We're going to introduce the book this evening, and then we're going to try to cover the first 14 verses. I think when I told my wife the amount of material I'm supposed to cover tonight, she laughed at me. I don't know what that means, but like I told the group the other night, you're probably going to find out what she meant. So let's get into the introduction, you know, really quickly. Paul is considered the author of the book of Ephesians, one of a group of four known as the prison epistles, probably written around 60 to 62 AD. By the way, the introduction in your notes designed for you not to have to write anything. It's not until we get to the text, you'll have some blanks. So just relax for a couple of minutes here as we go through the destination. of the letters, the Church of Ephesus in Asia Minor. Now, there is some discussion or debate whether or not the words in Ephesus are actually included in verse 1. Some of the manuscripts and copies that we have don't have that there. And so the reason some have concluded is they think it was an encyclical letter designed to be passed around to different churches in Asia Minor, with possibly a blank in that spot for the different areas or churches to just fill in their name when they got their letter. One of the things that's interesting about that theory, though, is there's really no manuscripts with a blank there. So it's just kind of a theory, so it may be best to assume, and we'll just assume that it was written to Ephesus, in Ephesus, was part of the original manuscript, although many able scholars would disagree, but that's okay. Apparently also Titchicus, which is a fun name to say if you're looking for a name for a son in the future. Just break it out, man. I haven't seen a Titchicus around. And so Titchicus apparently with Onesimus delivered this letter he's mentioned in chapter six, but he's also mentioned in the book of Colossians. And he probably, he did deliver the book of Philemon in Colossians to the Colossian church. Now, the historical perspective of Ephesus, and I think this will help us a little bit, One of the things we learn about Ephesus, it was one of the largest cities in the Mediterranean world at the time. It was located on a port, it had a river named Keister, and then it was noted for its theater and its temple, the Temple of Artemis or Diana, depending on who was calling her different names. Unfortunately, what they find out about the River Keister is just kind of an interesting problem. They had a silting problem in the river, and it was due to ill-advised engineering. There was a king who attempted to make it deeper for larger ships, and it had the opposite effect. And so it ended up closing in the harbor over time instead of improving access, and it may be one reason we learn later that Paul had to dock at Miletus and then call the Ephesus, the Ephesian elders to him. which would have been a 30-mile travel. He might not have been able to get into the harbor. We don't know if that's why, but it does just provide some interesting obstacles that the city had to face in terms of why they may have shrunk in size over time. This temple was an incredible, magnificent piece of architecture in the ancient world. larger than an NFL football field, 180 feet by 361 feet. It was built of marble, different types of wood paneling in the structure, and it was one of the largest known buildings in antiquity, and so it's considered one of the seven wonders of the ancient world. In fact, life in Ephesus revolves so much around this temple that when one of the Roman emperors was looking for a city to place a temple in worship of him, Ephesus was considered, but then they realized nobody's going to worship the emperor because they all love Artemis. They're really locked into Diana, and so the city was just taken with her, and I kind of, maybe around here, it'd be like putting maybe a Viking sports bar right in downtown Green Bay, you know, it just kind of, it probably wouldn't be well attended unless someone needed to use the bathroom, and then maybe they would head over there. So one of the things that's really interesting, and it just kind of speaks to the superstitiousness of pagan religions, was how the city of Ephesus was founded. According to the legend, the founders had difficulty locating a site or selecting a site for the city, so they consulted an oracle or a sorcerer, and this oracle told them that they should build a city wherever a fish and wild boar should point out. And you're like, wow, when's that ever going to happen? But here's how the story goes. Subsequently, while some fishermen were cooking a meal, a fish with a live coal jumped out of the fire, fell into some straw and ignited a thicket occupied by a wild boar. This boar was frightened and fled and was followed to the very site where the Temple of Artemis was later built. And this is the superstitious or founding of the city. In fact, in 400 AD, there was still a wild boar statue on Main Street. And so it's just kind of an interesting, gives you some perspective into the people that Paul met with there. One of the things we know about this city is it was very hospitable to magicians and sorcerers and charlatans. And that's why in Acts 19 it's significant that these new believers decided to burn their magic books. You may remember that story in Acts 19 worth 50,000 pieces of silver, the equivalent of 50,000 days wages, or if you do the math, 136 years of wages. that they burned in this, you know, the first, I guess, Aggie bonfire, I don't know. It was probably, in today's money, it was well over $6 million worth of books that they burned, realizing that the Lord would not have them involved, be involved in magic. Now, more importantly than the history of the city is Paul's history in Ephesus. And so just to walk through this really quickly, I've got some references there in the book of Acts, but following Paul's breakup with Barnabas, he and Silas decide to revisit the churches in Galatia, and they naturally wanted to keep moving west into Asia Minor. Now, here's one of the most interesting verses in all the Bible to me, Acts 16, 6, the Holy Spirit forbade them. to go into Asia Minor, really, really fascinating. And I think it was probably just the timing thing. It's probably just the timing thing. And so God had him bypass Asia Minor, go down to go over to Macedonia and then work their way down the continent of Greece, ending up in Corinth. When Paul left Corinth in Acts 18, 18, we see that finally he visited Ephesus. This was after about a year and a half in Corinth. He visited Ephesus, he reasoned with Jews in their synagogue, but he couldn't stay long because he was trying to get back to Jerusalem for a coming feast, and he did promise that he would return. This is also where he left Priscilla and Aquila, and where they straightened out Apollos, and they explained to him the way of God more accurately, the text tells us. So following Paul's return to Jerusalem, he comes back into Ephesus, he bumps into a dozen disciples of John the Baptist, if you remember that story, and they had not yet heard of the fulfillment of the one coming after John, and so Paul was able to share Jesus Christ with them, and