Receiving The Revelation Of The Mystery Of Gods Grace

Everyone, please stand for Old Testament scripture reading.

We found in the book of Deuteronomy chapter 18.

I'll begin in verse 15.

The Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among you, from your brothers.

It is the hymn you shall listen.

Just as you desired the Lord your God at Horeb on the day of the assembly, when you said, let me

not hear again the voice of the Lord my God or see this great fire anymore lest I die.

And the Lord said to me, they are right in what they have spoken.

I will raise up for them a prophet like you from among their brothers.

And I will put my words in his mouth and he shall speak to them all that I command him.

The New Testament reading this morning is in the book of Galatians.

We'll be reading from chapter one, verse 11, all the way through to chapter two, verse 10.

If you'd like to read along, that's page 972 in your pew Bibles.

For I would have you know, brothers, that the gospel that was preached by me.

Is not man's gospel.

For I did not receive it from any man, nor was I taught it, but I received it through a

revelation of Jesus Christ.

For you have heard of my former life in Judaism, how I persecuted the church of God violently and

tried to destroy it.

And I was advancing in Judaism beyond many of my own age among my people.

So extremely zealous was I for the traditions of my fathers.

But when he who had set me apart before I was born and who called me by his grace was pleased to reveal his

son to me in order that I might preach him among the Gentiles, I did not immediately consult

with anyone, nor did I go to Jerusalem to those who were apostles before me, but I went away

into Arabia and returned again to Damascus.

Then after three years, I went up to Jerusalem to visit Cephas and remained with him

15 days.

But I saw none of the other apostles except James, the Lord's brother, and what I am writing to you before

God, I do not lie.

Then I went into the regions of Syria and Cilicia, and I was still unknown in

person to the churches of Judea that are in Christ.

They only were hearing it said, he who used to persecute us is now preaching the faith he once tried to

destroy.

And they glorify God because of me.

Then after 14 years, I went up again to Jerusalem with Barnabas, taking Titus along

with me.

I went up because of a revelation set before them, though privately before those who seemed

influential, the gospel that I proclaimed among the Gentiles in order to make sure I was not

running or had not run in vain.

But even Titus, who was with me, was not forced to be circumcised, though he was a Greek.

Yet because of false brothers secretly brought in who slipped in to spy out our freedom

that we have in Christ Jesus so that they might bring us into slavery, to them we did not yield in

submission even for a moment so that the truth of the gospel might be preserved for you.

And from those who seemed to be influential, what they were makes no difference to me, God shows no partiality,

to those, I say, who seemed influential added nothing to me.

On the contrary, when they saw that I had been entrusted with the gospel to the uncircumcised, just as

Peter had been entrusted with the gospel to the circumcised, for he who worked through Peter for his apostolic

ministry to the circumcised worked also through me for mine to the Gentiles.

And when James and Cephas and John, who seemed to be pillars, perceived the grace that was given to me,

they gave the right of hand of fellowship to Barnabas and to me, that we should go to

the Gentiles and they to the circumcised.

Only they asked us to remember the poor, the very thing that I was eager to do.

You may be seated.

Well, good morning.

Good morning.

It's wonderful to see such a large crowd and be able to sing, worship together, and open up God's word

together as well.

And with that being said, I do ask you to open up your Bibles to Ephesians 3, Ephesians

chapter 3, as we delight ourselves in God

and his word and his truth.

Ephesians chapter 3, verse 1.

I'll read for this section here to verse 13.

The apostle Paul writes, 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.

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.

This mystery is that the Gentiles are fellow heirs, members of the same body, and

partakers of the promise in Christ Jesus, and that's through the gospel.

And so of this gospel, I, Paul, was made a minister according to the gift of God's grace,

which was given to me by the working of his power.

To me, though I am the very least of all these 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, in whom

we have boldness and access with confidence through our faith in him.

So I ask you not to lose heart over what I'm suffering for you, since or for

which is your glory.

Let us pray.

Oh, Father in heaven, we are in need of your words.

Speak, oh Lord, to us.

And oh God, we need ears to hear.

We need a heart that receives.

Lord, we need so many things.

We truly are needy people.

We are sheep, Lord, that we need to be led to greater waters,

to our food, to enrichment.

Lord, we know that as sheep, we can be frightful over many things.

We can be distracted and go astray.

God in heaven, I pray that Jesus Christ would be held up before us this morning as our great

shepherd.

And me as an under shepherd, I would be faithful to proclaim his word to these people who need it,

to my own soul that needs it.

