Ephesians 3: The Sentence That Waits Until Verse 14

And that's why the chapter opens the way it does, with "For this cause" and nothing to hang it on. Verse 1 gets as far as "I Paul, the prisoner of Jesus Christ for you Gentiles," and stops. There's no verb. The reader is waiting to hear what Paul did or wanted or asked for on account of this cause, and what turns up in verse 2 is "If ye have heard," which is a different sentence altogether.

The cause itself is whatever he finished saying at the end of chapter 2, where the Gentile readers are "builded together for an habitation of God through the Spirit" (Ephesians 2:22). He doesn't come back to the thought until verse 14, where the same three words open again and this time a verb shows up: "For this cause I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ." Twelve verses sit between the two (verses 2 through 13 if you're counting along) and I've read enough half-finished sentences in design docs to know the usual reason, which is that the writer remembered something the reader needed first.

What does Paul say in the twelve verses he stuck in the middle?

What he puts in there is the mystery, and he takes his time getting to it. Verse 3 has him reminding them that "by revelation he made known unto me the mystery," and then the verse opens a parenthesis of its own, "as I wrote afore in few words." I take that to mean he's pointing back at what he's already said in this letter, though the verse doesn't tell us where. Verse 4 gives the reason for the reminder: so that when they read, they "may understand my knowledge in the mystery of Christ."

The mystery itself turns out to be shorter than the build-up suggests.

That the Gentiles should be fellowheirs, and of the same body, and partakers of his promise in Christ by the gospel. (Ephesians 3:6)

That's the whole of it, three descriptions of the same fact, and each is about sitting down with the rest of the family: fellowheirs, the same body, partakers. Paul's word "mystery" is nothing like ours. When I say something is a mystery I mean nobody has worked it out. Paul uses it for a thing that was kept back and has now been told, and verse 5 says exactly when and to whom, "as it is now revealed unto his holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit." Apostles and prophets receiving a thing the world hadn't had before is a sentence I can read with some familiarity on a Sunday.

What I'd rather linger on is verse 9, because it undoes a reading a lot of us carry around without checking. If all you know about the Gentile question is the argument in Galatians, with Peter backing away from the table at Antioch once the men from James arrived (I wrote that one up under Galatians 2), you could come away thinking inclusion was an adjustment the early church made under pressure. Verse 9 says the fellowship of the mystery "from the beginning of the world hath been hid in God, who created all things by Jesus Christ." The word is hid, and hid is a long way from missing. A drawer you haven't opened yet still had the contents in it when it was built. Verse 11 calls the whole arrangement "the eternal purpose which he purposed in Christ Jesus our Lord," which puts the Gentiles in the original plans.

Back in verse 8 Paul calls himself "less than the least of all saints" and in the same sentence says the grace given him is "that I should preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ." Those two halves sit in one verse with no apology between them.

The verse about who's watching

Of everything in this chapter, verse 10 is the one I understand least, and I'll set it down here before saying anything about it.

To the intent that now unto the principalities and powers in heavenly places might be known by the church the manifold wisdom of God. (Ephesians 3:10)

Who the principalities and powers are, the chapter doesn't stop to say. What the verse does say is plain enough. Something about God's wisdom is being made known, it's being made known through the church, and the audience is not on earth. The church in question is the one he's just described, a body made of people who weren't supposed to share a table. If that's the display, then the display is the congregation, and the sermon and the building and the talks have nothing to do with it. What gets shown is who ended up sitting in the pews together.

It's an uncomfortable verse to take seriously on a Monday after a hard Sunday in a ward, when the people in the pews felt a lot more like an accident than a demonstration. Paul wrote it anyway, and I'd guess he'd had a few Sundays like that himself.

Verses 12 and 13 close out the detour. Verse 12 says "we have boldness and access with confidence by the faith of him," and verse 13 asks the Ephesians not to lose heart over his tribulations "for you, which is your glory." He's writing from prison and he tells them his troubles are something they have a share in. That's the last thing before he goes back to the sentence he started.