they put their faith in Jesus Christ, and then Paul began to move into the synagogues like he was. He spoke boldly with the Jews for three months. Chapter 19 of Acts tells us that the overall response turned hostile and negative. So he bumps out of the city and he teaches daily in the school of Tyrannus, and he continues there for two years. The impact of this teaching was astounding because the text tells us in verse 10, all who dwelt in Asia heard the word of the Lord Jesus, both Jews and Greeks. It's just an amazing, effective ministry that he had there. And what we see is not only that, but it was probably here that many of the men, or some of the men at least, who later joined Paul in the ministry, trusted in Christ. It may have been during this time, during his teaching in Tyrannus at this school, Philemon probably being one of them. Epaphras, Epaphroditus, if those are two different guys, some conjecture that's the same person. Tychicus, and then Trophimus the Ephesian, and all of these men went back and began to plant churches and disciple others and teach the word of God and be involved in the ministry with Paul. And so, very effective launching point or hub of ministry that turned out to be there. in Ephesus. In fact, the ministry was so impactful that it began to even hurt the livelihood of many of the merchants in town, and they began to oppose what they called the way, and that's recorded in Acts 19, 21 through 41. Following this, Paul decided to leave Ephesus and go back through the region of Macedonia to encourage the disciples there. After his time in Macedonia, Paul then wanted to get back to Jerusalem for the Day of Pentecost, and he wanted to deliver a financial contribution from the Gentile churches to the saints in Jerusalem. All of this is coming around, so we know what happens, unfortunately. on his way back. Well, first of all, he stops in Miletus and he calls the Ephesian elders to come to him. Interesting, because he had been there for two years. He had already appointed elders in the church. And so he calls for them to come see him in Miletus. Apparently, from the conversation, Paul may have thought this was going to be the last time he'd ever see them. They were they were shedding tears at this meeting. And so Paul makes it back to Jerusalem. He's arrested. He spends two years in a jail in Caesarea where he appeals to Caesar. Then he gets sent to Rome and he spends two years in a jail there. And this is where he writes the epistle to the Ephesians. And so just kind of a quick run through. through the history there in the Book of Acts. Now, in terms of why he wrote the epistle, we're going to try to recreate Paul's movements. And while Paul was sitting in Rome, probably contemplating his upcoming trial, potential work out west, because he was thinking about going to Spain at some point, startling news from the east came. In fact, there was a new heresy in Colossae that was either making inroads with the church there or about to make inroads with the church. At the same time, Onesimus, a runaway slave from Colossae, appeared before Paul, and he had confessed that he had abandoned his owner and probably stolen from his owner, and that's Philemon. This is all coming together at the same time, and so at this juncture, I believe Paul decided several things. Write to the Colossians with an appropriate warning. right to Philemon, urging him to take Onesimus back as a freeman and even to prepare a room for himself. And then third, he probably at that point finished the letter that he had started as the epistle that we now know to Ephesus, since they were going back these, hey, they can deliver this one, too. And so that's probably what what caused the the him to move forward in writing this letter. Now, what's the main purpose for the writing? of the book. Well, it's it's unique in that it's like Romans in this way, because Ephesians was designed to be a brief summary of Paul's theology. Romans was designed. Remember, Romans was a summary of the theology of righteousness. Remember, the theology of righteousness is simple. God requires it. Man doesn't have it. God provides it in the gospel. And God can outwork it in men and women's life who simply walk by faith after they've put their faith in Jesus Christ to save them from the penalty of sin. And so you've got this this righteousness, this theology of righteousness in the book of Romans that Paul sets forth. The other thing, though, in the book of Ephesians, it's a summary of the theology of the mystery of the church. So he's going to describe the church, universal, local. He's also going to describe the dispensation of grace. And so since the church was not revealed in the Old Testament, Paul is going to write about it in summary form here in the book of Ephesians. And so I've heard people refer to the book of Ephesians as the Alpine Heights. of Christianity. So that's a great description. I mean, there's so much rich truth in this book. And so hopefully you don't get altitude sickness as we move through. So some of the main themes, these are big. I get to speak a lot about this tonight because this is really emphasized greatly in this section. You know, believers need to know the value of the position that God has placed them in, in Christ, in Christ. We need to understand the value. In fact, our identification with Jesus Christ is emphasized close to 30 times in this epistle. And what God has determined through that position is not only to save unbelievers, but to bless believers in Christ fully without any reservation, nothing holding back. And so God does everything that he does for you as a believer through your position in Jesus Christ. So it's very important to understand that theme. Another theme is believers need to understand and utilize the resources they have in Jesus Christ to live out their daily lives. It's the Christian life is not designed to be a crank it out yourself. type of life, it's designed for you to stop trying and start trusting and start relying upon the resources that God's provided in Jesus Christ. And this is what part of the book is is about. Now, watch me. I think artfully summarize the book. We don't always agree with everything. In fact, we saw a quote in the pastor's conference by watching me. I was like, whoa, maybe I should take that. out of my notes, but we just don't agree with everything. But he artfully, I think, summarized the book of Ephesians when he said, sit, walk, stand. That was his summary of the book. Sitting represents the first three chapters where Paul asks nothing from believers than to just sit, listen, and learn about everything that you possess in Jesus Christ. And this is what Greek scholars would call the indicative section. This is just, these are truths that are communicated about you as a believer. Walk represents chapters four through the middle part of chapter six, where Paul commands and instructs the believers to now live in light of these truths. Now these are true of you. Now go walk and live in light of them. And this is what the Greek scholars call the imperative section. This is where we start getting some commands brought into the section. But always remember that in any command section in