Open your Bibles if you would
to Ephesians chapter 1. Ephesians chapter 1. This is
one of my favorite portions of scripture. The whole book of
Ephesians is an absolutely amazing letter. I was thinking about
this before service tonight, I was thinking about how in chapter
one we see the unfolding of God's sovereign plan and purpose for
his people. We're going to see God planning
salvation in eternity, God executing salvation in time, and then we
who are the blood-bought, born-again saints of God, being regenerated
by the Holy Spirit of God. And we will see tonight the whole
Trinity in action in our salvation. And we should be able to leave
here tonight proclaiming the same words as Jonah, which we
do, salvations of the Lord. It's so clear. I don't know if
there's a clearer passage in the New Testament than Ephesians
chapter 1, which brings forth The fact that salvation is of
the Lord. The fact that He is the only
Savior. The fact that the Lord Jesus
Christ has purchased His people. And the fact that we are sealed
with the Holy Spirit of promise. Now, think of this. Let's put
ourselves tonight in the place of the Ephesian church. Just
in our minds. We are living in a city, a huge
city, of Ephesus. There's idol worship all around
us. In fact, there's a temple to Diana, a false pagan god. Huge temple. So we're in the
midst of all this idol worship. We're in the midst of all this
idol worship too, aren't we? Even today. See, nothing new
under the sun, is there? Nothing new under the sun. We're
in the same situation. Let's read this letter, and I
know it's just our mindset though, thinking of how they felt. when
they received this wondrous letter from the Apostle Paul. And this
letter is addressed to a group of believers who are rich beyond
measure in Christ, and Paul will bring that forth. They may be
poor in their position in life, they may not be, but each of
the believers is rich abundantly in Christ. Bill Gates, he's got
a lot of money in this world, but he's got no spiritual blessings
in Christ. We live in an area with the big
three where there's owners of those companies, CEOs that make
millions of dollars a year. So they have a lot, they have
a lot financially, but they're bankrupt spiritually. We are
rich. We are rich beyond compare. And we're mercy beggars as we
live in this world. And sometimes when the things
of this world can come upon us, we can lose sight. of how rich
we are in Christ. And I'm not talking that health,
wealth, prosperity garbage that people talk about. That's the
most ridiculous thing. I get so upset about that stuff. I'm talking about being rich
in Christ. Rich in Christ and Him alone. And Paul is going
to send this letter by inspiration of the Holy Spirit of God to
remember the true author of this letter is the Holy Spirit of
God. So with that in our minds, let's look at chapter 1. Scripture
says, Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ by the will of God. Look
at that. So the first thing we see, Paul
is not an apostle by man, but he's an apostle by the will of
God. Right off the bat, he gives glory to our great God. Remember
what he says? I am what I am by the grace of
God. So he's giving glory to God right away. He's saying,
I am an apostle. And there's no apostles today.
I was out for breakfast with someone this week. this lady
said she was an apostle and well that's not a good thing to say
around me and I told her no I said you're lying there's no more
apostles and you're deceived you're deceived and even the
fellow with me said the same thing and she just quietly couldn't
defend herself there are no apostles nowadays there's none There was
12 apostles, one of them was the devil, and then there was
a 13th one, which brings us back to 12, which was Paul, the one
who's writing this letter. And he says this, look at this,
to the saints, to those who are born again by the Holy Spirit
of God, and look at that, we're called saints. I remember the
first time I told my mom I was a saint to God, she about fell
over. She was a Catholic. Oh, don't
ever say that, I said, but the Bible says I'm a saint. That's
what we are, beloved. That's what we are. We're holy
in Christ. We don't feel that way, but it states this, to the
saints, which are at Ephesus, and to the faithful, and remember
I mentioned this morning about being in Christ? To the faithful
in Christ Jesus. That's our state. He's writing
to those who are born-again, blood-washed believers who are
in Christ by the will of God. Grace be to you in peace. Grace
always precedes peace. There will be no peace without
grace. Grace always precedes peace. We have peace with God by the
grace of God in and through the Lord Jesus Christ, who is God.
