Normally, I would rather read one verse so that you do not get overwhelmed by too many Scriptures right at the start. Later we can read some verses, but the one verse I want to read is actually a prayer that I want to pray. If I read just one verse, then I need to pray—but I need to explain the prayer before I pray. I do not know if that makes sense.
As I was thinking about the believers I met yesterday and this morning, and some people I know, I felt that we would be okay reading a few verses. Even as we read, who knows what will happen? All of this is up to the Lord revealing Himself in us, and He does things.
What we may see is beyond what I have seen. What you may receive as we are in the Word together is up to the Lord; it does not depend upon the limitation of the speaker. As we read the Word of God, if our hearts are open to the Lord, the words of God can speak to us. He can reveal what they mean without someone making it plain and clear to us.
Yesterday, we spent some time in Ephesians 3:8 and considered how the apostle Paul was given grace to share the gospel with the nations—the gospel of the unsearchable riches of Christ.
I am a little sorry—not sorry—that I exploded too much last night and shared way too many things. We talked about God’s eternal purpose, some mysteries, and some Scriptures. But our point was not to nail everything down and make it all clear. It was more to see that, from the very beginning, when you receive the gospel and receive Christ, you receive the unsearchable riches of Christ.
This whole package of God’s purpose is purposed in Christ. That was the amazing thing I wanted to get across last night. I know some of the side things may have lost us, or perhaps you were just thinking, “Whoa, I need to think about that,” because that is how I felt.
Right now, I would like to get into some of these terms and what they mean. Hopefully, this will give us language to answer someone who asks, “What is God’s eternal purpose? What is this mystery we are reading about?”
In one sense, we may always feel, “I cannot quite explain it,” because it is unsearchable; it is beyond us. But in another sense, these are mysteries meant to be revealed now.
Also, I wanted to apologize to the translator last night. Whoever that guy was in the back, he was going at it. He was very expressive.
That was you? So fast! I thought, “There is no way he got that,” but then you got it. That was cool—just so cool.
Let us notice Ephesians 3:8:
To me, less than the least of all saints, hath this grace been given, to preach unto the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ;
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;
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,
According to the eternal purpose which He purposed in Christ Jesus our Lord;
In whom we have boldness and access in confidence through our faith in Him.
— Ephesians 3:8-12
Some translations say “hidden throughout the ages in God”; others say “in eternity.” Paul says that, through the church, the manifold wisdom of God is made known even to principalities and authorities in the heavenlies. This is according to the purpose of the ages—the eternal purpose—which He purposed in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Paul then says, “I beseech you not to faint through my tribulations for you, which is your glory.” Remember, he is in jail.
Then he begins this prayer. The reason for the prayer is everything he just mentioned: God’s purpose of the ages, Paul’s sharing of that purpose, and the making known of this mystery.
For this cause I bow my knees unto the Father,
From whom every family in heaven and on earth is named,
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;
That Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; to the end that ye, being rooted and grounded in love,
May be strong to apprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth,
And to know the love of Christ which passeth knowledge, that ye may be filled unto all the fulness of God.
— Ephesians 3:14-19
Notice this prayer: that we would be strengthened with power by His Spirit in the inner man, so that Christ may dwell through faith in our hearts, rooted and grounded in love.
There is a prayer here that we would gain spiritual strength to do this—to take the steps and walk in the works God prepared beforehand for us. This is Paul’s prayer.
To apprehend the breadth, length, depth, and height is not merely to understand something. It is to walk in it. We are strengthened in the inner man. We have the Holy Spirit dwelling deep inside, but Paul prays for an overflow—that Christ would not only dwell in us spiritually, but would overflow into the very rooms of our hearts.
You may have your own mind, but now you are discovering the mind of Christ. You may have your own will, but it is being conformed to the will of the Lord.
It is almost like the temple. The Holy of Holies contained the presence of God, but when the curtain was torn, that presence overflowed from the deepest part into the next room. It is like that with a Christian. Although the Holy Spirit dwells in our spirits, He is meant to flow beyond and truly dwell through faith in our hearts, not merely remain hidden within.
Paul prays that we would know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, and that we may be filled unto all the fullness of God.
