Chapter XVI (Part 3) – The Purpose of Christ – His Ecclesia

[Christ] is the Image of the invisible God, Firstborn of every creature, for in Him is all created, that in the heavens and that on the earth, the visible and the invisible, whether thrones, or lordships, or sovereignties, or authorities, all is created through Him and for Him, and He is before all, and all has its cohesion in Him.

And He is the Head of the body, the ecclesia…

kai (AND) autos (HE) estin (HE-IS-BEING) he (THE) kephale (HEAD) tou (OF-THE) somatos (BODY)

Part Three: The Blessings and Function of the Body

Christ Himself has received the grand calling, in accord with the purpose of God, to bring all back to the Father. To accomplish this great task, God has given us, the body, to Him, and resides in us as an affirmation of His success (Rom. 8:11, 2 Cor. 6:16-18, Eph. 1:18.) The terrestrial type for this is faithful Israel, who are called as the terrestrial instrument through which their Messiah will restore mankind to Yahweh. For us, among the celestials, we are to become celestial instruments through which we will eventually reconcile the celestial powers to Him.

It is hard for us to grasp how this will come to be without the training grounds we exist in now. For the present, we herald grace and peace. We sometimes succeed, and we sometimes fail, in conveying this message properly. Every success is exhilarating, and every failure a lesson. Yet we ask: a lesson for what?

Paul answers by purposing our blessings for the celestial realm. There, we will be heralding the same message of grace and peace, in the various regions of the heavens. We will succeed in our heralding above, and all whom we proclaim to will become subjected to us – therefore, to our Head, and therefore, to His Head.

All service we are entreated to provide is with a view to this goal. We are not asked to be “good” simply because it makes us appear good, or sustains our credibility in some manner on earth. Apart from God operating salvation in us, we are not credible, or good. It is because of salvation that the doors to further growth are opened to us. There is a problem prior to the cross, and we are meant to spend a lifetime meditating on that problem, so that we appreciate how the cross handles it. There is blessing following the cross, and we are meant to spend a lifetime rejoicing on these graces, so that we appreciate the One Who substantiated the cross.

We are meant, through this, to learn of God’s great goal for our sakes, to recognize the effects of our salvation, and what it means for the entire story He is telling. If He were not doing this, then there would be no reason for Him to name-drop the ecclesia in the center of one of the farthest-reaching passages in all of scripture, from the creation of all in Christ to the reconciliation of all in Christ. As said back in chapter 2, if salvation were all that God wanted to bring to our attention, the scriptures would be less than 30 pages long. There are many plot points which typify God’s character, which can only be appreciated properly through the magnifying lens of Christ’s accomplishment at Golgotha (Rom. 15:4, 2 Tim. 3:16.)

The simplest proof for this is Ephesians’ very existence. Such a letter would be unnecessary if Romans’ message of salvation were sufficient for the believer. God is elaborating on and expanding information founded in Romans. The edification of the ecclesia is so vital to Paul that he makes this known in the first Ephesian prayer, for us to receive a spirit of wisdom in realization (“ON-KNOWLEDGE”) of God (1:17.) The entire body will indeed come to a realization of Him. It is only on this premise – that of a proper understanding, a proper teaching, which will humble a believer, and free them from selfish motivation on the basis of God’s giving up His All for our sake, and bringing glory to Himself by sticking to His purpose for the eons. Only then will we reflect on the “self,” and the actions we took with a view to our own satisfaction, with the shame Paul promised (Rom. 6:21.)

Such reflection is present, even at the beginning of Ephesians (1:7)–

In [Christ] we are having the deliverance through His blood…

Such a statement necessitates the depths of our own personal unbelief against God (cf Rom. 1:18-3:24.) We would not need any “deliverance” if not for our prior enslavement to Satan, in sin. As expounded upon in Romans 3:21-26, God’s justification of the sinner cannot be well appreciated without acknowledging the overwhelming failure of the sinner to deliver himself (if such a thought even crosses their mind.)

