Talk 2 - Ephesians 1 v1-14

0:00 Morning, everybody. We are in Ephesians chapter 1, and there is a massive connection between what Chris has just been talking about and what we're about to read, because generosity from us stems from a response to God's generosity. And what we're looking at is the riches of God's grace to us. And so I want to invite you to follow with me in the next few moments one of the greatest statements, one of the greatest unpackings of the grace of God that you will find anywhere in the Bible. And just to enjoy it, you're not going to understand everything. Well, if you do, well done, because I don't. We are still treading in the foothills, I think, as human beings, trying to understand the majestic nature and the glory of the grace of God to us. Paul wrote this letter to Ephesians, to friends of his, because he spent a lot of time in and around the city of Ephesus helping to establish the church.

1:14 And I can imagine him probably in prison writing this or dictating it and having the faces of people in his mind. How is this going to impact old Titus as he sits there with his wife and kids listening to this? How is this going to impact? This is deeply personal. So let's not simply get caught up with the magnificence of the ideas in it, but also realize that this is written to real people in a real setting. And it's God expressing himself and revealing himself through these words written to the folks at Ephesus, but written for us also so many years later. Verses 1 to 14, we cover as well as we can in the time we have this morning. Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus, by the will of God to God's holy people in Ephesus, the faithful in Christ Jesus.

2:21 Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ. For he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight, in love. He predestined us for adoption to sonship through Jesus Christ in accordance with his pleasure and will to the praise of his glorious grace, which he has freely given us in the one he loves. In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins in accordance with the riches of God's grace that he lavished on us. With all wisdom and understanding he made known to us the mystery of his will, according to his good pleasure which he purposed in Christ to be put into effect when the times reach their fulfillment to bring unity to all things in heaven and on earth under Christ. And in him we were also chosen, having been predestined according to the plan of him who works out everything in conformity with the purpose of his will, in order that we, who were the first to put our hope in Christ, might be for the praise of his glory. And you also were included in Christ when you heard the message of truth, the gospel of your salvation, when you believed, you were marked in him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit, who is a deposit guaranteeing our inheritance until the redemption of those who are God's possession to the praise of his glory.

4:18 Now, it is an amazing beginning to the letter from verse 3 down to the end there. Verse 14 is all one sentence without punctuation. So the NIV has done its best to stick the commas and full stops and semicolons in. If you read, for example, the New English Standard Version or the New Revised Standard Version, you'll find the full stops sometimes in different places. because they're trying to work out. I prefer if there weren't any full stuff, actually, because it's meant just to be read through just the flow of it together. Now, the ideas here could easily send our heads spinning. And I'm sure that Paul didn't write this thinking that his friends in Ephesus would understand every word that he would write first time through, But nor did he write it to give them a headache or even to show off his brilliant learning.

5:21 This is as clear as Paul can be in human words to express what he is expressing. And it is, in the first instance, an expression of praise. Praise be to God, or literally, blessed be God who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in heavenly realms in Christ. And even if we don't therefore grasp everything in it, how much this would make our own praise to God deeper and richer, just to take these phrases and just thank God for them, even if we don't understand everything that is said here. Because I know for myself that it is a frequent struggle when it comes to prayer. We don't know what to say. We're not quite sure how to go about it. You know, if you get a gift for Christmas, and the words are limited in English, aren't they?

6:30 to say thank you. Well, thank you. Or thank you very much. Or thank you very, very, very much. You might even sing the song. Some of you will remember it from years ago. But it's limited. But one of the things you can do is to actually describe the gift you've been given.

6:53 And that opens it up. So let's suppose somebody buys you a car. Wouldn't that be nice? Some of you are dreaming of such a thing. To say thank you for the car, it just sounds a little bit, you know, it's just not enough. But why not talk about the power of the engine or the beautiful sleek lines of the car or the color combinations or those lovely leather seats and the wee button you press that it heats up when you're sitting in it. And you could go through all the detail. You can tell that I have a car in mind here, but never mind.

7:27 You go through the detail, and it enhances your appreciation. So we could say, God, thank you for saving me. And that's marvelous. But can we go just a little bit further? Lord, I've been thinking about it. This is meant, and we go through what it means. And it builds up that relationship that we have with God. So in the first instance, this is an expression of praise, of thanksgiving to God for his magnificent grace.

