Unfathomable Riches of Christ - The Church as Blessed and Chosen
Vern Peterman · Nov 18, 2018
Unfathomable Riches of Christ, No. 43
Holly Hills Bible Church
https://www.hollyhillsbiblechurch.org/teaching/messages/49261912563916

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

We have the church as blessed and chosen and that is continuing on with this series that we actually introduced at the end of September and now have kind of subject by subject the church as. And what we're looking at primarily here is we oftentimes talk here at Holly Hills about our position And frequently we think of, and not incorrectly, but we think of our positions as something we individually have, and that is true. However, the Bible does teach, and we've been going through a series of things, In fact, we're not going to continue on with this, but we could. We could go on with more things that are true of us as the church body in general. Us together, corporately.

That's the New Testament teaching. And so this one, the church is blessed and chosen. Let's ask this question. If I see the word blessed or bless in the Old Testament with Israel, what does that mean? It's conditional. Yeah, first of all, it's conditional. It's blessed if. Blessed if what? Blessed if you obey the law, right? So if you obey the law, you're blessed. And if you don't obey, you're cursed. So it's just that simple. If you obey, you're blessed. If you don't obey, you're cursed.

And specifically, there's one more thing, and that is, Deuteronomy is kind of the capital In the Old Testament, the whole chapter has to do with blessings in the first 14 verses, and then from verse 15 on to the end, which is 60 plus, is the verse reference, is about curses. And the blessings and curses have what character? Where are the blessings?

In the land. In the land. In fact, the blessings in the land and the curses in the land twice. In both of those. In the land, in the land, in the land, in the land. So very definitely in the land. So what else does that mean? Where are your blessings besides in the land? How else can you typify that or describe it? Through your actions. Certainly through the actions because it's if. But one of the things you talk about and say it's in the land, is that heavenly? No, it's earthly. So in the land not only is a location that's here on planet earth, but not only do we have in the land, but it's also the blessings are earthly.

If you read Deuteronomy 28, the blessings and the curses are earthly. Your crops will be great if you obey. Your offspring will be great if you obey. Your livestock will be phenomenally prolific and healthy if you obey. So it is conditional. It is in the land. It is earthly. It has to do with things here on planet earth. There is health and productivity promised for those who obey, and curses in those things for those who disobey. Yes? Is the land only Israel? Ah, the land is Israel because, why do we say that? The people of Israel were listening to Moses, right?

Deuteronomy, he was going to give the law, or he did give the law, and then his life was over. And who was going to take him into the promised land? Joshua was the one who was going to take him into the promised land. And so he's giving the law for the last time. Deuteronomy 28 is where he lays down. He does it elsewhere too, here and there.

But that whole chapter is blessings for 14 verses, verse 15 to the end of the chapter, all the curses. Blessings in the land twice, curses in the land twice. Blessings are all conditional. Now, this blessing for us is what? Is it conditional or unconditional? Unconditional. No ifs. So, is that the only difference? Heavenly. Instead of being earthly. It is unconditional as opposed to being conditional.

And if you obey, who gets the credit? But if you disobey, who gets the credit for that? You reap the penalty. Yeah, for the blessings and curses on earth. But for us in the church, is our obedience or disobedience the basis for these blessings that we're talking about?

No. Isn't that amazing? Yet I have heard many places and repeatedly Oh, you're still going through this because you don't have enough faith. You're still going through this because you're still sinning. Ever heard that? Yep. Is that true? Nope. How many Christian church-age believers get punished by God? Zippo. Punishment, zippo, none, nada. Discipline, yes. Hebrews 12, it's capital city for that. Punishment for the Christian, no. There is therefore about 10% of the condemnation. How about a grayscale? Zero, and how many decimal places after that? Infinite. There is no threshold, percentage, even a teensy-weensy. There is therefore now no condemnation for those who impressed Jesus, and no punishment.

Discipline? Yes. Trials? Yes. Punishment? No. Right? Yes. Was Job being disciplined? So let's look at this. First of all, was Job a church-age believer? No. So one of the things we have to be careful of with that, but you ask a very good question. But in our thinking, we need to remember that he was a believer. Are you looking forward to meeting Job? You have a few questions for him? How did you do that?

