REMARKS INTRODUCTORY TO THE LAST CHAPTER
Like an airplane making a rough landing, jolting the passengers in their seats, the closing chapter comes as a distinct shock to the unobservant reader the reader who has not noticed the prominent part played by Satan in the Ephesian letter. Much of the sixth chapter concerns warfare a subject which a superficial study might suggest is disconnected from the main body of the Ephesian letter. Actually this is not so, for as far back as the second chapter we were warned that Satan, the ruler of the authority of the air, holds sway on earth. Here at the close we find warfare in heavenly places. This is appropriate. Heaven and earth in Scripture language comprise the universe. Satan's evil spiritual powers are called "universal lords of darkness" for their evil sway is not confined to either sphere. We are called "children of light." The battle between light and darkness, then, must be joined. The battlefield is the universe. The reason for this is that the great subject of Ephesians is the will of God, which of necessity must prevail in God's universe. Satan opposes the will of God in a universal sense. And we are of God, and therefore Satan's foes.
Now the will of God is centered in Christ as Man. God's purpose is the reproduction of God in man which He has realized in Christ. It is the will of God, then, that Christ in Manhood shall inherit the universe. But that will also chose us in Him in a distant eternity to share His position of sonship, His blessedness before the Father, His universal inheritance in bodies of power and glory. These individual blessings have been merged into corporate blessing the Church, nearest to His heart and figured in the four ways we have just considered.
The Church belongs to eternity, not to time. Its origin was a past eternity its destiny a future eternity. But in time it shares the rejection of its absent Head. Its compensation for its present rejection is the knowledge of its indissoluble union with Christ. From that union flows its coming exaltation and glory with Christ when He enters into His inheritance. Then there will be universal praise and universal worship through the Church to Christ Jesus, world without end. From that union too we derive the eternal and abiding portion closest to God's heart that He will dwell with man and man with Him for we are one with the Son of the Father's love.
The mind of God thus expressed is virulently resisted by Satan. In Chapter 2 God delivered us from his power on earth and wrought a mighty work in us. We are no longer his subjects. In spite of that, Chapter 3 found Paul in prison the Pauline administration sharing the rejection of the body's Head. In Chapter 4 Christ cares for that body it must be strengthened to pass through a world ruled by Satan. In the remainder of that Chapter, in Chapter 5, and in the opening part of Chapter 6 we are called on to walk through this world as Christ walked. This is intolerable to Satan and in the remainder of Chapter 6 he opposes us as he opposed Christ first with subtlety (as he did at the temptation) then with force (as he did at the cross). But Christ, who overcame him, has bequeathed His armor the whole armor of God to us so that we too may overcome him.
To be good soldiers of Jesus Christ we must first be trained. We learn to obey. Before we can go into battle we must carry out Paul's precepts in our domestic and other circles and in the world. The world is where Satan rules, and if he sees men obeying God rather than him, war is imminent. He is opposed to the core teaching of Ephesians the will of God and will certainly attack those who obey it. That is why we are firmly exhorted to put on the whole armor of God. We are at war with Satan, although not always in battle. Like a skilled general he will choose the most suitable moment to attack us when He detects failure in us. The armor is needed in battle "the evil day" when Satan singles us out for attack.*1 Such is the inlet to the chapter which follows.