Ephesians chapter 2. I'll be honest with you, I have been praying and looking at what
I was going to preach about today. Throughout the week, last week
and this week leading up today, and it changed was on my mind and couldn't get
it out of my mind. And so as I was kind of getting
ready in my down in my study in my bedroom, I was like, well,
Lord, is this what you want me to talk about or what I thought
I was going to talk about? And the Lord just kind of impressed
upon my heart that this is what he wanted me to talk about. So
it's hopefully going to be a A blessing to your heart and an encouragement
to you, and I pray that the Lord will give me the words to say
this morning to speak. You know, Ephesians is one of
my favorite books of the Bible. Well, I can't really say that
all of them are my favorite books, but it seems that Ephesians I
go to a lot at our church, especially Ephesians chapter one. I mean,
those first, you know, But really, there's a transition
as it goes from chapter one into chapter two that is a wonderful,
wonderful thing for the child of grace to hear. We preach the
grace gospel not to get people saved, but for saved people.
The reason that we preach It is encouragement for them.
It's what builds them up. And so a lot of times people
in churches are like, you know, well, you know, there's so much
to preach about. Why don't you just keep preaching
about grace and why don't you keep preaching about the gospel
and all these things? Well, we need to hear that over
and over again. We still need to hear that. Matter of fact,
Jesus and John, he said that his body and his blood, they
were food indeed. They were things that we feed
upon. not in realistic things like the Catholics believe, you
know, whenever you take the wafer and put it in your mouth, it
actually becomes flesh, or the wine, whenever you drink it,
that it actually becomes the blood of Jesus. We don't believe
those things, but we truly believe that whenever we hear the gospel
of what Christ has done for us, that that is food for us, that
is our spiritual food that we feed off of. And matter of fact,
every child of grace has been born from above, You know, I'm reminded of the
song my grandmother and my grandfather used to sing to me when I was
a little kid all the time. I love to tell the story of unseen
things above, of Jesus and his glory, of Jesus and his love. And, you know, one of the lines
in that is, you know, I love to tell the story for those who
know it best seems hungering and thirsting to hear it like
the rest. Well, I can tell you those who are not born from above
aren't hungry and thirsty to hear it, but we are. And so a
lot of times when I come to God's Word, we have a lot of things
to preach on. I try to, at our church, I try
to preach the whole counsel of God and not just kind of harbor
it on one particular topic. Sometimes the Lord kind of gets
me in a place little while, but as preachers,
we're called to preach the whole counsel of God. And I think if
you're preaching through verse by verse, that tends to lend
itself to covering everything in God's word. But in the middle
of it all, Denny said something in his study this morning. In the middle of it all, there
is an overarching theme that kind of threads itself through to Jesus. Let's look at Jesus
this morning. So here in Ephesians chapter 2, I'm going to start
reading in verse 1 and follow along with me if you would. The
Bible says, and you hath be quickened who were dead in trespasses and
sins. Now that phrase hath be quickened
there you'll notice in your Bibles is italicized. It's not there
actually in the Greek. That was added by the translator but it is backed up, and we'll
get to it here in verse five in just a minute, but, and you
have be quickened who were dead in trespasses and sin, wherein
time past you walked according to the courts of this world,
according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit
that now worketh in the children of disobedience, among whom also
we all had our conversation, fulfilling the desires of the
flesh and of the mind, and were by nature the children of wrath,
even as others. But God, who is rich in mercy
for his great love wherewith he loved us, even when we were
dead in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ, by grace
ye are saved. Now that phrase there, that's
the first time that phrase is put together for us. in this
passage or in this portion of Scripture, by grace you are saved. And you notice it's by grace
you are saved. It's not by faith you are saved.
