First let's get something clear about erroneous notions of Paul and his founding a new religion, which he didn't. True, the halakhah of his Judaism switched from the Pharisaic oral law to the Ruach Hakodesh, but his religion was still one of the Judaisms of the time, not a new non-Judaism Gentile religion.

MOSHIACH'S LETTER THROUGH THE SHLIACH SHA'UL TO THE BRIT CHADASHA KEHILLAH IN EPHESUS

The date is probably 60/61 C.E.; the place, probably Rome. It has

been several years since Shliach Sha'ul has visited the Gentiles

in the Brit Chadasha kehillot in Asia Minor spread out around its

capital Ephesus. Shliach Sha'ul was first there briefly in 51

C.E. and then again in 55-57 C.E. But at this later time, Shliach

Sha'ul was more of an urban seminary professor-yeshiva dean

training leaders, than a rural pioneer congregation planter in

direct contact with a local assembly. II Timothy 4:19 may

indicate that the people Rav Sha'ul greets in Romans 16 are

Ephesians (see Romans 16:3 and the notes on Romans). But he wrote

that letter to the Romans in 57 C.E. and so many new believers

and congregations have been added since then who have never met

Rav Sha'ul that he doesn't know the people in the Brit Chadasha

kehillot as intimately and therefore does not give this letter,

which is really a kind of written prayer, the personal quality

Shliach Sha'ul normally exhibits in his epistles.

In Ephesians Shliach Sha'ul contemplates a new human race, and he

marvels at the new birth through which G-d has created this

resurrected humanity (2:10).

Shliach Sha'ul thinks of the new birth in different ways. One way

is in 2:6 where he sees a spiritual ascension already in progress

with a heavenly residence already reserved (1:3) as we are being

raised and enthroned in the Spirit with the Moshiach (1:20). How

awesome is the new birth!

This epistle is so dense it is almost impossible to teach what is

in it by a dry listing of topics. A very loose paraphrase of what

Shliach Sha'ul is saying will be better, as follows: Oh to have

the dull heart circumcised so that he has eyes to see and a mind

of wisdom to know what is happening as one united, spiritually

quickened humanity is ascending from the spiritually moribund

other humanity! What riches are being inherited! What power (the

power that raised Moshiach Yehoshua from the dead) is being

manifested! What a hidden mystery is unveiled! You who are not

Jews--what a marvel!--you have been predestinated to this new

humanity before the world was formed! You who had no share in

what the Jews were promised have been made full partners with

them, receiving the pledge of the inheritance, the promised Ruach

Hakodesh (1:13-14). The hostility between you who are not Jews

and you who are has been abolished. The mechitzah (separation in

the Beis Hamikdash) has been broken down. (See JNTP, 1989, Eph.

2:14.) How? In the death of the Moshiach on the execution stake

where there came forth a peace for Jews and non-Jews spiritually

resurrected in one transcendent new humanity. (Eph. 2:12 speaks

of "the commonwealth of Israel" in a way inferring that Gentile

followers of our Moshiach are no longer aliens there, just as

Phil. 3:3 speaks of them with Messianic Jews as "the

circumcision" and Gal. 6:16; 4:26 speaks of "the Israel of G-d"

and "the Jerusalem above," all pictures of this marvelous

eschatological heavenly Israel which includes even Gentiles! Acts

21:20 shows that Jews who believed in Moshiach Yehoshua and

preached him and celebrated him in the context of the

Torah-observance of Jewish life-style were just as validly true

belevers as Gentiles who remained largely distant from Jewish

culture. They were both one body according to Eph. 2, one

commonwealth, one Israel of G-d, one Jerusalem above.)

