Ephesians 1. I will echo what
my elder said about the blessing of this time of conference that
we've had so far. It's just been wonderful to meditate
on all that Christ is for His people. For those of you who
missed this time with us, well, you just missed this time with
us. You can get the CDs, but it's
not the same. We have been considering and
contemplating what it means to be in Christ. And as I had shared
with you in the beginning of the series, we are taking a very contracted statement in Christ,
and we are contemplating an infinite reality, and that is everything
that is in Christ and all that that means, which means at the
outset, we will fail to fully grasp what it means to be in
Christ. So what I did was frame the consideration
on three parts. First, when we consider what
it means to be in Christ, we are earnestly considering what
God did. This is what we talked about
on Friday. And I must reiterate that when
we talk about being in Christ, being in Christ is something
that God alone does. You don't place yourself in Christ. You cannot get into Christ by
something you do. You cannot will your way into
Christ. Even for those who are believers
confidently resting smack dab in the middle of all that they
know the Scripture says Christ is, they know that they themselves
have not found themselves in Christ by anything that they
did. It is purely an act of God's
sovereign prerogative to place men and women into Jesus Christ. So there is no negotiation with
God about this standing. There is no meriting before God
a place in Christ. It is merely God's act of taking
sinners and placing them into his son so that they might be
the objects of God's everlasting love. And all I can say to you
and me about this is, are you in Christ? If you are in Christ,
boy, you are in good shape. But I must also implore you to
consider what it means to be in Christ, because I would venture
that the vast majority of the religious world thinks indeed
that they are safe and secure in the arms of Jesus. In reality,
nothing could be further from the truth. We learned in the
several messages between myself and Pastor Todd How it is that
a sinner comes to see this blessed, glorious Savior for all he is
and all he is worth. And one of the things that I
took away from the many things that I took away from last night's
message by Pastor Nybird was when you come to Christ, you
don't come with any form of merit or any basis of acceptance that's
rooted in you. There's nothing about you and
I, this should be our understanding, that should say God has a reason
to accept me. God has a reason to embrace me.
There's something in me worth being in the blessed state of
union with Christ. The answer is no, we don't deserve
it. One of the revelations that you
are in Christ is that you realize that you don't deserve to be
in Christ. The second thing we considered
last night was As I shared, not only is it to be in him is a
work of God. First Corinthians 130. But to
be in Christ is to have all of the fullness of God for your
life. We talked at length about the
importance of the Christian understanding what we have in Christ. And I
made the observation that when I consider lots of professing
believers, that what they most struggle with and in many cases,
simply succumb to is their poverty strickenness when it comes to
the resources of grace that are in Christ. The average Christian
just does not know all that Christ has for those that are in him.
And ladies and gentlemen, isn't it a shame to know that one has
an inheritance that's undefiled, reserved in heaven for you, and
you not know what the contents of that inheritance is? Isn't
that a shame? And I encourage the saints to
look at the preparation that God made for His people in the
person of Christ, the riches of His glory. This is what we're
going to talk about today. The riches of His glory that
are yours in Christ. And I implore the people of God
and I implore you to spend all your life searching these things
out. For in Him are hidden all the
treasures of wisdom and knowledge. These things are for our edification,
they are for our joy, they are for our strength, they are for
our guidance, they are for our success, they are for our productivity. To the extent that we do not
know what God has for us in Christ, to that extent, we cannot enjoy
the kingdom of God. And finally, we come today to
the other consideration of what it means to be in Christ as you
have in your outline what it means to be in Christ is what
we are in Christ what we are in Christ what is a believer
in Christ Ephesians chapter 1 verses 1 through 7 is going to help
us on that meditation today what what is a believer in Christ
you can follow me in your outline if you want to The first thing
that I will say that a believer in Christ is what he actually
is, what his state of being is, what his position, what his condition
is. I want you to hear this now.
This one is going to trip you up, but I want you to hear it
now. The believer in Christ. Is blessed. The believer in Jesus
Christ is blessed. But I want you to grasp what
I mean by blessed now, because church folk love to say, when
you get the question, how you doing? I'm blessed. I want you to hold on now, because
when I say the believer in Christ is blessed, I mean that they
are truly blessed, truly blessed. And there is a enormous difference
between the flippant casual, superficial, I'm blessed terminology
and nomenclature that you have running around in religion as
if people really do know what it means to be blessed in Christ. And so the apostle is gonna train
our thoughts and help us understand something about our first point.