It’s humiliating, to the nth degree. No one enjoys their infirmities on display. It is a bitter and painful experience to recall your alienation from God. The very thought weighs heavily on almost all of us wizened enough to appreciate it.

I (Stephen) may attest my personal experience as a testament to this. The revelation of my complete and utter failure as an individual to achieve a righteous life, with all experience out of tune with my inner man, and the impossibility of me achieving goodness completely shattered my self-confidence. I felt like a phoenix, waking up each morning an unknown, drifting without purpose, wondering why I am alive and for what, if anything, I may be useful for. This reflected in my self-care routine, my spending habits, my drug use, and more. I had very little reprieve from this onslaught of shame, and had no immediate way of handling it.

The problem was that I lacked perspective and purpose. Even upon recognizing my salvation, I had nary a clue what to do with myself. Sure, it is a great blessing to recognize that God forgives my offenses – that no gripe or poor action on my end has earned a grudge from my Father. But it was hard to contextualize this. I held a broad understanding of the “snatching away” (1 Thess. 4:13-17,) but little context for this, either. Only when God’s plans were made known, and His purpose with the ecclesia unfolded, was I able to sever the “shame” from my “guilt.”

Only then could I stop condemning myself, and finally begin to do – on God’s time – as Paul asked: to walk worthily of the calling (Eph. 4:1, Phil. 3:12 – not as if I am already perfected, but I am pursuing, if I may be grasping also that for which I was grasped also by Christ Jesus.) With Him revealed, the perspective is clear. I deeply lament my ever-dwindling enmity toward God. I am so grateful for His removal of many hindrances which led me to waver and abandon Him. He never lost me, however, and remained true to His choice. All so that I am super-excessively cherishing His deliverance, that I spent no more time under an insufferable master than I needed to!

Operating All

The function of the body as first intimated to us in Ephesians is found in Ephesians 1:10-12. To review:

[God is] making known to us the secret of His will (in accord with His delight, which He purposed in [Christ] ) to have an administration of the complement of the eras, to head up all in the Christ -- both that in the heavens and that on the earth -- in [Christ], in Whom our lot was cast also, being designated beforehand according to the purpose of the One Who is operating all in accord with the counsel of His will, that we should be for the laud of His glory, who are pre-expectant in the Christ.

We stress, in this reading, the above underlined and italicized portions. For us, His ecclesia, God presents the continuous and underlying Cause of all – God Himself – and unites this truth to our lot and pre-expectancy. God, then, has ensured that all are locked up in stubbornness – that all, apart from Christ, inevitably offend God – with a view to display the mercy at the center of His heart toward this same all, through Christ (Rom. 11:32.)

We stress: through Christ. Christ is specially equipped to carry out this purpose Paul speaks of – to reconcile all created in Him for His God and Father. Again, as we insist, in order to receive, all must first be estranged. Thus the character of Satan was prepared as a foil for Himself. This Satan desires the same as Christ – to bring all creation to himself, and subject all to him. And not for lack of trying! The moment Satan was given the opportunity, he tempted Christ in the wilderness in His lowest state.

God’s will – to have all creation brought back to Him – is counter-acted by Satan at every turn. It is important to note the similarity in their respective desires, that we may know that even Satan’s operations are prepared beforehand by God. His desires only emulate God’s, yet in injustice (similar to our own operations – Romans 1:18-32.)

And this must be, for God must first display what happens when the ignorant and unjust rule for themselves instead of God. Such a process is a clear theme through Israel’s history in the Old Testament, particularly throughout Judges and the Chronicles (to give many examples would further slow us down, but for a few references, 2 Chr. 12:1-8, 1 Sam. 8, Judges 14, etc.) Such a pattern should highlight God’s point, that a knowledge of good is only brought about through an experience of bitter evil (Gen. 50:20, Ecc. 1:13, 3:10, Lam. 3:36-38.) It was indeed terrifying when Yahweh destroyed Solomon’s temple, and the temple authorized by Cyrus. Yet the discipline prepared them for salvation (2 Chr. 12:8.) The contrastive service between Yahweh and the nations whom the Israelites had idolized was the difference between a corruptible lord, and the Incorruptible.

