As we embark on the Word of God
today, we are back in Ephesians and not that we've really left,
but we're there. And most specifically, we are
in Ephesians by way of finalizing our covenant unity time together. My prayer for you is that you
would just be enriched by the reflection of the Word of God,
that you would be overjoyed in seeing how God's grace is effective
in your life, that you would understand and celebrate to the
praise of His glorious grace the overarching reality that
God indeed is working in the life of each Christian. And the
question that usually leaves us as we do something of this
nature in a topical way is we come away from it going, OK,
I hear the truth and I agree with the truth and I see the
truth. But now, how? How do we affect such things
in our lives? And so today I will share with
you just out of the book of Ephesians in five, six ways or six different
places, how the Word of God teaches us that God affects such things
in our lives. The primary text that will be
moving out of today, we're not going to exposit a text per se. We're going to close our time
moving back into chapter five, because that's where we are for
next week or actually the week after. Got a little treat for
you guys next week. But for the week after, we're going to begin
to pick up where we left off expositionally. But this week,
we're going to bring it all together. And that what we've learned thus
far in Ephesians, then looking at covenant together and unity
in the church, then moving into the continuation of Ephesians.
I believe it's important for us to look at this. Primarily. We see several places, if you
look quickly in chapter one, verse 19. And you see here that
God says through the Paul, through the Apostle Paul, and what is
the immeasurable greatness of his power toward us, we believe.
According to the working of his great mind, they were in Christ
when he raised him from the dead. Now, you might think, well, that's
a little odd to use the middle of a sentence. Well, everything
for the first twenty one verses of chapter one is a sentence.
So no matter where you start, the middle of a sentence. So we just
have to do that from time to time. But the overarching point
that I want to make, the main single argument that we want
to see come alive today in this text is that God effects Successful
living, successful worship, successful unity, successful faith, successful
fellowship, successful affection by the working of his power.
And yesterday and talking with some brothers yesterday morning,
one of the greatest concerns that all Christians have. Is. If we boil it all down, is how
am I walking, and I'll tell you why I can say this in a minute,
in the power of God. How am I walking the power of
God when every day it's a war and a battle between the mind
that is so fleshly sometimes and the spirit of God within
me that's so different, starkly opposed? How am I walking the
power of God when that war is going on? How am I walking in
the power of God when decisions are so difficult to make and
actions are so difficult to keep in check sometimes? How am I
walking in the power of God when my affection wanes sometimes? How am I walking in the power
of God when I am bewildered and dumbfounded and trying to figure
out the next step for my life or for my family or for my ministry?
How are we walking in the power of God? Well, that's what Paul
has hoped to do here is he's taken that theme of the fact
that God's powers at work within us and we see on through in verse
twenty one. Far above all rule and authority
and power and dominion and above every name that is named, not
only in this age, but in the age to come. And so we are seeing
here a picture that is painted all the way through chapter 3,
verse 20 of God's overarching, absolute, divine and sovereign
power at work in you, in the believer, in the individual,
and then most certainly in the church. So what does that do for us?
Well, I'd like to express it this way, that God, has established
a covenant of power with his people. And we who are the body
of Christ are not just a group of people that are waiting to
be led to the slaughter like sheep, but we are a group of
people who are undergirded by the very omnipotence of God. And so as we think of that. I
thought, well, let's look at all of the references to power
in the entire Bible. And I'll come in today, and from
Ephesians and the idea of God's power at work in the church,
I'll express all the different ways in which God's power is
seen and executed and affected in the entire Bible. That'll
be one great sermon. It'll be a great year or two
or three of sermons. Because out of 272 instances
of God's power, Twenty-some odd five to twenty-nine
of them are in the Psalms. So we hear terms like, Be exalted,
O Lord, in your strength. We will sing and praise, what? Your power. Psalm 21, 13. Or
Psalm 22, 20. Deliver my soul from the sword.
