EPH 1:9 ..."he made known to us the mystery of his will according to his good pleasure, which he purposed in Christ..."

Most people like a good mystery. This is why programs like Murder, She wrote with Angela Lansbury, or Matlock with Andy Griffith were, and are in the re-runs, so popular. We like being able to put the facts together and come to certain conclusions based on our perception of what those facts are.

But we might find it a bit amazing that God has mysteries that He has chosen to reveal to men and angels concerning Himself and His plans. There are lots of secret societies in the world today. They harbor mysteries which are meant only for a select few. They believe that they have answers to life that should remain a mystery to the general population.

Only those on the inside, in the upper echelons, should know this information because the average person wouldn't know what to do with this secret information or wouldn't appreciate it. And so it remains a secret, and we're intrigued with what goes on behind closed doors, whether it has something to do with government or a religious cult which cloaks itself and hides these mysteries.

But when God talks about mysteries it is not the same thing as trying to hide something from the general population. When God talks about mysteries He is truly desiring to reveal something which no man could know unless He revealed it.

The Greek word for mystery is musterion. Robertson in His Word Pictures in the N.T. says, this speaks of something which was once hidden, but now revealed. It was once kept silent, but now made known.

But, in what sense are the mysteries of God revealed, and more important, what are these mysteries? Are they the deep and wondrous mysteries of the universe? Do they involve certain mysterious incantations that can move mountains and change the course of history?

No, these mysteries are much more important than anything like that. These mysteries have to do with the human soul and where that soul will spend eternity. We hear a lot these days about new revelations concerning the future of man. Shirley McClain has popularized the mysteries of the New Age Movement. She, and others like her, contends that they have tapped into these mysteries through supernatural means.

They are now guides to lead mankind on the right path where we will all ultimately be able to come into the perfect harmony of the universe and realize our genuine potential as we one day become gods and goddesses.

That's very attractive to a lot of people. They reason, who wouldn't want to become a god and have powers beyond imagination and be liberated from this earthly bondage. It's power religion.

I can remember many years ago, before I became a Christian, dabbling in this stuff. I remember reading how the mind is a powerful tool which few people really tap into. It has the ability to move objects or influence people to do things they might otherwise do.

I sat under a hanging lamp one time for about an hour trying to get that thing to sway with only my mind powers. It never moved. I would sit in a doctors office trying to influence people to do certain things simply by putting suggestions in their minds with my mind. It never worked.

But because I opened myself up to those sorts of manifestations I did experience things that could only be explained as supernatural. And those mysterious things which I had "tapped into" gave me a sense of awe and a sense of having found something no ordinary person would ever experience.

But they also gave me a scare. I believe that was God's check on my life at the time. They scared me because some of the things I experienced were beyond my control. It was shortly after those days that I discovered another mystery that no one had ever told me about. It was a mystery which would change my life completely.

And yet it was a mystery which had been revealed many years before. It was a mystery, which clearly laid out in a book, what this life was all about and who this person was who brought forth this life. This book is the Word of God.

And though it was a new revelation to me, God had revealed this mystery many ages before. In fact, He had revealed it from the very beginning of creation. If God decided to remain silent that certainly would have been His prerogative, but He created man so that He could share these things with us. In a sense, He couldn't wait to share what these mysteries were to man.

The greatest mystery was that God created man to have fellowship with Him. From the beginning, we see that God never had any intention of hiding this mystery. But since the fall of man into sin, God has chosen to reveal how He would restore man to fellowship in increments. He didn't give Adam and Eve, for example all of the details of how He would do this.

He simply revealed a part of the mystery by saying to the Serpent, who was in fact Satan, "Because you have done this, "Cursed are you above all the livestock and all the wild animals! You will crawl on your belly and you will eat dust all the days of your life. And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; he will crush your head, and you will strike his heel." (GEN 3:14-15)

Does this not sound like the makings of a mystery novel? I'm sure Adam and Eve wondered how God would do this. In fact we know they did. When Adam was given his judgment by God he in turn named his wife. Up to this point she was simply called woman. After the fall and the sentence of death was pronounced upon them he gave her the name Eve.

The name Eve means living. Adam understood God to mean that though the sentence of death had been pronounced God was giving them the hope that life would be restored. "Adam named his wife Eve, because she would become the mother of all the living." (GEN 3:20)

She wasn't becoming the mother of just the physical descendants, but also of the spiritual descendants who would be restored to God through faith. She realized this. When Eve gave birth to her firstborn son she exclaimed in GEN 4:1 "With the help of the LORD I have brought forth a man."

In the Hebrew, the word for man could also be translated man-child. She understood that this child was not only the one through whom the human race would be propagated, she understood that through her seed would come the Messiah or Deliverer.

Keep in mind that both she and Adam had just been devastated because of their rebellion. They had lost that intimate fellowship with their loving Creator and now God had revealed something that was brand new to them, a mystery if you will, which promised them life and restored fellowship. Everything hinged on the seed of the woman through the promise God gave them.

Her faith and the faith of Adam naming her the woman of Life showed that God's mystery of reconciliation was now unfolding. God could very easily have brought the Messiah through Eve in the next generation and yet He chose not to do this. And the reason He chose not to do this was because in His eternal plan the time-frame for that event would have to wait.