A lot of times people switch those. It's for by grace are
you saved. He says, and have raised us up
together and made us sit together in heavenly places that in the
ages to come he might show the exceeding riches of his grace
and his kindness towards us through Christ Jesus. For by grace are
you saved through faith, and that not of yourselves, it is
the gift of God. Not of works, lest any man should
boast, for we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus. Unto
good works with God hath before ordained that we should welcome
him. Wherefore, remember that ye being
in times past Gentiles in the flesh, who are called uncircumcision
by that which is called the circumcision in the flesh made by hands, that
at the time you were without Christ, being alienated from
the commonwealth of Israel and strangers from the covenants
of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. But
now, in Christ Jesus, ye who sometimes were far off and hath broken down the middle
wall of partition between us, having abolished in his flesh
the enmity, even the law of commandments contained in ordinance, for to
make in himself of twain one new man, so making peace, and
that he might reconcile both unto God in one body by the cross,
having slain the enmity thereby, and came and preached peace to
you which were afar off and to them that were nigh. For through
him, we both have access by one spirit unto the Father. Now,
therefore, ye are no more strangers and foreigners, but fellow citizens
with the saints, and of the household of God, and are built upon the
foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself
being the chief cornerstone, in whom all the building fitly
framed together groweth unto a holy temple in the Lord, in
whom ye also are builted together for inhabitation Father, we come to you now and
we thank you for Jesus Christ. We thank you for this little
phrase in verse four, but God, we thank you, Father, that you
have given us life, that you have given us salvation, that
you have redeemed us, that you have removed the curse that is
upon us, Father. By the law, we pray, Father,
that we might live and know and trust in you, looking to you
alone for all of our righteousness. Father, we ask that you just
might continue to build us up and edify us through your word.
We ask now, Lord, even now, that the spirit might come and speak
to our hearts, that it might encourage us, that it might strengthen
us. Father, I pray that your spirit
might come and teach us, as we heard just last hour, we know
that Not anything that I say or anybody else says can change
anybody's mind or teach them anything. It's only as the Spirit
comes and teaches us. And so, Father, we pray that
you might give blinded eyes the ability to see, that you might
cause deaf ears to hear, that you might open up the heart and
take out that heart of stone and put in that heart of flesh
so that they might know you and love you. and love the brethren
of God, Father. We pray for the brothers in Christ
and sisters in Christ that are here today that have already
been given eyes to see and ears to hear. Lord, we pray that you
might teach them and give them understanding of the things that
are being said, that they might rightly know, and that they might
be encouraged by it, Father, that it might increase We see here at the beginning
of chapter two, it begins with, and you, and you, who is he talking
about? Who's Paul talking about here
whenever he is saying, and you? And if we add the half-quickened
who were dead in trespasses and sins, who is he talking about
there? Well, if we look back just a
page in our Bibles, we'll see in chapter one, Paul is writing
to the church in Ephesus. a letter to them and giving them
the gospel. As a matter of fact, we see in
chapter 1 is chock full of the gospel. And then in chapter 2,
he reminds them of what they were and what the gospel has
done for them. But look who it says, it says
there, Paul, in verse one, Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ by
the will of God to the saints which are at Ephesus. But he
doesn't stop there, he says, and to the faithful in Christ
Jesus. So this wasn't just particularly,
even though this was a personal letter to that church, this letter
also applies to all of us, right? It applies to all the faithful
in Christ. I'm gonna get into maybe what
some might think is a little bit of some semantics, but I
think it needs to be clarified. Who are the faithful in Christ
Jesus? Is it all of us who obey all
the time? Is that who the faithful is in Christ Jesus? No, matter
of fact, if you're a child of grace here today, you are the
faithful in Christ Jesus. We are faithful because he is
faithful. We are unfaithful. We cannot continue in faith. We have times where we are faithless,
even as children of God. I don't know about you, but the
more I get to know the word of God, the more I get to know who
God is, the more I see myself with all the platitudes and self-loving,
pulled away, I begin to see at the core who I am by nature is
horrible and very faithless. The only reason I have faith
is because Christ has given me a measure of it. The Bible says
that he has given a measure of faith and we don't determine
how much that measure is. He determines how much measure
that is. Today I may have Two hours from now after I leave
here and all of us have had a good time and praise the Lord and
worship God together and on the way home, he may give me five. You say, well, how could that
be? Brother coming from Sunday meeting. Brother, it's his business,
not mine. I pray that he makes me faithful.