My first point is, if you are in Christ, what you are in Christ
is truly blessed. Now, when we use the term blessed,
Mark how Paul uses it in verse three of chapter one of Ephesians. Blessed be the God and father
of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us. Do you see that? He's already
in a mode of what we call doxology. Paul is already at the heights
of his joy as he opens up verse three. He couldn't get past verses
one and two before he started speaking about how highly blessed
those, now watch this now, that are in Christ Jesus are. So when
we talk about blessing, here's what I want you to grasp. It
is the word that we often use when we do eulogies. It's a derivative
or a form of it. The word eulogy means to speak
well of. The Greek term here for blessed
is legitimately the Greek word, eula gomai. And what it means
also is to speak well of, to purpose well, to declare good,
to make one to be extremely favored. When we bless someone or when
we are blessed, we are speaking well of them, well of them. Now, mark what he says in verse
3 as we contemplate what it means to truly be blessed. Here's what he said. Blessed
be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who hath blessed
us. Now, why are the people of God
blessed? Are you ready? Because God is blessed. Because
God is blessed. Notice how he opens. Blessed
be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Now is God
blessed? Is God highly blessed? Now watch
what Paul is doing here. He's actually blessing God. Do you see that? Blessed be the
God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. At this point, he's speaking
well of God. Now do you know the Bible has
trained us from the beginning of time to speak well of God?
And if there's anybody that's going to speak well of God, it's
His people. Bless the Lord! Oh my soul, and all that is within
me, bless His holy name. I will bless the Lord at all
times. His praise shall be continually in my mouth. It was it was Zechariah
who said under inspiration of the Holy Ghost in Luke chapter
1 Blessed be our God who hath brought unto us this salvation
which we see today and if you will all through the Psalms The
psalmist teaches us to bless God. Now I want you to be exercised
on this for a moment. So go with me in your Bible to
Psalm 66. I'm gonna show you two verses,
but there are many. And I want you to grasp how the
people of God who knew God, who were in Christ, it was natural
to them, it was part of who they were to bless God. Now, again,
when we bless God, we are talking about speaking well of him. When
we bless God, we are talking about speaking well of who he
is. And when we bless God, we are
talking about speaking well of what God did. Really, how the
psalmist puts it is this way, ascribe ye greatness to God. When we talk about blessing God,
we're not talking about bestowing anything upon God that God doesn't
have. When we talk about blessing God,
we are merely talking about declaring the goodness, declaring the character,
declaring the work of God. And I am taught in the psalmist
that this is something that the people of God should do as a
part of worship. Listen to Psalm 66, Psalm 66
verse 8, are you there? O bless our God, ye people, and
make the voice of his praise to be heard, which holds our
soul in life and suffers our feet not to be moved. For you,
O God, have proved us, you have tried us, silver is tried now
watch this you have brought us into the net and laid afflictions
upon us you have caused men to rule over our run right over
our heads we went through fire and through water that's trouble
isn't it why on earth would you praise God for the trials that
you went through listen to the last line but you brought us
out into a wealthy place do you see it do you see it in other
words Blessing God is a consequence of understanding his saving work
in your life. Go with me to Psalm 68. Listen
to what David says over in Psalm 68. This is beautiful as well. And again, there are many throughout
the scriptures. In Psalm 68, notice what it says
here in verse 26. This is what David said. And we can read it over in verse
19 too. Blessed be the Lord who daily
loads us with benefits. Do you see that? Blessed be the
Lord who daily loads us with benefits. Verse 26, bless ye
God, where? In the congregation. Even Jehovah
from the mountains of Israel. And then he begins to speak as
to why we are to bless God. Now, saints, go back with me
to our text so we can keep working. Here's what I want to get across.
