Turn with me, if you would, to
Ephesians chapter one. Ephesians chapter one. This Bible
study and both of the messages today, all three of our messages,
they are all going to go together. in a way that I don't believe
I've ever had messages go together before. One is going to be a
continuation of the previous one. It's basically one big message,
and I wanted to spend a little time on each section of it. So
the Lord willing, for our messages this morning and tonight, both
of those are going to be in Romans 8. And right here in Ephesians 1
and there in Romans 8, both of these portions of scripture are
talking about God's people being adopted into His family. That's what both the particular
verses of Romans 8 that we are at as we go through Romans. And
here in Ephesians 1, they're both talking about our adoption
into the family of God and what that means for us because of
the adoption. So with that being the theme
of today, what I want to do is I want to give you all three
titles and that'll cause us to understand what the focus of
each one will be and how they're going to go together. The title
of this Bible study is The Adoption of Children. The title of the message in a
moment is, If Children Then Heirs. And then the title of the message
tonight will be, Heirs of a Glorious Hope. The adoption of children,
if children then heirs, heirs of a glorious hope. All right,
Ephesians 1 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. That's who he's writing to. To
the saints and the faithful in Christ Jesus. He is not writing
to every soul. He's not writing to every soul.
The Bible And you know, everyone who falls under the Christian
canopy has a Bible. Most everybody has a Bible, has
seen a Bible, but the Bible is not written to everybody. Now it says something about everybody. It exposes everybody. But the
promises of salvation are not written to everybody. They don't
potentially apply to everybody and that's what people think.
Well, there's some promises in here and they could potentially
apply to you if, no, they don't potentially apply to everybody. This word is only two and it's
only four God's adopted children. That's who he wrote it to, God's
children. Let me show you that over in
Matthew 11. Matthew chapter 11. Verse 25. At that time, Jesus answered
and said, I thank Thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because
Thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent and hast
revealed them unto babes, children. Even so, Father, for so it seemed
good in Thy sight. He said, You have on purpose
hid these things from those who see themselves to be wise in
the way of God, and you have revealed these things on purpose
to babes." Children, those who see themselves to be ignorant
in the things of God, revealed it to one, hid it from another. Look with me at Matthew 13. Matthew
13, verse 10 says, And the disciples came and said
unto him, why speakest thou unto them in parables? Our Lord preached
in parables. And they said, why are you preaching
in parables? He answered and said unto them, because it is
given unto you to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven. But
to them, it is not given. It's not given to everybody.
Verse 13, he said, therefore speak out of them in parables
because they seeing, see not. They see it, but they don't see
it. And he said, hearing, they hear
not, neither do they understand. They hear it, but they don't
hear it. Therefore they don't understand
it. They do not understand it. Turn with me to John 17. John 17 verse 1, these words
spake Jesus and lifted up his eyes to heaven and said, Father,
the hour has come, glorify thy son that thy son also may glorify
thee. As thou hast given him power
over all flesh, that he should give eternal life to as many
as thou hast given him. To as many as thou hast given
him. Verse six, I have manifested thy name unto the men which thou
gavest me out of the world. Every time you see the world
in the scripture, thank God he has a people all over this world,
all over the world. But he is referring to them,
which thou gavest me out of the world. Thine they were, and thou
gavest them me, and they've kept thy word. In 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. That's
pretty clear, isn't it? I'm praying for them. I'm not
praying for the whole world. I'm praying for the ones you've
given to me. Turn back a few pages to John
10. John 10, 24. Then came the Jews
round about him and said unto him, how long dost thou make
us to doubt? If thou be the Christ, tell us
plainly. Jesus answered them, I told you and you believed not. The works that I do in my Father's
name, they bear witness of me. But you believed not because
you are not of my sheep, as I said unto you. My sheep hear my voice
and I know them and they follow me and I give unto them eternal
life and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them
out of my hand. He did not say, you are not my
sheep because you don't believe me. He didn't say that. He said,
you don't believe because you're not of my sheep. By grace are
we saved through faith, believing. That is not of ourselves, that's
the gift of God. All right, one more. Acts 13. Acts chapter 13. Verse 48. And when the Gentiles heard this,
they were glad and glorified the word of the Lord. And as
many as were ordained to eternal life believed. That doesn't say as many as believed
were ordained to eternal life. It says as many as were ordained Now, I'm going to go ahead and
tell us all right now, here is the end of this Bible study. This is the transition point,
okay? We're establishing the fact that
this Word is not written to everybody. It's not written to everybody.