I pray that I am faithful in all things. But praise the Lord
there is one who stood in my place who was faithful because of his work, because
of his obedience, because of his death, that that is mine
in front of God. And so you are the faithful in
Christ Jesus. And so Paul is writing this letter
to all of us, and he says, and you, faithful in Christ Jesus,
who were dead in trespasses and sin, brethren, However the Lord
leads us on in our walk with him, in grace and knowledge,
we must never forget the fact who we are apart from him. I believe that's one of the reasons
why, and I preach this at our church all the time, Romans 7,
that contradiction that God has given to the flesh and the spirit
that Paul was writing about there at the end of chapter seven,
That contradiction, that warfare that we have is given, that's
our lot. God has given to us as his people.
And he's given us that lot to remind us ever that we are unable
to do, that we are unable to do. that we are unable to perform,
that we are unable to attain to the standard that God has
set, which is His righteousness and holiness. And so that flesh
is given to us whenever we are born from above, the flesh doesn't
change. God didn't take that flesh and
make it something better. A lot of people think whenever
you're born again, I don't mean to cause any problems
here. You can talk to me after the fact, but the word regeneration
is not the proper word for being born again. Whenever we are born
from above, whenever we are acquitted of God, a lot of people think,
well, God changes our flesh and makes it better now. No, the
flesh is just flesh as Denny said last hour. It cannot please
God. It doesn't get any better. But
God gives us his spirit in us. And that spirit that is in us
wars against that flesh that can't ever do right. Whenever
God created Adam, he created Adam natural, the Bible says
in Corinthians. And that natural nature, the
Bible says, cannot, cannot perceive the things of the spirit of God.
It cannot know the things of the Spirit of God. It cannot
enjoy the things of the Spirit of God. It does not function
within the realm of the Spirit of God. It cannot do anything.
It is enabled. Matter of fact, whenever we talk
about, you know, we have our little tulip that we talk about
all the time, you know, the T for total depravity, U for unlimited,
blah, blah, blah. The T, they're total depravity.
Whenever we speak of total depravity, We don't speak in the fact that
man is as evil as he could be, because we're not all there.
I mean, there's some guys that really are more evil in some
periods of their life, more evil than they were before that, whatever
it was. Whenever we speak of total depravity,
we speak of a total inability. We speak of total inability,
we don't have any spiritual the Spirit of God. We were born
without the ability to do right before God, to hear and understand
the things of God. We were born unable to keep the
law of God. And so we were dead in trespasses
and sins, and it's been like that ever since Adam. By Adam,
sin came into the world, and death came by sin, Adam brought
that into the world as God had formed and fashioned him. And
another side note here, Adam didn't mess up and God had to
make a different plan, okay? I've heard that a lot, that God
made Adam in this pristine world and Adam just had the free will
to choose or not to choose. He chose wrong and so God had
to turn around his plan and now send Jesus to be a redeemer of
all the people. Brethren, the Bible says that
Jesus was the lamb slain before the foundation of the world.
It was in God's ever eternal plan that sin would enter into
the world and death by sin because God had purpose before the foundation
of the world to show forth his glory in redeeming the people
for himself and the only way that to come into the world, and for
death to come into the world, and he did that by one man who
he had predestined to be the carrier of sin and death, and
that was Adam. Now a lot of what we learn in
our theological circles and seminaries, he said Adam had this perfectness
before God that he was holy before God. But the Bible also said Job was
upright before God. So I don't necessarily think
that upright means that Adam was perfect and holy in the way
that we're thinking. The Bible says that Adam, whenever
he came before the Lord and the Lord said, He didn't say if you
eat of this tree you shall surely die. He said, and surely die, bringing sin
and death into the world. See, nobody had sinned up to
that point. Sin had not entered into the world because nobody
had committed it yet. But he had fashioned Adam in
such a way so that sin would come into the world, and he did
that by Adam. And whenever Adam sinned, that
was the first sin in the world by man. And that that sin showed
something It showed that man could not
keep the law of God. Adam could not keep the law of
God. There was no way in the world that Adam could have kept
the law of God. Now, some people, whenever I
preach this, a lot of people get a little antsy and I kind
of see some people, I can only see some eyes, but some people
get a little antsy and think that, well, you're saying that
God intended that and that Adam, you know, he was made to sin. That he was that you're telling
me that that all of this Romans chapter 5, look with me down to verse 12
if you would. And I want to pause on some words
because I want you to pay close attention to something. It says,
wherefore, as by one man, sin entered into the world, and death
by sin, and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sin. What is the wages of sin? Death. Okay, whenever you sin, the wages
of that is death. Okay? For until the law, sin
was in the world, but sin is not imputed where there is no
law. Nevertheless, death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over
them that had not sinned after the simpletude of Adam's transgression. Now, I want you to pay close
attention here, because it says here, Adam's transgression. Who is the figure of him that
was to come? But not as the offense, take note of that word, offense,
so also is the free gift. For if through the offense of
one, many be dead. Much more the grace of God and
the gift by grace, which is by one man, Jesus Christ, hath abounded
unto many. And not as it was by was by one to condemnation, but
the free gift is of many offenses under justification. Now there's
a lot to talk about there and I'm holding restraint and not
getting into it because it doesn't pertain to what I'm talking about.