When I say that you and I are blessed, we are truly blessed,
It's because God has chosen to bless us. And the blessings that
God bestows on us, I want you to mark this now, are not merely
the blessings of material wealth and clothing and houses and cars. I'm sick of religion that talks
about how good God blesses them because of the things they have,
aren't you? Can I say something about that before I straighten
that out here in the text? Listen, God reigns upon the just
and the unjust. He gives wicked men material
things. He gives ungodly men material
things. He gives base men material things. And if truth be told, he gives
them more material things than he does us, for which sometimes
we want to complain. And David said it in the Psalms,
do not fret at the prosperity of the wicked. Don't get caught
up when God pours upon them all these material things of which
they say the Lord had blessed me. Because we understand, watch
this now, that the blessing with which they have falsely defined
blessing is nothing but a trap and a gin and a snare for those,
hear me now, that are not blessed by the blessed God and Father
of our Lord Jesus Christ. Stay right with our text now.
See, when Paul talks about us being blessed, he confines our
blessing to a condition and a status. Listen to point number two in
your outline. Are you there? We are blessed in relationship
to Christ. Do you see that? The people of
God are blessed in relationship to Christ. Blessed be the God
and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who have blessed us with
all spiritual blessings in heavenly places. This is a running sentence.
It's not ended yet. Here's the next line. According
as he has chosen us in what? Him. That's insider language,
isn't it? The him is who? Now watch this
now. God has blessed his people, not
in any haphazard indiscriminate way. The blessing of which Paul
is talking about is a blessing that is in relationship to God's
electing love of his people in Christ. In other words, the blessings
of which now we are now to contemplate have everything to do with God's
purpose of grace in Christ Jesus. And not one blessing is to be
understood outside of the scope and spear and aim of God in Christ. Now we have to contemplate what
does it mean to be blessed according as he has chosen us in him. See, because this is where Paul
is excited. Now you guys know, when you read
the New Testament carefully, Paul worshiped God, didn't he?
It didn't take him two minutes to get excited about what Christ
has done for him. All of the epistles are just
dripping with doxology by Paul. He would just break out in the
middle of an exposition and talk about how great God is, how inexhaustible
his glory is, how unsearchable are his ways. He just gets excited
because the revelations that were given of him are to him
of Christ Cannot but cause you to be excited. We are contemplating
things that is hard to believe aren't we? We're when we think
about what we are in christ. It is hard to believe based over
against our experience And yet as we learned last night the
the only way we can enter into these blessings is by faith To
enter into these blessings by faith. You've got to have a knowledge
of god so now let's Let's contemplate these blessings. What does it
mean to be blessed of God in relationship to our election
in Christ? Well, the blessings, the well-spokenness,
the purpose of God for his people, the good pleasure of God for
his people to us can be understood over in verse three. He hath
blessed us, watch this now, with all spiritual blessings in heavenly
places in Christ Jesus. See, now he's qualified the blessings.
I want you to stay there for a minute. We are blessed according
as he has chosen us in Christ. God has spoken well of his people.
God has decreed good to his people. God has chosen to bless his people
tremendously. He did that in his own purpose
before the world began. Before the world began, God spoke
well of his people. You know, before I had a being,
God spoke well of me. He spoke exceedingly well. He
blessed me in Christ before the world began. Aaron, the high
priest of God's people, and I told you that in order for you and
I to really know that we are in Christ, we've got to know
that we have to have a high priest. We've got to have a mediator
between us and God. That mediator has to prevail
with God and prevail for us, for us to enter into those blessings.
Aaron, the high priest in Numbers chapter six, Verse 27, whenever
he spoke to the congregation, he would say, the Lord bless
you. The Lord keep you. The Lord calls
his face to shine upon you. The Lord give you his peace.
The Lord lift up his confidence upon you. And the Lord be gracious
unto you. Watch this. So shall I place
my name among the children of Israel, and I will bless them. Aaron knew that for God to be
a blessing to his people, he has to reveal himself to them.
The Lord bless you and the Lord what? Keep you. We learned that
that's what it means to be in Christ, right? For God to place
a sinner in Christ is to protect them from themselves and from
hell. The Lord keep you and the Lord
calls his face to shine upon you. You know, the man or the
woman is blessed when God causes his face to shine upon them.
