Well, it's good to be here this
morning and good to be with everybody and pray that the Lord's given
you a good week this week, sister. The weather has been beautiful
and the flowers have bloomed out here in the front yard. They're
very pretty. And have a few days without rain
and let a little bit of the rivers and the creeks go down. We noticed
as we was coming in over Shoal Creek yesterday that looks like
it's gone back down into its banks. It looks like some of
the flooding has subsided. Well, turn with me if you would
this morning over to Ephesians chapter 1. That's where we want
to begin this morning. This is going to be a continuation
of our study on the doctrine of grace and then particularly
the section on unconditional personal election, unconditional
personal election. Now, we've already had a couple
of messages on this topic, and we've looked at a few verses
already preceding today's group of verses, but we're going to
continue on and look at some here in the New Testament. We
looked at several throughout the Old Testament. We looked
at some last week in the New Testament, and particularly we
looked at Romans 8, 9, and 10, Paul's great argument and defense
of God's sovereign individual election. We showed how that
was not national election as many perceive it to be, but it
was a personal election or an individual election that was
in view. And so this morning we want to
continue on just looking at other verses throughout the New Testament
that show us or teach us that there is such a thing as number
one election. There are some people that believe
the Bible don't teach election at all even though the word and
the terms and the words associated with that are found throughout
the scripture. They don't believe that there is any election. Some
believe that there is an election, but they have an erroneous view
of election, as we talked about last week, one of the ways that
we talked about last week. But what we want to look at is
we want to look and see that the Bible does teach not only
an elect and God's sovereign election but it teaches it very often in the Scripture. It's
not just an isolated event as we've seen several places through
the Old Testament and already into the New Testament we've
seen this to be true. This morning I'd like to start
in Ephesians chapter 1 Now, we have dealt with this verse ad
nauseum. I mean, it has been a verse that
we go to in a lot of things that we've talked about. Eternal justification,
we've talked about the two seeds, we've talked about predestination,
we've talked about union, a lot of things that we've talked about
over the years. Ephesians chapter one has a little
bit of all that in there. And so this verse is very familiar
to us here. And I know we've dealt with it
quite extensively, but again, I'd like to point out some things
here in Ephesians chapter one to start off with, but let's
bow our heads and ask the Lord to meet with us this morning.
Father, we thank you today for your mercy and for your grace,
and we thank you, Father, for the time that we have together
once again today. We thank you for the brethren
that you've gathered here together. Lord, we're so grateful to be
able to come for the hymns that we've just sung that extol you
and also talk about our fellowship one with another and how beautiful
that is that we are able to meet and worship together and to praise
and to glorify , in honor of wrote out of vain repetition,
out of social gathering. But Father, we truly come because
our hearts love you, desire you, desire worship, desire to be
fed the word of God, to hear the things of the scriptures,
to spend time with one another, to be edified by each other. Father, we're grateful for that
today and we ask that your spirit would help and aid us in doing
that today in spirit and in truth. Father, we thank you for Jesus
Christ whose blood was shed on our behalf that gives us the
ability to come even today to be a part of this fellowship
and to understand these things. We pray that that spirit do give
us understanding. And Lord, we just pray that you
just might help us today as we look at these passages Passages
that we've looked at time and time again, but father lord,
we pray that you give us a fresh look Upon these things that you
might speak deeper to us on these things Things that we may not
have understood or known in the past. May you reveal those if
they be there Lord, we just pray that you might make this more
known to us And that you might exalt yourself through your word
this morning Help me father to bring these messages and to speak
to these people that I might not speak error, that I might
speak truth, and that you might give me those words to say. Father,
I pray that you'll give them the hearing as well. We ask all
these things because we know that without it, this all would
be in vain and just another show of human effort. And so we ask
it in your son's precious and holy name, Jesus Christ, amen. Ephesians chapter 1 and we're
going to start reading at verse 1 and read down to verse 6 and
then we're going to look at a couple of other verses in Ephesians
1 but let me start with verse 1 and work down to verse 6 and
again we're talking about unconditional personal sovereign election. It says Paul an apostle of Jesus
Christ by the will of God And we'll just stop right there.