After this prayer, Ephesians moves into its later chapters and begins the call to walk worthily of this calling. The first three chapters reveal an extremely high calling—the highest calling possible. Our calling as the church is to display what God purposed from the ages, not merely between ourselves and God, but even to the unseen realm and the angels.
It takes three chapters just to explain the calling. Then Paul prays that we would be strengthened and begin to walk in it.
The first thing Paul gets into is the church: how we walk together, stick together, and grow together. Then he becomes very specific about how we are with our spouses, our children, and even, by application, how we are at work.
That is the right prayer, and that is the right focus. Sometimes we want to get right to the practical spot: “Let us do this.” But with God, sometimes we need to come up with Him to a high mountain and simply waste some time with the Lord.
There is an earlier prayer in Ephesians. In a way, you could separate the book by these two prayers. The prayer in Ephesians 3 is an overflow of the revelation of God’s purpose. Then Paul instructs us how to walk if we have been strengthened in the inner man, strengthened by His Spirit, and have had His love flowing into our hearts.
Let us go back to Ephesians 1. Last night, it was like you could not go two verses without seeing something about God’s will. After we read that we are accepted in the Beloved, and that in Christ we have redemption through His blood and forgiveness of our offenses, Paul says in Ephesians 1:9:
Making known unto us the mystery of His will,
According to His good pleasure which He purposed in Him.
— Ephesians 1:9
I want us to catch these terms because they are biblical terms. They are right here in Scripture, and they reveal something on God’s heart: the mystery of His will, His good pleasure, and His purpose.
Mysteries in Scripture are sometimes sealed up. In Daniel, he sees things and asks, “What?” At times, God tells him to seal them up because they are for a later age. Some things become clearer in Revelation, especially things from Daniel. Yet there are mysteries of God we simply do not know.
In Revelation, John hears seven thunders. He knows what they said and is about to write it down, but God tells him not to reveal it. Some mysteries remain hidden.
But the mystery of God’s will was hidden, and then, through the death, resurrection, ascension, and outpouring of the Spirit of Christ, it was revealed. The disciples had walked with Jesus for years, but there was still an unraveling taking place. In the book of Acts, they see something, then see a little more.
One major revelation was that there is no longer a division between Jew and Gentile. There is no middle wall of partition. There is one new man. This was a huge part of the gospel Paul preached: the unsearchable riches of Christ. Everything is finished in Christ.
For us in America, this may not seem like a major issue. But the greatest division among mankind was one God Himself created. At Babel, the nations were divided. Then God took Abraham and formed one nation—Israel—among all the nations.
There was Israel, the people of God, and then the nations. It was a major division, and it seemed unbreakable because God Himself had created it.
Yet when the good news came, even that division was done away with in Christ. The mystery of His will was made known.
Peter only barely understood this in Acts. God gave him the vision of the animals and told him to eat. God wanted to save Cornelius, a Gentile, along with his household. He sent Cornelius an angel, but angels are not normally the messengers of the gospel. The angel told Cornelius to send for Simon Peter.
God wanted Peter’s beautiful feet to walk into Cornelius’s house.
Peter began speaking, and despite himself, as the good news of Jesus came out, the Lord saved them. Peter did not fully understand that Gentiles could be saved. He was not preaching, “The middle wall of partition is broken down, and we are about to baptize you.” He was not there yet.
He was simply saying, “God sent me here, and you know I do not normally eat meals with Gentiles. I do not normally step into your house. But here I am.”
Then they believed. The Holy Spirit came upon them as at Pentecost. God unleashed far more than Peter understood or explained. Peter looked at the other Jews and asked, “How can we not baptize them?” It was historic.
When Peter returned to Jerusalem, the others asked, “What just happened?” Peter told the whole story again, almost word for word. He said they had to baptize them because the Holy Spirit had been poured out on them. Then they recognized that God had granted repentance unto life to the Gentiles also.
By the time we get to Paul, this revelation is much clearer. His arrest in Jerusalem was deeply connected to the issue of Gentiles in the church. The Jews made a great fuss because Paul saw that in Christ there is neither Jew nor Gentile.