scripture, it's always assumed that you're going to utilize your resources in Jesus Christ, you're going to utilize them, you're going to rely upon them. God is never sending you out, asking you to do something that he hasn't also resourced you to do. And we tap into that as we walk by faith and truly rely upon the Lord and our resources there. And then finally, Stan represents Chapter six, where Paul simply commands the believers stand tall, so to speak, in the victory that Christ has already won, pointing out that the victory is already ours. All right, let's jump into the text now, as we just kind of have that brief introduction. And verses one and two, he gives us the greetings. And he says, Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ, by the will of God, to the saints who are in Ephesus, and faithful in Christ Jesus, grace to you, and peace from God our Father. and the Lord Jesus Christ. Now, as we pull into this next slide, this is where your blanks are going to need to start getting filled in. Basically, what I've done is highlighted all the blanks in yellow and underline them. So that should just give you a clue as to what word you're looking to fill in. So now we move into this next section. And, you know, if you're a grammarian, you know, my wife's an English major. And in the part that she loved about English more than anything was grammar. And that always makes for difficulty for me, but she helps me in that way. But what's really interesting about this next section, verses 3 through 14, it's a single run-on sentence by the Apostle Paul. In fact, one Greek scholar It says it's 202 words of the most monstrous sentence conglomeration that has ever been found in the Greek language. That's how one scholar describes it. I think what's really great about this is if you've ever been around somebody that's excited about something, You know, I don't know if you've ever seen a little kid run in from outside to tell you something and they and they just can't even hardly get it out. And it's like and then and then and then and then and you like take a breath or you're going to pass out, you know, like just slow down. I'm not going anywhere. I think that's what Paul's doing here. I think that what we're about to look at in Ephesians 3 14 is is your spiritual bank statement. He's listing that listing the asset that you possess as a believer of Jesus Christ. And, you know, his conclusion is going to say, hey, God deserves applause. The things that God accomplished for us in Christ ought to just blow your mind. And this, I think, is what Paul was doing. Another another commentator described Paul as as reaching into a treasure chest and and grabbing a handful of jewels. And as he holds it up and as it It cascades through his hands as he sees it. He's writing down what he sees, and that's what we have recorded in Ephesians 3, 14. I like the illustration. My kids used to go to an urgent care, you know, not too much, but when they got sick. And one of the things that they got at the urgent care is every time they got done, they got to go pick a toy, one toy. out of a treasure chest. I had this phony treasure chest. They pop it open. The kids would dive in there and grab one toy. And what I like to say is that God doesn't God doesn't do it that way. God says, you know what? You're a believer in Christ. Come over here. I'm dumping the treasure chest on your head. You get it all. You get it all. And that's what we're going to see in this section. And so verse three. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ. Now, by the way, because we're covering so many verses, it's like I tell my congregation at home, sometimes we're gonna leave some meat on the bones. All right, it's just going to have to be the way it is. We've only got an hour, but we're still going to get a lot of meat. There's a lot of juice in this section, a lot of encouragement here for us, but we will have to leave some meat on the bones for sure. So when we talk about blessed be the God and father of the Lord Jesus Christ, the word blessed means to speak well of or to speak worthy of praise. And one of the things that you see in the Greek language is the word ends with the suffix toss, and it emphasizes that God is inherently worthy to be praised. So we're about to we're about to read of stuff that he did, which is going to get us excited anymore. But just inherent in his character, God is worthy to be praised. And so Paul starts off his section here with that. And this is one of the reasons that I believe. And here's your first blank. This is one of the reasons I believe that three verses three through 14 is one run on sentence. I think Paul took one breath and he got out everything he could without stopping. And I think he was so blown away by God. You know, that would be a great goal for the end of our session tonight, and this is, I think, the goal of any Bible teacher that ever expounds the word of God, is to exalt Jesus Christ in such a way that you think higher of him when you leave than when you came in. And that's the goal of this section, and I think that's what Paul was doing. We see he blessed us, you know? As this squirrel's saying, it's all yours, and it's all mine. And he's blessed us. And what's he blessed us with? Well, we'll look at that here in a second. But the word blessed and because of the context and this heiress participle, it reflects an action that has already been done. And by the way, who does this other than God? You ever had a contractor at your home to do work and you pay him the full amount before they get started, right? You don't, okay, we do that down in, no, I'm kidding. We don't even do that in Georgia, where people sound like they're nice. You know, they got a nice southern accent. They feel like you can trust them. You know, it's like Opie Taylor's at your door or something. But no, you don't pay them all at once. You pay a little bit to get them to come out, and then you inspect their work, and then you might give them a little bit more, but you're always holding it back until they get completely finished, right? So you can kind of maintain a little bit of control. God doesn't do that. He he has blessed you with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ. He's he's not holding back. He's not playing a contingency game. He's not trying to put you on probation. He's given you everything for your success and benefit in this life. That's what's so cool about our God. He's not holding back. And what we're going to see is there are three prepositional phrases used to further explain this blessing of God. This first phrase describes what he's blessed us with, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing. This describes the what God has blessed us with. Now this is a simple but very profound statement that believers presently possess every spiritual blessing that they can possess because of God's doing. God did this, you didn't earn it, it's all by grace, but you got it all, you got it all. That's why I think it's even ironic and somewhat comical when people say, have you gotten the second blessing? And I'm like, yeah, and the third and the fourth and ad infinitum. I've got them all not waiting for anything. They're