We skipped some verses
8 Therefore it says,
“When He ascended on high,
He led captive a host of captives,
And He gave gifts to men.”
9 (Now this expression, “He ascended,” what does it mean except that He also had descended into the lower parts of the earth? 10 He who descended is Himself also He who ascended far above all the heavens, so that He might fill all things.)
The full arms of Christ
Luke wrote of the ascension of Jesus Christ in Acts chapter 1. On the walk to that momentous event, Jesus and the disciples were talking about the future. The disciples were wondering about the Kingdom of Heaven. The assumptions they had of that kingdom were not panning out as they had expected. “Will you now restore the Kingdom of Israel?” they asked
Jesus deferred their question to God, briefly mentioned power and the Holy Spirit, and ascended away. Befuddled on that mountain bluff with kingdom questions unanswered God himself divulged a little more. God sent two messengers, angels in the common parlance, who prophesied that Jesus would at some point return in like manner. That is all they were told, and they wondered as they wandered back to a Jerusalem room.
We know what happened there so we will leave off from the ascension and turn back to Paul’s letter. While Luke told us of physical events, Paul told us of spiritual. Jesus returned to his Father with his hands full. Satan snagged the apple of God’s eye way back in the Garden. Men and women had been dying since that terrible day. Some, though, had been faithful along the way.
Where did the faithful go when they died? To Heaven? To Paradise? To the bosom of Abraham? Sheol? Before the crucifixion of Christ, there was no remission of sins. The debts were not paid. It seems to me, then, that the faithful dead could not be in the presence of Holy God. We have passages, maybe pseudo-parables, of Christ like the one of the Rich Man and Lazarus. One had his good things on earth showing little to no evidence of Godly allegiance. The other was poor and troubled on earth but depended upon God. When these two died they both left the earth and entered a different environment. On one side of a fixed chasm was a place of torment and on the other a place of rest (Luke 16:19-31),
This place is not heaven nor is it strictly hell, but the sections within this realm had their eternal parallels. Peter wrote (1 Peter 3:19) that Jesus went and preached to the spirits in prison. That is cryptic but suggests that even from the realms of the dead Jesus went and spoke.
I consider these things as the context for Paul’s words of Ephesians 4. When Jesus went back to heaven he had gutted Satan’s chambers. Both the faithful dead and probably a percentage of the unfaithful dead who had responded to the preaching of Jesus were claimed by Christ. These were the captives led by Christ when he ascended on high.
The open arms of Christ
Remember what we spoke of about verse 7? God gave and God gives grace to each person who yet remains alive on the earth. His arms are open and falling from them are helps and purpose, grace and destinies. All of these are like notes in a symphony. The thing is the symphony of humanity is being woven by him through us. Sometimes this life does not produce sounds that our present hearing considers majestic. Forget not verses like Ephesians 2:7.
7 …so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. (Ephesians 2:7–ESV)
Neither forget verses like Ephesians 3:10.
10…so that through the church the manifold wisdom of God might now be made known to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly places. (Ephesians 3:10–ESV)
If you are one who more easily sees things through bleak glasses just wait and see. In the coming ages, and even in this life, you will see God’s wisdom revealed. It is not just the rulers and authorities in heavenly places that will see the spectacle, the majesty, of God’s handiwork or hear the
Those open arms of Christ are not just about the bestowing of gifts. They also are welcoming, inviting, ready in the comforting.
God welcomed Jesus back into heaven. God welcomed the captives to their proper home. God bestows freedom for us from the control of sin and paves the pathway to victory. We can live there. That is called eternal life and it begins now.
Richard Ulrich says
My friend, Dr. William Conrad, points out that the Kingdom of God has two sequential parts. The first is the redemptive rule of God in each believer. The second is the realm where His reign will be exhibited over the whole earth, “in the ages to come” (Eph 2:7). Unity and diversity in our lives and in the church is very dynamic; and from time to time it certainly exhibits disconcerting discord and divisiveness . The advice St. Paul gives in this regard is “if it be possible, as much as lieth in you, live peaceably with all men” (Rom 12:18 KJV). The mark of any successful manager or statesman includes “ability to get consensus” according to the late historian, Dr. Rufus Fears. This often implies a kind of compromise which is hard to sort out and to reconcile with principles. RAU