Him as Head, Eph, 1:22-23

Good morning. As I think of this Memorial Day weekend, and Bob mentioned his visit to the World War II Memorial, I was just thinking that the personal impact on my life, my dad through the events of World War II, he was in the military and some of the movings around there, he was raised in a non-Christian home. and had lots of interesting stories to tell, but didn't know the Lord. And the events of World War II were obviously momentous in our own country and throughout the world, but I think also of the spiritual impact. It was the shuffling around that put him in contact with my grandfather on my mom's side, and then he became a believer. So it was a spiritually momentous time as well.

Just before we go into the passage here this morning, just a reminder that we have the sign-ups for the electives that are starting in a week from, excuse me, a month from this next Sunday. And so take a look at those and consider them if you haven't signed up for them. Because of the fact that we have in some cases smaller rooms and people need to have sign up so that we can get materials in place. We'd ask that you take a look at that. Some early notice gives us a lot more to work with, so we appreciate that.

Now, as we get into this passage here, there's something very interesting that's going on. Paul is continuing his prayer there, and he's kind of worked beyond the prayer, but he's began the topic with verse 15, praying for the believers in Ephesus. And the ultimate point that he leaves them with there in verse 19 is, what is the surpassing greatness of his power toward us who believe? That's his parting thought there in the middle of verse 19. And then he launches from that place, from the middle of 19 into 21, talking about the character of that power at work in us, at work towards us.

Then as we step into this passage here, he's finishing off this section, and really, as we'll look at in a little bit here, he started off in verse 3, in chapter 1, saying, you've been blessed with every spiritual blessing. From there, his pen gushed. And finally, he's finishing off this first chapter, and he's laying out, here is kind of the capstone of the ways in which you've been blessed with every spiritual blessing. And he amazingly does it in the Greek in two sentences, from verse 3 to the end here, as we'll look at here in a little bit.

The first thing I'd like us to take a look at here is, imagine you're in Paul's place. He had a challenging task. Here he is writing to churches, and certainly they can all, you know, speak and understand Greek, but they've got a variety of cultural backgrounds. And I think that's something that is important for us to kind of get a grip on. There's a variety of cultural backgrounds. You have those who have a Greek cultural background.

There are also Jews. One of the points we brought up some weeks back is that about 250 years prior to this, 2,000 Jewish families were moved from the area around Babylon into the area around Ephesus and Colossae, that general area. And so a number of Jews were in the area. They were a substantial and influential minority.

There were also Romans who were in the area that had been brought in to kind of keep the Roman domination in the area. So there was Roman people. There were also other cultures that had filtered into the area because Ephesus was both a major port city as well as having roads connected to areas inland.

So there's all these cultures. Now, so what I want you to do here, if you think about this, is just imagine Paul's situation. He's trying to put together words and phrases and figures of speech and make reference to things that were meaningful to these people across all these different cultures. And that is a challenge. So he was willing to bring these things together.

If he, for example, wrote a letter that sounded just Jewish through and through, what do you think the non-Jews are going to think? They're going to think, well, he's not talking about me. If, on the other hand, he comes in and he uses purely Greek figures of speech, purely Greek phrases and words, the Jews are going to think, well, he's not talking to me. There is already a natural animosity between these groups. And he's trying to tell them, you are all one in Christ. You see that? So he's got a real challenge in front of him.

Now, I want you to, for a minute, imagine you are writing a letter to a church. You ready? Got your pen out? You're writing a letter to a church. And what's going to happen, this church is going to be composed, just for the sake of example, some English-speaking people, and some people with a Spanish cultural background, and those of some German background as well.

Now, you're going to start writing this letter. That's right-handed, I'm left-handed. Let's do it left-handed, okay. I don't care, either one, both of them, I don't care. All right, but you're going to write this letter, okay, and as you're writing this letter, okay, you're going to try to imagine, how am I going to write to these people?

And let's just, for the sake of understanding the instance here, let's say you're going to tell them you're joking, okay? Now, one of the examples that we came up with in our How to Study the Bible class, and this was one we kind of put together with various people's cultural backgrounds, As we found out in the English language, you would use the phrase, you're pulling my leg. I don't know why that means you're joking, but that does.

