Let's take our Bibles and turn to Ephesians chapter three. Ephesians chapter three, we're moving right along through this study. It actually is getting by me a little faster than what I expected, but I've thoroughly enjoyed walking these weeks with the Apostle Paul through this letter. And this morning we're gonna be reading from chapter three, verse one through verse 13. For this reason, I, Paul, the prisoner of Christ Jesus for you Gentiles, if indeed you have heard of the dispensation of the grace of God which was given to me for you, how that by revelation he made known to me the mystery, as I've briefly written already, by which, would you read, you may understand my knowledge in the mystery of Christ, which in other ages was not made known to the sons of men, as it has now been revealed by the Spirit to his holy apostles and prophets. that the Gentiles should be fellow heirs of the same body and partakers of his promise in Christ through the gospel, of which I became a minister according to the gift of the grace of God given to me by the effective working of his power. To me, who am less than the least of all the saints, this grace was given, that I should preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ. and to make all see what is the fellowship of the mystery, which from the beginning of the ages has been hidden in God who created all things through Jesus Christ, to the intent that now the manifold wisdom of God might be made known by the church to the principalities and powers in the heavenly places, according to the eternal purpose which he accomplished in Christ our Lord, in whom we have boldness and access with confidence through faith in him. Therefore, I ask that you do not lose heart at my tribulations for you, which is your glory. Now, as we pick up this part of the letter to the Ephesians, Paul has explained already the reconciliation of the Gentiles first to God in that Jesus made peace through the blood of his cross, that his death for sins extends not just to Jews only, but also to everyone else, to Gentiles. And he explains that reconciliation between the Gentiles and God and also makes the connection to with their inclusion with believing Jews in this one new body, the church. And we can you could go back and look at verse 11 through 22 in the previous chapter, where once you had this wall of separation, the law which separated Jew from Gentile, Now God has taken all who have believed in Christ, both Jew and Gentile, and they are now neither Jew nor Gentile, but one in Christ. We'll call ourselves now Christians, people who belong to God. And so after he covers this bit of information that we looked at last week, he comes here to the first part of chapter 3, and he actually begins to pray. And how do I know he begins to pray? Well, because of verse 14. In verse 1 there, he said, Christ Jesus for you Gentiles. And then it's like he gets distracted. Now, I don't know, just a quick survey of the room. Does anyone get distracted when you begin to pray? It's just me? Really? Y'all should have had breakfast before you came to church or something. live it up a little bit. Yeah. So I don't know. I think that's a more common problem than maybe you're willing to admit right now that you sit down and you start to pray and your mind goes off to something else. And it almost seems like that's what's happened with Paul because you get to verse 14 and he says the same thing again. He goes, Oh yeah, for this reason, I bow my knees to the father of our Lord Jesus Christ. So Paul here, thinking of this reconciliation of the Gentiles to God, the inclusion of the Gentiles with the Jews in this one new body in Christ, we call the church. He begins to pray, but then he steps back at his remembrance of his imprisonment for them and his ministry to them. And this isn't some mere digression that we can just throw aside, and it's not really all that important to what we're reading. But we recognize that every word of Scripture, whether Paul intended originally to write it or not, however it came to his mind, has been given to us by the work of the Holy Spirit. This is the Word of God, even what may look like a simple digression by the Apostle Paul. And so here he remembers that he's been imprisoned. He's in prison as he's writing, actually. He remembers his imprisonment for this ministry to the Ephesian Gentiles. And he steps back now in these verses to elaborate further on this, what he calls the mystery of Christ. The mystery of Christ. What is it that we need to know about the mystery of Christ? And I've broken up this section into four headings. So if you're a note taker, here's your four headings. Number one. The revelation of the mystery, the revelation of the mystery. He said there in verse two, he said, if indeed you have heard of the dispensation of the grace of God, which was given to me for you. The word dispensation there just means stewardship or an administration, this stewardship of this mystery. was something that Paul didn't take on by himself and just decide that he was going to be the minister to the Gentiles. It wasn't just a choice he made, but it was given to him by God. God intends to reveal His purposes for the Gentiles to the world, and He chose to do it through the Apostle Paul. And so he says, this stewardship has been given to me for you. Verse 3, how