Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, to the saints who are in Ephesus, and are faithful in Christ Jesus: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ

Paul’s characteristic greeting sounds a lot like the Aaronic benediction with the repetitions left out. Aaron was to place God’s name upon the people of Israel, according to Numbers 6, by saying:

The Lord bless you and guard you;
the Lord make his face to shine upon you
and be gracious to you;
the Lord lift up his countenance upon you
and give you peace.

Now, if we view the first line about blessing and guarding as something that is made concrete in what follows–an introduction–then we have two repetitions of facial imagery each followed by a concrete form of desired blessing.  If we let the repetitions drop and simply leave the literal blessing to which each one is pointing then we end up with grace and peace—God’s favor and the benefit that results from that favor–as the distilled essence of the passage.

Paul is writing his mixed Jew-Gentile churches (mostly Gentile, usually) and blessing them as Aaron was to bless God’s people.  The Church is the new Israel.

By the way, Paul is really not that far off from what Aaron actually did in the wilderness when he blessed the people.  During most of Aaron’s ministry, Israel was not practicing circumcision, and they were accompanied by a mixed multitude from Egypt who, by the time they reached the Promised Land, had been incorporated as one people.  So the situation was not so different as one might suppose.