Now, we found in the Spanish background, a number of people would say, you're pulling my hair. Estás tomando mi pelo. You're pulling my hair. In a German background, you're carrying me on your arm. And so it's interesting, a different background, you'd have different expressions.

And you imagine Paul sitting there thinking, how am I going to write to these people who are Greek and Jewish and some other things too, and some Romans, and I'm going to write to them and I want to write something that they'll all understand and they'll all relate to.

Can you imagine what a challenge that is? That's what Paul had to do all the time. Can you imagine what that's like? So as Paul wrote to these churches, he would mix these languages and mix these cultural backgrounds all in one letter. What a challenge Paul had, okay? He would address oftentimes one group and then the other group as he wrote. And what we see here this morning is no exception. Here's an example that we saw before and it's very clear and distinctive.

In Colossians 1.16 it says, for by him, that is by Christ, all things were created. And we pointed out then that the Greek-speaking folks would say, I understand that. but then to use a particularly Jewish expression, it says, both in the heavens and on the earth.

You see that? So what did he do? He told them the same thing, but he says, I'll tell the Greek and Roman folks one thing, and I'll tell the Jewish folks another thing, and by the time they put it together, they all will understand what I mean, and it will have been said in words that they can all relate to. See what he's doing?

So Paul had to be very creative in the way he drew things. Now, fortunately, he's inspired by the Holy Spirit. That's got to help immensely. All right, now, so with Paul's writing here, he also had another challenge before him. He was doing two things.

One is he was drawing upon the Old Testament Scriptures, which he knew, here's already inspired Scripture that I can quote, and as a matter of fact, the New Testament authors quoted the Old Testament about 260 times. Okay? A lot. Now, but they weren't just restating the Old Testament, they were also revealing new truths.

So imagine, and we'll see the example here this morning, imagine you're not only trying to write something that appeals to these different cultural groups, you're also trying to bring in truth that's been revealed before and lay on top of that and beside it truth that's now newly revealed. See that? So you look at it, he has a phenomenal task in front of him to pull this together. Boy, I'm glad this stuff is inspired, right? Okay.

So what he did, he wove these things together as a fabric, these multicultural statements, if you will, as well as bringing in Old Testament truths, things that have already been revealed, things that the Jews certainly, and the Gentiles likely as well, would already see, oh yeah, that's a foundational fact, and then adding to that the things newly revealed.

What a piece of work! It's a masterpiece. As he goes on here, he's finishing off what we have broken up in terms of a chapter, finishing off this chapter and trying to convey to them, this is the way in which you've been blessed with every spiritual blessing. Imagine trying to tell that to groups of people that are as diverse as that. You've got Greeks, and you've got Jews, and you've got some Romans, and you've got some others mixed in there, and he's trying to tell them all that, and mix in things from the Old Testament that's already understood as this is inspired scripture, and then add to that newly revealed truth. This is a phenomenal piece of work.

All right, let's see how he's done that. One of them, he makes reference to seated him, that is seated Christ, at his, that is God the Father's, right hand. And that happens to come out of Psalm 110, and we see that quoted in Matthew, Mark, Luke, Acts, and Hebrews. That is the most quoted Old Testament passage in the New Testament. And so he draws upon that.

Now, let me ask you this, which group is going to look at that passage and say, hey, I like that, that's mine? The Jews are going to look at that, right? They're going to say, hey, that's my scripture. Then you look at the next one, he put all things in subjection under his feet. That one is from Psalm 86.

Paul again quotes it in 1 Corinthians 15 and in Hebrews 2.8 we see it as well. Here again is another picture out of the Old Testament. The Jews are going to look at that and say, hey, that's my scripture, I go for that.

Now, what we see though is a combination of Gentile and Jewish character in this passage as he completes the rest of the chapter. In truth, we could go through the whole book of Ephesians, and we'll point this out at various times, and look at places where he's saying this is a particularly Jewish statement. or this is a particularly Gentile statement. Now, as I point these things out, one clarification to make. I'm not saying that the things that are Jewish would be not understood by the Gentiles.

