The Church in God’s Cosmic Plan

The Church’s one foundation is Jesus Christ her Lord. The Church is his bride, his body and his family. The Church is the location of his central activity to fulfil his cosmic plans.

The Meaning of the word “Church” Greek ecclesia = assembly. It is not a cultic or religious word. It can be used of a political or union gathering (cf Acts 19) This article draws on Paul’s Letter to the Ephesians to make the following points.

The Church is Universal and Local at the same time.
It is useful to think of every local “church” as a manifestation of the otherwise invisible catholic church. “catholic” means “universal”. The true “universal” church is invisible to the senses, but is experienced by faith every time a local Christian church meets. Universal references in Ephesians: 1: 18, 24). Local references: 4: 15,16

The Church is the “one new person, ” that is trans-ethnic.
Some actual churches and even confederations of churches fail to meet this criterion of church. But you will find it in Ephesians 2: 15

The Church has cosmic value in the fulfilment of God’s Plan.
Ephesians 1: 20-23 pictures “the church” in the centre of the outworking of God's restoration plans for the universe.

Christ Founded the Church, but it stands of the Foundation of his Word.
So he is the cap stone, and under him are the prophets and apostles. Christ superintends the church on the basis of the Old Testament prophetic preparation and of the New Testament apostolic fulfilment.

The Church is the Intimate Bride of Christ.
The Church submits to headship. The congregation is enriched, beautified and protected by its Divine Husband. (5: 21-32) He purchased it with the dowry of his blood. (5: 25 and 1: 7)

The Church is the agency which God uses to parade his manifold wisdom before the spiritual principalities and powers.
The Church is already in heaven but is still upon the earth. From heaven it has dominion over the principalities and powers, and is able in some measure to enforce this supremacy upon the earth, though not entirely until the return of Christ.( 3: 10)

The Church is Often Under Attack.
Though with a scornful wonder Men see her sore distressed. By schisms rent asunder, By heresies distressed, Of peace for evermore… (Samuel Sebastian Wesley 1810-7)
The Church suffers by persecution, by its own sin by contempt from within its own ranks and by rejection of and contempt for the Scriptures. It also suffers from revisionism (“liberal theology”), by rejection of authority and by strife- in which the unbeliever is able to make the false conclusion that the God whom we worship was too small to create the universe and too mean to send his Son to make the atoning sacrifice!

The Church can Survive all Attack and fulfil its part in God’s Plan.
Resist the cunning of deceitful people (4: 14) Take the whole armour of God to stand against the demonic forces of evil.( 6: 10-18). Chapters 4 and 5 tell us how to recognise and repent of sin which damages relationships and blunts the edge of our work within God’s plans. And, yes, there are to be no cover-ups artificially to protect the “name” or image of the church. Not only are we to have no part in the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather to expose them! (5: 11)

We have been raised to “the heavenly places”We share Christ’s victory over the principalities and the powers.

In Ephesians 1: 3 it is clear that our eternal choice and calling by God locates us in the realm of heaven with the pre-existent Son of God.

Ephe 2: 1-6 indicates that there has been a rupture between earth and heaven with regard to us. Through sin, we find that we are born within the dominion of “the prince of the power of the air” who works through the children of disobedience. Verses 2-6 of Ephesians indicate that by the unearned mercy of God we were removed from the Devil’s dominion and restored to the dimension of heaven. We were enabled by God to share in Christ’s resurrection victory over the demonic order. We are seated with Christ in that dimension of victory.

Eph 4: 8 refers also to that resurrection victory of Jesus over the evil powers.

It is clear that Ephesians uses “heavenly places” to refer both to the dimension of Christ’s glory, but also to refer to the dimension in which the rebellious spiritual powers operate. As “the earth realm” includes the whole of the galaxies and the universe, it is clear that the placing of the different heavens is metaphorical rather than literal. The heaven where we sit with Christ is “far above” that in which the demons operate. The evil forces try to intercept and interrupt the victory and relationship which we share with Christ.

We are part of a cosmic plan

Two obstacles have to be overcome to bring about the fulfilment of God’s Plan.

(1) The rebellion of the evil demonic powers has to be overcome;

(2) Estrangement and disunity has to be overcome within the Church.

In principle, God has already made “one new man” by reconciling Jew and Gentile, but that and other divisions still need to be worked through.

Our Responsibility to Maintain the Unity of the Church

All my comments have been based on the Letter to the Ephesians. This book has two parts. Chapters 1-3 give the basis for Christian living. “This emphasis in Ephesians 1-3 on the broad seep of God’s saving purposes, together with his intention to bring all things together into unity in Christ, provides the theological basis for the long paraenesis of chapters 4-6, which is fundamentally an exhortation to unity” (P. O’Brien, Ephesians, pp 63-64.

(1) It is the unity which God’s Spirit creates, and it is not the readers’ own achievement. This unity already exists. We could not bring it about.

(2) However, secondly, we are responsible to keep this unity”.

Eph 4: 3 reads, “Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace.”

We are more likely to want to pursue the maintenance of this unity when we understand how essentially it fits into the purposes of God.

Lindsay Johnstone

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