But verse 17, for if by one man's offense, take note, death reign
by one, much more, they which receive abundance of grace and
of the gift of righteousness shall reign in life by one Jesus
Christ. upon all men to condemnation,
even so by the righteousness of one, the free gift came upon
all men under justification of life. Verse 19, for as by one
man's disobedience, you can use the word offense there if you
want to use the word offense, for by one man's disobedience,
many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one shall many
be made righteous. I now have read, I don't know
how many times I did count, four, five, seven, eight, nine, 10
times, something like that. Whose offense are we talking
about here? Whose offense is in the context here? Adam's, right? The context of
the offense is Adam's offense, right? So we can assume that
that is gonna play through for the rest of the context. was the first offense that brought
sin and death into the world, and thereby all of us partake
of the same thing. Now, there's other things that
we can think about here. Number one is we can talk about the
two seeds, okay? There's the seeds of disobedience,
and there's the seeds of obedience. There's the seeds of God, the
seeds of the devil. There's that two river, the river
of the two rivers, group that is all throughout
the scriptures. There are those who are the Father
who is Christ and those who are the Father who is the devil.
They are within those two groups. You either fall into one or the
other. You are either of Jacob or you
of Esau. You are of Abel or you of Tain. Ishmael or Isaac. Okay? And if you've never done a study
on that, it's an awesome study. God, those that are the devil,
the children of the devil, those who are the children of disobedience.
Matter of fact, in Genesis, didn't Jesus say that the seed of the
woman and the seed of the serpent were always going to be at odds
with each other? Now, I believe that has two meanings,
inwardly, flesh and spirit, but also, I think, outwardly, between
the people of God and the people of the devil. The one offense
here that is in context is Adam's, but look at verse 20. Moreover,
the law entered that the offense might abound. Why did God tell
them not to eat of the tree? So that the offense might abound,
so that Adam would sin. See God could have made it where
he can eat of any tree, right? There wasn't nothing inherently
wrong with the fruit of that tree. I mean, it wasn't like
a poison apple, okay? There wasn't nothing wrong with
it. If it even was an apple, I don't know if it was an apple
or not. That's just what we say in our traditions, right? God could have given every tree
to them. There was nothing inherently
wrong with that. The only reason it was forbidden is because God
said that tree's forbidden. So why did God give them a law?
Why did God give them a law to not eat of that tree? So that
the offense might abound. Well, why is that? Well, because the one who was
given the law had an inability to keep the law, and God's intent
was that sin and death would enter into the world. and that by that one man, that
sin and death would pass on to all men. So that whether you
are of the children of God or whether you are the children
of devil, you're gonna be made out of the one lump and God is
gonna glorify himself out of equal sinners, one being glorified
as vessels of honor, one being as vessels of dishonor. God is
gonna show forth his glory in redeeming evil, wicked people
who could not keep the law of God, even from the beginning. God was going to show forth his
glory in saving a people out of that who could never do anything. The time that God had appointed
for him to sin came and when he did, exactly what God said
would happen. Exactly what God said would happen. Now I'm of the mind, I don't
believe that Adam ever was made with the spirit of God in him
and that he lost the spirit of God. The Bible says in Corinthians
that he was made natural. And it's not that which is natural
that came, or which was not Adam is just like us, he comes
into this world natural and the spiritual comes after when we're
born from above. And so that's why, side note
again, you can't always listen to theologians and things, study
your Bible and let the Bible dictate to you what is being
said and not what some smart guy, that some other smart guy,
that some other smart guy and some other smart guy before him
said that this is how it should be. the Word of God teach you
and the Spirit of God teach you. So what are we seeing here? We've
seen that all of us from the beginning have an inability before
God to keep that which is perfect, to keep that which is holy, to
obey the law of God. So if you have it in your mind
that you're going to get to heaven by keeping the law, you're sadly
deceived. You're sadly deceived. If you
think that you're going to keep yourself, if you have been born
from above, that you're going to keep yourself righteous before
God by keeping the law, you're sadly deceived. Matter of fact,
if you look to the law and the keeping of the law, that is actually
the very definition of faithlessness. That's why Paul was and say, whoa, wait a minute,
you're getting off track. You're mixing law and grace.