that by revelation He made known to me the mystery. This is something that's been revealed to Paul by the Holy Spirit. Whenever Paul was recounting his conversion back in Acts 22, he gave all the main details like he does in every instance that he talks about his his conversion, how he was on his way to Damascus to to he had papers to arrest the Christians and to bring them back to Jerusalem to be tried and probably even killed. Yet while he was on his way, this bright light appears before him. He falls off his animal and Jesus speaks to him out of this light and says, Saul, why are you persecuting me? And what does he say? Who are you, Lord? So they answer his own question there. Who are you, Lord? And in that moment, Jesus revealed himself to Paul as the Messiah, as the head of the church. And Paul was converted. He was saved there on the road to Damascus. But then in Acts 22, when he's recalling this, he goes back to Jerusalem and Jesus says to him there, depart, for I will send you far from here to the Gentiles. This was a ministry that was given to Paul by Jesus after his conversion. He wrote to the Romans, he said, Nevertheless, brethren, I've written more boldly to you on some points as reminding you because of the grace given to me by God, that I might be a minister of Jesus Christ to the Gentiles, ministering the gospel of God, that the offering of the Gentiles might be acceptable, sanctified by the Holy Spirit. So this is a ministry, this is an administration that God has given to Paul to preach. And he refers to this mystery as revelation that was not previously known. This was something that was revealed to him by the Holy Spirit. And it was revealed now in these days, as he says in verse 5, to the apostles and the prophets. There in verse 5 he says, which in other ages was not made known to the sons of men. Now, if you go read your Old Testament, there's clear pointers to the fact that God's work goes beyond the Jews, that God intends to expand knowledge of him and even the blessings of Abraham to the ends of the earth. But as far as the inclusion of the Gentiles with the Jews into one body in the church, that was a mystery. That's something that was not revealed in any time past, but came to the apostle Paul and to the other apostles and prophets here in the New Testament time. And that's what Paul's saying here. So this was a revelation not previously known. It was revealed by the spirit to his holy apostles and prophets. So the first thing is the revelation of the mystery. But the second thing is the content of the mystery. the content of the mystery. And I'm glad he gets right to the point there in verse six. He says that they're fellow heirs. Verse six, that the Gentiles should be fellow heirs of the same body and partakers of his promise in Christ through the gospel. That's kind of a mouthful, sort of rapid fire, you know, one right after the other. But you think about each one, that now Gentiles in Christ are fellow heirs. That is to say that you have an equal right to God's inheritance as any Jew that ever believed in him. You, sitting here in Simmons Grove Baptist Church in Pilot Mountain, North Carolina in 2023, have an equal right to the inheritance of God as any Jew that ever received his promise and had a relationship with him in time past. I'm glad one person said amen. Thanks, Lance. This is the blessing that we have. But he says, you are fellow heirs and you are of the same body. And that's taking things a step further, and that'd be a step too far for some. That not only do we receive the benefits and the blessings of God as an outside group of people, but no, we've received the benefits and the blessings of God in Christ because we are now of the same body. There is no longer, as we considered last week, there is no wall of separation. Remember in the temple, there literally was a wall that Gentiles could not walk past. The Jews could go in, but the Gentiles could come this far and no further. But now we're not even just able to go in with them, but we are of the same body and we come together into the presence of God and receive His blessings. There is no more distinction between Jew and Gentile. There's no distinction at all, actually, between any people who are in Christ. And sometimes it's hard for us to wrap our minds around this, but Paul told the Galatians, there is neither Jew nor Greek, there's no more slave or free, there's no male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. That doesn't mean we don't live with real distinctions in the world, it just means that in Christ we're all equal. Where the Jews felt that they were near God and the Gentiles were far away, Paul says, no, there's no more Jew or Gentile, you're just Christians. where some who were free and others were slaves, they might have been tempted to believe that we are closer to God and we have more of His blessing because we're free and you don't have quite as much because you're a slave. And Paul says, no, there's no more slave or free in the family of God. And we're in a society that Paul lived in where men outranked women and women didn't really have any say in anything. Paul comes along and says, no, there's no more male and female in the family of God. We are all level. We're equal. We have the same access to God through Jesus Christ because we're of the same body, of