Gospel as Gift & Goal

Peace to the brothers and sisters, and love with faith from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Grace to all who love our Lord Jesus Christ with an undying love. (Ephesians 6:23-24) Paul often ends his letters with these two words: grace and peace.  They come in a different order and a different way every time—but these are the two words that reliably offer the benediction at the close of Paul's letters.  Here those blessings of grace and peace resonate as reminders of what came before in this letter.   Like from the first chapter's run-on sentence of lavish, overflowing gifts of grace or second chapter's famous words "by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—not by works, so that no one can boast" (2:8-9).  Now as we close, Paul reminds us once again that God's grace surrounds his people from beginning to end.  Grace: a gift given to us which spills over from us. And the word peace.  We discovered in chapter two that Jesus Christ himself "is our peace" (2:14).  His purpose being to "create in himself one new humanity out of the two, thus making peace, and in one body to reconcile both of them to God through the cross, by which he put to death their hostility. He came and preached peace to you who were far away and peace to those who were near. For through him we both have access to the Father by one Spirit" (2:15b-18).  This peace of Christ which has made us to be a "unity of the Spirit in the bonds of peace" is ours—a gift we are called to both receive and "keep" (4:3).  Peace then also, is a gift given to us which is to be actively tended by us.   Then, new words join the usual pair of grace and peace here.  Faith is one of them.  We already heard that word come up: "by grace you have been saved, through faith" (2:8).  It is "through faith in [Jesus] we may approach God with freedom and confidence" (3:12).  We learn that there is but "one faith," just as there is one Lord and baptism (4:5).  Again, this unity of "one faith" is a gift and a goal, just like peace.  We are called therefore to use our gifts to support and build one another up "until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son…" (4:13).  Faith in Christ is also our shield against the powers of evil (6:16).  But as the letter begins and ends, we hear not of faith in the abstract noun, but faith as a lived reality—a verb.  Paul writes at the beginning of the letter to "the faithful in Christ Jesus" and at the end he writes of "Tychicus, the dear brother and faithful servant in the Lord" (1:1, 6:21).  Faith is also a gift and goal. Love is another word Paul adds.  When love shows up in the first half of the book (which is a lot!), it always refers to God's own love, aside from just one instance.  Love too then, is firstly a gift of God before it is ever an act of humanity.  So profound is this gift of God that Paul prays his famous prayer for his hearers, that "being rooted and established in love, [you] may have power, together with all the [saints], to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God" (3:17-19).  Then in the second half of the book, love dominates Paul's instructions for how to live as a saint.  The emphasis can be summed up in the words of 5:2, where Paul invites us to "walk in the way of love, just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God."  Love as a gift, love as a goal. Faith and love come together in the beginning, where Paul writes "ever since I heard about your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love for all God's people, I have not stopped giving thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers" (1:15-16).  Now at the end he picks this unceasing prayer back up in his benediction: "love with faith from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ" (6:23). The most significant words added to this ending, though, are the names of God himself.  The letter began with a four-fold repeat of God the Father and Jesus Christ the Son.  They are both mentioned in each of the opening four verses.  Now at the end, they appear again.  The Father and the Son, giving gifts to the saints.  And, here we are as God's people, the saints, responding to God's good gifts.  This is the gospel according to Ephesians, it is the way that the saints practice a life of resurrection in Christ.  Receiving the gift and walking it out as our life's goal. For, to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen. (Ephesians 3:17-21).