which in other generations has not been made known to the sons of men, as it has now been revealed to his holy apostles and prophets in [the power of the] Spirit,
Paul has just said that God revealed a secret to him. Here he tells us when: not in earlier generations, but now — by the Spirit, to a chosen circle of men.
The word does not point to something puzzling. It points to a secret God kept until He chose to speak.
By the word "mystery" the Apostle does not mean anything mysterious — that is only the way people use the word. In Scripture a mystery is something kept secret until now. It could not be known in any other way than by revelation. Once it is revealed, faith alone can grasp it.
Commentators press that the negative in this verse is absolute. It is not that earlier generations saw a little and we now see more.
"Which was not made known to the sons of men in other generations." Here you have a plain statement that the secret was not revealed in other ages. The point is not that it was vaguely hinted at, or that people understood it badly. It was not revealed at all.
The words "sons of men" leave no one out. They cover the best-known believers of the past.
This description takes in the Jewish prophets, and earlier witnesses of the truth of God as well. As he adds a little later, it was "hidden in God," and so it was not among the secrets God shared even with Abraham His friend.
There was a reason for the long silence. It lay in Israel's standing as a separate people.
Scripture states this clearly and repeatedly. While the Jews were a separate people, and were bound to be so, the mystery of the church could not exist — and it was not revealed. To reveal that there was no difference between the Jew and the Greek would have overturned the whole structure at its base.
There is a second reason for the timing: the thing itself did not yet exist.
The unfolding of the Church came when the Holy Spirit was given in a new way... At Pentecost, for the first time, we have an assembly that is called the Church of God: a body where God intended to have Jew and Gentile without distinction. That state of things never existed before the day of Pentecost.
The word "prophets" usually points back to the Old Testament. Two things in the verse point the other way: the word order, and the "now."
The prophets in this verse are not Old Testament prophets. They are the ones spoken of in Ephesians 2:20. In both cases the order is "apostles and prophets". If he meant prophets of the Old Testament, you would expect "prophets and apostles". Also, the Apostle is speaking of what is "now" revealed, in contrast with what was revealed before.
The picture of the foundation in the previous chapter points the same way.
What prophets? Of the New Testament only. God was not taking up an old foundation. He was laying a new one, and He begins this new one in Christ dead and risen... The Greek phrase "the apostles and prophets" means that both groups were united in this joint work.
"By the Spirit" tells us how the truth arrived. It reached a small circle first.
These Spirit-given revelations reached, not the world, and not even all saints, but the apostles and prophets. Once they had received them, they passed them on to others.
Within that circle, Paul had a particular job.
This does not mean it was hidden from the other apostles — Paul tells us it was revealed to them too. But God gave Paul the special service of ministering this truth to the saints. So only in Paul's letters do we find the mystery unfolded.
This truth has a date. That date matters for us.
This mystery, we are told, was "hidden in God" Himself before (Ephesians 3:9). So the revelation of it cannot be found in Old Testament times, or before the ascension of our Lord Jesus Christ and the gift of the Holy Spirit. That it is now made known in our day should profoundly affect us.
- Hidden. In Scripture a mystery is a kept secret, not a riddle. Study cannot reach it. Revelation gives it, and faith holds it.
- Hidden from all. "Sons of men" covers everyone before — the prophets of old, and Abraham himself. It was hidden in God, not buried somewhere in the older Scriptures.
- Hidden for a reason. Israel stood as a separate people. The news that Jew and Greek are on one level would have overturned that whole order. And the church itself did not exist until the Spirit came.
- Now revealed. The "now" fixes the timing. The order "apostles and prophets" fixes the people. God laid a new foundation in Christ dead and risen; He did not reuse an old one.
- Now passed on. The Spirit gave it to that first circle, not to the world. They carried it outward, and God charged Paul to unfold it. That is why you find it in his letters — and why it should move us today.
that [they who are of] the nations should be joint heirs, and a joint body, and joint partakers of [his] promise in Christ Jesus by the glad tidings;
Ephesians 3 pauses so Paul can explain the secret God made known to him. This verse states that secret plainly. Gentiles share the same heirship, the same body and the same promise as believing Jews. But what was new here? The prophets had already spoken of blessing reaching the nations.
One writer points to a translation that keeps the repeated word in those three terms visible in English, even though the result reads awkwardly.
Ephesians 3:6 gives an even shorter summary of the mystery. Again it stresses the wonderful place given to Gentiles. Someone has translated the three words in that verse as "Joint-heirs, a joint-body and joint-partakers." This may be clumsy English. But it has the merit of making us see the main thought of the Spirit of God in the verse.