But he was not a church-age believer. Job was not in Christ. The Bible doesn't teach that. So there are some differences, but he was eternally saved, saved by grace through faith. But what that salvation means is different for him than for us. So, but let's get back to your original question, was Job being disciplined?

I don't believe he was. Yeah, as you read through it, you've got chapters and chapters and chapters and chapters, and there were things going on, and the Lord even had a bunch of questions for him at the end. Remember that? But you don't get the picture, well, you know, you're being disciplined per se, right? I think God was just making an example of him.

There was no discipline. There was no reason for the trial that I could discern. Yeah, so what happened afterwards, after this, what's in the book of Job, right at the end, God just said, You've been a nasty dude. And so I'm just going to make life really painful and tight, and that's just the way it's going to be." Is that what happened? No. He had what? Blessing. So the Lord blessed him through it. If you were to say, does that sound like he's being disciplined?

I don't think so. So very good question. But but we don't particularly get the picture and especially as this thing turns out afterwards. Right. So yes. Joe said the same thing. Look at Joe. He's my righteous. He's a righteous guy. He's done everything according to the law. He's just a very upright guy. There's no reason for a trial.

Kind of like Wayne, huh? Yeah, kind of like Wayne. Okay, let's look in the middle of page 1. Here's Ephesians 1, 3-14. And I bolded the portion of this that is particularly relevant. However, there's actually more relevant to this than I've quoted. But let's get started. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. And by the way, those words show up several times in the New Testament. And blessed be the God shows up even in the Old Testament, even in Genesis.

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ just as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world that we would be holy and blameless before him And we have in quotes there, see also Holy and Blameless in Ephesians 5.27 and Colossians 1.22. In love he predestined us to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ to himself according to the kind intention of his will to the praise of the glory of his grace which he freely bestowed on us and the beloved. Now, so a few things as I'm at this point not even going to continue reading this. I've stopped in verse 14. Why? At the end of verse 14, I've stopped my quote.

So in the Greek, verses 3-14 are one sentence. It's broken up into English so that we don't go a little bit, wow, How do I sort this one out? But in truth, you have difficulties breaking out. We start at the end of verse 4, in love he predestined us. Does that actually in the Greek start the sentence?

No. So actually in the Greek it's a run-on sentence as we would call it in English. And as I've read repeatedly, 3-14 is the longest Greek sentence in all of Greek literature, historically in modern times. Then verse 15 to the end of the chapter is the second longest Greek sentence in all of Greek literature.

This has blessed and chosen all the blessings done when I get to verse 14. No. And so that's one of the things we look at. It makes the general statement, blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ, right there in verse 3. But the description of those blessings, the enumeration, if you will, of those blessings doesn't stop even at verse 14. Let's go on to chapter 2, verse 4. The first three verses describe the condition of us as unbelievers. And then it starts off verse 4, but God. And then it describes what God did, are those blessings.

Yep, further blessings. And, let's ask this question, are those blessings, when He raised us up with Christ and seated us with Him in the heavenly places, that in the ages to come He might show, that is to demonstrate visibly, the riches, plural, of His grace? Are those blessings?

Yep. Do you earn them? Are they gracious? Yep. The blessings in this book don't stop in verse 14 of the first chapter. Yes? I was just thinking, these are probably the ones we could probably understand. All of the other blessings in the heavens, we aren't there yet.

Yeah, so think about it. Can you get to the bottom and the end of the book of Ephesians? Really, no. I mean, you keep looking at it and it's like, wow, I didn't see that before. I see more and more each time I look at it. We're going to spend the rest of our lives catching up to what God's already done and said. Is Scripture, even though it is inspired by an infinite God, is Scripture exhaustive? Oh yes, you may get exhausted, but is Scripture exhaustive about what it reveals. Does it reveal every possible truth to its full depth? No. And so what's going to happen to the rolling ages of eternity? We're going to keep learning about grace.

He is going to show us, to demonstrate it to us, that's what Ephesians 2.7 says, on into the rolling ages to come. People say, or ask the question, well what will I be doing for eternity? That's not the point. It's what God will be doing for eternity, and you're going to be responding and learning from it, for eternity. In the ages to come, He will show us.