All of this dealing will only bring faithful Israel into their promised land. Presently (that is, April, 2026, at the time of this writing,) this has not yet occurred. As we have seen from Paul’s pattern, indignation and judgment precedes the salvation of the calloused. After the nation’s adjudication, the faithful will be roused at His advent and glory (Ps. 110:3.) He will become their God, and they will be His people (Jer. 31:33.)

Thus we see the broad scope of God’s operations (which were elaborated on in God’s Timeline.) Satan is to serve as a temporary contrast to God – one who usurps while operating in injustice. We have learned what it is to serve the most unjust creature – one whose intelligence is only superseded by Christ and God. This painful experience has not yet reached its climax, but prepares us duly for a great realization: that, apart from service toward God, there is only service toward this old master. In contrast to the old, the new enables a permanent and true happiness, rooted and grounded in love, and fostered in the grace blessings He has given (which we will consider shortly.)

To tie this back to the earlier portion of this chapter, we affirm that this process will inevitably become true for all. It begins with us, as a proof of grace’s success. To recall the goal of our calling:

For the applause of the glory of His grace, which graces us in the Beloved…

The ultimate goal is not to glorify the creature. The only Creature Who does deserve a glory (by God’s endeavors) is continually pointing that glory toward His God, and not Himself. We will all be cured of our stubbornness – our disinclination to enter into a divine service for God, in favor of the creation – and given the blessing of His mercy. In this, all will become for Him, because we are first for Him – even as all Israel is for God, because the Levites were first for God (cf. Rom. 15:4.)

There are indeed special blessings which come with being “for God” prior to the salvation of all. Our joyful service to Him is quite unique. When God is All in all, for example, no one will need to be “reconciled” to God, for all will be subject and death will have been abolished. Thus our service, at present, to be a part of the One completing the All in all, is unlike any other service which one will ever be able to provide to God.

This should be weighed when considering Ephesians 1, for when speaking of the goal of our choosing before the disruption of the world, God looks toward the with which grace which He specially graces us. It is imperative that He gets this right, that we realize His glory over the course of our training, along with all corrective (and approbative) measures taken at the dais of Christ, to conform us to the image of His Son.

The Beloved is Christ Jesus, of course. We are said to be in Him three times in Eph. 1:1-6. This accords with our place as sons of God, and therefore partake of His office. We are sons because we are joined to the only-begotten Son of God. Our election takes us from this Root, to grace us in Him. We now share Christ’s nobility on this premise, and serve as fruits of His growth in love (Eph. 1:6, Col. 1:13.) Hence He is referred to as the Beloved, emphasizing the greatest depth of this relationship (cf. Eph. 3:17.)

The question is begged: what is that with which we are graced? We have touched upon some of these blessings by broadly surveying Romans 8, and may even stress Paul’s summary in 8:32 – “Surely, He Who spares not His own Son, but gives Him up for us all, how shall He not, together with Him, also, be graciously granting us all?” (cf. 1 Cor. 3:22.)

Indeed, every epistle of Paul reveals a new layer or aspect of the blessings we have considered hitherto. In the immediate context of Eph. 1, we have examined our blessings. Yet we may observe a similar pattern between Christ’s Origin and Consummation, and our blessings. Where we reach back to the earliest points of contact in which God’s preparation began, we can stretch forth to the farthest payoffs in like manner.

To do this, we may look at the blessings placed in Christ before the eons, manifested now for our edification and applause. For all following along in Part III of this study, this is also the last of the list of truths we can be grasp concerning the time prior to creation’s inception:

1.    God – alone

2.    All in God

3.    The Creation of God’s Son

4.    All in Christ

5.    God chooses us in Christ

6.    The Pre-eonian gifts to the ecclesia

As with the other five truths, this truth also familiarizes us with the grand purpose of God, which, as we have seen in various verses, flows through all of His preparations for the universe, the story He tells therein, and its ultimate goal. It is the last because it is the greatest; the first four points may be rationally realized within the confines of the circumcision evangel, but the final two are undoubtedly exclusive to present truth for the ecclesia, and could not be understood apart from our place and growth within God’s dealings.