8:00 It's an unpacking then. God understands it all, but Paul is unpacking it to show his appreciation and to reveal it to us how great the grace of God is. And then he goes into some of these details. And as I say, some of them are quite complicated, and we're tempted to say, okay, you know, let's just go to chapter six, because it gets a wee bit more practical in inverted commas. Imagine one of these days that you got a letter from your solicitor, and the solicitor tells you, much to your surprise, that Uncle Charlie, who went to America many years ago, has passed away and has left you as a beneficiary in his will. Sounds a little bit exciting. And then you discover that he lived in Texas. That's even more exciting.

8:52 And he actually, you think, oh, maybe he had an oil well or two. That would be interesting. So you go to the solicitors, and the solicitor has this long sheath of paper with all these things on it. And the solicitor starts to read it out. Well, you as the beneficiary, By signing this will, by accepting it, this is what you will receive. And so it begins. Well, there's a car. There's a fantastic Cadillac thing of a car.

9:23 And then it goes into all the details about the different kind of shares and the oil wells and the businesses and the investments. And you just go, oh, I couldn't be bothered with this. I'll just take the car. Really? I doubt it very much. You might be saying, the more detail, the better. Come on, bring it on. This is exciting.

9:49 And that's what's going on here. The more detail, the better. I don't want this to end. This is fantastic to get into it. And as we read it, thank God. Talk to him. That's what I do. This is his word.

10:04 And thank him for what you understand. Ask him about what you don't. Lord, I read the words. I see what you're saying, but at the moment, I don't really understand it. Please help me at a level appropriate to me. So my task is to guide you a little bit through this big sentence. And here Paul is painting on a grand scale. Notice in particular the sweep of time that he covers, past, present, and future.

10:33 That will provide a neat little structure, if you like, for the sentence, because it roughly follows that structure. Now, it's not the past as in last year. It's the past as in before the creation of the universe. And then it's the present in terms of all the good things that we can now enjoy as children of God, sons and daughters, born again, believers, Christians, whatever term you want to use. All the good things that we have now presently to enjoy in Christ. And then he shoots off into the future. Again, not in terms of next summer, but the climax, the fullness of the times, the goal of world history. And he uses this incredible word at the end where he talks about inheritance.

11:41 And that's, of course, where I got the idea for the solicitor and so on, because it's this inheritance that one day is going to be fully opened to us. So that's the grand scale. And it is important because it gives us a big story into which you can fit your little story. I was born on the 15th of April, 1953. It seems like an awful long time ago. You know the way you have to fill these things in for banks or a passport and something, and they have a list, and you have to scroll through the years? You know, it gets quite discouraging.

12:30 Will we ever get back to 1953? But here we go, 1953. I don't remember being born. I vaguely remember a few things that happened when I was little. But I remember this growing awareness that I was here. Do you remember that? That I existed, you know, hands, you know, all the rest of it. And an awareness that nobody had asked my permission for me being here.

12:56 I just turned up. And there I was. Well, I didn't just turn up, but you know what I mean. I'll not go into the details. But here I was. Nobody had asked my permission. And as I grew up and sort of, you know, got used to being here and used to interacting with others and then trying to figure this out, this life thing. Now, maybe just because I was a melancholy child and spent a lot of time on my own, maybe the rest of you didn't have thoughts like this, but I suspect most of us do.

13:27 You know, you go from primary school where you're a big hero into form one where you're zero, and you're trying to work it out, and you discover that you're not the smartest tool in the box. You really aren't. You're not the sharp as you thought. And you're not God's gift to Irish rugby, let alone Ulster rugby. You're not. And you're trying to figure out, who am I? What am I? Why am I here?

13:51 What is this all about? You know, and then you discover that there are more people in the world than live in Armagh, which is, you know, it's quite a rude awakening. And then you discover that there's actually, whatever it is now, up to close to eight billion or whatever. What does my little life count for? And it's vast number of people. I've discovered that I'm not the only one to have had the questions, nor the only one to have struggled into adult life, trying to work these things out. and the thing is you see the culture in which you live in and I live in has no answer to this because it's preaching its message of pure materialism there's no reason for you to be here you just showed up one of these days something's going to destroy your life you're gone that's it it's over and there's no significance there's no value there's no meaning to that here's how it's expressed by a photographer philosopher that his photography is wonderful and his philosophy is terrible.