The mystery was unfolding to Paul. It was a treasure of Christ that he was discovering. The church in Jerusalem had only barely touched it.
In Acts 15, they held a major council over whether Gentiles needed to keep the law. Through fellowship, they recognized that Gentiles had been saved without keeping the law, just as the Jews had been saved by grace.
When Paul writes Ephesians and speaks of there being no division between Jews and Gentiles, it is a present revelation of the mystery. It was fresh. It was unfolding before their eyes. Paul had seen more and more, and he saw it all in Christ: the one new man.
In Ephesians 1:10, Paul continues:
Unto a dispensation of the fulness of the times, to sum up all things in Christ, the things in the heavens, and the things upon the earth; in Him, I say,
In whom also we were made a heritage, having been foreordained according to the purpose of Him who worketh all things after the counsel of His will.
— Ephesians 1:10-11
Do you hear all these purposes, wills, and mysteries? Catch this terminology. As God sums up all things in heaven and earth in Christ, He does so according to His ancient purpose. Even the inheritance we have obtained was marked out beforehand, before the world was created.
He works all things according to the counsel of His own will, so that we should be to the praise of His glory.
Then Paul says:
In whom ye also, having heard the word of the truth, the gospel of your salvation,—in whom, having also believed, ye were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise,
Which is an earnest of our inheritance, unto the redemption of God’s own possession, unto the praise of His glory.
— Ephesians 1:13-14
This verse has been special to me because I found it when I discovered that I had the Holy Spirit inside of me. What a major revelation of the riches of His grace: you have been sealed with the Holy Spirit.
This is how God will never leave you nor forsake you.
The Holy Spirit is the earnest—the guarantee—of the promise, the future, and the will of God that He will accomplish. God will make sure that the possession He has taken hold of goes all the way through. You will be there. You will be conformed to the image of Christ. You will be to the praise of His glory because you have been sealed with the Holy Spirit.
It is not possible for you not to shine the glory of Christ in the end. What God has purposed, and what you received when you received Christ, will be brought to completion.
As Philippians 1:6 says:
He who began a good work in you will perfect it until the day of Jesus Christ.
— Philippians 1:6
He will do this. He is glorious.
After all this, Paul comes to the prayer I really wanted to read today:
Wherefore I also, having heard of the faith in the Lord Jesus which is among you, and which ye show toward all the saints,
Cease not to give thanks for you, making mention of you in my prayers;
That the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give unto you a spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him;
Having the eyes of your hearts enlightened, that ye may know what is the hope of His calling, what the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints,
And what the exceeding greatness of His power to us-ward who believe, according to that working of the strength of His might.
— Ephesians 1:15-19
Here is Paul’s prayer: that God would give us a spirit of wisdom and revelation, opening the eyes of our hearts so that we would see something.
As we see, we not only see Him; we see the riches of His inheritance in the saints—in the church. You see Him, and then you see more of Him as you see Him in the church.
At first, when you are saved, you may not know where it is all going. You know you have seen some riches of His grace: “I am forgiven of my sins.” But Paul asks, “What about the riches of His inheritance?” What is God gaining in the saints? What riches is He finding, creating, and discovering in His believers?
This is not our inheritance in Christ; it is God’s inheritance in the saints. That is just crazy how it is said.
Lord, with delight and joy in our hearts, as we contemplate these things, we are so glad to be with Your saints, where You have an inheritance. We are glad to be here with Your Word open before us.
Lord, we pray according to what we have read: give us the spirit of wisdom and revelation. Open the eyes of our hearts. Open us beyond what we know, beyond what our minds comprehend, that we would see You.
We want to see You on the throne. We want to see Your glorious riches. Give us revelation. Let the clouds roll back, and make Your Son known to us.
Father, meet us now. Whether in a small way or a major way, we want to see Jesus. We quiet our hearts and fix our attention on the Leader and Completer of our faith, the Lord Jesus.
Lord, we hear Your call to behold Him—to behold the Lamb of God who has taken away our sins. We fix our hearts, our minds, and our gaze on Him. Enlighten us, Lord, in Jesus’ name. Amen.
Revelation is a biblical term, but it is also a reality essential to us as believers. It has happened to you. God has revealed something to you, whether you understood it at first or not.
