YouTube video sermon
Ephesians 1:1-2
Well, let me invite you to take your copy of God’s Word and turn with me to Paul’s letter to the Ephesians. We’ve just concluded a 3-month study in the Old Testament book of Proverbs. Then we turned our attention to the events of Holy Week and Easter. Now it’s time for us to change gears again – this time to the New Testament and the book of Ephesians.
In the course of human history, certain writings have emerged out of the countless masses of literature and stood a head or two above the rest. For example, you think about Homer’s epic poems, Iliad and Odyssey, or the great biblical narratives of Israel, or the writings of Dostoevsky, the Confessions of St. Augustine, or Marcus Aurelius, or the poetry of Dante or Milton, and I believe that Paul’s letter to the Ephesians should be in that group. It stands out for a particular brilliance and clarity and beauty.
In fact, the Protestant Reformer, John Calvin, called it “The Queen of the Epistles.” English poet, Samuel Coleridge said that it was “the divinest composition of man.” When John Knox, another great Protestant Reformer and the founder of the Presbyterian Church of Scotland, was on his deathbed, the book that was most often read to him was John Calvin’s Sermons on the Letter to the Ephesians. And another great Scotsman, John Mackay, a former president of Princeton Theological Seminary said, “Here is the distilled essence of Christian faith. It is truth that sings; it is doctrine set to music.”
Now, before I read the first chapter, let me offer three more brief comments. First, yes, I’m going to read the entire first chapter (all 23 verses). One of the things that Christians have historically done within the context of weekly worship is to read and/or have read to them the Scriptures. So just let the Word of God have its way with you. Allow it to bless you, and perhaps make a mental note or two about how it “speaks” to your heart and mind. Second, this is a letter, so let’s read it that way. When you receive a letter today (or better yet, an e-mail), you don’t sit down and immediately begin to dissect it and analyze it – word by word and phrase by phrase. You read it in its fullness, then go back and pick up bits and pieces. Third, and finally, I want to encourage you to read the entire letter several times over the next couple of months. It takes less than 20 minutes to read – and that’s reading it out loud. If you read it like you would anything else, it will likely take less than 10-15 minutes. And with each reading and repetition, to paraphrase the psalmist, you’ll be storing up God’s Word in your heart that you might not sin against Him (Psalm 119:11).
So, with that as our primer and brief introduction, let’s begin by reading Ephesians 1:1-23.
1 Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God,
To the saints who are in Ephesus, and are faithful in Christ Jesus:
2 Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, 4 even as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before Him. In love 5 He predestined us for adoption to Himself as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of His will, 6 to the praise of His glorious grace, with which He has blessed us in the Beloved. 7 In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of His grace, 8 which He lavished upon us, in all wisdom and insight 9 making known to us the mystery of His will, according to His purpose, which He set forth in Christ 10 as a plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in Him, things in heaven and things on earth.
11 In Him we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to the purpose of Him who works all things according to the counsel of His will, 12 so that we who were the first to hope in Christ might be to the praise of His glory. 13 In Him you also, when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and believed in Him, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit, 14 who is the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it, to the praise of His glory.
15 For this reason, because I have heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love toward all the saints, 16 I do not cease to give thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers, 17 that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you the Spirit of wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of Him, 18 having the eyes of your hearts enlightened, that you may know what is the hope to which He has called you, what are the riches of His glorious inheritance in the saints, 19 and what is the immeasurable greatness of His power toward us who believe, according to the working of His great might 20 that He worked in Christ when He raised Him from the dead and seated Him at His right hand in the heavenly places, 21 far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and above every name that is named, not only in this age but also in the one to come. 22 And He put all things under His feet and gave Him as head over all things to the church, 23 which is His body, the fullness of Him who fills all in all.
Father, what we know not, teach us; what we have not, give us; what we are not, make us. For your Son’s sake. Amen.
I want to simply introduce Paul’s letter by making four observations, all related to the wonder of the gospel, which is what we’re introduced to here – what God has done for us in Christ to save us from sin, Satan, and hell.
Gospel Grammar
First of all, understanding what we might refer to as gospel grammar. There’s kind of a grammar to the gospel, if you like. And it’s very important that we’re clear concerning this. And the grammar of the gospel falls out quite wonderfully in Ephesians. It divides very clearly at the end of chapter 3 from Paul’s emphasis on all that God has done for us in Christ (chapters 1-3), then, beginning in chapter 4, all that we now do and become because of what God has done for us in Christ (chapters 4-6). But he takes three chapters to explain the wonder of God’s provision and dealings with his own. And until that’s clear, it’s a real danger to start on all of the “doing” stuff.
You may have been brought up in a church that, every single Sunday when you went away, you were ultimately discouraged. Because somebody had said to you, “This is what you need to do. And you need to do more of this, and this is what you need to stop doing, and this is what you need to start doing.”
And you went out the door and you said, “How in the world am I going to do this? I’ve been trying to do this for all my life, and I can’t do it. What is the divine impetus? What’s the dynamic that makes this action possible?” You were never told. That’s because of a failure in the grammar of the gospel.
What Paul does here in Ephesians is he takes the first three chapters, and the verbs are almost exclusively in the indicative. Do you remember what the indicative mood is (probably not)? It’s a type of grammatical sentence that states facts or asks questions. That’s all that Paul is doing in these first three chapters, with one exception. (For those of you that like a challenge, see if you can find the one exception where Paul isn’t stating a fact.)
The bottom line is this: in the first three chapters, Paul explains exactly what God has done in Christ. For example, just look at verse 3 again: “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places… (v. 4) He chose us in Him before the foundation… (v. 5) He predestined us for adoption…” Do you see that. Paul says, “Look at what the Father has done! See what God has done! See, here, what God has done!” That’s what he’s saying, and we need to understand the grammar of it all. We need to see and understand why he’s putting the letter together in this fashion, before we move to the action parts.
Once he’s done with the indicatives, then he turns to the imperatives. Do you remember what the imperative mood is? It’s a command. It’s the “doing” part. Only after the indicatives does Paul move to the talking about how to be a proper husband, how to be a proper wife, how should children act, how should slaves and masters behave toward one another, and so on. See, it’s very possible for us to go through the Bible in such a way that it simply becomes just an experience of “how to” discoveries: “how to this” and “how to that” and “how not to do” the next thing. Paul makes sure that we don’t fall victim to that.
Gospel Geography
Second is gospel geography. Paul points out to them the geography of the gospel. What do I mean by that? Well, if your Bible is open, you’ll see that the recipients of Ephesians have two homes (v. 1): “To the saints who are in Ephesus, and are [the] faithful in Christ Jesus.” So there are two homes, two realities: number one, they’re in Ephesus, and number two, they’re in Christ Jesus. We can immediately make application and say, by the grace of God, having turned to Him in repentance and in faith, we find ourselves both “in Landrum” and “in Christ Jesus.”
We have folks in our church family that have passports from Russia, South Africa, Hungary, and perhaps other countries around the world besides the United States. But ultimately the believer’s passport is in heaven, because we are now placed “in the heavenly places” in Christ Jesus. And it’s vitally important that we understand this in the overall construction of Paul’s argument. See, in the first three chapters he underscores the wonder of what it means to be “in Christ Jesus,” and then, in the second three chapters he works out what it means to be “in Christ Jesus” while also being “in Ephesus.”
So, when the believers in Ephesus gathered together for their worship times and their study of the Bible, they probably didn’t look like much at all. They were living in a culture that was able to tolerate just about anything other than the claims of Christ. The spiritual forces of darkness were real in Ephesus. The primary worship was directed to Diana of the Ephesians. Her presence dominated the place. The reconstructed temple of Diana was regarded as one of the early Seven Wonders of the World. Occult was rampant in Ephesus. The sense of pushback from the surrounding culture was real. Sounds a little like 2021 America, doesn’t it? It was rather easy, then, for the believers in Ephesus to feel completely overwhelmed.
So, Paul is reminding them, and reminding us through them, that they have been raised from spiritual death and they’ve been “seated with Christ in the heavenly places” (v. 20). That’s a remarkable thought. So, you have this gospel geography, if you will. Tomorrow, we’ll return to the routine of life in Landrum or Greenville or Greer or Travelers Rest. But if we belong to Christ, we’re not only in Greenville, but we’re also in Him. Of course, this doesn’t mean that we’ve been removed from the rigors of the battle. Far from it! In fact, at the end of the letter Paul is going to remind us of the armor for our warfare. We haven’t been removed from the battle, but we are assured that Christ, in His death and in His resurrection, has conquered sin, death, and the grave – our biggest enemies.
Gospel Identity
Third is gospel identity. As I say, when these people gathered, they wouldn’t have looked like very much. Even the brightest and best of them wouldn’t have stood out in this culture. We recognize that.
We’re a diverse group of people. There’re all kinds of folks here – different backgrounds, different colors, different places. It’s quite wonderful. But when you take our little congregation here and compare it to the population of SC, then you realize that we ain’t all that. Even if we were to stand up and announce all of our capacities and accomplishments and so on, we ain’t all that. And so, it’s important that Paul reminds these Ephesians not only of the grammar of the gospel and the geography of the gospel, but also of their gospel identity.
