The Riches of God's Grace in Ephesians

If you notice, I'm not Vern. Even though we're actually about the same height, people have said, well, you guys look about the same height, you know, and this and that. But actually, I think he's a bit taller than I am, just by a smidgen. So, okay. Well, I had the pleasure this morning of kind of continuing on the series in grace. So we kind of talked about it, Mike and Vern and I, when he was going to be gone. Well, what should we cover? And, you know, there's just, there's a myriad of things. And Vern's been, if you think about it, he's been covering grace versus law for over a year now. But I thought about it.

Actually, this is a Sunday school class we're going to do in maybe 30 minutes. Hopefully this won't be overload. So what I've decided here, let's see, hopefully this thing will, there we go. There's a class that we have occasionally. I think Randy's taught it with me and other folks. And I think Mae Courtney has, Who We Are in Christ.

And actually it uses, as a core part of that class, it uses a writing by Dr. Chaffer in one of his books that talk about, he compilated the riches of God's grace. And he counted 33 riches there. And actually I think depending on how you count, you can get a lot more. But I thought, well, it would be good to kind of find a place that maybe when you leave here today, you go away and say, I could find some riches of God's grace in one book. So it turns out that the book of Ephesians is a central repository of some of these wonderful truths. And so I thought I would just briefly go over the riches of God's grace in Ephesians.

So that knocks it down from about 33 or so pounds, you count, to about 25 or so. So we're going to attempt to go through those 25 riches. Randy's laughing back there, I hear. Each one is actually a class. Each one of the 25 could be a class or more. If Courtney's teaching, it could be multiple classes. Which is good, because Courtney does questions.

So we're going to attempt to do that. But I want to kind of lay the foundation. These wonderful truths from God's Word include the things which are done for the believer the instant he believes. What's marvelous is God doesn't say, OK, I'm going to give you the riches of my grace. I'm going to give you a little bit of time. Today, you get one rich. Tomorrow, you get another rich, and so on, day after day. So maybe by the end of your life, you have it all. God gives you them all.

But the problem is we don't realize it. We don't know what we have. So that's the intent of teaching God's word, teaching his wonderful riches. And there's a quote. Chaffer has in one of his writings, it says, the significant phrase, the things that accompany salvation, Hebrews 6, 9, may be interpreted as referring to those mighty positions and possessions which are wrought instantaneously and simultaneously by God at the instant an individual exercises saving faith. So if there's any doubt this is going to happen, boom. This boom, you don't comprehend. At least I certainly didn't. I think most believers I've talked with don't comprehend what they have. They don't know their resume in Christ.

So we're going to attempt to give you a part of that resume. Hopefully you'll walk away with, well hey, the book of Ephesians, I can just open it up to chapter one and I can just start in there and I can just be so encouraged in my faith. So I'd like to kind of These are statements I've drawn heavily upon Dr. Chaffer's work here. So basically, he has six statements here about the essential character of God's divine grace.

The first one, they're not experienced. So don't look for experience here. Don't look for a warm fuzzy. These are wonderful truths. They're in God's word, we're to believe by faith. They're not progressive. Even though you grow in grace and the knowledge of them, they're instantaneous. They're in no way related to human merit. You don't get brownie points if you grew up in a Christian home. That's wonderful. I'm not putting that down. I didn't grow up in a Christian home. So I came to the Lord much later in life. But that's a wonderful thing.

But human merit doesn't count. Your human family doesn't count. They're eternal in character. As God is eternal, these truths are eternal. They are known only through the Word of God. You're not going to find these in your local newspaper. If they're quoting God's Word, you might. but you're not going to find them outside the word of God. And then lastly, they're not produced by man, but by God alone.

So now I'd like to go through these six things and kind of expand on those a little bit. The first one, they're not experienced. The facts of the new created life, they may grow by experience, but they're not based in experience. For example, justification. If you think about justification, it's never experienced. It's an eternal fact. We're declared righteous.

In Romans 5.1 it says, Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. So looking at that verse in the blue part I've highlighted, we have been justified. Another thing that we're going to notice as we go through here, we're going to see this repetitively, we're going to see statements about us that are are stated in the past, have, having been, have been, and that's this tense in the Greek called the Eris tense, a passpoint fact. It's something that's true of us right now. We have been justified by faith. It tells the mechanism of how it happened.