My precious life from the, what? Power of the dog. So the power
of God is mighty and it is to be praised and it is strong.
And then the next thing we see is that there are other people
with power, but God is able to preserve and protect us from
that power. So what we'll see throughout
the scripture is that God And when we think about the power
of God, we we often misalign it. It's a misnomer. Yes, God
is greatly powerful. Yes, God is all powerful. Yes,
God is is more powerful than all things, all true statements. But we suppose that there are
other things in this world with power that are not comparable
to the power of God. But just in the same way, we
we impart power on things and peoples and powers and principalities. And in the essence of what we
learned about the power of God, and I want to take you through
a picture of the power of God, and then we'll come right back
to the church and we'll give seven to twelve things and how
we see God's power at work with us and among us. But what I want
you to see today is that it's not God's omnipotence, which
is all powerful. It's not in comparison to the
powers of the world and the cosmos. But it's in possession of the
powers of the cosmos. So see that for a minute. God
is not all powerful because he's greater than the powers that
be. He is all powerful because all power is his to impart. So that which we see, well, what
about government? Well, Paul says in Romans 13 that all government
is empowered by God, whether righteous or wicked. That God
establishes them and that the authority that they have is God's
to give. And either they will exalt the
glory of God and the power of God through their authority and
righteousness, or they will exalt God's judgment on them for wickedness.
So either way you put it, God is powerful and God's power is
afforded and given as stewards of his power to government, to
pastors, to parents. And so God's omnipotence means
that all power is his. So we don't look like, oh, what
about the devil? Oh yeah, the enemy, he's fighting against
the Lord with all power, really? Is he powerfully opposing God? No, I say he's pathetically begging
God. We see expression in the Scripture
where Jesus was tempted in the wilderness in Luke, and we see
the devil having to use the authority and the power of God just to
tempt Jesus. What do you mean? Satan couldn't
come up and exalt his own self or his own self. He couldn't
come up and say, hey, look, look at me and look at what I have
to offer. He couldn't come up and offer
that in front of Jesus because it would have been pathetically
laughed away. But the humanity of Jesus was hungry. The humanity
of Jesus had a mission. And so Satan came to Jesus with
the authority and the power of God. The Lord God and his word
says, And he abused the power of God
and turned it, the power of God in the Garden of Eden, where
it tells us that indeed God is holy and says, do not eat of
the fruits of the trees in the middle of the garden, for you
shall surely die. And Satan didn't come and offer them his power.
He came to take and damage that power which belonged to God.
And so he used the power of God in a sadistic and determined
way to deceive So even the greatest enemy of
God, Lucifer, all that he has is the power of God given to
him. His authority is given to him
by God, and at the moment of God's pleasure, he will remove
that from him. The supernatural ability of angels
is nothing but an extension of God's all power. Change your
thoughts, church, in that there is not In opposition, though
there is an opposition, there is no powerful opposition against
God, for it is all his to yield. He is the greatest. He is not
only the greatest of all powers, he is the owner of all powers.
And the psalmist. Knows that. Hell has power. Enemies have
power. But all through the Psalms, 30
different times, almost 30 times, I see where. We look at the power
of God and we realize that there is no power in this world, this
universe that that is not given except through God, and so that
there is not a battle even to be won, for it is already God's
in victory. So now let's look at. An Old
Testament example that came to me yesterday morning, in the
life of a young man named David. We think about the power of God
and what we do is we come and we set we set in motion this
doubt in our heads and we we know that God is all powerful,
so we pray. But we pray with an expectation that God will
take and do what we want to be done. And we fail to see exactly
that God's will may be exactly where we are in the circumstances
that we're in. And so we fail to realize that. And when something
doesn't change, we blame God. But God, you're not as powerful
as you say you are because you're not affecting the change in my
life that I'm praying by faith for you to do. But what we fail
to see is that the power of God is at work in the midst of that. The power of God is at work.
And in two different ways, and this is sort of a philosophical
thing, and it may frustrate some of you. That's OK. I'm sorry.