Those who say that the Moshiach's Kehillah has nothing to do with

Israel should remember that such a doctrine could never have been

preached before C.E. 100. The doctrine assumes something never

assumed by the Brit Chadasha Scriptures: namely, a breach between

the remnant Israel of G-d of Jewish birth on the land of Israel

and the Gentile "G-d-fearers" admitted into fellowship with the

remnant of Israel by the Brit Chadasha gerousia or council

meeting in Israel in Acts 15. The Bible, while it predicts the

return of the nation of Israel to the land in the last days and

while it anticipates Jews becoming Messianic Jews in the last

days, nowhere treats these miracles as a separate and unrelated

development from His saving a remnant from the world. There is

only one L-rd and he has only one body and one Besuras Hageulah

and one redeemed remnant set apart for salvation and He is only

returning once to deliver them. He does not have two returns for

two different peoples nor does He have two ways to salvation or

two saving covenants.

If Shliach Sha'ul had been preaching a separate program of

salvation for the Gentiles, the persecution he encountered would

hardly have been of the intensity that it was. What enfuriated so

many people about Rav Sha'ul's Besuras Hageulah was that he was

admitting former Goyishe sinners into full membership into

redeemed eschatological Israel without circumcising them into

total submission to the Torah of Moshe. He said that he was not

doing this but that G-d was grafting in the wild olive branch!

Into what? Into Ideal Israel, the Israel above, eschatological

Israel. And "Israel after the flesh" also had to be grafted in

by G-d. Shliach Sha'ul was not leading the mission to create a

Brit Chadasha kehillah separate from Israel. Shliach Sha'ul

risked his life with his final trip to Jerusalem to prove that

this was precisely what he was not doing. Shliach Sha'ul was

admitting as full proselytes to Moshiach's Judaism everyone he

won to the L-rd. This is why so many people wanted to kill him

and were slandering him and discrediting him. Shliach Sha'ul was

making a shambles of Diaspora Judaism in the eyes of so many of

his enemies because he was admittting people as Moshiach's

talmidim according to the Acts 15 gerousia and the Besuras

Hageulah of remnant Israel preached by the Council of the Elders

of Israel rather than according to the Sanhedrin. It's true that

in Acts 21:28-29 he did not take his formerly heathen disciples

into the Beis Hamikdash area in Jerusalem (as he was falsely

accused); however, he does say in Eph. 2:11 that Gentiles were

alienated from the citizenship of Israel and were strangers of

the covenants of promise, indicating that this is no longer the

case as far as eschatological redeemed Israel is concerned. So

their uncircumcision is in the flesh only and not in the Spirit

or in the Messianic Age that is already dawning (compare Eph.

2:11 to Phil. 3:3).

Rav Sha'ul's martyrdom was caused by his zeal to prove (by that

last Jerusalem trip and the collection journey) that there is

only one eschatologlcal Israel and only one door into it. He was

a marked man (more in prison than out of prison) from this point

on in his ministry, but he risked everything anyway, because

there were those in Rav Sha'ul's lifetime that wanted to see a

separation between the Jews and Rav Sha'ul's Brit Chadasha

kehillah. There were unbelieving Jews and Jewish apostates in

Jerusalem whose theology also wanted to cut Rav Sha'ul's "Brit

Chadasha kehillah" off from "Israel" and see them as two and not

one. What made them murderously angry was when he said that "we

are the true circumcision" and "the Israel of G-d" and they knew

that he was referring first to Messianic Jews but also to Titus

and Luke and all the full (yet uncircumcised) proselytes along

with Messianic Jews as the only remnant of Israel. The resident

aliens who were regenerated in the Moshiach Yehoshua were no

longer aliens to the spiritual commonwealth of Israel even if

they were Gentile by birth. They were grafted in by rebirth, even

if the apostate political and religious leaders could not see

this.

Brit Chadasha Judaism is the true religion presented in the pages

of the Brit Chadasha. Gentile proselytes are allowed to come into

the faith (Acts 15) without circumcision of the flesh. But

circumcision of the heart (a spiritual new creation where the old

nature is cut away) is the sine qua non (indispensable condition)

of membership in the eschatological redeemed Israel of G-d.