I'm going to stop two or three times or more as we read through
down through here. But let me just pause and draw
your attention here that Paul is an apostle of Jesus Christ,
not by his will. He didn't choose to be an apostle. He didn't think, you know what,
whenever I grow up I want to be an apostle. uh... he didn't even go through all
of his training under gamaliel and say you know what i want
to do all this training so that i can go out and be a apostle
uh... you know a lot of guys like to
uh... uh... so you know hey i think i want
to go to seminary so i can become a preacher That's not how it
works. Seminary don't make you a preacher.
God calling you makes you a preacher. God giving you a gift to do that
makes you a preacher. So it has nothing to do with
your will or with your academia. But it has to do with God calling
you and he does that by his will. The Bible talks about in Corinthians
that he is given gifts in the church as he wills. The Holy Spirit brings and applies
those gifts as he wills. not as we will. And that's where
a lot of erroneous things go on, especially among the Pentecostal
churches and charismatic churches and the churches that believe
in the continuance of the special spiritual gifts, is that these
things are just at the discretion of the believer and they can
just do that whenever they want to do that. The Holy Spirit is
the one who gives them those gifts. And so here we see that
Paul was an apostle of Jesus Christ by the will of God. If
you remember, Paul was on the road to Damascus to go and destroy
or to gather up at least, at the very least, to gather up
and imprison the Christians who were meeting in Damascus as a
church in Damascus. He was going there to persecute
them, to lock them up, to kill them, whatever the case might
be there. He was on his way to do that and on his way to actively
destroy and to stop this movement about Jesus, God struck Paul
down. blinded his eyes spoke to him
personally and said I've got something that you're gonna do
you're gonna be my apostle you're gonna do this and do that you're
gonna go down to the street called straight and there's gonna be
a man waiting for you there called Ananias and he's gonna you know
lay his hands on you and I got some stuff that you're gonna
do and you're gonna be the apostle to the Gentiles and And Paul
wasn't even a believer in Jesus. Paul wasn't even thinking about
being a believer in Jesus. He was going to persecute the
believers in Jesus. And so what this is saying here
is not just a fluffery introduction. This is as Paul was telling the
truth about his conversion. I'm an apostle of Jesus Christ
by the will of God. It wasn't by my will, it was
by God's will. He chose me for this office. He chose me to have the gift
to do what I'm doing. He's called me into this ministry. It's by His will, not by my will.
And I think every true gospel preacher can tell you the same
thing I've mentioned to you before. I kind of come to the pastor
kicking and screaming, you know. That wasn't the thing that I
wanted to do at the very first. Now, I like to preach because
I like to basically, to be honest with you, when I started preaching,
I liked They kind of have the attention of people and the applause
of men and to be able to be something to instruct somebody. So I did
kind of have an air of arrogance and pride in my reasoning why
I wanted to be a preacher. But as time went on and as the
Lord began to deal with me and as I believe I became converted
later on, I began to want to preach to tell about Christ,
but I didn't have a heart to want to go out and pastor a church
and to follow that call because, you know, I was at the bottom
line, I'm selfish, but the Lord called me to that and called
me to something that at first I didn't want to do and I didn't
want to be, you know, that wasn't my concern I was traveling and
singing in the southern gospel group and that's what I wanted
to do I wanted to do that full-time I wanted to go and be able to
do that every day all day and that's all I wanted to do and
then occasionally get to preach here and there when we were at
churches but that wasn't God's will for me God's will for me
changed my whole entire life and uh... the life of my family
and so we see here paul an apostle of jesus christ by the will of
god you say well what does that have to do with the election
here we see very clearly that paul was on the road completely
unconverted completely going in and out for a good morning
mark are you this morning uh... by god's will paul was chosen
And because Paul was chosen at a point in time, that became
evident to Paul as the Holy Spirit gave him an understanding. and
open his eyes to that. And he also give him a call in
a ministerial facet. And so we see that Paul was an
apostle by the will of God. He didn't choose that, but God
chose him for that. And if God does that, then that
means it wasn't by his will. And so his coming to Christ wasn't
by his will, and his ministry in Christ wasn't by his will.