There's no grace coming from God. There's no peace. And look
what it says, from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ.
It comes from the Father through Christ. He's the conduit to us.
And notice we're going to see some facts brought forth here.
These are not up for debate. There's no debate in the word
of God. It says here, blessed be the God and Father of our
Lord Jesus Christ who had blessed us with all spiritual blessings
in heavenly places in Christ. That's a statement of fact. Look
at that. Who hath blessed us. It's past tense. When have they
blessed us with all spiritual blessings in Christ? In eternity. How do we know that? Well, look
at the next verse. And notice again in verse 3, in Christ.
We could name every message that we ever preach as gospel preachers
in Christ. Literally, we could do that.
Because if you're not in Christ, you don't have all those spiritual
blessings. Now look at this, according as he hath chosen us
in him before the foundation of the world. How can people
deny election? It's so clear there, isn't it?
God himself, look at this, let's tie verse three and four together.
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who
hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places
in Christ. When, according as He, that being God spoken of,
the Father, in verse 3, according as He hath chosen us in Him,
in Christ, again, in Christ, in Christ. When? Before the foundation
of the world. Before the foundation of the
world. That means it has nothing to do with us, as far as earning,
right? As far as even marriage. You
see that? Isn't that wondrous? It's all about Him. We're seeing
here the unfolding of God's sovereign plan in eternity in this portion.
He's the one who chose us. He did it in eternity. He chose
us in Christ, in whom we have all spiritual blessings. And
all we are is receivers. We know that from chapter 2,
right? For by grace you say through faith, and that not of yourselves,
it's a gift of God, not of works, lest any man should boast. We
are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus. Oh my, it's
wonderful. It just gets better too. It just
gets better. According as he hath chosen us
in their chosen there, means chosen. It means to choose in
the Greek. chosen us in him in Christ when
before the foundation of the world why that we should be holy
and without blame before him in love that we should be able
to stand in the presence of God forever forever member in over
in Colossians it says that he has made us meet that means qualified
he's qualified us for heaven below how in Christ nowhere else
it's all wrapped up in him And that's why the preaching of the
righteousness of Christ is so important. That's why the preaching
of the righteousness of Christ alone is so important, because
we see clearly that our righteousness has nothing to do with our salvation.
As a matter of fact, it disqualifies us, doesn't it? Isn't that amazing?
So we're going to see here, we're seeing here, this is all planned
and purposed by God here. And Luke goes on to say this,
having predestinated us into the adoption of children by Jesus
Christ to himself, according to the good pleasure of whose
will? Where's man's will? Oh, people always say, people
always say, well, you have to make a decision. It's all about
your will. Whose will was it that we be
in Christ? According to the scripture here,
it's God's will, isn't it? And it's according to His good
pleasure. That's wonderful. That's absolutely wonderful.
He chose us in Christ because, as I said this morning, it pleased
Him to do so. According to His good pleasure.
It was His good pleasure to save you. As I said this morning,
that's something we're never gonna get over. Absolutely never
will we get over that fact. As a matter of fact, again, in
heaven we sing worthy is the lamb, don't we? Giving him all
the glory, honor, and praise. All of it, all of it. And back
up to verse four again, that we should be holy and without
blame before him in love. We're sinners to the core. We're
sinners even after we're saved. But in Christ, we're made holy.
were accepted by God in Christ. Look at that, He predestinated
us. What? Unto adoption. Now we're sons of God. Unto adoption
of children by Jesus Christ to Himself. We're the bride of Christ,
beloved. We're His. According to the good
pleasure of His will. We could just sit right there.
See, God's will is supreme. There's only one real free will
in this whole universe. It's God's. He can do whatever
He pleases, right? He says, I'll have mercy on whom
I'll have mercy. I'll have compassion on whom I'll have compassion.
We can't say anything, can we? Except when the Lord saves us,
we say, glory to your name, O Lord. Oh, hallelujah. Praise your name.