Oh God in heaven, I thank you for our neediness and I thank you that you meet us in our need.

And I trust you now that you'll do so.

Father, not because of anything in us, but because you are a God who does not change and you have promised and you'll do

it.

And so let us have our faith and confidence in this and approach you with boldness because of what Jesus has done for us

and is doing for us even today.

In Jesus' name, amen.

Well, John Calvin once said that our hearts are idol -making factories.

And I often say, I probably read it somewhere, that you will, or we,

lie to ourselves more than anyone else will ever lie to us.

We are very often deceived and we often go astray in our deception and believe things that are false, which

is why we need God's word.

We need his truth over and over again given to us.

Because the first time we hear it, we might just follow deception instead.

And so maybe the second, third, fourth, and thousandth time, we'll actually follow the truth.

Now we are truly people who oftentimes deceive ourselves.

We lie to ourselves.

And so I find it so good and helpful for us now.

This week, as we looked at what it means to how we are to view Christian suffering

and how we are to view it and how we are to respond to that suffering, I find it very helpful that

now we are seeing in verses one through six, Paul talk about what does it mean to suffer

for Christ?

Or what does that actually look like?

Because indeed, we could be suffering, but suffering in a way that's not rooted and stamped in Christ.

And here we see what it means to actually suffer.

As Paul was suffering for Christ.

If you remember last week, we talked about how we need to view our suffering, view suffering as Paul was viewing his

suffering in light of Jesus Christ.

It needs to be stamped by him.

And we looked at how we are to respond with Christian suffering.

And that is we are not to lose hope, as we saw in verse 13.

We are not to stop or we are not to not proceed forward, but

rather we are to not lose hope and proceed forward in glorifying Christ.

And we know oftentimes in our suffering, we'll want to stop.

But Paul tells us do not lose heart over his sufferings for Christ.

And so we learn that, but now we must solidify as Paul does in verses one through six, what does it mean to

actually suffer for Christ?

Or that Christ would put a stamp of his stamp on our suffering so that any suffering we

walk through, we can say this belongs to Jesus, since it's so vital as we walk this life that we would

suffer for Jesus.

How do we know when it's Christian suffering?

I think we get that here.

Because indeed, people suffer for various reasons all their life because of sin.

I was just thinking this morning of Muhammad, right?

That the false prophet Muhammad with his false religion, Islam, right?

He suffered, he got kicked out of Mecca and he had to go to Medina, he had to live in a cave.

He was suffering, but that certainly wasn't a suffering rooted in Jesus.

It was a false religion.

Or even think of someone like Hitler.

Hitler tried his best to take over Germany and he tried his best to take over Germany by force and he was thrown in prison

where he wrote Mein Kampf.

And he had to suffer in prison.

But indeed, it's not a suffering that is rooted in Christ by any measure, imagination.

So we gotta ask ourselves, of course we're not Muhammad, we're not Hitler, but is our suffering that we are

going through, is that stamped by Christ?

Is it for Christ, is it in Christ?

Whether it's explicitly for the gospel preaching as Paul was facing, or even in any

suffering that I face, am I going through that in Christ?

This is Christ's suffering now.

And what does that look like?

What is some flesh on that?

What does that look like in more particulars?

And I think we see that now in verses one or two through six that we'll go through this

morning, Lord willing.

And we'll see verses two through six, it is Christ's suffering, it is rooted in Christ when it's rooted

in God's revelation.

And we'll see what that looks like, hopefully.

When it's rooted in God's revelation, we know it is Christ -stamped approval suffering.

And we'll see next week, Lord willing, in verses seven through 13, and when that proclamation

of that revelation or when our suffering is because we are proclaiming that revelation that we've received, okay?

So rooted in Christ's suffering means that it's rooted in God's revelation and in the proclamation

of that revelation that we are all to do.

That's why I hope to see 2 ,000 feet up in the air what I hope to cover these next

two Lord's Days.

Now, so with that in mind, let's look at verse two.

He says, assuming, remember, he's cutting off his original sentence, which he's talking about suffering and he's talking

about doing it for the sake of Christ and the gospel and giving to the Gentiles, right?

He's talking about those things.

He says, don't lose heart.

But he cuts himself off and he says in verse two, he says, assuming that you have heard of

the stewardship of God's grace that was given to me for you Gentiles.

Now, just as a way aside, it's interesting that he says, assuming that you have heard, you see that, assuming

that you have heard.

