Kingsport Sovereign Grace Church,
located at 2709 Rock Springs Road in Kingsport, Tennessee,
would like to invite you to listen to a message of sovereign grace
by their pastor, Gabe Stoniker. For information and service times,
visit www.ksgc.church. And now, Gabe Stoniker. If you
would like to follow along with me today, I will be speaking
to you from Ephesians chapter one. Glorious chapter in the
Bible, Ephesians chapter one. And if we want to know the mind
and the will and the purpose and the work of God, all of that
is very plainly, very simply laid out in Ephesians chapter
one. It's important that we know the mind and the will and the
purpose and the work of our God. And he has declared that to us.
So Ephesians chapter one, verse one says, Paul, an apostle of
Jesus Christ, Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ. What that means
is Paul is speaking God's word. He very clearly declares that
right from the beginning. Paul is speaking God's Word.
The prophets and the apostles, they were given by the Spirit
of God, being moved by the Spirit of God, they were given God's
actual words. And now we have them. The canon
of the scripture is written. We have God's actual words. This is not Paul's opinion. Sometimes you will hear men refer
to the apostles and refer to the prophets and their writings
as though that was their opinion. And that's what they thought.
And they said it here, but changed their mind there. None of that
is so. This is God's word. Paul was speaking God's Word. This is not his opinion. This
is not his own teaching. This is God's teaching. These
are God's very words. That's so important for us to
know. If you want to see that, you can find that in 2 Peter
1. 2 Peter 1 verse 20 says, Knowing this first, that no prophecy of the scripture
is of any private interpretation. That means no man came up with
this on his own. No prophecy of the scripture
is of any private interpretation, for the prophecy came not in
old time by the will of man, but holy men of God. set apart men of God, chosen
men of God, spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost. They spake as they were moved
by the Holy Ghost. This is God's word. This is God
Almighty's word. That's what it means when it
says Paul, an apostle. The word apostle means a messenger,
a sent one. This is worthy to believed. As
he told Timothy, this is worthy of all acceptation. You can take
this to the bank. This is God's word. All right. Now, if you look with me back
at Ephesians one, verse one says, Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ,
by the will of God, by the will of God. That means this is what
God wants me to say. This is what God has purposed
for me to say. Paul said, I was made to be an
apostle by the will of God, by the will of God. God did this.
And Paul is saying everything I'm about to say is according
to the will of God. all of it, his will. Verse one
says, Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ by the will of God to
the saints, which are at Ephesus, he's writing to the Ephesians
and to the faithful in Christ Jesus. He said, I'm writing to
a particular people. I'm writing to the saints that
are at Ephesus, and I'm writing to all of the faithful in Christ
Jesus, all who have been chosen by God to be faithful followers
and believers of the Lord Jesus Christ. Over in John 17, this
is a very important chapter in the scripture. This is our Lord's
high priestly prayer, as it's called, where he is praying to
his father. And it says in John 17, verse
one, these words spake Jesus and lifted up his eyes to heaven
and said father the hour is come glorify thy son that thy son
also may glorify thee as thou hast given him power over all
flesh power over all flesh the whole world all flesh he says
that he should give eternal life to as many as thou hast given
him. That's who Christ came to give
eternal life to. As many as the father gave to
him, not the whole world. Now he has power over the whole
world, all flesh. He is the God and sovereign over
all flesh. He can do what he wants with
whom he wants. But our Lord came into the world
to save a particular people, a chosen people according to
the will of God the Father. Verse six right here in John
17, he said, I have manifested thy name unto the men which thou
gavest me out of the world. Thine they were and thou gavest
them me and they have kept thy word. Verse nine, he said, I
pray for them. I pray not for the world, but
for them which thou hast given me, for they are thine. Do we see that? This word, this
word of God, the promise of this word, the good news of this word
is not written to everybody. Salvation is not promised to
the entire world. Now, why is it so important that
we declare that to men and women? Why am I saying that right now?
That's news that when you hear it, it makes you think, oh no.
Why is it so important that we declare that to men and women?