We have found that, within the primary revelation of Himself, God reveals Himself to us through the Son of His love, in any form His Son assumes over the course of the eons. As any who have been in love can say with certainty: the premise, object, and goal of love is to give, rather than to get. Paul himself relays this to us, saying, “Happy is it to give rather than to get” (Acts 20:35.)

Indeed, “giving” is God’s goal in creating us. At the zenith of our individual salvation, Paul reveals that God gave us His Son, and with Christ, He is giving believers all. Such a hefty allotment is not promised to the entire universe. No other group is ever said to be “given all,” or later, that “all is yours.”

Examination of these gifts is indeed worthy of its own special study (one which we will draft at a later time as a complement both to “God’s Timeline” and our present study.) For now, we wish to point at the timing of these gifts, and their placement. We will then further connect the gifts themselves to God’s goal with the ecclesia, and finally apply all of this to Paul’s mention of the ecclesia in Colossians 1:18, and bridge the gap between 1:15-17 and the conclusion of 1:20.

There are three particular pre-eonian grace gifts which we wish to present to the reader. The first of these is in 2 Tim. 1:9–

[God] saves us and calls us with a holy calling, not in accord with our acts, but in accord with His own purpose and the grace which is given to us in Christ Jesus before times eonian, yet now is being manifested through the advent of our Saviour, Christ Jesus…

The second may be read in Tit. 1:2–

Paul… in expectation of life eonian, which God, Who does not lie, promises before times eonian…

And the last may be found in 1 Cor. 2:6-7–

Yet wisdom are we speaking among the mature, yet a wisdom not of this eon, neither of the chief men of this eon, who are being discarded, but we are speaking God’s wisdom in a secret, wisdom which has been concealed, which God designates before -- before the eons, for our glory…

Our pre-eonian gifts may be summarized thus:

1.    Grace

2.    Life eonian

3.    Wisdom

Our three pre-eonian gifts are not at all said to originate at the cross, or before the cross, or at Jesus’ birth, or even His rousing. A clear distinction is made, especially in 2 Tim. 1:9, between the placement of the gifts in Christ Jesus, and their later manifestation after Christ’s ascension; in Christ Jesus, the title of our exalted Saviour.

This grace was first placed in Christ, as with the rest of creation. And the intimate depth of this is made known to us by its timing: before times eonian. This is repeated for our promise of life eonian (according with our choosing before the disruption of the world,) and even the wisdom which is unfolded to us through the secrets God reveals to us.

These blessings, per Paul’s pattern in Romans, cannot be given to us unless the cross first occurs. Therefore, salvation enables these gifts. Yet all God’s gifts serve a purpose; in this case, to prepare us for Christ’s allotment, as sons of God (Rom. 8:17,) which is all (1 Cor. 3:22, Heb. 1:3, Eph. 1:10.) For the accomplishment of God’s will is the primary reason for which we herald. Though the immediate place may change, surely this disposition to see the Father receive all His glory will not vanish among the celestials!

Let us begin to condense all that we have considered:

1.    God creates all in Christ, so that all belong to Christ

2.    All become estranged so that reconciliation to Christ is needed

3.    Since the crucifixion is a success, the reconciliation is guaranteed

4.    The manifestation of the ecclesia and their blessings must occur, to prove conciliation’s success

5.    Ergo: the reconciliation of all is procedural. It is happening in a sequence, which will consummate with all, apart from death, sin, and suffering, every creature being perfected in the Son of His love

The consummation of God’s purpose, to be All in all, begins with us. He will be All in us when we are snatched away to meet our Lord in the air (1 Thess. 4:13-18.) Yet we are completed for the highest honors given in Ephesians 2:5-6–

God, being rich in mercy, because of His vast love with which He loves us (we also being dead to the offenses and the lusts), (1) vivifies us together in Christ (in grace are you saved!) and (2) rouses us together and (3) seats us together among the celestials, in Christ Jesus…

For the express purpose of Eph. 2:7–

…that, in the oncoming eons, He should be displaying the transcendent riches of His grace in His kindness to us in Christ Jesus.