mine. Not because I'm good, but because of Jesus Christ and because of what he accomplished. And, you know, part of the package of spiritual blessings that will will be detailed in the following 11 verses. And it's safe to say that you possess more than you probably will ever realize or ever consistently partake of. Man, can you just imagine that? The depth and the wealth of the blessings that you possess in Jesus Christ that you may not even realize you have by the end of this life. It's like, you know, the Logos software system, you know, on steroids. You know, I mean, anybody that uses Bible study software, you end up getting locked into about four or five things that you use all the time. And you got like hundreds of other things on there that you never use. I wonder if it's like that with our spiritual blessing, just the resources that we possess in Jesus Christ. It reminds me of a story. Some of you might have heard this before. William Randolph Hearst was a famous journalist in yesteryears, and he was a big art connoisseur. In fact, at one time, they estimated he owned 25% of the world's rare art pieces. Just this one man, a journalist in California. In fact, he owned so much art, he couldn't even fit it into his house anymore. He ran out of space. And so he built a storage building to hold more artwork. And then he ran out of space and he built another storage building and so on and so on, where he had multiple storage buildings full of artwork. And so one day, as he was reading a periodical from another country, he saw a rare piece of artwork and he told his personal assistant, you go to Europe, you track that down and buy it. I don't care how much it costs. And so he kept getting these notifications from his assistant, we cannot find the piece. Nobody knows where it is. I think it might be in Italy, but I'd have to catch, he's like, go to Italy, get it, go find it. And he's like, well, it's not in Italy. I think it might be over here. He sent this man, popped him around from country to country looking for this art piece. And finally, he gets a call from the man. And the man says, we found the piece of artwork. And William Randolph Hearst says, Great, buy it, bring it home. He said, It's in one of your warehouses. You already own it. And, you know, I wonder sometime if that doesn't represent us in the resources that we possess in Jesus Christ, thinking we need something that we already possess that's already ours. We need to take God at face value and believe. that He's given you everything you need. We learned that in Peter. He's given you everything you need for what? For life and godliness. You got it all, you got it all. You know, it kind of reminds me of, this was my dream growing up. I wanted a ball pit in my house, in my bedroom. I just had dreams of diving into a ball pit and like never finding my way out. There's something about ball pits, and that's before they started finding out that feces and vomit, meningitis, and lots of a host of other things were also located in those ball pits. But you know, without that uncleanness, It really, to me, gives me a great picture of the where. Where did God bless you with all spiritual blessings? What did he, what container did he dump you into, so to speak, to guarantee this? And this is where I think Paul started talking and he just couldn't stop. And then, and then, and then I just think it comes out right here because the second and third prepositional phrases we see, he says, who has blessed us in the heavenly places in Christ. And these two phrases describe the where that God has blessed us. You know, and I think the where is the key to the whole section that follows. The where is the key to the whole section that follows as it describes what I would call the behind the scenes mechanism by which God poured out his blessings on each believer. He did it in Christ. That's why those blessings are guaranteed. That's why those blessings are yours. That's why those blessings can never be taken away from you, because he did it in Jesus Christ. You know, I can get you to New York from here. I can get you to New York a lot of different ways. I can buy you a Greyhound bus ticket. You may not arrive in New York, depending on what cities you go through on the Greyhound bus. I could get you there by limousine. I could get you there on an airplane flight and coach. I could get you there in an airplane flight in first class, or I could buy you or rent you a private Gulfstream That's you're the only passenger on there with the complete buffet. I can get you there in style. And, you know, when when God placed you in Jesus Christ, he placed you in the most preeminent position that exists in the history of the universe. That's where you are. That's where you're located. That's where God has poured out these blessings upon you. And it's this location or this vehicle or this person, we'll say, is going to answer all the following questions and more. How could God bless you, bless us in such a way that it is not dependent upon you to keep the blessings? It's because he blessed you in Christ. How could God justify or declare you righteous you filthy, rotten, guilty, caught in the act, red-handed sinner like me? How could he do that? Because he's placed you in Christ. How could a just God allow you into heaven? Well, a just God can allow you into heaven because he took his justice out on his son. and he placed you in Christ. How could God's salvation plan be guaranteed when we keep making mistakes? The harder we try, the more mistakes we make. How can he guarantee your salvation package, which also includes your glorification? It's because he placed you in Christ. How could God fully execute his salvation plan from the penalty of sin, from the power of sin, and from the presence of sin? It's because he identified you and placed you in Jesus Christ. You see, this is so huge for our Christian lives to recognize and to understand. And all of this is only possible because God placed us in Christ. We are in union with him. And you know, God deserves the praise for that. God deserves applause for that. In fact, that's what we're gonna be doing for eternity because I think in eternity, we're gonna finally realize all that he did in the fullest extent and we won't be able to stop for eternity. I mean, that oughta blow our minds with what he's done on our behalf. It's just incredible. And now we move to verse four. How did God do this? How did God accomplish this? Well, verse four tells us, just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love. This Greek word just as is the Greek word kathos, and it's a conjunction. It's a compound word, and it implies manner in the Greek. In other words, it describes a way in which something is done or the way in which something happens. And in this case, this word just as, is describing the manner in which God has blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places. In other words, how did God do this? How did God bless you with every spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ? And what we're going to see is that God accomplished this through a vehicle. through a position or a location in Christ. And like I said earlier, it's not a vehicle per