Why is it so important that we make the word of God on that
clear? Here's the reason why. It's because
the very credibility and authority and power of God depends on it. The very credibility, the very
authority, and the very power of God depends on it. Think about this with me, okay?
Just think about this. If God loved a person, you ask
people, well, who does God love? And people naturally say, well,
God loves everybody. Well, is that what he said about
Esau? Is that what he said about Pharaoh? Is that what he said about different
ones throughout the scripture? If God loved a person, but the
person ended up going to hell, What good would God's love be
to that person or to anybody for that matter? What good would
God's love be if God loved a person and that person ended up going
to hell? What good would God's love be? What would it matter
if it could not save if God loved someone but could not save them? What difference would it make
whether God loved them or not? If Christ shed his blood for
a person, you ask people, well, who did Christ die for? The natural
answer is it's wrong. But the natural answer is, well,
Christ died for everybody. That's not what we just read.
If Christ shed his blood for a person, OK, if Christ died
for a person, but the person ended up going to hell anyway.
Then what confidence could we have in the cross of Christ?
What confidence could we have? We say, well, Christ died on
the cross to save his people from their sins. Well, if he
died for someone and they went to hell anyway, what confidence
could we have in the cross of Christ? What would his blood
and his death matter in salvation? What would it matter? He died,
they went to hell anyway. If he made a payment for a particular
person's sin, and they went to hell anyway, what good was the
payment? Really? Think about that. If
Christ wills for someone to be saved, if Christ wants a person
to be saved, you will hear men say from pulpits, falsely, wrongly,
they'll stand up and say, now Christ wants everybody to be
saved. Christ wants you to be saved. If you will let him, if
you will this and that, that's wrong. If Christ wants a person
to be saved, but that person is not saved and ends up going
to hell, then Christ is a failure. If Christ wants a person to be
saved and he can't save them, Christ is a failure. And I'll
tell you this, the Lord Jesus Christ is not a failure. The
high God, the king of kings, the almighty himself, is not
a failure. God manifest in the flesh is
not a failure. Salvation is not up to chance.
Not up to chance with God. Every soul that God loved, he
saved. Every one of them. Every soul
that Christ shed his blood for, he saved. Every one of them. Every soul that the spirit calls
is going to come running to the God who saved him or her. Salvation
is not a choice. Salvation is not resistible.
Now he's trying to save you, but you won't let him. That's
not so. If the almighty says, come to me, we're coming to him. We don't have a choice in this
matter. Salvation's of the Lord. It's totally of the Lord. That's
why it's so important that we very clearly declare and understand
who our Lord is speaking these promises to. His very authority
and his power and his credibility depends on it. This is the very
mind, the very will, the very purpose and the very work of
God right here in Ephesians 1. This is what he came to do. This
is who he came to do it for, and this is what he did, all
right? Ephesians 1, if you're following me back in Ephesians
1 here, verse 1 says, Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ, by the
will of God, to the saints which are at Ephesus, and to the faithful
in Christ Jesus, grace be to you. I love that line. I just
love that line. What does grace mean? You hear
the word grace everywhere. Everyone knows the song Amazing
Grace. What does grace mean? The word
grace means free gift. That's what it means. Free gift. Verse two says, grace be to you
and peace. Grace and peace. What does peace
mean? Here's what it means. When you
look up the word, it means truce. It means unity. It means reconciliation. It means friendship. It means
accord. Peace. Verse two says, grace
be to you and peace from God, our father and from the Lord
Jesus Christ. They, God, the Father, Son, and
Spirit, three persons, one God. When we say he, we mean they,
and when we say they, we mean he. I don't understand that,
but that's so. I believe it. They are the ones. He is the one who authored grace
and peace. God Almighty. Father, Son, and
Spirit, they are the ones who executed grace and peace. They are the ones who brought
grace and peace to us. Not us to them, them to us. Again, salvation is of the Lord. The Lord. Three persons, one
God, one Lord, Salvation's of the Lord. Start to finish. Salvation
is of God. It's something that he purposed
in his mind. He purposed to do this. He purposed
it in his mind and in his heart before he ever made the world.
