Fw: Mystery story

Ephesians 3 For this reason I, Paul, a prisoner of Christ Jesus on behalf of you Gentiles— 2 assuming that you have heard of the stewardship of God's grace that was given to me for you, 3 how the mystery was made known to me by revelation, as I have written briefly. 4 When you read this, you can perceive my insight into the mystery of Christ.....6 This mystery is that the Gentiles are fellow heirs, members of the same body, and partakers of the promise in Christ Jesus through the gospel......9 and to bring to light for everyone what is the plan of the mystery hidden for ages in God, who created all things, 

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Who doesn't like a good mystery?  Shirley and I have been watching a British miniseries that is a mystery involving a missing child, an unexplained death and an unsolved tragedy from the past.  You start with bits and pieces of the matter and you speculate on the explanations but you generally don't figure these things out until the final show, when all of the secrets are revealed.

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You can almost say that another definition for "mystery" is "my story" and the author will decide when and how to reveal that story to you.  In the beginning of Ephesians, chapter 3, the apostle Paul uses the word "mystery" four times in the first nine verses.  It turns out that God has written a mystery for the ages and no one can really grasp the meaning without His help.  As Paul states in the third verse, the mystery needed to be "revealed" to him.  And once a good mystery has been revealed you want to tell others.  Verse 4 tells us that the mystery is all about Christ...Jesus Christ...the man who also was God...who had been foretold from the beginning of Hebrew recorded history...who lived a life of contradiction (He died so we can live...He came from Heaven so we could go there...He was punished for our sins) that we could find a life of completion.

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Verse 6 reveals a wonderful aspect of the mystery...that God's plan, which had been for one nation...became a plan for all nations.  That the walls and barriers of separation between people come down and all can be joined in one common body through faith in Christ.

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Verse 9 explains that this mystery had been kept secret for ages...even before the time of Creation...that God had planned for this remarkable relationship with mankind even before the earth was formed or the first person formed.

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This is a mystery...a great mystery...but I hope you have stayed for the final show, when the mystery is revealed to you (personally)!

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blessings,

Rob Smith

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"Death is inevitable.  Life is a choice!"

John 11:25

Jesus said to her, "I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live."