se. It's really a person. But I'm I'm using that as a as a mechanism term as to how he did it. He placed you in Christ. He placed you in a person. And this is how he was able to bless you with all spiritual blessings. That's what the word says. Now, before we we get a little bit further, let's notice a couple excuse me, a couple of things the text does not say. And you help me, look at your own Bible and make sure that I'm telling the truth here. It does not say that God chose us before the foundation of the world. That's not what it says. It says God chose us in him before the foundation of the world. You see that? That's a subtle but yet very important observation. Notice it doesn't say that God chose us out of Adam before the foundation of the world. It says what? God chose us in him, in Christ, before the foundation of the world. And see, I believe when God is talking about this choice, he's talking specifically about the position. He's talking about where he chose to place believers to secure these blessings for them. He chose us in him. The choice itself is the where this is where God would secure and be able to guarantee all the blessings that he desired to bestow on believers. And this is the manner or the means going back to the word just as by which God has blessed us with every spiritual blessing. This is. How he did it. When did he do it? Well, he did it before the foundation of the world. Again, God in his infinite wisdom knew exactly how he wanted to do this, even before the foundation of the world. God knows what he's doing. I mean. He doesn't need a contingency plan. We make plans and we say, man, if it doesn't work out, just, you know, come over here and let's get this in place and let's just make sure we've got this settled. God doesn't have a contingency plan. He just does it because he knows how to do it right. He knows how to do it well. He knows how to do it perfectly. And he did this before the foundation of the world. Why did he do it this way? That we should be holy and without blame before him in love. And this phrase describes the overarching reason why God chose us in Christ. Before him gives us an indication of when this takes place. And this takes place at our glorification, when we appear before him. And you know it was in this position, this position of in Christ that God could solve your sin debt and your righteousness problem. We could literally be holy and blame before him only because he placed us in Christ. Each one of us has these two problems. We've got a sin debt hanging over our head, and that's death. The penalty of sin is death. And we've got a righteousness issue. We're not perfect like God. We don't do things right. We've sinned. And in the gospel, in Christ, God solved both of these problems. Your sin penalty was that you deserve to die. Christ died for you so that you wouldn't have to die. Number one, took care of it. We learned from Second Corinthians 521 that Christ is now our righteousness. And by the way, go with me to Second Corinthians 521, since we're talking about being in Christ. How did you become the righteousness of God? How did you get a righteousness credited to your account that's equal to God's righteousness? Check it out. Second Corinthians 521. For he made him who knew no sin to be sin for us that we might become the righteousness of God. Where? in him. You see, God accomplished things by placing you in Jesus Christ that we're going to find out more. The more we study the word of God, we're going to find out more that we have because of him, because of that position that God has placed us in. Verse five, God also predestined or having predestined us to adoption as sons by Jesus Christ to himself, according to the good pleasure of his will. Having predestined. Predestined is a compound word in the Greek pro orizo. It means to determine or to decree beforehand. Okay, to decree or determine beforehand. And so God determined something beforehand for those in Christ. What was it? Well, people, many people are very sloppy with their exegesis here and they'll say he predestined us to be saved. In fact, many people will say, see, the word predestines in the Bible, thus Calvinism is true, and they just shut their book and they say, yeah, proof, Ephesians 1.5. But what does the text say? What does the text say? Well, the text says that he predestined us to adoption as sons by Jesus Christ to himself. And so the question that we should be asking is, what does adoption mean? But when he says adoption, what does he mean? And you know what? How many people handle that is they they try to read what adoption means today, back into what Paul meant when he said adoption. Now, that is a weird way to do interpretation. In fact, if I gave you a letter from the Civil War in the eighteen hundreds and I tried to get you to interpret it from me, and it was a man riding his wife at home and he said, hey, I put some clothes for you, extra clothes for you before I left in the trunk. How many of you would say, oh, I wonder what car he was driving? Right. Would we read our understanding of trunk back into an 1860 letter? Or will we take into consideration context and culture and when it was written and to whom it was written and say, OK, well, they didn't even have cars back then. He probably meant a closed trunk. Right. That's how we would do normally. But somehow we come to the Bible and we don't do that. And I've actually had people challenge me on a word means, and they're challenging me from Webster's Dictionary. Really? I mean, with all the resources we have on the Internet, that you can actually get into Greek lexicons and start to understand. Well, adoption is one of those words we've got. We can't read our meaning. There were actually several types of adoptions in Paul's day. We've got one described in Galatians four, one through seven. which we won't read for time's sake, but the adoption I believe Paul is speaking of here, and this is why I think it's very significant to understand this. In the Roman culture of Paul's day, you adopted your own biological children, not somebody else's biological child. Now, there were adoptions in the day where you adopted somebody else's child into your family. I don't think that's what Paul is talking about here. I think he's got a very unique meaning for his word adoption that was also true in the Roman culture. And let me explain what you did. See, you didn't adopt somebody into your family. You adopted somebody already in your family. And this was significant because adoption was the way that you officially conferred an inheritance upon one of your own children. Now, this was needed in the day and age where men had multiple wives, concubines, children running around from all of these different women, and they had to decide, which one am I leaving my inheritance to? And they would go through an official adoption ceremony. They were his biological kids, but he determined who he would adopt, and it was a big ceremony, and from that point, they would move from what we would call a technon, a Greek word for child, to a hwios, which was a full-fledged son with an inheritance. And I believe this is what Paul is talking about. Now, what's really interesting about