The function is given us: that the whole point of giving these blessings is to display this beautiful and unique requital of love from the lowest of creation, as a means of revealing Himself in full to the entire universe. He can show, not only His grace, but the transcendent riches of His grace – that is, our freedom from sin, our vivification, God’s bold show of not condemning the worst sinners in the universe, all on the basis of His Son’s righteous sacrifice for our sins, carrying us through the cross into the new life.

Our conclusion, then, is inevitable. When we join Christ in His headship over all, we begin the “payoff” to our training – the restoration of all with Christ until the conclusion of the fourth eon (cf. Acts 3:21,) and then, of course, the reconciliation of all with Christ at the conclusion of the fifth eon (Col. 1:20,) through the sharing Paul’s message among the celestials, to begin the justification and conciliation of the third heavens (2 Cor. 5:20.)

Creation to Reconciliation

With the body’s journey conveyed, its blessings recognized, its purpose revealed, and its function already in effect, and its relationship to the Head meditated on, let us return to our passage, Colossians 1:15-20. Please bear with us in grace once more–

[Christ] is the Image of the invisible God, Firstborn of every creature, for in Him is all created, that in the heavens and that on the earth, the visible and the invisible, whether thrones, or lordships, or sovereignties, or authorities, all is created through Him and for Him, and He is before all, and all has its cohesion in Him.

And He is the Head of the body, the ecclesia, Who is Sovereign; Firstborn from among the dead, that in all He may be becoming first, for in Him the entire complement delights to dwell, and through Him to reconcile all to Him (making peace through the blood of His cross,) through Him, whether those on earth or those in the heavens.

We may appreciate, then, the relationship that this beautiful phrase has to its surrounding lines. The fundamental underlying countercurrent of reconciliation is enmity. For reconciliation to become the goal, what is “good” and “peaceable” must be disrupted. As we know, through our calling, we are the first to be brought into the conciliation of God (Rom. 5:1,) and with the fulfillment of our expectation (Eph. 1:3-5,) will become the first to be fully reconciled to God.

Yet the connection of the body to the former portion of the passage is just as intimate! Note that the subject is still Christ – not the ecclesia. The whole point of the ecclesia is to laud God! How do we laud God except through Christ? Thus our recognition of Christ’s history is of vital import to those being joined to Him, with a view to praise God’s transcendent grace!

We recall to your attention Ephesians 1:22–

[God] subjects all under [Christ’s] feet, and gives [Christ], as Head over all, to the ecclesia which is His body, the complement of the One completing the all in all.

Such a statement agrees completely with Colossians 1, for it highlights the same pattern: Christ is treated as God’s Image from step one – not from conciliation onward, but in creation. His headship is not derived from us, the ecclesia, for He is already Head over all. But we, His body, derive meaning from His prior headship – without which, neither could we have such an authoritative role in the near future concerning all creation. It is because the Head over all, Who has had all created in Him, is Himself given to us, that we partake of such an authority over creation.

Yet this raises the necessary tension we have alluded to. If all is created in Him, through Him, and for Him, then the estrangement of creation is not a true repudiation of His headship, but a denial of it. Creation has been calling for His dismissal under selfish pretenses. Hence the necessity of the cross: not to grant Him authority (for it is with that authority that He came to save to begin with,) but to vindicate His authority. And this is precisely Paul’s movement in Colossians 1:18–20! He Who is had all created in Him has, post-resurrection and ascension, become Head of the body, to become the One through Whom all is reconciled. Without a prior disruption, there is no restoration or reconciliation. Without a Headship already in place, there is no premise on which Christ can restore and reconcile. Therefore the ecclesia is a display – not as the origin of His headship, but as the first resolution of the unfounded enmity toward God’s throne.