What makes that an interesting thing here is that if you look at Acts, you look at Acts 19, you look at

Acts 20, that's when Paul was in Ephesus.

That's when he was with the Ephesians.

He's writing this to the Ephesians from prison in Rome.

And we see in Acts 19 and 20, we see him with the Ephesians and he wasn't there a short bit.

He was there for a couple years.

Acts 19, eight through 10 talks about he was there for a couple years with the

Christian believers in Ephesus as he proclaimed the gospel to the whole Asian region.

Now, when we think of Asia, it's not that huge continent that we think of now, it's just that little part of Turkey, the

west coast of Turkey there, which is that region.

So we see in Acts, we see that he spent a lot of time.

With the Ephesians.

He spent a couple years as he proclaimed the gospel there and also in all of Asia.

And we see in Acts 20, if you remember, he has a certain intimacy with the Ephesian elders.

Remember, he's not gonna see them anymore.

He knows he's going to Rome, he's gonna be in prison.

And you remember, he has that great speech or that great preaching to the Ephesian elders.

And there's a great intimacy there between him and the Ephesian elders in which they're weeping because he says, I will not

see you anymore.

And so there's an intimacy there.

They knew each other, they loved each other, they cared for one another.

And so it's very interesting to then see in verse two, assuming that you have heard of the stewardship of God's grace that

was given to me for you.

Oh my goodness, if he was with them for a couple years, I hope they would hear that.

I hope they would hear that he is an apostle and that he has a stewardship from God to dispense of the gospel.

I hope they would have heard that.

So it's kind of interesting that Paul would say, assuming that you heard of it.

Now, some people argue that perhaps now that he's writing this letter in prison in Rome, which would have

been several months, it would have been a while afterwards, I think a few years, that perhaps the church has

grown so much, perhaps there's so many new people in there.

He's saying, perhaps some of you new people don't know as far as you did a couple years ago when the church was in

its infancy, right?

So maybe that might be the case.

Or perhaps this letter here, another thought is this letter here, the

Ephesians, the letter to the Ephesians was actually a letter meant to be written to the region in general.

In fact, the Asian region.

That it wasn't just supposed to be read in Ephesus, it was supposed to be read in all that region.

And so maybe someone in that region didn't know him as well as Ephesus did.

And the reason why it's called Ephesians is because that was the main church in that region.

Could be it as well.

But ultimately, it's not, we don't need to lose too much sleep over it.

We don't need to spend too much time on that.

But, because the message is still the same.

He's still saying the same thing.

In which, if you notice, he says, assuming that you have heard, heard of what?

Of the stewardship of God's grace that was given to me for you.

And he's saying the same thing.

That we've been going over, right?

You remember Ephesians three, verse one?

He says, I, Paul, a prisoner of Christ Jesus on behalf of you, Gentiles.

Right, in verse 13, so I ask you not to lose heart over what I'm suffering in prison for you, which is

your glory.

And so, verse two, he's saying the same thing.

He says, I was given a stewardship of God's grace that was given to me for you.

But now, he's fleshing out what that imprisonment looks like.

He's replacing the word imprisonment, suffering with stewardship for God's grace for you.

So, now he's not saying, I'm in prison for you.

He's not saying anymore, I'm suffering for you.

But he's saying, I am given a stewardship of God's grace for you, which is leading him into

suffering and leading him into imprisonment.

Now, you can see, as we've been talking about, why he would say, don't lose heart.

Don't lose heart for my suffering, why?

Because as I'm looking at this prison cell, I'm looking at a gift God has given me to be a stewardship of his grace.

You see, he wasn't seeing explicitly the Roman cell around him, which the people who loved him would be

considering that, be like, he's suffering for our sake.

He's saying, I'm looking at God's gift of stewardship, stewarding the grace that he's given me for

the Gentiles.

He would have loved the Roman cell if that meant that he was given a stewardship.

Now, what is a stewardship?

What does it mean to, what is a steward, to understand this appropriately?

To be a steward of something is taking care of something for someone.

Maybe that's not as clear as I could make it, but to be a steward is to take care of something and it's not

your own, it's for someone else.

Again, I probably talk too much about chickens and coops and everything, but oh well, here we go again, in which I consider

it like I made a chicken coop, it was my funds, it was my money, I made it all myself, and then I'm not gonna

continue to do that work, I'm gonna give it to my children for them to be stewards of that coop, to clean it, to

collect the eggs, to do everything so I don't have to even look at it anymore or smell anything or whatever, it's theirs,

right?