Blessing for the nations was no secret. The Old Testament said plenty about it. So the new thing must lie somewhere else.
Nothing could be more obvious, even to a quick reader of God's word, than this. The Old Testament is full of predictions of blessing to the Gentiles under the Messiah's reign… It was no hidden mystery that both Jews and Gentiles would be blessed under Him and by Him when the Seed came — the One to whom the promises were made. But something else had been hidden in God from all past ages and generations. The Gentiles would be fellow heirs and of the same body. Believing Jews and believing Gentiles would be joined into one, in perfect equality with each other, both alike becoming the body of Christ.
Another writer weighs the words. "Fellow heirs" on its own could have left a ranking in place.
Here again we are told that the Gentiles were not only "fellow heirs" — a term that might still leave class distinctions in place — but of the "same body." So the "unity of the Spirit" is completely unique. No one knew of it or prophesied about it before.
The heirship here is not the earthly inheritance promised through Abraham. It is the inheritance Christ Himself holds.
The inheritance spoken of here is not the one promised to Abraham. In that earthly inheritance Israel will hold the first place, and the Gentiles will come into blessing on that ground… Here we have the great inheritance that Christ is the heir of. By the grace of God we are joint heirs with Him in it… To share God's inheritance with God's own Son certainly goes beyond the highest thought any person could reach.
Jew and Gentile are not joined to each other first. Every link between them runs through Christ.
They were made "fellow heirs" with each other by being made fellow heirs with Christ. In the same way, they were made "of the same body" with each other by being made members of the body of Christ. That is how the Gentiles became "partakers of God's promise in Christ by the gospel."
Some read the verse as Gentiles being let into Israel's privileges. One writer rejects that, and rejects the reverse too.
The Gentile is not raised to the Jewish level on earth. Nor is the Jew brought down to the Gentile level. Both are taken off their old standing and raised to a level immeasurably higher. They are united to one another on completely new ground — heavenly ground in Christ. The gospel brings all this about, and it speaks to both on one common level of guilt and utter ruin.
This levelling had a practical edge. Gentile believers did not receive their place from Jewish teachers.
The Gentiles did not come into this under Jewish control or by Jewish teaching. They stand in an equal status with them — not, of course, in Judaism, but in Christianity. That is why chapter two speaks of the dividing wall being broken down and both being reconciled in one body. All that the Jews were as a nation has gone in the cross of Christ.
The long silence before this was no accident. One writer shows why it had to be that way.
So we have the clear and repeated statement about the mystery of the church. It could not exist while the Jews were a separate people, and had to stay that way. It was not even revealed. To announce that there was no difference between the Jew and the Greek would have overturned the whole structure at its base.
- Joint. One word runs through all three terms — joint-heirs, a joint-body, joint-partakers. That repetition carries the whole verse.
- Hidden. The secret had to stay hidden while Israel stood apart. Announcing "no difference" would have pulled that whole order down.
- New. Blessing for the nations was already prophesied. Being in the same body was not. That is the part no one had heard.
- Higher. Neither side moves onto the other's ground. The gospel lifts both off their old standing onto heavenly ground in Christ.
- Through Christ. Believers are fellow heirs and one body with each other only because they belong to Christ first.
of which I am become minister according to the gift of the grace of God given to me, according to the working of his power.
Paul has just described the mystery — the secret God kept hidden and has now revealed. Here he turns from the message to the messenger: how does a man come to hold such a trust?
Paul's word for himself is "minister." One writer compares how churches use that word:
In Episcopalian churches, a "deacon" is a clergyman of the lowest rank. Baptists have "deacons" who are not "in the ministry" at all. But the Apostle Paul calls himself a deacon (minister), and he ties that word to the very highest form of service. That service is making known the "mystery," hidden so long, but now revealed (Eph. 3:7).
Paul was made a minister "of this gospel." One writer shows how far that commission reached:
The administration of the grace of God that the Apostle speaks of covers his whole mission. In verse 7 he gives the details of the mystery. Then he speaks of this same grace in relation to the gospel in verse 8... His double ministry, of the gospel and of the mystery, came to him in divine grace, according to the working of the power of God. It worked in him powerfully, so that he could carry out the service given him to do.