He says, Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ, by the will of
God, to the saints which are at Ephesus, and to the faithful
in Christ Jesus. Again, we see here that the saints
which are at Ephesus, that was directly who he was writing to,
but also to all the faithful in Christ Jesus. We're all one
in the same. We're all considered saints,
but this letter applies to us as well. He says, Grace be to
you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Good
morning. How are y'all? Good to see you
guys. You're walking. It looks like
you're doing better, or at least got something to mask the pain. Oh, yeah. I heard he was a quack. You're going to see, we're in
Ephesians chapter 1. Paul, the apostle of Jesus Christ,
by the will of God. So it shows us there that election
not only elected Paul to salvation, but it also elected him to the
ministry as well. And that wasn't by his own choosing.
Verse 2, Grace be to you and peace from God our Father and
from the Lord Jesus Christ. So grace comes to us and peace
comes to us, not by our asking, not by our working, not by our
merit, but grace comes to us and peace comes to us from God
the father and the lord jesus christ that's where he says it
comes from now get a lot of people overlooked some of these introductions
and the richness of the introduction they just blow past that that
i was just an introductory salutation and they go on past that paul
now said a couple of things very pointedly here number one i'm
an apostle uh... of jesus christ not by my will
but by god's will And second of all, grace and peace be to
you from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. It doesn't
come from me, his apostle, and it doesn't come from any other
preacher, and it doesn't come from a church. It doesn't come
from your will or your wanting or your working. It comes from
God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Okay? He isn't just saying,
bless you and peace be upon you. You know, he's not saying that.
He's telling them, grace be to you. and peace from God our father
from the Lord Jesus Christ. Be to who? To the saints which
are at Ephesus and to the faithful in Christ Jesus. Not just the
saints at Ephesus, but the saints everywhere. Those who are the
faithful in Christ Jesus. Now that doesn't mean those who
are working nonstop for Jesus Christ, okay? All of us are the
faithful in Christ Jesus. Why? Because His faithfulness
has been imputed to us. We're faithful in Him, not faithful
in ourselves. We're faithful in Him. Any faithfulness
that you see in me is because of His faithfulness working through
me. But what makes me perfect faithful
in God's sight is the faithfulness of Christ that was imputed to
me. And so all of this is given to everyone. From the strongest,
most mature Christian to the weakest, most immature Christian,
there's no difference in that faithfulness. That faithfulness
is an imputation of Christ, and we all have that if we are in
Christ Jesus. And so that is grace and that
is peace from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Verse
3, blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who
hath blessed us, again the faithful in Christ Jesus, with all spiritual
blessings in heavenly places. Now, I want you to pay close
attention, brethren. Who did the blessing here? Now, again,
I don't have all the answers as far as the Trinity is concerned,
as far as the Godhead is concerned. As far as how it all works and
exactly it works out. Okay. All I can say is what I
know from Scripture, see from Scripture. I try not to let,
you know, creeds and confessions and commentaries and, you know,
all that kind of stuff be the place where I run to. and everything. I know what they have said in
the past. I know what the Nicene effect has been upon many people's
understanding, including those who are not Protestant Reformed,
even among Baptists. The Nicenist has had an impact
upon our view of the Trinity, and it's hard to get that out
because that's what you hear over and over and over and over
again. But I'll say this right here. It does say right here
that we are blessed by God, our Father. Blessed be the God and
Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with all spiritual
blessings in heavenly places. So God the Father, God the Word
and God the Holy Spirit, I've mentioned this to you all in
times past. In John, we learn that the Father,
the Word, and the Holy Spirit are all one. And we also learned
that all the Godhead, Father, Word, and Holy Spirit in Colossians
tells us that that Godhead, those three dwell in one Jesus Christ,
the man Jesus Christ. Bodily, that Godhead is in the
man Jesus Christ. So, you know, I'll be honest,
I don't know how it all works here. And I pray that the Lord
give me more light in this area as I grow older and study more.
And maybe someone else can give me, help me with that, give light
and instruction on that and the Holy Spirit give understanding
to that. But I'll say this right here
in verse three, it says, that God the father of our Lord Jesus
Christ is the one who should be blessed because he has blessed
us. So all spiritual blessings that
the elect of God have received in heavenly places in Christ
was given to us by God the father. That's what that verse says.