So even though it's my coop, I made it, it's my funds and everything, I've given it to my children for them to

steward it, to take care of it, to take care of it and make sure it functions well.

So here, Paul is saying that I have been made a steward, he says in verse two,

that you have heard of the stewardship of God's grace

that was given to me for you.

See, Paul was saying he was made a steward of God's grace, right?

The thing that's not his that someone else's is grace, it's God's grace, and

God has chosen to make Paul a steward of that grace.

And we gotta understand how wondrous that is, how beautiful that is.

You can imagine Paul, fulfillment in life, saying that God has given me a stewardship to expend

his grace to the Gentile nations, right?

You gotta understand that God is rich in grace, he's rich in mercy, he

loves and he gives generously to all those who come to him, right?

It's the same kind of concept that we've been talking about that he says in Ephesians one, verse three,

blessed be God, the father of our Lord Jesus Christ who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing

in the heavenly places.

You see, it is God's nature to have so much blessings bound up into him that he loves to give

to people.

He loves to give generously all these blessings and it is as we are his creatures,

it is us to long for it, to desire it, to grab hold of the blessings he gives us.

When we say although we have fallen in sin, God still generously gives of his grace, he gives of the blessing, the

spiritual blessings, and it's by grace, unmerited favor, we don't deserve it yet freely shown and given.

And Paul gets to be a steward of that.

He gets to dispense of that.

God says I'm going to use Paul to dispense of that grace.

And so again, as he's looking at that Roman cell, he's considering the fact what a treasure, what a

blessing, what a calling that God has chose me to dispense of his wondrous

blessings to the nations.

Far be it that I would ever bemoan or murmur or complain that it led me to prison.

I will celebrate the fact that I'm a steward of his grace is what Paul's saying.

So again, have your mind in that.

So do not lose heart in my suffering, he's saying.

This is my glory, this is your glory, this is Christ's glory, this is wondrous.

You know what's fascinating too is that we know that the richness, the beauty of God's

grace is driven, it's available, it's possible because of what Jesus Christ has done.

He's came in human, he took on human form as truly God and he lived righteously,

perfectly, right?

Where we are unrighteous and we have the death of sin weighed down on us, Jesus walked with

love and unity with his Father.

And yet he died anyways because he wanted to give of that blessing that he had to his

people.

But yeah, it's very fascinating that when Jesus died and rose again from the grave, thus sealing

that justification, sealing that forgiveness, he does it then say, and since you guys are dumb,

I'm gonna go ahead and dispense it myself.

I don't trust the church to do that.

But instead, what does he do?

He goes back to be with the Father, right?

And then he gives of his spirit to enliven the church for the task to be stewards of this grace

to the nations.

And so Paul, as an apostle, right, it goes to the apostles, it goes to the prophets as we'll get into, and then it goes to

all the church that we would be stewards of this grace that he's given to us.

So not only do we enjoy salvation ourselves, but we are then stewards of that grace to

others with the way that we live, with the words that we say.

And it's a great blessing to be stewards of this grace that God has entrusted to his

apostles, to his prophets, to the pastors, and to his bride, to us, beloved.

We are stewards.

Paul is stewards with this grace, of this grace for

Christ.

So again, Paul, seeing his prison cell, that's what he's seeing, that I have been entrusted

to steward or dispense of this amazing richness of his blessings to

the nations.

And again, this has implications for us indeed.

Truly, we're not apostles, but we certainly are the church.

And truly, we grab hold of the apostolic message that's found here, and we are stewards of

that to the nations, to the Gentiles.

And that just means to everyone.

There's never someone that you see that you say, well, he's probably, I can for sure know that he's not elect.

The whole point is that the gospel has gone to the nations, to everyone.

Everyone we encounter, we say that I am a steward of grace to show them the gospel.

And again, let's then attach that to suffering.

Not when I'm suffering.

When I'm suffering, I can complain and moan and be bitter, right?

And don't attach that to the glory of Christ at all.

That can just make that isolated, right?

No.

Indeed, and in our suffering, what do we want with it?

We want Christ to be glorified so that we can be stewards of his grace, even to those who see our suffering.

As we put stamp of Christ on it, as we say, and this is the gospel that although I was once in sin, now I'm in Christ,

and now I am a proclaimer of his excellency, even in my suffering, right?

This has implications for us, truly, as we look at this.

Now, again, though, we can flesh this out further because Paul fleshes it out further.