It's written to God's children, God's adopted children. If you want to know if this Word
is written to you, here's how you can tell. Has God caused
you to believe it? This is what it says. We just
read what it says. Has God caused you to believe
it? Because if you believe it, that
is not your doing. That is God's doing. We give
ourselves way too much credit in believing. We go around with
this lack of assurance. Do I belong to Him? Do I belong
to Him? Do you believe it? Yeah, I believe it, but do I
belong to Him? If you believe it, that's God's doing. If you
believe it, you were ordained to believe it. Had you not been
ordained to believe it, you couldn't believe it. You'd be one of the
ones who say, I don't believe that. All right, so do you believe
the record of God's Word? I was thinking about this this
morning. If somebody, and people do, and they come and they want
to talk about salvation and this and that, this would be my advice.
I believe this is going to be my advice. Get a King James Bible. Get a King James Bible and whatever
it says, believe it like a child. Yeah, but I don't understand
it. Oh no, it's easy to understand. impossible to believe unless
God, that can't be right, that can't be right. When God sends
His Spirit, that's right, amen. Get a King James Bible, read
it, and believe it. All right. This is how we can
know, this is really how we can know. I am so glad that this
doesn't say, as many as were ordained to eternal life stopped
sinning. Aren't you so glad it doesn't
say that? It says they believed. They believed. God is God and
I am not. I believe that. I truly do believe
that. God has every right to do what
he wants with whom he wants and I don't. I believe that. Had God not chosen a people to
save, no one would have been saved. Because this flesh is
naturally enmity against God's salvation. That means it hates
God's salvation. It will not come to Him that
it might have life. God in mercy and kindness and
love has to lay hold of a sinner and against that sinner's will. Totally against the sinner's
will. The father has to drag the sinner to Christ. The father
draws means the father drags the sinner to Christ. God has
to irresistibly force salvation on a sinner or the sinner will
not be saved. That's John chapter 5 and John
chapter 6. And by His grace, we believe
that. We believe it. God's sovereign
work in salvation. God choosing the sinner. God
redeeming the sinner. God regenerating the sinner.
That's the only hope that the sinner has. If God leaves a sinner alone,
that sinner will choose to die in his self-righteous sins. That's
where he'll choose to die. Now, by His grace, we believe
that. Every soul that's ordained to life will believe God. Alright,
look with me back at Ephesians 1. 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.
Grace be to you. Verse three, he said, blessed
be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed
us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ. What a big verse that is. That's the secret to it all right
there, in Christ. That is the secret to it all.
The adoption of children is in Christ. All of God's children
are in Christ. That's the key to it all. In
Christ. In Christ. That's everything. God has blessed us with all spiritual
blessings in Christ. What does that mean? You can
tell people that it's in Christ. Oh yeah, it's in Christ. What
does that mean? He's about to mention election.
He's about to mention righteousness, predestination, adoption, acceptance,
redemption, forgiveness, grace. On down, he's going to mention
an inheritance. And he said all of it is in Christ. Verse four says, according as
he hath chosen us in him. You know what that means? That
means God didn't choose us. He chose Christ. God chose Christ. He said, behold my servant. He's my elect. I put my spirit
on him. He chose Christ, but we were
in Christ. Therefore, when the Father chose
Christ and accepted Christ and received the worthiness and the
perfection of Christ, He chose and He accepted and He received
us in Christ. Verse 4 says, according as He
hath chosen us in Him before the foundation of the world.
That ought to prove that it has nothing to do with us. Christ
was the only one around before the foundation of the world.
We didn't do any good or evil to influence His choice. 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. He's
saying that we should be perfect, that we should be righteous.
Mankind naturally sees that in order to go to heaven, you have
to be good. That's obvious. Sin can't enter heaven. Sin is
not going to enter into heaven. Only what's good and perfect
and right. Man naturally sees that, but what man does not naturally
see is he doesn't have the ability to produce goodness in himself. No ability at all. Our goodness
that earns our entrance into glory is not our goodness at
all. Our goodness is Christ's goodness. Our perfection is Christ's perfection. Our holiness, our innocence is
Christ's holiness and Christ's innocence. As He is, so are we
in Him. Now let me illustrate that to
you in this way. A woman that is pregnant with
a child, If you could ask the child in
the womb, if you could have a conversation with the child in the womb and
ask this child in the womb, what are you going to eat today? Whatever my mother eats today.
