The Gathering into One in Christ
“That in the dispensation of the fulness of times He might gather together in one all things IN Christ, both which are ia heaven, and which are on earth; even IN Him.” — Eph. i. lo.
HE Apostle’s monogram has here a special significance added to it, by the pronoun which closes the verse. As it has been expressed by an able commentator: “With what force and pertinence this passage re-echoes the vital words In Him, an emphasis which the repetition of the words Even in Him, seems specially designed to enhance.”
The verse is confessedly a difficult and enigmatical one. But keeping in view the In Christo as the pivot, so to speak, on which it turns, we may take it, as suggestive at least, of vaiious thoughts regarding this “dispensation “(as it is here called)” of the fulness of times,” whose characteristic is the” gathering together in one all things in ChrisC
Let, however, two remarks be premised for the better elucidation of the verse. The first is, that the expression “gather together in one,” of our version, is comprised in a single word in the original Greek. As the Apostle refers to this gathering as being in Christ, he evidently speaks of an aggregation round Him as the centre. The interpretation of the figure by the commentator Grotius, as “the reunion of a dispersed army,” is incomplete, unless we add the rallying of broken ranks around the Great Chief or Spiritual Captain. It has been more appropriately supposed by others to have reference to an orator recapitulating to his auditory at the close of his speech; “gathering together into one” the scattered links of thought and argument, familiarly known as ’ the heads of his discourse.’ If so, we repeat, it is “in Christ.”
A second preliminary observation of a critical kind is in regard to the word in the opening of our verse, ‘dispensation’ which has a special significance and signification in the original, not conveyed in our rendering, {plKovofiia). Its literal reference is to house arrangement, the conduct of household affairs; and in its connection with this ’ whole family in heaven and earth,’ it is suggestive of the righteous administration of the Great Master of the Household. The unfolding of the Christian dispensation is an “Economy!’ One age of progress and advancement gives birth to another, until the evolution of cycles, and eras, and dispensations, culminates in “the fulness of times.’’
See Barnes, in loc.
As little as the material world owes its present beauty and order to the exploded myth of an old dreamer (the ’ fortuitous concourse of atoms ‘), has the realm of the spiritual been left uncontrolled to caprice of circumstance. There are no disjointed links in the chain of the divine administration. The God of the Christian economy is a God of order. The spiritual fabric of which He is the Architect is symmetrically built. “The whole building fitly framed together,” — planned in systematic and harmonious beauty in the counsels of Eternity, has been age after age “growing unto an holy Temple in the Lord.” And tier will be added to tier, column to column, till the termination of the appointed cycles. There has been a knitting together of the separate parts in the mystical body, by a gradual process of development, till it reaches “the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ,” the perfect man in Him.
Let us now proceed to note the more special lessons contained in our motto- verse.
( I.) The primary and obvious reference of the words is that which we have already considered in a previous meditation, and on which we need not further linger — the gathering together of Jew and Gentile; the unfolding of “the mystery hid from ages and generations “(Col. i. 26), when the middle wall of partition was broken down; — when the Jew, long exclusive and excluding, came to own and recognise as” brothers in
Christ,” those Gentile proselytes who lived in the Pagan cities to which the circular epistle was written. Foremost, doubtless, among these, would be some who had before proclaimed as their alone deity, the Great Diana of the JSphesians, whose image had fallen down from Jupiter (Acts xix. 35). In one sense, therefore, this “gathering into one” — this strange fusion of incongruous elements — was the immediate result of the Incarnation of Christ. “Uven m Him.” But for the cross of Jesus, the words of Paul in this same epistle never could have been spoken — “Now therefore ye are no more strangers and foreigners, but fellow-citizens with the saints, and of the household of God: and are built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ Himself being the chief corner-stone” (Eph. ii. 19, 20).
(2.) But this view is a restricted and a partial one, local and temporary. The words suggest a much wider and grander interpretation in relation to Christ’s Government of the Universe.
Observe that “gathering into One, even in Him” is further emphasised in the succeeding clause; — “all things which are in heaven and which are on earth.” Surely the mere welding together of two dispensations must fall far short of the full meaning of the Apostle. It is indeed a lofty thought — that of a vast creation, inclusive of things celestial and terrestrial, being brought under the sway of the Incarnate Redeemer; well worthy of being designated “a dispensation.”
“All things,” we read elsewhere, were made, not only “b?/ Him” but “/or Him.” “He hath put all things under His feet.” The elementary truth of theology, reiterated throughout inspired Scripture, represents this earth, by reason of sin, as having forfeited the divine regard. Not only so, but that in being separated from God, it was sundered from all that was holy and happy in God’s universe. In Christ the yawning gulf has been bridged: this blessed union and intercommunion between man and other members of the wide family of God has been resumed. Again IN Him are heaven and earth made a united empire. Angels who had never swerved from their allegiance, once more become “ministering spirits,” sent forth in the sublimest of embassies, “to minister to them who are heirs of salvation.” Our planet is reponed to its place in the brotherhood of holy and loyal worlds, under the harmony of a reign of law and a reign of love.