As a result of that, we have peace with God. And notice the very last part. It's through our Lord Jesus Christ. We're going to notice in all these truths, it's going to say through him, in him, by him, It's not going to be us. It's going to be Him. But we're to believe that. We're to trust that. And then there's a verse that I'd like to read, kind of a companion verse that goes along with that.

In 2 Corinthians 5.21, another truth. He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him. we might become, because of what Christ did, we might become the righteousness of God in him. So let's go on. That's number one.

Number two is they're not progressive. This is not a, you know, in business you have this, do we achieve this growth, this much growth? We're not, and like with kids, right? You measure them, they're little guys and they get bigger, they mark on the side of the wall. In the Christian life, in terms of God's truth, we have it all. We need to realize what they are. They do not grow or develop from a small beginning. They are perfect and complete the instant they are possessed.

And it's important to know that. You might think, well, boy, if I just work a little harder here, God's going to think more of me. No, He thinks as much of you now because of the Savior as He ever will think of you. So that's good to have in your head. And if you do, fall into sin, or you walk away from them, you still have those possessions. You haven't lost them, they're still there. You may not be counting upon them or abiding in them. So that's important to know. Some examples, like a son. A son does not grow into fuller sonship. An old man is no more, at the end of his life, he's no more a son than he was at the day of his birth. A verse along that line talks about sonship.

Just a statement that God makes in Galatians. He says in 3.26, for you are all sons through faith in Christ Jesus. Once again, through faith in Christ Jesus. Those words are going to hit us over and over and over again. Number three, they're not related to human merit. God starts out from us being enemies of Him. While we were yet sinners, Christ died for the ungodly.

The riches of God's grace are built solely on the merits of Christ. If they're built on our merits, then we'd have reason to worry, we'd have reason to be concerned. But they're built on His merits. The believer is made to stand on the unchanging person of the Son of God. The Christian is accepted, now and forever, in the Beloved.

And Romans 5.15.7 says, Therefore, except one another, just as Christ also has accepted us to the glory of God the Father.

Another thing we're going to see here are these truths. These truths will be stated, especially when we get to the latter part of Ephesians 3-5 there. We're going to see God will make a statement about us, and He'll say, based upon that, this is how you're to act. That was true in this 517.

Therefore, accept one another. Why? Just as you also are accepted by us, by God. God accepted you, we're to accept our brothers in the Lord. Number four. They're eternal in character. The imparted life of God is eternal, as Christ is eternal. Hence, when the word of God says, I give unto you eternal life, and they shall never perish. It's a gift.

He's not asking us to perform something, do anything. He's asking us to believe it. Sometimes we struggle with that. All I have to do is just believe that. We may struggle with that simple fact. The realization of such a relationship may vary. We may not feel like we're eternally secure. That's not the way in the equation. We're to trust what God's Word says. The facts of the new life are never subject to time or eternity.

And in John 6.40 it says, For this is the will of my Father, that every one who beholds the Son, and believes in him, will have eternal life. And I myself will raise him up on the last day. Once again, we see these verbs have, have been, I have it, it's a possession of mine. We're to trust in what we have in our Savior. And that's our reservoir, that's our resume, that's who we are. All those things, we're to trust on that and that's how we live our life, based upon that.

Number five, they're known only through the Word of God. They defy human imagination and since they cannot be experienced, the reality can be entered into only by believing the Word of God. The eternal riches are for everyone who believes. And this is the verse that was read this morning. Actually, I'm not sure it's the absolutely best verse. So this just talks about the integrity of God's word and it wasn't man's word. For this reason, we constantly thank God that when you receive the word of God, which you heard from us, you accepted it, not as the word of men, but for what it really is, the word of God, which also performs its work in you who believe. So we see that it's God's word, it's not man's word, and we trust him for that. And then sixth, they're not produced by man, but by God alone.

Unbeliever can't add anything to his salvation. He can't take one step. It's not like God looks around and says, boy, some of you are doing real well. You're almost there. I'm going to help you out and pretty soon you're going to get saved. Others of you, you're not doing so well.

