With love from our Lord Jesus Christ, Eph, 6:21-24

Okay, just to kind of keep ourselves on the right horizon here, we're looking at through the end of next month, through the end of November, finishing the Ephesians and Colossians series and then beginning into Isaiah. So today will be the last of the book of Ephesians and then we'll look at Colossians for a few weeks and then do a wrap-up. All right, the passage we're looking at here that finishes off the end of the book of Ephesians. Paul is writing there and letting them know, he says, I've written you here this six chapter letter, and anything that you need to be filled in beyond that, this fellow Tychicus can help you out. And then he kind of gives final regards to them.

Now, let's look at this fellow Tychicus here. What do we know about this guy? His first mention was in Acts 20, verse 4. It looks like that was on Paul's completing, kind of heading towards Jerusalem, his third missionary journey. So as he's heading back, Tychicus' name comes up. His name shows up here in Ephesians, and also we'll see in Colossians as well.

And the likelihood is he's delivering both letters at once. And we'll see further evidence of that shortly. But Tychicus was picked up in that area from the evidence we have. And he also is named in both. And some of the texts around the two letters is almost identical.

And it would make a whole lot of sense since it would take as much as a few months for him to get the letter delivered. to send them both at once rather than have to make them two trips. So here's Tychicus. It appears that he's one of two candidates that Paul lists to go to take Titus' place in Crete.

2 Timothy 4.12. Here's Paul's last letter, last chapter. It says that Tychicus was sent to Ephesus.

It could be that he was also intended to relieve Timothy there. So here's what we end up with. He put it all together. And this fellow Tychicus was likely a Gentile believer from the area around Ephesus. He went a great many miles in service to Paul, delivering several of Paul's letters. And then Paul also says here that he brought other news about Paul's situation and status. And he appears to have relieved and replaced some apostolic delegates, Timothy and Titus, at least one, possibly even two of them, so that when he arrives, they get relieved of their responsibility. So does that make Tychicus a gospel gopher? All right. Well, you might call it that. We're not quite calling him a gopher. But anyway, what it looks like is this.

He put lots of miles on these Roman roads. It's possible he made some of that by sea. But they put lots of miles on Roman roads. He delivered as many as five letters that we know of, possibly more. When you sum it all up, Tychicus could have spent as much as a year of his life running Paul's letters around the Roman Empire. How about that? With all the back and forth time and everything, that's probably a reasonable estimate. Can you imagine spending that much time running letters around?

And yet, how valuable are these? what tremendous things he brought about from one church to the next and one person to the next. So here's this fellow, Tychicus, and how does Paul describe him? We have this Tychicus, the beloved brother and faithful minister in the Lord. And here's where he brought up the two passages. If you clip out of Ephesians 6, 21 and 22 and Colossians 4, 7 and 8, the similar kind of passage, what we find is except for this one phrase, kaisoundalos in the Greek, the two are identical. It kind of seems to imply to me likely that they were written at the same time and here's Paul writing one letter and then another and then sending them both with Tychicus to drop one first off at Ephesus and then go a few days journey further and then take the other one to Colossae. Now, It has this kind of a structure to it. Here's Tychicus, and he has beloved brother and faithful minister in the Lord. This is called a Granville-Sharp construction. Don't worry about it. You can't get cut on it. The idea is this.

Both beloved brother and faithful minister are pairs of words that describe this one guy. He is a beloved brother and he's a faithful minister. He's both in the Lord. This beloved brother is agapitas, Adelphos. He was the one, because remember he's beloved, he's the one receiving the love, unconditional love, this agape love from the Lord himself and from other believers. He is a brother, because as we saw in the book of Ephesians, chapter 2, verse 19, he was of God's household, made of God's household, even though likely a Gentile. And then the second part, the faithful minister.

He was faithful to the work that the Lord had given him. And faithfulness is, of course, part of the fruit of the Spirit. It is what you would expect of someone who is walking with the Lord, not just walking for the Lord. He did a lot of that, didn't he? but walking with the Lord. And the word there for minister is diakonos. Now, a lot of us might get this idea that it's something like this guy here.

And that's not really what Paul's talking about. He's saying, here's a person who is a spiritual servant. We're along this idea. So here is this fellow who serves faithfully. That's the concept that he's trying to get across here. So if the word minister gets that across to you, then that's fine. But just remember, he's a servant, serving faithfully. It is the manner in which he serves and that he does serve that's Paul's point.