What does the prayer ask for in Ephesians 3:14-19?

The posture comes first, since he says "I bow my knees" and then he names who he's bowing to: the Father "of whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named." A family that has one name and spans heaven and earth is a strange thing to say to a church that had just spent a generation arguing over who counted. It's also the one place in the chapter where Paul stops talking about what the Gentiles are and says whose they are.

Once he's back at his knees the prayer comes in a rush, every clause leaning on the one before it. He asks that they be strengthened "with might by his Spirit in the inner man," that Christ would dwell "in your hearts by faith," and that they'd be "rooted and grounded in love" before he gets to the request the rest was building toward.

May be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height; And to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, that ye might be filled with all the fulness of God. (Ephesians 3:18-19)

Verse 18 gives four dimensions and never says what they're the dimensions of. When I draw up a cabinet for the shop, say a 34 1/2 inch tall base cabinet in three quarter inch plywood, every dimension line ends on an edge of a particular part, and a line that ends on nothing gets circled in red before the saw is on. Most readers supply the love of Christ from the next verse. It's a good supply and may be exactly what Paul meant, but the grammar hands us the dimensions first and the love only after an "and," and I think the reading holds up better if you leave the gap showing for a second before you fill it in. Whatever the thing is, it has height and depth and it's too large to take in from a single position.

That may be why the verse says "with all saints." The "ye" running through this prayer is plural, and the comprehending is something they do alongside everyone else, from different seats.

Then the part that sounds like a contradiction, where they're asked to know a love that "passeth knowledge." Just ahead of it in verse 18 he prays they'd be able to comprehend, so he wants them to know it, and he's also telling them they won't reach the far wall. I don't know how a man holds both in one prayer. He seems to have managed it without any trouble, which is more than I can say for most of my own prayers, where I want the whole answer first. The prayer ends in verse 19 on being "filled with all the fulness of God," and after four dimensions that nobody can measure, the word fulness comes as a relief to anyone who likes a container with a stated capacity.

The doxology, and where it lands

The last two verses are a single sentence and they go by fast.

Now unto him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us, unto him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus throughout all ages, world without end. Amen. (Ephesians 3:20-21)

He's just asked for strength, indwelling, roots, comprehension and fullness, which is a lot to put in one request, and he closes by saying God can do beyond all that. The power is described as one that "worketh in us," and the glory is "in the church," which is where verse 10 put the display. The chapter that opens with a detour closes at the place the detour was about.

Back in chapter 1 Paul slid from "we" to "ye also" without telling anybody, and I wrote about that in Ephesians 1 and the Small Word That Changes the Pronoun. By chapter 3 he's stopped sliding. The "us" in verse 20 includes the people he began the chapter by calling "you Gentiles."

Frequently Asked Questions

What does "mystery" mean in Ephesians 3?

Something that was kept back and has now been told. Paul states it outright in verse 6, so there's nothing left to solve, and if you go looking for a hidden meaning behind it you'll walk right past the one on the page.

Why does Paul call himself "less than the least of all saints"?

Nobody can say for sure what he had in mind, since he gives no reason. The part I'd watch is what the verse does next, which is hand him a job. Whatever he thought of himself, the work wasn't waiting on his opinion.

Do the breadth, length, depth and height each stand for something?

People assign them meanings, and a few of those I've liked. The verse gives you no key though, so I hold them loosely. The old reading that makes them the shape of the cross is tidy and might be right, and I'd still sooner mention it than build on it.

If Christ's love "passeth knowledge," why try to understand it?

Because the same verse asks them to comprehend it. Paul prays for both in one breath, and I take that as permission to keep going without expecting to finish.

I've spent most of the day on one sentence that took fourteen verses to end. The cooler in the cabin is down to a single can of root beer, and I've decided it's mine.

— D.