Archive for December 2nd, 2008
[Introductory note: Years ago I read Gordon Clark claim that Ephesians 3:9-10 argues for supralapsarianism. He cited Charles Hodge on this verse with a dismissive gloss. I went and read Hodge on this and actually found his comments more plausible than Clark had led me to believe. Clark had not given due respect to the doxological aspect to Paul’s reference to God “who created all things;” c.f., Romans 10:6.]
Charles Hodge:
V. 9. It was Paul’s first duty to preach the unsearchable riches of Christ among the Gentiles, for he was especially the “apostle of the Gentiles.” But his, duty was not confined to them. He was commissioned both to preach to the Gentiles, and to make all see, &c. This is the common interpretation of the passage. Others, however, insist that the all is here limited by the context to the Gentiles. But the force of and, which marks the accession of a new idea, is thus in a great measure lost. And the following verse favours the widest latitude that can be given to the words in question.
The word photozein properly means, to shine, as any luminous body does, and then to illuminate, to impart light to, as a candle does to those on whom it shines, and as God does to the minds of men, and as the Gospel does, which is as a light shining in a dark place, and hence the apostle, 2 Cor. 4, 4, speaks of the photismos tou euaggeliou. Utitur apta similitudine, says Calvin, quum dicit, photian pantas, quasi plena luce effulgeat Dei gratia in suo apostolatu. The Church is compared to a candlestick, and ministers to stars. Their office is to dispense light. The light imparted by the Gospel was knowledge, and hence to illuminate is, in fact, to teach; which is the idea the word is intended here to express.
The thing taught was, he oikonomia tou musteriou tou apokekrummenou, the economy of the mystery which from the beginning of the world hath been hid in God. The common text in this clause reads konomia, fellowship, but all the corrected editions of the New Testament, on the authority of the ancient MSS., read oikonomia, plan, or, economy. The mystery or secret, is not the simple purpose to call the Gentiles into the church, but the mystery of redemption. This mystery, apo ton aionon, from ages, from the beginning of time, had been hid in God. Compare Rom. 16, 25, “The mystery which was kept secret since the world began.” 1 Cor. 2, 7, “The wisdom of God in a mystery, the hidden wisdom, which God ordained before the world.” Col. 1, 26, “The mystery which hath been hid from ages and from generations.” In all these places the mystery spoken of is God’s purpose of redemption, formed in the counsels of eternity, impenetrably hidden from the view of men until revealed in his own time. It was this plan of redemption thus formed, thus long concealed, but now made known through the Gospel, that Paul was sent to bear as a guiding and saving light to all men.