Ephesians 3

The Secret Plan of God

1-3 This is why I, Paul, am in jail for Christ, having taken up the cause of you outsiders, so-called. I take it that you're familiar with the part I was given in God's plan for including everybody. I got the inside story on this from God himself, as I just wrote you in brief.

4-6 As you read over what I have written to you, you'll be able to see for yourselves into the mystery of Christ. None of our ancestors understood this. Only in our time has it been made clear by God's Spirit through his holy apostles and prophets of this new order. The mystery is that people who have never heard of God and those who have heard of him all their lives (what I've been calling outsiders and insiders) stand on the same ground before God. They get the same offer, same help, same promises in Christ Jesus. The Message is accessible and welcoming to everyone, across the board.

7-8 This is my life work: helping people understand and respond to this Message. It came as a sheer gift to me, a real surprise, God handling all the details. When it came to presenting the Message to people who had no background in God's way, I was the least qualified of any of the available Christians. God saw to it that I was equipped, but you can be sure that it had nothing to do with my natural abilities.

9-10 And so here I am, preaching and writing about things that are way over my head, the inexhaustible riches and generosity of Christ. My task is to bring out in the open and make plain what God, who created all this in the first place, has been doing in secret and behind the scenes all along. Through followers of Jesus like yourselves gathered in churches, this extraordinary plan of God is becoming known and talked about even among the angels!

11-13 All this is proceeding along lines planned all along by God and then executed in Christ Jesus. When we trust in him, we're free to say whatever needs to be said, bold to go wherever we need to go. So don't let my present trouble on your behalf get you down. Be proud!

14-19 My response is to get down on my knees before the Father, this magnificent Father who parcels out all heaven and earth. I ask him to strengthen you by his Spirit—not a brute strength but a glorious inner strength—that Christ will live in you as you open the door and invite him in. And I ask him that with both feet planted firmly on love, you'll be able to take in with all followers of Jesus the extravagant dimensions of Christ's love. Reach out and experience the breadth! Test its length! Plumb the depths! Rise to the heights! Live full lives, full in the fullness of God.

20-21 God can do anything, you know—far more than you could ever imagine or guess or request in your wildest dreams! He does it not by pushing us around but by working within us, his Spirit deeply and gently within us.
Glory to God in the church! Glory to God in the Messiah, in Jesus! Glory down all the generations! Glory through all millennia! Oh, yes!

Ephesians 3

1 For this cause I Paul, the prisoner of Christ Jesus in behalf of you Gentiles,--2 if so be that ye have heard of the dispensation of that grace of God which was given me to you-ward;3 how that by revelation was made known unto me the mystery, as I wrote before in few words,4 whereby, when ye read, ye can perceive my understanding in the mystery of Christ;5 which in other generations was not made known unto the sons of men, as it hath now been revealed unto his holy apostles and prophets in the Spirit;6 to wit, that the Gentiles are fellow-heirs, and fellow-members of the body, and fellow-partakers of the promise in Christ Jesus through the gospel,7 whereof I was made a minister, according to the gift of that grace of God which was given me according to the working of his power.8 Unto me, who am less than the least of all saints, was this grace given, to preach unto the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ;9 and to make all men see what is the dispensation of the mystery which for ages hath been hid in God who created all things;10 to the intent that now unto the principalities and the powers in the heavenly places might be made known through the church the manifold wisdom of God,11 according to the eternal purpose which he purposed in Christ Jesus our Lord:12 in whom we have boldness and access in confidence through our faith in him.13 Wherefore I ask that ye may not faint at my tribulations for you, which are your glory.14 For this cause I bow my knees unto the Father,15 from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named,16 that he would grant you, according to the riches of his glory, that ye may be strengthened with power through his Spirit in the inward man;17 that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; to the end that ye, being rooted and grounded in love,18 may be strong to apprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth,19 and to know the love of Christ which passeth knowledge, that ye may be filled unto all the fulness of God.20 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,21 unto him be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus unto all generations for ever and ever. Amen.