When God reveals himself to you in the person of Christ, do you
know you're blessed? Not a lot of people can see God's
glory. Not a lot of people see the beauty
and the fullness and the richness of the radiance of Jesus Christ. Not a lot of people are excited
about Christ. But I tell you what, everyone
whom God has caused to see the glory of God in Christ are excited
about Christ. And you know, they know that
they are blessed. Not everyone is blessed like this because
this blessing is according as he has chosen us in him. And that blessing is to reveal
Christ to us. And when he makes Christ manifest
to us, you know what he's giving us? Grace. He's giving us peace. He's blessing us with the revelation
of his continence. If you'll notice that prayer
that Aaron prays in number 627, it is really simply God showing
himself to us in all the fullness of his attributes, in all the
fullness of his person. We are blessed when we see the
glory of God. And this is exactly what Paul
is saying here in our text. We are blessed in relationship
to our election to Christ. In your outline, They pertain
to his character and his kingdom. In fact, the language of being
blessed of God in Christ with spiritual blessings in heavenly
places is really the language of sonship. Mark with me the
statement that Paul makes again in line one of verse three. Blessed
be what? Jehovah? No, he says blessed
be God Watch this. Blessed be the God and Father
of our Lord Jesus Christ. Now Paul knows what he's aiming
at and it's this. There's a relationship between
the Father and the Son of which only men can experience these
blessings. There's a relationship between
God the Father and God the Son through whom these spiritual
and these heavenly blessings are bestowed upon those that
are in Christ. Mark this now, this is the language
of sonship. I told you on Friday that not
only do we need a high priest as our mediator, but we need
a kinsman just like us to be able to negotiate with God in
order for us to enter into those blessings. Is that true? Keep
your hand here and go to Hebrews chapter two. I want to show you
something as we affirm this. When Paul says, blessed be the
God and father of our Lord Jesus Christ, I want you saints to
grasp this. Every time you read this now
in the New Testament, here's what I want you to read. When
paul says blessed be the god and father of our lord jesus
christ. He is asserting the three persons of the godhead He is
establishing the relationship between the father and the son
and he's saying there is no eternal or spiritual blessing for anyone
outside of that relationship Outside of the father and the
son There are no eternal blessings Eternal blessings are only to
be obtained through the son by the father If you and I are experiencing
the blessings of God, it's because the Son has bestowed them upon
us. This is because the Son has obtained
all the fullness of God, all the fullness that God is pleased
to place in Him. If we will experience the blessings
of God, they must come through the Son. Here in Hebrews chapter
2, The Hebrew writer is speaking to what God has done through
Jesus Christ to make us one with him. And he says over in chapter
two, these words, and I'm going to read them starting at verse
11. Chapter two, verse 11, for both
he that sanctify it and they that are sanctified are all of
what? Now notice what he's talking
about, children of God. And he's speaking to the ministry
of Jesus Christ as the high priest and captain of his people, for
both he that sanctifies, the he here is God the Father, and
they who are sanctified, that's God's elect, I'm sorry, for the
he here that sanctified is the Lord Jesus Christ, and they that
are sanctified are God's elect, and all of them are of one. The one here is God the Father,
for which cause he is not ashamed to call them what? See, we are
talking about a sonship language when we talk about being blessed
by God the Father through God the Son. Listen to what he says,
saying, I will declare your name unto my what? In the midst of
the church will I sing praise unto thee. And again, I will
put my trust in him. And again, behold, I and the
children which God hath given me. And here's what I am asserting.
We can go back to our text now. Hebrews chapter 2 verses 10 through
13 is explaining the union of the believer in Christ. And Hebrews
chapter 2 verse 13 is telling us that God has a storehouse
of wealth for his elect, but only in as much as they are in
Christ. that God has pleased to place
us in Christ and make us one with Christ so that Christ becomes
our brethren and we become his brethren. In fact, we are called
his children. We'll see this later on down
the line for which being the children of God in Christ. Now
we can experience the blessings that are laid out for us by God
in Ephesians chapter one. Now notice what it says in Ephesians
chapter one again, verse three, and we're going to move to verse
four and develop this. Blessed be the God and Father
of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us, spoken well of
us, purposed us with how many spiritual blessings? All spiritual
blessings. Where? In heavenly places. Where? In Christ. That's locked
up, isn't it? The blessings are in Christ.