We think we're learning things here, and I hope we are, but we're just getting started. As a matter of fact, we can put it this way. We're just barely getting started. Wow! That's pretty astounding. Oh, and by the way, 1 Corinthians chapter 6 says you're going to judge angels. How many of you are ready for that? Pick me! Pick me! Pick me! It's like, ooh, wow! So as we look at this, God the Father is the one who is credited with blessing us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ. So what percentage? 100%. Every physical blessing? spiritual blessing unconditionally.

Because later on in chapter 4, he's going to say, okay, now that we've covered all this great stuff and your unfathomable riches, let's talk about your lying and stealing problem. Oh, and you need to forgive one another. We need to talk about that. But that's after all this great stuff here.

You've been blessed with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ. Oh yeah, we'll get to the other stuff, but that doesn't impact the fact that you're blessed with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ. It says, He chose us in Him. So we said blessed and chosen. So verse 4, He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world. What does that mean? What does it mean that He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world? He gave us salvation for one thing.

Lots more, I'm sure. He has a plan. One is He's got something in mind figured out. He had it figured out before He said, let there be light and all the other things that He brought about in creation. Pre-knowing. God set things in place at the outset.

Now, did He just choose us? Hey, I'll pick these guys. He chose us in Him. In Christ. for the foundation of the world. So this being in Christ is not something that God just kind of came along and a few thousand years of history went by and he said, hey, I've got a great idea. I think I'll identify this group of people in Christ.

And I think that'll be a pretty good thing. And so we'll just kind of surprise them. And just let them know what a great idea we came up with. I don't think so. Yeah. He chose us in Him. This was not an afterthought. Before the foundation of the world. I think we have to get our mind around the new creation rather than wrapped up in the old creation. We're thinking we were chosen in the old creation. No, that's in the new.

So let's talk about in Christ. In what ways are we in Christ? One is our federal head, so that's a parallel truth to being in Christ. So we talk about being identified with Him as death, burial, resurrection, ascension and seeding. Or who is the first of the new creation? Christ is, and we are in Christ. When did this idea of a new creation happen? The idea of a new creation happened before God made the first one.

Discipline. How about that? So you, God already had in mind, before he said let there be light for this one. And what's interesting is in the old creation he started with let there be light. Yeah. And in the new creation he started with man. Fascinating. Yeah. It is a different kind of creation, right? So this is really kind of amazing. So let's also think about something else.

What does it mean to be chosen? Did God sit there and just kind of... He came up with a random number generator and assigned us all numbers and said, you get picked and you're going to hell. And you get picked and I'll pick you and you, but this guy's got to burn. I don't care about that guy.

And so is that the way it works? Yes. Well it seems like it should be connected to what we talked about maybe a month ago and that is that Christ died for everyone on the cross. Yes. So it was up to the people to take that gift of salvation and become a believer. So when you say that he chose us, does that mean that a person has to take this chosen-ness? Or did he specifically pick people out and say, you're saved, but you aren't? Like Judas, all the disciples supposedly were picked and chosen, right? Did Judas really have a chance, or was he destined for his end?

Do you know what I'm saying? Yes, I know what you're saying. Very good question. Any thoughts on that? He chose them, but he knew they were going to do it. So he talked about God's foreknowledge, right? So individually God knows in advance who is going to choose.

Is that the basis on which he chooses? No. And so here's the thing, what people try to do is to say, well, humanly speaking, how does this work? And on the one hand, I'll get people leaning towards Calvinism. And on the other hand, you get people leaning towards Arminianism, where I choose and then God responds to that, right? God, knowing in advance who would decide, chooses. And so that's the Arminian leaning. Does the Bible teach either one of those? No. The Bible does not. And so here's the thing. Both of those are isms.

Calvinism, Arminianism, And we don't need any isms. I don't need Calvinism, Arminianism, Opentheism, or Botulism. Right? Don't need any of those. Right? You get a couple of wrinkles. Yeah. I'll take that. That's okay. But the truth is, when I look at this, I can take what the Bible teaches and just teach it.