Paul, speaking of his salvation in Galatians 1, says that it pleased God to reveal His Son in him. There was a revealing of Christ, and Paul saw Christ.
In Paul’s case, heaven literally seemed to roll back. He saw Jesus. Those with him saw light, and though they did not understand the words, they heard a frightening sound. Saul was blinded. The eyes of his heart were opened while his physical eyes were shut. It was a picture-perfect situation.
Yet Paul does not describe it merely as an outward event. In Galatians 1, he describes it in a way that happens to all of us: God reveals His Son in us.
Think also of Peter in Matthew 16. Jesus asked, “Who do you say that I am?” Peter answered:
Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God.
— Matthew 16:16
Jesus told him that he was blessed because flesh and blood had not revealed this to him, but the Father in heaven.
Revelation comes from God the Father. The wonderful thing is that the Father delights to show His Son. The Father wants to reveal His Son. If our hearts are open, He will reveal Christ to us.
There are large revelations in Scripture, such as salvation revelations. But there are also ordinary, regular, almost daily insights—small clouds rolling back so that we see a little bit of Christ.
Sometimes, as you are in His Word, you discover a small piece of Christ. Technically, that is a taste of revelation. God delights to do this.
It does not need to be something strange, physical, audible, or spectacular. In a normal way, God reveals. Whenever He reveals something to us, even when it helps us in a practical matter, it is always on His heart to reveal His Son through it.
In Matthew 3, when Jesus was baptized, heaven opened, the Holy Spirit came down upon Him like a dove, and the Father spoke:
This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.
— Matthew 3:17
That was revelation. Yet not everyone caught it. Some may have heard it and later thought, “That was strange.” But John the Baptist had an open heart toward God.
John said in John 1 that he did not know who the Messiah would be, but God had told him that the One upon whom he saw the Spirit descending and remaining was the One.
When the Holy Spirit came upon Jesus, John knew: “This is the Lamb of God. This is the Messiah.”
Later, when Jesus walked by John and his disciples, John was able to say:
Behold, the Lamb of God, that taketh away the sin of the world!
— John 1:29
When God wants to reveal something, we have to pause. We have to contemplate. We have to slow down. We cannot think or talk as fast as we were going last night. We have to step back and say, “Wait a second—the Lamb of God.”
Those Jews knew much about lambs, sacrifices, and Passover. John’s simple proclamation gave them something to behold.
The next day he added only half a sentence:
Behold, the Lamb of God, that taketh away the sin of the world!
— John 1:29
Then some of John’s disciples left him and began to follow Jesus. That was what John had been preparing them for. Jesus turned and asked them, “What seek ye?” They asked, “Where abidest Thou?” He answered, “Come, and ye shall see.”
Revelation came to them. They saw Him. They had beheld Him.
John the apostle describes this beholding in John 1:14:
And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us,
And we beheld His glory, glory as of the only begotten from the Father,
Full of grace and truth.
— John 1:14
We have beheld His glory. We have contemplated His glory. We took a step back and stared at Him—not merely physically, but spiritually. The eyes of our hearts were opened, and we saw the glory of the only begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth.
That is what happens when God reveals something. There is a beholding that needs to happen.
As we read verses and talk together this weekend about God’s purpose, we need to take a step back. Something may catch you, and our prayer is, “God, give me the spirit of wisdom and revelation. Open the eyes of my heart.”
It is good to understand teaching. For example, it is helpful to understand that what God is doing in all creation is not merely about me. The cross is far beyond just me, though the greatness of His love is such that we can say He would have died for you personally.
But in another sense, what He is doing on the cross is far beyond any one of us. We are grateful to have a small part in this immense purpose of God.
Still, the prayer must be personal and present: “Lord, open our eyes.” As we handle the Word of truth, enlightenment comes to us. Even if it is only a little, we see something beyond.
You take a step back and see that His purpose from eternity is bound up in His Son. Then something you have known in the back of your heart becomes clear. When you love Jesus, when you sing a worship song, and when you are swept into worship, you realize why it is so special to behold Jesus: He is the most special thing to the Father.