the same family. We're partakers of God's promise, he says. Particularly the promise of the new covenant. And we talked last week about how that promise was given to Jews. And outside of Christ, we have no claim to it. That promise in Ezekiel 36, that I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you. I will take out your heart of stone and flesh and give you a heart of flesh. I will put my spirit within you and cause you to walk in my statutes. You'll keep my judgments and do them. That's a promise that God gave to Israel. But now because of Christ, we have been made partakers of that promise. We experience the same thing any believing Jew experiences in the spiritual sense that God removes that heart of stone. He takes that old nature and he gives us a new heart, makes us a new creation in Christ Jesus. He gives us his spirit. He helps us to walk in his statutes and to keep his rules. That's a blessing. We are partakers of God's promise. But I want to be clear about a couple things here. We are partakers of His promise only, the next two words, in Christ. Paul's going to hammer this nail through this whole letter. These things are only possible in Christ. 2 Corinthians 1.20, for all the promises of God in him, that is in Christ, are yes and amen. to the glory of God through us. Jesus said this in John 14. He said, I am the way, the truth, the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. That's exclusive. That's discriminating. That's passing judgment on people who believe other things. You're just going to have to come to terms with it because Jesus said he is the only way. And it's unloving to pretend that anything else is true. Friend, wherever you are, whatever you believe, I want to be very clear about this. You can only receive these promises. You can only receive these blessings. You can only be brought into the family of God in Christ, in Jesus Christ, through him alone, his death and resurrection in your behalf. And he says that we're made partakers of the promise in Christ through the gospel, through that good news. This comes to us through the gospel. What did Paul say about the gospel? He said, I'm not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God unto salvation. To whom? To everyone who believes. To the Jew first. Yeah, they got the message first. He says, but also to the Greek. And I'll just add, to the American. to anyone who ever hears that good news, that Jesus did die for your sins, that he rose from the dead, that he took the punishment that you deserve on himself so that you could be forgiven and be given life in him. And all that you need to do is lay hold of it by faith, to turn away from your sins, to turn away from your efforts to save yourself or to do good enough to please God and just say, Jesus, I'm trusting in you alone. That's it. That's the only way we become partakers of this promise and be brought into the family of God. There's necessity here. There's necessity here for personal faith. It doesn't matter who you know that's a Christian. It doesn't matter whether your grandpa was a preacher. It doesn't matter what your family history is in relation to the church. It doesn't matter what service you've done to the church or how much money you've given to missions. Friends, listen, unless you've put your faith in Jesus Christ and been born again, Jesus said, unless a man is born again, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. So my question to you isn't what have you done? Who are you? Who do you belong to? What's your history? My question is only this. Have you been born again? There's necessity there for personal faith in Jesus. And this promise is available to you just as it is to everyone else. The third thing is this, the ministry of the mystery, the revelation of the mystery, the content of the mystery, the ministry of the mystery. It was a gift given by grace and by power. He says there in verse seven, of which I became a minister. according to the gift of the grace of God given to me by the effective working of his power. And he says, I became a minister there. It's a passive indicative form of the verb genomite, which simply means I was made a minister. It's a passive verb. It's not something that, again, Paul just decided one day, you know what, I think I'm gonna go into the ministry. I'm gonna preach the gospel of Jesus. No, but he says, I was made a minister, not his doing, but God's. And any true minister, anyone who really does the work of God, isn't one who just up and decides one day that they're gonna do it. But if you'll do anything for God, you're gonna do what God has made you to do. You're gonna do the ministry that God has made you for. And he considered this gift of his ministry, a grace. He said, I received it of the grace of God. Now you'll talk to some pastors who talk about the ministry and grace is the last thing that you would use to describe how they talk about it. I know a lot of pastors, so I hear all the complaints, right? I love our church. I don't have too many complaints. But this is a gift of grace. This is a privilege that we have in any ministry that God gives you to do. It is a gift of God's grace. To be able to do anything for God is a gift. a gift of his grace. It's not a burden. It's a grace. It was given, he says, by the effective working of his power. It's only God's