the cultural adoption is that it generally happened after a probationary time. which included observation of the child's life and an arbitrary decision by the father. By the way, it was never guaranteed. Never guaranteed. Okay, so put that in perspective. God predestined your adoption. No probation period. He's not waiting to see how you live out your life and then decide, oh, okay, I like this one, I'm gonna give him an inheritance. No, you get it the moment you put your faith in Christ. Why? Because he placed you in Christ. That's where he can secure that blessing for you and you've got this inheritance. This is something that God has predetermined for every believer in Jesus Christ, no redheaded stepchild in God's family, right? No redheaded stepchild. How can he do this? Notice the phrase in verse five. Let's go back to the text. Having predestined us to adoption as sons, how? By Jesus Christ to himself. You know, if he ever had a son that performed, it was Jesus Christ. He performed. And you know what? Because you're in him. you get the benefit of what he did for you. Isn't that great? I mean, isn't that exciting truth to know that you have an adoption? When you look in the mirror at night, when I look in the mirror at night, there are some days all I see is an absolute screw up. And yet, Ephesians 1.5 is still true of me on those days. It's true of me on my best days. It's true of me on my worst days because I've got a savior whom I am placed in and the benefits that I received are based on his merit and not mine. And that is just hallelujah chorus type truth. And so one of the things that's great about Jesus, you know, we don't have to get too far away from our Sunday school lesson. You probably heard this before, but there was a little kid in Sunday school. A teacher asked this question. She said, what's what's brown and furry and runs all around? And the kids are looking at each other. No one's answering. She's like, man, little Jimmy, he usually answers everything. So she says, OK, it's brown. It's furry. It runs around. It jumps up on trees. It collects acorns. Anybody want to take a guess? And they're all looking at each other like, man, what? I don't even know what she's talking about. So she tries again. It's brown. Come on. It's brown. It's furry. It's got a tail. It jumps up trees. It collects acorns. And she's like, Jimmy, come on. You always have the answer. What's the answer, Jimmy? Tell me what that is. And he says, well, I know the answer is Jesus, but it sure sounds like a squirrel to me. And you know, one of the great things about the simplicity of that answer is this. Why do you have the spiritual blessings that you have in Christ? It's because of Jesus. Jesus is always the right answer. He's always the right answer. We've got to remember that. You know, one of the things that Paul says in Galatians 3, 26, to kind of back up this point is we are all sons. We are all we us. We're not just techno. We're full heirs of God through faith in Jesus Christ. Romans 8, 17, Paul says that if we are children, i.e., if we're born into the family, How are you born again? It's when you put your faith in Jesus Christ, who died for you and rose again. When you're born into the family, then you're an heir with a full inheritance. This is what's called a Huyas, a son, an adopted son. And so God predetermined that. And by the way, if he predetermined that you would receive the adoption, this inheritance, what phase of our one salvation is he talking about here? What's predestined? Our justification? or our glorification, he's talking about the third phase of our salvation. And doesn't that make sense? Isn't that what Romans eight teaches? Those who are justified are also glorified. So it's guaranteed. And God set that up that way in Christ. And let's move on to verse six. This is to the praise of the glory of his grace, by which he made us accepted in the blood. And now, why did God do this? Well, verse five tells us it was according to the good pleasure of his will. Good pleasure means a gracious purpose. God's gracious purpose was to take unworthy, undeserving sinners and put them in a spot in Christ where they could experience full salvation and pure unmerited favor and blessing. And if you're like, wow, we didn't deserve it. Amen. That's grace. You don't deserve it. You're right. And you never will. God's favorable disposition is towards you and for you. One of my favorite verses in the Bible, if God be for you, who can be against you? You know what the implication is too? And if someone is against you, who cares? Because God is for you. There's nobody that can rise up against you. By which, in verse six, we see referring to God's grace. God's grace is what caused this next phrase. He made us accepted in the beloved. Literally, the phrase made us accepted means God graced us. By his grace, he graced the daylights out of you. You could maybe say in our modern language, he highly honored and greatly favored us again. How? Well, look back at verse six in the beloved in Christ. You see this position that we're in. I don't think we realize fully what we have in Christ Jesus. In Christ we have redemption, verses seven through eight. In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins according to the riches of his grace, which he made to abound toward us in all wisdom and prudence. Notice it says that we have redemption. It's a present active indicative, meaning this is something that we presently and continually possess. You own this right now if you're a believer in Jesus Christ. You have redemption. It's not something you have to beg for. It's not something you have to ask for every night before you go to bed. You've got it. The moment you put your faith in Christ, and where do you get it? It's in him. Notice that again at the beginning of verse seven. In him, we have redemption. It's because of our position in him. We know the word redemption means to let go free, to be let go free for a ransom. We know that the ransom paid was Jesus Christ's blood. We know that Jesus Christ paid the exact price needed to free us from sin's penalty and thus we were provided the forgiveness of sins. Redemption is the cause, forgiveness is the effect. Again, what was the penalty of sin? Death, what did Jesus do? He died. And how do we know that God accepted his death on your behalf? He raised him from the dead. Acts 17 says he raised him from the dead to persuade you And he's going to judge the world in righteousness by that man. He raised him from the dead to say, if you trust in him, his death can count in your place. God has accepted his his his work on your behalf. He's satisfied. His wrath is satisfied. The question remains for each one of us. Are we satisfied? Will we trust in Jesus Christ and him alone for our salvation? Noticing Christ, that we have the forgiveness of sins. It's not something that we have to continually ask for. It's something that we presently possess. And that blows the mind of many religious people across this country. The fact that asking for forgiveness of sins isn't even found in the Bible. And yet it's one of the most common cliches used by people today that they think they need to be saved by asking for forgiveness. And