We can't add one step. There's nothing we can add. Christ has done it completely all. So man's merit can never be involved. The riches of God's grace are his work alone. Only God can translate a believer from darkness to light. Only God can make him a citizen of heaven. All these we're going to see as we go through Ephesians. God alone is able to provide salvation to all those who put their trust in him. So it's totally his work, his plan.

So now I'd like to look at a position versus condition chart. I've used this. This is a chart from Hal. I think others have used this as well. But I think it pictorial will help out. What we're talking about today is entirely heavenly. It's entirely the top part of this picture.

It's what we call our position or who we are in Christ. This is our spiritual resume. So I show a guy and a gal in Christ seated in the heavenlies. And that's contrasted with our condition, our earthly walk. So what the Lord, our moment by moment, it's changeable, depends on how we feel. What our Lord wants us to do is, he wants us to count upon what we have in heavenly places, in our heavenly position, to conduct our earthly life.

That's the picture. So as I go through these, think of these as being my resume. If somebody, you go for a job, you get your resume out, your spiritual resume is something that's vitally important to you. You're to know it better than your employer. Because that's what you're basing your faith on. And we just learned in James today of how important our heavenly resume is. Because we can get all kinds of, we can get all off the track. And we can be thrown about by every wind of doctrine.

Okay, with that in mind, we're going to start in, I'm first going to go through Ephesians two times. I'm going to go through with Dr. Chafer's titles. and the place where they occur. In the handout you have all the passages we're going to look at. First I'm just going to go through and give Schaeffer's titles through the chapters. Then I'm going to come back and we're going to look at the verses. So kind of a two-pass deal here. Chapter 1, Possessing Every Spiritual Blessing.

That's in Ephesians 1.3. In the Eternal Plan of God, we're chosen.

Ephesians 1.4. Don't forget, we're going to come back and look at these in detail.

Children of God or Sons of God. Just a note here, if you have the King James Bible, it will say children. But actually, it's huios in the Greek. More accurately, it's Sons of God. Both are true of us. We're both children of God and we're sons of God. But in this passage, sons is a better translation, I believe.

We're acceptable to God by Jesus Christ. We've been literally made accepted how important that is. Sometimes we don't feel accepted We feel like we feel strangers or aliens We've been redeemed actually verse 7 has Get two for one here. The second half has forgiven all trespasses Then in the eternal plan of God we've been predestined Ephesians 1 11 and blessed with the earnest or firstfruits of the Spirit, Ephesians 1.14, his inheritance, within the much more care of God, what Schaeffer did, he kind of collected ones under an umbrella title in some cases, so we're going to see within the much more care of God, his power, and we're going to see other occasions where he puts another thing underneath of it. So you could actually, if you expand it out, it would be more than just his 33.

Now we go to chapter 2, within the much more care of God, His love, His great love for us, Ephesians 2.4. Children of God, He's made us alive. Heavenly association, partnership and position, in 2.6. Within the much more care of God again, His grace, 2.7.

Children of God again, a new creation, Ephesians 2.10.

Made near, Ephesians 2.13.

Having access to God, Ephesians 2.18. You see, access kind of occurs multiple times in here.

Of a family and household of God, Ephesians 2.19. Fellow citizens. On the rock, Christ Jesus, 2.20.

And if you're wondering, this compilation actually is on like a one or two page handout. And if you want to ask me after, I can give you Schaefer's 33. I think Courtney had other. We can give you the full listing of that. This is only a partial listing. And if I'd been Vern, I'd say it would be in the handout in the back. But I'm not quite that cool. OK. That's OK. All right. Chapters 3, 4, and 5.

Now what's interesting here is we're going to see, you know, if you're a good student of Paul's epistles, you'll say, well, he's going to tell me in the first couple of chapters, he's going to give me all my who I am in Christ verses. And most of the stuff in the later chapters are going to just be how I'm to live that life. What's cool is we're going to find that there's a few times in here he gives us positional statements about ourselves and then tells us what to do with those positional statements.

So the first one is, of the family and household of God, we're heirs, members, partakers, in 3.6. We're vitally united to the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, 4.6. Sealed with the Holy Spirit, 4.30. Forgiven all trespasses. Just think about this resume. I mean, it's just, each one is just packed full of really wonderful things.