Now, verse 22, he says, I sent him to you for this very purpose that you may know about us and that he may comfort your hearts. He's obviously taking a letter. But he's also intending to have them just minister, not just arrive and say, here, sign here, and walk away. He is indeed expecting Tychicus to also work in ministry with these people, building up the body of Christ there as he brings the letter, as he delivers it. So here is Paul's written letter and Tychicus, who is a living letter. Both of them are intended to benefit the believers there and to build up the body of Christ as the letter arrives and as Tychicus arrives with the letter. All right, I have sent him for this very purpose. So he's really explicit here. No, so it's not a porpoise, it's a purpose, okay? Just so you got that straight. Think about this.

Here is Tychicus, he's starting off in Rome, getting a letter from Paul. Here's Paul, he's chained up to a Praetorian guard 24-7. and somehow gets this letter written. And so here's Tychicus. He's got the one letter to the church at Ephesus, another letter to the church at Colossae, and he's starting to walk. And he may have taken some of the route by ship, or he may have made the whole trip by land and finished it off with a trip by ship. We don't know exactly how he got it there. But nonetheless, he did get it there. But it wasn't just to get the letter there so that you may know about us.

Paul wanted, even though he was stuck in this situation, chained to a Praetorian guard, he wanted them to know, here's how we're doing. Here's what's happening with us personally. As we've gone through this letter, we've actually not heard Paul talk a whole lot about his situation. He said twice he's a prisoner of the Lord or a prisoner of Christ. He said that he is an ambassador in chains, but he's really not talked about it a lot.

He's expecting Tychicus to kind of convey the situation. We have from the last chapter of Acts, the indication that Paul, who actually had the option of being put in the public prison there, instead was allowed to have some rental quarters closer to most likely this Praetorian guard. And we locked up to a Praetorian guard all the time. And so from there, Tychicus then takes the message. And by the way, just so that we have an idea what this is like, in a Roman prison, you know how these days they bring prisoners food. The prisoners may not jump up and down about it, but they get food.

In a Roman prison, that wasn't something you could assume. There was no duty on the part of the prisoner, excuse me, on the part of the prison to provide you with food. And if your clothing got ragged or started to stink, there was no obligation to replace them or to clean them. So in a Roman prison, you had to have friends or relatives or somebody that cared about you that brought food and that brought changes of clothing.

So you can see that they would be quite concerned. The first thing they hear is Paul's in prison and they're thinking, oh no. They need to have it clear in their minds, no, look, there are believers there in Rome and they're helping Paul and helping take care of him. So don't worry about that. And Paul had to deal with the same issue as he's writing with the church in Philippi, remember, as we went through that study a couple of years back. So here's Tychicus. He takes some time, weeks, and could be even a few months to get the letter to where it's going. and that he may comfort your hearts." Now, it's understandable, and I want you to understand what I'm saying here when I say it's understandable. I'm not saying that you can understand a bull, okay? That's not what the point is at all here, okay? And believe me, this bull's not thinking about Arby's either, okay?

But it's understandable that they would be very concerned about Paul, okay? He'd been in prison for two years already. They're hearing stories about shipwreck and all kinds of crazy things, being bitten by a serpent. These incredible things are happening and they're hearing, okay, now Paul's in Rome. They need to get some clarification. What's going on? What's happening? What's the outlook here?

And is he being taken care of? So they would have plenty to be concerned about and so what would Tychicus part B to say the believers in Rome are taking care of him. There's even been some that have traveled with him to make sure that he's taken care of.

Don't worry about it. It's okay. Now, so we look at this passage here. We want to zero in on verses 23 and 24 and We're going to do a little bit of morphing here. Can you handle that? Okay, we're going to morph. What we're going to do is take this and take out the verse numbers and then kind of reformat it a bit so that we can see some things in it.

Peace and grace are the greetings that Paul began with in Ephesians 1-2. Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. So he started off the letter with grace and peace, And now what does he do? He flips the sequence and repeats it the same thing. It's something like we saw in the book of Philippians. There's kind of the bookends principle, where there are subjects and greetings that are brought up at the start that are also brought up again at the end, kind of almost as a reminder.

Now, at this point in here, you may be wondering, why is it that Vern and Nancy are singing cowboy songs in Germany with a man from India? I don't care. Let's stand up and sing. We're going to sing this acapella, alright? He is our peace, who has broken down every wall. He is our peace. He is our peace. He is our peace who has broken down every wall. He is our peace. He is our peace. For we have died to law and we live by grace. He is our peace. He is our peace. For we have died to law, and we live by grace. He is our peace. He is our peace.