Whoa, wait a minute, wait a minute. That's not what I taught you
at the beginning, which was given to me by Christ, that it is by
Christ alone. It's grace alone. It's nothing
that you do in and of yourself. That's why he said, have you
who began in grace, are you now made perfect by the law? You made perfect by law keeping?
Brother Denny mentioned it in his teaching back there. And I'm in 100% agreement. I
don't believe in progressive sanctification. I don't believe
that we're getting more and more holy. And the reason why is because
the flesh doesn't get any better. And that which is inside of us,
the spirit of God that is given to us, the Bible says it cannot
sin. That it's holy. there's this consternation. And
it says in you, the faithful in Christ, you were there, you
were dead in trespasses and sins, unable to keep anything before
God, do anything before God. You were unable. Listen, if you're
here today and you have yet to come to know your sin before
God and to look to Christ alone for your salvation, You're dead
in trespasses and sins. It says in verse two, where in times
past ye walked according to the course of this world, according
to the prince and the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in
the children of disobedience. Now here again, this is where
I mentioned there is two strains of people. You notice here that
Paul even makes this distinction. He says, He says, where in times
past you walked according to the course of this world, that's
how we all did. We walked according to the dictates
of this world. The world system, that's what
we're talking about, the world system. Get ahead, do what we
can, pull ourselves up by our own bootstraps, self-made man
or woman, whatever, however you wanna put it. We walked according
to the things of pride, the things according to the flesh. It says, according to the prince
of the power of the air. Well, this is talking about Satan himself.
He is the prince. Now, the power of the air, I
kind of had to look up what that was talking about. The Jews have
this, has the notion that the devils, all our spirits, and
that, you know, they're all around us everywhere, you know, and
they fill the space between earth and the sky. and Satan is the
one who is over them. So I don't think there's anything
necessarily inherent in that power of the air part, but other
than the fact that he is the prince of them, of all of them. But it says, the spirit that
now worketh in the children of disobedience. We don't really
stop and think, but to those who are not of Christ, and when
I say not of Christ, I'm not talking about those who have
been converted. I'm talking about those who are,
of Christ, whether they have been converted or not converted.
A lot of things that Denny said, I was going to say this morning. We are not goats that turn into
sheep. We are sheep from the moment
we're born. We just don't have the knowledge
that we are until we're converted, until the Lord gives us the new
birth. And this is the same here. the
children of disobedience, the spirit that works in the children
of disobedience. Now we, by nature, we're just
like the children of disobedience, but we are not of that group.
He says here, look at verse three, among whom we also, among whom
also we all had our conversation. We are among the children of
disobedience. Even before our conversion, we
look like them, talk like them, act like them, think like them,
but we are not them. Matter of fact, I think that
translates into some of John 17, we are of the world, but
we are not, or we are in the world, but not of the world.
And while we were in the world, we did not know that we were
not of the world. until God give us that understanding.
And so we see here that among whom also we all had our conversation
in times of past, so there's a distinction. There are the
children of obedience and they are only gonna do what the spirit
of disobedience is gonna have them to do. That's why the Bible
said, Jesus said to the Pharisees, he said, you're your father,
the devil, and it's his things that you're gonna do. He was
a liar, you're gonna be a liar. Matter of fact, you've been lying
on me ever since you come into power. See, those Pharisees wasn't pointing.