But the Jews would recognize it as, this is my term. This is my, you know, scripture, whatever. And the Gentiles, in turn, would look at it and say, yeah, that's something I can relate to. See, the Jews would not be excluded by it They wouldn't be saying, wonder what he means by that, but they wouldn't have the same sense of, yeah, that's mine. Paul weaves these together in inspired scripture. That is a marvelous thing. Okay.

What we want to look particularly at here is, here's this place at the end of the passage where it says Christ, and it's interesting, our English versions don't bring this out, but Ephesians 1.10 and Ephesians 1.20, The word Christ in there, actually in the Greek, is the definite article. It has the sense THE Christ.

With that as a title, the Jews would instantly look at that and say, that's our Messiah. They'd look at that and they would claim it. They'd say, I know who that is. That's the Messiah that we've been looking for for centuries and centuries and centuries. That's who he's talking about. They would really respond to that.

Now, as we look at this passage, he goes and salts it with another reference to the Messiah here. And so as we enter this passage, he has just gotten through saying the Messiah, which the Jews are going to look at and they're going to relate to that real easily. He's going to say, and he, that is God the Father, put all things in subjection under his feet, the Messiah's feet. Okay, now one thing is he's put this in subjection under his feet.

It's a whole lot more than just putting feet on top of somebody, okay? All right, so what he's talking about here is this is an act that was spelled out in Psalm 110, okay? That took place, remember, in the end of Matthew, Jesus says, all authority has been given to me in heaven and on earth, okay? So this is something that was implemented in terms of declaration there, when Christ was crucified, buried, raised, ascended, and seated. It is still to be implemented in history, as we'll see here shortly. One of the things to look at is there are several places where this shows up.

The instance that comes out is not the expression in subjection under his feet, but it talks about making the earth a footstool. the example that comes out of Psalm 110. And it's a long-standing tradition. For centuries, countries who are under a king or under an emperor of some kind have had this throne and footstool picture. And here's even a Byzantine coin where there's a footstool there. And I had to point it out there just because it's a little obscure. But the idea of a throne and the footstool is real common. It's been around for centuries.

Here's a modern reenactment of the idea of you'll have royalty and the idea of under the feet means complete submission. Even a Roman emperor, just a couple centuries after this time, was captured by the Persians, if you can imagine such an embarrassing event, and was forced to be a footstool for the king of Persia. even a mounting block for the king to get up on his horse. And this is an example of the thought for centuries this has been the idea and the understanding of things, since we don't have a king in this country. it sometimes slips past us. But for centuries, in a great many different places, this picture of being in subjection, under the feet, was something that meant being supreme royalty and having things beneath you, having everything beneath you be subject to you.

Okay, it's a reference here to Psalm 86 here in verse 22. And so I want to take a look at that. This psalm points to, first back to the time when Adam, the first Adam, okay, Adam was given a place of authority over the creation, but lost it. Lost it when he fell. And so then, if 1 Corinthians 15 points to Christ as the second Adam, the one who regains that place of supremacy but does not lose it.

As we look at the same psalm it's referred to in Hebrews 2.8 when we were looking through Philippians 3.21, we looked at it there, and what you see at the end of Philippians 3.21 is by the exertion of the power that he has even to subject all things to himself.

That is Christ subjecting everything to himself. More on this throne and footstool theme, this is an idea that's been throughout Scripture. It's not something that Paul is just kind of casting up here. Throughout Scripture it's been brought up. Isaiah 66, verse 1 says, Thus says the Lord, Heaven is my throne and the earth is my footstool. There are a number of other Old Testament and even New Testament passages that continue on with this throne and footstool theme.

And then we even see related to that, every knee will bow. We've even got some modern songs to that effect. Every knee will bow. This is the same thing, recognizing Christ's sovereignty and supremacy. It's part of the same theme of everything being subject to Him, everything being under His feet, and every knee bowing, recognizing Christ's authority. So we've got to ask a question here.

If God put all things in subjection under Christ, why don't we see everything in subjection right now? How come, if that's true, I can still get in an accident? How come, if that's true, I can still have people being completely out of control? How come, if everything is subject to Christ, there's all kinds of problems in the world? How can that be? How come everything isn't perfect right now? One of the things, even Scripture recognizes this.