He purposed to create a world and we're standing on it and
he did it. And before he ever created this world, he purposed
in his mind and heart to save a particular people. He did that
before he ever made people. He purposed to save people before
he ever made people. Well, how did he know they would
need saving? He's God. He's God. The Lamb of God is
the Lamb slain before the foundation of the world. Before God ever
made a people, He provided a salvation, he provided a savior for those
people. Salvation is God's doing from
the beginning, from the start. Look at verse one, it says, Paul,
an apostle of Jesus Christ, by the will of God, to the saints
which are at Ephesus and to the faithful in Christ Jesus, grace
be to you and peace from God our Father and from the Lord
Jesus Christ. Verse three says, blessed be
the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed
us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ. That's a glorious verse of scripture.
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who
hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places
Christ. The only way that a sinner, I
am a sinner, you are a sinner, all have sinned, the only way
that a sinner can receive a blessing from God is by being in Christ. That's the only way. It's not
going to be in a sinner's good works. A lot of people think
that's where it comes from. How could I receive a blessing
for God? Well, I'll receive it in my good works. I'll receive
it in my good deeds. I'll receive it in turning over
a new leaf and being a better person. That's not so. That's
not so. It's only going to be in Christ.
It's not going to be in our own good works. It's not going to
be in a sinner's church membership. Well, I want to be saved and
I want to receive the blessing. So what do I do? Well, I'll join
a church. Salvation is not in joining a church. I believe every
soul on this earth ought to worship God and be a member of his true
congregation. I'm not for people not assembling
with the saints, but that's not where salvation is. It's not
going to be in what a sinner gives. Well, I want to be saved,
so I'll give my money, and I'll give my time, and I'll give my
talents, and we'll do humanitarian work. I think humanitarian work's
wonderful, but salvation's not in that. It's not going to be
in what a sinner gives up. Well, I know I shouldn't be doing
this, and I know I shouldn't have this, so I'm going to give
all this up. I'm going to cut all this out
and become a monk on a mountain somewhere. Salvation's not in
that. Salvation is only by being in Christ. The blessings of God
only come in Christ. Now, what does that mean? What
is it to be in Christ? What is it to be in Christ? Well,
here's what it is. It's to be chosen in Him by the
Father. It's to be predestinated in Him. It's to be adopted in Him. It's to be accepted in Him. It's to be redeemed in Him. It's to be forgiven in Him. That's
what it is to be in Christ, and that's what Ephesians 1 tells
us right here. All right, let's just quickly
read down through this. Verse 1 says, Paul, an apostle
of Jesus Christ, by the will of God to the saints which are
at Ephesus and to the faithful in Christ Jesus, grace be to
you and peace from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ.
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who
hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places
in Christ. Verse four says, according as
he hath chosen us in him, in Christ, before the foundation
of the world. that we should be holy and without
blame before him in love. Now, who chose who? Men are always
telling people, now, you need to make your choice, you need
to make your decision. Now, wait a minute, who chooses
who? Just listen to John 15, verse
16. The Lord Jesus Christ said to
his disciples, you have not chosen me, but I have chosen you and
ordained you. I have chosen you. He did all
of the choosing in salvation. There was only one choice made
in our salvation, and it was the choice of the Lord our God.
It was his decision. He did the choosing. And when
did our text say he did the choosing? Well, Romans 9 says in verse
11, it says the children being not yet born, this is speaking
of Isaac and Jacob and Esau, that's who it's speaking of.
The children being not yet born, neither having done any good
or evil that the purpose of God according to election might stand,
not of works, but of him that calleth. It was said unto her,
the elder shall serve the younger. As it is written, Jacob have
I loved, Esau have I hated. Now, when was that? Before they
were ever born. Before any soul was born. That's when God did the choosing.