But it's all Him. It's all Him. Now look at this,
verse 6, to the praise of the glory of His grace, wherein He
hath made us accepted in the beloved. Now we're transitioning
to that which occurred in time. So we see all there, the sovereign
will and grace of God has planned salvation's plan in Christ. And we've seen from those first
six verses that it's all in Him. And what can we do but say to
the praise of the glory of His grace? It's the grace of God. And we see here at work the grace
of God. So the grace of God in Christ,
the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit had planned and purposed that
a people would be saved in Christ. Again, the key meaning, in Christ.
Now let's see it being executed. We saw this morning that our
Savior came to this world as a submissive servant, Jehovah's
servant, and he lived that perfect life. And then he died on Calvary's
cross, and he said, I lay down my life for the sheep, didn't
he? And he did that. Look at this. In whom we have
redemption. Who? Christ. In Christ. Again, in Christ. In whom we
have redemption. Now is it, in whom we have redemption
if we decide to follow Jesus? Doesn't say that, does it? It
says, in whom we have redemption. Even the forgiveness of sins.
Look at that. through his blood, there's the
key, in whom we have redemption through his blood. So now we
see salvation's plan transitioning to a time of Calvary's cross,
when our great God became a man, and when he died on Calvary's
cross, to save his people from their sins. It says through his
blood. There's salvation no other way. There's no salvation in
Mary. There's no salvation in Buddha.
There's no salvation in Muhammad. There's no salvation in any other
thing or person. There's only salvation in and
through the Lord Jesus Christ, and it's through his precious
blood that was shed for his people. Why? For the forgiveness of our
sins. Those are what we own, isn't
it? The forgiveness of our sins. Look at this. According to the
riches of His grace. So we see, we've seen here that
we're saved according to the good pleasure of His will, God's
will, and now we see here that Christ came to this world, died
on the cross, shed His precious blood to redeem us from all our
sins, and it's all according to the riches of God's grace.
Unmerited favor. Unmerited favor. It's absolutely
incredible. wherein he hath abounded toward
us, his grace has abounded toward us in all wisdom and prudence.
Why in all wisdom and prudence? Because it's all part of salvation's
plan for maternity. And our great God, our great
God, he's wise, isn't he? He's full of grace. Look at this. Look at verse nine. Heaven made
known unto us the mystery of his will, according to his good
pleasure again, which he hath, what? Purposed in himself. When
did he purpose all this in himself? Well, we see back there in verse
four, right? 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. And
he's revealed that plan to us, hasn't he? I didn't know any
of this. If you had have talked to me
20 years ago about this, I would have had no idea what you were
talking about. When I was 30 years old, I'd have had no idea
what you were talking about. I was blind as a white goose
in a snowstorm. I had no clue. No clue at all.
But now, by the grace of God, I know this. And I don't know
it by my own doing, and neither do you, who are God's people.
You only know it as I only know it because God's revealed it
to us. And now we rejoice in it, don't we? And we give God
all the glory. And we see here, he purposed that in himself,
according to his good pleasure. It's incredible. Look at this,
that in the dispensation of the fullness of times, he might gather
together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven
and which are in earth, even in him. 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. Now we see a theme here, don't
we? God does what he wills. He doesn't do what we will, but
he does what he wills, doesn't he? It's so clear. And he does
what he wills in heaven and in earth. Look at verse 12, that
we should be to the praise of his glory who first trusted in
Christ. Now we come to our time, time
of love for every believer. What's the time of love? When
God the Holy Spirit reveals Christ to us. That's the time of love.
Look at verse 13, in whom ye also trusted after ye heard what?
The word of truth, the gospel. of the Lord Jesus Christ, the
gospel of how Christ came to save sinners. The gospel that
at one time fell upon deaf ears with us. We heard it, but we
didn't hear it. All we heard was the words of the preacher,
but now we hear it. by the power of the Holy Spirit
of God. And look what Paul writes there, in whom ye also trusted. After that, ye heard the word
of truth, the gospel of what? Your salvation. The gospel's
the gospel of our salvation for each individual believer, isn't
it? God saved me. He saved me by revealing Christ
to me through the preaching of the gospel. Is it so for you?
