Charles Hodge on Ephesians 3:9-10

[Introductory note: Years ago  I read Gordon Clark argue that Ephesians 3:9-10 argue for supralapsarianism. He cited Charles Hodge on this verse with a dismissive gloss. I went and read Hodge on this and actually found his comments more plausible than Clark had led me to believe. Clark did  not respect the doxological aspect to Paul's reference to God "who created all things;" c.f., Romans 10:6.]

Charles Hodge:

V. 9. It was Paul’s first duty to preach the unsearchable riches of Christ among the Gentiles, for he was especially the “apostle of the Gentiles.” But his, duty was not confined to them. He was commissioned both to preach to the Gentiles, and to make all see, &c. This is the common interpretation of the passage. Others, however, insist that the all is here limited by the context to the Gentiles. But the force of and, which marks the accession of a new idea, is thus in a great measure lost. And the following verse favours the widest latitude that can be given to the words in question.

The word photozein properly means, to shine, as any luminous body does, and then to illuminate, to impart light to, as a candle does to those on whom it shines, and as God does to the minds of men, and as the Gospel does, which is as a light shining in a dark place, and hence the apostle, 2 Cor. 4, 4, speaks of the photismos tou euaggeliou. Utitur apta similitudine, says Calvin, quum dicit, photian pantas, quasi plena luce effulgeat Dei gratia in suo apostolatu. The Church is compared to a candlestick, and ministers to stars. Their office is to dispense light. The light imparted by the Gospel was knowledge, and hence to illuminate is, in fact, to teach; which is the idea the word is intended here to express.

The thing taught was, he oikonomia tou musteriou tou apokekrummenou, the economy of the mystery which from the beginning of the world hath been hid in God. The common text in this clause reads konomia, fellowship, but all the corrected editions of the New Testament, on the authority of the ancient MSS., read oikonomia, plan, or, economy. The mystery or secret, is not the simple purpose to call the Gentiles into the church, but the mystery of redemption. This mystery, apo ton aionon, from ages, from the beginning of time, had been hid in God. Compare Rom. 16, 25, “The mystery which was kept secret since the world began.” 1 Cor. 2, 7, “The wisdom of God in a mystery, the hidden wisdom, which God ordained before the world.” Col. 1, 26, “The mystery which hath been hid from ages and from generations.” In all these places the mystery spoken of is God’s purpose of redemption, formed in the counsels of eternity, impenetrably hidden from the view of men until revealed in his own time. It was this plan of redemption thus formed, thus long concealed, but now made known through the Gospel, that Paul was sent to bear as a guiding and saving light to all men.

AA Hodge on Supra-Lapsarianism

AA Hodge:

45. What is the supra-lapsarian theory of predestination?

The term supra-lapsarian (supra lapsum) designates that view of the various provisions of the divine decree in their logical relations which supposes that the ultimate end which God proposed to himself was his own glory in the salvation of some men and in the damnation of others, and that, as a means to that end, he decreed to create man, and to permit him to fall According to this view, man simply as creatible, and fallible, and not as actually created or fallen, is the object of election and reprobation. The order of the decrees would then be–

1st. Of all possible men, God first decreed the salvation of of others, for the end of his own glory. 2d. He decreed, as a means to that end, to create those already elected or reprobated. 3d. He decreed to permit them to fall. 4th. He decreed to provide a salvation for the elect. This view was held by Beza, the successor of Calvin in Geneva, and by Gomarus, the great opponent of Arminius…

47. State the arguments against the supra-lapsarian scheme.

This scheme is unquestionably the most logical of all. It is postulated upon the principle, that what is last in execution is the in intention, which undoubtedly holds true in all spheres comprehended in human experience. Hence it is argued that if the final result of the whole matter is the glorification of God in the salvation of the elect and the perdition of the non-elect, it must have been the deliberate purpose of God from the beginning. But the case is too high and too vast for the a priori application and enforcement of the ordinary rules of human judgment; we can here only know in virtue of and within the limits of positive revelation