And it's to take the weight off of us and put it on the Lord. We're to be resting and trusting that these wonderful things are true of us, not because we've earned them. We didn't earn any of these things. There's nothing in our life that earned any of these. This is all because of God's gracious character.

Now lastly, light of the Lord. How can we possibly be light of the Lord? You know, people have this idea about having little lamps. They have their little lamp out. Well, this says we have the very light that is in Christ is in us. It's so much more than just a little lamp. It's not it's this is light of the Lord. It's really cool Okay, so now Now we're going to get our binoculars on here our magnifying glasses, and we're going to start looking at the verses So hopefully you're still with me here. You haven't You know haven't dozed off So we're going to we're going to do it two ways now.

I look through here, and I Bonnie's a great help She says Roger you've got to give them too much. You're going to go they're going to I'm going to vary it here. I'm going to give you verses sometimes, and sometimes summaries, because I felt if I do verse after verse after verse, I mean, it's wonderful, but it's just going to be too much. So I'm going to give you a page of verses, a page of bullets. A page of verses, a page of bullets. I'm hoping to make this easier to digest.

Okay, we start off Ephesians chapter 1. We're going to start again, back to verse 3 again. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ Who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the in heavenly places in Christ Jesus You know, I looked at this verse it starts off the beginning feet. It's it's a summary verse. It gives you the big view it says We have every We have everyone this is this is mind-boggling. First of all, he said he blesses God or he eulogizes God's literally for this wonderful statement who has blessed us. Another thing to look at. Go through, you can circle the us's and the we's and the me's and the you's. They're just all through Ephesians. You're in there just every verse almost. So do that too. Circle the we's and the us's and the me's. He's blessed us with every, every is this word in the Greek, pas, it means every, all, None excluded. So don't get too carried away here.

You're not promised a Mercedes or whatever. You're promised of spiritual blessings, which God is the giver of. You have them all. But it's focused on spiritual blessings. Also, there's two qualifiers. It's in heavenly places. See that picture up there? In heavenly places. And it's in Christ. So you have every of all the spiritual blessings there are. You have them all, and they're in heavenly places, in Christ Jesus.

I mean, how much better does it get than that? Now what's going to happen is, we're going to enumerate, this is the top state, we're going to enumerate what some of those are. Okay, number four, verse four. Just as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we would be holy and blameless before him in love. So he tells us right off the bat, you're chosen. You're a chosen person. And right off the bat, you're going to think, well, wait a minute.

But didn't I choose him? Wasn't I involved? I had exercised faith. So we're going to see there are truths about us that are true simultaneously. He says he chose us. That's part of a resume. But we, by faith, believed in him. So both things are true. We're not to get wrapped around the axle on that. So part of our spiritual resume is that we're chosen. Number five, verse five.

He predestined us to the adoption as sons through Jesus Christ to himself according to the kind intention of his will. So here's another word, predestined. It's based on a previously marked out, he marked us out in advance, so don't get wrapped around the axle on that one. You say, well, okay, predestination, that sounds kind of That's part of our resume. We're predestined to the adoption of sons. Adoption of son is kind of this phrase that talks about being placed as an adult son. So that was his plan, that every believer would be placed as an adult son. How did that happen? It tells us in the verse, through Jesus Christ to himself. And why did he do it? According to the kind intention of his will. So our resume is building up here. We've got three points of our resume, right? Number six, verse six.

To the praise of the glory of His grace, which He freely bestowed on us in the Beloved, wherein He has made us acceptable in the Beloved. Okay, I put, it may seem a little confusing, I put both translations. First is the New American Standard, and then in parentheses is the King James. In this case, I think the King James is more accurate, because it basically tells us we've been made accepted. Boy, that's a cool thing.

We've been made accepted. I actually have a verse I want to read talking about that word made accepted. Accepted is caused to find favor. Literally, it's graced. We've been graced. And listen to this. This is something we read at Christmas time. And let me read it here for you.

In Luke chapter 1, verses 26 to 28, it says, Now in the sixth month, the angel Gabriel was sent from God to a city in Galilee called Nazareth to a virgin engaged to a man whose name was Joseph, a descendant of David. And the virgin's name was Mary. And coming in, he, that's Gabriel, said to her, greetings, favored one. The Lord is with you.