power that can make you a minister. And listen, it's only God's power that can accomplish the ministry through you. We've talked plenty of times before that analogy that Jesus gives of the branches and the vine, how that if we abide in him, we will bear much fruit. You as a branch cannot go out on your own and accomplish anything. But if you abide in the vine, that source of strength, He can produce much through you. He became a minister by the effective working of God's power. It was a humbling ministry. There in verse 8, he says, to me who am less than the least of all the saints. Less than the least. That doesn't make a lot of sense, does it? Because less is comparative, right? You can take a couple of things and you can say this is less than this. But if you say least, that sort of rules everything else out. There's nothing less than least. But here Paul comes along and he says, I'm not just the least, I'm leaster. Paul, you're making stuff up now. Come on. He says, I'm less than the least. This is how he saw himself. He recognized who he was before he knew Christ. He was a Christian killer. And now here he is preaching the Christ that they preached. knowing who He is, knowing where God's brought Him from. He says, I'm less than the least. And listen, He doesn't just say, I'm less than the least of the apostles. I mean, He could look around at Peter and James and John and all these guys doing all this ministry across the world and say, man, I'm less than the least of all the apostles. And that would have been understandable. Paul, I get that. Me too. No, Paul says, I'm not less than the least of the apostles. He says, I am less of the least of the saints. Who are the saints? You, everybody, every Christian, everybody who's ever put their faith in Jesus, that's who he's talking about when he says saints. So if Paul walked into this room today and sat down in the pew, I said, Paul, come up here and say a little something. You know what he might say? He'd say, no, I don't think so. I'm less than the least of all of you. You imagine the, that's Paul. He's the missionary, church planter. He says, I'm less than the least of all the saints. If you've got a right view of ministry, you're going to be humble. If you approach the ministry and you approach anything that God has gifted you to do, and you say, man, God's lucky to have me on his team. Man, God got a good one when he got me. You have got the wrong idea. Paul was humble. He recognized the ministry that God had given him. And he said, I'm less than the least of all the saints. It's a humbling ministry. It's a ministry of proclamation. Look there again in verse eight, he says, this grace was given that I should preach among the Gentiles, the unsearchable riches of Christ and to make all see what is the fellowship of the mystery, which from the beginning of the ages has been hidden in God who created all things through Jesus Christ. Paul says, God didn't just give me this revelation of what He had done in the Gentiles. He didn't just give me this revelation of the mystery of Christ in the gospel so that I could enjoy it and ride along till I get to heaven. No, God revealed to Paul what He revealed to Paul so He could preach it, so He could tell it to others. Friends, you've been reconciled to God, not just so you can enjoy your reconciliation and coast on to glory, but you were reconciled to God so that you could be given the ministry of reconciliation and preach to others. You be reconciled to God. You don't have to stand up here and open a Bible and wear a suit coat and say, this morning in the Word of God, we're going to turn to such and such. No, friends, as you go, as you live your daily life, as you interact with other people, God reconciled you to himself so that you could go out and lead others themselves to be reconciled to God. One pastor said, and I just quoted it this morning at Sunday school, and I've said it to you before, the gospel came to you on its way to someone else. He didn't save you just for you. He saved you to use you to save others. It's a ministry of proclamation. And then the fourth thing is the purpose of the mystery. The purpose of the mystery. To the intent, verse 10, it's a pretty clear transition. To the intent that now the manifold wisdom of God might be made known. It's God's purpose in this mystery of Christ to reveal God's manifold wisdom. Manifold just means it's multifaceted, variegated, wisdom on every side. God has revealed this mystery and given Paul and us the ministry of this mystery so that God's wisdom can be put on display. You see, the wisdom of God can never fully be comprehended by His creation, can it? If God was a God that we could understand completely, entirely in our own minds, He wouldn't be much of a God. He's much bigger than us, much wiser than us, much more complex than us. Yet He has revealed to us what we need to know about Him. And it's through the revelation of this mystery that Paul preaches that he is putting his wisdom on display. That's what God is doing when we proclaim the gospel. He says he's made known his wisdom by the church. Hey, that's us. God has chosen to use the church as his arena or his stage to display his wisdom. That's what we're here for, is to put God on display. And he says he's done it by the church, to whom? Who's he showing off to at this point? He says, the principalities and powers in the heavenly places. That's just some old language to say heavenly beings, or we'd use the word maybe angels. That's kind of odd to think about. that God uses the church as a stage to put his wisdom on display for the viewing of heavenly beings. They observe God's work among his people. Luke 15 says, likewise, I say to you, there is joy in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents. So obviously they see what's going on in the church. 