So I have to take it that that's what that means. Unless other
light is given that I don't know about. So God the Father has
blessed all the faithful in Christ Jesus in heavenly places with
all spiritual blessings, and He's done that in Christ. So we see that before, and we'll
see before the foundation of the world here in just a minute,
but we already know that. Before the foundation of the
world, there was a union with the faithful in Christ Jesus
and the Lord Jesus Christ. There was a union there. There
was a union that within that union brought all spiritual blessings. So every spiritual blessing that
could be blessed upon the faithful in Christ Jesus was blessed upon
them in Christ and that union in Him by way of that union in
Him was blessed in heavenly places. And we'll see here that's before
the foundation of the world. So, here again, God doesn't wait
in time to consider those blessings to be upon us. Okay? God doesn't
have to wait in time to bless us with all spiritual blessings.
Do we come to understand those blessings? Do we come to acknowledge
those blessings? Do we come to love those blessings?
To more fully grow in the grace and knowledge of not only Jesus
Christ but those blessings? Absolutely. Do I know more about
my justification today than I did whenever I first learned about
justification? Absolutely. The Lord has grown
me in knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ and of His Word. The Lord
has grown me in grace. OK, he hasn't made me in myself
more holy, but he has in me given me more understanding, more knowledge,
and he has given me grace to know these things, to see these
things, to believe these things. These are all the outworking
of the spiritual blessings that God give us in heavenly places
before the foundation of the world in Christ. Now we'll see
how that works in Let me turn over here quickly
because we're going to be here again in a few minutes anyway. In 1 Timothy 1 9 he says, Who
hath saved us and called us with a holy calling, not according
to our works, but according to His own purpose and grace, which
was given us in Christ Jesus before the foundation of the
world. So again we see that there is a union here between us and
Christ Jesus and something given to us Okay. Not given to Christ, given to
us. Both these places it says it
was given to us. Ephesians and 2 Timothy. It says
that these things were given to us. So that means God's intent
was for a specific people to receive specific spiritual blessings. and that was given before the
foundation of the world okay so in essence if you if you allow
me this uh... uh... parallel here we we read
last week in romans nine before the boys have been born while
they were in the womb before any of us were born while we
were still in the womb of adam before any of us have done good
or bad and i would say even before adam before anybody had done
good and bad, including Adam. God had blessed us with all spiritual
blessings. He had saved us and called us
with a holy calling, not according to our works, but according to
His own purpose and grace, which was given to us. His purpose
and grace was given to us in Christ Jesus. Now, how does that
work out? What does that mean? I don't
know. It wasn't there. I only can say what the Bible
says. I don't want to go too much further, but it obviously
was something that God did in Christ. There was a union with
us and Christ, and because of that union, because of that being
in Christ, there, not here, there, we received all spiritual blessings. We were given all spiritual blessings.
Now, the theologian wants to come alongside and say, oh, yeah,
well, that's talking about in time because, you know, we receive
those in time. And the first place those go
to is they go, well, were you quickened before the foundation
of the world? If so, then that means when you
were born, you were quickened. Okay. You know, do we experience
these blessings? Yes. Was the blessing of quickening
given to us before the foundation of the world? Absolutely, because
we had life in Christ. It was hidden in God, in Christ,
before the foundation of the world. That life was there. It
didn't come into this earthen vessel. The earthen vessel didn't
come until after Adam. But that life was given to us
at a specific time. And so, yes, that life was already
there. It just had not been deposited
in this earthen vessel until God chose to do that in the time
of love. And so, yes, the quickening is
a spiritual blessing that was given to us in Christ Jesus before
the foundation of the world. And we came into the experience
of that at His allotted time here on earth. Now, that's all
I can recollect from this. That's all I can get out of that.