Hebrews 2.8 says, but we do not yet see all things subjected to Him. So we need to ask, what's going on? Why is this? Why have we got this state of affairs where Christ said, all authority has been given to me, and yet we see things that appear to be out of control? Things that you look at and you say, that's not right. Ever turn on the news, look at it, boy, it seems like the things they're eager to tell you are things that are out of control, right? Something that went wrong. It's this thing. Now, here's the key, and it comes out of 1 Corinthians 15. It says, For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet. Ah, there's a process going on here.

Now, we're used to until. We think of until, yeah. Now, you got to wait until the computer does what it's supposed to. You have to wait until the light turns green. We're used to until on that kind of time frame. We even have some ladies here who recently had to wait until the baby is born.

So, we have the idea of until, but this is a really big until, isn't it? This is a huge until, because this is not just waiting within our lifetime. This is not waiting on our human time scale. This is looking until a point in time, a future time. Here's a picture we looked at before, because remember we looked at where Paul said, this age and then the one to come. Remember that?

Well, what's happening here, we have this present evil age, And in the midst of that, we pointed out, the Messiah comes, and it's at that point in time where he's crucified, buried, raised, ascended, and seated. At that point in time, then he says, all authority has been given. But then, what does that do? That begins an implementation, a process, that is not complete until finally death is the last enemy defeated. And that's what we finally see. Death abolished completes the process.

Something else to notice about what he's making reference to here, so far anyway. This is all of the old creation, isn't it? The old creation, starting from the creation of the world, marvellous things, but it's the old creation, all the way to the point of death being abolished. That's the until. time frame that he's talking about, the big picture, not the sort of untils that we're accustomed to waiting through here. From the time of creation and then things fell, that brought about the reason, because of the fall that was brought about through the first Adam and we were in him, that fall created the reason for us to need the Lord to come and to begin that until. It's the process since the cross all the way to the time when death is abolished. That's the until that scripture is talking about, 1 Corinthians 15. Now, then he goes on in the middle of this passage, what does he say?

And gave him, that is the Father gave him as head over all things to the church. The Father gave Christ head of all things to the church. Here's your present. It's the working of the strength of the Father's might, which He brought about in and through Christ.

We've seen that. When He raised Him from the dead, seated Him at His right hand in the heavenly places, far above all rule and authority and power and dominion and every name that is named, not only this age, but the one to come, and He put all things in subjection under Christ's feet, then He says, ah, now, that's the one, that's the one, That's the time I'll give that one to the church. He didn't just walk a young Jew up to you and say, here, church, have him. It is after all this has taken place, then he says, ah, this is the one I'll give to the church. You see the difference?

Here's the one, and we've been through this, here's the one who created everything. He was the agency through which everything was created. Here is the one who has been the sustainer of the universe, as we saw in Colossians chapter 1. Here is the one who came down and was crucified and buried and raised, ascended and seated. And he is the one who was given the right hand of the Father, the seat of power and honor. He is the one who will reign over all things until every enemy is subdued, all the way to the point of ending death.

He says, that's the one I'll give to the church. How's that for a present? That's a potent present. But it wasn't a thing that He gave us, it was a person. It's key also to look that it's His description of that Christ that is the gift to you that is also working in you. Isn't that amazing? He is the gift to us as the Church as a body, He is also the one who is working in us. That's powerful. This is the power that is the demonstrated source, extent, and character of God's power that's in Christ. He is the one who has everything to do with the old creation, and us, as a part of the new creation, receive Him as a gift. Christ is given to the Church. He is also its head and eternal gift.

Here's a gift you get for a while. See, death is only going to be with us here for a while, isn't it? Here in the old creation. It'll be here for a while and then it'll be gone. Will this gift be gone? No. Isn't that something? There's lots of things we have to contend with here on planet Earth. We've got things even reported that just this last week, and things coming up, and we look at it and we say, boy, there's a lot we have to deal with here, isn't there? This is a gift that doesn't go away, folks. And it's a personal gift.

Notice, the church, and he identifies the church, which is his body. To use a kind of figure of speech, we've got our head in the clouds. Christ. Christ is seated in the heavenlies. Let's take a look at the picture that we looked at this some weeks back, but I think it's valuable for us to kind of reiterate it here. All that has been described in terms of being seated at the right hand of the Father, in terms of the working of His power into us, all that's being described in terms of Christ reigning until all enemies have been subdued, that's dealing with the old creation. This is dealing with the new. It is dealing with everything in the old creation so that we can be a part of the new, so that we can be a new creation.