15:11 He says this purpose is not an inherent quality of life or the universe. It is something arbitrary and fictional. In that sense, to the degree that we have a choice in the matter, we may as well pick a purpose that makes the blink of time we each get to be conscious beings as personally satisfying as we can make it by whatever criteria is most meaningful to a given individual. So pick a purpose. There is no reason for you to be here. Pick a purpose. Have a go. If you're lucky enough, it's all going to be over and that'll be it.

15:45 Another person writes, we know that chaos is out there. We know deep down that it will ultimately win. He doesn't tell us how we know that. It's just an assumption. So his particular art is about bending things back towards order, wrestling them from chaos. Oh, the heroic artist on the face of the earth. Sounds noble, but it is ultimately hopeless. And here's Paul setting out this big story.

16:18 But we need to understand that it clashes at every point with the story culture has invented for itself. Before the foundation of the world, can you even picture that? Go back in your mind to a time before the universe came into being. Interestingly, the prevailing view of science until relatively recently was that the universe has always existed. So it is remarkable that the Bible consistently states that the universe is not eternal. It had a beginning. What a lot of times scientists would have saved themselves if they had simply listened. Genesis 1, in the beginning, God.

17:01 John 1, in the beginning, was the Word. So there was a beginning. But more than that, this is not an impersonal universe. It didn't come out of nothing. There is a person, if that's the right word, behind it. a mind, a person, God. Paul begins there. And he begins with God's mind, what he was thinking before the world was here.

17:44 This universe has a purpose. It is neither arbitrary nor fictional as that photographer claimed. He chose us in Christ before the creation of the world. To be before him and love, holy, blameless. Some big ideas in this. Chosen in Christ. Listen to the phrase. He repeats the idea in verse 11, in him we were also chosen.

18:22 What does he mean by in Christ? It's in almost every statement, every part of this paragraph. Verse 3, we're blessed with every spiritual blessing in Christ. Verse 4, we're chosen in Christ. Verse 6, the grace has been given to us in the one he loves, that is Jesus. In him we have redemption. And verse 9, 11, 12, 13, twice in 13. This constant emphasis on being in Christ.

18:55 And if you think about it, it is an extraordinary idea. In Paul's day, if you were a follower of some great Greek philosopher, for example, Aristotle, you would never have described yourself as being in Aristotle. Followers of Karl Marx would never describe themselves as being in Marx. But this is one of the things that being a Christian means. It means being in Christ. You see, in order to have salvation, it is not enough just to admire Jesus, to know about him. to try to follow his teachings. We must be in him.

19:47 If I could use an illustration from the Old Testament, it's like the ark of salvation in Noah's day. The people who were saved were in the ark. And that's part at least of the idea here. It's where we are in Christ. God is laying down the terms of salvation. It is in Christ. All the spiritual blessings are in him. We experience God's lavish grace in him.

20:24 So the crucial thing then is to be in Christ. And the obvious question is, well, how do we get in Christ? Now, some people read verse four, for he chose us in him before the creation of the world, as if it said, for God chose us to be in Christ before the creation of the world. But the words to be aren't there. God chose us in Christ. How do we get into Christ? Well, that is explained in verse 13, right at the end of the paragraph. You also, he says to the Ephesians, were included in Christ.

21:09 When? When you heard the message of truth, the gospel of your salvation, when you believed, you were marked in him with the seal, the promised Holy Spirit. In other words, to be in Christ, the Ephesians heard the gospel, responded in faith, and as a result, they were included in Christ and sealed by the Holy Spirit. And by being included in Christ, they become then part of the us that Paul is talking about here, part of this chosen community that is in Christ. Now, my focus this morning is trying to point out what Paul says in this particular text, not on everything that is said on the much wider big issue of God's sovereignty and human responsibility. I believe in both because both are taught by Scripture. I also believe that the tension between the two is taught in Scripture, and therefore any attempt to suppress one side in favor of the other is bound to be wrong because the Bible itself promotes both. And problems often arise and arguments and disagreements and a lot of heat when we attempt to fit everything Scripture says into a neat system or formula, especially if we use terms that the Bible itself doesn't use.