Observe further; that in our motto-verse this * gathering into one ’ is not of all persons, but of “all things The ’ earth ’ here spoken of, may be taken in its most literal meaning. The inanimate is included with the animate. The realm material is to share the blessedness of the realm spiritual. The very outer creation, whose fair face is blighted and scanned by sin, is to participate in the regeneration “m Christ Jesus” “the glorious liberty of the children of God.”
Magnificent theme of contemplation! we again say — (too magnificent for a few brief sentences) — that Jesus is the mighty “King Regent” of this vast administration, — “the Eestorer of the breaches!” No wonder Paul loves the repetition “Uven in Jlim” “His spiritual mediative work has secured it, and His mediatorial Person is the spiritual centre of the universe. As the stone dropped into the lake creates those widening and concentric circles which ultimately reach the furthest shore; so the deed done on Calvary has sent its blessed undulations through the distant spheres and realms of God’s great empire.” We may add with Luther, “Although other empires, kingdoms, principalities, and dominions have their changes, and soon fall away like flowers, this kingdom, on the contrary, has roots so firm and deep, that by no force nor might can it be torn up or laid waste, but abides for ever.”
(3.) A third view that may be taken, not less glorious and animating, is one, unlike those already stated, as it belongs to the future. It is prospective and reversionary; and, in one sense, to which the others are subordinate. This yet higher reference is set forth and expounded by the Apostle in i Cor. xv. 51,52: “Behold, I shew you a mystery; we shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed. In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed.” In this sense the things spoken of ’ in heaven and earth,’ must be
* Dr. Eadie, “Commentary on Ephesians,” p. 53.
taken in their more special application to persons, “The fulness of times” may thus be regarded as the winding up of the present dispensation, when the number of the elect shall be accomplished. Those ’ on earth ’ referring to “the quick,” — believers who shall be alive when the Lord comes. Those in heaven, referring to the vast company of those who have fallen asleep: — “the dead in Christ.” And “the mystery” (well may it be so called in the verse immediately preceding) will be the wondrous transformation and renovation of the whole family of the Redeemed — from Abel, downward to its last member, on the day of Resurrection; when “He shall send His angels, and shall gather together His elect from the four winds, from the uttermost part of earth to the uttermost part of heaven “: — when, at the same solemn moment, “He shall change our vile bodies, and fashion them like unto His glorious body, according to the working whereby He is able even to subdue all things unto Himself” (Phil. iii. 21). “As the dewdrops,” says a devout writer on the words we are now considering — “spangle the ground, ere they are exhaled when the sun bursts in his glory from the morning sky; so shall His people awake from their graves, and stand in regenerated life and glory as they rise to meet their Lord in the air. This is the consummation of that great mystery, ‘the gathering together of all things in Christ’ of which the Apostle speaks. Then shall we behold Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, and all the saints of old, all the Old Testament Church, and the New Testament Church, * the whole family in heaven and earth ‘; — then shall we behold these all gathered together IN Christ.... Oh, when the trumpet shall sound, shall we be among those ‘Blessed and holy ’ who have ‘part in the first resurrection’? (Rev. xx. 6). And, In the dispensation of the fidness of times, shall we be among those of earth or heaven that are gathered together IN Christ, by grace, to glory?”
(4.) There is yet a fourth view, also prospective, suggested by the Apostle’s words, which may admit, at all events, of reverential pondering: — it is what in a permissible, and evangelical, but not in an unwarranted and speculative sense, may be called the view of universal restoration. Let none misapprehend, or misunderstand; as if by this, recognition were given to a new article in the creed of what is called ’ advanced modern thought ‘; — the theory propounded first by Origen, and revived in these later days.
It is a subject, indeed, upon which, we willingly own, no one can presumptuously dogmatise. We dare not, on the one hand, impeach or tamper with the Divine Justice and Righteousness, Neither, on the other, can we, poor mortals, assign limits to the same divine, boundless Love. “With God” (whatever be compatible with His rectitude, and truth, and other moral attributes) “with God all things are possible.” To His Church, and to all who believe in His Son’s
* M’Gliee on Ephesians, pp.53-55.
name, “His mercy is from everlasting to everlasting.” Nay, further, there is a glorious future — a glorious uniti/, waiting that Church, when the earthly Prayer we have already quoted of the Great Intercessor shall be fulfilled, “that they may be made perfect in one:” — “that they all may be one; as Thou, Father, art in Me, and I in Thee, that they also may be one in us” (John xvii. 21). “In that day there shall be one Lord and His name one” (Zech. xiv. 9). I hear the sound of “much people in Heaven” gathered out of * every kindred, and nation, and people, and tongue, A chastened imagination may be free to indulge its pleasing reverie regarding these * nations,’ as well as persons “of the saved” (Rev. xix. i; xxi. 24). Beyond “the dark hills of time,” it may see a rainbow of hope spanning the distant altitudes of eternity; — this sin-stricken, woe-worn world resuming its place among restored planets, — -joining in the harmonies of the glad coronation-song,
“Crown Him Lord of all.”