We thus see why the election of the ecclesia is of such importance. When we view the text as we are, the gravity of the authority which the ecclesia is being called to is contextualized. We are claiming the Image of God, the Form of God Who appears in the Old Testament, the audible “Yahweh,” or “Jehovah,” or whatever transliteration you may prefer, becomes Jesus Christ, “YAHWEH-Saviour Anointed,” in the New Testament. God is, of course, absolutely God. Jesus, meanwhile, is relatively God. He is showing Yahweh in the Old Testament, and it is not pillaging to the God to do this (Phil. 2:6-7.) What the absolute Deity would do in Christ’s circumstance, Christ perfectly conveys from Genesis to Revelation.

It is this Deity Whom we are being intimately joined to. We are being brought into the authority of this One, Whose majesty is only glimpsed at, even in the Hebrew text. We are being integrated into this most intimate of relationships to creation, being forever bound to the all first established in the spirit of holiness we have been joined to. It is imperative that our election occur before any creature is brought into being, for it thematically binds us to this relationship as well; without Christ’s relationship to creation, into estrangement, we could not possibly be elected to our foreknown calling!

There is, therefore, yet another aspect to this intimate progression of Colossians 1:17-18. We come to realize the Son of God as we grow aware of the depths of our salvation. In one way, we recognize His authority in awe. In another way, we recognize the need for God to create a position such as “the body,” due to the extent of the animosity creation holds toward Him. As we are perfected, we are brought into the inner recesses of God’s heart (Eph. 3:17,) to the secrets of Paul’s prison epistles – very much including Christ’s eonian sovereignty in full, and the revolving arguments He has faced from every throne, lordship, sovereignty, and authority.

When we realize the Son of God, in His various challenges from the celestial realm, we are matured (Eph. 4:13.) All will, of course, be mature when our bodies are changed (1 Cor. 15:51-53,) we meet the Lord in the air (1 Thess. 4:13-18,) and we are presented before the dais of God, and are requited for that which we put into practice during our training here on earth, whether good or bad (2 Cor. 5:9-10, Eph. 6:8, Col. 3:24-25.) Thus we are all destined to recognize this intimate tension between the Head of all, and all.

We beckon your attention once more to Ephesians 3:8-10–

To me, less than the least of all saints, was granted this grace: to bring the evangel of the untraceable riches of Christ to the nations, and to enlighten all as to what is the administration of the secret, which has been concealed from the eons in God, Who creates all, that now may be made known to the sovereignties and the authorities among the celestials, through the ecclesia, the multifarious wisdom of God, in accord with the purpose of the eons, which He makes in Christ Jesus, our Lord…

This is not a recitation of the salvation of the celestial realm. It is a revelation to the celestials of the multifarious wisdom of God, which accords with God’s purpose, to become All in all (1 Cor. 15:28, Eph. 1:23,) and to reveal the truth to all (1 Tim. 2:4,) through the ecclesia.

We are God’s achievement (Eph. 2:10.) We are not only saved, but displayed (Rom. 3:26, Eph. 2:7.) We ask, then: displayed to whom? Surely not to mankind alone, most of whom are not aware of the powers which bind us, but to the powers mentioned in the creation of all in Christ, who are the implicated recipients of us, living letters from God (2 Cor. 3:6-7,) who have been estranged from their Sovereign.

This is further affirmed for us in Eph. 6:12, in a passage which corresponds with the authority designated to us in Eph. 1:3-14–

Put on the panoply of God, to enable you to stand up to the stratagems of the Adversary, for it is not ours to wrestle with blood and flesh, but with the sovereignties, with the authorities, with the world-mights of this darkness, with the spiritual forces of wickedness among the celestials.