The blessings are in heaven. And the nature of the blessings
are what? Spiritual. Now, that's very important
for you to grasp. See, I hear athletes and singers
and all kinds of, you know, contemporary clowns get up to the microphone
after that they have produced X rated products to corrupt the
hearts of men everywhere and thank their Lord Jesus Christ
for blessing them. Are you hearing me? But I know
that they don't know Christ and I know that they don't know the
term blessing. And so in this conference, if
you don't get anything out of today's message, to be in Christ
is to be blessed, not with those blessings. The blessings with
which God's people are blessed because God has spoken well of
them in their representative and head, Jesus Christ, before
the world began are spiritual blessings. Let me just name a
few before I go on. What are some of the spiritual
blessings with which God has determined to bless his people
with? Eternal life? Eternal life? Do you have eternal
life? Do you have eternal life? Then
you are blessed. Eternal life. Pastor, I think
I have it, but can you explain? I'd be glad to. To have eternal
life is to have Christ. Christ is our life. To have eternal life is to be
born again. Regeneration is a spiritual blessing
that God has designated to His elect alone. To have eternal
life is to be born again. To be born again is to possess
God's objective of conforming you to the image of Jesus Christ.
To have eternal life is for God to have justified you freely
by His grace, which is in Christ Jesus. You know what a blessed
soul is walking around planet Earth? That's a person that has
been freely justified by the grace of God. Do you know what
he's doing? He's walking around this world
free in his conscience of the guilt and condemnation and damnation
of his sin. Ladies and gentlemen, it doesn't
get any better than that. Whomsoever the son shall set
free shall be free indeed. The man or the woman that has
come to know their justification and the word justification simply
means to be made free After having been examined by God's law. That's
another part of what his intention is down here after being examined
by God's law You know what? God says that man has never seen
let him go. Am I making some sense? That
man has never seen and the law says I agree with you. Let him
go In fact who brought him here in the first place? And the sinner is amazed. He's
amazed that God would say you're free to go. Do you know how happy
he is? Free to go. Whomsoever the Son
shall set free will be free indeed. And that freedom is a process.
We come to know it more and more as we come to know Christ. But
I am so happy that I've been liberated by Jesus Christ, aren't
you? That's a spiritual blessing, eternal life. It's in Christ.
Regeneration brings us into the blessed knowledge. Our minds
being renewed and transformed brings us into the blessed knowledge
of the sacrificial work of Christ on our behalf to justify us,
not before men, but God. And if God before us who can
be against us, but you are a triumphant sinner walking around this earth
with God on your side That's blessings That's blessings
You are blessed to be conformed to the image of Christ. That
means the third person of the infinite triune Godhead has taken
control of your life He's come alongside of you. He's indwelt
you. He's now taken over your life,
and He's now actually changing that computer chip in your brain
every day. He's leading. He's guiding. He's
conforming. He's disciplining. He's giving
insights. He's illuminating your mind.
He's giving you new affections, new joys, new aspirations, new
hope. He keeps your faith alive. Do
you believe the Spirit of God keeps your faith alive? My faith
would die a thousand times a day if the Holy Ghost didn't blow
the wind of his grace on my faith. See, we call the Father the remote
person of the Godhead because he sits on his throne in glory
and never moves. Our Father who art in heaven,
a glorious sovereign on his throne. We call the Son our mediator
because He stands between God the Father and His elect people
to bring them into the blessings of the Father. And we call God
the Holy Ghost the E-mediator. He's the one that's right here
upon us. He's the one that makes Christ a reality to us. He's
the one that actually breaks open the blessings of spiritual
things and make them a reality in our lives. Our blessings are
spiritual. and our blessings are heavenly
because God's kingdom is heavenly. Our blessings are spiritual because
the God we worship is Spirit. Are you guys understanding? See,
this is the thing we have to resolve. You will only speak
of God to the degree that you know Him. And if the God you
know is a carnal God giving temporal earthly blessings, you don't
have the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Now watch
this. The blessings with which God
has blessed us in Christ according as he has chosen us are enormous,
tremendous, and inexhaustible. But down here on this earth,
you may be broke as a dog. See, I just tripped somebody
up right there. I just tripped him up. I just
tripped him up. Did I just trip him up? You mean I can be blessed and
jacked up at the same time? Absolutely. Absolutely. Didn't we learn that brother
Mephibosheth found himself way in Lodibor where there was no
pastor, where there was no flock, there was no word, no preaching,
no gospel. He was in dry desert land. They
couldn't grow any grass there. That certainly couldn't have
been the church of the living God. It was false religion. He
was in false religion, yet he was chosen in Christ, and he
was highly favored, and he was highly blessed. And when God
called him by his grace, fetched him out of Lotabath, he placed
him at the table of David, as he has placed us at the table
of David. But our feet are still laying. So we got men and women
who are highly favored, who don't look like it. Now, This don't make those of
you who are aspiring to wealth and caught up in the word of
faith and prosperity gospel feel good. I know that. We want you
to be blessed. We really do. But we want you
to be blessed eternally. I would that God strip you of
everything you have so that he might shut you up to Christ alone.
