“Let’s get Paul out of the Bible and over in church history! I like reading the gospels, but I disagree with Paul’s views on women or gay people.” Statements like this are quite common these days. But if you don’t like Paul, what would be left of the faith we have?
What about those passages in Paul’s letters that we love to read?
- Therefore there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.
- And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.
- It is for freedom that Christ has set us free.
- Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again. Rejoice!
All these are quotations from Paul’s letters. Which of them would you like to remove from the Bible? As for me, I would like to keep them all. If we can trust Paul when he speaks words that we love to hear, maybe we need to trust him when we hear words that are difficult to understand for people in our time and our society. We need to take time with Paul and let God speak to us through him. If we do we shall get a deeper understanding of the will of God.
This fall in Bergen International Church we shall focus on Paul’s letter to the Ephesians. This small letter covers less than ten pages of the Bible but it has got a lot of deep insight in the mysteries of our faith, as well as much practical advice for our Christian life, relevant even today.
The author begins his letter by identifying himself as “Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God”. After Paul’s dramatic encounter with Christ on the way to Damascus, Jesus himself makes him his apostle. Paul becomes an official spokesman of Jesus. There is no contradiciton between the message of Jesus in the gospels and the message of Jesus through his apostle Paul. It is a mistake to allow same-sex “marriages” on the grounds that Jesus never talks about homosexuality in the gospels. It is the same Jesus who has given Paul and the other apostles the authority to instruct the church on his behalf.
In the Nicene creed we confess that we believe in “one, holy, catholic and apostolic church”. What do we mean by that? Firstly that the church was established by the apostles. Our congregation wasn’t established by Paul, but we are part of the big, universal church that was established by the apostles. We are building on the foundation that the apostles made before us. (Eph. 2:20) Secondly that we need to be in agreement with the apostles. What we believe and how we behave is not for the public opinion to decide. Thirdly that we are in fellowship with the apostles. They belong to the part of the church that is in heaven, while we are still on this earth, but it is still one church. Paul is our apostle, also in the sense that his message is meant for us today.
The letter is addressed “to the saints in Ephesus, the faithful in Christ Jesus”.
We know that Paul had a special relationship with the church in Ephesus. On his third missionary journey he stayed there two years. But in the oldest manuscripts, the words “in Ephesus” are missing. Perhaps the letter was meant for the surrounding churches too. We really don’t know why. But we do know that not only the churches near Ephesus, but the churches all across the Christian world wanted to read this letter and the rest of Paul’s letters. Now it is our turn to see what this apostle has to say to our young congregation here in Bergen.
The first thing we notice is that he writes to “the saints”. This is not the elite Christians, but all God’s people. You are a saint because you belong to God.
Secondly we note the word “faithful”. This can mean “to have faith” or to be faithful or trustworthy. Probably it can mean both. Because someone who believes in Jesus Christ, must also be a trustworthy person.
Thirdly they are “in Christ”. That’s a key term in the Ephesians. To be in Christ is to be united with him, just as an arm belongs to the body. In the same way are we united with Christ and with one another.
There are no Christians in Ephesus today. It is a ruin city. But the apostle Paul has a message “to the saints, the faithful in Christ Jesus” wherever you are. What is that message?
Next time we’ll see that it is a message of grace. The word “grace” appears 12 times throughout the letter. It is a message where the person of Paul is overshadowed completely by the grace of Jesus Christ.
Pastor Geir Sakseid