the problem with that is that most people who think they need to ask for forgiveness of sins believe that if they went out from here tonight, painted one on the town, died in a car accident on the way home, and didn't have a chance to ask for forgiveness of those sins, that they'd go to hell. That's what they believe. That's what they mean by that. Many times it's a confusion because they're not trusting in the finished work of Christ. They're trusting in their ability to continue asking for forgiveness of sins. They're not secure in their salvation. What does verse seven sound like? Does that sound like security or insecurity? No, it's security. In him, you have these things. of God, 1 Corinthians 1 30 says you are in Christ Jesus. God is the one who placed you in Jesus Christ. You are secure and you can't lose it. Again, how could God do this according to the riches of his grace? The depths of God's grace are limitless. And it's this very grace and it's limitless wealth that God made abound toward us in all wisdom and prudence. And when we talk about this word made abound, it's an awesome word. It means there's so much that there's leftovers, you know, and not meatloaf, like good leftovers. No, I just, I actually like meatloaf, but. Good leftovers, so much that there's leftovers. And you know, when God does things, he blows your mind. When you just take into consideration what God accomplishes and how he makes things work, it ought to blow your mind. You ought to be enraptured moment by moment, every day as you sit there and take in to your thinking what Jesus Christ accomplished for you. It's incredible. It ought to just blow us away. And notice how he did it. God did it in all wisdom, meaning he skillfully applied knowledge and in all prudence, meaning he used good judgment as it relates to dealing with his own resources. In other words, God knows what he's doing. God knows how to do it well. He does it right. He does it awesome. And there's no there's no argument to the contrary. Now, verses nine and 10. says a God having made known to us the mystery of his will, according to his good pleasure, where he purposed in himself, which he purposed in himself, that in the dispensation of the fullness of the times he might gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven and which are on earth in him. And he uses this phrase, having made known to us the mystery of his will. And what we see is that God in his wisdom and prudence made known or decreed something to us. He literally brought us into the know on something. What was it? Didn't you? Didn't you? I won't say, hey, that's probably a strong word. Didn't you dislike the kids in school that had a little secret going on and they wouldn't tell you? Like, weren't they? Those were the annoying kids, right? I mean, that's just we're being honest with ourself. You know, God did something and he wants to let you in to the inner circle, so to speak. He wants to let you in on the know, because if you know some of these things, if you can begin to understand what he's communicating here in Ephesians one, it's going to change your life. It's it's going to change your motivation in the Christian life. It's going to change the way that you relate on a daily basis to the Lord. You may there may be some in here today that view God as as this as this God up here is just waiting to zap you when you make a mistake. You may have a faulty view of God, but these verses right here expressing and manifesting the love of God and the concern that he took and the great care that he put in place for your success and enjoyment of this life. You begin to realize that and it begins to motivate you in a different way. And you begin to be filled by the spirit of God and you begin to see other peoples and other people in a different light. This is the design of this section. Sit down, as Watchman Nee said, continue to take it in. continue to study this and understand how valuable a position you are in Jesus Christ. And one of the things that he revealed to us was the mystery of his will. And the word mystery, as used in the New Testament, does not refer to something spooky or scary like Scooby-Doo, but rather, you know, something that has been revealed in the present, which was not revealed in the past. And so we're going to get a lot more of that as we go through the book, because one mystery that he describes is the church and the way that he put the church together. But making known this particular mystery was done according to God's good pleasure, his gracious purpose, which, again, the text tells us he purposed in himself. This word purposed is a compound word in the Greek. excuse me, pro meaning before and tithami meaning to place. And so the idea of the word is it was meant to set before someone, to set forth before the eyes or to design beforehand. And what did God design beforehand? Well, we've kind of been talking about it a lot, but it's good to review. He designed beforehand this great plan of putting believers in Jesus Christ. And he himself executed the plan and then shared it with those who might benefit from it. And so what specifically was God's mystery that he made known? He says it here in the text that in the dispensation of the fullness of the times, he might gather together in one all things in Christ. What does that mean? Well, at just the right time in human history, God sent forth his son to do only what he could do, and that was to solve the sin problem for all of mankind. He sent Jesus at just the right time to take care of this. So the unrevealed truth, this mystery, is simply this. It's the mechanism by which God would affect the salvation of those who would put their faith in God's solution for sin. How would he do that? Well, those who would put their faith in his son, he will place them in union with his son, and that will secure every blessing that God wants to bestow on the believer, and that's how he did that. That was the quote-unquote mechanism. And so as it relates to the execution of this mystery, we know that every saved person in any age of human history has their sin paid for the same exact way. Jesus Christ died for their sins and paid their penalty. And this is why in Romans three, he says that he overlooked the sins of the past. He literally winked at him. Why? Because he knew there was coming a day when his son would pay the penalty for their sins and he could allow them into heaven. And that's what happened when Jesus died and rose again and cleared out the paradise compartment, if you will, of Hades. But when will this dispensation be fully realized? In other words, when will this house rule, which is what a dispensation means, look like gathering together in one all things both in heaven and on earth? Well, I think it's going to be fully realized during the millennial kingdom. beginning at Christ's second coming. And so although God promised the kingdom to the Jews in the Old Testament, that's not a mystery. That was talked about a lot, quite a lot. The mystery, I believe, is the way God would go about executing this and bringing everything together in complete dependence upon the finished work of his son. And by the way, his name is Jesus Christ. And he's