What shall it profit a man if he gained the whole world and
lose his soul? Am I making some sense? Oh, and
I thank God the way he brought Christ into the world. Do you
know how much we would have tore up religion had Jesus been born
in a five-star hotel? Do you know how we would have
tore this thing up? They still try to make him a king on this
earth and he lived large because he had a money bag. Remember
that? He who was rich became poor that
we through his poverty might become rich. We are blessed with
spiritual and heavenly blessings in total. And what I mean by
that is when we understand what's taking place with what Paul's
aim is with regards to the blessings, what God is saying is because
of my son, who is the heir of all things, and you are in him,
everything he has is yours. I want to run these verses through
your head because what I want you to grasp is the privilege
you have is not so much the things that God has given to you, but
the fact that he has given you his son and he has given his
son to you and he has given you to his son. The union is enormous. We are talking sonship here.
We are talking sonship and let me make it very clear that we
are talking sonship by addressing verse 5, having predestinated
us unto the adoption of sons by Jesus Christ to himself. Do you see that? This is the
purpose of God having blessed us. He blessed us according in
relationship to, subordinate to, with the purpose of having
chosen us in Him. The blessings are confined to
Christ. He did that before the world began, that we should be
what? Holy, without blame, before Him
in love. I want to talk about that. Having
already predestinated us. God carved out our destiny before
the world began. And pastor, what is that destiny?
That destiny is to make you like God. That's right. Let me talk to you for a minute.
When God gave us the first three chapters of the book of Genesis,
he gave us a prototype the new heavens and the new earth if
any man be in Christ Jesus he's a new creature you know what
God said after he had created the heavens in the earth and
then he created man on the earth and he said it was good he said
let us make man in our image and in our likeness and then
he blessed man we know that he was not talking about the first
Adam but the last Adam For to ultimately be created in the
image of God is for us to be created in the image of Christ.
For us to ultimately arrive at that mandate, that creation mandate,
is for us to be brought into a real knowledge of God through
Jesus Christ. Are you guys hearing me? Christ
is the image of the invisible God. And we are made over in
the image of God through Christ. Christ is the only Son of God,
and we who are believers are sons of God in Him. Is that true?
I want to run you through a few verses just so you can get this
and I want to wrap this up. Here's the mind of God, ladies
and gentlemen, in blessing us in Christ Jesus. Never forget
this. Never separate or detach the
blessings of God for you apart from Christ. That would be a
heinous, heinous insult against the Father. Why should God bless
you with anything apart from Christ, when Christ has done
it all for you? Why should God let you enter
into the storehouse of his corn when it was Joseph who figured
out and solved this problem? Did you solve your sin problem?
Did you deal with your debt? Did you deal with your guilt?
Did you make yourself right with God? Who did that? Christ. And God says, come to me through
him. You better come to him through him. And here's what God wants
to do and he will do it and is doing it. He is bringing many
sons to glory right now through Jesus Christ. Romans chapter
8, just go there briefly. Romans chapter 8, I want you
to see this now. What are we in Christ? Truly
blessed. I'm blessed. Are you? Are you
blessed? Well, tell me something about
that blessing, the origin of it. Tell me something about the
nature of that blessing. Tell me something of the grounds
of that blessing. Tell me something of the goal
of that blessing. Tell me something of the purpose
of that blessing. Who does that blessing exalt?