He's a steward of God's grace for the nations, for the Gentiles, for the

Ephesians, but what does that look like further?

And he answers that in verse three.

He says, how the mystery was made known to me by revelation, as I have written

briefly.

So we're getting on track.

How is that grace dispensed out?

How is it given out, right?

And we're seeing that it is, in verse three, it is by the mystery being made known via

revelation.

That's what he's saying.

So in other words, Paul didn't pick up a sword and say, I'm gonna start lobbing off heads like Muhammad the false prophet did in order to dispense

the kingdom of God, right?

This is a different entity.

This is a different thing.

This is true religion.

This is the fact that God's revelation has been revealed and now it's to be, we'll see,

declared.

Or today, perhaps today, the way that the grace is dispensed to all is that affirming people in

their own revelation, right?

Whatever they have revealed to be true about them, we just affirm them in it and we pat them on the back and we make

them feel good and therefore that is expending, that is giving God's grace, kindness, spiritual blessings to

them.

How many churches have fallen into that trap?

They want the world to define what it means to be loving to people.

They want the world to define what it means to give them what they need.

They want their own revelation to be confirmed in them and we just have to pat them on the back.

But notice that's not the way grace is dispensed, is it?

It's not the way it's dispensed in verse three.

It is dispensed by mystery being revealed, again, to the apostles, to the church and given to the nations.

It is God's revelation that needs to be revealed, not the revealing of personal revelation.

I was, we'll talk about it in the afternoon service, but it reminded me, we had at

the Ohio State University in Marion, we had, we were

around and where the people kind of come through and we had signs and just stood there to try to get in

conversation.

It was a great, it was a great afternoon.

We got in some really good conversations.

At first, it was just other Christians that needed to be discipled and everything, which that happens a lot.

But then after that first round, then it kind of got a little bit nastier and there's this one

professor that came out, this one young lady professor, and she saw the sign in which it

simulates, in some ways, of homosexuality being sin.

And she couldn't get over that this is their identity.

This is who they are.

This is who they, she didn't use this word, but this is who they revealed themselves to be.

How dare you say anything different or make them feel bad about it.

And this is the mindset of the world is that you do not question or doubt

or throw any shade on someone's personal revelation.

But here we see that to dispense of God's grace, we lovingly give his revelation, the mystery

revealed to the nations.

And that is an act of kindness, goodness, the spiritual blessings flow forth from that.

That is what we are to do.

So again, look at verse three.

How the mystery was made known to me by revelation.

So again, suffering needs to be rooted in God's revelation for it to be stamped by Christ.

Mystery is like God's secret of salvation.

You know, when we think of mystery, we think of anything that's unknown.

But when we see mystery in scripture, it always has to do with the unknown nature of God's salvation.

That's always mystery, it's always together with that thought.

It's God's salvation that is not known to us naturally.

It is, so mystery is God's secret of salvation.

And it's always made known to people by his special revelation, which is what Paul

says.

So mystery is the secret of salvation that he always chooses to make known by his revelation

or revealing it to us.

And the contrast of that is that Adam and Eve, when they sin, they didn't

need to be told, as we confess together, they didn't need to be told that they were sinners.

They didn't need a special revelation for them to feel their shame.

Now, special revelation will further their shame, it'll make their shame more acute and aware, they'll know

it, but they didn't need God's special revelation, his word declared specially, for them to feel the weight

of their sin.

They just knew it right away, right?

They knew it right away and they instinctively knew that they need to be covered because of their shame.

They didn't need any special revelation telling them that.

But they did, and we all need to hear God's special revelation to tell us how

exactly our sin can be covered.

We do not know just from looking at God's creation, of God's salvation that he's

doing in the world.

We know of our sin by nature, we know we're guilty.

Every one of us knows that the feeling of that shame, everyone that you talk to knows what it feels like to feel shame

in God's creation because the world itself cries out, you're guilty.

We don't need a special revelation with that.

But we do need a special revelation from God to tell us how to take care of that guilt in a way that he has

ordained.

We do need that special revelation, we do need that to be revealed because it is a mystery to us by

nature.

Excuse me, by nature.

And what's interesting about that mystery being revealed is it's a highly anticipating

revealing, isn't it?

As you consider your sin, as you consider the guilt and shame, it's highly anticipated that that mystery would be revealed,.

That I would know that more.

And the world itself, they don't know this, but they highly anticipated I need special revelation of how to take

care of my guilt and shame.

