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According to Luke’s account of Paul’s third missionary journey (Acts 18:23–21:16), Paul arrived in Ephesus in the spring of AD 52. Paul’s three-year ministry in the city bore much fruit. Luke informs us that the word of the Lord was increasing and many people were coming to faith in Jesus Christ (19:20). But the increasing number of Christians in the city also created “no little disturbance” among the city’s merchants (19:23), leading to the riot described in Acts 19:21–41.
Paul soon left Ephesus for Macedonia to meet with the churches that had been founded during his second missionary journey, returning to Asia Minor by way of Miletus, a seaport near Ephesus (20:17). Knowing that he would eventually go on to Jerusalem, Paul summoned the elders from Ephesus to meet with him in Miletus to say goodbye to those men with whom he had labored in ministry for several years and from whom he had to depart.
Compelled by the Holy Spirit with some urgency to leave for Jerusalem, Paul did not yet know what exactly awaited him, only that imprisonment and affliction were likely, with his death a real possibility (20:22–24). Paul knew that he would never see these men again, so there was much to tell them before he departed. As Luke recounts the poignant scene, there was heartfelt prayer and many tears shed as the men accompanied Paul to his ship when he set sail.
A number of things stand out in Paul’s “farewell speech” to these men in Acts 20:17–38. Paul offers a defense of his ministry, telling the brothers that he is innocent of the blood of all men. He held nothing back from them, preaching to both Jew and gentile the need for repentance before God and faith in Jesus Christ (v. 20). Throughout their years of service together, Paul prepared the Ephesian elders to shepherd the flock of Christ and equipped them to deal with savage wolves who would arise in their midst, introducing false doctrines. Paul faithfully fulfilled his mission in Ephesus. He proclaimed to them “the whole counsel of God” (v. 27).
When Paul speaks of “the whole counsel” (the plan or purpose) of God, we may detect a faint echo from Psalm 1:1. In the opening words of the Psalter, the psalmist contrasts the counsel of the wicked with the way of the righteous. Throughout Paul’s time in Ephesus, he witnessed firsthand those who scoff at and oppose the purposes of God—a large, angry gathering of them assembled at one point in opposition to Paul’s preaching, threatening harm, and for hours chanting, “Great is Artemis of the Ephesians!” (Acts 19:28).
But the Ephesian Christians are among those blessed by God and who refuse to listen to the counsel of the wicked as they rage against Paul and the gospel. The wicked will perish apart from the congregation of the righteous (Ps. 1:5), while those who have come to faith through Paul’s preaching now walk in the ways of the Lord and are known to him (v. 6). There are two “counsels” behind Paul’s farewell speech—the whole counsel of God stands in sharp contrast to the counsel of the unrighteous.
The whole counsel of God is summarized by Luke in Paul’s farewell and includes his teaching about those things that are profitable for Christians to know (Acts 20:20), testifying about the gospel of grace (v. 24) and proclaiming the kingdom of God (v. 25). A number of these matters are found throughout Paul’s epistles and explained in much more detail.
In 2 Timothy 3:14–16, for example, Paul gives Timothy a list of profitable teaching found in God-breathed Scripture, which makes one wise for salvation through faith in Jesus Christ and also instructs, corrects, and trains God’s people in righteousness. Paul speaks of the gospel of grace in a number of verses, but Ephesians 2:8 comes to mind: “For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God.” As for the kingdom of God, Paul indicates that it consists in power, not talk (1 Cor. 4:20), and it cannot be inherited by flesh and blood (15:50). Luke closes the book of Acts by recounting that while imprisoned in Rome awaiting his trial before Caesar, Paul proclaimed the kingdom of God and taught about the Lord Jesus for three years at his own expense (Acts 20:31).
Luke’s summation of the main emphases of Paul’s preaching helps us understand what it means to proclaim the whole of God’s counsel in our own day. Those things mentioned by Luke are directly connected to the gospel that Jesus revealed to Paul while the latter was on the road to Damascus to hunt down and arrest Christians (Acts 9:1–19). After his encounter with the risen Jesus, Paul began preaching the gospel revealed to him by the Lord (Gal. 1:11–12). Paul held nothing back. Based on the way that Luke uses the phrase in Acts 20:27, “the whole counsel of God” refers to the proclamation of the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ in the power of the Holy Spirit. Through this preaching, God extends His kingdom and ushers in the new creation.
That said, it is also a good and necessary inference that the whole of biblical revelation in both Testaments is the story of Jesus Christ’s role in our redemption. Previously, this was hidden in the types and shadows of the Old Testament and then brought to light in the New Testament (Col. 2:17). The whole counsel of God extends to all those things that God has revealed in His Word. Jesus makes this point in several places. In John 5:39, Jesus challenges the Pharisees with an amazing claim: “You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that bear witness about me.” After His death and resurrection, Jesus told His downcast disciples walking along the road to Emmaus that the whole of Scripture (starting with Genesis) testifies of Him (Luke 24:27).
Luke describes “the whole counsel of God” in Acts 20:27 as the person and work of Christ proclaimed by Paul during his gentile mission. But the Christ whom Paul preaches tells us that the whole of redemptive history (i.e., the whole of Scripture) speaks of Him. It is proper, then, to understand the whole counsel of God as all that is revealed in the Bible with Jesus Christ at the center of the biblical message. Therefore, the Westminster Confession of Faith is correct to define “the whole counsel of God” as “all things necessary for his own glory, man’s salvation, faith and life, [which] is either expressly set down in Scripture, or by good and necessary consequence may be deduced from Scripture” (1.6).
If the phrase “the whole counsel of God” refers to the sum of those things revealed in Scripture, then this also limits Christian preaching, teaching, and doctrine to those things found in Scripture or deduced from it as a necessary inference. The whole counsel of God is revealed in His Word and is therefore limited to that which is revealed in His Word.
The temptation is always great to inject into preaching human opinions, practical advice, groundless speculation, stories, anecdotes, and illustrations that have little or nothing to do with the biblical text. Many preachers are quite skilled in doing just that. Though such preaching is often done under the guise of proclaiming “the whole counsel of God,” the door is opened, whether intentionally or not, to embracing the counsel of the unrighteous. This is a subtle move and is often hard to discern.
Even when preaching outside and beyond the counsel of God, men often avoid out-and-out falsehood but do succeed in replacing, ignoring, or distorting the person of Christ and the message of our redemption as the central theme of Scripture. “Counsel” that is not grounded in God’s revelation in His Word can often be interesting and favorable to sinful human interest. But preaching the whole counsel of God as revealed in Scripture should exclude all such things not found in Scripture as set forth in the Westminster Confession of Faith (1.6). The whole counsel of God excludes things added (i.e., not in the Bible), new revelation supposedly given by the Holy Spirit, and the traditions of men.
Paul’s defense of his ministry in Ephesus is direct and emphatic. The Apostle proclaimed the whole counsel of God throughout his missionary journeys. This sets the boundary for Christian preaching today as the whole of Scripture, while focusing on Jesus Christ and Him crucified. What, then, is the whole counsel of God? It simply means that we proclaim not ourselves but Jesus Christ and Him crucified from all of Scripture (see 1 Cor. 1:23; 2 Cor. 4:5).