I don't know. There may be something fuller to that, and maybe I might
have that wrong. I don't know. But that's what
I see. That's what I understand. That's
what it seems to be to me, having seen what it says here. It says,
We are blessed with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places
in Christ according. Verse four, according. So, Paul is about to give us
the grounding or the foundation for why we've received all spiritual
blessings in heavenly places. Now, we gotta be careful here
that we don't diminish the work of Christ on the cross, okay? The work of Christ on the cross
was imminent. The work of Christ on the cross
was needed. The work on the cross was perfect. The work on the cross that Christ
did was efficacious, should I say that? And so we don't want to
diminish that. But brethren, let me, before
we get to the cross of Christ, let's look and it says here that
the blessings in heavenly places was given to us in Christ according
to something. On the basis of something. With the foundation of something. Now, we need to see what the
foundation is. What is the foundation? And I think when you get this,
when you break this down and you throw away theology books
that corrupt the way we think, okay? Smart guys sound smart,
and because they sound smart, they make you think that they're
smart. And when you think that they're smart, you tend to listen
to them when they're not so smart, okay? What does the Scripture say,
not in light of Luther and Calvin and anybody else? What does the
Scripture say? That we are blessed with all
spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ according as
He hath chosen us in Him. So anybody who receives the spiritual
blessings that were given in heavenly places, because of a
union with Christ Jesus, receives that because they were chosen
to receive those in Christ Jesus. Now, that's a lot of words. According,
one, as to, he, three, hath, four, chosen, five, us, six,
in, seven, him, eight. Eight words in that phrase. But
it means one word, election. According to election. And isn't that what Paul said
that we found out last week? Let's remind ourselves, let's
jump back there real quick. I know you've slept, I've slept,
we've all slept a little bit. When I sleep, I usually tend
to not be too coherent of things after that. But let's look back
again. Romans chapter 9, verse 11. for the children being not yet
born, neither having done any good or evil," here it is, "...that
the purpose of God," pause there, okay, "...that the
purpose of God," 2 Timothy said that we were given what? That
we were saved and called? I lost my place, I'm sorry. And we were saved and called
with a holy calling, not according to our works, but according to
His purpose and grace. We found grace and peace be to
you. By the Lord, by our God and Father
of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with all spiritual
blessings and heavenly place in Christ Jesus, according as
He hath chosen us in Him. Okay? Back to Romans 9. That the purpose of God, according
to election. You could probably substitute
in there, according as He hath chosen us in Him. There. that
the purpose of God, according as He has chosen us in Him, might
stand, not of works, but of Him that calleth." What does it say
over here? Not according to our works. "...who
hath called us with a holy calling, not according to our works, but
according to His purpose." So again, it goes back, according
to His purpose and grace, that is according to His purpose and
grace. According to the purpose of God,
And the purpose of God, the foundation, is election. And he says it very
clearly, that the purpose of God according to election, the
purpose of God for the elect is according to that election
of giving them. What is he talking about here?
He was talking about choosing one over the other. He's choosing
Jacob over Esau. He chose Isaac over Ishmael. So there was a personal election
to grace of one undeserving over another undeserving. And the
purpose of that was according to God's election. So that's
the place where we start. All spiritual blessings start
with election. All spiritual blessings start
with the fact that God has elected in Himself and blessed in the
Son. That's where we go. And so He
says, Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord and Savior,
Jesus Christ. Sorry, I added Savior, Lord Jesus
Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly
places, according as He hath chosen us in Him. That, my friend, there is where
we're united to Christ. We're not united to Christ at
faith. Faith is the evidence that we have already been united
to Christ. We do not get united with Christ
by coming to faith, by our trusting Him, by our believing on Him. We believe on Him, trust in Him
because we were united in Him and received the spiritual blessing
there. And it was made manifest here. But look at what he says. When
did this take place? According as He hath chosen us
in Him before the foundation of the world. Now why did He
do it before the foundation of the world? There is a reason.