See, that's what Jesus said. Oh, Jerusalem, Jerusalem. That
whole that whole speech that Jesus gave to them was that was
not Jesus talking. You know, we have our little
pictures of Jesus looking down upon Jerusalem, weeping, and
oh, I wish that, you know. Old Jerusalem, Jerusalem was
actually a condemnation to the Pharisees, who as leaders were
supposed to be telling and pointing the people to Christ. All through
the Old Testament, the gospel had been preached to them in
tithes and foreshadows. And I actually believe in word,
in many cases, especially with Abraham and some of the others,
that God had preached the gospel And all that stuff was pointing
to Jesus Christ. And those religious leaders were
supposed to take that same Bible that Paul, that same Bible that
Peter, that same Bible that John, the same Bible that all these
apostles had and was preaching Christ, take that word and preach
it in Christ. But they weren't doing that.
What were they preaching? They were preaching Moses. They were
preaching Moses. Let's go to Moses. Let's go to
Moses. And Jesus had said, you know, if I would have been the
leader here, I would have protected these people and pointed them
in the direction that they would, but you haven't done it. And
so we see that the children of disobedience are always gonna
do like their father. They're gonna do like their father.
But it says here that we are not like that anymore.
Now that's kind of weird because I just heard that we are still
in the flesh and we still sin. Yeah, but we've been given a
different mind. That also in chapter seven of Romans, Paul
said, he's seen the end of himself, that in my flesh dwells no good
thing, that I am wretched, vile in my flesh, and that I serve
the law of sin in my flesh. But in my mind, I serve the law
of Christ. It's in my heart. That's what's
been changed. That's in me, that the spirit of God that's in me,
that is now controlling my thoughts and my mind, it wants to serve
the law of Christ. And he said, for richer man than
I am, who is going to deliver me from this body of death that
continues to war with what I want in my mind? Christ, he's the one who's gonna
deliver me from that. But he did consign or resign
within himself that I'm gonna serve the law of sin to the day
that I die with my flesh. But with my mind, I'm gonna serve
the law of God. And God gave that wonderful, wonderful, wonderful
gospel in the next verse. Therefore, there is now no condemnation
to those who are in Christ Jesus. Brethren, listen, even though
we are right here with them, and do in our flesh, we are not
the same as the children of disobedience. We have been given another father. We've been given another head.
We've been given another life than what we have in the flesh. We have been given the spirit
of God. And so that's why in verse four,
we see those beautiful words about God. He makes the difference. Now, The children of disobedience,
we see in Ephesians chapter five, if you'll turn over there with
me. Ephesians chapter five verse six, I'm just about done. Ephesians
chapter five and verse six. It says, let no man deceive you
with vain words, for because of these things come the wrath
of God. upon the children of disobedience. Now, this is the
reason why I say we're not the same as the children of disobedience.
The wrath of God only comes upon the children of disobedience.
You say, well, wait a minute, haven't we all disobeyed? That's
what I'm saying. That's what grace is all about.
It doesn't come down to how many sins you have done or how many
sins you've not done. It doesn't come down to how many
laws you've kept or how many laws you haven't kept. It all
comes down to, has there been a righteousness applied to your
account or not? If it is not, then you're in
disobedience. If there has, there is therefore
now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. Why?
Because you have been justified of all sin, forgiven of all debt. There is nothing else to pay.
There is nothing else for God to even look at. The Bible says
that he has removed our sin as far as the east is from the west.
Turn around here, Delaware. He has forgotten. everything
you have done. Pause a minute and think. How
much have you done? Guess what? He doesn't count
it against you. You say, well, yeah, but if we
disobeyed the Zikar within theological circles that
says that we are under God's wrath until we're born again.
Then God removes that wrath and we're no longer under God's wrath.