Amen, eh? He did that, and that's what
Paul's bringing forth here. The gospel of your salvation,
it's not ours that We didn't do anything. It's God's salvation,
but we've received it by the grace of God and the mercy of
God, and we trusted Christ by the grace and mercy of God, because
we know that God's given us faith to believe. He made us willing
in the day of his power. It's all about Him. This chapter
is all about what God's done. All about what He's done. In
whom also after that she believed, you were sealed with that Holy
Spirit of promise. There's regeneration by the Holy
Spirit of God. What did our King say? You must
be born again. You must be born again. There
it is. If you're not born again you will not see the kingdom
of heaven. It says you must be born again. Our master said that
in John chapter 3 and look at that. You were sealed with that
Holy Spirit of promise. See that word sealed there? I've
mentioned this before but I'm going to mention it again. In
the ancient days When boxes were put on cargo ships, there was
a seal placed on them. So Brother Jim, if you had some
boxes that were going on a certain ship, they would be sealed with
your seal. Brother Dan, if you had some
boxes going on the same ship, how would you tell the boxes
apart if there wasn't a seal? So your boxes would be sealed
with your seal. Then I got some boxes too, a
couple boxes thrown there too, and they're sealed with my seal.
So we get to the next port, and Brother Jim takes his boxes,
Brother Dan takes his boxes, and I take my boxes. And the
only reason we know the difference between the boxes is because
of that seal. That's what that seal means.
We're sealed by the Holy Spirit of promise, beloved. That's wondrous.
We're His. We're marked. We're marked, beloved,
as His. How? Well, by the precious blood
of Christ. Look at verse 14, which is the
earnest of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased
possession under the praise of His glory. Wherefore I also,
verse 15, after I heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus and love
to all the saints, ceased not to give thanks for you, making
mention of you in my prayers. So Paul continuously prayed for
God's people. When he heard of their faith,
he rejoiced. He rejoiced, just like when we
heard that the Lord had saved Brother Bill Kirkpatrick. I know
you guys have been praying for him for years, and the Lord saved
him. We rejoiced, didn't we, when we heard that wondrous news,
and we gave God all the glory. Well, Paul had heard of the Ephesians'
faith, and he's giving glory to God for it. He's giving glory
to God. Look at verse 17. that the God
of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give unto
you the spirit of wisdom and revelation and the knowledge
of him, the eyes of your understanding being enlightened, that you may
know what is the hope of his calling and what the riches of
the glory of his inheritance is in the saints. See, now we
know something. Now we know something we didn't
know before. We know Christ. because he's revealed himself
to us by his grace and by his mercy. And we have an inheritance,
beloved, that cannot be defiled by anything we do. Isn't that
incredible? Because if you're sealed, think
of this, if that box is sealed, yours, Jim, brother Jim, that's
your box. It's not mine. It's not Dan's.
It's yours. It's yours. We are sealed by
the Holy Spirit of promise where he is. And we have an inheritance,
again, that cannot be corrupted. Because why? It's in Christ.
Now if it was of our doing, we would mess it up so bad. Oh my
gosh. It'd be gone in probably what?
Two seconds. Not even that. Right? But do
you see the assurance we have? Do you see the security we have
in Christ? Let us be constantly reminded
of that. Let us remind ourselves of that,
that we are to look to Christ and Him alone. Look at this in
verse 19 too, that we may know what is the exceeding greatness
of His power to usward. who believe according to the
working of his mighty power. We were dead. We know that now.
We were spiritually dead. Graveyard dead. We couldn't make
ourselves alive. But now we're alive by the regenerating
power of God. Now we know about his power,
don't we? We've experienced it. We've experienced
the life-giving power of God the Holy Spirit. And now we know
him. Now we know him. And now we proclaim
he can save whomever he wills, can't he? He can save whoever
He wills. Oh, I pray, if it be God's will,
and you don't know Him, you who will hear this message, oh, I
pray that God give you life, that you be born again by the
Holy Spirit of God, if it be His will. And look at this, look
at verse 19, and what is the exceeding greatness of His power
to us, to you who believe. His power has been exercised
on you and me as blood-washed believers. He's manifested His
mighty power to us. And then it closes in there again,
according to the working of His mighty power, regeneration, redemption,
justification, adoption, all by the mighty power of God. Do
you notice that in this passage there's nothing about what we
do? Do you notice that Paul is just proclaiming what God's done?