Where are you going to go today? Wherever my mother goes today.
The mother's life is the child's life in the mother. Is the child really eating? Yes. Is the child really going from
point A to point B? Yes. But only in the mother. Everything that mother does applies
to that child. If it is, as the scripture words
it, reckoned unto the mother, it's reckoned unto the child. You're never going to see a pregnant
mother go up to a gate at an airport with a boarding pass
and hear them say to her, all right, there's your ticket for
you, but where's the ticket for your baby? It's right here. When I bought
this ticket for myself, I bought this ticket for the one who's
inside me. Well, where's your baby going
to sit? right there with me. The one
inside me is going to be seated right there in me. A lot of times we may wonder, this
is something that a lot of people wonder, a lot of believers wonder,
am I good enough to go to heaven? Here's the answer. No. Have I really done enough to
go to heaven? Here's the answer. No. Did that baby do anything to
help purchase that airline ticket? No. But if God has given us to Christ,
and if we are in Him, then this is the only question that needs
to be asked. Is Christ good enough to go to
heaven? That's the only thing we need
to know. Has Christ done enough to walk straight through the
gates of heaven itself? Yes. Yes, He has. And if that's what He is, and
if that's what He has earned, then that's what we are, and
that's what we have earned in Him. Where He goes, we go in
Him. What He does, we do in Him. All of His work is on His own
behalf and it's on the behalf of every soul that the Father
has placed in Him. Let me show you this quickly.
Look with me at Hebrews 2. Hebrews 2. Verse 9, it says, but we see
Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels for the
suffering of death, crowned with glory and honor, that He, by
the grace of God, should taste death for every man. And hopefully
we realize that that means every man that the Father has placed
in Him. He's about to literally tell us that right here in this
passage. Verse 10, for it became him for
whom are all things and by whom are all things in bringing many
sons unto glory to make the captain of their salvation perfect through
sufferings. For both he that sanctifieth
and they who are sanctified are all of one. They're all one. For which cause he is not ashamed
to call them brethren. Have you ever seen a mother pregnant?
who is ashamed to say, this is my baby. This is me. He said,
we're all one, and he's not ashamed to call them brethren. They're
in him. Saying, I will declare thy name
unto my brethren in the midst of the church, will I sing praise
unto thee. I'll do that. Verse 13, and again,
I will put my trust in him. He said, I will put my trust
in the Father. I will do all this, verse 13
he said, and again, behold, I and the children which God hath given
me. I'm doing this for myself, and
I'm doing this for every child that the Father has given to
me. I'm doing it for both of us. So back in Ephesians 1, that's
what it means in verse 5. when He said, having predestinated
us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to Himself according
to the good pleasure of His will. We were chosen to adoption, predestinated
unto adoption by Jesus Christ to Himself. He did this for us. He secured our legal right to
be added to the family of God, counted as members of the family.
He did it all according to the good pleasure of His will. That
means He wanted to. He did it because He wanted to.
And verse 6 says it's all to the praise of the glory of His
grace. Now I'm going to pause for a
minute and we're going to pick up right here. in the message
in a minute, and this is gonna intertwine with Romans 8. Before
we stop, notice that he said in verse 13, in whom. You also trusted after that you
heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, in
whom also after that you believed, you were sealed with that Holy
Spirit of promise, which is the earnest of our inheritance until
the redemption of the purchased possession unto the praise of
his glory." He said, in whom? In Christ. You trusted after
you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation,
in whom also after that you believed. And that's what we were talking
about a minute ago. You heard it. And you believed it and you
were sealed with that Holy Spirit of promise, which is the earnest. When you buy a house, you put
down an earnest. You put down an earnest payment.
And what you're saying is, I promise I'll buy this house. Well, God
says to his child, my earnest to you is my spirit. If I've
sent my Spirit to you and caused you to believe, then you are
mine. I bought you and every promise
that there is in Christ is going to come to you. Verse 14, which
is the earnest of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased
possession unto the praise of His glory. Now if that applies
to us, then we're about to see what that means for us. If we're
children, then we're heirs. And that's a wonderful thought.
All right, you're dismissed.