One of the things we pointed out before is the new creation is not new just in sequence. It's not like, okay, we had an old creation and now we've got a new one just because the old one is a little older and this new one is newer. It's new in kind, different in kind. It does not have the characteristic of the old creation. The new creation, as we pointed out, is populated by those of the old creation who have believed God. All who have believed God will populate the new creation. All these are saints.

It says there, him who is head of all things. Now what this really says, it doesn't just say he is the head of the church. It says him who is the head of all things is given to the church. Now is he the head of the church too? Yes. Certainly, because he is the head of all things. But he is not making the statement, him who is just the head of the church is given to the church. Him who is the head of all things here in the old creation and in the new, that's the one who is the gift to you.

Remember earlier we talked about the fact that some people would get an idea of, is this Gentile or Greek or Jewish? Well, the head and body idea that Paul illustrates here in Ephesians and in Colossians, That was something that the Greek authors would relate to. And this last one, Philo of Alexandria, is sort of a mixture. A Jew with a lot of Greek influence. But it's also an idea that comes out of the Old Testament. Both the Greek speaking people, the people with the Greek background, and the Jewish people would hear this and read this and they would say, ah, I know what he's talking about. They would understand exactly what he's saying. I think one of the things we want to point out here is the New Testament applies this analogy to the head and the body of Christ in the church. This analogy is put together.

Only Paul, as we pointed out from Colossians 1.18, uses this analogy. But this passage here is the first of the ones we'll see in the book of Ephesians as we step through it that makes this point. He's going to return to this analogy several times.

Why? Because it's going to be helpful in us seeing some additional truths that he's got built into this picture of the head and the body. We used this picture before, and so this Ephesians 121 is the first of that picture, that illustration that Paul uses. And finally, what does it mean?

The head is the source of growth. It's the focal point of the growth of the body. The saviour of the body, and the subject, the Church's subject rather, to Christ the Church. This giving of Christ to the Church is not just a meaningless, useless event. Our having received Christ as head, okay, having been given Christ as head is something that is vital and essential for us as believers, as a Church body. The Church's head certainly means, as we see here in this passage, that He has supremacy and authority.

But also we see, as we continue through, that Christ is the very life of the Church. It's important we see that this isn't just primarily a social event. This isn't a social gathering. This isn't just something we do because it's a nice thing to do to gather together. But instead it is indeed something that the Lord has put in place from eternity for eternity's sake, that this is indeed an organism and not just a human institution.

Now, the last phrase there that comes out of Ephesians 1.23, the fullness of him who fills all in all.

Do you feel full this morning? Let's take a look at this and see what this means. There's a couple of Greek words that stand out. One is this word, fullness, is a noun, and pleurao, the verb there that follows, is a verb. We'll take a look at that in a minute, too. But one of the things we want to take a look at here, this noun, pleuroma, there's some background to it. It's interesting that Paul uses this word pleuroma with more intensity here in the book of Ephesians than in any other book of the New Testament. matter of fact, of any New Testament author.

It shows up as many times, and the only place it shows up as an equal number is in the Book of Romans, where there's more than twice as many chapters. So he's really putting a focus on this pleroma here and there, and look at one of the things that feeds into it.

First of all, Ephesus was a shipping town. It was a port, right? That was their claim to fame. They had the port So lots of people accustomed to shipping. Lots of people accustomed to dealing with the harbor. And matter of fact, here's the modern harbor at Ephesus.

This was the view, if you look from the stadium, the theater, where everybody would gather, and estimates vary, but somewhere around 25, and estimates go as high as 50,000 people could sit in this theater. They would look out at the road that goes to the harbor. Paul most certainly walked up that very road. He's also in that theater we know. And it went out to the harbor.

Now the ancient harbor is filled with silt, but this was the pride of Ephesus. They very much thought in terms of their city and the city being a harbor and the whole shipping industry. But look at some of the, here's some of the reasons why I bring this up.