The objections against this scheme are–

1st. Man creatible is a nonentity. He could not have been loved or chosen unless considered as created.
2d The whole language of Scripture upon this subject implies that the ” elect” are chosen as the objects of eternal love, not from the number of creatible, but from the mass of actually sinful men.–John xv. 19; Rom. xi. 5, 7.
3d. The Scriptures declare that the elect are chosen to sanctification, and to the sprinkling of the blood of Christ. They must therefore have been regarded when chosen as guilty and defiled by sin.–1 Pet. i. 2; Eph. i. 4-6.
4th Predestination includes reprobation. This view represents God as reprobating the non elect by a sovereign act, without any respect to their sins simply for his own glory. This appears to be inconsistent with the divine righteousness, as we as with the teaching of Scripture. The non-elect are “ordained to dishonor and wrath for their sins, to the praise of his glorious justice–Conf. Faith,” ch. 3, sec. 3-7, “ L. Cat,” question 13; “S. Cat.,” question 20.

48. Show that a correct exegesis of Eph. iii 9,10, does not support the supra-lapsarian view.

This passage is claimed as a direct affirmation of the supra- lapsarian theory. If the hina, introducing the tenth verse, refers to the immediately receding clause, then the passage teaches that God created all things in order that his manifold wisdom might be displayed by the church to the angels. It is evident, however, that hina, refers to the preceding phrase, in which Paul declares that he was ordained to preach the gospel to the Gentiles, and to enlighten all men as to the mystery of redemption. All this he was commissioned to do, in order that God’s glory might be displayed, etc.–See “Hodge on Ephesians.”

AA Hodge, Outlines of Theology (London, Thomas Nelson & Sons, 1879),  232 and 233.  [Note: what AA Hodge says here does not do justice to C Hodge's full explanation of this point in this Commentary on Ephesians. The reader should also peruse C Hodge's remarks there.]

John Murray Commenting on Romans 9:22-24

John Murray:

22–24 These verses are an unfinished sentence (6 Luke 19:42; John 6: 62; Acts 23: 9). Literally the Greek terms are “but if” and their force is properly rendered by ‘what if’, as in the version, or, as Sanday and Headlam observe, “like our English idiom ‘what and if.’” Understood thus the three verses are an expansion and application of what underlies the analogy appealed to in verses 20b, 21. If God in the exercise of his sovereign right makes some vessels of wrath and others vessels of mercy what have lve to say? It is a rhetorical way of reiterating the question of verse 20.

The interpretation of these verses may more suitably be discussed in the order of the following details.

1. “Vessels of wrath” and “vessels of mercy” are best regarded in terms of verse 21. The potter makes vessels for certain purposes. So here the vessels are for wrath and mercy. It is true that they are vessels deserving wrath but this cannot apply in respect of mercy to the vessels of mercy. Hence both should be taken in a sense that can apply to both. This view is to the same effect as that of Calvin who says that vessels are to be taken in a general sense to mean instruments and therefore instruments for the exhibition of God’s mercy and the display of his judgment.

2. The participle “willing” has been interpreted in two ways: “because willing” or “although willing.” In the former case the thought would be that because God wishes to give more illustrious display of his wrath and power he exercises his longsuffering. In the latter case the meaning would be: although God wills to execute his wrath he nevertheless restrains and postpones this execution from the constraint of longsuffering. In the one case longsuffering serves the purpose of effective display of wrath and power, in the other case longsuffering inhibits the execution of the just desert. In favour of the latter it could be said that according to 2:4 God’s longsuffering is a manifestation of the goodness of God directed to repentance and could hardly be represented as the means of promoting the demonstration of God’s wrath. Before reaching a decision on this question other considerations bearing on the interpretation of verses 22,23 have to be taken into account.