That's not what this Bible says. You say, well preacher, it says
it right there in Ephesians, you just read it. Look with me
if you will. Verse three, among them also
we had our conversation in times past in the lust of the flesh,
fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind. and were
by nature children of wrath even as others. So there you go, that
we're under God's wrath. Now, I'm not a learned man at all. Matter of fact, I quit college
after one year, went to work, been humping it ever since, okay? I've not been to seminary, I
don't know the languages very well, horrible in our own language. Is that what that says? Does
that say that we are under God's wrath? Why do so many people believe
that and why are we told that? It says we were by nature the
children of wrath, children of wrath, not children under wrath,
children of wrath. What does that mean? wrathful against God we don't
like the God of this Bible by nature our nature hates the God
of this Bible our nature hates the God and I tell you what you
just go to anybody and talk to them about and you'll find how much they
hate the God of the Bible. You go and start talking to people
about that Jesus doesn't love everybody and that Jesus only
died for some and not everyone, and you'll find the people who
do not love the God of the Bible. Matter of fact, if you keep talking
to them too much, you'll find how wrathful they really are
towards the God of this Bible. See, we're at enmity. See, he's loved us with an everlasting
love. That love didn't begin when we got saved, or converted,
I should say. That love was before the foundation
of the world. But it says here that we were
by nature children of wrath, even as others. Now, I wanna
solidify this for you in case you think it's just semantics
again. Turn with me, if you would, over to Numbers 23. Look with me down to verse 21.
Now let me encourage you guys to
compare spiritual things with spiritual, all right? He hath
not beheld iniquity in Jacob, neither hath he seen perverseness
in Israel. The Lord his God is with him,
and the shout of a king is among them. The Bible here says he
hath not beheld iniquity in Jacob. Neither hath he seen perverseness
in Israel. If there ever was a time that
God saw iniquity or perverseness in us, this verse has absolutely
no meaning because there was a time. But it says here, he
hath not. has never, will never see iniquity
and perverseness in his people. Why is that? Well, we had a land
slain before the foundation of the world was laid. But look
here, it tells us why. The Lord his God, now that word
Lord there is Jehovah. Now if I had the time, I could
show you that that's talking about Jesus. The Lord his God is with him,
and the shout of the king is among them. And I just think
that every time Satan comes before the Lord and tries to accuse
the brethren, the shout of the king is among them. The shout
of the king says, my blood was shed for them. There is no remission
of sin without the shedding of blood. Well, it's been remitted,
because my blood was shed. Look with me if you would at
Psalms 32. Psalms 32. Another perplexing
thing that I, at one time, I didn't believe this, but now, faced
with Scripture, I have to. Starting in verse one, it says,
blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered.
We're blessed. If your transgression is forgiven
and your sin is covered, you're a blessed person. Now if I remember
Ephesians chapter one says that we were blessed with all spiritual
blessings in heavenly places in Christ Jesus according as
he has chosen us in him before the foundation of the world.
Before anyone had done good or bad. So that the purpose of God
according to election might stand so that we might be before him
in love. so that we might be to the purpose of his calling,
which is election, that we might be to the purpose of that, to
the glory of his grace. But look at it here, verse two.
Also blessed is the man unto whom. Now every word counts here,
brethren. I tell our church this all the
time. Every word counts in God's word. The Holy Spirit doesn't
just put filler in it. He does have good language skills. And he tells us, doesn't the
Bible say that all scripture is given by inspiration and is
profitable? Okay. Blessed is the man unto
whom the Lord imputed not iniquity and in whose spirit there is
no God. Again, I say, if there ever was
a time that God had not imputed or had imputed iniquity to us
or saw God in us, this verse has no meaning. Might as well
pull it out of the Bible because it doesn't pertain to anyone
except Jesus. I also remember that we were
created in Christ Jesus. I also remember that he imputed
his righteousness to us. Was that righteousness imputed
at the cross? Was that righteousness imputed
whenever you were born again? Was that righteousness imputed
whenever you were converted of the gospel and believed the gospel?