Alright? Now, I'm just going to do a short version of this one, okay? And let me warn you in advance, the second verse may be different from what you're used to. Amazing grace, how sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me. I once was lost, but now am found.

Was blind, but now I see The earth shall soon dissolve like snow The sun forgets to shine. With Christ I'm seated, ever Him to know. He'll be forever mine. When we've been there ten thousand years, bright shining as the sun, we've no less days to sing God's praise. than when we'd first begun." Now see, it wasn't so bad. He didn't even have to sing it in German. Have a seat. Okay.

So here he starts off with, notice, he says, Peace be to the brethren, love with faith. It's almost identical when we look at the areas that are Boxed in red there to what he started off with. Peace from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. And then the grace part here. Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Other than one little pronoun there, it is identical.

And look at where the peace comes from. Look at where the peace comes from. Have you noticed? Our culture has people scrambling, desperate for peace, looking everywhere they possibly can. All the wrong places, looking for peace. Paul tells us at the beginning and at the end of this letter where peace comes from. It comes from the Lord. No question about it. He is abundantly clear.

This piece would be the Jewish greeting. And unlike in our own culture, we would say hello, and then if we were saying goodbye to somebody, we wouldn't say hello again. That would be confusing, right? In this culture, you would say shalom either way. You greet them, you're leaving, either way. So it's not just hello, it's good wishes, okay? Either way. And so the Hebrew would be shalom, or in the Greek, eirene, we get our English name, women's name, Irene, from this.

And Paul had been writing about peace all through the book. That's something as we've studied through it, he certainly had the initial greeting, but he continued on about this subject of peace, and peace showed up several times as we studied chapter 2, where there was peace brought between the Jew and the Gentile, who were otherwise divided and constantly arguing because of the law. He goes on in chapter 4, 615 and now verse 23, bring up peace again. Peace is no minor subject in Paul's message to the church at Ephesus. Paul is writing to the believers there and he had emphasized peace with God, peace within each believer's heart, and peace between the believers, especially the Jew and the Gentile.

That had been a repeated message as he talked to them. Now, grace, that's the other word here. Grace, or the Greek word charis, is also the Greek form of good wishes. So what did Paul do? He wanted to make sure he communicated with everybody there at the church, so speak to the Jews and the Greeks with this greeting. Charis, he would write them.

And that also has been a subject that he's brought up repeatedly as he's spoken throughout the book. And one of them that comes to mind particularly to me is the one we spoke of in chapter 2, verse 7. Unfolding ages will pass, and the Lord will continue to show us His grace. We can read about it repeatedly and begin to learn, but the Lord says, man, you have a lot to learn. That's why we talked about we will be with the Lord for a billion years, I don't care what number you throw out, and we'll still be gasping at the things He will reveal. You mean there's more? You mean it's bigger? You mean there's more depth to it?

Amazed at God's grace as the eons roll on. Grace is that unmerited favor that flows richly from God, the riches of His grace. God is infinite and eternal in His grace. He doesn't come and say, look, I've got so much grace, deal with it. Instead, grace that continues to roll on for eternity, grace that flows, riches, wealth of His grace, marvelous grace, as we sing, amazing grace. The kind of grace that no time will exhaust. The kind of grace that continues to amaze us forever. All grace, like the peace, is sourced in Him. Grace is God's character.

As we look at this kind of setup here, this structure that we've got, there are more nuggets here in this passage. Now I want to make clear, not that we're missing a nugget, we're not talking about So, why does Vern keep showing all these weird pictures up here?

Well, I tell you, one reason why we do this is we certainly want you to pay attention to what's going on, but we just don't want anybody falling asleep. Thank you. We will even do strange, odd things that appear random with the sound system, if that's what it takes. Because I know some of you, if I don't do something like this, end up just sleeping like a log here, okay? And we can't have that, right? Alright.

Now, meanwhile, back at our channel. Peace be to the brethren. Why? In order for a person to enjoy God's peace, God who is the source of peace, remember He's made that clear at the start and at the end of this book, peace that comes from God, only comes to those who have a family relationship with Him. Peace be to the brethren. Why?