Furthermore, only the Brit Chadasha Scriptures can define the

faith. When the Gentile clergy and their structures are allowed

to define the faith (instead of the Jewish Bible), then we have

things like the worship of the Queen of Heaven and other

non-Jewish heresies.

G-d has an ultimate purpose: it is to display us (2:7) raised up

and enthroned with Moshiach in the Heavenly realms. As far as the

sofia tou Theou is concerned, G-d is using our salvation and

ministry in the ekklesia to send a message to the demonic

strongholds who are watching us (3:10) and in spiritual conflict

with us (6:12). What is being revealed to them and the whole

cosmos is G-d's secret plan, never revealed before except in Rav

Sha'ul's ministry, which is the musterion tou Xristou which is

Moshiach in the Gentiles and the Jews in the Brit Chadasha

kehillah, (see Col. 1:27). See Eph. 1:9; 3:3; 5:32; 6:19; Col.

1:26; 4:3.

In Phil. 3:3 and Gal. 6:15-16 Shliach Sha'ul is talking to

would-be proselytes to Israel's Messianic religion/kingdom or

"heavenly realm" (Eph. 1:3,20; 2:6; 3:10; 6:12) and Shliach

Sha'ul is assuring these Gentiles that they already have what the

Judaizers are offering them--they are already spiritually

enthroned in the redeemed eschatological Israel of G-d and the

free Jerusalem above (Gal. 4:26). See also Rev. 20:4; Eph.

2:11-13.

To have the faith to see this is a gift from G-d. You had nothing

to do with the origin of this faith. The faith didn't come from

you, because if it did you could boast about it (2:8-9).

Here's another way of seeing the new birth. The true people of

G-d are His household, which rises on the Beis Hamikdash

foundation of the inerrant canonical prophecy entrusted to the

Shluchim and prophets (3:20). The keystone which holds together

the standing structure of prophecy and people alike is Moshiach

Yehoshua himself. G-d clothes Himself in this growing

construction, this living Beis Hamikdash, like a Spirit putting

on a body, a body that is full of the peace of Him who died and

rose and ascended and fills everything.

All this was revealed to Shliach Sha'ul for the sake of those who

are not Jews, that they may become heirs with the Jews, and thus

grasp the unfathomable love of the Moshiach.

What then are the practical ramifications of these first three

chapters? Continuing to paraphrase, we could say the following:

Patiently bear with one another in love to maintain the unity of

the faith through the equipping process as all grows to maturity

in this new humanity. Who does the equipping? The shluchim and

nevi'im and kiruv outreach ministers and ro'im and morim. Who do

they equip? The kedoshim. For what purpose? For the work of the

ministry in the world until the perfect new humanity is built up

and is complete.

All of these gifts equip the for service to the world out of

which is growing a perfect new humanity, one that is expanding

qualitatively and quantitatively. The Moshiach himself is joining

this body together and enabling each part to love the other so

that all can grow.

Then Shliach Sha'ul exhorts that we are to avoid having the

futile mind of the Gentiles who love debauchery. Cut off,

circumcise away, the old man of lust and rottenness and get the

new mind G-d wants for you. Watch lying and gnawing anger and

stealing and foul talk and don't grieve your seal of salvation,

the Ruach Hakodesh. Cut out bawdy humor, drinking, and

fornication. Any filthy unclean person nursing idolatrous lust

makes G-d angry and will never see heaven. Live totally

transparent lives and have nothing to do with deeds done in

secret darkness. Wake up! If you desire to get high, let it be by

being filled with Ruach Hakodesh and not with wine! Fill your

life with G-dly music and not with whatever is a waste of time!

Stay in G-d's order and in his love, which means that husbands

are to love their wives (who are to respect their husbands) as

their own bodies (a wife is one body with her husband). This

means we must stop all carping, all incessant wrangling. And it

also means being tenderhearted and forgiving toward one another.