That's why the that is there. So that, or that, we should be
holy and without blame before Him in love. Now, you want to
know why I believe in eternal justification? Justification at its simplistic
definition means deemed blameless. They were blameless, but because
of somebody else or something else, they were accounted as
blameless. They were reckoned as blameless. They were judged as not guilty,
blameless. Wouldn't everybody kind of agree
with that assessment? I think that that is what the
scriptures seem to point out. So here we see that the reason
that God has blessed us with those blessings according to
election before the foundation of the world is so that we in
time would be before would be blameless before him in love. He has loved us with an everlasting
love. Well, what's that love predicated
upon? Us being blameless in the Son. Can we draw that distinction
out here? According as He has chosen us before the foundation
of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before
Him in love. That we should be before Him
in love. God set His love upon us, not because of what He's
seen in us in our works, but He set His love upon us because
we were blessed with all spiritual blessings and elected in Christ
Jesus. That's why He set His love upon
us. So that love was given to us because there was a blamelessness
to us because of Christ Jesus. And even though we were in Adam,
And from Adam until now and on into the future until Christ
comes again, every child of grace who was blessed with all spiritual
blessings in heavenly places was blessed so that they would
be blameless before him in love. Now, the detractor may come and
say, well, yeah, that's talking about when we're glorified. Whenever
we're glorified, that's whenever we'll be blameless before Him
at that point, because, I mean, you're a sinner, right? You've
sinned, then you're not blameless before Him. Well, wait a minute,
wait a minute. Every bit of our blamelessness,
there's not one person on the face of the earth can say that
they are blameless. Every one of us are blameless.
Or I'm sorry, are blamed, have blamed. We have sinned, okay,
and we have blamed. So blameless is positional. Because every one of us have
been blamed. In Adam we were blamed. He caused
the blame. And that blame fell upon everybody.
Why? Because every one of us is sinned. That shows that we
too have what Adam has, a nature that cannot keep God's law. So
because we are blamed practically, it ain't meaning that. Whenever
we come before God, what's going to be why we're considered blameless
is because of an imputed blamelessness to us. Right? But the detractor says it's in
the future. When we come before God and we're
made glorified, that's whenever we'll be before Him without blame. Well, brother, didn't... I just
quoted Chris. Well, brother, didn't... Paul say, there is
therefore now no condemnation. That means there is no blame.
There is therefore now no condemnation. Not waiting into the future,
there is therefore now no condemnation. So, us being blameless has nothing to do with waiting
for future time. Second thing I would note about
that argument that they want to say it's in the future is
it says that we might be without blame before Him in love, that
we should be holy and without blame before Him in love. Is He not going to love us until
the future? So right now He don't love us. The God who cannot change hates us now and love us in the
future. No, he says he loves us with
an everlasting love. That love was before we were
created. It'll be there after we have
been glorified, but it's right here right now. We love him because
he first loved us. So that love is on us now. Why?
Because if we love him, that means his love is already there
on us. He's told us that he has loved us with that everlasting
love. So brethren, if we want to take that argument that it's
talking about something in the future, then you've got to take
love with it. God doesn't love us until we
get to the future. According as He hath chosen us in Him,
eternal, sovereign, unconditional, personal election. That's what
we're seeing here. God is sovereignly doing this.
How do we know it's sovereignly? Because it's not according to
our works, plus it was done before anybody was ever created. Verse 5, that we should be holy
and without blame before Him in love, having, okay? having predestinated us unto
the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to Himself." So Jesus
adopted. Now this is something that just
kind of came into my mind just in the last few days, and I still
have to look this out. I want to see how this plays
out throughout the Scripture as well. But have you noticed
here? It was God the Father who blessed us with all spiritual
blessings. It was Him who chose us to be
in Christ, but it says, having predestinated us unto the adoption
of children by Jesus Christ to Himself. Now, I'll be honest, I don't
know exactly all that here, but I do know that there was an everlasting
covenant. Hebrews tells us that there is
the blood of the everlasting covenant. So there was a covenant
that is everlasting. If it's everlasting, that meant
that it began before there was ever a time before the foundation
of the world. That everlasting covenant was
between God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit, and
God the Son took upon him that people and said, I will be their
charity. Now, could that be what this
is talking about here? That he's the one that says, I will adopt
them as children. God elects them and says, I have
a people. And the son says, I will take
them and make them my people. I will adopt them as children. I think that's probably what
the Bible might bear out. Didn't Jesus say in John chapter
17, thine they were and thou gavest them to me? Thine they were. Didn't he say that they are mine,
what's thine is mine, and what's mine is thine? Isn't that what
this is saying right here? That having predestinated us
under the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to Himself, He
also being God, remember, Jesus Christ is the Godhead, the Father,
the Son, or the Word and the Holy Spirit dwelling in bodily
form. Having adopted the children by
Jesus Christ to Himself according to the good pleasure of His will. So again, we see that election,
predestination, is all according to the good pleasure of God's
will. Why? To the praise of the glory
of His grace wherein He hath made us accepted in the Beloved. Now remember, grace be to you
and peace from God our Father and Lord Jesus Christ was given
to us before the foundation of the world. So here, the praise
of the glory of His grace wherein He hath made us accepted. He
made us accepted in the Beloved. Who's the Beloved? A lot of people
think the Beloved here is speaking of the church. Jesus is the Beloved
in view here. Jesus is the Beloved in view
here. Now, are we called the Beloved?