And one more thing we see in here and also in Romans chapter 8, that the word for predestination is actually a rare term. And what we find predestined are outcomes. Not every little move you make. Not every choice that you make along the way. God does not predestine everything like a machine. was predestined as outcome. So again, we don't have a mechanical, simplistic, humanly comprehensible, here's how it all works, system.

That's what Calvinism and Arminianism and Open Theism are, all three of them. Those systems, even though they sound like conflict, they all agree. that I as a human being can understand how God does salvation from beginning to end. And can we understand how God does salvation from beginning to end? No. Not happening, right?

So what we do is we take what the Bible says on faith, and we leave the part that doesn't quite square up to our thinking, we leave that up to God. Because His ways, the Bible says, are higher than my ways. And I'm not going to force the way God does things into something I can comprehend, because the minute I do, I'm unbiblical. And so you have these people, I know some of them personally, I've known them for decades, their mind just gets all locked into this Calvinist thinking, because it all seems so logical, and then I know some other people that are Minion in their thinking, because it all seems so logical, Can't think if I know any open theists. No, I don't. Anyway, but, in the end, his ways are higher than my ways. His thoughts are higher than my thoughts. So I take the teaching of scripture, I don't reduce it down to what I can comprehend, or else I've got something that's humanly created and not heavenly generated. Can you quickly identify Calvinism and Arminianism? So let's put it this way. Let me summarize this. Calvinism, Arminianism, and open theism all agree on one thing. I just kind of make people blink. But they all agree on one thing.

I as a human being can comprehend how God does salvation from beginning to end. They all lock on different things once they have that starting assumption. So the Calvinist locks in, I can understand everything that God does from beginning to end, they lock in on God's sovereignty. Oh, God does all the choosing and God does all, you know, people even think that they can believe. And so yeah, everything's all locked in.

So it's not just predestination, although they will weave that into it, but it's just God makes all the decisions. And my apparent decision making is really an outcome from God's having made a decision. We're just pawns. Yeah, God, it's God. calls the shots.

Would that include the so-called age of accountability as far as children are concerned? Yeah, there's all sorts of sub-things, and they'll spend centuries discussing all the little things, you know, what's the age of accountability regarding, you know.

So there's all sorts of little things, and then, you know, the double predestination question, that God choose some to go to heaven and choose some explicitly and deliberately to go to hell. So double predestination. And by the way, who were the double predestination people during Jesus' time? The Essenes, or Essenes as they're sometimes called. They believed in double predestination. God chose us. God chose the Sadducees and the Pharisees to go to hell. That was their thought. And that's why you could hate your enemy. And the enemy was the Sadducees and the Pharisees. And you can hate them. That's just fine. As a matter of fact, you're supposed to. God hates them and you can too. Or you're supposed to.

So there's Calvinism locking in on sovereignty. Arminianism locks in on man's will and God being responsive to that for knowing what people will choose and then choosing those who will choose him. Arminianism typically has associated with it also a loss of salvation need. Calvinism not. However, in Calvinism, it has backdoor loss of salvation. If you behaved in such and such a way, they think, well, if you backslide You really never were a Christian. You really never were saved.

So that's the way of looking at it. In open theism, so here's the third one, the locking in point is God doesn't know the future. Prophecy in open theism is God's best guess. Yes? I read another guy quote just recently. that since God is not willing that any should perish, He thinks that all will be saved, including all those in Sodom and Gomorrah. And ultimately it's... because otherwise it would be against His will that anybody would perish.

Right, and this again is where people will use human logic, right? Let's reduce this down to something I can understand. So that what people will do is they'll take a truth, and then expand that beyond its biblical bounds. They'll expand it beyond its biblical bounds to the point where it's not biblical. And then go and press that. And these are the isms.

Does God's foreknowledge mean that God predestines everything that he foreknows? No. The open theist says, well, if God doesn't predestine everything that he knows, if he doesn't do that, then he must not know much, right? Yes. But it does seem like he predestines certain individuals in Scripture. Like Jeremiah specifically says that He was. If you look at it from birth, let's think of the ones that are said from birth, there's been a specific and personal preset already done. So in the New Testament, who can you think of for that?