So this word has made is favored. We've been graced. We've been favored. Isn't isn't that what we've been God has favored us He's made us except he's favored us. I think that's just really so cool and then Verse 7 we get two for one here We have been redeemed in him notice in him. We have been redeemed through his blood It tells you the whole process in him. We have been redeemed through his blood the forgiveness of our trespasses according to his riches of his grace and So, you know, redeem basically is an idea, there's like a marketplace, a marketplace of sin, and God paid the price with his blood for that. He bought us out.

He paid the required price. And that resulted in the forgiveness of sin, of our trespasses. You know, trespasses and sin are pretty much synonymous, even though trespasses has a little bit different flavor. You know, it's the idea of a false step, a deviation.

So we built up about, there's actually six there in this. Okay, so now, rather than doing another set of verses, I'm going to switch to bullets now, because I felt it was too much. Okay, the rest of chapter one, we're just going to kind of summarize in bullets here. It's in 11, 13, 14, 18, and 19.

First of all, in him we were made an inheritance. Actually, that's the only time, inheritance is mentioned, but this particular word, made an inheritance, is the only case where it's actually delivered that way. We were made, and it's actually something we didn't do. It's in the passive voice. We were made in inheritance. Next, having been predestined according to His purpose. Those are kind of linked together. The predestined and being made in inheritance.

You were sealed in Him with the Holy Spirit of promise. So the Holy Spirit is our seal. Remember the seal was something they put on a document to make sure nobody broke into it. Well, the Holy Spirit is given to validate what God has done in our lives. The Holy Spirit is given as a pledge of our inheritance.

The last two statements here, I'm going to do both of those, are basically, Paul is praying here, if you look at the context of the last part of Ephesians, he's praying here, and he has a prayer about us knowing something. He wants us to know what is the hope of his calling, And you will know what is the surpassing greatness of his power toward us. There are two things you're to know. Okay, so that's chapter one. So now, chapter two. You still with me here? Okay. All right.

But God, being rich in his mercy, because of his great love, which he loved us. So let's just kind of go to five here. So these two are linked, I believe, if you look at the context. This is His great love for us. And what happened as a result of that great love for us?

He made us alive. You know, we were dead in trespasses and sins. He made us alive together with Christ. By grace you have been saved. So we're going to see a lot of these co... You know, with our Savior, we see a lot of these things that happened... what happened to the Lord happened to us. The Lord was made alive in a sense when he rose from the grave, and he was definitely made alive. And we are made alive together with him.

And I wanted to read, and there's a passage, kind of a parallel passage there, in Colossians 2.13. When you were dead in your transgressions and the uncircumcision of your flesh, he made you alive together with him, having forgiven you all of your transgressions. Okay, six. So here we're going to see this co-nature of what God has done for us.

You could read this, and co-raised us up with him and co-seated us with him in heavenly places in Christ Jesus. So we're heavenly citizens. That picture about us in heaven is absolutely true. That's the picture we're to have in our minds, that these truths are about us in heaven in Christ Jesus. Seven. so that in the ages to come he might show the surpassing riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus."

So this is his surpassing, that word surpassing, there's this word in the Greek, it's like the word balo, like rebal, and that surpasses is the idea that this balo, it's an intensifier, huperbalo, Have you ever played baseball and somebody overthrows home plate?

They throw it past the catcher and it goes into the stands? Well, that surpasses that idea. It's surpassed. It's way beyond. The guy missed it. He went way beyond the guy at home plate. He missed the guy entirely. They're surpassing riches of what God has done for us in Christ Jesus. Again, in Christ Jesus, in Christ Jesus. It's just over. And notice us, we.

10. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God has prepared beforehand, so that we would walk in them. If you want to talk about your service to the Lord, go to this verse. It is just so critical. It says, we are his workmanship. Literally, we are his masterpiece. And we're created where? We're created in Christ Jesus for good works. So God desires that we do good works.

But what does the last part say? The last part's key. Did I prepare those works? Did I write down what can I do for the Lord? I wrote down, I can do this, I can do that. It might be a fabulous list. But it says, which God has prepared beforehand so that, with a purpose that, we should walk in them.

So we're not out there trying to discover these good works. We're focused on the Lord, and I believe in time He will show you what those good works are. We're not making up the list. He has the list. He has the good works. We're to look to Him to find out what the good works are. That's just key in service for the Lord. Okay, we're going to switch. Ready? Okay, back to bullets. Okay. And Bonnie's passing out here. I'm losing my voice. Okay. Okay.

All right. In 13, 17 through 20, having been brought near or made near by the blood of Christ. Oh boy, this is a cool one. This is a cool one. Okay. That basically, the part where it says we have been brought near or made near It's the idea... Actually, I'm getting a little bit ahead of myself. No, that's right, that's right. Okay. Okay, that made near or brought near is the idea. It's this word genomai in the Greek.

It's we've come into a new state of being. You know, we were aliens and strangers. We were separated from God, but now we've made near. by the blood of Christ. We've come into a new state of being that we never were before. That's what that Made Near is all about.

For through him we have our access in one spirit to the Father. And this idea of access is kind of cool. A leading or bringing into the presence of. So we've been brought in or led into the presence of through Christ to the Father, and it's by one spirit. So the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are involved in that process. Through Him, we've been brought into the presence of the Father through one spirit.

You are fellow citizens with the saints and are the household of God. And if you think about it, we were strangers and aliens, and it says that in the verses if you read them. We were strangers and aliens, but now we're fellow saints and are the household of God. Quite a contrast there between those two. And lastly, having built upon the foundation of the apostles and the prophets, Jesus Christ, the cornerstone. This is labeled in the other list just being on the rock, Christ Jesus, which is very appropriate. Okay. All right. Ephesians 4 through 6.

The main thing here, it's a mystery. In scripture, a mystery is something that hasn't been revealed. Well, this mystery that hasn't been revealed is that the Gentiles, and that speaks of us as well, are fellow heirs, fellow members of the body, and fellow partakers of the promises in Christ Jesus.

Again, it's in Christ Jesus. So we're united to the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Actually, I'm sorry. I got to help myself there. And that's in this passage. In the Ephesians 4 through 6 passage, chapter 4, 4 through 6, there is one God, one Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all. OK. We're getting close here. OK. The Holy Spirit of God seals you for the day of redemption. God in Christ Jesus has forgiven you. Here's the two verses. The two verses at the end here. The last two points I want to make in the Ephesians chapter 4 and chapter 5 are these two passages. This connects our position with our condition.

So what it says here is, it says, second bullet, God in Christ Jesus has forgiven you. So what are you to do? So you should forgive others. You know, Vern always kind of harps on this point. You know, we've been forgiven so that we can forgive. We don't forgive so that God will forgive us. We've already been forgiven.

That motivates our action. Our position motivates our action. Last point there, you are light in the Lord. So what do we do with that piece of information? We walk as children of light. So there we see the connection between the position and the condition. Okay, to sum it up.

The work is now fully accomplished in and for those who have believed on the Lord Jesus Christ. It is all superhuman, and God alone could do it. Man could never have any part of it. If he could, it would, at that point, be imperfect, ruined forever. The riches of God's grace are the beginning. Thank God, this is the beginning. He gives it to you when you first believe. This is the beginning point. The end point is our final presentation in glory. But the beginning point is the richness of God's grace. So that's why it's critical to understand those.

His grace is the greatest divine undertaking for the one who has lost in sin. Nothing less than this would satisfy the infinite love of God, that he might thus be free to satisfy his boundless love. He met all the issues of sin for the lost, and so perfectly has he completed it, that man needs only to believe and receive the bounty of His grace. So I hope that didn't wipe you out too much.

There's just a lot there. And I commend you to look at the book of Ephesians. Just open it up. Start circling the usses and the wees and the in-hims. It's a treasure house. If you're ever down, go to Ephesians and see who you are. All right. Let's pray.

Dear Father, we thank you so much for this day, Lord. We thank you for the marvelous riches we have, Lord. We thank you that your word declares them precisely and accurately, and it describes them in a way that glorifies you and that we're to get excited about. We thank you for that. In Christ's name, amen.