When He shows us Jesus, the heart of God is touched. He says, “Yes, that is it. That is what I am after. This is what I want you to see. This is what I want you to hear.”
Sometimes we need to come away from our normal routines. We need a weekend away, perhaps on a little mountain—though this may be more of a mountain for the septic tank.
Peter had received revelation in Matthew 16, but then in Matthew 17, Jesus took Peter, James, and John up the mountain.
Christ is everything. Even while He walked on earth, He was the eternal Word of God. All creation came through Him. As John 1 says, He was with God in the beginning, and He was God. He came and dwelt among us.
If you behold Him, you see the glory of the only begotten Son. Yet there was still more glory to behold. He was, in a sense, hiding His glory. He was a real man walking around, but within Him was the King of glory, the Creator of all creation, and the life of all mankind.
People saw only slight rays of light as He walked among mankind. Those who saw even a little light sometimes wanted to move away because their sins were exposed. Men loved darkness rather than light.
Jesus was not walking around slaying everyone with the full brilliance of His glory. It was as though a little ray of light slipped out here and there. He sneezes, and a ray of glory comes out; one person gets saved, and another person suddenly needs to go to the bathroom.
Sometimes, when the light of the gospel begins to shine, people get uncomfortable. Their conscience is being touched. They begin to wiggle around and think, “Maybe I should go.” No—it is not your stomach. It is your conscience. Stay. That is a light shining.
John 1 says that He came unto His own, and His own received Him not. The Creator came to His creatures, and His creatures ran from Him. Yet whoever received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God.
Then, on the mountain, more glory was revealed.
Jesus, in His normal clothing, began to shine with a brightness beyond what we are accustomed to—the Shekinah glory of God, a brightness one can scarcely look upon.
The disciples saw His majesty. Peter later described this in 2 Peter 1. He said that they had not followed cleverly devised fables, but had been eyewitnesses of Christ’s majesty. They saw His kingdom and His kingly glory on the mountain.
For we did not follow cunningly devised fables, when we made known unto you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eyewitnesses of His majesty.
— 2 Peter 1:16
They saw the King of kings, the King of the kingdom of heaven. They saw a glimpse of His future glory. God, for a moment, revealed something of the glory bound up in His Son.
Then they saw Moses and Elijah. Peter, beholding the glory of the Son of God, said, “I have a good idea. Let us make some tents. Let us stay here on the mountain. This conference can continue for a while, because this is the best.”
It makes sense to me.
But God removed Moses and Elijah. You can hang on to Moses’ staff, or Elijah’s mantle, but when God takes them away, you cannot hold on.
Then God said again:
This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased; hear ye Him.
— Matthew 17:5
He added, “Hear Him.” You have seen His majesty; now let Jesus be your Lord. Listen to Him. Obey Him.
When God reveals something, there is something for us to do based upon what He has revealed. Sometimes revelation slays us. Sometimes it may seem minor, but we think, “Whoa—Christ.”
Do not dismiss the smallest revealing of Christ. Treasure it. There are unsearchable riches in Christ, and as we search and find Him, something may change our lives.
This is why Paul prayed that we would not merely receive teaching or understand something new. It is not merely, “Okay, there is a bigger picture now.” It is, “God, reveal Christ. Open the eyes of our hearts that we may see Him in His glory.”
By being born again, a taste of revelation has already happened. Without the Father revealing His Son, you would not be born again.
When I was first saved, I did not know that God had revealed Christ to me. I simply knew that He showed me some aspect of His grace. I saw that if I repented of my sins and prayed, it would actually work because Jesus had really died for me.
I saw a taste of His work on the cross. I did not see the physical face of Jesus, but I did see Christ, just barely.
As I began following Him and reading the Gospels, I started seeing Jesus. I thought, “Jesus is awesome.”
Within my first year of being saved, some other high schoolers and I decided to read the Bible in one week. We called it “Crave,” based on the thought that newborn babes crave the Word. We gathered in a barn a little larger than this one.
Day and night, people rotated through reading Scripture aloud. We were in pajamas and everything. We had to get certain guys to read portions of the Old Testament because none of us could pronounce the names. We found a Hebrew guy for that.
It was so cool.