Here the relative arbiters of all conflict is clearly indicated. Not solely here, but the entirety of Eph. 6:10-17 present for us the “panoply” of God. This panoply serves as a figure of association; each part of the panoply is well understood to be a doctrine with which we are to be educated:

1.    Girded about our loins with truth (6:13)

2.    Wearing the cuirass of righteousness (6:13)

3.    Sandals of the evangel of peace (6:14)

4.    Shield of faith (6:15)

5.    Helmet of salvation (6:16)

6.    Sword of the spirit (which is a declaration of God) (6:16)

Together, these form the “panoply” (not the “armor,” but the panoplia, or “EVERY-IMPLEMENT.”) We are entreated to educate ourselves through the word of God, for the war we face is not one of flesh and blood, but of information, during an era where information on the spirit of God is most important. Each implement is critical. Paul occupies us with each implement with every revelation. As you can tell from our study, this topic, of Christ’s existence as the Image of God at the beginning of creation, even in foreknowledge and pre-designation, impacts each of these aspects of each piece of armor.

As we grow in Christ, our panoply slowly fits us. Our chest becomes fit for our cuirass, our feet become trained for our sandals, our arms trained to hold our sword and our shield, and our head grows big enough to fit our helmet. We become aware of our new life, and it is only as far as our appreciation for our new life in Christ goes that we can appreciate our initial inclusion in Christ. If we struggle with the “all” created in Him, then we by no means fully appreciate the “all” reconciled in Him as well. There is no way to discount this fact, of the creation of “all” in the Son of His love, without discounting the fact of the reconciliation of all in like manner.

The reconciliation stands upon the former as its only sufficient ground. If all were not truly created in Him, then reconciliation in Him through the cross becomes either partial or arbitrary (see chapter 14,) lacking the universal scope Paul so emphatically declares in Col. 1:16 and 1:20. The same “all” which derives its relative origin in the Son must find its relative consummation in that same Son, or else God’s purpose is fractured, and His counsel not purposed in Christ.

But such cannot be. Rather, as we are trained in our present walk – learning obedience, growing in discernment, being conformed to His image – we are thus “fitted” to perceive this unity: that the origin and the consummation of the eons and their purpose are bookended in Christ (Eph. 3:11, Rev. 21:6, 22:13.)

Thus both points stand firmly established: Christ’s Headship is challenged by the spiritual forces of wickedness, and vindicated by the ecclesia. The ecclesia, in turn, is brought into a conscious realization of this cosmic contention, becoming the first to apprehend, and eventually to display, the wisdom of God in resolving it.

Conclusion

We find, in conclusion, that our growth in Christ is twofold – one which attains, through conduct, to the unity of the faith, and one which attains, through revelation, a realization of the son of God. Our maturity is not merely moral, but revelatory. You cannot have one without the other. We are being brought to see that creation and reconciliation are not two disconnected acts, but serve one continuous purpose, through the same Channel – moving from origin to consummation in the Beloved. And only as we come to terms with the breadth of all creation’s beginning in Him can we begin to grasp the certainty and glory of the end that God has purposed in Him for all, for His glory.

In view of all that has been set forth—from the creation of all in Christ (Col. 1:15–17), to the present calling of His body (Rom. 8:28–30; 1 Th. 1:4–5), to the celestial blessings and election before the disruption of the world (Eph. 1:3–5), and finally to our place in the assured reconciliation of all (Col. 1:18-20; 1 Cor. 15:22–28,) we may now perceive the ecclesia in its proper place within the purpose of God. We are not an end, but a beginning. We are the complement of Christ, but the first called into the new. We are not the conclusion, but the initial proof that grace superexceeds where sin increases (Rom. 5:20–21).

Called in accord with His purpose, justified in His righteousness, and destined for glorification in His Son, we stand as the earliest exhibition of that divine operation (Rom. 8:28-30) which will one day subject all to Christ (Eph. 1:22-23, 2:6-7,) and through Him, to God, that God may be All in all (1 Cor. 15:28). Thus the Head is not without His body, nor the reconciliation without its commencement, for in us the success of the cross is first manifest, and through us the grace, life and wisdom which it effects will yet be displayed to the heavens and the earth alike (Eph. 3:10). Therefore, let us recognize both the gravity and the glory of our calling: that, being in Christ, chosen before the world’s disruption and perfected in due time, we are for Him—unto the laud of the glory of His grace, now and for the eons to come (Eph. 1:6, 12).

- GerudoKing