“Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ. For he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight. In love he predestined us for adoption to sonship through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will—to the praise of his glorious grace, which he has freely given us in the One he loves. In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, in accordance with the riches of God’s grace that he lavished on us. With all wisdom and understanding, he made known to us the mystery of his will according to his good pleasure, which he purposed in Christ, to be put into effect when the times reach their fulfillment—to bring unity to all things in heaven and on earth under Christ.” – Ephesians 1:3-10 NIV
A long time ago, I thought that evangelism is the only way we can participate in the mission of God since I thought the main part of the Great Commission from Jesus Christ is just to make disciples (Matthew 28:19). I think I got a gift of encouraging others spiritually, so I thought I could do both. According to the theological dictionary, ‘evangelism’ is “The sharing of the gospel of Jesus Christ through a variety of means.” However, I also learnt that, in order to evangelise, I should not use theological words at all as non-believers cannot understand them. My mentor told me that I have a gift of teaching. After a short while, I realised that she is right and I have more enthusiasm for it. One of my closest friends also taught me that I cannot evangelise and teach at the same time as my writing does not flow if I do both. Nonetheless, the mission of God includes teaching as well (Matthew 28:20; Ephesians 4:11-13). However, I am willing to learn about evangelism as I desire that gift as well. The main reason for this is that my number one wish is that everybody would be reconciled to God and others (2 Corinthians 5:11-21).
As God has been tremendously merciful to all of us, God desperately wants us to be united with Him and others through Jesus Christ (Philippians 2:1-11). More than that, He desires to have the entire universe since He has created everything. In other words, God’s wish is to restore everything in the way it was in the beginning by gathering all things in Christ (Colossians 1:15-20). Since Jesus is complete God and human, He is the head of all creation, whether it is in heaven or on earth. The way how Jesus Christ can be unified with us is by the Holy Spirit. A commentary reads,
He [Christ] unites humanity to Spirit and places the Spirit in humanity. Being Himself made the fountainhead of the Spirit, Christ gives the Spirit to be the head of humanity. Thus, through the Son [Christ] by the Spirit we ourselves now see and hear and speak.
God’s Spirit is the source that establishes Christ as the mediator between God and man. Therefore, He had to send the Spirit down to those who are willing to believe that Jesus is the Lord and Saviour when He is seated at the right hand of God in heavenly realms, in order for us to be unified with God. 1 Corinthians 2:6-13 states that things of God have been revealed to believers by His Spirit.
Meditate on the whole passage of 1 Corinthians 2 and think of the ways the Spirit of God has been revealed to you.
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