At the point of the cross, we watched an old video based directly on the Gospel of Matthew. Jesus was on the cross, suffering and speaking the words recorded in Matthew.
Something unlocked in the eyes of my heart. Although I had seen Christ in one sense, this was my first glimpse of the real face of Jesus.
I sat there and beheld Him on the cross. I was overwhelmed because I saw Jesus. Everything I had learned about salvation had been good, but now I saw Jesus.
It was as if God took Moses and Elijah away from me and said, “Here is My Son.”
All of us saw the film. All of us saw the actor and heard the Scriptures. But I was there, hiding in the room, pouring out tears, because I saw Jesus.
I remember it. I touched something beyond what I had learned because I touched the Person.
That is when teaching and understanding are lifted up. God reveals His Son.
It affected me. Some things I was struggling with became easy to drop. They were simply gone. Yet I do not remember every detail of what happened. I remember Jesus.
In Isaiah 6, Isaiah sees the Lord in the temple and is undone. He says:
Woe is me! for I am undone; because I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips:
For mine eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts.
— Isaiah 6:5
This is a prophet of God, a man who had been telling people to get right, and yet when he sees God’s glory, he is undone.
Then the coal of fire touches his lips.
That is the way the Lord works. Whether the revelation is large, as with Isaiah, or something simple, if you see Christ, the Lord wants to cleanse you. He wants to open your mouth. He wants to send you.
After Isaiah’s lips were cleansed, the Lord asked whom He would send. Isaiah responded:
Here am I; send me.
— Isaiah 6:8
A revelation of Christ brings cleansing, and cleansing brings response. Something must be shared.
This kind of revelation comes from the Lord Himself. When it comes, some part of us is undone. It does not matter how well you think you are doing today—you are a little undone.
You may not call it that. You may just feel upgraded. You may not even know that the blood cleansed you, but some darkness fades away as the blood cleanses you and you see more of Christ.
That is what is meant to happen.
I prepared slides and more clarity to explain these things, but I do not want to go too far with it. I mainly wanted to testify of a revealing of Christ. Still, here is something brief that may help us remember God’s purpose.
From your perspective, God’s eternal purpose is not a bad thing—it is a God thing. In Romans 8, we see salvation from the standpoint of being justified, sanctified, and glorified.
And we know that to them that love God all things work together for good, even to them that are called according to His purpose.
— Romans 8:28
Then Paul says:
For whom He foreknew, He also foreordained to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the firstborn among many brethren.
— Romans 8:29
To simplify it: from your perspective, God’s will is that you would be conformed to the image of His Son.
He is using everything in your life for this purpose. He loved you, and you love Him because He first loved you. He is working even the hard things and the wonderful things for one purpose: to conform you to the image of His Son.
The only begotten Son of God becomes the firstborn among many brethren.
Romans 8 says all creation is groaning and waiting for the revelation of the sons of God. As God conforms us to the image of Christ, He reveals the Son of God in us.
Man was made in the image of God, and God is bringing that purpose full circle. You were meant to shine Christ. You were meant to express the glory of God. That is how you were created to be.
There is another perspective, one Ephesians emphasizes: the largeness of what God is doing among all of us.
God’s purpose has to do with Christ and the church. It is not merely Christ and this church; it is Christ and the glorious church.
In Ephesians 5, while speaking about husbands and wives, Paul says that he is speaking of a great mystery—Christ and the church. Christ gave Himself for the church. He washes her with the water of the Word and will present her to Himself glorious, without spot or wrinkle.
Throughout Ephesians, we see the church: the body growing up into the Head, the house of God, the bride. Christ is meant to shine and be fully expressed through the church.
There is the Head, and there is the body of Christ, which is the church. The body is meant to be connected to the Head.
One thing God is doing is preparing a bride for His Son. God did not merely want creatures to entertain Him. He desired the height of creation: one who would be bone of His bones and flesh of His flesh, sharing the same life.
In Christ Jesus, God is creating us. Old things pass away, and Christ becomes our life. That is why, if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation. The church will be glorious because it will be full of Christ.
