Riches of His Grace, Eph,1:7-8
Ephesians 1:7-8 · Vern Peterman · Feb 8, 2004
Ephesians & Colossians, No. 07
Holly Hills Bible Church
https://www.hollyhillsbiblechurch.org/teaching/messages/482623253472

Transcribed from the recording by SermonAudio, so expect the occasional misheard word.

Good morning. If we look at this passage here this morning, it's a brief one. Oh, how powerful. Lots of depth in this, and so it's a delight to be able to look at God's Word and to examine this passage of Scripture here. One of the things we brought up in the past here, and we want to return to it, is just as we move through this passage, we brought up before that verses 3 through 14 in the Greek are all one sentence. Can you imagine being a translator, trying to figure out where do I stop and start with the sentences in this thing? To try to bring it over to English is a real challenge. But the breakdown is like this.

Verses 3 through 6 talk of the blessings and elections from God the Father. So we've seen that. Now we're moving on into 7 and 8, and this section from 7 through 12 looks at the impact of the sacrifice of God the Son. And then finally, when we get to the last couple of verses, It'll be the work of the Holy Spirit in sealing the believer.

And so those are to be kept in perspective. The sum total message here is that we're looking at seeing how we've been blessed. That's how this passage is laying it out. We've been blessed with every spiritual blessing in the heavenlies in Christ. That's what's being spelled out in this passage as we move through it. We saw previously how we've been chosen before the foundation of the world, predestined to adoption as sons, and graced in the Beloved, and that it was all God's doing.

None of it was spelled out, if you do this, you'll get this. If you do this, you'll get this. None of it was even spelled out as, make sure you do this so that you can get this. It was all blessings, 100%, completely, in the heavenlies, past tense. Done deal. and he goes on and says that this choosing and this predestining, all of what's been spelled out, are in love and in his kind intention.

The Lord didn't just do it because he felt pity on us, certainly that, but beyond that, it is motivated by God's love. It is motivated by God's good and benevolent intent. That's what motivated the Lord to do it. Then as we move into these verses, verses 7 and 8, We're going to see a continuation of this pattern of profuse listings of these blessings. One of the things we see is that these blessings originate in the past. He's made the point that they originate before the foundation of the world. It's also by God's initiative and God's action.

There isn't one case, as we go through this, where future possession of those blessings is conditioned upon our actions. Isn't that good news? There's not one instance as we go through these things where he says, if you do this, then you'll have these blessings.

They are all spelled out as you already have them, past tense, done deal, 100%. You've been blessed with every spiritual blessing, not a percentage, every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places already, completely, entirely, done deal. That's the way they're spelled out.

As we step into this passage here, he starts off again with a pattern that we've seen he's begun and he's going to continue as he goes through the first chapter and on into the next chapters of Ephesians. He starts off with, in him, and actually the Greek text supports the King James Version better here, in whom. It's the translators again, they're trying to struggle with this. Okay, I've got this one long sentence.

But the idea, it is in Jesus Christ. We've been blessed with every spiritual blessing in the heavenlies in Christ. That is where our blessings are. And so he continues on that message here, blessed in Christ in the heavenlies. And so he returns to, in Him, we have the redemption.

Now another point to be made here, in the Greek text here, we have, in Him, we have the redemption through the blood of Him. the forgiveness of the trespasses of us according to the riches of the grace of Him." And those are the definite articles in the Greek text.

What you see is every time a noun comes up here, it's specific. And I think it's important for us to get the sense of what Paul's saying. These are specific things that the Lord has done. These are specific things that have happened. These are specific things that are characteristic of the Lord. And He doesn't want us to lose sight of those facts. And so He puts the emphasis there with the series of definite articles. Not a noun goes by before He puts the definite article in front of it to let us know these are the specific things that He's focusing on. And the whole verse just screams that message.

Now the next thing He brings out, in Him we have It's easy in English to say, okay, we have, good, what's next? But I think we want to pause here a minute. We have is the word echo, okay? It doesn't mean, we have, we have, we have, we have. But instead, echo has this idea of genuine possession. We saw this word repeatedly when we were going through the book of Revelation, and there it often had the idea of something was in hand. This word was used, for example, when Christ says, I have the keys to death and Hades.

It's an in-hand possession. You've got it. You've got it. It's not something theoretical. It's not something farther off, or you might have it, or eventually you're going to have it. It's a genuine possession. You've got it. And he's emphatic about that. He uses a short word, but it's very focused in what it's conveying to us.

This is given in a present active indicative, and it has the idea of, we are having the redemption. How about that? Right now, if you're a believer here this morning, you are having the redemption. You're going to be saved sometime down the road, or you might be saved, or you're partway there. You got it, folks. We're having it right now. We have it. Then, he says, in him we have, and again the Greek says, the redemption, in him we have redemption, and this word here, apollutrosis, it's a compound word and it means to redeem from, to ransom from. This word apollutrosis was used in this context.

If someone was a slave or a captive, like in a military capture situation, this was the act of paying the price to buy that slave or captive back from their position. And the implication was that that captivity was going to result in their death. They're just going to be put to death. And so you're being bought back from the position of death. Think of what this means.

We were at great risk when the Lord redeemed us. And this is the picture, this word here is conveying buying somebody back away from a position where they were at great risk, and that great risk is absolutely, completely, totally condemned. That's what we were bought back from. So this is really, really good news. It's a buying back, and it has the idea of paying ransom money.

This word is used in more Ephesians. We've seen it here for the first time. More in Ephesians than any other book in the New Testament. We're going to see it again before we finish the first chapter, in verse 14, and then again in Ephesians 4.30. So we're going to see it twice more as we go through the book of Ephesians. This is a listing of the different New Testament words for redemption. Each one of these is used in different passages. You see them listed there.

Agorazo is to buy in the slave market. Ex-agorazo is simply kind of an amendment or special case of that, to buy out of the slave market, to take someone off the market by buying them out. The next one is Lutron, and this is a part of the word here, it's a ransom price, that's the act of paying the ransom price. Lutromai is a ransom, to ransom or set free for a price. Lutrosus, the act of buying by paying a ransom price, and this one here built on that, the act of buying back Not just buying, but buying back by paying that ransom price. So that's the word we're looking at here this morning.

Ephesians 1.7 is a key passage in introducing that idea. We have been bought back by the payment of that ransom price here.

Now here's one that's easy to pass on. As a matter of fact, in the Greek it's an even smaller looking word, and so it's easy to pass on, but we don't want to pass on it. It may seem inconsequential, but this little tiny word is huge. It's a huge, huge little word. And here's why. This through is dia, a small word.

It means the redemption that we have, remember, the redemption that we're having, the ransom payment price that we are having, is by means of Christ's blood. Now, as we look at the whole of Scripture, we get these messages. God has provided no other alternative. God didn't come and say, well, look, there's these three or four different ways. He says, this is it. No other alternatives. This is the one. This is the means. It's interesting. Human beings like to cook up various alternatives. God reveals no other alternative. This one only. Salvation doesn't come through any church.

You see, what we're doing here as we gather, this is the gathering of those who have been redeemed. That's the purpose we're gathering here, to build one another up in Christ. But salvation doesn't come through any church. You can't walk into a church building, you can't do it with regularity, you can't take anything that the church offers or give anything into the church offering that's going to carry this out. We're glad that you're here, that God has purpose in us being here, but it's not for this. The redemption is entirely By means of Christ's blood, the Church is not the dispenser of that.

We can tell people about it. We want people to know about it. But we are not the agency, the means by which people are redeemed. That is through Jesus Christ. You want to be redeemed? If you're not here this morning, talk to God about it. We're glad to talk to you about it too. But ultimately, it's between each person and the Lord.

The Church can't get in the way. All we can do is show people the way. Salvation doesn't come through any church. You'll find a number of churches that will try to lay claim to that. Oh, we've got the corner on this. No. The Bible never gives that option. It's through Christ, period.

We can't enhance or improve upon it either. This is the means by which God's provided. We can't add to it. We can't say, oh Lord, but I'll do this, this, and this. We can't say, Lord, but I won't do this, this, and this. There's nothing we can do or not do that's going to enhance or improve upon or complete this. It is a done deal. If you're a believer here this morning, you are having now the redemption 100%. You've been blessed entirely and completely. And there's nothing we can do. We can only believe it's all God's doing.

Through His blood, one of the things that is clear here Christ had to die in order to provide the means of salvation. What is amazing is we think of Christ on the cross, and the shedding of His blood in Hebrews 12 says, for the joy set before Him, He endured the cross. Isn't that amazing?

Painful, awful experience. Crucifixion is a slave's death, as miserable as it comes. Many of the crucifixions were done with... they had no clothing on, little clothing on. The crucifixion was not done in any way that would leave anything but shame and pain upon the person who was going through it. And yet, for the joy set before him, he endured the cross. Why? Because of his love for us.

One of the things that's also made clear in Hebrews 9.22 is that only by the shedding of blood is there remission of sin. But how did God make that effective? God made that effective.

He put it into effect by identifying us with Christ in his death. We were identified with Christ in his crucifixion, in his burial, in his resurrection, ascension, and seeding. All five of those truths are clearly taught in these books that we'll be looking at here, in Ephesians and Colossians. of our having been redeemed by Christ's blood takes place, not just by wishful thinking, but because the Lord identified us with His death. When He was crucified, we were there. When He was crucified, we were there. We were identified with Him.

If you were a believer here today, this morning, you've been identified with Christ, and that was the beginning of the five ways in which we've been identified with Christ, and that is how your redemption is affected. That is how we are having the redemption, because those five means of identification are already a done deal for every believer. Done deal. Completed. 100%.

We have the redemption through His blood, this redemption, and this apolutrosis, this buying back, this paying the ransom, Those are things that are spelled out in the passages of the New Testament. A couple of them that you'll find are Romans 3.24 and 25 and Hebrews 9.14 and 15. Those are other passages that also link up this buying back as a ransom in Christ's blood. It is most explicit teaching of Scripture that it is Christ's blood that paid that ransom, that bought us back from the verge, the very edge of death.

All right. Forgiveness. Oh, this is a great word. Aphasis in the Greek. The idea means to pardon or release from the guilt, and the intent is this. You have been released from the guilt as if the event for which you are guilty never took place. What does this mean?

It means that having been identified with Christ in His death, burial, resurrection, ascension, and seeding, having been Identified with Christ, you have a different history. It is a tendency among human beings to sit there and look back on their past. As a matter of fact, a lot of people who become Christians continue to struggle with things about their past. Some people will say, oh, God can't forgive this. You know, I did a lot of bad things and there's a few things that just, I'm sorry, God can't possibly forgive that. Guess what?

The reason is not because this is bad, or that's worse, or this is really, really bad. It's because you've got a different history. That's why. You no longer have your history. It's been dislocated, disconnected. It's not yours. Sorry. You can't have it anymore. You have a different history. And the history you have is no longer yours, it's Christ's.

That's the effect of this forgiveness. That's the effect of this forgiveness. And you know, a lot of us may have some things that you look at and you say, boy, I sure wish I hadn't have done that. Or, boy, I sure wish I'd have done this. This little short word is potent.

That history isn't ours anymore. We have His history. We have the Lord's history. For all who believe, we have His history. The forgiveness is complete, total, 100%. as if the guilt, the fault, had never been committed. In Matthew 26, and the Lord says to the disciples there, Drink from it, all of you, for this is my blood of the covenant which is poured out for many for, same word, ephesis, forgiveness of sins. Complete dislocation, complete setting aside of that past, as if the past event had never taken place. That's the position we have before the Lord.

Wonderful thing, isn't it? Wonderful thing. Trespasses. This is paraptoma, another compound word. It means an alongside fall. Instead of staying on the path, it fell alongside it. That's the concept there. Falling alongside the path instead of staying on it. It's like I tripped. Instead of walking along the path, all of a sudden I fell and I'm alongside it. I'm off the course.

Now, Paul uses a couple of words for sins in Ephesians, and this is one of them. We see it show up here. We're going to see it show up again. And then in Ephesians 2.1, he pairs up this word paroptima with the other hamartia.

And it's interesting, in both those cases where he pairs them up in Ephesians 2.1, and we'll look at this more closely when we get there, there's a definite article. It's the trespasses, the falling alongside, and the hamartia, the missing the mark. This word here really characterizes a failure, this hamartia, that he pairs it up with.

Paroptima has the idea of a falling, and falling alongside, whereas this other one translated sins, in Ephesians 2.1 is one of failure, missing the mark, falling short. And then this little word pair, according to, that comes from a single Greek word, this is kata, the small Greek word, it carries the idea of consistent with. That's the concept that he's conveying here. According to, consistent with.

And one of the things that it points out here, this redemption, this forgiveness that comes with that redemption that we have in Christ, is entirely by His doing. Why? It isn't just because God just on a whim decided to do it. It is because it is of God's character that these are carried out. So that's why it says, consistent with the riches of His grace which He lavished on us in all wisdom and insight. It's consistent with who God is.

Isn't that a good thing? We sometimes as human beings will use this term free will, but the truth is we do things, we make decisions based upon our nature. And you know, we think of God as being all-powerful and all-knowing and those kinds of things, but the truth is there are things God can't do. How about that?

And the things that he cannot do are the things that are inconsistent with his nature. What he spells out here is these are the things that God has done, and they are entirely consistent with his nature, and with that nature being expressed to us. That nature, who God is, his very character is expressed to us. That's why if we talk about God's characteristics, it's not just something ethereal and theoretical. It is a reflection of God's expression of who he is. who he was, who he is now, and who he always will be into eternity. God can only act consistent with his nature, and he has done so, and that's what's spelled out here.

It's a good thing. Finally, it says, "...the riches of his grace which he lavished on us." What does that convey to you? The riches of his grace which he lavished on us. This is abundance. This is richness. This is great, great grace. This is amazing grace. The riches of His grace.

This word is used throughout the New Testament. And the word to the Greek mind, when they were reading this word, they said, here is somebody who is rich way above the norm of the society. That's the way the Greeks would use it. So imagine they're looking at this passage here, and they're seeing the riches of His grace.

Here is God who is wealthy, way above the norm. And He's rich not in the kind of stuff that human beings count riches in, but He's rich in grace. Way above the norm. He is wealthy in grace. You know somebody who has some higher-up connections? God is THE connection. He is rich in grace.

And what we see as we go through the New Testament That word riches is linked up with God's goodness, forbearance, wisdom, knowledge, grace, and glory. And here we see it in grace and glory, particularly in the first part of Ephesians. God is rich in these things, His character is overflowing with these things, and He, in that overflowing character, expressed them to us accordingly, consistent with that character. Overflowing riches of grace and glory are expressed to us.

God doesn't have riches in material things, as if that matters. As a matter of fact, he can speak those into existence any time he wants. So it's not the material things, but the riches of his character, of who he is. When we walk through heaven's gates, I'm assuming walking is the right description, but when we walk through heaven's gates, we will not be overwhelmed by the gold streets. That's going to seem, OK, that's great, but that's not the point. we will be overwhelmed with the riches of who He is. And He is beginning to introduce His character here, the riches of His grace. Here's grace, and the Greek has this structure here, the grace of Him. It is a quality that God has Himself. It's inherent in who He is.

He graces, not because somebody is twisting His arm, saying, OK, you've got to grace these people. He graces not because we did something. It's not because we twisted His arm or did something and He says, well, they did that, now I've got to do this. It's not that at all. It's the riches of His grace that comes out of His character. It is who He is, not anything we can earn, deserve, or force Him to be. That is also a really good thing, because there's nothing we can do to repay Him. Nothing.

Occasionally you'll find out about people who receive like a tax bill for several billion dollars or a water bill. I saw recently someone got a water bill that was well over the seven figures. Those are snafus. But the situation that we were before we knew the Lord is no snafu.

We have an indebtedness we just can't even hope to pay. It's like you've got this bill only it's no laughing matter. You do owe it. It's hopeless to begin to touch it. And the Lord has overwhelming grace, riches of His grace to address that. He says, oh, you've got an $800 million water bill? No problem. Only it's not a water bill that we're paying here. The riches of His grace. And what did He do? He lavished those upon us. He didn't just say, hey, I know you've got this $800 million water bill, and here's a couple bucks. Instead, He uses this He lavished, he overwhelmingly displayed it towards us.

He didn't even come up with a matching contribution thing. Alright, so you come up with half, I'll come up with half, and we'll be happy. We couldn't even touch that. The King James Version has the idea, he abounded, and that's a good way to put it across. The other point being, it's past tense, folks. We're not waiting for God to abound. We're not waiting for him to express it. He did. He's done. It's a hundred percent. He has already abounded with this lavishing. Here's the way the structure comes across.

In wisdom and insight, and that's the end of the verse there, in wisdom and insight we have the riches of His grace. The Greek preposition there has the idea of ice, is the word, Riches of grace into us. And don't we need grace into us? It doesn't just kind of come around us, or it's not approximately associated with us. But the riches of His grace touch us where we need it. Folks, I don't know about you, but I need it right here, right where I am. Into us. Into us. Touching us right where we are. That's what we need. Let's take a look at this wisdom and insight.

In him that we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the rich of his grace, which he lavished on us, and all wisdom and insight. Here in the New American Standard Version, it puts a period there and then starts it as if it's a new sentence. But in fact, here again is where the translators struggle, because you've got one long sentence in the Greek, how do I break it up? And they've chosen to do it that. However, I think looking at it carefully, it's pointing it to this wisdom and insight having to do with the way he lavished things upon us, the way he expressed the riches of his grace.

The Greek culture, as many of us are aware, put a major influence on Ephesians and Colossians, and they greatly admired philosophical development there, intellectual development. They would put a great focus upon the development of philosophy and intellect. In doing so, they used three words frequently as the people in these cultures that would go about talking about their philosophy and intellectual development. They used the words Sophia, Phronesis, and Synesis. So, what are the things we see here? Paul writes to the churches at Ephesus and Colossae, and they've been substantially influenced by the Greeks in their pursuit of philosophy and intellect. And what did he write about? Sophia.

And here we see it in Ephesians 1, verse 1. We're also going to see it multiple times in Colossians. Phronesis here in 1.8. So here's the second of the three words that the Greeks discussed abundantly. And then finally, sunesis is going to reveal in both Ephesians and Colossians.

So here's the three words. You think, here's the Greeks, they're pursuing these three ideas. Sophia being the idea of wisdom, Pharnacis being more practical sense of what to do and what not to do, and Synasus being the idea of pulling things together, pulling it together. So he brings up all three of these words and says, you are looking for this wisdom, you're looking for this intellectual development.

He says, let me tell you, what you're looking for is found in Him, in Christ, in Christ. is a message he's sending across to them. And these are all spelled out, but with godly expression, not with worldly expression. So he's saying, here in Christ you will find satisfying what you're longing for, and where you're going to find it is in Christ, but it will have an expression that this world does not even begin to know.

Now, if we look at this word Sophia, it shows up 50 plus times in the New Testament, but as I went through the listing, One of the things you'll see is that each case, it falls specifically on one side of the line or the other. There's either a wisdom of God that shows up in one set of passages, and most of the New Testament uses the word Sophia, wisdom, in that way. And then in a minority of cases, interestingly, mostly with the Corinthians, you'll find a worldly wisdom spelled out there. And so he addresses a key subject Center to the mind of those who are of Greek background and what he does is you really want wisdom It's God's wisdom and this here in Ephesians 1 7 and 8 Demonstrates and shows God's wisdom fully This word Sophia here shows the huge divide between godly wisdom and worldly wisdom And you want to take a look at it, kind of an expounding upon that, look at 1 Corinthians chapter 2 and starting into chapter 3.

When God blessed the church, He did it consistent with the riches of His grace which He lavished on us. It was entirely within God's wisdom, within God's insight and understanding. Now, if you were to say, hey, I want to redeem the world, would you have designed things the way God did? You might not have. As a matter of fact, you probably would not have. but God had wisdom.

And notice he says, all wisdom, all wisdom, every bit of wisdom. And then the other word translated insight or prudence in the King James, phronesis. This other word here is a word that is the noun form of the verb we saw repeatedly in the book of Philippians. Remember that? Every single chapter had at least one and typically several occurrences of that word phroneo, which has the idea of mindedness. Here it shows up, and it comes across as a noun. It indicates a complete comprehension and understanding, but it has, in the culture, a practical sense of knowing what to do and what not to do. It's a wisdom that gets applied. So we look at this passage here, and what's it saying? Let's go through the expanded and explained here.

In our position in Christ, We who believe are continuing to have the eternal purchase as a ransom by means of Christ's payment of His blood, which has the consequence of the forgiveness by God as if our past, present, and future trespasses had never taken place. That's right. As if they had never taken place. How about the future ones? Yes, those too. Consistent with the overflowing riches of God's character, of giving without expectation in return, being that grace which he expressed to us lavishly in comprehensive godly wisdom and practical insight." Wow. What he wrote to these people was absolutely stunning, shocking stuff.

Never, ever was there a God who would do this and, matter of fact, have it 100% done deal. You see, the religions that this world comes up with tell you you've got to keep going back and doing something. That blessings, if you're going to get them, are going to be out there based on what you do. He has an entirely different message. He says you've already been blessed 100%, completely, in the heavenlies, untouchable, irreversible, you're there, it's done. And there's no ifs to these blessings, All believers, 100%, completely, eternally, irreversibly blessed. Nothing hanging out there, nothing left for you to do. Sorry.

I think one of the things that's helpful is for us to take a look at what does this mean? Suppose this kind of brown bar, if you will, is to represent our salvation, our redemption, is not at all of our own doing. The idea of this brown color is to say this is the earthly effort. It's not of our own doing. We don't deserve or earn it. So we don't get there, if you will, by our efforts. It is also not some sort of a mixture.

It is not a matter of we do our best and God does the rest. Ever hear that? We do our best and God does the rest? No. It is not a matter of you do your part and God will kind of fill in the gap. Do the rest of it. This goes along with what we teach here at Holly Hills. God is not here to help you in the sense of, you know, do your best and God will kind of fill in what's missing.

This salvation here is entirely through Christ's blood. We've been redeemed entirely through Christ, not of our own doing. God isn't taking us the rest of the way. It's not the other way around. It isn't that Christ died so that we can finish the job. Christ did not redeem us so that He says, okay, now that you've been redeemed, now you can start working for the rest of it.

No, that's not the picture we get here. We've been completely, totally, 100% blessed, totally redeemed, entirely through Christ's blood, done deal. No ifs here, is there? No ifs. Nothing left to fulfill. God didn't come to us and say, I'll make you a deal. Let's go have these on this. We'll split it up here and there's not even any other percentage. It's not God's doing and then we do the rest either.

You ever hear the idea of, you know, it's a balance between the good and the bad? At the college that Nancy and I went to, it was real interesting, one of the people on the journalism And one of the staff for the school paper went around and did a survey and just asked people, are you good enough to go to heaven? As a matter of fact, I think it asked the question, are you above average good so that you'll get to go to heaven? And what was really interesting is something like 80% of the people thought they were above average. Now, figure that one out.

But there's none of that here, is there? You've been blessed with every spiritual blessing in Christ, in the heavenlies, And it has nothing to do with measuring your good or bad. Do you see your good or bad in these verses? No. That's not the point. That's not the picture. There is no scale to see whether you've done more good than bad.

One of the pictures we get from Romans 3, 23 and 24, and that's one of those verses that connects up this apollutrosis and the blood, this redeeming in the blood. For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. How many? All. So what that says, if you're going to put us on the scale, the scale is all the other way. It's all to the bad side. All.

If God is going to measure using this scale, none of us will get there. Here's something else. God does not grade on the curve. God doesn't grade on the curve. He doesn't say, well, compared to the mass of humanity, you come out pretty well. And, as a matter of fact, you did alright here, and so I'll let you in. No, it has nothing to do with that. There is no grading on the curve.

I'm not sure that heaven's computers are programmed for statistics. It says for each one, for each one, do they have Christ's righteousness. Again, for all have sinned and fall short. If God grades on the curve, guess what? We all flunk. That's the way God grades on the curve. We all flunk. We cannot get there. We desperately need Christ's redemption. So finally, our salvation is entirely of God's doing.

It's God giving 100%, but 100% isn't quite the right idea because we've got some other words in there. Remember? Overflowing, abundant, lavish, riches. You see, what do we offer? We got this empty cup. So what's God's answer to that? He doesn't bring out his eyedropper and go, bloop. He doesn't even pull out a little picture and say, there you go, it's full. His response? His response is overflowing. Riches of His grace. Immense over-response.

It's the kind of response that, as a matter of fact, Ephesians 2.7 says, it will take the rest of eternity for him to show how much he has demonstrated his grace. That's what he means by riches of his grace. That's what he means by lavish. We came with our empty cup and he responded with a Niagara Falls of grace. That's the picture we get from this passage.

Isn't that wonderful stuff? That's just great. This is all marvelous good news. It's marvelous good news we don't deserve. It's marvelous good news we can't earn. It's marvelous good news There's nothing left for us to do to earn or deserve any of this, or to work our way back, or to try to beat the curve, or out-balance the good with the bad.

Entirely, God's overwhelming, rich response from His grace that He lavished upon us. Let's pray. Lord, how marvelously You've blessed us. How wonderful, how rich, a store of grace that you have showed to us and bestowed on us, Lord, and we will take eternity to discover the depths of it, the immensity of it. When thousands and thousands of years have gone by, if years are anything to measure by, we will have only begun to see how marvelous and deep and overwhelming and rich is your grace and how much you have lavished upon us these tremendous blessings that we have in you. Thank you for our marvelous position that we have because of who you are and what you have done. In Jesus' name, amen.