But God is God has two ways. He affects this world. He affects
this world through what we call second causes. For example, God
saves sinners through the second cause of the written word out
of the mouth of men. God doesn't in someone's sleep
go poof, and they're a Christian. It doesn't work that way. He
has chosen that it was not going to work that way. Could He do
it? Yes. But He said that it would work this way. So God uses
the second cause of human history and the second cause of the agency
of man to move into His divine purpose perfectly to effect salvation
for the church. God used the hands of men to crucify Jesus. But yet Paul
said that God put him on the cross. Isaiah said that it pleased
the father to crush the son. So we see the second causes. We see the second causes of sustenance
of life. Well, I know. God can sustain
life. We had the conversation recently
about fasting. Fasting is a difficult thing
physically. It hurts some people physically.
But God can sustain life. But God has naturally, through
second causes, decreed to sustain life through what? Food and water
and sunshine and nutrition. And so we don't go around going,
oh well, I'm a man of perfect faith. I'll never eat. Well,
you'll die. Except that God puts it in your
heart to not eat, and then you never eat, and then you're a
miracle walking around, and you're an anomaly of nature. And so
God, then, in that sense, is not using a second cause, but
a divine fiat. He is immediately and supernaturally
moving into the realm of changing that which is natural. And He
can do both, and He does both all the time. For example, David
and Goliath, as we've recently reviewed some of us, We compare
our lives and our troubles, and sometimes we teach our children
that in that story of David, this young shepherd boy who was
not worthy to be king, nor was he in the stature to be in the
military, he comes and faces the giant Goliath, eight to nine
feet tall, blasphemous, powerful. And we like to tell our children,
see, be like David and face your giants. That's not the moral
of the narrative of David. The doctrine of David is that
God is victorious, supernaturally, over all things, over all power,
over all pain, over all suffering, and certainly over all grunting
Philistine idiots like Goliath. And so nothing in this world
that we face is an obstacle for us to overcome, but that which
God has already powerfully overcome. Now, here is the two ways in
which Goliath could be destroyed. Why should Goliath be destroyed?
Because he defamed the name of God and he put fear in the hearts
of God's army. The king himself would hide in
his tent. And the Philistine would come out and say, OK, where
are your champions? I'll tell you how we do this,
you cowards. You send one man out and I will fight one man.
And whoever lives is the victor. Just one. Oh, what's wrong? You're a you're a you're a people
of God. Where is your God now? Is he
asleep? Is he dead? Maybe he's not even
real. Well, the Israelites shuddered
in their tents, and David, going to attend to his brothers and
bring them supplies, heard the rants of this Philistine, and
it infuriated him. Are you going to go out there
and do something about that? Let's go do something now! Go! You're the army of God, for Pete's
sake! Go chop off his head! Not going to happen. Have you
seen how big he is? Well, I'll go. So David... is told by Saul
to put on his armor, it doesn't fit, it's not appropriate. Man's
preparation is not going to overcome God's designation in that God
has designed it for David to face an unbeatable foe and to
be victorious, not in his own merit, but in the merit of God.