They might not know it in that way, but their depression, their sadness, their outburst of anger, their

depression, everything is a result of that shame they feel in which they are desiring, I need special

revelation to know how to take care of my greatest problem.

And so that, again, that special revelation, that mystery revealed is highly anticipated because

of the misery of sin, the natural revelation that we are guilty and have a guilty and

shameful conscience.

And Paul says that my suffering is rooted in knowing this blessed mystery.

You see that?

Paul's saying, again, in verse three, the mystery, this highly anticipated mystery in which the whole world needs to

know and understand and celebrate and worship.

This has been made known to me.

So in the back of your mind, hear it.

Paul's saying, do not lose heart.

Do not lose heart.

Yeah, sure, knowing this mystery and declaring it as we'll see, it's landed me in prison and I'm suffering

because of it.

But what a blessed reality it is that the mystery has been revealed, this great anticipated

mystery of salvation has been revealed to me and I get to declare it to the nations.

Oh, don't lose heart for a moment.

Don't lose heart for a moment for this prison cell is blessed as far as he is concerned.

Paul says, my suffering is rooted in knowing the mystery of the gospel that all men

need.

When you know the mystery, right?

When it's been revealed to you and you know what everyone, you know the longing of every heart, right?

You just wanna scream it out.

You wanna shout it out.

You wanna reveal it to people.

It's like watching a movie in which, as you're watching a movie, the viewer has been made known what the

needed remedy of the problem is, right?

Like those goofy chick flick movies, right?

It's always the same plot in which the man and the woman, they like each other, it's going

well and then all of a sudden something happens that's a mystery in which they both get wrong and they think, oh, you're the worst person in the

world.

I hate you now.

And then they go off their own ways and you just wanna scream at the TV.

It's not what you think it is, moron, right?

That's what you wanna say.

That's what it always is.

And then all of a sudden they figure it out and they say, oh, I do love you now.

And then that's it, that's the end, end credits.

But every movie has this kind of way that makes us anticipate things, right?

There's a mystery involved.

We don't know how it's gonna end.

We don't know always the solution, right?

But when we know it, when we see what the solution is, we wanna scream it out to the actors.

Hey, this is what you need to do, right?

And it's the same way, right?

There's a mystery involved that there's this highly anticipated problem, right, of sin and there's this mystery of

God's gonna take care of it, it's a mystery, and then he slowly reveals it.

And as we grab hold of that revelation, it excites us.

We're excited and we wanna declare it to the world.

This is what we need right here.

Again, what makes it all the more intense is it's a progressive revealing.

This mystery revealed, and Paul says as an apostle, it's been revealed to him, it's a progressive

revealing throughout the ages.

As the revealing progresses, so does the need for the revelation.

And what do I mean?

Let's look at verse four.

When you read this, he says, you can perceive my insight into this

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.

So what he's saying is that that mystery revealed, it was very faint in the sons of men in other

generations.

And think of the Old Testament, think of all the prophets of old, think of everything.

It was very faint, it was revealed.

He doesn't say it wasn't revealed, he says it wasn't revealed like it was then.

So it was revealed very faintly, but then it kind of grew in the Old Testament.

You could see that mystery being further revealed more and more, in which then Christ comes, and it's

like the sun bursting forth from the horizon finally in all its beauty and glory, because the mystery is

fully revealed and then given to the apostles in which it is completed in the scriptures.

And so as the mystery progresses in the Old Testament, so does our need for the mystery,

right?

If you notice in the Old Testament, we see both things being revealed, the mystery of Christ,

and we see the mystery of, or not so much the mystery, but the revealing, the full revealing of our sinful

wickedness.

And that's what you should be seeing in the Old Testament.

Man, we are bad.

It's worse than we thought in the garden.

It's even worse than that.

And so as the sin is fully revealed in the law of God and everything, so is the need for the mystery to be fully

revealed in grace, in which finally it comes forth in Jesus as like a great fresh breath of

fresh air.

I said that wrong.

But it's like, oh, finally, Jesus has come.

That's the whole point of the Old Testament.

It's supposed to make you anticipate, we need someone and we need someone now.

So when Jesus comes, it's like, ah, yes, here he is.

And that's why we see it all in the gospels at the beginning, right?

The baby Jesus being held and the prophet, the prophetess, they're saying, here he is.

We have him.

Because they fully see their sin and they see the mystery is now being fully revealed in this

baby, right?

And of course, then it's given to the apostles by Christ when he goes back to be with the father so that it's completed

in the scriptures that we have now.