Paul rules natural ability out as the source of his ministry. One writer ties the "power" in this verse back to the power described earlier in the letter:
How fitting that the chief messenger of this was himself Jewish, one who had to be laid hold of by God in a compelling way. Paul is emphatically "minister" (not simply a minister) of these great truths, not by natural ability, but by the gift of the grace of God. This gift required the effective working of God's power — the same power spoken of in chapter 1:19 in connection with the resurrection of Christ.
The working of His power was not only the force behind Paul's preaching. It first did something to Paul himself:
The apostle Paul had "become a ministering servant of the gospel ... according to the working (inworking) of God's power." God had revealed His Son in Paul, so that Paul might preach Jesus the Son of God among the Gentiles. God, who put Christ on his lips, was the One who had first put Christ into his heart.
What is this mystery, and why does handling it need power? The same writer explains, and then shows what Paul was to do with it:
What is meant by the term mystery? It is what was hidden in God. It is something we can only know when God graciously reveals it and gives certain ones power to understand it... In verse 7 the apostle tells us he was the minister of this by "the effectual working of His power". He did not have the truth of this mystery merely as a scholar, to store it up in his heart. It was something the saints were meant to know, and he had been formed as a vessel to minister it.
What was true for an apostle is true for anyone who wants to pass on what he has learned. Every stage needs grace and power:
The Apostle was made the minister of this great truth. He now tells us that carrying out such a ministry needs the grace of God and the power of God. If in our little measure we are to pass on these great truths ministered by the Apostle, we shall surely need divine grace and divine power... Nature could never discover the truth of the mystery. When God reveals it, nature cannot grasp it. And when we do grasp it, mere natural ability is not enough to minister it. The grace of God reveals the mystery. Only the Spirit's work in us lets us grasp the truth revealed. And only the grace of God enables us to minister it.
- Given, not earned. Paul is a minister of these truths "not by natural ability, but by the gift of the grace of God."
- Given inwardly first. The One who "put Christ on his lips" had first "put Christ into his heart." The power worked in the man before it worked through him.
- Given a servant's name. Paul takes the lowest word available for himself and attaches it to "the very highest form of service."
- Given to be handed on. He held the mystery not "as a scholar to store it up in his heart," but as a vessel formed to minister it.
- Given to us in measure. Nature cannot discover, grasp, or minister this truth. Anyone who passes it on "in our little measure" needs the same grace and the same power.
To me, less than the least of all saints, has this grace been given, to announce among the nations the glad tidings of the unsearchable riches of the Christ,
Paul has just been speaking of the mystery: truth God kept hidden and then made known. Here he says who received that message, and he describes himself in the lowest terms he ever used.
Paul calls himself "the very least of all the saints" — "less than the least of all saints" in older translations. That is not false modesty. It is what happens to a man when the size of the truth he handles dawns on him.
The apostle also tells us the effect that this great truth had upon himself. In the presence of the greatness of God's grace he sees that he is the chief of sinners (1 Timothy 1:15). In the presence of the immense view of blessing unfolded by the mystery, he feels that he is less than the least of all saints. The greater the glories that are opened to our sight, the smaller we become in our own eyes.
It is the lowest of three descriptions Paul gave of himself, and they run downward, not upward.
There are three statements in which he speaks of himself. Chief of sinners; not fit to be called an apostle; and, less than the least of all saints. He said all these things of himself. It seems that the further he progressed in these glorious things, the less he thought of himself. I do not know of anything more likely to humble us than a grasp of the glory of Christ.
Paul did not win this work. God gave it, and He gave it to a man who felt small.
The apostle who, above all others, entered into the greatness of the mystery is the one who can call himself less than the least of all saints. And the one who has some sense of his own littleness is the one to whom God gives grace to minister the truth.
"Unsearchable" does not mean unknowable. It means no one can reach the end of these riches. And there is a reason for that.
The unsearchable riches of Christ are riches whose depth we cannot fathom, so immense are they. The measure of these riches is the glory God will give to Christ, according to what He is and according to the worth of His work. All has been done by Christ and for Christ; all has been created by Him and for Him. Presenting Christ to the Gentiles, outside the limited revelation of the ancient prophets, brought out the riches of Christ as unsearchable.
But whose riches are they?
Read this expression, "the unsearchable riches of Christ," in its context. It refers not to all the wealth that is His own, but to all that is in Him for His saints. Take one item only: God "has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places." Can we trace those blessings out and master the whole subject? We can do no such thing. They are too big for our little grasp. They are unsearchable; and so too is all that we have in Christ. Yet though unsearchable they may be known by us, and so they were the subject of the apostle's ministry.
The word that struck Paul was not "riches" but "Gentiles" — the nations outside Israel.
