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>> Scene number one: There are three parts you remember. The wisdom of God being manifest
to the powers and rulers and authorities, the demons and to Satan himself, the prince
of the power of the air. Number two, the riches, the unsearchable riches of the glory of Christ.
Verse 8. Third, the revelation of the mystery hidden for ages in God. Verse 9, now, my question
is, what’s the relationship between these three parts of scene one? How do they relate
to each other? The clue as to how they relate is found in the meaning of the mystery.
And I direct your attention now to verse 6 because in verse 6, we have the definition
of the mystery that has been secret for ages and now is being revealed. What is it? Verse
6, the mystery is that the Gentiles, that's most of us here, the nations, are now fellow
heirs, members of the same body, partakers of the promise in Christ Jesus through the
Gospel. The mystery is that the Gentiles, the nations, are now included in the promises
of God made to Israel. That is why verse 8 says Paul preaches to the Gentiles the unsearchable
riches of the Christ, the Messiah. This is stunning that now all the nations are included
in all the promises made to Israel. This is the mystery. All the promises of God made
in the Old Testament are now ‘yes’ in Christ Jesus, in Messiah Jesus. And everyone
who is connected to Jesus by faith alone is an heir of all the promises of God in the
Old Testament.
Now, the connection between that and the unsearchable riches of the Messiah is that that’s what
they inherit. The mystery is that all of the unsearchable riches of the Messiah and his
kingdom are now inherited not only by Christ-trusting Jews but by Christ-trusting pagan Gentiles
from every people and tongue and tribe and nation. That's the mystery and that's the
connection between the first two parts of the scene.
The unsearchable riches of the Messiah which we're all on tip-toe to fully receive and
the mystery are connected because the mystery is that the nations participate in the promises
made to Israel and those promises are summed up in the unsearchable riches of the Messiah.
Now, the question is, how does that connection, unsearchable riches participated in by all
the nations, relate to the manifestation of the wisdom of God to the devil? And the answer
is found in the last phrase of verse 6. Look at it with me. This mystery, this inclusion
of the nations in the unsearchable riches of the Messiah is -- notice the phrase, through
the Gospel. The nations are streaming in to the unsearchable riches of the Messiah through
the Gospel. What's that? The clearest, most concise definition of the Gospel that Paul
ever gave was found in verses 1 and 4 of First Corinthians 15. I'll just read it for you.
You know it.
“Now I would remind you of the Gospel, verse 4, that Christ died for our sins in accordance
with the scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance
with the scriptures.” So we Gentiles, we nations of the earth, are streaming in to
the unsearchable riches of the Messiah through Christ's dying for us. And being buried and
rising triumphant over sin and death and Satan and guilt and shame and hell. It happens through
the cross. Now my question is this. How does the cross relate to the wisdom of God displayed
to the devil and his messengers? And you know where I'm going. I'm going to First Corinthians
chapter 1, verse 22, for the relationship between the Gospel, the cross and the wisdom
of God displayed to the universe. It reads like this.
“Jews demand signs and Greeks seek wisdom. But we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling
block to Jews and folly to the Gentiles but to those who are called from both Jews and
the nations, the Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God.”
The crucifixion of the Messiah is not the wisdom of the world. It is not the power of
the world. To the world it is foolishness and it is weak. But to those who are called
whose eyes are open by the sovereign call of God, the cross is in reality, power and
divine wisdom. When the Messiah dies on the cross, he creates the church out of all the
nations of the world. And the world and the devil in this death and in this global creation
of a new humanity we see the wisdom of God in Christ but the amazing thing is in a little
phrase at the beginning of verse 10. We don't just see the wisdom of God in Christ, his
person and his work. We do. We do. That is where it shines most brightly. But what it
says at the beginning of verse 10 is this. So that through the church, the manifold wisdom
of God might now be made known to all those wicked powers.
This is breath taking. There isn't anything greater that can be said about this reality,
in this room called the church and all over the world, there isn't anything greater that
can be said about the global church of Jesus but that through the death of the Messiah,
God has created a people in whom he means for his infinite wisdom to be manifest to
the cosmic powers of evil. It is a stunning thought.
So scene number one, is the inclusion of the nations in the unsearchable riches of the
Messiah, through the Gospel of Christ crucified and that crucifixion is the wisdom of God
displayed and it is displayed through the church in the world. And one day, God hasten
the day, one day all the rulers and all the authorities and all the demons and Satan himself
as they are thrown in to the lake of fire will be forced to say, God is infinitely wise.
Now, before I turn to scene number two and three, we'll take them together in just a
moment. Before I do that, I want you to notice one more implication and I felt led to draw
this out. I rewrote this last night for us because I think there is a tension among us
that could be overcome if I get this right.
