DAILY DEVOTION: EPHESIANS 1:10

By Stan Brown

​Ephesians 1:10  with a view to an administration suitable to the fulness of the times, that is, the summing up of all things in Christ, things in the heavens and things upon the earth. 

I just perused a commentary that spent nine pages discussing this one verse.  I will spend less space and attempt to make it more understandable.  God wants us to understand His mysteries.  According to His kind intention and abundant riches God gives us an understanding of the events of all time.  From the very beginning when God said to the serpent, He shall bruise you on the head, And you shall bruise him on the heel. (Gen. 3:15), all things have pointed to the time when God will bring together all things in Christ.  Throughout the Old Testament, the prophets pointed to Jesus who would ultimately provide the fulfillment for all the eternal, unconditional promises that God made to Abraham.  Ultimately, all things will be unified through the only One who can accomplish it.  Satan wants disunity because God’s plan includes all things in Christ. 
 
Paul wrote to the Galatians, But when the fullness of the time came, God sent forth His Son, born of a woman, born under the Law, so that He might redeem those who were under the Law, that we might receive the adoption as sons (Gal. 4:4-5).  Jesus came in the fullness of time to redeem us as a startling event in history that shouted out that God’s plan was still in progress.  We live in a time when although it sometimes seems otherwise, the words of Jesus remain true, All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth (Matt. 28:18).  Christ is in charge right now.  In the current verse, Paul broadens things a little as he writes the fullness of times, pointing to all things that will yet occur.  He wants us to understand that as we live in the midst of a chaotic world God is working to bring together all things in Christ.  Christ will rule in the millennium as He will demonstrate the full authority He possesses.  Yet, when Satan is loosed, he will once more generate the chaos that he loves.  Ultimately the full authority of Christ will be demonstrated as the eternal state is ushered in where Christ will reign and the final fulfilment of the words the summing up of all things in Christ will be demonstrated forever.  And He who sits on the throne said, “Behold, I am making all things new (Rev. 21:5).
 
Just as when Paul wrote the epistle to the Ephesians, God remains perfectly comfortable with the progress toward the ultimate summing up of all things in Christ.   As we see increasing disunity in the world, we know that the time cannot be far off that God will bring together all things in Christ. 
 
In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth (Gen. 1:1).  All things in the heavens and things upon the earth (Eph. 1:10) will soon be unified in Christ as God intended from the beginning.  God has not forgotten His plan.  He is bringing it to pass.   Praise His Holy Name!!