Goldfish in the Morgue Devotional
Day 3 - Biblical Autopsy (Ephesians 3:1-5)
Biblical Autopsy
Biblical Scripture Passage: Ephesians 3:1-5
Focal Verse: …if indeed you have heard of the stewardship of God’s grace which was given to me for you; that by revelation there was made known to me the mystery, as I wrote before in brief… ~ Ephesians 3:2-3
Most people know what an autopsy is. The average person would say it’s when a coroner or medical examiner cuts a body open and looks at the organs to figure out what killed someone. The average person would be only partially right about that. There’s far more to the story than that simple description, but as this isn’t a pathology textbook, I’ll let it pass.
What most people don’t know is the literal definition of the word ‘autopsy’. Our English word for it comes from the Greek word autopsia. It literally means ‘to see with one’s own eye’. Your primary care doctor diagnoses you by inference and conjecture based on tests they run that measure certain elements within your body. In an autopsy, the pathologist sees things your doctor has only imagined. They physically look inside an human body. They examines a deceased person’s internal organs, skeletal structure, and brain and they use their own eyes to do it. They examine the body on a cellular level as well by looking at specimens on a slide in a microscope. They literally see everything inside the body to come up with answers for how the person died.
In today’s passage, Paul is telling the Ephesians (a predominantly Gentile city) that he knows what He’s talking about because He has performed a sort of ‘autopsy’ on the Mystery of Christ himself. He’s done this by God revealing the truth to Paul on the Road to Damascus, as well as throughout his missionary journeys. Paul has seen with his own eyes the grace of Christ Jesus. He has seen with his own eyes the truth of the gospel. He has seen with his own eyes that God didn’t care whether a person was Jew or Gentile—circumcised or uncircumcised. It didn’t matter and Paul was assuring them of this. He was, through his own spiritual autopsy, telling them that believers in Christ were all one with a single DNA strand (Christ’s!).
Now after the physical act of an autopsy is completed and all the test results are in, there’s one final act a pathologist has to perform to conclude the case. They must write an autopsy report. This report may later be entered as ‘evidence’ in a court of law to prosecute criminals and the like. It must be comprehensive and it must be accurate and dependable. Most of all, it must be truthful.
In this passage, Paul refers to his own writings as proof of the truth. Since God wasn’t likely to personally reveal Himself to individual members of the church, Paul insisted they read his letters to them again and again to be assured they are covered in the blood of Christ (verse 4). My friends, let’s rest in the assurance of God’s word as the spiritual autopsy report we need to give us the assurance of our salvation. It is accurate. It is comprehensive. And most of all, it is so very very truthful.
Let me ask you: what biblical truths has God revealed to you with your own eyes? How has seeing these things with your own eyes impacted your walk with Christ? With sharing Christ with others?
Father God, I pray that you would help us to trust your word more and more each day. Thank you for the comfort it gives us on a daily basis. Use it always to grow us more and more like your son, and let us rest assured, by the eye-witness testimony of the inspired writers who penned the words within.
If you’re interested in I Died Swallowing a Goldfish and Other Life Lessons from the Morgue, the book that inspired this devotional, you can check it out here: