Heavenly Father, you are so good. We thank you for this retreat center. We thank you for safe travels for all who are here. Father, we pray that this weekend would be a special time where you speak to us through your word, by your spirit, that we would come to know you and esteem you more fully. Father, may we be humbled and may you be exalted through this teaching and through this whole weekend. Father, give us hearts that we might see your majesty, that we might see our lowliness, and that we might celebrate the great and glorious Gift of salvation that you have brought us through your son father I pray that even now that you would bless this teaching that you would Bless the hearing of this teaching and father we we come asking that your Holy Spirit would transform us From the inside out that we would love you more deeply we ask these things in Jesus name. Amen Okay, well, it's interesting because when Jeff first put out the preaching schedule, and I volunteered for the first one, I forget what the title that Jeff originally had on the title, and he and I spent about 10 minutes kind of thrashing around, because he's got the doctoral degree and I don't, and so we were trying to, specifically, what is it that we're, how are we trying to approach this, what are we trying to get accomplished? And after about 10 minutes of nibbling around the edges, finally Jeff just said, remind us of the gospel. remind us of the gospel. It's the one message that we can never hear too often, right? The gospel of God's grace toward us in Christ Jesus. So that's my hope for our time together tonight. We're gonna be spending time in a very familiar passage, Ephesians 2 verses 1 through 10. And since I'm not jumping into the middle of it, or since I'm not continuing in a sermon series on the book of Ephesians or anything, One of the things that I wanted to tear apart, that I was thoroughly blessed by the preparing of this message, but I wanted to understand more deeply not only why this passage is where it is in the book of Ephesians, but also to understand more deeply what was Paul trying to accomplish, what was God trying to accomplish through the Apostle Paul in the writing of the book of Ephesians. And so I found a faithful theologian who put together some notes. I'm not going to lie to you and tell you that this early material is original, because it's not. Not only is it heavily plagiarized, it's exactly copied. But I figured rather than trying to reinvent the wheel, I would let the guy who went to seminary and teaches at a seminary actually inform our minds and our hearts on this. I think it's very insightful as it pertains to why Paul presents the gospel in that ten verse passage the way he did. So let me read, I'll just kind of read these in bullet form and I think it'll hopefully inform our time together tonight. Paul's frequent references to the church as a mystery or secret, previously unknown but now revealed, identified the Apostle's main purpose in writing as having been the exposition of the mystery of the Church. His emphasis on the Church as Christ's body, in which both Jewish and Gentile believers are one, suggests that Paul wrote to promote unity in the Ephesian Church and in the universal Church. The emphasis on the importance of love is also strong." So that gives us an indication as to the purposes. In addition to the church and love, Ephesians emphasizes God's action in bringing salvation, the importance of the Christian's growth in knowledge, the importance of living out one's faith consistently, and spiritual warfare. Ephesians is one of the most loved of Paul's epistles because it is both very important doctrinally and extremely practical. And I love to break things down into their simplest form, and so I think a good way to think of the book of Ephesians is the first three chapters are primarily doctrinal in nature, and then the last three chapters are really practical in nature from the standpoint of, okay, there are three chapters of doctrine, and then what does that look like on the ground with flesh on. It's very practical in chapters 4-6. So the way this outline shows up is chapters 1-3 really the Christian's calling, the gospel is central to that, again with the Christian church being at the theme of the whole book, and then the Christian's conduct being chapters 4-6. And so, again, we're going to be camping out a little bit in chapter 2, but so you can see where it fits into the nature of the church and why the gospel is presented as central to the church. So, the church is the subject of the book of Ephesians. One of the features of this book that distinguishes it from other Pauline epistles is its universal character. Ephesians deals with matters of perspective that are important to all churches of all periods of church history. The book of Ephesians enables us to view, I love this line, to view God's creation from an alpine altitude. When we study this book, it is as though we have climbed a high mountain peak because the book gives us that kind of perspective on what God has created. So Ephesians is an exposition of one of the most important statements Jesus ever uttered during his earthly ministry. That statement is in Matthew 16 verse 18 which says, I will build my church and the gates of Hades will not overpower it. So as we examine the central teaching in Ephesians, we can see that it falls into two parts. First, there is the revelation concerning the eternal character of the church, and second, there is the teaching about the temporal conduct of the church. So again, character of the church, chapters one through three, the conduct of the church, four through six. So in summary, Ephesians reveals the important place that the church has in God's eternal plan for history. In the past, he conceived of it as part of his eternal plan, In the present he is constructing it with his eternal power, and in the future he will bring it to consummation in fulfillment of his eternal purpose. To summarize, the church must maintain unity as it grows, it must sanctify every relationship as it makes its confession to the world, and it must stand firm against its spiritual enemies as it conflicts with Satan's forces. These points clarify Matthew 16, 18 again, I will build my church and the gates of Hades shall not overpower it. The Church cooperates with God as He builds it in three ways. First, it must remain united itself. Second, it must present a message of purity and holiness to the world by its sanctified relationships. And third, it must fight God's enemies after putting on the whole armor of God. Attempting to summarize the teaching of Ephesians into a short message statement, I would phrase it this way. Ephesians reveals that the church is part of God's eternal plan and it grows as a result of God's power working through believers' lives, overcoming their spiritual enemies. So I hope that provides a little context for the passage that we're going to be reviewing tonight. So again, the theme of the book of Ephesians is the church. We all know from the word that Christ loves his church, and this passage is obviously very central to the life of the church, because this is a book that was written with the church at the center of it, and the gospel is very clearly at the center of the church. So let's read together Ephesians chapter two, verses one through 10. And you were dead in your trespasses and sins in which you formerly walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, of the spirit that is now working in the sons of disobedience. Among them we too all formerly lived in the lusts of our flesh, indulging the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest. But God, being rich in mercy because of his great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our transgressions, made us alive together with Christ. By grace you have been saved. and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus so that in the ages to come he might show the surpassing riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus for by grace you have been saved through faith and that not of yourselves it is the gift of God not as a result of works so that no one may boast for we are his workmanship created in Christ Jesus for good works which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them. So here's the question. We all, we're gospel people, we've been shaped by the gospel, we've been presented by the gospel, but don't we already know the gospel? So why would we bother to review the gospel tonight? And as I was preparing this message, one of the things that became obvious to me, I was thinking about how often times the script God uses through the scriptures reminds us of things that we already know. God tends to be very repetitive, and why is that? Because we tend to forget, we tend to drift, we tend to get distracted, and we are constantly subject to deceit. And one of the themes, really two of the big themes that come out of this passage and other passages throughout the scripture is we're really talking about the depravity of man and the holiness of God and the grace of God that he practices towards sinful man. And I think it's interesting that, again, this letter, keeping in mind that this letter is written as a shaping, formative letter to the church, this is what the church is all about. The gospel is the first 10 verses of chapter 2. So he's writing to Christians, he's reminding the early church of the gospel of his grace towards sinners in Jesus Christ. So I think that this is a message that we can never hear too often. And so he reminds us of this in this passage. So the Ephesian church needed to be reminded of the gospel of God's grace towards sinners. I think I can, by extension, I think we can assume that Christ Fellowship Bible Church needs to be reminded of God's, of the gospel of God's grace towards sinners. And Insert Your Name, Lincoln Vermeer, needs to be reminded of the gospel of God's grace towards sinners. So this great gospel is something that we just cannot hear too often. and because it shapes our lives, not only in this life, but for eternity. So, again, the flow of the book is really that the first three chapters are really kind of foundational, formative, relative to this is the nature, the character of the church, and then the last three chapters are really the implications of the first three chapters. And again, he's reminding us that if we're not constantly reminded afresh of God's great work in Jesus, that we will not rightly be able to live out the implications. We won't be able to live a life pleasing to God if we're not constantly exposing our minds and our hearts to this great gospel of grace. So here's the goal of my sermon tonight. is that for the rest of this night, and as you lay down to go to sleep tonight, probably much later than I will lay down to go to sleep tonight, but that as you do that, I pray that you will be humbled, that you will see yourself rightly in relationship to God, that we'll be humbled by the recognition of not only our sin, but our lowly state in comparison to God, but more importantly, that you'll be reminded of the greatness and the majesty and the holiness of God and the great gift that he has given us in Jesus. So, that is my goal for our time together tonight. So, as we begin our time, I've broken this up into, based on verses 1 through 3, section 1, which I've titled, which is called, You Were Once Dead to God. This is not This is not an up-with-man kind of passage. This is some pretty dark reading. We take it as authoritative and as true because it's God's Word, but there's not a lot of self-esteem in these three verses as it pertains to mankind. So let me read these again real quick, and then we'll dig in and start to tear it apart a little bit. So verses one through three are as follows. And you were dead in your trespasses and sins, in which you formerly walked according to the course of the world, according to the prince of the power of the air, of the spirit that is now working in the sons of disobedience. Among them we too all formerly lived in the lusts of our flesh, indulging the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest." So let's talk a little bit about verses one through three. Look at the phrase beginning verse 2, you were dead. Now the only thing good news about that phrase is were is in the past tense. But death, notice that we weren't spiritually sick, we weren't anemic, we weren't just a little under the weather, we weren't disoriented, spiritually dead. I'd like for those of you, now there may be some in the crowd who were saved at such a young age that they don't remember a time when they were spiritually dead. I was saved at the age of 33. I remember all too well what it was like to be spiritually dead. to have no appetite, no hunger, no thirst for the things of God. And I think it's actually helpful for us to go back and remember what that life was like because it's in remembering how sad and depraved we were apart from Christ that I think only fuels the nature of our celebration of Jesus and what he's done for us. Just by contrast, I remember full well And quite honestly, it's convicting being married to a godly woman. Gwen came to Christ about a year before I met her, and she had this vibrancy in her relationship with Christ. Now again, I thought myself to be saved. But Gwen had this hunger and thirst and vibrancy and joy in her walk with Christ that I just didn't have. And it was only after I got saved that I was able to understand why I was, in a sense, kind of jealous of her, of the excitement that she had for the things of Christ. And so I think it's healthy every now and again to go back and remember just how lost and sad and joyless I was before Christ. So I would encourage each of you to just kind of reflect on that. and also the joy that God has provided on this side of salvation. Let's look at the next phrase. Trespasses and sins. These are not mistakes, they're not shortcomings, nothing like that. These are an offense. These sins are an offense against an almighty God. Again, it's not just mistakes. And it's important to remember that because these are not just mistakes or shortcomings, but that we were in rebellion against an Almighty and Holy God, that we were deservedly under His righteous wrath. So this is not just This is not, this is more than just deserving of a slap on the wrist, or time out, or whatever the case may be. We were actually deserving, because God is holy, He has wrath towards sin. His holiness, His justice demands that He punish sin. Well, guess what? Insert in the blank there, that was you, that was me. We were deserving of that, okay? So it's not like we were good people who needed just a little bit of help. We were actually in rebellion against Almighty God. And because of that, he very deservedly could have punished us in this furious wrath, but he did not. Let's look at the next phrase. Formerly walked. The thought that occurred to me when I was thinking this through is dead men walking. Physically alive, spiritually dead. Because we formerly walked in this way. And I think it's also encouraging to think that for those of us who are on this side of the cross, for those of us who have been born again, it's great to celebrate what Christ has done for us, but it's also, I think, helpful to go back and remember that probably each one of us has friends, neighbors, co-workers, family members who fit this description, who they're outside of Christ and are in need of salvation. So again, that fuels our celebration of what Christ has done for us, but in love we should also pursue those who have not yet been reconciled to God. Next phrase that I want to highlight, the course of this world. The world in this kind of a context is really talking about all that is in opposition to God, in rebellion against him. And the next phrase, the prince of the power of the air. This is pretty clearly Satan, the devil. I think it's interesting that he's referred to as a prince, not the king. We've got one king, his name is Jesus. But God in his sovereignty has allowed Satan to have a tremendous amount of influence here on this earth. And so, he is on a leash, and he's subject to God, but yet, according to this passage, every person who is outside of Christ, in a sense, has Satan as their boss. Okay, so it's not like they're just good people walking around, trying to sort things out. They are, in a sense, subordinate and under the rule in some sense. Again, all under the sovereign umbrella of God in all things. But God has given Satan influence here in the lives of those who are outside of Christ. And I think we have to admit to ourselves, this is a really hard truth. You know, it's so tempting for us. I've been thinking a lot about this lately. It's so tempting for us to to look at people and kind of assign to them a certain level of behavior. To look at somebody that is really moral and just assume that, well, I'm