God’s eternal purpose can be described as Christ and the church. He desires this church experience. At the end of the Bible, this is what we see: the New Jerusalem coming down. This is what God has been after from the beginning.
From the perspective of all creation, we can take a step back. God creates everything; angels fall, mankind falls, and then God redeems at the cross. He matures us, saves us completely, and defeats His enemies.
At the end, all creation is made new. In its newness, everything is summed up in Christ.
To sum up all things in Christ, the things in the heavens, and the things upon the earth.
— Ephesians 1:10
One reason the Father desired all creation was that all creation would shine Christ—would shine the Son of God and be summed up in Christ. The heavens, the earth, everything.
All things were created through the Word of God, through the Son of God, because everything is coming back to Him.
So, when we speak of God’s eternal purpose, we can say:
I want to say something about God revealing something to us and changing our lives. We pray for revelation because God truly wants to do something.
As a Christian, after following the Lord for some years, He kept revealing treasures of His grace. I had seen Christ spiritually. I loved the Lord Jesus, and in my pursuit, I wanted to give Him everything. I wanted Jesus to be my Lord one hundred percent.
As I served the Lord, people started putting titles on me. I became an intern pastor, working and preaching in different places. While I was in college, I often attended training at my denomination’s headquarters.
During that time, the Lord brought me deeper into following Jesus. He began showing me that some of my works were not part of the new creation. Some were carnal. I began repenting and saying, “Lord, I just want Christ.”
I had discovered that the church is not the building or the organization. That was a big discovery. We read 1 Corinthians 12 and saw that we are body parts, members of the body of Christ.
We were accidentally experiencing church life. We were “illegally” fellowshipping outside church meetings and Bible studies. We would gather with believers and ask, “What have you found of Christ? Let us read the Bible together just for fun.”
We were churching it, and we knew we were churching it. It was really exciting.
Then, in my normal morning reading time, the Word came to me. I had memorized the fruit of the Spirit in Galatians 5—a really cool thing to memorize. But the Lord led me to memorize the works of the flesh, which was less fun.
One of the works of the flesh that shocked me was divisions among us. It is a carnal thing.
I thought, “This is a work of the flesh, because I am in a division—a denomination.”
Then I came to 1 Corinthians 1:
Now I beseech you, brethren, through the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that ye all speak the same thing, and that there be no divisions among you.
— 1 Corinthians 1:10
Paul says that some declared, “I am of Paul,” “I am of Apollos,” “I am of Cephas,” or “I am of Christ.” Then he asks:
Is Christ divided? Was Paul crucified for you? Or were ye baptized into the name of Paul?
— 1 Corinthians 1:13
The Lord spoke to me in my morning time: “Jeffrey, you are carnal, because you are all into your division.”
This was not some massive, spectacular revelation. It was a simple revelation of God saying, “You need to obey something.”
I was at a pastor’s conference in my denomination with men I really liked. The lead speaker told a clever joke about how many people from various denominations it takes to change a light bulb. Everyone was laughing.
There was nothing wrong with the joke. But for me, after the Lord had spoken to me that morning, I heard, “Are ye not yet carnal?” It was so loud to me.
In obedience to the Lord, I told a pastor as we traveled back, “I have to remove my name from the membership list. I am a member in heaven, but I have to stop being a member of this denomination.”
It was a big shock and a major life change. It changed my career and affected my family and friends.
Because of my leadership position, I was asked not to fellowship with other believers in the denomination. I could talk to them, but not about Jesus.
At that time, you could not talk to me about the weather for more than one sentence before I said, “Do you know who created that?” If you talked about football, I might say, “It is all going to burn.” I had such a strange attitude.
My housemates and friends were in that denomination, and suddenly I could not talk with them freely. The Lord was so close to me, though. Things He had taught me about the cross and brokenness came alive because I felt so alone.
I was hiding, reading the Bible, reading every book I could find, searching the Lord, and making little discoveries. Meanwhile, my friends were warned not to talk to Jeff Pittman because he might start his own denomination—the very thing I did not want to do.
My wife, Catherine, was in New York and part of that denomination. People warned her, “Watch out for Jeff Pittman. He is going to make a denomination out of all the young people.” Thankfully, she eventually talked to me.