Was it when you walked an aisle or went through a baptistry or
whatever? When was that imputed? Well, I believe that imputations
happened at the same time. The imputation of iniquity to
one and the imputation of righteousness to the other took place at the
same time when the surety, who is someone who takes responsibility
for the acts of another, when the surety stepped forth in the
covenant of grace and said, send me and I will go and if I go,
I will bring them back to you and if I did not bring them back
to you, then you can lay that at my hand. Isn't that what Joseph's
brother said whenever he took Benjamin back to Egypt with him? He told his father, Isaac, he
said, listen, I'll go and I'll be his surety. And it'll be my
responsibility to get them and to bring them back. Blessed is the man unto whom
the Lord imputes not sin, and the name of God. So what does
that have to do with what we're talking about in Ephesians? Well,
brethren, the fact is there's a transition from the first part
of Ephesians chapter two to the last part. And you who were by
nature this way are not that way because of the
but God. but God who is rich in mercy
for his great love. Did you talk about that love
and how we can't even hardly fathom that love? The Bible here
says it's a great love. Whenever you use the word great
love in connection with God who is infinite, it's a great love. But God who is rich in mercy
for his great love, wherewith he loved us, again, that us refers
back to the beginning, the faithful in Christ Jesus, even when we
were dead in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ, by grace
you are saved. There wasn't nothing that we
did for it. Nothing that we could have done for it. Why? Because
we were dead in trespasses and sins. We were thinking and feeling
and operating in the ways of the world, just like the children
of disobedience. We functioned on their level
and in their ways. But God, who is rich in mercy,
changed that. He gave you a new mind. Let this
mind be you, which was also in Christ Jesus. We have the mind
of Christ. We now have the mind that loves
God and loves the brethren and loves the Word of God, that desires
to obey God in the inward man. We have a God now that to us
is beautiful and righteous and holy, where before we didn't
like Him so much. Even when we were dead in sins,
He quickened us together with Christ and hath raised us up
together in Christ Jesus, that in the ages to come, you might
show exceeding riches of his grace and his kindness. Well,
we know that's true. He told us in Romans nine that
the reason that he did that is so that we might know his grace
and know his glories for his glory. So brethren, I'm thankful
this morning that there was a but God in there. I'm thankful that
in my life, I pray there's been a but God. And if you're here
today, the only thing that's gonna cause the difference is
God. You who are dead in trespasses
and sins, unless God quickens you, will die in your sins. And so we pray God's mercy upon
our loved ones, upon our friends, upon our family. And we thank
God, we praise God for our family and friends that God Heavenly Father, we come to you
now and we thank you so much once again for Christ Jesus.
We thank you for the blood that was shed on our behalf. We thank
you for the forgiveness of sins, the imputation of righteousness.
We thank you for redeeming us from the curse of the law. We
thank you, Father, for blessing us with all spiritual blessings
in heavenly places. We thank you, Father, for the
hope Thank you, Father, for the promise
of your soon return. We look forward to, we pray,
Lord, that it be quickly. Father, we thank you for the
church here in Delaware. I pray, Lord, that you'll be
with them and guide them as they search for a pastor. I pray,
Lord, that you would keep them and edify them, Lord, during
these times. And all the brethren that might
come and fill this pulpit, Lord, I pray for them. It might be
encouraging and it might be strengthening nourishing to them. Lord, we
pray that you just might continue to keep them individually within
this church, Lord, that there might not be any despair or there
might not be any loss of desire to me. Father, we just pray that
there's many things about Christ being the head of
his church, and he adds to the church as he sees fit. And Father,
we pray that you would help these brethren who you have taught,
who you have given life to, that you have brought in grace and
knowledge closer to the understanding of Christ and conformity to Christ
in their understanding and knowledge. Lord, we pray that you might
continue that even now, Father, Lord, we pray that there might
be unity among the people. We pray that there might be peace
among the people during this time period, because we know
that that can become very tumultuous because of our flesh. But Father,
it is your church and you will take care of it as you've seen
fit. And Lord, we just thank you for them. They've been such
a blessing to our family. They've been a blessing to many
families, Lord, that I've spoke to that have been in contact
with this church. And so now, Lord, we just pray
that you would be to them what they need. Again, we thank you
for Christ. We thank you for salvation through
him. And Father, I pray that if there's
anyone here today that has yet been converted from the gospel
being heard, Lord, I pray that you might draw them to yourself
this morning and that you might give them eyes to see and ears
to hear. they might be baptized and joined
to the local church for the teaching and edification. Lord, we pray
that they might become a functioning servant, part of the church.
And Father, again, we thank you for all that you are in this
time that we have together and may it be honoring to you for
it's in Jesus' name that we