Children, take note of a special promise just for you. With

6:1-4, Rav Sha'ul pauses for a brief sermon to children and

includes their fathers in his audience as well.

The battle against demonic powers is described at the end of the

book in chapter 6 and the weapons are laid out, each with its

purpose, so that the believer will know how to resist the devil

and stand his ground against every temptation to sin and so

escape the defilement that leads to death and press on to the

upward call of Moshiach Yehoshua to abundant and holy Chayyei

Olam (Eternal Life).

The Greek word eklegomai means "I choose, I select, I pick out.

"Those so "picked out" are called the eklektos. "Many are

invited/summoned but few are picked out" (Matt. 22:14). As far as

the Jewish people are concerned, "there is a remnant (those that

are left as survivors after the divine wrath burns away the rest)

picked out by grace (Rom. 11:5). "What Israel sought so earnestly

it did not obtain, but the picked out ones did" (Rom. 11:7). We

endure all we endure for the sake of the picked out ones (who

will trust Moshiach but haven't yet), that they too may

obtain...salvation" (II Tim. 2:10). G-d's picked out ones are

"strangers in the world" (I Shimon Kefa 1:1).

G-d is free to pick out as He chooses. Rom. 9:16 says that G-d's

choice" does not...depend on man's desire or effort, but on G-d's

mercy" (Rom. 9:16; also Yochanan 1:13). There were two twins in

Rebecca's womb but only one was picked out. "Even before they had

been born or had done anything good or bad (so that G-d's eklogen

prothesis purpose of election might continue, not by works but

by His summons)" Rebecca was told that G-d's favor was on the

twin named Jacob (Rom. 9:11-13). Shliach Sha'ul was a proud

persecutor and did not merit G-d's mercy. He was the chief of

sinners (I Tim. 1:15). "But for that very reason I received

mercy, so that (purpose! ina) in me, as the foremost, Moshiach

Yehoshua might display the utmost patience, making me an example

to those who would come to believe in him for Chayyei Olam

(Eternal Life)" (I Tim. 1:16). G-d's free and undeserved choice

means that the one who is picked out is picked out for a purpose,

a divine purpose, and with a special responsibility to serve the

G-d who chose him. Eph. 1:4 says that the "picked out" ones are

chosen for the purpose of good works (Eph. 2:10) and for

citizenship as fellow-heirs with the saints in the household of

G-d (Eph.2:19). Also the picked out ones are chosen to become

servants of the Besuras Hageulah (Eph. 3:7) and for the purpose

of being holy and blameless in His sight and so that we "might

live for the praise of His glory" (Eph. 1:12); also so that we

might come to the "unity and to maturity, to the measure of the

full stature of Moshiach" (Eph. 4:13) and so that "in the ages to

come He might show the immeasurable riches of His unmerited

favor/grace in kindness toward us in Moshiach Yehoshua" (Eph.

2:7). Another purpose of our election is that we be no longer

children and that we get our doctrine straight (Eph. 4:14) and

that we find our fruitful place in the Body of G-d's people (Eph.

4:16).

Charis is the action of One who volunteers to do something, to

which He is not bound. No human act or attitude influences G-d to

act as he does. When G-d chooses to provide salvation, he does so

freely as a gift (Eph. 2:8) and for no other reason than "out of

the great love with which He loved us" (Eph. 2:4).

Therefore, we must be kind to one another, "tenderhearted,

forgiving one another, as G-d in Moshiach has forgiven you" (Eph.

4:32).

G-d has given us not only the gift of salvation but a commission

(Eph. 3:2). Is it for Greek ministry? Jewish ministry? What? For

Shliach Sha'ul it was to "bring to the Gentiles the news of the

boundless riches of Moshiach" (Eph. 3:8).

PREDESTINATION

Acts 4:28 (Everything that happened to Moshiach Yehoshua was

predestined) Rom. 8:29,30, I Cor. 2:7, Eph.1:5, Eph. 1:11, 4:11