This is the mystery Paul speaks of here. Not a mystery which is undisclosed or not made available, but a mystery which is now coming to fruition in Jesus Christ as He has fulfilled all things concerning His first coming.

All throughout the O.T. Scriptures God has been revealing more and more of His will and His plan concerning this blessed Messiah promised to Adam and Eve and all of sinful humanity.

And so when Paul says in EPH 1:9 "And he has made known to us the mystery of his will according to his good pleasure, which he purposed in Christ,..." he means to say that He has made this known all along. And now in these last days He has fully revealed not only who this Messiah is, but that this Messiah actually accomplished what He planned from all eternity; to redeem men and purchase a people for His own possession so that we may have this restored fellowship which was lost in the Garden.

This is a mystery only to the degree that all of the details were finally shown to be in Jesus Christ. The promise of this revelation was given by God from the beginning. The whole world was aware of this promise. It was passed down from generation to generation. All of the descendants of Adam and Eve certainly had access to the promise.

Adam lived 930 years, the flood came a little over a thousand years after his death. His descendants certainly knew of the story of how their father had sinned against the Lord. Lamech, who was the father of Noah was alive up to 4 years before the flood.

This is what we're told about him in GEN 5:28 "When Lamech had lived 182 years, he had a son.
29 He named him Noah and said, "He will comfort us in the labor and painful toil of our hands caused by the ground the LORD has cursed."

Lamech certainly understood that it was because of sin that God judged Adam and Eve. He also knew, maybe because of some revelation that God gave him, that Noah would comfort the world to the degree that God's plan of redemption would come through his seed; the same promise given to Adam and Eve.

We come to Gen.5:30 "After Noah was born, Lamech lived 595 years and had other sons and daughters.
31 Altogether, Lamech lived 777 years, and then he died.
32 After Noah was 500 years old, he became the father of Shem, Ham and Japheth."

What's also interesting is that Lamech's father was the legendary Methuselah who lived 969 years and who actually outlived his son Lamech to the point where he died the same year the flood actually came.

Lamech was around 595 years after Noah was born. The Scriptures give us every indication that Noah was aware of the judgment before the birth of his three sons. We read in 1PE 3:20 concerning the rebellious people during the life of Noah, "who disobeyed long ago when God waited patiently in the days of Noah while the ark was being built. In it only a few people, eight in all, were saved through water,..."

It is in the days of Noah, or in other words, during his lifetime as a man, distinct from his father, now with his own wife, that God gives Noah the plan to build the Ark. It's very possible that the first few people to work on the Ark were Noah, his wife and Noah's father Lamech and maybe even Methuselah. They were apparently godly men who understood the promises given by God.

We do know that Noah is referred to as a righteous man in the sense that he followed God and His promises concerning a Savior, by faith. But where do you think that faith in the promises came from? It came from Lamech, his father who received it from his father Methuselah.

There may have been a few godly men and women during those times prior to Noah's birth, but the one thing we do know is that at the time of the flood, no one except for Noah and his family were found faithful. If Lamech had remained alive he most certainly would have gone with his son on the ark, but he died 4 years before. As I mentioned earlier Methuselah outlived his son and probably died just before the flood.

As a side-note, when you go through the genealogies from Adam to the flood what you discover is that Methuselah would have been around long enough to know Enos, who was the grandson of Adam. And so the witness of the truth, from the very mouth of Adams grandson, was given to Methuselah who was also the grandfather of Noah. He too would be a witness to the very end, right up to the flood.

But according to Gen.5:30 Noah had other brothers and sisters who most certainly were around when the flood came. Imagine the grief of Noah as he had been pleading with them for years to trust that God would judge the world and yet they wouldn't respond.

Families lived in close proximity in those days. I'm sure some of the first people to bang on the closed door of the ark were his brothers and sisters. What a time that must have been for Noah to leave not only the rest of mankind behind, but his own family, who now knew that these mysteries revealed were in fact true. God did not hide the truth. But men chose to keep it a mystery in their hearts as they rejected the truth.

The mystery of God's will has been made manifest from the beginning. It pleased Him to reveal what He was doing and how He was going to do it. This is why the O.T. is made up of so much prophecy concerning the Messiah. God was revealing more and more information over the years.

The first prophecy was written down by Moses around 1400 B.C., in Gen.3:16 which we spoke of earlier which promised that the head of Satan would be crushed, part of which signifies that his power of sin in the lives of people would be crushed and that people would be set free from the penalty and power of sin as they embraced this promised Messiah by faith.

Over 700 years before the birth of Christ the prophet Micah wrote concerning this Messiah in MIC 5:2 "But you, Bethlehem Ephrathah, though you are small among the clans of Judah, out of you will come for me one who will be ruler over Israel, whose origins are from of old, from days of eternity.
4 He will stand and shepherd his flock in the strength of the LORD, in the majesty of the name of the LORD his God. And they will live securely, for then his greatness will reach to the ends of the earth.
5 And he will be their peace..."