22:51 If you want to follow up that discussion on these words chosen, elect, and so on, I can recommend my brother's book on the subject Determined to Believe. If you look at chapter 6 there, it's especially helpful when it comes to understanding how the Bible uses words like chosen and predestination and foreknowledge. Chosen and elect are common ways that the New Testament refers to Christian believers. Peter does that, to the elect in Christ Jesus. Here we discover that Christians are chosen in Christ. It doesn't say they are individually selected to be believers, although that's how some read it. Israel was often described as being chosen, but they were not all genuine believers, as Hebrews tells us. In fact, very few of them were at one stage.

23:51 The disciples were described as being chosen, but according to Jesus, one of them was a devil. So chosen doesn't equal Christian in every case in the New Testament. We need to be careful. What Paul is doing here is focusing on the purpose. Chosen for what? All believers, all genuine believers are in Christ. What's the purpose? They're chosen for something.

24:23 All those believers are chosen for something. The answer is not chosen to believe, but chosen to be before him in love. The purpose for life. to be before him in love, holy and blameless as his adopted children. That is God's purpose for everyone who believes, everyone who is in Christ. So before the creation of the world, God's plan was to make a world so that on that world there could be creatures, including human beings, who would have the opportunity to become children of God and to be placed as his sons and daughters. It wasn't that God created the universe and then decided what he'll do with it. What am I going to do with all this stuff?

25:26 Oh, I know. Before the foundation of the world, God had this idea, this plan. we were always the goal. As I said last week, God created the universe that he might have us. But for that to happen, there had to be a context, a place for us to live. Now, of course, God could have created creatures and put them anywhere, but he chose to have a world and put creatures on it because those creatures, that wasn't enough for God. God didn't simply want creatures before him. He wanted sons and daughters become his, as it's translated, adopted sons and daughters.

26:18 That literally means to be placed as his sons, placed as sons and daughters because this has nothing to do with gender. It is about status as a child and therefore an heir of God. And some people struggle with this because they think, aren't we all children of God? As many religious people think and teach. Well, we're all creatures of God. He created us in his image. He cares for the whole of creation. But we are not all children of God.

26:58 Listen to what John says about this, about the coming of Jesus. To as many as received him, to them he gave the right to become children of God. Note the phrase, become children. You can't become what you already are. So we are all creatures created in his image, the pinnacle of his creation. But God is not content with that. He wants us before him as his sons and his daughters. And that's why this planet is here.

27:39 It is an amazing thing. And that's why there is in all of our hearts a sense that this is not the final story. It doesn't sit well with us. There is the notion of eternity in our hearts we all recognize very quickly in life that this is temporary. One of the big things a child has to grapple with, I remember it vividly in my own case, is the reality of death. I'm trying to work all that out. But there is that sense that there's got to be more. There's something inside me that is longing for more.

28:18 And if we're created with desires that this world cannot satisfy, as C.S. Lewis pointed out, The likelihood is that this is not the only world we were created for. The whole point about being here is that we become sons and daughters of God. And we do that by receiving Christ. Remember what Jesus said? Whatever is born of the flesh is flesh. What is born of the Spirit is Spirit. So don't be surprised when I tell you you must be born again.

28:54 There is no crossing of categories between flesh and spirit without God's intervention. It just can't be done. You say, well, what's the difference between a creature of God and a child of God? C.S. Lewis illustrated like this. A craftsman makes a beautiful chair. He puts all his skill into it. And from the style and the detail, you can tell a great deal, of course, about the craftsman who created it.

29:23 but set the chair beside the craftsman's child and it's a totally different thing. And it's not that the child looks nicer than the chair because, you know, well, I'll not go too far down that line. But the child, sir, shares the craftsman's life in a way that the chair never can. That's why we need to be born again. And that's why God cannot create sons and daughters, because that's not how they're made. Similarly, a simple analogy, you can't be born married, can you? Well, certainly not in this country. And if you could be, then it wouldn't be marriage as we know it.