Yeah.

We see it's a progression of the revelation.

Adam and Eve had a faint light of it after the fall.

Whenever they were told, they heard the cursing of the serpent saying that one will come from her

that will end what you have done.

And you know, you see after the flood, all the families were cursed but one family, right?

If you notice, it's like the sin problem is festering and growing worse.

And instead of all the families being blessed, all the families are now gonna be cursed in God's wrath in the flood.

But yet right after that, what are we told in Genesis 12, three with Abram?

What is he told?

All the families one day will be blessed by you.

So, you know, again, it wasn't that long ago when all the families except one was completely devastated in

God's wrath.

And then here we see Abram being told revelation, mystery being revealed that one day from you,

all the families are gonna be blessed.

The very opposite of what just happened, we'll see it reversed here.

And then we see again, Israel being forth, coming forth from Abraham

proved to be a stench to the world, right?

Again, the anticipation, the mystery, right?

All the families are gonna be blessed from Abraham, from his family.

But yet then we see what progresses is Israel, instead of being a blessing to the nations, they become a stench to the nations.

And the prophets in that badness,.

There's a better word,.

In that, you know, terribleness, there's a better word for it.

But in that the prophets say, you guys are terrible, but yet there's gonna be one who's gonna come from you that will make it good.

So you see how the anticipation of the need is growing, but also the mystery in Christ

being revealed is growing as well as in the prophets, especially look at Isaiah, that's a gospel right there.

You see that Christ is being revealed in greater degree in light of the failures of Israel.

And so we see it's a progression of the revealing of Christ fully anticipated because of our sin.

From the ashes of Israel's failures to be the blessing to the world, Christ would come and fulfill the longing

of every heart for that blessing.

Again, because I think it's that good, I'm gonna repeat it.

From the ashes of Israel's failures to be the blessing to the world, Christ would come and fulfill the

longing of the heart for that blessing.

And what's amazing about Jesus is what he does is then his apostles, have you noticed one thing about all of his apostles?

They're all Jews, they're all from Israel.

So despite the fact that they have failed completely as a whole, he's gonna come and renew Israel and from that renewed

Israel, he's gonna bless the world.

So again, this is the mystery revealed further, more and more until it finally bursts forth

at the seams at the Old Testament, the start of the new, and finally you realize with the work of Christ

and the work of the apostles.

This is the revelation completed, the mystery revealed completely.

And we see it was again in verse four, he says, it has been revealed to his holy apostles and prophets

by the Spirit.

That's why in Acts, who's the main player?

I can say that without sounding irreverent.

Who's the main player in Acts?

The Holy Spirit, right?

And what's the point of Acts?

The Acts of the apostles who have received the full revelation of the mystery.

So we see the whole work of the Holy Spirit is to enliven the apostles, enliven the apostle Paul,

enliven the people to fully reveal the mystery that has now came down because Jesus has completed

it.

And what is that mystery?

Well, look at verse six again.

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.

The blessings that come forth from Jesus has come to the Gentiles, it has come to the nations.

And Paul says, and I have been used as a, I've been chosen as a steward of that grace to the nations.

So indeed, I'm suffering.

Indeed, I'm in this Roman cell, but it's because I have been chosen to be a steward of this

grace, highly anticipated, highly a mystery, but now fully revealed and I got to dispense of

that at the start.

What a blessing that is.

The whole point is that it's such a blessing to be found in Christ and to share in giving of

his gospel that he will take the sufferings of a million lives to have such a beautiful

blessing given to him.

And notice, and we'll end here, what those last few words says in verse six.

It's that the mystery is that the Gentiles are fellow heirs, members of the same body, and partakers of the promise in Christ Jesus, what is it,

through the gospel.

So, in other words, is that it's not so much just that we, or he and I, we

receive the revelation, the mystery, in which we receive it, but then we then proclaim

it to the nations.

And that's the whole point of the gospel.

It's through the gospel or the giving of the good news.

So Paul says, I received the blessings.

I've received, oh, don't let me get my mind in a pretzel here.

He says, I have received, as a steward, I've received the stewardship of God to dispense his grace.

I've received a revelation, the mystery that is now revealed, and now I'm gonna give it, or I'm gonna proclaim it through

the gospel.

And that's what the gospel is.

It's the good news.

It's the good message that the revelation has been completed, and now you can come and know Jesus, and the

nations can come and know Jesus.

