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These last passages, we believe, sound a great deep. Away back before man was
created on the earth, there was a great falling away on the part of the angels and the
higher orders of the heavenly host. Allusions to this defection are scattered through the
Scriptures. The great controversy appears to have centred around the person and office
of Christ. Pride was the snare and condemnation of the Devil. The rebellious Spirit
seems to be challenged when the Lord again brings the first-begotten into the world,
saying, "And let all the angels of God worship Him" (Heb. 1: 6). Man himself was made
"for a little lower than the angels". The sin and the redemption of man is neither at the
beginning nor the end of the purpose of the ages. Man, as it were, stands between two
great opposing forces. The god of this age, the Devil, who for a little season seems to
work his awful will, and the God of heaven and earth, the God of all the ages, the God
and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, Who will, yet shew who is "the blessed and only
potentate, the King of kings, and the Lord of lords" (I Tim. 6: 15). It is with this
knowledge that we read something of the meaning and purpose of Eph. 3: 10:--
"To the intent that now unto the principalities and powers in heavenly places might be
known by the Church the manifold wisdom of God."
Observe the connection which this verse has with the preceding verses:--
"The dispensation of the grace of God given me to youward, the Mystery, that the
Gentiles should be fellow-heirs, according to that gospel whereof I was made a minister,
that I should preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ, EVEN to
illuminate all as to the dispensation of the Mystery WITH THE OBJECT THAT (hina)
the principalities and powers may learn through the Church the manifold wisdom of
God" (verses 2-10).
The precious truth of the Mystery is misunderstood and those who hold it are
misunderstood with it. They are sometimes charged with not taking part enough in active
service. Let every member of the One Body remember that God has defined the sphere
of his ministry and his warfare in Eph. 3: and 6: "We wrestle NOT with flesh and
blood." We may not engage in this or join in with that propaganda--we have
nevertheless a conflict, though unseen by the eye of the flesh. We may not preach from
pulpits or platforms, yet each one of us has an ever-waiting and expectant congregation
(not composed of men, but made up of heaven's brightest and highest spirits), they are
being taught by God through the Church (taught through not by, the Church being the
great object lesson ever before their eyes). Taught of what? Of grace, of mercy, of
love--yes, but pre-eminently, the manifold WISDOM of God.
The heavenly host that has watched the unfolding plan of the ages can appreciate, with
that great unfolding before it as a panorama, the diversified wisdom of God. His enemy
is the very incarnation of wisdom, for he is "That old serpent, the Devil", and the
proverbial utterance associates wisdom with serpents: "Be wise as serpents". "Yet God
taketh the wise in his own craftiness."
The heavenly watchers who looked down upon this earth of ours in the year that Paul
entered Rome were not feasting their eyes upon palace and temple of either Jerusalem,
Athens or Rome. They were intent upon one spot, unknown to any of us to-day, the hired