John Davenant on the Danger of “Ordering” the Decrees of God

Davenant:

HITHERTO we have treated of the death of Christ as it regards the whole human race, in the universal circuit of his quickening power to be brought into act under the condition of faith, as to every man. For although, through the want of this condition, the death of Christ does not display its saving virtue in the greater part of men, yet it is not to be denied, that the Scriptures every where clearly testify, nor is it to be doubted, but God had in himself the most just and wise reasons of his counsel, while he determined that the death of his Son should be applicable to all men on condition of faith, and nevertheless did not determine to effect or procure that it should be applied to all by the gift of faith to each individual. We ought not, therefore, to oppose to each other and clash together these Divine decrees, “I will that my Son should so offer himself on the cross for the sins of the human race, that all men individually may be saved by believing in him;–and–I will so dispense my efficacious grace that not all, but the elect only, may receive this saving faith, whereby they may be saved.” If these two decrees seem to any one to oppose each other, he ought rather to acknowledge the weakness of his own understanding, than to deny any of those things which are so plainly contained in the holy Scriptures. Let this, then, be fixed and established, That according to the decree of God himself, Christ was so offered on the cross for all men, that his death is a kind of universal remedy appointed for all men individually, in order to obtain remission of sins and eternal life, to be applied by faith. But now, lest under this universal virtue of the death of Christ, which extends to all rational creatures, we should destroy its special efficacy, which actually pertains to the predestinated alone, we shall enter upon the other part of the discussion we undertook, which will explain and defend the special prerogative of the elect in the death of Christ, both from the will of God the Father in giving his Son to death, and that of the Son in offering himself. For we ought not so to contend that Christ died for all, as to believe with the Pelagians, that the quickening efficacy of his death is at the same time common to all, from the intention of the Divine will, but in its event becomes saving to some and not to others, no otherwise than from the contingent use of human liberty. Nor are we to fancy with the Arminians, that God gave his Son to death absolutely intending nothing more than that from that that he might haw a mere power of saving some sinners, notwithstanding his justice, and that any sinners might have a way or means by which they might be saved, notwithstanding their own sin.” Hence arises that celebrated corollary of Grevinchovius, in his dissertation on the death of Christ (p. 9,) “That the dignify, necessity, and usefulness of, redemption might abundantly appear by its being obtained, even though it should never be actually applied to any individual.” Again (p. 14,) “That the redemption might be obtained for all, and yet applied to none on account of their unbelief.” But we by no means think that the death of Christ was like the cast of dice, but that it was decreed from eternity by God the Father and Christ, through the merit of his death, infallibly to save some certain persons whom the Scripture marks by the name of the elect; and therefore, that, according to the will of God, the death of Christ was, by some special mode and counsel, offered and accepted for their redemption.

Johannes Wollebius on Reprobation

Wollebius:

XI. Those who teach the doctrine of election in such a way as to deny reprobation, are clearly wrong.

Scripture teaches reprobation no less than election. Isaiah 41:9 “I chose you and do not abandon you.” Malachi 1:2-3: “I loved Jacob; I hated Esau.” Romans 9: 18: “He has mercy on whom he will, and he hardens whom he will.” Romans 11:7: “The elect attained it; the others were hardened.” I Thessalonians 5:9: “God has not destined us for wrath, but for salvation.” 2 Timothy 2: 20: “Vessels for noble use, and for ignoble.” Jude 4: “Some men long destined for damnation came in secretly.” XII. Just as Christ is the cause not of election but of salvation, so faithlessness is the cause not of reprobation but of damnation.

Damnation differs from reprobation as the means of carrying out a decree differs from the decree itself.

XIII. Not damnation, but the revelation of the glory of the justice of God, is the purpose of reprobation.

Therefore man cannot properly be said to have been created in order to be damned; for damnation, by which the person who has been rejected brings about evil for himself, is not the purpose but the means of achieving the purpose of God.

XIV. For purposes of instruction, two acts of reprobation may be assumed: the denial of unmerited grace, which is called preterition, and deliverance to merited punishment, which is called precondemnation.

Johannes Wollebius, “Compendium Theologiae Christianae,” in John W. Beardslee III, Reformed Dogmatics (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Baker, 1977), 52-53. [Originally published in 1626.]