things that they should be as if they were of no account to us. God's Spirit should be quickening our inner person, the spirit within us, to the end that the Messiah himself dwells in us in this sacred union and sacred bond that brings us into the fellowship Yeshua shares with the Father. Ultimately, this process draws us into union with the one God where we discover the truth that has eluded us, namely, that God is love—love that transcends all boundaries.
The Fullness of God
Thus, Paul prayed for the disciples in Ephesus that the eyes of their hearts would be opened to apprehend the immeasurable:
That you, being rooted and grounded in love, may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God. (Ephesians 3:17-19)
The apostle prayed that we "may be filled with all the fullness of God, echoing his statement at the end of the first chapter:
... which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all. (Ephesians 1:22-23)
We find a similar turn of phrase used to describe Yeshua in Colossians:
For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell. (Colossians 1:19)
In this verse, the term translated "fullness" is the Greek word ple-roma. We can't be sure what Paul intended to imply by referring to the "fullness of God" that was pleased to dwell in Yeshua and that Paul desired to see fill Yeshua's disciples. I can tell you that it implies the sense of totality, meaning that all the "parts" (so to speak) are present. The fullness of God means God is fully present, with nothing missing. Later Christian mysticism (i.e., Gnosticism) used the term pleroma to describe the divine attributes of the Aeons (the Emanations) of the transcendent God through which the utterly unknowable and unre-vealed limitlessness of God reveals itself above the lower worlds. This concept is, more or less, the Gnostic version of the Sephirot described in Kabbalistic literature, and there's every likelihood that the original Gnostic idea has its source in the type of apostolic mysticism we see hinted at in Ephesians and Colossians.
A similar idea exists in Jewish mysticism today in the so-called "Tree of Life (Etz Chayim)" which purports to chart the component attributes of God. One need not endorse the schema to see the parallels in early Christianity's esoteric ideas. According to Jewish mysticism today, the Ein Sof (the infinite, transcendent God) reveals himself and continuously creates the worlds below him, including this uni-verse, through ten Emanations (Sephirot): Wisdom (Chochmah), Insight (Binah), Knowledge (Da'at), Loving Kindness (Chesed), Power (Gevurah), Splendor (Tiferet), Eternality (Netzach), Glory (Hod), Foundation (Yesod), and Kingdom (Malchut). Above all of them sits Crown (Keter), the source of all the rest. At the end of the chain is Kingdom (Malchut), which manifests in this physical world and receives the fullness of those above it.
The entire system is a juggling of abstraction and metaphor to try to measure the immeasurable God, to translate the ineffable into human language, and understand how the infinite God can enter the world of three dimensions and interact with human beings. Likewise, Paul earlier prayed that the eyes of our hearts might be opened to know "what is the immeasurable greatness of his power toward us who believe" (Ephesians 1:19). Now he prays that we might measure the immeasurable in "the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God." In the apostolic scheme of the pleroma, whatever it might have been, love sits in the place of Keter (Crown) above Da'at (Knowledge):
If I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove moun-tains, but have not love, I am nothing. (1 Corinthians 13:2)
So, once again, we find Paul to be speaking in the language of Jewish mysticism when he says, "For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell" (Colossians 1:19). This same fullness (which in Jewish mysticism finds one expression in the Tree of Life) is the pleroma, the fullness of which Paul speaks when he prays for us, "that you may be filled with all the fullness of God."
The fullness of God is pleased to dwell in the Messiah, incarnated as if impregnated into the physical body of Yeshua of Nazareth. The spirit of Yeshua, a portion of his being, is pleased to dwell in his dis-ciples, incarnated as if impregnated into each one. Together, his disciples comprise one corporate body, the body of the Messiah, which contains the fullness of God.
Compared with these thoughts and meditations on the significance of being a disciple of Yeshua, concerns over flesh-level prestige based upon who is Jewish and who is of the nations should feel petty and irrelevant.
Paul concludes this discussion on the identity of the Gentile disciple in Yeshua with a brief doxology:
Now to him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever. Amen. (Ephesians 3:20-21)
Fake Ending
Is that the end? The "Amen" at the end of Ephesians 3:21 seems like a perfect place to end the epistle. After a breathtaking and sweeping flight through the mind of the Spirit of God, this is a good place to land. But it's not the end. From this point on, Paul comes down from the spiritual heights to explain the practical legal implications of his theological treatise. Ephesians 4 begins a discourse on how Yeshua's disciples should live.