Ephesians 1:10 That in the dispensation of the fullness of times he might gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven… This was the mystery of God hid for ages, but now revealed. I. IT IMPLIES A PRIOR SEPARATION OF THE THINGS RE-COLLECTED OR REGATHERED TO GOD IS JESUS CHRIST AS CENTRE OR HEAD. Sin is the great divider. It separates man from God; it separates man from man; it causes a schism within man himself. Rebellion introduced disorder. There was a break of moral continuity between earth and heaven caused by the Fall. "Earth was morally severed from heaven and the worlds which retained their pristine integrity." The primary reference here may be to the separation or enmity which so long held apart the Jew and the Gentile, but it undoubtedly has a wider reference to the relations between heaven and earth which were so profoundly affected by the fall of man. II. THE OBJECTS OF THE REUNION. 1. Jews and Gentiles, so long apart, are now "made both one" through the blood of the cross. Men try in our day to bring about a union of humanity on a basis of moral rule, or of socialism, or of the creed of liberty, equality, and fraternity; but the cross is the only reconciler of man to man. It is only under Christianity that any approach has been made toward a juster view of human rights, and toward a more genuine interest in the welfare of individual men. 2. The whole Church of God in heaven and in earth is reunited in Christ. This includes the saints of all dispensations, who, whether they lived under the comparative twilight of the Jewish dispensation, or in the days of antichristian apostasy in our own dispensation, found their home at last in glory. There are those who imagine that the pre-Christian saints do not belong to the Church of God, because this Church, they affirm, first came into being on the day of Pentecost, and therefore they assign to the saints of Jewish times an inferior place of glory in heaven. The Church of God for which Christ died (Ephesians 5:2) must include the saints of all time. This is the Church which he hath purchased with his own blood, and, if the Old Testament saints are not in it, they are lost. There is no redemption apart from union with the person of the Redeemer; for the one sentence in the Corinthian Epistle covers the destinies of the whole human race: "As in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive" (1 Corinthians 15:22). And if we are Abraham's seed, we must have union with Christ; for "they that are of faith are blessed with faithful Abraham" (Galatians 3.). Those, therefore, who are to be gathered together in Christ must include the saints of every dispensation. 3. The angels of heaven are probably included among "the things of heaven." When we consider that Jesus Christ is Head of angels as well as men, that the angels are ministering spirits to the heirs of salvation, that they had a profound interest in the work of redemption, that the Church itself was to be the means of instructing them in the wonders of God's plan of salvation (Ephesians 3:10), that the angels themselves may have been confirmed in their holy steadfastness by the Son of God, that our Divine Redeemer continues to wear in the sight of angels the human nature he wore on earth, - it is no extravagant speculation that all the heavenly hosts are united under a new Head, and in a new bond in virtue of the grand transaction of Calvary. 4. There seems no just reason for believing that the passage sanctions the restoration of lost men and lost angels. The parallel passage in Colossians 1:20, which speaks of "things in heaven and things on earth" - that is, the redeemed saints of earth and heaven - seems to exclude such an interpretation. III. THE CENTER OF REUNION IS CHRIST. The re-collecting or regathering is twice-told as in him. An ancient prophetic voice spoke of him as the One to whom "shall the gathering of the people be" (Genesis 49:10). He is the Center of everything in the universe. He is the Center of nature, for not only were all things made by him, but in him they consist; he is the Center of providence, for he upholds all things by the word of his power; he is the Center of Christendom, just as he was the Center of the old theocracy; he is the Center of the Church invisible, for he is its Head and its Life; he is the Center of heaven, for it is the Lamb that is in the midst of the throne; he is the Center of the Godhead itself, Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. It is, therefore, in him that "all things in earth and all things in heaven" are re-collected or summed up, for the showing forth, with a luster before unknown, of the majesty and glory of God. "I in them, and thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one" (John 17:23). - T.C. Parallel Verses KJV: That in the dispensation of the fulness of times he might gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven, and which are on earth; even in him: |
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