Facing Prometheus — Week 27 (The Mysterion) | “Pulling Back the Curtain” | Pastor Jason Parrish
About the series: We’re currently in Facing Prometheus: A Letter to the Ephesians and the Future Church Dilemma, a 48-week look at how Paul’s letter to the church in Ephesus can transform our lives. For more on what the series is about, watch the prequel message here.
This week the series opens a new section, “Facing Prometheus: The Mysterion,” and Pastor Jason returns to begin it. The mystērion is not a secret place you travel to or a hidden knowledge you unlock. In Paul’s language it is God’s purpose in Christ, a reality we are initiated into, and it includes the unveiling of something most of us walk past every day: that our lives and our faith are spiritual in nature, and that the ground we live on is contested.
In Week 27 of Facing Prometheus: A Letter to the Ephesians and the Future Church Dilemma, Pastor Jason begins with the subject “Pulling Back the Curtain,” examining what Paul says about the spiritual nature of our everyday lives and how that reality reorients the way we see the world. This is the foundation for the weeks on the armor of God that follow; before the armor can make sense, we have to become familiar with the battle it’s for.
The Text — Ephesians 6:10–20
“Finally, be strengthened by the Lord and by his vast strength. Put on the full armor of God so that you can stand against the schemes of the devil. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers of this darkness, against evil, spiritual forces in the heavens. For this reason take up the full armor of God, so that you may be able to resist in the evil day, and having prepared everything, to take your stand. Stand, therefore, with truth like a belt around your waist, righteousness like armor on your chest, and your feet sandaled with readiness for the gospel of peace. In every situation take up the shield of faith with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one. Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit—which is the word of God. Pray at all times in the Spirit with every prayer and request, and stay alert with all perseverance and intercession for all the saints. Pray also for me, that the message may be given to me when I open my mouth to make known with boldness the mystery of the gospel. For this I am an ambassador in chains. Pray that I might be bold enough to speak about it as I should.”
— Ephesians 6:10–20 (CSB)
Pulling Back the Curtain
Like the moment the curtain is pulled back in The Wizard of Oz, exposing what was really going on the whole time, Paul is working to expose what is actually taking place in the world. This is not the first time he does it. He speaks of “the mystery of his will” purposed in Christ (Ephesians 1:7–10) and of “the mystery hidden for ages in God” now made known through the church “to the rulers and authorities in the heavens” (Ephesians 3:8–10). The everyday world has a dimension behind it, and Paul keeps drawing back the curtain on it.
★★★ There is no “natural” life. There is only the spiritual life, and it is lived in a body, a house, at a job, in the car, and at school, and it is contested ground. The Mysterion is not a secret place or a faraway place you go to obtain something. It is the unveiling of the war you are already in.
★★ You do not have a natural life and a spiritual life. You have one life, and it is a contested one.
Many people don’t fully grasp this, and so they’re sideswiped when life plays out the way it does. We call it fate, or serendipity, or just the way things are, or the cards we were dealt. The Bible calls it something else: a battle. As Constantine Campbell comments, the discussion of spiritual warfare shows that the everyday experience of believers has a spiritual and cosmic dimension, with unseen forces working against them and seeking their destruction. If that isn’t understood, the whole conversation about the armor of God will seem irrelevant. So before the armor, we have to see the reality of the battle, which Paul says is “not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers of this darkness” (Ephesians 6:12).
Two Ditches
This is supernatural language, and in a Western culture shaped by empirical, scientific explanation, it can feel antiquated or superstitious, something many have chosen to explain away or reject. As we give it our attention, one of Pastor Jason’s favorite authors offers a warning. C. S. Lewis, in The Screwtape Letters, names two equal and opposite errors people fall into about the devils: one is to disbelieve in their existence, and the other is to believe and to feel an excessive, unhealthy interest in them.
- Disbelief. It rarely announces itself. It doesn’t usually say out loud that the spiritual language of Ephesians is just metaphor or poetry. It quietly stops treating any of it as a landscape we actually inhabit. We affirm it on Sunday and never think about it again until the next Sunday.
- Preoccupation. It looks for a demon around every corner, and it lets us off the hook, because if everything is “out there,” then nothing is mine. My failures, hang-ups, and shortcomings all get assigned to something else. A bad day or a flat tire must be the work of the devil.
★★ Lewis says the devils are equally pleased by both ditches, because either way we are neutralized, whether by lack of perception or by preoccupation.
This landed with the Ephesians because of where they lived. Occultic practice, witchcraft, idolatry, and magic held great influence in their city. Acts 19:11–20 gives the backdrop: the seven sons of Sceva try to invoke “the Jesus that Paul preaches,” and the evil spirit answers, “I know Jesus, and I recognize Paul, but who are you?” before overpowering them. As word spread, believers came confessing their practices, and those who had practiced magic burned their books publicly, fifty thousand pieces of silver worth. This was a city steeped in the occult, later underscored by the prevailing worship of the goddess Artemis.