Who does it benefit? I'll tell you if you're truly
blessed, if you can explain those questions. Am I telling the truth? Romans chapter 8, listen to what
the Apostle Paul says in Romans 8, verses 29 and 30. You've heard
these words before, but I want you to grasp them now in this
concept. What we are in Christ. Verse 28, and we know that all
things work together for good to them that what? Do you understand
that's part of the gift, one of the blessings that God gives
you? Please listen to me. To love God is to be given the
gift. to love God. Do you understand? Not everybody loves God. And we know that all things work
together for the good to them that love God, to them who are
what? Called. According to his what there it
is. That's that connecting clause again. God doesn't call us willy-nilly
He calls us according to what purpose and his purpose We already
know we heard it last night 2nd Timothy chapter 1 verse 9 his
purpose of grace which we had in Christ Jesus Before the world
began see God doesn't do anything any in a saving and an eternal
way apart from Christ This is why we make much of Jesus. I
because the father makes much of Jesus. Listen to it. Listen
to it. For whom he did for know, we
believe in predestination, don't we? He also did predestinate
to, here it is, be conformed to the image of his son. That
is the ultimate objective of the blessings. Did you guys get
that? Okay, I want to nail this home
now. I want to nail this home. Watch this now. When God marked
you out, And when God called you by his grace, when God began
to deal with you, and in fact, I'm not getting that right, when
God chose you in Christ before the world began, and the moment
that you hit this terra firma through the birth of your mom
and daddy, whoever that was, from that moment, God was leading
and guiding and bringing you to the place where he would conform
you to the image of a son. Are you hearing what I'm saying?
You know what that means? Your life was a struggle. It
was filled with complexity. You were you were you were overwhelmed
by the darkness. You were in controlled are controlled
rather by sin and evil. And in your own mind, you don't
know what's going on. But God does. Watch this now. But God does. And even the trouble
that you are going through now, every bit of it, every bit of
it is to conform you to Christ. if the people of God would get
this. See, because we want to throw trouble off that this is
not of God. This is not of God. Can I share with you what the
Bible says? Are you ready? All things are of God for us
who know him. All things are of God. All things
are of God. David said, when Shimei cursed
him, the Lord's gonna do me good behind this. Joseph said, you
meant it for evil? And that boy went through something,
didn't he? But God meant it for good. See, those men understood
election and predestination, and they saw the glory of God
in Christ. They knew better is the end of
a thing than the beginning thereof. They knew that. Do you know it? Right now you're going through
some trouble, some real bad troubles. Worst thing could have happened
to you was for you to marry that knucklehead. And yet God, watch this. God is right now using that knucklehead
to make you look more like Christ than you ever did. He's teaching you how to pray,
how to call on God, how to depend on God, how to wait on God, hope
in God. You've gotten to a point where
you believe man is totally depraved. And you can't fix his problem.
I'm giving him to God. That's what God wanted you to
do in the first place. And you don't know this. But
he did the same thing with you. You know what you're both learning?
It's got to be all of grace. This is just true. Watch it now. He's conforming us to the image
of Christ. In order that this is a purpose
clause that he might be the first born among many brethren. I'm going to cut it short here,
but I want you to grasp this. What we are in Christ. Is because of who Christ is.
And what God is doing is making us just like his son. Because
his son is his supreme joy. God delights in his son. By the way, so does the Holy
Ghost. I'm going to say this right now before I let this go.