Why does it require the crucifixion of the Son of God in order for the Jewish people
and the nations to enter the unsearchable riches of Christ? Why that price? Now there
are different ways to answer that. I'm going to give you one crucial, indispensible way
and it's found in a little phrase in verse 3 of chapter 2 so if you'll drop your eyes
with me up, I'm going to read this verse and point out one phrase which is indispensible
in this Congress if we're to get the Gospel right and evangelism right and the wisdom
of God right. Verse 3 of chapter 2. “We all once lived among the sons of disobedience,
in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind and were”
-- here it comes – “by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind.” It's
terrifying. All human beings are children of wrath by nature. They didn't just decide
to be this way. It's their nature. My nature, your nature is sinful and corrupt and rebellious.
Christ did not have to die merely because I'm a sinner. He had to die because God in
his infinite holiness and justice is angry at the world. We are children of anger. We
are justly deserving of the wrath and the anger of God. This is the greatest problem
for mankind in the universe. There isn't anything that surpasses lostness and being bound for
an everlasting suffering under the wrath of God.
Now you can feel perhaps the tension. If God had not in love put Christ between his wrath
and us, so that Christ according to Galatians 3:13 become the curse for us, he became the
curse for us or according to Romans chapter 8, verse 3, he bore the condemnation for our
sin. It stuck on him. If God had not done that, all Jews and all nations would perish
forever under the just condemnation of God. And God did put Christ forward. He did offer
his own Son so that anyone everywhere who believes in him would not suffer eternally.
Now, here is a statement I want to venture. Please go with me here. I'm begging God that
you would be able to go with me here. There are two truths that are in tension in this
room and in the global church. There are many but I'm talking about two. One truth goes
like this. When the Gospel takes root in our souls, it impels us outward to the alleviation
of all unjust human suffering in this age. Yesterday was a loud thunder cloud of that
truth and it is true. And there's another truth, and the other truth is, when the Gospel
takes root in our souls, it awakens us to the horrible reality of eternal suffering
in hell under the wrath of a just and omnipotent God. And it impels us out to rescue the perishing.
We cry, “Flee the wrath to come. Flee the wrath to come.” That's our message because
Christ has died. He has absorbed the wrath of God. He has canceled sin. Everyone who
is united to him by faith alone is forgiven of their sins and counted righteous in Christ
and has eternal life. Come, o nations. Come to Christ. That's our message. It is the most
important news in the universe.
Here is my sentence I want to try on you. Some love the one truth preeminently. Others,
the other. What I want us to be able to say, could the Lausanne say, could the global church
say this: for Christ's sake we Christians care about all suffering, especially eternal
suffering. I don't want you to choose between these two truths. Christ doesn't want you
to choose between pouring your life out for the alleviation of unjust human suffering
now and the pouring out your life to rescue the perishing from everlasting suffering which
is 10 million times worse than anything anybody will ever experience here. I don't want to
you choose between those two. Christ is calling us to pull these together.
If there rises in your heart a resistance to the phrase ‘especially eternal suffering’
or if there rises in your heart or resistance to the phrase ‘we care about all suffering
now,’ if resistance rises to either one of those, either we have a defective view
of hell or a defective heart.
Now, I close just very briefly with a reference to scene number two and scene number three.
We spent almost all of our time on scene one. We'll just wrap it up with a brief look at
scene number two and three. Namely suffering and prayer. And it goes like this. God appoints
suffering and prayer as means of gathering the nations into the unsearchable riches of
the glory of God's wisdom. Suffering and prayer. Prison and prayer are appointed by God. When
Paul was willing to go to prison for the sake of Christ, he showed the nations that Christ
is more precious than freedom. When Paul was willing to suffer for Christ, he showed the
nations that Christ is more precious than comfort and security and prosperity. In other
words, the infinite value of the wisdom of God is revealed not in Paul's prosperity but
in Paul's pain, in his prison. That's where it shines because this is the wisdom of the
cross and we are called to take up our crosses and display to the demons that we treasure
Christ more than any human comfort. We're not after prosperity. We're after Christ.
And so our suffering then becomes the glory of the nations. They see the beauty and value
and glory of the unsearchable riches of Christ in our willingness to go to prison or to suffer
in order to draw them into it with us. That's the way God has made it to be.
Now, last comment. Nobody chooses to go to prison. Nobody chooses to walk away from prosperity.
Nobody can see the breadth and length and height and depth of the love of Christ so
fully, that they're willing to’ let goods and kindred go, this mortal life also.’
Nobody says with the apostle Paul, ‘I count everything as loss for the surpassing value
of knowing Christ our Lord.’ Nobody talks like that unless divine, supernatural, sovereign,
omnipotent power has broken into their lives and God has ordained that it come into our
lives through prayer.
So, unto you, o Lord, who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think
through the power that is at work in us, to you, o Lord, be glory in the church and in
Christ Jesus throughout all generations forever and ever. And all the people said Amen.