We are safe, and abundantly within warrant, in predicating this, regarding those who have fled to Jesus for salvation; — yes, regarding the humblest, feeblest, dimmest satellite, which owns the power, the light, and life of the great Central Sun. “Christ,” we read, loved the Church, and gave Himself for it,... that He might present it to Himself a glorious Church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing; but that it should be holy and without blemish “(Eph. v. 27). “A glorious Church!” is the comment of Richard Knill, — “this expression is found but once in the Bible, and it is in connection with persons who had been great sinners. So bad, indeed, as to be styled dead in sin, — without God, and without hope in the world.” But further we are forbidden to go, in support of any human theory of final restoration. This would be trenching on the realm of the unknowable; intruding on the region which angels fear to tread. We leave others to theorise and dogmatise where the Word of God seems to observe and to inculcate the attitude of * mute expressive silence.’ When the Holy Oracle, indeed, does speak, it is not, like the Pagan oracles, in utterances of studied ambiguity, but in words of unmistakable warning; and those incur grave responsibility who would seek to minimise or modify these solemn monitions. Just as much as they err, on the other hand, who, in gloomily formulated dogmas, would listen to nothing but muffled peals and funeral bells and dirges of doom, attempting to make themselves wiser than God.
One thing, I repeat, can alone be asserted without modification or qualification; that for Christ’s own people — those who are IN Him, the lost moral harmonies, not only can be, but are, everlastingly restored and retuned. Listen to the Apostle’s declaration as he stands on the living Rock of Ages, and proclaims the ground of a reconciliation that can never more be
144 CHRISTO.
marred or disturbed: — “And, having made peace though the blood of His cross, by Him to reconcile all things unto Himself; by him, I say, whether they be things in earth, or things in heaven” (Col. i. 20). “This much,” observes such a safe guide as Bishop Ellicott, after warning against doing violence to revelations that carry with them their own limitations, — “this much, however, we may dare to say, but no more than this: — that all, from its union with the Saviour, is saveable, shall be saved; all that from being one with the Restorer is capable of restoration, shall be restored; yea, all that distinctly evinces the continued and prejjonderating action of the true central force shall be gathered up into the ever-blessed centre of Life and Love.” ’
We may aver further, that there is in reserve for the Redeemed an ever brightening and more glorious future. Their song is ever to increase; to grow, as it were, in intensity and volume. At first it is heard by the seer as “a voice of a great multitude;” deeper, as “the voice of many waters;” deeper still, as “the voice of mighty thunderings” (Rev. xix. 6). The circles of joy are to be ceaselessly widening and expanding: though at the same time we believe the utterance of each of the glorified multitude will still be the old prayer of Paul upon earth — “that I may know Him.” As if, after ages and cycles have rolled
“Destiny of the Creature,” p. 94.
by, they were only lisping the alphabet of knowledge; or, like the world’s great philosopher, picking up tiny shells on the beach, while the vast ocean of truth and bliss lies undiscovered before them — “And every creature which is in heaven, and on the earth, and under the earth, and such as are in the sea, and all that are in them, heard I saying, Blessing, and honour, and glory, and power, be unto Him that sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb, for ever and ever” (Rev. V. 1 3). The refrain of the song of earth will be the refrain of the Eternal Anthem — “Of Him are ye IN Christ Jesus... even in Him!”
And surely, if yet one more word may be added, it is, that it becomes our duty, as individuals and as Churches, to help on this glorious consummation, this “dispensation of the fulness of times” Be the mystery what it may, the essence of that fulness (what cannot be marred or diminished by rival theological theories and dogmas) is the glorifying of our Great Master. These “all things,” material and immaterial, are in Christ: and, if in Him ourselves, it follows, as alike our obligation and our privilege, to seek to bring others to be partakers of our joy! Both assertions seem beautifully brought out in these other words of our Apostle (2 Cor. iv. 6): — “God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined into our hearts” — to do what? To keep it there? secreted, unutilised, monopolised? Nay, as the verb may be more graphically and grammatically rendered, “to give out” (not
K to ’ ffive ’ merely, as in our version, but “to give out:” we are the moral reflectors of the Great Sun of Righteousness) “to give out the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.”
“Come thou,” — may the divine words addressed of old to Noah be repeated — “Come thou, and all thy house, into the ark.” It is the simplest truth in the Apostle’s new * economy,’ but one that can never weary nor grow old by repetition. There is room in that Ark — there is room in Christ for all! Different it is in things that are * of the earth earthy.’ There is room there only for the few; the rich, the gifted, the noble, the ambitious, the powerful, the successful The vast majority are left to battle with the storm, — to mingle indiscriminately in the crowd. The many are left out in the dark, while the few favoured guests, only, troop to the festal halL
Not so with Christ and His offered salvation. Blood for all: hope for all: grace for all: robes and crowns and palms for all. All warranted — all welcome. Oh may we, in the glorious fulness of God’s own times, be at last “gathered together in one — EVEN IN Him!”