Yes, we see that in 1 Peter, right? In 1 Peter, we're called
the Beloved there. But here, he's talking about
Jesus Christ. We are made, accepted in the
Beloved. And again, remember, we're talking
about before the foundation of the world. All of this conversation
is in context before the foundation of the world. Paul is laying
it out, but its context is within the framework of before the foundation
of the world, before anybody had done anything good or bad,
before anything had ever happened so that the purpose of God according
to election might stand. God's purpose and grace was given
to us in heavenly places, not in earthly places, in heavenly
places. I think that's also strange where
Paul makes that contrast in Corinthians where he says that Adam was of
the earth, earthy, and that he was natural, but he was the first
Adam who was of the earth. natural but jesus was the second
who was uh... heavenly and of the spirit spiritual
a a heavenly adam and here again we see the exact same thing being
brought brought out here that we have blessings in heavenly
place is not an earthly place it's in heavenly place But it
says here, we are accepted in the Beloved. How do we know that
that Beloved is speaking of Jesus Christ? Look at verse 7. In whom
we have redemption through His blood. Well, who do we have redemption
through blood? Through Jesus Christ. So the
in whom points back to the Beloved. So we're accepted in Jesus Christ. We're made accepted. Ain't that
what that says? wherein he hath made us accepted
in Jesus Christ." We're not accepted because we believe. We're not
accepted because we repent. We're not accepted because we
decide or come down an aisle or pray at a pew or baptize in
the baptistry or join a membership or anything like that. Those
things all have their importance. I'm not saying that some of those
things in and of themselves are to be discarded and to be deemed
not important. The thing that gets you accepted
is not because you accepted Him. You were accepted, not you accepted
Him. I don't know how many sermons
I preached years ago about you need to accept Jesus Christ as
your Lord and Savior. You need to accept Him into your
heart, accept Him into your life. Brethren, the prayer that we
should be praying is not that people accept Him, it's that
He should accept them. That's the prayer. That's the
prayer that we should be praying. We pray that they are accepted
of God. Not that they accept God, but
they are accepted of God. So we see, again, this is election. This has nothing to do with us.
This is all before the foundation of the world. If this is true,
if this is what the Bible is speaking right here, we must
bow our knee in submission to what it says and say, then all
my salvation which would entail all spiritual blessing, all of
my salvation was founded and wrapped up, decided and marked
out before the foundation of the world, before anything had
happened, before Adam fell, before we sinned, before we came to
Christ, before we did anything. That's when it took place and
it was according to God, according to His pleasure. In whom we have redemption through
his blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches
of his grace, wherein he hath abounded towards us in all wisdom
and prudence, having made known unto us the mystery of his will,
according to his good pleasure, which he hath purposed in himself."
Again, whenever it says purposed in himself, I think that goes
back to this God the Father, then to God the Son, God the
Son, back to God the Father, okay? He's purposed all this
into himself. Me and my friend J.C. Fulton
was talking yesterday, and one of the things that no matter
what your eschatology is, and he made that perfectly clear
to me because we have differing Eschatology I will say his eschatology
is very very close to mine. It was just a few minor changes,
but anyway He said no matter what your eschatology the Bible
does teach that at the end of all things Whenever all of us
have it come to Christ and everything that he offers the kingdom back
up to God and that God becomes all and in all and and i would
have to say that that is true that the bible says that but
again here we see this reciprocity of the godhead and the man jesus
christ the man jesus christ again gives glory and honor to the
father the father gives jesus christ to be object of the warship
jesus glorifies the father the father glorifies the son And
so that reciprocity is there, okay? We see that even in Jesus'
own prayers and things like that. There's a reciprocity between
God the Father and God the Son. So whatever that Godhead is,
God the Father, God the Word, God the Holy Spirit, and Jesus
Christ, the one in whom they indwell, not meaning that there's
three gods, not meaning that there's a dichotomy between Jesus
as a God and this invisible God, I'm saying that there's one God
and He is in the man, Jesus Christ, okay? So, this reciprocity here
is found because we see here that He has purposed these things
in Himself. He has purposed to give to the
Son, for the Son to adopt, for the Son to redeem. and then it
to be given back. 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 on earth, even
in him." Now again, this is speaking from God the Father's perspective.