Earlier in this chapter, Paul sets the unsearchable riches of Christ against all that God had revealed before. In all the Old Testament scriptures there had been nothing of the mystery as we get it here. There had been glimpses now and then, but nothing more. What strikes the apostle's mind is that he should preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ. It was outside all the promises.
Paul's preaching had two halves, and the second was as vast as the first.
Paul proclaimed not only the complete ruin of man, but the unsearchable riches of Christ. These riches are beyond all human calculation, and they carry blessings that have no limit. Could we search to the end of His riches, we should not reach the limit of the blessings that these riches bestow.
That wealth is still the preacher's theme, and it belongs to a Man now in glory.
All that Christ has is His beyond death — riches that cannot be tarnished and can never be lost. The glory of Solomon shone out in his riches. How much brighter is the glory of Christ shining out in His unsearchable riches — not in an earthly kingdom, but from the place He fills at God's right hand. This divine treasury enriches us, and the apostle had the privilege of preaching among the Gentiles Christ's unsearchable riches. It is the fame of Him who is greater than Solomon that Paul, and preachers today, tell to men.
- Smaller. The more Paul saw of Christ, the less he thought of himself.
- Given. He did not earn the work. God gives this grace to the man who knows he is small.
- Unsearchable. No one can reach the end of these riches. Their measure is the glory God will give to Christ.
- Ours. They are held in Christ for His people: too big to master, yet really known.
- Outward. Paul carried them to the nations, outside all the promises, and preachers today still have the same endless theme.
and to enlighten all [with the knowledge of] what is the administration of the mystery hidden throughout the ages in God, who has created all things,
Alongside preaching Christ, Paul had a second task: to bring into the open a secret God had kept to Himself since the world began. Commentators ask what its "plan" means, why God hid it in Himself and not in Scripture, and why the verse names Him as Creator.
Older translations use the word "fellowship" here. The ESV says "plan." Writers trace it back to the running of a household.
Second, God gave him the work of enlightening everyone about "the administration of the mystery." The word translated "administration" means "the law, or arrangement, of a house." It is the word our word "economy" comes from. At God's command the Gospel had gone out among the nations. It had brought "those who are of the nations" into the body of Christ and the house of God. That made an entirely new situation. A new "economy," or "house-law," or "administration," had to be set up.
So Paul's task was not only to state the secret but to show how it works out in practice.
He was not simply to enlighten everyone with the truth of the mystery, but with the knowledge of how it is administered. He was to show all people how God works out in time His counsel from eternity to eternity, by forming the Assembly on earth. So he was to bring out in public what had been hidden in God until then, from the beginning of the world.
The light here is for "everyone." That reach goes past the circle of believers.
Besides the side of the mystery that faces the saints, it also applies to all people without distinction — to those outside the Church. Anyone who preaches the gospel must preach Christ. But few understand the kind of grace that joins the soul to Christ as a member of His body, of His flesh and of His bones. This was a main part of Paul's work.
The secret was not buried in older writings, waiting to be decoded.
The passages I have just quoted from Romans 16 and Ephesians 3 prove, beyond all question, that the truth of the one body, made up of Jew and Gentile, was "hid in God" — not hid in Old Testament Scriptures, but hid in God. For certainly, whatever the Scriptures contain is no longer hidden but revealed.
This also shapes what "mystery" means here. It is not just something too deep for the mind to work out.
Notice that this is not called a mystery merely in the sense of something nature or reason could never have discovered on its own. All the revealed truths of the Gospel are mysteries in that sense. But this was a mystery "hid in God" — an unrevealed mystery.
Why did God keep it back so long? One answer ties the timing to Christ's own path.
Such a matter is worthy of the supreme majesty of Him who created all things by Jesus Christ. God held this revelation back until Christ had come, suffered, died, risen and returned to heaven. Only in this way could a Man in glory be Head of His body, the Church. Then He could use a weak, dependent vessel to declare this mystery, and so magnify the great glory of the revelation all the more.
The delay was not indecision on God's part.
The Church... was still no afterthought of His. From the beginning of the world it had been hid in God, who created all things. The One who planned the whole work of creation, and carried out His purpose by His divine power, had kept that wonderful secret hidden in His heart all along. The secret is tied closely to His glory and His counsels about His Son. God chose Paul out of all intelligent creatures to be the first to explain it.
Naming God as the maker of everything shows how large a place this secret holds.
To say it was hid in God would tell us only that it was His secret, told to no one else. But the verse links the secret with Him as Creator. That gives the impression that the church was to hold a very important place in that creation, and that God's full purpose in creation could not come to light until the secret was out.