And so when David stands before this giant trained in the military,
trained to fight. He stands before him in his tunic
or his whatever he's wearing, normal clothes with a leather
strap and a string and five stones. And Goliath mocks God and he
mocks David and he says, Am I a dog? Are you going to whack on me
with sticks? And David looks him in the face and said, I'm
not a dog, but I'll tell you what I am. I come in the name
of the Lord God of Israel and this day he will take you down
by my hand and I will take your sword and I will chop off your
head and the birds will eat of your flesh. And in the roar of
his laughter, David put a stone right here. He was a marksman. And God used that second cause
of David's marksmanship to bring about his divine decree to restore
courage to the nation of Israel. And when that giant fell, David,
this young boy, chopped off the man's head with his own sword,
held it up and threw it to the birds. And all of Israel was
recharged. And they chased the Philistines
as far as they could and annihilated them all. So the power of God
does the impossible that humans tell you is ridiculously a waste
of time. That's just what the Old Testament
shows. Now, the New Testament in Paul's
letter to the Ephesians says that we are being worked inwardly
by the power of God and not just the same power that made creation. that God spoke, let there be
and there was, that that's not more amazing. And not just by
the power that established the people, not just by the power
that led the Israelites out of Egypt by divine, amazing things,
but not just the power that gave a young boy the ability to kill
a large giant, not just the power to close the lions in the den
of Daniel, not just the power to shudder and shake the ground
and swallow up his enemies, not just the power to destroy the
walls of Jericho, not just the power, but the power to bring
man from dead to life. And Jesus Christ, the power that
raised Him from the dead. See, we have watered down the
power of God, not purposefully, not intentionally, not by our
own argument, but we've watered it down because we have taken
for granted those things. that God has in His divine and omnipotent
power established a people for Himself in and through Christ. And so then God has created a
church for Himself. And He's set us in place in humanity
and in history to the praise of His glory and empowered us
with all that He is. and all the divine ability that
he possesses, which is greater than anything. The opposition
we see in Ephesians 2.2, that we once walked. In what? Following the course of this
world. Following the prince of the power of the air, who is
a created being by the Lord God Himself. In Ephesians 3, verse 7, Paul
says these words, And God, by the grace given to me, by the
gift of God's grace, I'm a minister of the gospel, which was giving
me by the working of his power. Paul says in Romans one, verse
16, that I'm not ashamed of the power of God. No, he doesn't. He says, I'm
not ashamed of the gospel. He relates them identically. He lays them down on a parallel
plane and says, these is this says, for I'm not ashamed of
the gospel of Jesus Christ, for it is the power of God. He gives a direct correlation
that defines the gospel as the power of God. Therefore, the
power of God is the gospel. And so the gospel, which is given
to Paul by the working of the power of God, which is the gospel,
so the gospel was given to Paul by the gospel. And what is the gospel? God embarking
and proclaiming the good news, the evangel, that He has come
to earth as a man and taken the sins of the church. And then
He has raised Jesus up from the dead and has said that He has
raised us from the dead. We are no longer dead in our
trespasses and sin, but while we were still dead, God raised
us to life and seated us to the right hand of the Father with
Jesus. So there we are. And then Paul prays in Ephesians
three. He prays these words. For this reason, I bow my knees
before the father from whom every family in heaven and earth is
named, that according to the riches of his glory, that he
may grant you to be strengthened. Strengthened. Strengthened. How?
With power through His Spirit in your inner being. So the very
gospel that is the power of God to effect change is moving through
the world and into the church through the power of the Spirit
of God. So the very God of the universe that created it all
indwells His people with all of His power. I know this is
sort of like, wow, get to the point. The point is God's powerful.
Beyond powerful. all powerful. And then the other
point is, is that same power that is all God's is now indwelling
in each Christian. Now, what that does not mean
is that we now have powers and we're like Harry Potter or whatever
the anybody else that you shoots magic Merlin or anything. It's
not like we're magical. It doesn't give us the authority
to yield the mysteries and the miracles of God, though it may.
It's not us who yields it, it's God who yields it, and we're
a tool and instrument. But more spectacular than miracles
is the miracle of a changed life, of new birth, a resurrected being
from death to life. And then in the end of chapter
3, he prays this. I've probably mentioned this
verse. every day for the last six months, but now to him who
is able to do far more abundantly than all we ask or think, according
to the power at work within us. So do you hear that? So Paul
is saying then that we. are empowered and the working
of God's powers at work within us, and that what we can think
we'd like God to do and what we could ask God to do at the
largest precipice of our imagination, at the largest distance of the
most magnificent thing that we could consider, that God is able
to do far more abundantly than that by the power that is at
work in us. So, well, I just can't love.