30:08 It involves taking a decision. You cannot be created a son and daughter of God. It's something we become by receiving and trusting Christ. And the challenge, of course, coming through all of this is, am I in Christ? Have I received Jesus? Have I trusted him? Have I become a child of God? What's the reason for all of this?

30:39 Why would God do this? Verse 6, to the praise of his glorious grace, which he has freely given us in the one he loves. Jesus is the one God loves. And out of his love for his son, his purpose is to have eternally before him people who have trusted his son, have received his son, people who are in him, joined to him to the praise of his glorious grace. God has done this as a kind of exhibition to the entire universe of his grace. It's very hard to put it into words. God's grace is indescribably glorious. And we will discover that it is by grace that we're saved, totally free, unmerited gift of forgiveness of sins through the blood of his Son.

31:41 The grace of God lavished upon us. because apart from that, of course, we couldn't have engaged with the purposes of God because of our sin and our trespasses. And God has done something about that in order to place us as sons and daughters. We have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins. What a stunning thing that is. There are millions upon millions of people today looking for forgiveness, struggling with guilt.

32:25 And here, not as something we can earn, we can never earn this, but as a gift of God in Christ, at the cost of the blood of his Son, He gives us forgiveness on the whole of life as the very basis on which I can be a son of God with all my failures and continued falling short, knowing that the blood of Jesus Christ, God's Son, cleanses me from all sin. These are some of the things that are unpacked for the present, and time has raced along, and I must finish, but I'll finish with this, that there is this future. The story isn't over. And Paul uses a remarkable word. He says that everything is going to be brought in unity in Christ, and that's the way the NIV and others translates it. The word he uses is a word to describe what a speaker, a public speaker would do to sum everything up, You know, the way of the talk might be, all right, here's the five points. Here's what you need to understand the whole thing.

33:45 So what Paul is saying that this whole big story from before the foundation of the earth to the end, the fullness of the time is going to be summed up in Christ. In the beginning was the word. God is a God of communication. He's been speaking, speaking in creation. What was he saying when he created giraffes? That is an interesting question. Or created all those stars out there that we don't know anything about. Or at the level of the nanoparticles and all.

34:23 What is God saying? What is God saying in creating you? Different from everybody else. An interesting story. One little story amongst billions of others. What is God saying? What is he saying in history by allowing certain things to happen? And it looks like chaos, but it isn't chaos because it's all heading somewhere because the purposes of God will ultimately be fulfilled.

34:51 What is God saying? We'd love to know. Listen in. The whole thing is one gigantic sermon that is going to be summed up in Christ, the living word of God. and he says by the way when you became a Christian you were stamped with a seal a seal of the Holy Spirit as people would do to note that that belongs to me don't you be opening it it belongs to me God has stamped every child with the seal of his spirit as the guarantee of entering a glorious indescribable purpose inheritance in that future and a lot of that of course is unpacked in various other parts of the Bible and we can look at it in image form but that's the basic thing. Past, present, future.

36:08 Past, you are in God's mind. The universe is here. The world is here so that God might have you. Present, the opportunity to receive Christ, to be born again and therefore to know forgiveness and to walk in relationship with him, holy and blameless before him in a living relationship with the living God, knowing that death doesn't end everything. It's only a doorway into a glorious future. And when the fullness of time comes, Christ will sum it all up. In Christ it's summed up, and you and I in Christ will enjoy a magnificent inheritance. That's the story.

36:53 I hope that in the struggles and difficulties that we face today and tomorrow, the pain, the suffering, as well as the joys, that the vision of this, that's Paul's idea, get a hold of this. And we'll find out next week how we might get a hold of it by the help of his spirit. Let's pray together. Father, thank you for a magnificent, rich insight into your plans and purposes. And I pray that you'd help all of us. You would give us a spirit of revelation in the knowledge of you so we deepen in our understanding of the hope to which you have called us. The riches of your inheritance in us.

37:50 What you get out of all of this. And the greatness of the power that's involved and taking us from being creatures sinful, fallen to becoming the growing up sons and daughters of God that will govern the universe together with Christ forever. What a vision, what a picture. Encourage all of us, we pray in Jesus' name. Amen.