It is Jesus who was born in Bethlehem and is the Great Shepherd who is our peace. The prophet Isaiah also wrote some 700 years before Christ in ISA 7:14 "Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign: The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and will call him Immanuel."

What do we read in MAT 1:20? "But after he had considered this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, "Joseph son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary home as your wife, because what is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit.
21 She will give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins."
22 All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had said through the prophet:
23 "The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel" -which means, "God with us."

The prophet Zechariah wrote some 500 years before Christ in ZEC 9:9 "Rejoice greatly, O Daughter of Zion! Shout, Daughter of Jerusalem! See, your king comes to you, righteous and having salvation, gentle and riding on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey."

We read in LUK 19:30 "Go to the village ahead of you, and as you enter it, you will find a colt tied there, which no one has ever ridden. Untie it and bring it here.
31 If anyone asks you, 'Why are you untying it?' tell him, 'The Lord needs it.'
35 They brought it to Jesus, threw their cloaks on the colt and put Jesus on it.
36 As he went along, people spread their cloaks on the road.
37 When he came near the place where the road goes down the Mount of Olives, the whole crowd of disciples began joyfully to praise God in loud voices for all the miracles they had seen:
38 "Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord!" "Peace in heaven and glory in the highest!"

There are over 300 Messianic prophecies in the O.T., which are God's way of revealing this mystery to men. But as we see in our text this mystery was not some after thought of God. We read that He "made known to us the mystery of his will"; in other words the will or plan of God which was devised from all of eternity. This is still in connection with what Paul had previously said in this letter.

We read in EPH 1:4 "For he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight."

His will was in effect even before time began. In our study on Thursday evening, we are going through the book of Genesis and what we saw this last week is how the earth was the first physical body in space formed in all the universe.

It isn't until the fourth day that any other heavenly body is created by the word of His power. On that day the sun, the moon and all the stars are placed in the heavens. It is the earth which is first created because it is the one thing which takes center stage in all the universe, because it is on this stage that God's redemptive plan for mankind is worked out.

The Son of the living God and Creator would take on flesh to come into this world with the express purpose of fulfilling this eternal mystery where God would bring man back into a peaceful relationship with Himself.

And so in one sense we can say that the creation of this earth which is center stage in all the universe was done so that God could redeem and possess a people for Himself. Some might say He went through a lot of trouble in creating this world so that He come into it to die for us.

It was no trouble for God to create this world and universe in six literal days, and believe me it was no trouble for Him to take on flesh and become a man to redeem us. It was His great delight and pleasure to do this for you and me.

HEB 12:2 "Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God."

Jesus Christ knew exactly what He was doing. It was His will and plan to do this from all of eternity. During His earthly ministry he told His disciples in JOH 12:31 "Now is the time for judgment on this world; now the prince of this world will be driven out.
32 But I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all men to myself.
33 He said this to show the kind of death he was going to die."

JOH 16:33 "I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world."
JOH 17:1 "After Jesus said this, he looked toward heaven and prayed: "Father, the time has come. Glorify your Son, that your Son may glorify you.
2 For you granted him authority over all people that he might give eternal life to all those you have given him.
3 Now this is eternal life: that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent.
4 I have brought you glory on earth by completing the work you gave me to do.
5 And now, Father, glorify me in your presence with the glory I had with you before the world began."

PHI 2:8 "And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death - even death on a cross!
9 Therefore God exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every name,
10 that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth,
11 and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father."

This is the mystery God revealed to Adam and Eve and to all the Patriarches down through the ages. This is "the mystery of his will according to his good pleasure, which he purposed in Christ,
10 to be put into effect when the times will have reached their fulfillment - to bring all things in heaven and on earth together under one head, even Christ."

We'll get more into that next week. But you know, as I put this study together, it struck me that this mystery of God's will which had been slowly revealed by the Spirit of God since the fall, is the pure unadulterated grace of God being extended to a people who don't deserve this great salvation.

And to me, in some ways, that's a greater mystery. 'Why Lord, did you plan to redeem sinful men?' 'Why did you bother with us when we didn't want you, when we took this revelation of this great mystery found in Christ, and like in the days of Noah, rejected it?'

'Why did You give sinful men a second chance after Adam and Eve's sin in the Garden and then a third chance after the flood?' 'Why did you strive with men during those years after Abraham?'

'Why Lord did you strive with Israel all those years when their hearts were far from You and they turned to false idols?' 'Why did you even bother to fulfill this mystery which we know as salvation after all of this?'

'And then after You sent Your only begotten Son into this world we crucified Him. Why Lord did you continue with Your will and your plan to draw all men to Yourself after this most blatant rejection of Your will for us?'

Of all the mysteries in the universe, this is the most baffling to me. And yet those words ring in my ears: "for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God." (HEB 12:2)

That's the only answer we have. And I for one am glad He "fulfilled the mystery of His will according to his good pleasure, which he purposed in Christ..."

This is why we shouldn't be too surprised that this first portion of this letter is a time of praise and worship on Paul's part. Praise God that He not only made His plan from all eternity but that He really did fulfill it in Christ and will fulfill all things in Him so that you and I in Christ will be with Him forever.

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