Yes, you can. I can't walk righteously? Yes,
you can. I can't worship correctly? Yes,
you can. You and your flesh? Not a chance.
God within you? Yes, He can. And He will. I can't share my faith? Yes,
you can. And to embark on the apostles,
they say, yes, you will, if you are empowered by the Spirit.
Oh, I want to be spirit power. Well, then get saved. And then forever commit yourself
to the apostles' teaching. The Scripture teaches that God's
power is immeasurable. In Job 9, verse 4, it says that
God's power is vast. The Scripture in Psalm 24 says
that God is strong and mighty. The power of the Lord is strong
and mighty. In Deuteronomy 7, verse 21, it says that God is
great and awesome. In Isaiah 1, He's the Lord Almighty,
the Mighty One of Israel. In Jeremiah 32, Listen to this text. Our sovereign
Lord, you have made the heavens and the earth by your great power
and outstretched arm. Nothing is too hard for you.
You show love to thousands, but bring the punishment for the
father's sins into the laps of their children after them. Oh,
great, powerful God, whose name is Lord Almighty. Great are your
purposes and mighty are your deeds. The Scripture teaches
in Isaiah 40 that the testimony of creation is a testimony to
God's power and strength. Scripture teaches several places
that He is the owner of the world. He's the ruler of all kingdoms.
He's the King of all creation. No one can resist Him. No one
can overpower Him. He is the Lord. He is the Lord
Almighty. He's the blessed and only ruler,
the King of kings, the Lord of lords. Nothing can go beyond
His control. Whatever the Lord pleases, He
does in heaven and in earth and in the seas and in all the deep.
Psalm 135, 6. For the Lord of hosts has planned. Who can frustrate
the plans of the Lord? Isaiah asks. And as for his outstretched
hand, who can turn it back? No one can stop that which God
has purposed. No one can overcome the plans
of the Lord. No one can put him into a hold
and bend his heart and bend his mind in any fashion. Job recognizes that in 42nd chapter
of that letter. No one can thwart the plan. No
one can turn back your outstretched hand. Isaiah 46 10 declaring
the end from the beginning in the ancient times, things which
have not been done, saying my purpose will be established and
I will accomplish all that I please. And Job replied and Job 42 verses
one through two. I know that you can do all things.
And Daniel four thirty five, we hear this and all the inhabitants
of the earth are counted as nothing, but he does according to his
will and the host of heaven and among the inhabitants of earth
and that no one can ward off his hand by saying to him, what
are you doing and what have you done? Well, friends, there's
not enough time in the world today for us to establish the
greatness of the power of God, but let's take for just a moment
the understanding of the covenant of God's power in the church.
Understand that there must be a unity and a covenant unity
and a covenant worship and a covenant fellowship and a covenant affection
and a covenant prayer, all orchestrated and established
and operating effectively out of the unified covenant power
of God. And so we're not just the people who covenant together
in the fruits of what God is doing. We are covenanting together
because God has empowered us. And we are all of one Lord and
one faith and one baptism, and we know that the power of God
is at work in the church mightily without measure. Let's look at
12 simple and unique ways, this is all review and where the God
the way that God's power is at work in the church. God's power
is at work in the church, and it says there that God has established
the church before the creation of the world. That God, by His
mighty power in Christ, has saved us. God has decreed by His power
that the church exists. In Ephesians 3.10, the purpose
of the church is to display the manifold wisdom of God to the
rulers and authorities of the heavenly places. Because the
church exists, the power of God is seen in its existence. The
power of God is seen in the salvation of man. How are we saved? By His pleasure, by the power
at work within us through Christ, in Christ, for Christ. God has
saved the church by His power. He has not established salvation
in the middle of some place theoretically or philosophically or spiritually
or metaphysically or physically. He's not established power that
way. I mean, salvation and sat there for us to go and stumble
around and find and pluck it off and eat it. He has powerfully
saved his own. God's power is seen in the affections
of the heart of his children. There is nothing more powerful
than seeing that as God has established the church and He's empowered
the church, that the church that once was dead in her trespasses
and sins and her trespass against God is now made alive with Christ,
in Christ, through Christ, for Christ. And so our hearts are
no longer in dabbling in the world and frustrated with life
and trying to find satisfaction with other things, but we are
satisfied in Christ. And the church is full and joyful. and affectionate toward Him.