That's because salvation's of the Lord. It's not by anything
we do. It's wonderful. Look at verse
20. Which he wrought, again, look at these two words again,
in Christ. There's a key. Do you notice
the theme again? Paul is continuously bringing forth before them in
Christ, in Christ. When he raised him from the dead,
so we saw God's power exercised when Christ was raised from the
dead and sat him at his own right hand in the heavenly places.
And we know that that same power raised us from our spiritual
deadness. That same power was exercised. far above all principality,
and power, and might, and dominion, in every name that is named,
not only in this world, or that being age, but also in that which
is to come. Now notice that. Where's Christ
right now? He's far above all principality, power, and might,
and dominion. So our Savior, the one who keeps
us by his grace, is far above anything in this world that can
touch us. He's far above anything that's visible or invisible that
can touch us. He's over all. Why do I fret
then? The flesh, the flesh, the flesh,
the flesh. Look at that magnificent statement.
far above all principality and power and might. There's nothing
that is stronger than our God. You hear religious people talking
and you think, after you listen to them for a little while, that
they really believe Satan's stronger than God. But that's not true.
We know from the book of Job, Satan can only do what God allows.
He's restrained. Like Henry Mahan said, he's like
a dog on a leash. far above all principality and
power and might and dominion. That's everything. Anything in
this world, anything visible or invisible, He's over it all. He's in glory right now. In every
name, not his name. Think of all the great names
that have went through history in this world. No great names,
just give Caesar, Augustus, Alexander, all these great names that the
world just holds up and vaults up in renown. Nothing compared
to Christ. He's far above them all. He's
far above them all, the Lord. He's the King of kings, and he's
the Lord of lords. And this scripture declares that.
He's above them all. And where is he right now? Well,
he sat down. work's finished. And he did it
all. We see here in this whole chapter,
God did it all. No wonder Paul penned in the
second chapter, for by grace he is saved through faith, and
that knowledge is a gift of God. We didn't do nothing to earn
it. We didn't do nothing to merit it. If we got what we deserved,
we'd be in hell. This is pure grace. This is a
measurable grace before us. And look at that, not only in
this world or age, but also in that which is to come. There
has never been and there never will be anyone who can usurp
God from his throne. He's almighty. And he won't leave
his throne either, will he? No way. You've heard me say empires
of Rose, Babylon, oh, great empire. Rome, militarily Rome. Before
Rome, Greek just conquered vast swaths of land. And then the
Roman army comes in right behind them, conquering more land. But our Lord is far above all.
And all those empires, where are they now? They're gone. We
read about them in the history books. They were raised up for
a time, and when they fulfilled their purpose, they were gone.
What did our God say about Pharaoh that he raised them up for this
purpose? my oh my and look at verse 22 and let us take comfort
here and that put all things under his feet under christ's
feet our savior the one who keeps us the one who saved us and the
one who keeps us has all power all of it and gave him to be
the head over all things to the church. He's the head, and we're
the body. And what's it say of the church?
Which is the body, the fullness of him that filleth all in all.
So in this portion of scripture we've looked at tonight, we've
seen the unfolding of God's sovereign plan. We've seen it executed
in time when Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law.
We've seen the Holy Spirit sealing us. We're his, we're God's. And
we've seen it's all by His almighty power. Lord, help us not to doubt. Help us to look to Thee. We live
in a time now like that. I was talking to a sister this
morning, and she said, when I mentioned about the ebb and flow, right,
she brought a great point out. She said, there's the ebb and
flow, but where's the constant? That's Christ right through it
all. Oh my, I was so blessed. I wish she had told me that before
the message. Oh my, isn't that true? It's true, isn't it? He's
the constant beloved. Let us keep looking to Him. Let
us keep looking.