Because that's the only way that the peace is going to make any sense to you at all. That's the only way that a person can experience to have a family relationship with the Lord. There is peace there. Therefore, we have an eternal family relationship with each other, brethren. We have a relationship with the Lord and therefore a relationship with one another. And that's the basis on which peace can be wished. This isn't just a greeting like a social custom. Shalom. Eirene.

It is instead wishing something that is specifically valid for those who are Brethren in the Lord of God's family because there is a relationship with the Lord the estrangement with the Lord has been resolved entirely and eternally And love with faith hmm now, what's that mean?

In Ephesians 1 15 Paul wrote for this reason I to having heard of the faith in the Lord Jesus which exists among you So he is returning to a theme that he had brought up earlier in the book and your love for all the saints." This is love, however, from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ, but he connects up those two there. He also, in Ephesians 3, 7, wrote about faith and love together, and you've got that as a part of your handout as well. In verse 17, he writes, and this is kind of in the middle of the passage here, so excuse me for jumping in there, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith, and that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ, which surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled up with all the fullness of God." Faith is a necessary aspect for us to know God's love. It doesn't mean that those who don't believe are not loved by God. They are. God so loved the world. But, for us to know that personally, we must have a relationship with Him.

And there is no substitute. There is no substitute. Now, it's from. Real simple, the Greek there is Apo. This peace and love that are from, they have their source in God the Father and Lord Jesus Christ. He makes it clear at the start. He makes it clear here at the finish.

They are from the Lord himself. But we can expect the world to be looking for that everywhere else. The world will search desperately. There are instances of people who have served their life long and been horrifically panicked as their life is coming to its end, realizing that they don't have a relationship with the Lord. It is only from the Lord that the peace and the grace is evident.

It says, Grace be with those who love our Lord Jesus Christ. Now, this is the one place in the whole book that speaks of our love for the Lord. Isn't that interesting? Here he's got six chapters. He's been talking about love all the way through. But this is the one place that talks about our love for the Lord. How come? Why does he wait until this point to bring this up?

If you look at it, he's written about God's unconditional love for us. That's back in Ephesians 2, 4 and other. Christ's love for us several times. The believers' love for one another. He brought that up more than once. We can go beyond that. The believing husband's love for his wife. Several times in chapter 5. About love in general. Several different places. Why is he waiting until this time to bring up the believer's love for Christ? You say, oh heavens, I forgot! Is that what's happening? No, I think there's actually a reason. Let's take a look at it.

In 1 John 4, 19, we have this principle. We love because He first loved us. We love because He first loved us. Our love for one another as believers comes as a result of the Lord's love for us. So what is He doing? He's talked about love in every other respect. Our love in response to the Lord's love for us makes sense here right at the end. Makes perfect sense. We're responding to the love He has shown to us. When we were going through the Ephesians 5 passage, we showed this relationship here.

The husband is loved of the Lord first and then responds to the Lord. The wife also is loved of the Lord first and responds to the Lord. The relationship between the husband and wife, four times the husband is told to love his wife, but not conversely. It is the husband's job to initiate because he is taking the role of Christ in relationship to the church. The husband's love is to initiate, the wife's love is responsive.

Perhaps that's why Paul makes the note of our love for Christ here at the very last. He said, I've been telling you about the love of the Lord. Our love for Him is in response. Now that you know thoroughly about the Lord's love for us, This makes perfect sense here. Look at it also here. Peace be to the brethren and love with faith from, where's the love from? The Lord. Grace be with all those who love our Lord. How do they love? In response to His love first. That's the sequence. It does make sense. It's consistent with the first John 4, 19 passage. So, we've got a question here.

Is Paul saying that grace is conditioned upon our loving Christ with incorruptible love? You get grace if you love Him with incorruptible love. Is that what he's saying? Uh-oh. That's scary. Is he saying that grace is conditional? I thought it wasn't conditional. It's unmerited favor, isn't it? Are we in trouble here? Have we got a problem? Are you concerned? Nobody's getting up. Okay, all right.

God has explained this thoroughly through Paul and has demonstrated his endless love for us. That's clear as we've seen in several passages throughout Ephesians here. Ephesians 1.4, going back to the beginning of the book first, just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we would be holy and blameless before Him in love. And you can compare that phrase with Ephesians 5, 25-27, and the relationship between the husband and the wife. Ephesians 2, 4-7 puts it this way, but God being rich in mercy because of what? Because of His great love with which He loved us.