That is the power of God at work. So often we contemplate, why
does so-and-so not love the Lord anymore? Well, he never did.
Yes, our affection can wane, and yes, our flesh can rise up,
but those who are in Christ, the power of God is sufficient
to sustain them and to keep their affections focused fully on the
true satisfaction of their soul, which is Jesus. Who is Jesus?
And that's the next thing, is that God's power is seen in the
joy of the beloved. That as we see throughout the letter, especially
what we've already studied thus far, Paul says, do not lose heart. The power of God at work in me,
the grace of God at work in me, the gospel that's at work in
me is at work in you. And so I suffer for your sake, which
is for your glory. Do not lose heart. For that which I am experiencing
now that you see with human eyes is indeed suffering, and you
want me to remove out from it. But I'm telling you now that
it's part of my joy. Other than really bad drugs,
only God can do that. And with an altered mind, it's
not true joy. It's an artificial joy. God's power is seen in the worship
of the saints. to the praise of His glorious
grace, that we recognize the inefficiency of the human heart,
the inefficiency of the human ability to come to a place of
repentance and faith, and we see the just judgment that God
has established for those who are not His, who are wicked before
His eyes. And then He takes His righteousness
from His Son and He puts it on those who are His. And we worship Him for that.
And we worship him and we love him and we adore him and we're
thankful for him. And we come to a place to where
we understand that our full hope is Christ. And we grow together
in that power. The power of God is seen in the
worship of the church. The power of God is seen in the
perseverance of the church. I know recently some of you have
experienced brothers and sisters in Christ who have dissolved
a fellowship. And that troubles me because
it's so disheartening. It's so disheartening to see
churches just close. How do you do that? How do you
walk away from people who've experienced the power of God
together? In a powerful unity of supernatural,
spontaneous affection, and then they just rip each other away
and just move on. It makes no sense. It doesn't
make sense that people can do that. Maybe the reason sometimes
that that happens is because God needs people to dissipate,
to go someplace else, to move on and do something else. But
no matter what, God, whether the fellowship folds or not,
God perseveres the church. God's power is seen in that perseverance.
God's power is seen in Christ's holiness, the power of God and
the holiness of Jesus Christ, Jesus as a man. Pursuing righteousness,
walking without sin, without more. That's the power of God
to create a human being righteous before Him. Just like Adam and
Eve were at their creation, then they rebelled against God and
sin entered the world. And every one of us are victim
of that nature. And it places us in a position
of deserving wrath just by our nature, not our actions. Our
actions definitely deserve wrath, but the Scripture teaches that
our nature deserves wrath. who we are. The essence of our
being deserves the judgment of God. And so God has established
righteousness for humanity in the human person of Jesus, and
that's a powerful thing. God's power is seen there. God's
power is only seen in the holiness of Christ, but he's seen in the
resurrection of Jesus. It's seen in the crucifixion
of Jesus. God's power at work. And this
is the same power that's at work in you and in me and in us collectively
as a body. We have the power of God that
produced righteousness and atonement and resurrection power. God's power is seen in the unity
of the faith and how we are able to stand
firm on convictions of doctrine and theology and teaching. How
we're able to come and settle our differences even if we don't
agree, but we understand the one true God has established
His grace in one true way through one true man, and that's Jesus. And although some of us want
wine for communion, some of us want grape juice, some of us
want whole two-liter bottles of Mountain Dew, whatever it
might be, we agree to disagree and move on in unity. Because we have a unity of the
faith. We're not unified in false teaching. We're not unified in
opposing doctrines. We're unified in the continuity
of that which is the gospel of Jesus, which is the power of
God. So you might say, well, it's OK if people believe differently. Yes, but not on these essentials,
not on the foundations of the gospel, for it is a very affront
to the power of God. And if the gospel is thwarted,
then the power of God is affected. If you believe in a gospel that
is man centered and man focused and man able, And you are absolutely
destroying the power of God, and you are putting man's power
in the presence of God's ability, and that God must have the pieces
of man's power and will in order to effect salvation. And that
is a damnable offense. God's power is seen in the unity
of the faith. God's power is seen sometimes as we are unified,
we become proud. And so God's power among the
body is seen in the humility of the soul. We are humbled.