Jesus is one and there's another. John the Baptist maybe. John the Baptist and another. Paul. So there are specific ones by name and it's not a universal statement. What's interesting is I don't find explicit statements to that. It may be true, but in terms of explicit statements I can find them for Jesus, for John the Baptist, and for Paul. What about Mary? What's interesting, Mary you don't see that. Not her personally. However, However, what happened in her regarding Christ was something that God had set in place.

Here's Isaiah, a virgin will bear a son. So, very interesting, you'll find specific instances where that's stated as a general statement, predestination of church-age believers is to outcomes, not for mechanistic, you know, this happened and this happened and this happened because God decreed that it would be so.

Right? Okay, so let's take a look here. So just a quick summary, Ephesians 1, verses 3-14 starts off, especially in verses 3 and 4, talking about having been blessed and chosen. Now, I'd like us to do a flip side look. This answers another question. What does chosen mean? Is chosen this sovereign, you know, God picks this one to go to heaven, and especially as a predestination, God chooses that one to go to hell. Is that what is meant by chosen? If we look at the Old Testament, we find, and actually this is only a selection, I could put in more, but I just picked several of them, passages regarding God loving and choosing Israel, which I think is insightful for us to examine here.

Deuteronomy 4, 37-40, because He loved your fathers, therefore He chose their descendants after them. What's the choosing? Based on? Fathers. Yeah, but what's the verb that he uses before choosing? It's because of? Love. Love is the verb before. Love and then chosen. So the choosing is based on love.

Let's look at Deuteronomy seven, six through eight, for you are holy people to the Lord your God. The Lord your God has chosen you, oh that sounds Calvinistic, right? Chosen you for his own possession out of all the peoples who are on the face of the earth. The Lord God did not set his love on you nor choose you because you are more a number than any of the peoples.

Did he set his love on them? Did he choose them? Yes. What it says is negative is not because you're greater in population. But love and choosing are connected, aren't they? Let's look farther down in verse 8. But because the Lord loved you. Deuteronomy 10.15 Yet on your fathers did the Lord set his affection to love them. and he chose their descendants after them. Choosing is not simply something where God says, well I choose you, but you I choose to go to hell.

What does choosing mean? What does choosing mean? Love. Choosing is connected with love. Choosing and love are inextricably connected. So if the Lord chose you in Him before the foundation of the world, what does that mean? That He loves you? Is that great? You see, rather than being something dread, well, God chose me and I have a choice in the matter, He chose me and that's it. Instead, look at the choosing as an expression of love. Yeah. OK. But it does say, he's not talking about individuals here. He's talking about descendants and peoples. Yep. And that's because of forefathers who he said he loved them. But if you read through a lot of the Old Testament scripture, they didn't do a very good job with the love that he gave them. So let's ask this.

Was it because he knew they would always be good people? No. No. What? You mean they messed up and he still loved them? Was Jacob a straight forward, straight arrow, honest as the day is long kind of guy? As good as he saw. Yeah, not so much. Right? Not so much. So what do you see here? What do you see? He loved the fathers of these Israelites that we're talking to here, and it didn't have to do with them being really, really, really good guys. See that?

So he chose us in him because we were so fantastic. Is that right? As a matter of fact, very few As a matter of fact, He chose us in Him. If Christ had not died on the cross, were we even choosable? No. It was because of our unchoosability that Christ died on the cross. Otherwise, there is not even the remotest chance that we were choosable. First you guys have a major fatal blemish I've got to deal with here. And then I'll choose you. And I'm going to deal with it before I make the world.

Yes. So, in my mind, it's like, what criteria that he used to choose. Choosing, I always think, like a playground activity. Pickball or something. I choose you and I don't choose you. Let's ask this question. In a playground, when you pick people, how do you pick them?

Either because of their ability or who you like. Yeah. I like you or And it's typically a conditional thing. I like you because kind of thing. And I pick you because, boy, you really hit the ball, kick the ball really well, whatever the talent happens to be. So I know that song. Of course I'm going to pick you. So it's all if, isn't it? Our playground picking is all about if. Is God's choosing of us all about if?

