 |  |
How often we find those without the necessary qualification occupied in evangelistic
work when their "measure" is that of teaching, organizing, interceding or what not. And
again, let us give a deaf ear to that bane of the Christian worker, the busybody who is
always telling us what we "ought to do". The Lord knows whether He wants us to be
preaching to the unsaved, teaching the saints, ministering to the sick, serving with our
hands, using the pen, or praying for others. Let us each one be "fully persuaded in his
own mind", and then seeing our ministry "fulfil it" (Col. 4: 7; II Tim. 4: 5).
Before detailing the ministry which was given by Christ to the church of the one body,
the apostle makes a reference to Psa. 68: 18. We have not here in Eph. 4: 8 a strictly
literal quotation either of the Hebrew or the Greek of the 70: The sense of the passage
is preserved, and this manner of reference makes us feel that the apostle wished to take a
thought from the Psalm rather than intend us to understand that he taught that this Psalm
was strictly prophetic of the ascension of Christ and the gift of apostles, prophets, etc.
The "ascension on high" of Psa. 68: 18 has reference to the "the hill of God . . . . . an
high hill as the hill of Bashan" (verse 15); the ascension of Eph. 4:, as we shall see, is
beyond computation in vastness. The apostle decides for us just what part of this
quotation he intended to be prominent, for in verse 9 he lifts it out for further
consideration:--
"Now that word `HE WENT UP' what saith it, but that He first came down to the
earth below?" (Conybeare and Howson).
What does it imply? If the Scripture declares that Christ ascended, He must have
previously descended first to the lower parts of the earth. Many old expositors interpret
this descent of the Lord as a descent into hell. Others understand it to refer to the grave.
Bloomfield, Conybeare & Howson and many others see in the expression, "the lower
parts of the earth", "the lower parts, namely, the earth". Dr. Bullinger, in Figures of
Speech, places the expression under the "Genitive of Apposition", "the lower parts, that
is to say, the earth":--
"He that descended is the same also that ascended up far above all heavens, that He
might fill all things" (Eph. 4: 10).
Have we appreciated as we should the fact of the ascension and its bearing upon the
church of the dispensation of the mystery? "Christ risen" is not sufficient. Israel's King
must be Christ risen, for Psa. 2: 7 declares the decree:--
"The Lord hath said unto Me, Thou art My Son, this day have I begotten Thee."
In Heb. 4: 14 the apostle tells us that Christ "passed through the heavens"; in 7: 26
he says of Him, "made higher than the heavens". These passages, together with that of
Eph. 4: 10, give us some idea of the magnitude of that ascension.
The apostle has a purpose in this statement as we may well believe. What is it? Christ
ascended up far above all heavens "that He might fill (pleroo, cf. pleroma) all things"
(ta panta, the all things). We cannot avoid the reference back to Eph. 1: 20-23:--