Even when our flesh rises up, we are humbled. God gives us
humility. God gives us the power to understand
and receive and believe and to apply what Paul says when he
says, have this mind, which is yours in Christ. That though he was equal with
God, he did not take equality with God, something to be grasped,
but he made himself nothing, a slave, obedient, obedient unto
death, even death on a cross. Have this mind among you, church,
which is already yours in Christ. This is your mind. Now effectively
walk in it. How? By the power of God, which
is the gospel. What steps do we take? Just fall
down. Stop. Rest in the grace of God. And understand the power of God.
Number eleven, if you're taking notes in that, the power of God
is seen in the understanding of his word. As those things
come out to you and your mind clicks and your heart overwhelms
with affection, you go, wow, I see. I see that's the power
of God's spirit effectively giving you understanding. God's power is seen in the worship
of his bride toward himself. God's power. Is effective in the church. God's
power is moving and active in the church. The power of the
gospel is indeed the power of God. Now, there are several things
that are going on right now in our hearts. One, some of us are
utterly frustrated and confused. It's OK. So I think, well, what,
as he said, I don't know. We'll see. Some of us go, well,
I see it. I feel it. I know it. I hear
it. Yes, but I don't get it. How is that working in my life? Well, continue to seek out the
Word and to be united in the fellowship of the saints and
watch God unfold that working in you. You cannot see the power
of God at work in you effectively or fully without being in covenant
with the church because That's who God effectively works in,
the body, not the toe. What good is a toe? Pretty significant
if it's chopped off the foot, but by itself? Once you take your pinky toe
off, you're going to have a hard time standing. Once you have a bag
of pinky toes, that's gross. They're useless unto themselves.
except to rot and be thrown away. So what does that mean for me?
Well, as we move to a time of reflection, think about the power
of God. Think about what Jesus has called
us to do in remembrance of the gospel. Do you see the Lord's
table as it sits over there? And it's a time for remembrance.
And we are to look back at what? To look back at the power of
God in Christ, that God standing before those twelve men and then
one leaves. Go do that which you must do. The power of God at work. Through
second causes that Judas left the room to turn him over to
have him arrested that same night so that the power of God at work
in the world through the timeline of history, from all of creation
before the world began, that God set forth before he ever
said, let there be light. That he would go and take his
30 pieces of silver and he turned over the Christ to be arrested.
So that it would be tried three times and found innocent and
then convicted anyway and illegally found guilty. or sentenced, rather
illegally found innocent, illegally sentenced, and then to die, to
be humiliated, the God of all the universe subjected Himself
to that so that He could rightly, in His power, demonstrate His
gracious mercy and love toward us who are His church. And so, by the power of God,
God takes the holy man, Jesus, and He crushes him. And he bears the sins of all
who believe. And his blood spills out as a
new covenant. And we wonder why we feel so
defeated. Greater is he who is in you,
church, than he who is in the world. That's not a cliche. That's
not a bumper sticker. That's first John. The apostle. whom Jesus loved, the beloved
John. That which is from the beginning,
that which we proclaim, God shone to you, let there be
light. That's the power of God showing
you the reality of Himself through Jesus Christ, that the good news
of God is that He's come to rescue sinners. He has done just that. And what is it that overcomes
the world? Our faith in whom? Jesus the Christ. Not our belief
that it will be overcome and our steadfast confidence that
it is already overcome. Even when it kills us, we live
nanny nanny. You lose. You killed us and we're
alive. There's a picture of that as
Jesus is raised from the dead. But before that, in John 11,
He raises Lazarus from the dead. And it says that the Jews plotted
to kill Jesus and to kill Lazarus, whom He had raised from the dead.