The Holy Ghost doesn't do anything other than exalt Christ. His
job is to make you like Christ. When he leads you into the fire
and you start screaming, he doesn't care. He already knows what you're
going to look like when you come out. He looks at the image, he
looks at you, and he says you got to stay in there a little
longer. No, not quite yet. No, not quite yet. He doesn't
care how long you want to. When he's done with you, both
the Father and the Holy Ghost will be very happy. Point number four, the threefold
objective of these blessings. Go back to our text. I just need
you to see this. The threefold objective of these
blessings. We know now that the blessing
of which Paul is talking about here has to pertain to the work
of Christ and the rule of Christ, the reign of Christ over His
people and for the purpose of blessing His people with His
likeness. We know that now. We are not buying into this superficial
interpretation of blessing. It's according as He has chosen
us in Him. Listen to what it says in verse 4. That we should
be what? Holy. And what? Without blame. Before Him in what? Love. Now
let me talk a moment about this Trinitarian purpose of God. Can
I do that? Language in the Scripture is
not there to fill the page. When God purposed us, He purposed
us to be holy, He purposed us to be without blame, and He purposed
us in love. Now, if I wanted to give you
a short definition, do you know what the definition of that concept
of that purpose is? Here it is. To be like God. Listen,
God is holy. Are you hearing me? God is holy. Secondly, God is blameless. There is no fault in God. There
is no blemish in God. There is no spot in God. God
is pure. God is impeccable. God is gloriously,
infinitely impeccable. That's what he will have his
people to be. Holy, blameless, and watch this,
in his love. God is what? Love. Is that true? God is love, God
is holy, and God is righteous. Now, I can break these up into
their Trinitarian persons and be really blessed. Although all
three of these characteristics apply to all three persons, but
let's call holiness the primary but not exclusive or purposeful
attribute of the father. God, our father is holy. Jesus
said in John 17, a text I would want to expand, but I'll take
another day to do it. Holy father, restore unto me
the glory that I had with you before the world began." Peter
tells us in 1 Peter, if you call on the Father, see to it that
you are walking in holiness, for as it is written, be ye holy
for I am holy. Now, we already know all three
persons are holy. Holy, holy, holy Lord God Almighty. Isn't that what Isaiah saw? He
saw all three persons holy. They are holy. But I'll tell
you something. The word blameless in our text doesn't merely have
to do with the intrinsic character of the Godhead, but rather with
the specific work that Christ accomplished in order to make
us blameless before him. When God said, I will have all
of my people to be blameless, what he meant was he would bestow
upon them, impute to them the righteousness that Jesus Christ
himself won when he purged us of our sin, when he justified
us freely at Calvary Street, when he became a propitiation
for our sin. And now the righteousness of
God is revealed apart from the works of the law. God would have
us to be like the Father. God would have us to be like
the Son. And God would have us to be like the Father and the
Son in love. In love. When we talk about the
love of God, we are talking about not only an objective reality
that is seen most clearly in the person of Christ, but we
are talking about experiencing the grace of God internally,
are we not? God has shed abroad the love of God in our hearts
by the what? Holy Ghost. the Spirit of God
that pours the love of Christ into our heart that allows us
to Confidently stand before God without trembling Notice what
the text is God wants to bring us into a state of holiness into
a state of blamelessness in love that's God's objective and can
I tell you something he's already done that to the extent that
that Christ has accomplished everything for our eternal redemption,
we right now stand before God, holy and blameless and in love. You believe that? There is therefore
now no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus, because
God has fully clothed us in the person and the work His son Jesus
Christ and he has brought us to himself. You know what God
has done by blessing us go with me to Revelation chapter 21 This
is my last one. I'm gonna jump past all the other
stuff Revelation chapter 21 Do you know what God has done in
blessing his elect? He has caused them to triumph Over all things
in Christ He has caused his people to triumph over all things in
Christ revelation chapter 21 notice what it says revelation chapter 21 verses
5 through 7 here it is let me start at verse 4 and God
shall wipe away all tears from their eyes and there shall be
no more death Neither sorrow nor crying, neither shall there
be any more pain. Here it is. For the former things
are passed away. And he that sat upon the throne
said, Behold, I make all things new. And he said unto me, Write,
for these words are true and faithful. Verse 6. And he said unto me, It is done. I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning
and the end, and I will give unto him that is a thirst of
the fountain of the water of life freely. And here it is.
Watch this now. He that overcometh shall inherit
what? All things. And I will be his
God. And he shall be my what? Ladies
and gentlemen, the one who has overcome is Christ. He's the one that has overcome
death. He's overcome hell. He's overcome
Satan. He's overcome the wrath of God.
He's overcome your alienation, your separation. Christ has overcome
everything. And guess what else? Are you
in him? Then you've overcome everything too. You know what
the text says? And we are destined to inherit
all things. Now, please, if God has determined
to cause you to inherit all things, not some things, all things,
do you believe that? See, y'all don't believe that.
I know you don't. I'm getting ready to move because
you don't believe that. I just you don't believe you. You don't
believe what God has gloriously displayed in the person of his
son. In this book, we call the word of God and in the glorious
proclamation of the gospel. all things are yours all things
are yours for Christ's sake what are we in him we are just like
his son we are conquerors in fact more than conquerors through
him that loved us and gave himself for us we are victorious in Christ
we have inherited all things by him just because he has chosen
to to place us in him. Amen. Amen.