1 Peter 1 12, Peter was talking about these things going on in the church, things which angels desire to look into, he says. Now, we may not understand all of that, it may not be something that we'll entirely grasp in this world, but part of God's purpose, part of God's purpose in the mystery of Christ is that he might teach something of his wisdom to the angels. He's done it to accomplish His eternal purposes, verse 11. He says, according to the eternal purpose which He accomplished in Christ Jesus, our Lord. So God has put His wisdom on display to accomplish all that He intended to do from before the creation of the world. You want to hear something really encouraging? You're not going to mess up God's big plan. That's encouraging to me because I know that I'm imperfect. I know that I'm weak and that I'm frail and I'm just a lousy human being sometimes. But it's good to know that God uses weak people to display his strength. He uses the foolish to make known his wisdom. He will accomplish his eternal purposes. God isn't going to go along for all that human history has gone on and then come along one day and say, man, Jacob just messed it up. We're going to blow the world up and start all over. Here's the Garden of Eden, volume two. We're not going to mess it up. God has eternal purposes that he's going to accomplish. That ought to encourage you to get on board with his plan, not to shy away. God's ultimate purpose is his glory. He says that according to the eternal purpose, which he accomplished in Christ Jesus, our Lord, in whom we have boldness and access with confidence through faith in him. Therefore, I ask that you do not lose heart of my tribulations for you, which is your glory. We glorify him in our salvation, in our redemption, and then the angels see his wisdom in that and they glorify him too. Everywhere you look, God is going to get glory because that's His purpose. He did it to provide boldness and access through faith in Christ. He said just that in verse 12, in whom we have boldness and access with confidence through faith in Him. We can come freely to this God who reveals mysteries. We have this privilege of prayer. And I asked you last week, and I'll ask it again. Do you make use of this privilege? Do you spend time with this God who allows you, who leaves His door open, that you may come to Him and pray? Pray alone, daily, get up early, spend time with God before you lay eyes on anybody else. Get your Bible, see what He has to say to you, and then you turn around and you talk to Him. commune with your maker, have fellowship with him, friendship with your God. Do you think of your relationship with God like that as a friendship? That's what he's designed you for. And I'll just add this in here. It's not just so that we can have a private relationship with him in our bedroom at 5 a.m. But that we as a corporate body may be able to gather together and voice our prayers together to him. We have a prayer meeting on Wednesday night, and I just want to say I am so incredibly thankful for those of you who faithfully come with your heart prepared to pray. But friends, if we really valued what prayer is, if we really understood the power that God has given through prayer, this place would be full every time. The fool is said in his heart, there is no God. The fool is the one who lives as if he doesn't exist. And we go our own way, living in our own strength. But the wise, he says in that same Psalm, is the one who seeks him. It is wisdom to seek after God. We have been given boldness and access with confidence through faith in Him. Friends, we can come to Him boldly, we can come to Him confidently, but that confidence isn't in ourself. Our confidence in coming before God is that we are dressed now in the righteousness of the Lord Jesus Christ. that He has opened the door, He has made the way. No, we and ourselves couldn't come because we're sinful, but we now, if we've been born again, are dressed in His righteousness and we can come confidently knowing that we will never be turned away when we come into His presence to pray. These are the blessings you have in Christ, friends. I just want you to lay hold of them, live in them and enjoy them. Then he wraps up this section in verse 13 with a therefore. Here's the conclusion of it all. It's sort of an interesting way to do this. He says, therefore, I ask that you do not lose heart at my tribulations for you, which is your glory. He's given all this sort of as an aside and elaboration on this, these benefits that God has given to the Gentiles and including them in his family and making them one with Jews in Christ. And he concludes that by saying, don't lose heart at my tribulations. And I think Paul is making this point in this in this section here, that the ministry of Christ's mystery is worth any cost. The ministry of Christ's mystery is