No. No. It is very different. Yes. It says in Romans, the just man shall live by faith. Yes. So the faith factor is what he's talking about here. Yeah, really big. The just man shall live by his works. Is that the way it works? No. No. He shall live by faith. And so we're the people of faith, as you go through time, we're all just the greatest guys. One's with great faith. Yeah, great faith, but not always the greatest guys. Jesus is descended from what king? David. Was David just a wonderful fellow? Other than some of his problems. Yeah, yeah. He had some issues, right? With all capital letters he had issues.

So here we look at this, and it is by grace that he chose us, he blessed us, but none of the isms are the proper biblical explanation. And He chose us is not some cold, fatalistic thing that God does. As a matter of fact, the Bible doesn't explain how it all works out. That He chose us is connected repeatedly, starting in the Old Testament, with He loved us.

So it's not just a, I choose you, and I choose you, and I choose you, but you, and you, and you, you're just going to burn forever, just because I decide. And it's not that way. It's not what the Bible teaches. But choosing you says that he loved you, and not because you're a good guy and gay. Boom. So let's turn back, given that, and I skipped over the Jeremiah 31 because we're running out of time, but I'll leave that to you.

The bottom of first page, 2 Thessalonians 2, 13-15. But we should always give thanks to God for you, brethren, beloved by the Lord, because God has chosen you yesterday morning at 5 59 a.m. That's when you got the message. Yeah, that's when the text message came through, right? So, He has chosen you from the beginning. For salvation, through sanctification by the Spirit and faith in the truth. It was for this that He called you through our Gospel so that you may gain the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ. One more thing, does Paul ever write to people and say, I thank you? Why not? Is he rude? Is he lacking in courtesy and politeness? Why doesn't he say, thank you?

The Philippians sent a large monetary gift in his support when he was in prison, in a house arrest, in Rome. I'm going to talk about that this morning. And they sent Epaphroditus with this gift and said, Epaphroditus is also a gift. He is your servant, however you would like to use him.

So he sends back this four chapter long thank you letter in which he doesn't say thank you even once. Why not? Why doesn't he say thank you? Is he just thick headed and rude? What's the problem here? Why doesn't he say thank you? Does he have an emotional problem?

What's the deal? What's that? They're living out their blessing. It's expected. Okay. Does he say thanks? Does Paul write thanks? Yes he does. But who does he thank? Repeatedly, you'll find Paul writing, I thank God for you. And the reason for that is that in the culture of the day, including among the pagans especially, if I thank you, then the gods will be angry with the person that I thank instead of them. And so if I were to say thank you to somebody directly, in our culture we don't understand this, but if I were to say in that culture, thank you, that would be inviting the rage of the gods, because they didn't get the credit.

So that's the mentality. And so you'll find Paul repeatedly saying, including right at the beginning of this passage we're quoting. You find Paul saying repeatedly, I thank God for you. Because that was okay. But to thank someone directly was to call a curse of the gods down on them. And they would be furious with you. So you'll find that repeatedly in the New Testament. Very, very rare to thank someone directly. Usually it's Jewish, and it's only a few.

But the great pattern is, I thank God for you. God has chosen you from the beginning. That is entirely consistent with what He wrote to the believers in Ephesus. You've been blessed and you've been chosen. Credit to the Father. And the means and place of blessing, the mechanism of blessing is what? You're made to be in Christ. You're in Christ. That's the mechanism by which you're blessed.

And the blessing and the choosing started way back before God said, let there be light. Because it was his intent that the new creation, in God's plan and mind and intent, started before he made the old creation that we're in now. Wow. And we're plumb out of time. Or prunes or whatever you like. Thank you, Lord, for your word. Thank you for this wonderful, on the one hand, but also inscrutable set of truths.

And we just thank you that we've been blessed with every spiritual blessing unconditionally in the heavenly places in Christ. And our blessings are total, our blessings are unconditional, and they're also personal. They're in Christ and in Christ alone. Thank you for that. Thank you Heavenly Father for all that we can see or to be credited with. We thank you in Jesus' name. Amen.