I remember this as though it were yesterday. I was on the floor, and the Lord had been near to me personally, showing me His face. In whatever suffering I was going through, I was beginning to understand fellowship in the sufferings of Christ.
Pastors would tell me, “You may be right that division is carnal, but what are you going to do? You cannot do anything about it.”
I said, “I do not know what I am going to do, but I cannot be in a division because it is carnal. I can fellowship with believers. I will find other believers who are just believers.”
They would say, “You are just going to create another division.” I said, “No, there has to be a way.”
Before I discovered that believers can simply gather in the Lord’s name, I was reading Ephesians 5, where Paul says that he is speaking of a great mystery—Christ and the church.
Then I began reading Revelation 21 and Revelation 22. If you have not read them recently, go read what is going to happen.
I saw the glorious church without spot or wrinkle. I saw the Lamb of God and His bride coming down. She was shining, all glorious, and He was pleased. The wife of the Lamb came down.
This is the New Jerusalem. Yet it is all Christ. The light of the whole city is not the sun; it is the Lamb. He is in the center. There is no temple because the whole thing is filled with His presence. It is all His house.
We are living stones built together as a habitation for God. In that city, the gold is not ordinary gold—it is transparent gold.
I saw the shining of Christ in the center, shining through the stones. I saw Christ within the stones. There were no extra colors, no extra dirt. It was all Christ.
I saw the glorious church that is on His heart. It was as though He said, “This is My church, without spot or wrinkle. It is not what you think it has been. It is no one according to the flesh. In the end, they will all look like this, and they will shine My Son.”
It was like the Father saying to the disciples, “This is My Son; hear Him.” He was saying, “This is it. This is the church.”
The eyes of my heart were opened.
It was not separate from Christ. You have to know that the glory was the glory of Christ. That was what undid me.
It was not, “Okay, He will build His church and make it better and better.” It was that as believers are conformed to the image of Christ and put together, you have Christ in Christ, in Christ, in Christ—an overwhelming glory that all creation sees.
The centerpiece of all creation is the New Jerusalem, and its centerpiece is the Lamb. The New Jerusalem expresses the Lamb as nothing else could.
She is bone of His bones and flesh of His flesh. She is one with Him. The two become one flesh.
You have Christ and the glorious church.
As I saw that, I sat back. I was on the floor, looking into this, discovering it, and I said, “This is it, Lord. I do not want anything else. This is what I want. This is what I am after.”
All this happened because I was trying to obey concerning the church, but I had no idea what the church really was. I asked, “How do we do church without starting another division? How do I do this the right way and be one with all God’s people?”
God removed all my questions, as if He removed Moses and Elijah. It was not about my practice or how we would go forward. He simply said, “Look what I am doing.”
When I saw that, all my questions were answered. If anything has to do with that glory, that is what I am about. I want to see that glory.
If it must be expressed in a limited way now, with whoever I can find, then I will pursue with those who call on the Lord out of a pure heart.
But flee youthful lusts, and follow after righteousness, faith, love, peace, with them that call on the Lord out of a pure heart.
— 2 Timothy 2:22
We keep finding believers so that we can pursue the Lord together.
That heavenly vision—the purpose of God, the mystery of Christ and the church—changed my life.
Whenever the Lord reveals Himself to us, we need to take a step back. He works inside us. Our lips are cleansed, our hands are cleansed, and our hearts are cleansed. Then, based on that revelation, He says, “Go. Let us do this.”
Let us pray together and look to the Lord to reveal His Son in us afresh.
Lord, we come to You with our hearts trembling before You. We want to see Jesus. We pray for all of us that the eyes of our hearts would be opened.
Lord, we have all seen You, and we want to know You more. Open our eyes. Let heaven be rolled back. Rend the heavens, come down, fill this place, and fill our hearts with the glory of the only begotten.
Lord, fill areas of our hearts that have not yet been filled. Strengthen us in the inner man, that we would walk in the steps to which You are calling us.
Fill our mouths, that utterance would be given to us. As we open our mouths, may we boldly make known the mystery of the gospel.
Lord, we commit ourselves to You. We worship You, and we fix our gaze on You, in Jesus’ name. Amen.