A Prisoner of Jesus Christ, Not Rome

Ephesians 3:2 – 13 
 
The Ephesian Epistle majors on reconciliation and unity, both towards God and men, with the theological and applicative underpinnings focused on the nature and purpose of the church, the body of Christ. But as with all things Divine, the Kingdom’s perception of realities is at odds with what appears customary to us. Paul surfaced two such enigmas; his special divine gifting in reaching the Gentiles, and his broader concerns for the Ephesians in their adverse views on his continued incarceration. Both however, impact our acuity of normative Christian living.
 
Given his imprisonment in Rome where this letter was penned, it hardly seemed a triumphal testimony of heavenly power at work in the eyes of the believers (Eph 3:1,13). But Paul was not apologetic about his chains; instead, he explicitly portrays himself as a prisoner of the Lord. Is it not perceptually preferable to be in the latter than a prisoner of Rome? Jesus’ own passage through time that concluded with His crucifixion, invariably exemplified this paradoxical logic too: victory through apparent defeat, and when I am weak, then I am strong (c.f., Ps 91:1-10; 1 Cor 1:27-31; Eph 1:19-20). It was this fact that Paul was endeavouring to communicate to reassure the Ephesians, that despite his restricted circumstances, he was victorious in God. This insightful realization in the sovereignty of God over one’s life remains unchanged when persecution is unavoidable (cf., 2 Tim 3:12). As suffering comes along, Paul walks through it with Him, as His servant (Eph 3: 7-8, ‘a servant,’ ‘very least of all the saints’), with a mindset that posited how he could serve God better despite his constraints. The fact was Paul seemed upbeat about the opportunities available to him and his team of helpers in prison. This challenges us in our witness in an environment comparatively unrestrained in movement and expression. 
 
During his imprisonment, Paul recollected on his divine calling in bringing the gospel to the Ephesian Gentiles (Eph 3:4-9), which he referenced as the mystery of God, given to him by the grace of God’s power. This ‘mystery’ is the very constituent of the church. There was present between the Jews and the Gentiles of Paul’s day, a colossal racial and cultural barrier; illustrated by the disciples’ own deeply prejudicial perspective (Acts 9:1-2; cf., Peter in Acts 10:9-23), with no place within their Jewish world, even as Christians, for the Gentiles! In which case, divisiveness along ethnic lines would have been the norm, but for the eternal purpose of God in moulding the new man in Christ, where “the Gentiles are fellow heirs and fellow members of the body, and fellow partakers of the promise in Christ Jesus through the gospel” (Eph 3:6-7). God miraculously transformed and chose Paul to overcome this obstacle (Eph 3:7) in giving expression to the early church a degree of inclusivity. There is an implied significance in this struggle, in that it was the Divine intention to witness to the evil principalities and powers that despite the Adamic fall, the body of Christ is to be the guiding light for human diversity and unity in this deign age of divisiveness (Eph 3:9-10). 
 
Realistic perceptions are critical in our expressed faith. And when perceptions are ungrounded in a devoted relationship with our Lord, they become positively naive and may even be spurious. Like Paul, to uphold a heavenly testimony on earth would require a Spirit-filled inside-out transformation of our heart and mind, with a consistent reversal of worldly principles for Kingdom’s priorities (Matt. 6:33).