Was it God's skimpy love? God's barely sufficient? God's just barely enough love. Oh, I kind of love those people. No. His great love with which He loved us. When we were dead in our transgressions, He made us alive together with Christ. Look at verse 7. So that in the ages to come, He might show the surpassing riches of His grace. Here's the love first and the grace following. Endless grace. Now, we've got this in the New American Standard, which is typically what I work from here, incorruptible love or insincerity in the King James.

This word translated incorruptible is aphtharsia. Now, I know what you're thinking probably looking at that. You're thinking aphtharsia is probably really bad. The doc says to you, you've got aphtharsia. Oh no! and we're really concerned about that. But, I need to tell you that's not to be concerned about at all, it's not a problem, because it's a good thing. It means immortality, incorruption, incorruptible, or endless.

It shows up several different passages there, which I'll leave it to you to look up. In context here, it has this idea carried over Paul is ending this letter with a reference to our endless love for Christ in response to His endless and unconditional love for each of us. So this verse would convey, and I've got a little typo there I'd like you to correct, would convey grace be to all who endlessly love our Lord Jesus Christ in response to His initiating an expression of endless love for us. He initiated it, we are responding. In both cases, it's endless love.

If we look at 1 Corinthians 13.8, he says, love never fails. It doesn't fall off. And of course, we have a path with a huge cliff there just to give the indication. Love doesn't fall off. It doesn't truncate in time.

The same word is used metaphorically in Romans 9.6 of the Word of God. The Word of God does not fail. It doesn't come to a certain point and say, oh, that's it. The word of God continues on, uncorruptible, endless. We see a reference there in the Old Testament, Joshua, the same word is used in the Greek Old Testament, of God's word to Israel. It's repeated in the Old Testament as well.

Similarly, Paul's writing here in Ephesians 6.24 of a love that never falls off or fails at some time. It's a love that is responsive to the endless love of Christ. Therefore, it is also endless. We will have an eternal, endless love relationship with the Lord. That's what he's talking about. I'm going to move past the details in this and let you peruse that on your own here.

One of the points I'd make, we have this concept of endless love in our own kind of, and I would say modern romance, but in truth, it's been around for centuries. Romeo and Juliet's a romantic tragedy by William Shakespeare. It's been performed on theaters, it's been done several times over in movies, and there have been different variations on the theme. One of the songs that was done for one of the productions of Romeo and Juliet was Lionel Richie's Endless Love, and it's done as a romantic duet.

It was cut again by others as well. But the truth is, although human beings have this ideal of endless love, it can't happen. It can't happen. Even the story itself has an end in the Shakespeare account. For endless love to be a reality, it takes God's love. That has no end.

It's this kind of love that the Lord is talking about. Endless love. Grace be to all those who love our Lord, those who are responsive to the endless love of the Lord by personal faith in Christ. That's the message. The Lord has it so that there is an eternal romance between Christ and the Church. Those who are married here on earth have the opportunity for a time to live that out. But the reality that marriage is designed to live out, the reality is the relationship between Christ and the Church, which is endless. Endless love.

And the word Amen finishes off the book in the King James and New King James versions. I think the New King James is what's in your pew racks there. And it means that's true or so be it. About the time Nancy and I were married, the thing that you would have said is right on. That would have meant amen. Well, that dates us.

Now, Paul has conveyed truths in us in this book that are just unparalleled. Marvelous, wonderful things. In the sequence, when he first described us as dead and trespasses and sins, he ends that sequence with leaving us seated in the heavenlies. He has begun describing the division between the Jew and the Gentile, and instead he says, you've been unfathomably blessed.

So blessed, Ephesians 1.3, blessed with every spiritual blessing. Any exceptions? every spiritual blessing, where? In the heavenly places, in Christ Jesus.

Marvelous things we've been told here in this book. Amen is a fit ending to it. An account here in which we will know endless love and we don't have to wait for it. It starts now. Let's pray. Lord, thank you for your endless love for us, your inexplicable love Thank you for your marvelous blessings, the unfathomable riches, riches of grace that we have because of your love for us. Thank you for that. Thank you that we have a hope that this world knows nothing of, a peace that this world knows nothing of, and a grace that this world is clueless about. We pray, Lord, in our very own hearts and lives that our As Paul prayed, the eyes of our hearts would be opened, that we would see the marvelous things that are built into your very character, who you are, and that you have directed towards us because you love us. We thank you and we praise you. In Jesus' name, amen.