Jerry Bridges was a Christian author and staff member of The Navigators, which is a Christian training organization. One of his last books was called Who Am I? – Identity in Christ. It’s very slim, but it’s very good on the question of our identity in Christ. One of the reasons for Christian ineffectiveness is that we don’t know who we are. Who are these people? Look at what Paul says: he’s writing “to the saints who are in Ephesus.” And don’t be too quick to dismiss that label: saints.
Our Tuesday men’s Bible study just began studying Paul’s letter to the Colossians, which begins almost identically to Ephesians, and we spent about 15 minutes discussing the various nuances of the word “saint.” Some of you grew up in a church tradition (be it Catholic, Anglican, Eastern Orthodox or Lutheran) where the broader community of believers recognized certain followers as having a greater degree of holiness or righteousness, and thus the church hierarchy, the church structure had a process by which to express this. In the Catholic Church it’s called canonization, and in the Eastern Orthodox Church it’s called glorification. But both are formal ways of elevating or recognizing someone as living an especially devoted life to Christ. And the fact of the matter is this; even if you didn’t grow up in one of those church traditions, that idea – what I just described – is often what comes to our minds when we hear the word “saint.” But that’s not what Paul meant, and it’s not the biblical understanding of the word.
According to the New Testament, all Christians, all genuine followers of Jesus – young, old, rich, poor, wise, simple – regardless of any miraculous event attributed to your life or any sense of devotion, everyone that places their faith in Jesus is set apart by God for His sacred purposes, are thereby made holy. In fact, that’s what the word “saint” means – holy ones. It’s the Greek word hagios, meaning holy. In all seriousness, we can only be holy and righteous by having that standing imputed to us by God through Christ. But once we’ve been made holy – apart from anything we’ve done – then we grow in holiness as we faithfully follow Jesus.
And we need to get ahold of this, because it’s very, very different from what you find in many religious expressions for holiness or sainthood. Those of you who have gone to India or places like India will know that it is not uncommon to see “the holy man.” The holy man is usually stripped naked or almost naked, he usually looks like a royal mess, and he’s begging for things. But he’s regarded as holy in that community. It may have nothing at all to do with righteousness; it has to do with religion and with externalism: “This is what a holy man looks like, this is what a holy man does. He divests himself of this and that and the next thing.”
I don’t say this to be disruptive or insensitive or even arrogant. I’m just saying that when you read the Bible you aren’t introduced to that image in connection with holiness. In externalized religion, people are constantly thinking, “It’s about me, and it’s about what I do, and it’s about how well I do it, and so forth…” Religion is always about how well I do; Christianity is about the wonder of what Christ has done. So that a real Christian is always saying, “O how the grace of God amazes me! Because I, in and of myself, am unworthy.” How politically incorrect is that, to describe yourself as unworthy when society would have you believe you’re such a wonderful, fantastic, amazing person? If you see me as being wonderful and fantastic and amazing, then let me just say it’s only because of Jesus. (Amen?)
If you’ve trust in Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins and seek to follow Him with all of your heart, mind, soul and strength, then you’re a saint. Not because I said so, or because this or that church said so, but because Jesus made you so.
Gospel Security
Gospel grammar, gospel geography, gospel identity, and finally, gospel security: “Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.” The security of the gospel is this: God grants us peace through grace. It’s in our understanding of the amazing grace of God that we can rest content, even when our hearts condemn us – that we marvel that God in His grace would have reached down to us and inclined our hearts to Him and opened our eyes to His truth and made us His own.
Read it through and you’ll discover how grace is just impregnated, particularly through the first three chapters. Think about it. When did God start to love you? When you started attending church? When you started showing an interest in religion? When you started reading your Bible? When you decided you were going to be a better person? Is that when God said, “Oh, I’ll love them for that!” No. He loved you before the dawn of time. He loved you in Christ before creation. Before He created the universe, He loved you. That’s what we’re talking about when we talk about grace. And it’s that grace which then grants peace, first with God and then with one another.
I know it’s cliché. It’s churchy, especially following Easter Sunday, but it’s the truth. It’s the gospel. The answer to our broken world is found only one place: at the cross of Jesus Christ. He answers the deepest dilemma of our lives: morality, meaning in life, purpose in life, why we’re here, what do we make of all the chaos and violence and injustice. Where is all this rectified? Certainly not in Washington, D.C. Certainly not in corporate America. Certainly not in the halls of academia. Certainly not in science and technology. Where is it rectified? At Calvary.
It’s only in Jesus that the racial barriers of our nation are dismantled. It’s only at the cross that rich and poor bow together. It’s only in the church of Jesus Christ that old people and young people sing together and listen to the Bible together and seek to reach the world together. Because listen, the answer to our broken world is found only one place: at the cross of Jesus Christ. It’s at the foot of the cross where Jesus brings us into a new society, and gives us a new standard of love that makes it possible for us to be united – diverse as we may be. It’s only in Christ. It’s only by His amazing grace.