Why did God do it that way? Why did he do it then? Well,
our text Ephesians 1 verse 4 says, according as he hath chosen us
in him before the foundation of the world, that we should
be holy and without blame before him in love. We were chosen then
to be purified, to be washed, to be guiltless, to be holy and
without blame. Verse five says, having predestinated
us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself. He predestinated us. Why did
he do it before the foundation of the world? Because everything
about us had to be predestinated to the Lord Jesus Christ, predestinated
to adoption. In our sin, we would have never
brought ourselves to the Lord Jesus Christ. So the father did
that for us. He predetermined everything about
us, what we would be, where we would be, how we would be predestinated,
predestinated. Years ago, there was a preacher
who went into, he had a television broadcast just like this, and
he went into a grocery store or a gas station And there was
a man behind the register there and he had a Bible on the counter.
And this preacher saw that Bible and he said to him, that's a
nice Bible you have. And the man said, thank you. He said,
I know who you are. You're the preacher on television.
And the preacher said, yes. He said, you believe in predestination,
don't you? And the man said, well, I believe
so. What does the Bible say about
it? And the man said, well, I don't know. He said, well, let me see
your Bible there. And he opened it up here to Ephesians
1 and he read verse 5 to him, having predestinated us unto
the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself. He read in
verse 11, in whom also we have obtained an inheritance being
predestinated according to the purpose of him who worketh all
things after the counsel of his own will. He took him over to
Romans 8 where it says, whom he did foreknow before the world
He did also predestinate to be conformed to the image of his
son. The preacher said, oh, so predestination
is what conforms us to the image of Christ. He said, you want
to be like Christ, don't you? And the man said, oh, yeah. He
said, well, then you believe in predestination, too. If we
want to come to the Lord Jesus Christ, if we want to, in the
end, in glory, be just like the holy, spotless Lamb of God, we
must be predestinated to it. Thank God, that's exactly what
he did. Verse five says, having predestinated us unto the adoption
of children by Jesus Christ to himself. Why did he do it that
way? It goes on to say, according
to the good pleasure of his will. He did it that way because that's
what he wanted to do. This is God we're talking about.
This is God we're dealing with. He does whatever he wants to
do. That's what God does. God does
whatever God wants to do. If it is according to the good
pleasure of his will, that's what he does. Isaiah 43 says,
no one can stop him. And it says he doesn't have to
get permission from anybody. King Nebuchadnezzar said in Daniel
four, verse 35, he does according to his will in the armies of
heaven, and among the inhabitants of the earth, and none can stay
his hand or say unto him, what doest thou? No one can stop him. No one can question him. This
is God. This is God almighty. Everything
that he did for undeserving sinners like us, he didn't do it because
we earned it. He didn't do it because we deserved
it. He did not owe it to us. in any way, shape, or form. It
was just according to the good pleasure of His will. That's
why verse six says, this is all to the praise of the glory of
His grace. It was all His free gift, therefore
He gets all the glory for it. Verse six says, to the praise
of the glory of His grace, wherein He hath made us accepted in the
beloved. Christ bore our sins in his body
on the tree, therefore removing all of us from us. And the moment
they were gone, God the Father said, welcome in, accepted in
the beloved, in Christ. Verse seven says, in whom? In
the Lord Jesus Christ. We have redemption through his
blood, the forgiveness of sins according to the riches of his
grace. Do you know why God's chosen
sinners are forgiven? It's not because of anything
we've done. It's because of the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. That's the reason why. What can
wash away my sins? What can make me whole again?
What can redeem me and cause God to forgive me? Nothing but
the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. Oh, precious is the flow that
made me white as snow. No other fount I know. Nothing
but the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. Isn't that wonderful
news? That's the mind and heart and
will and purpose and work of our God. That's what he chose
to do for sinners. And that's what he did. And if
he's caused us to believe it and to bow to it, he did it for
us. Every soul that he did this for, he draws to himself by causing
them to cry out to him, I believe. I pray that may be the case for
us. You have been listening to a
message by Gabe Stoniker, pastor of Kingsport Sovereign Grace
Church in Kingsport, Tennessee. If you would like a copy of this
message or to hear other messages of Sovereign Grace, you can call
or write to the number and address on your screen or visit www.ksgc.church. Tune in at this same time next
week for another message of God's free and sovereign grace.