Who can begin to fathom the mystery of Jesus?  There is no one to compare with him.   He is one of us and yet unlike us, for he is both God and man in one person.  As such, he is himself the eternal purpose of God in election made actual among us. For in eternity God decided to be one with us and for us to be one with him.  And the Father’s Son was elected to be the God-human in whom the eternal purpose would be fulfilled.

 This mystery of Jesus is nothing less than the coming of God himself into the midst of our estranged humanity.  Coming personally to rescue us from all that enslaved us in order to gather us as liberated children into living fellowship with his Father and with one another in the Spirit. For Jesus, the elect man, was eternally purposed by God and sent into the world for us so we might share together in the mystery of union between Father and Son in the Spirit.

Paul writes, “God has chosen to make known among the Gentiles the glorious riches of this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory”.  Christ is now in us and we are in him and this too is the mystery. He who ascended to fill all things now lives in union with us.  And he will bring his community to its fullness in God’s eternal purpose.  For he will return again to consummate God’s eternal purpose in the new creation.  All this is the mystery in which we share as those united to Christ by the Spirit.