The word pleroma was used to describe the full crew of a ship. The word pleroma was used to describe the full cargo of the ship. Have you got a full ship? They'd use that word pleroma. The full number of ships, if they had a contract to carry a number of different ships with similar cargo, or the full number of citizens of the city.

This word had lots of significance, so Paul said, I'll draw on it. It had lots of local meaning to those people. So the fullness of him, they would understand. To them, it would mean all hands on deck. the full cargo is in this ship. They had all sorts of mental pictures that would come into play as they saw this. Then let's look at this next one, the fullness of him who fills all and all. Now think of it this way.

Our position is certainly fixed in the heavenlies, no question about that. But one of the things that comes out in the way he describes this here, is a living, vital character in our ongoing relationship with the Lord, okay? It is not static, it's not dead, it's not just a, okay, you have this position and now you're done, see you in heaven. There's something living and vital and ongoing and that's why He's brought up this head and body relationship and He's finally capping it off with a statement of the fullness, okay? And what does He do? He here, and we often see this throughout the New Testament, we see the present tense active character of a lot of these verbs. Let me give you an example.

John 10.28, Jesus says of His sheep, I am constantly giving them life. He doesn't say, I gave them life. I am constantly giving them life. There is a vitality. There is a continuation. that goes in this. Even the heart example that Hal's seeing this week. This heart is something we continually need, right? Constantly need. This same focus comes here. Jesus says, I am constantly giving them life. There is a continuation, a present vitality that's being communicated.

Here we see in Ephesians 1.23, it has the sense of Him who is constantly filling all in all, And finally, in Colossians 3, 4, Christ who is constantly our life, continuing to be our life. Now, what's about this fills all in all? What on earth is that talking about? It just means He fills a lot? What does it mean?

Christ is the one who fills every single believer. As a matter of fact, that's a theme we're going to see crop up in Ephesians several more times. Christ fills every single believer. If you're sitting here this morning and you are a believer, this includes you. Christ fills every believer. He is the content of the filling.

Christ isn't filling the believer in some little tiny narrow way, not in a limited way, not in some small way. Christ is not intended to be a part of our life. Christ is not intended to be a thing apart. Christ is not intended to be some segment of our life. All. All. Okay? In every way. Always. Every respect. That's part of what he's getting across here.

If we look ahead here in Colossians 3, 15 through 17, Paul tells the church at Colossae, which is not that far from Ephesus, he says, let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts. By the way, that word rule means the umpire, the referee. Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you are called into one body and be thankful. And then this comes out amazingly, let the word of Christ richly dwell within you.

Richly. That is a sense of fullness, isn't it? Richly dwell within you. and let all wisdom and teaching and admonishing one another with psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with thankfulness in your hearts to God, whatever you do in word or deed, do all in the name of our Lord Jesus, giving thanks to him through God the Father." Notice the superlatives there, okay? Christ is intended to fill not just some believers, not just in a few ways, not so Christ can be a part of your life.

All is the intent. All. Now you're going to need the binoculars that are in your pew racks. I'm kidding, of course. But this is the Ephesians 3 through 23, chapter 1. I'm glad a few of you are sitting up a little closer. Anyway, the big blue dots there are in the Greek Those are the ends of the sentences.

Can you imagine that? Paul's pen gushed. Why do I bring this up and get you to squint your eyes so much? The reason for bringing this up is to see that what Paul started off doing here is saying that you've been blessed with every spiritual blessing.

Not some, not most, not here's the list and I know it's kind of limited, I'm sorry. every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places. He goes on, his pen just goes into hyperspace as he's spelling this thing out. And he's finally finishing this thing, saying Christ fills all, in all, in every way. There is no deficiency in the way in which you've been blessed. There is no partiality, and by that I mean some percentage. that Christ is intended to be involved in your lives. He is a complete present to the church.

We've been blessed with every spiritual blessing, and to try to cram it into two sentences was all that Paul could do. Because it is such a marvelous gift, we will spend eternity, Ephesians 2, 7 says, just beginning to comprehend what this means. Marvelous, marvelous grace. Thank you, Lord, for this marvelous way in which you've blessed us. You have indeed blessed us with every spiritual blessing. You've filled us in every way, every believer here this morning. We give you thanks for that, Lord. How marvelous. In Jesus' name, Amen.