worth any cost. He's imprisoned because of this ministry. Yet in verse one there, he said he was the prisoner of whom? Of Christ Jesus. Now, Paul was quite literally a prisoner of Rome. He could have he could have said, I, Paul, the prisoner of Caesar for you Gentiles, and that would have been true because he's in a Roman prison. They were very nice. But when Paul considered his imprisonment, he didn't see himself as a prisoner of Rome. He didn't see himself as a prisoner of Caesar, but he looked at his condition. He says, I'm a prisoner of Christ Jesus. I'm a slave to him. He's the one I owe everything to. Do you see yourself that way? We talk about being friends of God, children of God, all kinds of language like that. But do you see yourself as a prisoner of Christ? He said, I'm a prisoner of the Lord Jesus Christ. Then he encourages the Ephesians not to lose heart. He said, I ask that you do not lose heart at my tribulations for you. Yes, I'm in prison. Yes, I'm writing this to you from a stinking cell. There's a rat over here next to me while I'm writing. Don't lose heart. Why? Because the glory of the ministry outweighs every tribulation. He says, this is your glory. In 2 Corinthians 4, he said this, he says, but we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellence of the power may be of God and not of us. We are hard pressed on every side, yet not crushed. We're perplexed, but not in despair. We're persecuted, but not forsaken. Struck down, but not destroyed. always carrying about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our body. For we who live are always delivered to death for Jesus' sake, that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our mortal flesh. You see, we can celebrate the power of the resurrection that is at work in the church. But what had to come before the resurrection? the crucifixion. Before there can be resurrection power, there must be the fellowship of his sufferings. And friends, when we suffer in any form of ministry, if we are pressed down, as he says, on every side, suffering in the ministry always leads to glory. Don't lose hope. Do not despair when things get hard in the work of God, because that hardship, that tribulation leads to glory. And he said this to the Romans, he said, I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that shall be revealed in us. They're not worthy to be compared to the glory that shall be revealed in us. We make just three statements here as an application. One, God has given every Christian a place to minister. Find it and give your all to him there. Whatever your life circumstances are right now, whatever your circle of influence is, no matter what's going on in your life right now, God has given every Christian a place to minister. Where's yours? This is where prayer comes in handy. If you're not sure, pray about it. Ask the Lord to make it clear to you. Where is it, Lord, that you have for me to minister and serve? And when you see where it is, you go all in for him. So every Christian has a place to minister. Find it and give him your all there. Second, ministry that honors God and counts for eternity is always costly. So prepare yourself before things get hard. You see, if you wait until you're in the middle of trial, if you wait until you're in the middle of suffering to start cultivating your relationship with the Lord, it is so difficult. Now, God will come through. He'll make a way. He will draw you in. He's not going to turn you away. But let me tell you something, it is so much easier, and you'll make so much better, so many better decisions, if before you ever enter into a trial, you make up your mind, I know this is gonna be costly, but I know that he has my best interests at heart, and that he's gonna take care of me, and I'm gonna make it through, and there's glory on the other side. That's what he intends for us. So ministry that honors God and counts for eternity is always costly, but prepare yourself before things get hard. And then third, lastly, the glory always outweighs the cost, so press on with joy. The glory always outweighs the cost, so press on with joy. Friend, we can be sorrowful, yet always rejoicing when we are in Christ. We know that he's with us. He said, I will go with you all the way, even to the end of the world. The ministry of Christ's mystery is worth any cost. Now, I don't know where it is God wants you to serve, but I think we need to take time for prayer right now. Seek the Lord, ask him what he'd have you to do. And if it is that you've not been born again, that you're still dead and trespasses and sins, Confess those sins to him and ask him to save you because Jesus died for you. And I promise you, he will. Would you bow with me? Father, take your word. plant it like seed in our hearts, and produce your fruit in us. Ministry is often difficult. No matter what department you're in or what arena you work, Lord, ministry always includes suffering, but we have confidence in you that suffering always leads to glory. And we look forward to that day when suffering is no more, when we stand in your presence and bask in your glory for eternity. Show us clearly what you'd have us to do. If there are unbelievers among us, I pray that you would convince them of their sin and of judgment to come. May they come to you for mercy. I pray in Jesus name. Amen.