Matthew Henry's Complete Commentary on the Whole Bible
Ephesians
Completed by SAMUEL ROSEWELL.
AN
EXPOSITION,
W I T H P R A C T I C A L O B S E R V A T I O N S,
OF THE EPISTLE OF ST. PAUL TO
T H E E P H E S I A N S.
SOME
think that this epistle to the Ephesians was a circular letter sent to
several churches, and that the copy directed to the Ephesians happened
to be taken into the canon, and so it came to bear that particular
inscription. And they have been induced the rather to think this
because it is the only one of all Paul's epistles that has nothing in
it peculiarly adapted to the state or case of that particular church;
but it has much of common concernment to all Christians, and especially
to all who, having been Gentiles in times past, were converted to
Christianity. But then it may be observed, on the other hand, that the
epistle is expressly inscribed
(1:1)
to the saints which are at Ephesus; and in the close of it he
tells them that he had sent Tychicus unto them, whom, in
2 Tim. iv. 12,
he says he had sent to Ephesus. It is an epistle that bears date out of
a prison: and some have observed that what this apostle wrote when he
was a prisoner had the greatest relish and savour in it of the things
of God. When his tribulations did abound, his consolations and
experiences did much more abound, whence we may observe that the
afflictive exercises of God's people, and particularly of his
ministers, often tend to the advantage of others as well as to their
own. The apostle's design is to settle and establish the Ephesians in
the truth, and further to acquaint them with the mystery of the gospel,
in order to it. In the former part he represents the great privilege of
the Ephesians, who, having been in time past idolatrous heathens, were
now converted to Christianity and received into covenant with God,
which he illustrates from a view of their deplorable state before their
conversion,
ch. 1-3.
In the latter part (which we have in the
4th, 5th, and 6th chapters)
he instructs them in the principal duties of religion, both personal
and relative, and exhorts and quickens them to the faithful discharge
of them. Zanchy observes that we have here an epitome of the whole
Christian doctrine, and of almost all the chief heads of divinity.
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