It started in God the Father's perspective, it's continuing
in God the Father's, in what God the Father is doing in the
man, Jesus Christ. That in the fullness of the times,
he might gather together in one all things in Christ. Who are
the ones in Christ? Well, we just learned about it.
They are the ones who are the faithful in Christ Jesus. They
are the ones who grace and peace has been given to. They are the
ones who are blessed with all spiritual blessings in heavenly
places. They are the ones that have been chosen before the foundation
of the world. They are the ones who are holy
and without blame. who are before Him in love, those
who have been predestinated unto the adoption of children, the
ones who are to the praise and the glory of His grace, the ones
who are accepted in the blood, the ones who have redemption
through His blood, the ones who have forgiveness of sins according
to the riches of His grace. That's who He's talking about
here. Those are the ones who are in Christ Jesus. Both which
are in heaven and which are in earth. Those who are in Him. in whom we also have obtained
inheritance being predestinated according to the purpose of Him
who worketh all things after the counsel of His own will,
that we should be to the praise of His glory who first trusted
in Christ. So we see here that we are elected
to this purpose. We are elected or elected in
this purpose. And that this purpose of God
will stand. Romans 9, that the purpose of
God according to election might stand. Why? Because it's outside
of us. That was the point. The point
that God's purpose is going to stand that all of Israel will
be saved is that it has nothing to do whether we're good or bad.
It's according to God's choice God's election. That's why it's
going to stand. That's why Fuller was wrong. There's not millions of people
dying and going to hell because they haven't been reached. OK,
God's purpose, according to election shall stand and not one of them
are going to be left. They're all going to come to
him. They're all going to be blessed by God, the father. They're
all going to be given the spiritual blessing. They're all going to
be adopted as children. They're all going to be redeemed,
forgiven. They're all going to abound towards in wisdom and
in prudence. And they're all going to be found
here with an inheritance. Not one now in our life, in our
uh... understanding of things uh... you know uh... someone could
have a family and there can be some estrangement among a father
and a son or among some children or among some relatives and that
person whenever he dies and he may have something now my kids
are out of luck i don't have nothing uh... at least now i
don't know if the lord may bless me with something to give them
later on but you know uh... they can get my old work van
or something i guess i don't know But, there may be some estrangement
and there may be a will made up and in that will someone is
chosen to be left out of the will. Someone is chosen to be
given the will. Or, the father may have favorites
among the children and say, I'm leaving $50,000,000 and I'm giving
$49,000,000 to my oldest son and then the rest of the kids,
you get to split the $1,000,000 amongst yourselves. Well, they
all get less of an inheritance. But brethren, that's not what
the Bible shows here. We are all joint heirs and we
all receive the inheritance. It doesn't say inheritances.
It says the inheritance. There's one inheritance. And
we all receive it equally. And that inheritance, I would
first and foremost say, is Jesus Christ. Not a mansion. Not streaks
of gold. Not golden harps and wings and
all that kind of stuff. We receive Him personally. In front of us. And all that
he is. All that he is done. We receive
him now. That my friends, I think it's
probably one of the clearest passages. One of the clearest
passages in scriptures that teach. that we have been elected. That
there is an election of God. Now, we're going to stop right
there. We'll take a quick break to use the bathroom, get a drink,
and we'll come back in. You can turn over to 1 Thessalonians.
We're going to be starting up in 1 Thessalonians. We'll come
back from the break and look at a couple other passages and
keep trucking. So, let's pause right there,
and we'll come back in for the break.