sure that person must be right with God, but God doesn't think in those same categories. It's very possible to be not born again, to be unregenerate, and yet to be a moral person. So we need to set aside, now certainly the transforming power of Christ does transform our behavior, but at the same time it's possible to be both essentially moral and lost to the outside of Christ. I was thinking about this some months ago when I was watching some video clips of the funeral of Stan Musial. For those of you guys, for those who don't know much about Stan Musial, he died a couple of months ago. He was one of the, he was, you know, he was Stan the man. I mean, he was a dearly beloved, and this is a baseball town, and so he was a beloved Cardinal, just an amazing athlete, just had a tremendous run of success with the Cardinals. I actually had the benefit of meeting him once or twice in passing, and in watching the funeral, and it was absolutely true, he was just just an extraordinarily kind and generous man. I saw him giving autographs to young people, and he would sit there as long as there were people there that were wanting autographs. And he was widely recognized, and I can affirm this from having met him, he was extraordinarily gracious, and he was very kind in his disposition, things like that. And yet, in walking and watching the clips from the funeral, what was constantly mentioned about him, and I saw this and it was alluded to this in a number, that he's certainly in heaven because he was such a nice man. that he was constantly affirmed for how generous he was and yet his funeral service was being held in a church that does not affirm the biblical gospel that we would affirm. That we can't earn our way to heaven through God. So there's a disconnect here between Stan's a great guy and certainly he's in heaven because of what a great and moral and generous life he lived. There's not a person that's going to be in heaven because they were a great and generous and moral person. It all has to do in their relationship with Christ. Again, the theme of this weekend is we're either in Christ or we're not in Christ. And so moral and immoral is not the determining factor of whether or not we're going to be in heaven. It's are we in Christ? Have we been redeemed by Him? So we need to learn to think in biblical categories rather than in our more humanistic categories. The next phrase, sons of disobedience. Again, there's some pretty tough language in this passage, but again, we're talking about those who are outside of Christ, walking in disobedience. And I think again about how tempting it is to want to justify ourselves based on our morality, but God just doesn't allow for that. Then we move on to verse three. when he said, among them, we too all, okay, all. So there's no exceptions here. This is very inclusive and all-encompassing. God does not allow for us to justify ourselves or to provide, to offer up any self-righteousness that we might like to think we have in order to make ourselves right with him. There's also some pretty charged language in this same verse where he's talking about lusts of our flesh, indulging the desires of the flesh, and then closing out that verse by describing those who are outside of Christ as children of wrath. Again, very, very heavy language. but again it shows, I mean these are the very words of God, so it shows us that God doesn't take sin lightly, so we can't take sin lightly, we also can't take our depravity lightly, because God is holy and demands a foreign righteousness for us to be made right with Him. So in looking at this phrase, children of wrath, I thought there are really two possible responses to a person being confronted with their condition outside of Christ. Because children of wrath, again, a very loaded phrase, I can think of two possible responses. One is certainly that it could be hyperbole, that doesn't apply to me, or maybe in an extreme example, the one that you hear a lot about is Hitler, so you can see where maybe Hitler's gonna get what he deserves. But not me, I'm a nice person. or the right response would be recognizing it, yes, I have offended a holy God. God's holy, he demands perfection. I was born in sin, my bent was towards sin, and I've been in rebellion against him, and so I rightly deserve to suffer his wrath for all eternity. So there's the right response. So now, section 2, verses 4 through 10, I've titled, We Are Now Alive in God. So, dead towards God, and now He makes us alive towards God. So let me read real quickly again, verses 4 through 10. But God, being rich in mercy because of His great love with which He loved us even when we were dead in our transgressions, made us alive together with Christ. By grace you have been saved, and raised us up with Him and seated us with Him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the ages to come He might show the surpassing riches of His grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. For by grace you have been saved through faith, And that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God, not as a result of works, so that no one may boast. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them." Again, this section I've titled, We Are Now Alive in God. Key word at the beginning of verse four, but. Clearly we're making a change in direction here. And then we look at the next word, but God. So Paul is laying out here who is the agent behind this change in direction. God gets the glory, not us. And it's not a case that we woke up. It's not a case that we just came to our senses, in a sense we did. But it's not like, again, it's not like we were a little sick and needed some medicine. No, we were dead and we needed life. And again, it was God who took action. I think there's a key phrase there, but God, and so what do we know about this God? What does Paul tell us about this God that led him to take this action? Look at that next phrase, being rich in mercy. Mercy being that which is God not giving us, that which we deserve, okay? So again, which is his wrath and judgment. So again, the next phrase, because of His great love with which He loved us. Again, let's look at the contrast here. There was nothing worthy or deserving about us that would cause God to love us. It's simply because He loved us. Again, the idea here is that when we start connecting the dots on these things, It really is very humbling to us, right? I mean, we should be rightly and appropriately humble before an Almighty God. And so as we are humble and God is elevated, all of a sudden we start to see things rightly as God has told us them to be. So then he describes us again later on in that verse. at the beginning of verse five. Dead, again I think he's reaffirming for us that the dead described up in verse two is not a typo, we really were dead. And then the next phrase, made us alive together with Christ. So again, God is the agent behind this transformation. We were dead, now we're alive. God is the agent behind this giving of life that we need. As the word picture that I think of when I think of being made alive together with Christ, back when I was probably in my teens and 20s, there was a, we've all seen these medical shows, but ER was the show that was real popular at that time. And it was regularly that they're ushering someone into the emergency room. and they're flatline, right? So they've got the heart monitor hooked up to this person. It's just a straight line going across. There's no pulse. There's no sign of life. Well, what do they do? They get the paddles out. They squirt the goop on there. They rub it together. They charge up the machine and they put the paddles right in the top of the chest. And you see the thud, and all of a sudden there's an electric shock that they're using to try to start the heart. And what they're hoping for is that you start seeing the machine start to indicate that there's a sign of life again, that there's pulse, right? So I think spiritually you could, there's an analogy here from the standpoint of we were flatline, God comes along with his paddles and gives us the life that we need and gives us a spiritual pulse. So that shows the dramatic nature, I think, of the conversion, the life that God gives us. Again, a little later on in that verse, together with Christ, I think then this is going to be a theme that comes out in the teaching this weekend, is that our spiritual life is just inseparably connected with Christ's life. That Jesus, and only Jesus, is the reason that we can have life. If he had stayed in the grave, there would be no hope. But that because he has been resurrected from the dead, he has ascended, he is interceding, ruling over all creation, and he has promised that he is coming back to gather us and that we have an eternal home with him, that's where our hope is anchored. The next phrase, by grace you have been saved. An obvious summary of all that he stated thus far. The next phrase, raised us up with him. Again, this new life, again he's just affirming things that he's already taught. This new life is directly and eternally connected to the resurrected Christ. This is very good news. It's so very tempting for us Even on this side of the cross, there's this great desire in each of us sometimes to want to justify ourselves before God. And it's so very important that we need to keep going back to God's truth and remembering that the only reason we have life and the only reason we have hope is simply because the God's gospel of grace towards sinners, and that's really all represented in Jesus' work on our behalf. So there is this great temptation. I thought of the parable in Luke, where you've got the Pharisee and the tax collector, and the Pharisee, basically it boils down to, praise God, I'm not like those people. And then there's the tax collector who, in humility, goes off by himself and says, God, be merciful to me, the sinner. And it's that man who went home justified, who knew he had nothing to offer to God. But we need to constantly remind ourselves. And again, I think that's part of the reason why this passage, chapter 2, 1 to 10, As Paul is mapping out this letter to the church about the church, he's reminding us that you need to be reminded of this great gospel of grace for time, for just repeatedly, so that we can continue to orient, reorient our lives according to God's great plan. Next phrase, and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus. I think it's interesting here that seated is in the past tense. So there's a, and then there's a, I think another cross reference for this that I would direct you to would be Philippians chapter three, verse 20, which says that our citizenship is in heaven. And again, these things are all in Christ Jesus. But a helpful analogy I thought of, that I'm sure I plagiarized from somewhere, but heard it at some point, so I'll share it with you, is that 2 Corinthians 5 talks about us as being ambassadors of Jesus, okay? So think about what is an ambassador. An ambassador is one who has his citizenship in one country, country A. He's actually physically located in country B. And so he represents the interests of country A to country B, but his homeland is in country A, and he has a separate king. So our homeland is truly, because of Jesus, our homeland is truly