One writer reads the verse as God's answer to why anything exists at all
If I were asked why God created the universe, I should point to this verse as the answer.
- Hidden — God kept the secret in Himself, not in earlier Scripture. Whatever Scripture contains is already revealed.
- Held back — it was no afterthought. God waited until Christ had died, risen and gone to glory, so that a Man in glory could be Head of His body.
- Handed over — God chose Paul to explain it first, and trusted him not only with the truth but with its house-law, the way it works out.
- Held out — the light is for "everyone," reaching beyond believers to those outside.
- Home — naming God as Creator ties the secret to the whole universe. Creation itself served the purpose God carried in His heart.
in order that now to the principalities and authorities in the heavenlies might be made known through the assembly the all-various wisdom of God,
God's design for the church has an audience in heaven. It raises three questions: what "manifold" wisdom means, who the rulers and authorities are, and why Paul says "now."
The word behind "manifold" appears nowhere else in the Bible. Its picture comes from art.
The word for all-variegated is used only this once in the Bible. It is polupoikilos. Picture a Greek looking at a magnificent painting, a masterpiece of brilliance and design, blending its colours in the most beautiful harmony. This is the word he would use for that varied and yet harmonious combination of colour, with its rich hues and delicate tints, so pleasing to his eye.
Heaven had watched God work long before this.
This mystery of the church was hidden in the depths of His counsels. Until then God had not revealed it, and the church did not yet exist. It is "now" that God makes His manifold wisdom known to the principalities and powers through the church. They had seen His patience, His power, His government. They had never seen a heavenly body of people on earth, united to His Son in heaven.
One writer lists what had to happen before any church could exist.
Creation was the most perfect expression of a Creator's wisdom. But in the forming of the church God displays His wisdom in every form. Before the church could be formed, God's glory had to be vindicated, man's need met, sin put away, death abolished, and the power of Satan broken. The barrier between Jew and Gentile had to come down. Heaven had to be opened, Christ seated as Man in the glory, the Holy Spirit sent to earth, and the gospel preached.
God chose to unveil this wisdom at the moment when everything looked lost.
God, as creator of all things, had shown His wisdom. But this wisdom was still to receive a far more wonderful display. He planned that display in His counsels from all eternity, and only now has He brought it to light. When all His earthly purposes seemed to fail, when Satan seemed to have won, God's manifold wisdom shows itself. It turns this apparent defeat into the crowning victory of His grace.
These watchers are the angels of God, and the lesson runs on earth now. That makes the way we live a serious matter.
Are we living so much in line with God's will for His church that He can point to us as a lesson to the angels of God? That, and nothing less, is God's intention. You certainly cannot escape the responsibility that comes with it by refusing to act on it! God will not wait until we reach heaven to show the heavenly hosts His manifold wisdom through the church. He is doing it now, on earth, while the members of the church are still being called.
Commentators differ over how far our failure belongs in this verse. One says the angels see God's wisdom even in the way God handles our failure.
If we look at the practical state of the church today, we may wonder how the holy angels can see it! But we must remember two things. First, they never die. Much failure is before their eyes today, but they also saw the church as God set it up, in the days of its first love before the failure began. Second, since the wisdom of God is "manifold," they see fresh sides of it in the way God deals with the failure we show, and carries out His purpose despite it.
Another writer says the verse is not about our record at all: "To bring the failure of the assemblies into these verses is to spoil the teaching here." (H J Vine)
The colours show wherever people who share nothing else become one.
There is no fellowship like it. It takes no notice of borders or languages, or of the colour of the skin... What but divine power could fuse people of different nations into one spirit and one mind? All distinctions of class and race disappear as they worship their common Lord. It is sad that divisions, sects and parties spoil this wonderful object lesson to the principalities and powers in the heavenly places.
- Hidden. God kept the church a secret in Himself. Angels had seen His patience, His power and His government, but never a heavenly body on earth joined to His Son in heaven.
- Costly. Sin had to be put away, death abolished, Satan's power broken and the Jew–Gentile barrier removed before one church could exist.
- Many-coloured. The word here appears just once in the Bible. It pictures a masterpiece of blended colour: wisdom shown in every direction at once.
- Watched. The audience sits in heaven. What they see is God turning Satan's apparent triumph at the cross into the crowning victory of His grace.
- Now. It is happening on earth today, not after we reach heaven. That is why divisions among believers spoil the very lesson the angels are reading.