the one who died for us and rose again. He's an identifiable man in human history that did validated and verifiable miracles that fulfilled prophecy from the Old Testament so that we can identify him. And God put this all together to execute his overarching plan. for the ages and and it's again, God knows what he's doing. He's got this all figured out. And so verse 11, we learn also that we are God's inheritance. We we we've obtained an inheritance, but we're also his and him. Also, we have obtained an inheritance being predestined according to the purpose of him who works all things according to the counsel of his will. Again, notice the emphasis on this blessing also found in Christ, you're gonna see that a lot in this section. Obtaining an inheritance means to cast lots. And so what it's basically saying is the lot fell to believers and because it's in the passive voice, it indicates that the believers do not earn or merit this, but that God casts a lot for these believers by placing them in Christ. And so believers obtain an inheritance and they are spoken of as God's inheritance at the same exact time. Also notice this, that obtaining the inheritance is spoken of in the past tense. That's unique. That's a unique way that God phrases this. It's something that the believer already possesses. Where? In Christ. Although we are waiting for the actual fulfillment of it during the millennial kingdom. But this is something that we possess, but we'll wait for it until the millennial kingdom. Notice, too, the second use of the word predestined. We saw that back in verse five, but here again, what does it speak of? It speaks of God predestining the inheritance, again, the glorification of the believer, not the justification of the believer, as some will teach. Verse 12, that we who first trusted in Christ should be to the praise of his glory. And Paul uses a compound word here. Some of you that work with Greek, you'll recognize alpizo. It's usually the word that we translate hope. That's typically the word we translate hope. So the word means to hope in advance or to hope in before. And so I think he's specifically speaking of those men and women who believe the gospel before the Ephesian believers. He's gonna get to them in verses 13 and 14. The fact that God predestined this group to obtain an inheritance or to be God's inheritance is the thing that is to the praise of his glory. And again, this praise of his glory reflects just applauding. He's worthy of applause and all that he's done. And then as we close out the section, verses 13 through 14, we see this additional security that he mentions. Because not only did we trust in Christ, but we're going to find out that we were also sealed by his Holy Spirit if that doesn't provide a double measure of security. But he says, in whom you also trusted after you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, in whom also having believed, you were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise, who is the guarantee of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession to the praise of his glory. And notice the order that Paul gives here. It's hearing the gospel, then believing. It's hearing the gospel, then believing. Romans 10, 17, faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of God. And so you see that a message, the gospel message needs to be shared and then people can believe it. Notice two, faith in Christ is the one prerequisite for being sealed by the Holy Spirit, having believed you were sealed. Not you will be sealed someday, you hope to be sealed someday, you were sealed. It's a done deal, it happened the moment you put your faith in Jesus Christ. The word seal means to close up or to make fast. Obviously it was used of seal signets on letters or books in that day so somebody couldn't read it. You could close and have a very private letter delivered to somebody and put a seal on it so that somebody couldn't break the seal. In fact, in Paul's day, sealing of a package secured or validated the contents and identified a package's contents as coming from someone specific. You know, if you got a letter, the seal had been broken and maybe some lines had been crossed out and rewritten, you'd be like, hey, I don't know if I got the original message here, but if it was sealed, And it had lines crossed out and rewritten. You'd probably trust it because the seal was on it. And it provided that that confidence that that package was secure and and done well. So putting a seal on an object indicated ownership of that object as well. And so the spirit seal on the believer indicates a couple of things. God's ownership. Number two, security and permanence. It's a done deal. And number three, God's authority. And because of the context of the passage, the believer, by being baptized into Christ, is safe and secure in Christ, having been sealed in him. And then we move to verse 14. where it tells us that the spirit of God is the guarantee of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession. And this is what's great. The Holy Spirit himself is our seal, and he remains present tense, the guarantee of our inheritance, which is which is our new bodies. He's speaking of our new bodies, I believe here. This word guarantee is an interesting word. Anybody that's ever bought a house will remember maybe this step. The word guarantee means a down payment or earnest money. It stood for the part of the price paid beforehand to confirm that the deal's gonna go through. In fact, what happens in a house sale when you put earnest money down, if you decide to back out of the deal, what happens to your earnest money? You lose it. Yeah. So it's it's designed to give you great security and confidence that the person who's buying your house is not just playing games like they're serious. They're going to close the deal. That's what an earnest payments design. God says the Holy Spirit is that to the believer to guarantee the redemption of the purchase possession, isn't it? I mean, that just provides incredible security. And so this gives great assurance to the believer that if God has given the Holy Spirit as an earnest money deposit, he will never and could never take him away and send an unfaithful believer to hell. And see, I'm out of breath just going through. Paul's run on sentence, but isn't it all isn't just awesome to know what you have in Jesus Christ. I pray you are encouraged tonight. I pray that that you leave the room, you know, a little lighter in your feet, thinking about the wonderful savior that you have, the wonderful God, the wonderful plan that God has put in place for you. And so let's close with a word of prayer. Lord, we do thank you. We're We just marvel at the way that you do things. You do them well, you do them complete, you do them excellent. Lord, we have no complaints in the way that you do things. And as we look at the passage this evening, it's just encouraging, Lord, to see the great care that you took to put us in a position of incredible blessing Blessing that we cannot lose because of the merit and the accomplishment of your son. May he receive all the praise and the glory for everything that you've ever done. And it's in his name that we pray. Amen.