in heaven, our king is Jesus, and so we represent Jesus' interests here on earth, but this is really not our home. And so these are deep and mysterious truths, but God is reminding us through Paul that we need to reorient our thinking along to these truths, to God's truth. So let's look at verse seven. Why does God do all these things? I think there's a powerful premise here, verse seven. So that in the ages to come, He, God, Jesus, might show the surpassing riches of His grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. So the point behind God saving us is not so that we will be made much of, but so that we will make much of God. He tells us that very clearly in this passage. And I think an analogy that I thought of also is that in a sense we can think of ourselves as really trophies of God's grace. So the point of the trophy is to point to the accomplishment. I thought of I don't think it's there anymore, but Ozzie Smith used to have a restaurant that he was affiliated with out by Westport, and you could go in there, and I forget how many there were, but there were seven or eight, nine gold gloves, trophies that were in this trophy case there, and it was actually really cool. I mean, these were pretty amazing trophies to see, but the point is, the trophy is not The trophy is not the thing itself. The trophy really points back to the accomplishments that he made on the baseball field. So similarly, since we are trophies of God's grace, the purpose of our lives is really to point at the accomplishment that Christ accomplished on the cross, in the resurrection, in his ascension, and in his ongoing intervention and rule over all creation. So the reason he saved us is to make a big deal out of him. Very, very freeing, very, very powerful premise. Again, I think it's interesting in the next verse where it talks about the surpassing riches of His grace. God isn't that stingy with His grace, right? God is lavish and surpassing in the richness of His grace. Again, you see the phrase, in Christ Jesus, in Christ Jesus, throughout this passage. And I think it's just a constant, repetitive theme that the only reason that any of these benefits accrue to us, it has nothing to do with anything worthy or deserving in us. It's simply because of Jesus that all these good things come our way. Again, grace, unmerited favor, completely undeserved. And then when we look at verse eight, for by grace you have been saved through faith. I ran into an author that talked a little bit about the nature of this faith, and I wanna read this one paragraph real quick. The basis of our salvation is God's grace, unmerited favor, and divine enablement. The instrument by which we receive salvation is faith, i.e. trust in Christ. Faith is not an act or work that earns merit with God, which He rewards with salvation. Let me read that sentence again. Faith is not an act or work that earns merit with God, which He rewards with salvation. When a person puts out his hand to take a gift that someone else offers, he or she is doing nothing to merit that gift. The giver gets credit for the gift, not the receiver. Likewise, faith is not a meritorious work. So again, a repeated theme through this is, You, God's telling us, you mankind are lowly. This is why I sent my son. But I think he's addressing our constant temptation to want to think that somehow I did something to make myself right with God. And he tells us very clearly in this passage, no you didn't. And so, again, a gift of God, not a result of works, that addresses our native desire for self-glory. I mean, who doesn't know in their heart that they've just got this hunger to be made much of, right? But that's not why we're here. Now, he tells us, not as a result of works, so that no one may boast. We're not supposed to boast on ourselves, but we are supposed to be boastful people. Turn with me, if you would, to Galatians 6, verse 14. Again, I think we've got this inherent desire to boast on something and celebrate. But we are both supposed to be boastful people, it's just that it matters greatly what we boast of. Galatians 6 verse 14 says the following, So boasting, in the right context, is affirmed and encouraged. But again, we're supposed to be boasting in Christ. God will not share His glory with anyone else. He's not going to let us hold up any jewels of behavior or morality or anything to try to impress Him, right? What impresses God is His Son. And how we're gonna get reconciled to God is admit our shortcoming, admit our sin, and embrace His Son, Jesus, as the only path to be reconciled to God. That's what impresses God. Let's look at verse 10 real quick. For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them. Again, his workmanship I think maps out pretty clearly that God is the creator, we are the created. You've got a picture in Romans 9, I believe it is, where it talks about God being the potter and we being the clay. So clearly we are subordinate to him, he owns us, we report to him. created in Christ Jesus. Again, Jesus is the means by which all these great blessings come to us. Our very existence and life is tied to him. Four good works. I think there's a great temptation in looking at this verse that we think, finally, there's something I get to do here. I get to do some good works. I finally get to contribute to my salvation. Not so fast. This is, I think it's interesting how he says, created in Christ Jesus four good works, and we, about the time we might think, good, I can contribute something, he says, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them. God is unwilling to share his glory with anyone. He crushed his son under his wrath so