How dumb. I know what let's do. Let's kill
the man that just came back. God is able to overcome the world.
God is and his power, God's power, that the gospel is able to reconcile
the worst of relations. We see the imagery. The lion
shall lay down with a lamb. Well, I've never had a lamb and
I've never had a lion as a pet, but I've seen enough of the National
Geographic to know what happens when those two get in proximity.
It's not lovely. But the imagery there is that
these opposing forces by nature. The lion doesn't sit around and
go, I hate lambs. I can't wait to find one so I can just eat
it. I can't stand them. I want to annihilate them so
I'm going to eat them all. No, he's hungry. His instinct is
to eat that which is cuddly. Why? Because eating that which
is ferocious ends up in a fight that he might lose. So the predatorial
instinct of a lion is to eat that which is easier to prey
on. Lamb, lion laid down with a lamb. How about pit bull with
chihuahua? I mean, whichever way you want
to put the imagery, the power of God is able to restore relations.
Now, what's the good picture there? While we were still enemies. Christ bore our sin. And he who knew no sin became
sin that we might become the righteousness of God. Do you
see that? See, that's power. That's the power of God at work.
What else could there be that's worse than being enemies with
God? What could life give you that could compare to that? What in the world comes close
to that horror? The gospel says you're friends
with God. Not only are you friends, God
took your wickedness and put it on the righteous one and killed
him that you might take his righteousness. So you are restored to life in
Christ. God is a... Is there any relationship
in this world that's more offensive than being at odds and enemies
with God? No. What about those areas that aren't
relational? What about this, that internal darkness? What
about depression? What about the idea of death
and frustration and despair? What is the world going to give
you but despair? When the power of God says that
our hope is in Christ alone. Not Christ plus this. Not this
plus Christ. Not Christ spread over the minutia
of great banquet tables. No. Throw all that junk away
and see that Christ is enough. That's hope. So the power of
God is able to restore hope in the darkness. The darkness is
where we stumble. We do not see where we're going.
The blindness, the deadness, the disease and the depravity.
The light is Christ alone. God doesn't shine a light on
Jesus. He shines Christ in us. Light shines out of darkness. Let there be light. What is that? That's God saying, I'm going
to show them me. The light of Christ is the life
of men. There was a man named John. He
was not the light, but he came to bear witness about the light.
And he came to his own, but his own did not receive him. But
to all who did receive him, he gave the right to become the
children of God, not by blood, nor by choice, nor by the will
of the head, nor by, you take it, but by the will of the Father. And we have seen the glory of
God in the face of Christ. The light is Jesus. The light
comes in the world, he tells Nicodemus. And this is the judgment,
he says in John three, that the light has come into the world,
but that people love the darkness rather than the light, because
their works are evil. For no one comes to the light,
lest their works be exposed. But those who do come to the
light come so that it may be clearly seen that their works
have been carried out in God. And so what God does in His hope
and in His power is He sees us dead and blind and unable to
see or even look. And He reaches into that darkness
in His power and He pulls out of darkness the lost, dead, depraved,
dark soul. And He hurls us into the light
of the knowledge of Jesus Christ. And we are transformed. And hope
is ours by His power. And the outcome of that is the
power of God that is at work within us today to see reconciliation,
to see salvation, to see unity, to see worship, and most importantly,
to see the transformation of the soul collectively as the
body as we walk before him in his eyes to the praise of his
glory. So that is what the power of God does. That's how the power
of God works. That's the introduction to this
sermon.