One of the most

generous acts you can do is to listen carefully when someone tells you who they

are. So often, when we encounter someone, we make up our minds about them

before they tell us about themselves. We make judgments based on their

background, their appearance, their accent, their age, their gender, their job.

When they tell us who they are, we often simply try to fit their words about

themselves into our predetermined picture. In other words, we don’t truly

listen to them. We don’t allow them to define themselves. Rather, we filter

what they say about themselves through the grid of who we have already decided they

are like.

Who do you think

Paul is? He is, after all, one of the most influential—and therefore

talked-about—figures in the history of Western civilisation. There are plenty

of opinions floating around about who he is and what he’s like. Some regard him

as a

champion of forgiveness and unconditional love in the face of suffering.

Others see him as a

flawed founder of faith, blinded by his own bigotry. For many, he is

a distant authority figure from a bygone era: the ‘Saint Paul’ who appears in

icons and stained glass windows, who wrote unfathomable letters that have

caused centuries of religious argument. And there are plenty of other opinions

about Paul to choose from.

Paul wrote many

letters. And in those letters, he always introduces himself. He always tells

his readers something important about who he is. Ephesians 1:1 is no exception.

Paul doesn’t use many words to introduce himself here, but each word is

important. It’s worth setting aside our preconceptions and prejudices for a

moment and listening carefully to the words Paul has chosen to define his own

identity.

Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God.Ephesians 1:1a

Paul

The earliest manuscript copy of Paul’s Letter to the Ephesians, Papyrus 46, in the Chester Beatty Library, Dublin. This copy is dated to 175-225 AD. Image from earlybible.com.

The first word Paul

chooses to define himself is his name: “Paul”. This might sound entirely

unremarkable until we realise that Paul had another name that he could have

used. That name was ‘Saul’ (see Acts 13:9). Paul was Jewish, and ‘Saul’ was the

name he would have used when associating amongst his Jewish community,

especially amongst those who knew their Hebrew Bibles (King Saul was the first

king of the united kingdom of Israel, see 1 Samuel). ‘Paul’ was Saul’s Greco-Roman

name. That’s the name he used throughout his letters, because he was deeply

interested in relating to gentiles (i.e., non-Jewish people) and speaking to

them about Jesus Christ.

Paul hadn’t always had

such a strong desire to share the message about Jesus Christ with others. In

fact, in his early life, he was violently opposed to Jesus Christ. He was

particularly opposed to the way Jesus’ followers seemed to denigrate the holiness

of God’s special people Israel. So Saul relentlessly persecuted the fledgling gathering

of Jesus’ followers. However, while he was on his way to stir up trouble for

Jesus’ followers in Damascus,

Our family lived for

several years in Durham, in the north east of England. One day, through my son’s primary school, we were offered some cheap tickets to see a Premier League football match in nearby Sunderland. Since we’d never seen a Premier League game, my son and I decided it would be great to go. I knew that our neighbour Patrick, who’d grown up in Durham, was a huge football fan. So I asked Patrick if he had any advice for us on the best way to get ourselves to the match. Patrick told me there was a bus to the game that stopped right outside our house. The day arrived, and my son and I hopped on the bus with Patrick.

But there was a

surprise in store for us. The bus was, in fact, the Sunderland supporters’ bus!

So as soon as we got on, we realised we had to make a decision. Were we going

to support Sunderland, or their opponents Wigan Athletic? You can probably

guess our decision: we very swiftly and decisively became Sunderland

supporters! We rode to the match as Sunderland supporters; we bought the

Sunderland supporters’ scarf; we cheered and groaned at the match as Sunderland

supporters; and on the bus home, after a disappointing one-all draw, we joined

in with the misery and regret of Sunderland supporters. We hadn’t planned to

spend the day as die-hard Sunderland supporters. But hey, we were on the bus.

Something similar

might be true for you when it comes to the whole Christian thing. Maybe you’ve

hopped on the ‘Christian bus’, so to speak. Maybe you’ve become a Christian

recently. Maybe you’ve grown up as a Christian all your life. Maybe you’re

still investigating what it’s all about. Or maybe you’re even one of the bus

drivers—someone involved in Christian ministry or leadership in some way.

Whoever you are, you might be feeling that things aren’t quite playing out as

you were expecting when you hopped on. Maybe you’re confused about the things

that you’re learning from the Bible. Maybe you’re suffering and you don’t know

how that could possibly fit in to God’s plan. Maybe it’s all becoming a bit

bland or boring. Maybe you’re seeing the sin of other Christians and becoming

disillusioned. Maybe you’re disappointed by people at church. Maybe you’re

feeling the weight of opposition from people around you: the snide remarks, the

hatred, or worse. Maybe you feel the tide of the world is against you, and you’re

wondering if it’s all worth it anyway.

Don’t lose heart!

In the early 60s AD, the Apostle Paul wrote a letter

called Ephesians to believers in Jesus who were in danger of losing

heart (Ephesians 3:13). Paul was the great early missionary of Jesus Christ,

the one who, along with a team of co-workers, had spread the message about

Jesus (the “gospel”) throughout the eastern part of the Roman Empire. But when

Paul wrote his letter, he was in prison in Rome. He’d been chained up because

powerful people opposed his gospel. At this point, he’d already been held

captive for several years. The authorities seemed to have won. And for many of

the people who’d heard and believed the gospel that Paul and others had

proclaimed and taught, it would certainly have looked like things weren’t going

to plan. So Paul penned this letter from his imprisonment, to these believers

in and around Ephesus (in the Roman Province of Asia, which is modern day

Turkey), to encourage them. And what he said to them is indeed vastly

encouraging, and still speaks powerfully today.

The

central message of Ephesians is that the God of the universe has an amazing

plan,