Pastor Jason pressed that ancient scene into the present. When those Ephesians came to Jesus, they renounced every spiritual thing they had engaged in and came to him with open hands. The counterfeits haven’t disappeared; the names have just changed. It is not Jesus plus chakra. It is not Jesus plus crystals, tarot, magic, “the universe,” or “I’m a Libra.” It is not Jesus plus another religion.
★★★ Jesus plus nothing equals everything.
Your crystals didn’t rise from the grave. The stars were hung in the sky by the One who created them; they do not run your life, and they do not tell you who you are. Jesus gives the joy, the hope, and everything you need for life and godliness.
Against that backdrop, Clinton Arnold argues that an appropriate Christian perspective on spirits is a foundational concern, and asks whether the church is alert and ready to face this challenge, prepared to help people who have opened their lives to that realm. Sam Storms puts it bluntly: far too many Christians think far too little of the extent of Satan’s influence, treating his existence and activity the way we treat gravity or breathing, hardly giving it a second thought. Yet he and his are very much at work. As John writes, “the whole world is under the sway of the evil one” even as we belong to God and to his Son (1 John 5:18–20). Reflecting on that text, John Stott observes that John blurs no issues: everyone belongs either to God or to the world, either to God or under the control of the evil one.
Remember the timing of John’s words. He wrote this after the cross, after the resurrection, after the ascension, after Pentecost, and after all things had been placed under Christ’s feet.
★★ We believe, confess, and know that Christ has won. But we also know the devil is still at work in the world and in the hearts of humanity. There is no neutrality to this life.
Two Guiding Truths
Over the coming weeks the series will address this practically, theologically, and personally. But two truths lay the foundation.
1. The battle has a home address
Paul places this teaching in a very deliberate spot in the letter, right alongside real life: marriage, parenting, gender, work. As Campbell notes, the spiritual-warfare discussion is almost “apocalyptic” in the sense that it reveals a hidden reality behind the curtain of the material world, alerting believers to the real nature of their struggle against sin and evil. That carries very practical weight. When I am parenting, warfare is taking place. When I am in married life, warfare is taking place. When we are budgeting, leading, resting, and working, warfare is taking place.
★★★ Spiritual warfare has a home address, and it is my house. Nothing is neutral, and everything is spiritual.
When people say they can’t experience God in everyday life, it may be because they don’t view everyday life as spiritual. A barrier to one is a barrier to the other.
2. Believing in the spiritual world is different from seeing the spiritual world
On the road to Emmaus (Luke 24:13–35), two disciples walk seven miles beside the risen Christ and don’t recognize him. Notice what they do have. When Jesus asks what they’re discussing, they give an accurate summary: Jesus of Nazareth, a prophet mighty in deed and word, condemned and crucified, and they even report the women’s testimony that he’s alive. Their facts are correct. Their theology is orthodox. They believe the resurrection report.
★★★ Two disciples walk seven miles beside the risen Christ and do not see him. You can have the right theology, read your Bible, attend services, give, serve, and go through all the motions, and still not have your eyes opened to what is really going on around you.
Jesus presses the same point with his disciples in Mark 8:11–21. After feeding thousands, he warns them about the leaven of the Pharisees, and they think he’s talking about their forgotten bread. He asks, “Do you have eyes and not see; do you have ears and not hear? Don’t you understand yet?” The common problem in all of us is not always disbelief. Often it’s that we cannot perceive, because we don’t have the right set of eyes, spiritual eyes.
The fix
Jesus names it in John 3:3: unless someone is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. You must be born again. And for those who have already surrendered their lives to Christ, the call is to keep those spiritual eyes open through ongoing communion with Christ and his word.
Closing
Before we ever pick up a single piece of the armor, Paul pulls back the curtain so we can see the field we’re standing on. There is one life, and it is spiritual and contested. The battle isn’t off in some distant realm; it has a home address. And the goal isn’t a demon behind every bush or a shrug that none of it is real, but eyes that are actually open, seeing everyday life for the spiritual reality it is.
Referenced in this message:
Constantine R. Campbell, The Letter to the Ephesians, Pillar New Testament Commentary (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2023).
C. S. Lewis, The Screwtape Letters (1942; repr., New York: HarperOne, 2001).
Clinton E. Arnold, Powers of Darkness: Principalities & Powers in Paul’s Letters (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1992).
Sam Storms, Understanding Spiritual Warfare: A Comprehensive Guide (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2021).
John R. W. Stott, The Letters of John, Tyndale New Testament Commentaries (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1988).
Scripture quotations are from the Christian Standard Bible (CSB).