And so that's why we're gonna see, from verses two to six, to then seven

to 12, that not only does he receive the beautiful revelation, the mystery revealed, but he

also, through the gospel, proclaims this great mystery, this great revelation revealed to the

nations.

And it's in this way that he's received and proclaimed that he's suffering, but yet it's blessed because he's bringing the blessings

to the nations.

And so, recapping to make sure we can get our bearings, is your suffering rooted

in the revelation of God to then proclaim this revelation in the gospel to those who see you,

both in word and deed?

In other words, in your suffering, can you say that, yes, I am suffering with affliction, I'm suffering with something, but I

want that something, that suffering, to reveal the gospel to the nations?

That if someone sees anything in my suffering, if someone sees anything in what I'm going through, they'll see the gospel

proclaim the blessings to the nations, whether it's in my words or even in my actions.

How do you act that way in your suffering?

Where everyone else would act a certain way, you're acting this way, why?

And it's because you're proclaiming the gospel in your suffering.

We see this is exactly what was driving Paul, right?

Explicitly, he was preaching the gospel, and we'll see this next week especially, in which he was landed in suffering because

of it.

But it's no different for us as well, that we have the mystery revealed to us as the church.

And so now, when we go through anything in life, we are dominated with the thought of, I want the gospel to be revealed

in this.

Whatever it may be, I want it to be, I want Christ to be revealed, I want his message to be revealed, I want his gospel to be revealed,

so that the nations would come and know Christ.

See, it's interesting, he says to the Gentiles, right?

And we might think, well, you know, it's not about Jew, you know, we don't have an issue with Jew and Gentile anymore.

But really, what's being said here is that it's for everyone, the whole world,

every nation.

Whereas in the Old Testament, it was only for the Jews, in the New Testament, it's for the nations, it's for everyone.

And so this is our mindset, as we go through anything in life, is I want the gospel to preach in my suffering.

I want someone to see the gospel there, because anyone can come to know Jesus through my suffering.

So is your suffering rooted in the revelation of God, that is the giving forth of that revelation?

Are you attaching your life, everyday life, are you attaching it to the meaning that we are to

be so overwhelmed and excited for the gospel, for the revealing of this mystery

that everything I go through, it's stamped by that revealing, it's stamped by that gospel, I want it to be declared.

And again, as we are going through it in that way, as we're considering our whole lives in that, whatever area of life that we're in,

as we have it full of meaning, as Paul does, we don't look around and see a Roman cell, we look

around and we see that I've been given a stewardship of a grace to be dispensed to the nations, that

he would use even this suffering to do that very thing, makes this suffering worth it.

That if God gives us three measures of suffering, may we return with 20 measures of the

gospel of Christ with it.

May this be why we suffer, may this be the meaning why we suffer, it's because God has revealed himself.

His mystery has fully been revealed, and now we can show that to the nations, even in our

suffering that he has chosen to give us.

May that be the purpose that we have in our lives.

So let's pray.

Oh God in heaven, we thank you Lord for Jesus Christ.

We thank you for the apostles, we thank you for the church.

As we will get more in this book, we know Lord that this is the whole purpose of your church,

that you and your kindness, Jesus Christ, he

has done all the work for us, but yet he has gifted us with a stewardship to dispense this grace

in this already not yet time of our lives.

This time in which we await when Jesus returns and makes all things right

and ends sin forever.

But Lord, you and your sovereignty haven't ordained that yet.

Instead, we have this life to live.

I pray that we would look to Paul and we would see that what he saw his life was all about is

the revealing of this mystery to the nations.

And Lord, and likewise as the church of Christ, may we see that this mystery has been revealed,

has been entrusted to the church, to us, in which, oh may the world see Christ

in every facet of our lives, so that this mystery revealed, given

forth in the gospel, may be revealed in our own lives.

God in heaven, I know, I'm aware of my own life just how much we are deceived.

We wake up not with this purpose.

We wake up not with this purpose to be a gospel witness to our neighbor, to our

loved ones, to our family.

And our suffering, it becomes isolated of Christ.

It becomes its own entity.

And we don't understand any of it because of that.

But I pray, God, that you would, again, use this as a reminder, a much needed reminder, to bring all things under the

authority of Jesus Christ.

He is reigning on high and he is over all things.

So I pray that as his people, as his church, we would even put our own sufferings under his feet and

say, oh may the mystery be revealed even in this suffering.

Oh Lord, help us for we are weak, but in you we are made strong.

So we praise you for Jesus this morning.

In Jesus' name, amen.