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Scripture Reading: Eph. 1:9-10; 2-6, 3:9-11; 1 Cor. 9:16-17; 1 Tim. 1:3-4
Although the divine economy is the central topic in the New Testament, it has not been touched that much among the Christians in past centuries. The matter of God’s economy is greatly developed in Paul’s writings. Ephesians is a book on God’s eternal purpose to have the church as the Body of Christ. In such a book Paul uses the word economy (1:10; 3:2, 9). In Ephesians the apostle Paul wants to show us that the church as the Body of Christ is something of God’s economy. Paul uses the word economy in relationship with other words such as good pleasure, will, and purpose (1:9, 11). God has a good pleasure, which is His heart’s desire. God also has a will, which is according to His good pleasure. The reason I visit a certain place is because I first have a desire. Then I make a decision to go to that place. This is the exercise of my will according to my desire, my good pleasure. God’s will came out of His desire. In Ephesians the word purpose is used as a noun and as a verb (3:11; 1:9). The purpose comes out of the will. In God’s heart there was a desire, and out of this desire God made a will. According to God’s will, He made a purpose.
Because God has a purpose, He needs an economy. The Greek word for economy is oikonomia. This Greek word is composed of two words — oikos, meaning “house” or “household,” and nomos, meaning “law.” An economy is a house law, a household administration. God’s household administration is for the carrying out of God’s purpose, God’s plan. God’s economy is God’s planned administration to carry out His eternal purpose.
We all need to realize what God’s eternal purpose is. Bible scholars have discovered that in God’s planned administration there are different ages. The Bible unveils to us the age before the law, the age of the law, the age of grace, and the age of the kingdom. These are the four main ages revealed in the Scriptures. The age before the law was from Adam to Moses (Rom. 5:13-14). The age of the law was from Moses to Christ’s first coming (John 1:17). The age of grace is from Christ’s first coming to His second coming (v. 17; Titus 2:11). The fourth age will be the age of the kingdom, the age of the millennium, the thousand years of Christ’s reign (Rev. 20:4-6). In these four different ages God has different ways to deal with His people. In the age before the law, God dealt with the patriarchs mainly according to His mercy and grace based upon His promise. In the age of the law, from Moses to Christ’s first coming, God dealt with His people according to the law. From Christ’s first coming to His second coming, the age of grace, God deals with us according to His grace. After Christ’s second coming, for one thousand years God will deal with His people according to His kingdom. These are the four main different ways for God to deal with people in the four different ages. Although these Bible teachers saw these four different ages, they did not tell us the purpose for which God deals with people in these four major ways.
If you trace the root of the word economy, it goes back to a word that refers to the parceling out of food, the distributing of food as in parcels. Joseph is a good illustration of this. His job was to distribute all the food supply of Pharaoh to feed all the hungry people. This root word also means to distribute food to the cattle for grazing. To distribute is to dispense. In God’s economy He dispenses Himself into His people as life, as life supply, and as everything to them. God wants to dispense Himself as food to us.
The Holy Bible tells us that God is rich as food to us. The Lord Jesus declared that He is the bread of life (John 6:48), and Paul says that he was charged to preach the unsearchable riches of Christ (Eph. 3:8). Christ is life, and His riches are unsearchable. All these riches of life are to be dispensed into His believers. Paul was commissioned to be a dispenser of these riches, a steward. He was to be a steward in the same way that Joseph was a great steward to distribute the rich life supply of Pharaoh’s household. In the Old Testament Joseph dispensed food to the hungry people, and in the New Testament the apostle Paul dispensed the unsearchable riches of Christ to the believers. By this we can see what the proper denotation of the word oikonomia is — God’s household administration to dispense the divine riches of the Triune God as life and life supply into His chosen and redeemed people.
In the portions of Scripture we have selected from Ephesians, 1 Corinthians, and 1 Timothy, we can see that, because of such a dispensing, the church has been produced. The church has been produced by the dispensing of the unsearchable riches of Christ. The church is not a religious organization, but the church is the Body of Christ produced by the dispensing of the riches of Christ into all the believers. Every time we are gathered into the name of the Lord Jesus (Matt. 18:20), we enjoy the dispensing of the riches of Christ into our being. It is this dispensing of the Triune God into us that makes us members of the Body of Christ. In the church life the Lord has redeemed us from different peoples and from different races, yet we all are one. We are one because we have the same life. The same riches of Christ have been dispensed and are being dispensed into all of us.
Ephesians 3:9 talks about the dispensation (oikonomia), the economy of the mystery, “which throughout the ages has been hidden in God.” God’s mystery is His hidden purpose. His purpose is to dispense Himself into His chosen people. Hence, there is the economy of the mystery of God. This mystery was hidden in God from the ages (that is, from eternity) and through all past ages, but now it has been brought to light to the New Testament believers. Abraham, Moses, and even David did not have a realization of God’s hidden purpose. God opened up His heart to show the apostles His hidden mystery, especially to the apostle Paul. God’s hidden purpose is His economy, His administrative plan, to distribute Himself into all His chosen people. These chosen ones are from different races and cultures around the globe. God redeemed His people from every tribe, tongue, people, and nation (Rev. 5:9). God has chosen us, and Christ has been dispensed into our being. This was planned by God, and this plan of God was His economy.
God had a desire, a good pleasure, according to which He made a will. Based upon His will, God made a purpose. He then made a plan to administrate His purpose, and this plan is to dispense Himself into all His chosen people. This is the economy of God. It was a mystery because it was hidden. It was never made known to anyone until the time of the apostles. In Ephesians, 1 Corinthians, and 1 Timothy, Paul tells us that God has such an economy, which was a mystery but now has been made known to all of us. Now we know this mystery. We know God’s economy, and we are now enjoying His dispensing. The Triune God is dispensing Himself into us to be our life and to be our life supply. He is dispensing Himself into us as our food and our drink that we may live by Him. Is this not wonderful? This is much better than religion. We do not come together just to have a kind of religious worship service. But we gather together to enjoy the dispensing of the marvelous Triune God into our being. This is God’s divine dispensing. God desires to dispense Himself. In the Lord’s ministry we only care for the divine dispensing of the Triune God Himself into His chosen people.
God’s economy is according to His wisdom. According to His wisdom, God created the universe with man as the center. In God’s wisdom He became a man to live on this earth for thirty-three and a half years, to die on the cross to terminate the old creation, and to resurrect from the dead to germinate the new creation for the single purpose of dispensing Himself as the Triune God into us. It is in this way that God’s multifarious wisdom is made known through the church (Eph. 3:10).
We are all here under God’s wisdom. What multifarious wisdom it took on God’s part to prepare everything so that He could dispense Himself into us! He prepared incarnation, crucifixion, resurrection, and an all-inclusive redemption in order that He might carry out His economy to dispense Himself into you and me. This is the gospel in its fullness. The gospel is not merely to save sinners from hell to heaven. The gospel involves the Triune God passing through creation, incarnation, human living, crucifixion, resurrection, and ascension, and as the life-giving Spirit dispensing Himself with all that He is, with all that He has attained and obtained, into our being. To merely save sinners from hell to heaven is too small a gospel. God’s gospel is to dispense the Triune God into you and me. This is the great gospel! We all need to praise and thank the Lord for the divine dispensing of the Divine Trinity into sinners to make them the sons of God.