that we might be purchased by him so that we might live to his glory. But what a great treasure it is that He then remakes us so that we can live a life that's pleasing to Him in these works that He prepared beforehand for us. So it's important to remind ourselves that these works do not contribute to salvation, they flow from salvation. So the way, the humbling nature of verses one through three, okay, what did we contribute to our salvation? Well, really nothing more than our sin, right? That's the one thing that we contribute to our salvation. That should be greatly and terribly humbling to us, which is exactly the posture that we should have before a holy and almighty God. But look at the great salvation that He provided in His Son. And so, these good works flow from salvation, they don't contribute to salvation, but they should be a necessary byproduct of the great transformation that God has brought about in each of our lives. So then as we note the contrast between verses 2 and 10, it talks about in verse 2, in which we formerly walked, emphasize the word walked, according to the course of this world. Well, we're still walking in verse 10. prepared, we walk in them, we walk in good works. So we're walking no matter what. So we're walking no matter what. We're either walking according to the course of the world or we're walking in the good works that God prepared in advance for us to do. So, what does this all mean? I think that as I summarize this passage, I'd like for each of us to kind of reflect on this beautiful gospel that God has given us. I mean, think about how I think the beauty of Christ is only highlighted and magnified when we look at the depravity of our own lives. I mean, think about this. It's not like we were neutral toward God, okay? We were depraved before God. We were in open rebellion against him, having offended a holy God, and we stood under his wrath. Turn with me real quick to John chapter three. John chapter 3, the very last verse. Because again, because of our tendency to always think highly of ourselves, when we think highly of ourselves, essentially what we're doing is we're diminishing and we're devaluing God, which is a very dangerous and unhealthy place to be. John chapter 3, verse 36. He who believes in the Son has eternal life, but he who does not obey the Son will not see light, but the wrath of God abides on him." So, I think that as we understand what should be, rightly, the humility of man before a holy God, and we look at God's holiness, His justice, His great love towards us, and the great sacrifice that He made in order to make this all possible, Again, key in on those words as we think about the rest of the teachings this weekend, in Christ Jesus, in Christ Jesus. We've got this native tendency inside each of us that we want to self-justify, we want to proclaim our self-righteousness, we want to We want to elevate ourselves, again, which means that we're pulling God down, we're pulling the majesty of God down, but rightly understood. When we embrace our humility before a holy God, when we embrace our nothingness, and when that inherently elevates God and His majesty, not only is that right and healthy, but it's biblically informed. And so my hope for our time together tonight, if there's nothing else that comes out of this, I hope that we will esteem ourselves more lowly and appropriately. I hope that we will esteem God, Jesus, and the Spirit, that we will esteem them much more highly, and that as a result of that, We will celebrate even more fervently the great salvation that God has provided for us in Jesus Christ, recognizing this, our ongoing temptation to elevate self. We need to constantly provide the corrective of this gospel. And just again, be more thoughtful about it, and this I'm preaching to myself more than anybody right now, is just constantly remind myself of my need for my heart and my mind to constantly be reminded of this great gospel because of my ongoing propensity to elevate self. But really our joy is tied to this gospel. It's my hope that the rest of our time here tonight, and even as you put your head on your pillow tonight, is that the final thought you have tonight is what an amazing God that he would send his very own perfect son to die on a cross, to be raised from the dead, so that when He was on the cross, my sins laid on Him, He crushed His very own Son under His righteous and furious wrath, that His Son suffered in my place, and only because of that, only because He suffered in my place, am I made right with Him. Let's close in prayer. Heavenly Father, we thank you for this great gospel of grace. Father, I pray that your Holy Spirit would inform our minds and our hearts of your great gospel. Father, you know our propensity to drift and stray, and Father, to constantly want to be made much of, to elevate ourselves before others and before you. Father, we thank you for this great corrective that you've provided in this passage. I pray, Father, that you would use these truths to humble us rightly before you. Father, may you be elevated in our minds and in our hearts, May we celebrate Jesus more fully and more passionately as a result of having studied this time, this together tonight. And I pray that you would bless Jeff. and Randy and Jason as they open your word for us later on this day, later on this weekend. Father, we thank you for a church that loves your word and proclaims your word. I pray that you would make us people of the word and that, Father, that you would help us to celebrate the great gospel of your grace towards sinners in Jesus this weekend and forever. We ask these things in Jesus' name, amen.