Body
Christ is the firstborn from the
dead so that ‘among all things he might be pre-eminent’ (v. 18d). The
pre-eminence of Christ is as the head of a body, the church. The
emphasis on a ‘body’ derives from the Genesis account of the creation of Eve.
As a matter of anatomy, she was his body and by implication he was her
head. This is what is meant by Adam’s declaration, ‘bone of my bones and flesh
of my flesh’ (Gen 2:23). But Adam also declares that Eve was the mother of all
living, and these children are an expression of her body. So, Adam would
have been head of a much larger body than the ‘body’ of Eve.
The church is now constituted by
those creatures that are like Christ in being prospectively like-born from the
dead (Rom 6:4-5). These creation are an expression of her body. They are those
who whom the gospel is preached (Col 1:23) (In Christ the fulness of God dwells
bodily [Col 1:19; 2:9], and the body here is not Christ’s body, it is
Christ’s body – the church [Eph 1:23; cf. John 1:16]; over which he is head).
Because of the relationship between Even and her children. Paul can talk in the
same paragraph of both the body of Christ and new creatures in a new creation.
The theme of the body of Christ
connects up with the theme of the kingdom. This can be seen if we explore the
expression ‘head over all’ from Eph 1:22, which is picked up from 1 Chron 29:11,
the model for the Lord’s prayer.
This prayer of David is uttered in
a celebration of the gifts that the people had brought for the temple building.
All the gifts were from God, they were his riches because he possessed all things.
These facts surrounding David’s prayer are used by Paul to teach about Christ
and the temple – ‘In whom all the building fitly framed together growth unto a
holy temple in the Lord.’ (Eph 2:21).
And hath put all things under his
feet, and gave him to be the head over all (The expression head over
all comes in other contexts of military rule: Josh 11:10; Jud 10:18; 11:8)
things to the church, which is his body . . . Eph 1:22
Blessed be thou, Lord God of
Israel our Father, for ever and ever. Thine, O Lord, is the greatness, and the
power and the glory, and the victory, and the majesty: for all that is
in heaven and in the earth is thine; thine is the kingdom, O Lord, and thou art
exalted as head over all. 1 Chron 29:10-11
This fact supplies the clue as to
why the ideas of a body and the ideas of a kingdom—dominion over
principalities, powers, thrones, and rulers—come together in the passages we
are examining. The temple, or the body, stands at the centre of the arrangements
of a kingdom. This was the case under David and Solomon. The connections are
set out in Table 1.
|
Ephesians
1 |
1
Chronicles 29 |
|
Blessed be the God and Father . . . Eph 1:3 |
Blessed are you, Lord God of Israel . . . our Father v. 10 |
|
The Father of Glory Eph 1:18 |
Our Father v. 10 |
|
Ye may know . . . the riches of his glory Eph 3:16 |
Riches . . . from you v. 12 |
|
Riches of his grace Eph 2:7 |
|
|
Unsearchable riches Eph 3:8 |
|
|
Greatness of his power to us Eph 1:19 |
The greatness, the power . . . make great to all vv. 11-12 |
|
Give unto you . . . . knowledge Eph 1:17 |
Give strength to all v. 12 |
|
Mighty power Eph 1:19 |
Power and might v. 12 |
|
Far above all Eph 1:21 |
Exalted v. 11 |
|
Power and might Eph 1:19 |
Power and might v. 12 |
|
Head over all Eph 1:22 |
Head over all v. 11 |
|
Praise of his glory Eph 1:6, 12 |
Praise your glorious name v. 13 |
|
Strangers and foreigners Eph 2:19 |
Aliens and pilgrims v. 15 |
Table 1
(Andrew Perry, Before He Was
Born: Combating Arguments for the Pre-existence of Christ [7th ed. [4th
revision]; Staffordshire, U.K.: Willow Publications, 2022], 124-25)