The Church: Proof of God's Victory

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Hey, everybody. I'm Pastor Jeff Durbin with Apologia Church. I want to thank you all so much for watching the content right here on Apologia Studios channel.

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What you're about to watch is a sermon, a message from Apologia Church's worship service. And again, I want to thank you all so much for watching, for liking, for commenting, for sharing the sermon itself.

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We truly believe that it's important for the Christian church to have an engagement in the public square with the word of God.

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So we thank you so much for partnering with us to send this out across the world. I just wanted to say something before you actually watch this, and that is that I'm not your pastor.

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Though I'd love to be, I am not your pastor. And it's very important as you're watching this, you know that it's

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God's design for individual Christians to be part of a local Christian church under the care of qualified faithful biblical elders.

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And so as much as we love all of you watching these sermons and we're thankful to God that God uses them to bless you, to encourage you,

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I do want to encourage you as a minister of the gospel to get plugged into a local body of believers, particularly

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I think important a reformed church would be best. But we want to encourage you to get plugged into a solid biblical church where you can fellowship, where you can worship, where you can serve, where you can be connected.

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That is vitally important and actually a biblical command. And so as much as again as we love for your participation, your partnership, and we are so thankful to God that he's using these in your lives, we want to encourage you to get plugged into a local church.

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You can though actually partner with Apologia Church as we proclaim the gospel and provide a defense of the biblical gospel all around the world.

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You can do that by going to ApologiaStudios .com. You can partner with us by becoming All Access.

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When you do, you help to make all of this possible and you get all of our TV shows, our after shows, and Apologia Academy, all of that.

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And you're a part of all that God is doing with us in the world to proclaim, herald the gospel of the kingdom.

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You can partner with us. And I want to say one last word about that. Do make sure that none of your giving and partnership towards Apologia Church interferes with your giving, your worship, your tithes, your offerings to a local body of believers in your area.

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So thank you again so much for watching these and sharing them. God bless you. All right. Happy Lord's Day, everybody.

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How are you? Happy Father's Day. I am on a lovingly short leash tonight.

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So I will try to be as succinct as possible without sacrificing the glory of the text that we're going to be talking about, but just remember that the word of God is not captive or bound.

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So I hope you all are with me this evening. Very nice to see all of you. If you would, we're going to jump right into our text.

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Go to Ephesians chapter 3. Turn there. And really I want to read the verse first, the section of scripture that we're going to, and then

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I want to jump back in our time together and really give an adequate overview and a summary of what the apostle

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Paul is saying in chapters 1 and 2. So that way by the time we arrive in chapter 3, we can experience the full weight of glory that's staring us down in this and hopefully you'll be able to see by the grace of the

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Spirit what the basis for our hope is in the future, our confidence as we talk about where we're going, what our corporate identity is, what the basis for our certainty is in the victory of the future with the gospel by God's grace.

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We'll see that in his word tonight. How many of you believe that when these words are read in the presence of the church, especially gathered the corporate believers together, it is the very word of God.

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It is God speaking this evening. This is the tremendous privilege that we have been given as this body and local church, of course, but part of the global church to be edified, to be equipped, to be encouraged by our

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God who still speaks to us through his word today, because so much of what the early church in the first century was experiencing, the challenges, everything that they were going through mirrors in so many ways what we're encountering today.

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So I'm very, very excited to present this text to you today. We're going to start reading in verse 1 just to give us some context here.

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Chapter 3. Hear now the words of the living and the true God. For this reason,

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I, Paul, a prisoner of Christ Jesus on behalf of you

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Gentiles, assuming that you have heard of the stewardship of God's grace that was given to me for you, how the mystery was made known to me by revelation, as I have written briefly.

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When you read this, you can perceive my insight into the mystery of Christ, which was not made known to the sons of men in other generations, as it has now been revealed to his holy apostles and prophets by the

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Spirit. This mystery is that the Gentiles are fellow heirs, members of the same body, and partakers of the promise in Christ Jesus through the gospel.

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Of this gospel, I was made a minister according to the gift of God's grace, which was given me by the working of his power.

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To me, though I am the very least of all the saints, this grace was given to preach to the

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Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ and to bring to light for everyone what is the plan of the mystery hidden for ages in God, who created all things so that through the church, the manifold wisdom of God might now be made known to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly places.

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Thus far as the reading of God's word, let's pray together and ask the Lord to bless our time. Father, I just want to thank you,

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God. Thank you for this tremendous grace that you have given me to open your word and hopefully, as you did on that day so many years ago,

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God, divide it into portions and feed your sheep. Lord, I thank you for this opportunity,

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God. We thank you, Lord, that we are able to know you, that we're able to call you our own, that you are our inheritance, that in you we have every reason not to be fearful for the future, but to be filled with genuine hope because of our calling in you, because of our inheritance, and because of the incomparably great power that you have exerted in Christ Jesus and also in our lives by giving us everything that you have given to him,

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Lord. Thank you for your word today. Bless our time together. Holy Spirit, give us understanding and cause us to glory and worship in what we see today,

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Lord God. Thank you. In your name we pray. Amen. Central focus of the epistle to the

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Ephesians really centers around two great themes, and that is the reconciliation of all things, the cosmos, the universe, things in heaven, things on earth, in the person of Jesus Christ himself, and then also the uniting together of the people of God from the

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Jews and the Gentiles. But to suffice to say all of things are summed up in the person of Jesus Christ, all things in heaven, things on earth.

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As Paul begins this in chapter one, he starts talking about all of these many blessings that we've been given in Christ, right?

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And these are the things that as Christians, especially as reformed Christians, we look at our election unto holiness.

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We look at being predestined for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ, all to the purpose of his will, to the praise of his glorious grace.

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God has given us this myriad of different blessings that we have in Christ, in the beloved.

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And this is where we go to. This is where we turn to when we're struggling with our faith, when the cares of this world are closing in upon us.

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We go to texts like Ephesians 1 to remind us of all that we have in Christ Jesus, everything that he has blessed us with.

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And all of these blessings are said to be found in the heavenly places. Key theme in the epistle to the

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Ephesians. All of these blessings that we have in Christ and the heavenly places are ours only in Christ, only in him.

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That first section in Ephesians chapter one is a praise of thanksgiving to God, a barakah, a eulogia.

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It's a blessing to God the Father for what he's given us in Jesus Christ. And we have all of those benefits up front.

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But then as Paul moves into verses 8, 9, and 10, you see now this kind of summary statement or this lynchpin, if you will, by which we get from the blessings linking us to the power that they're grounded in, what comes after.

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And we see that in verse 8, God does this. He lavishes all of these things upon us in all wisdom and insight, making known to us the mystery of his will.

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This mystery that Paul refers to over and over again, especially in the first few chapters, refers to something that was hidden in the past, in God's secret counsel, in his secret will, but now through the church and through the apostolic witness, he has chosen in this way to make it known to his people through the ministry of his spirit.

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He's given us wisdom and insight, making known to us the mystery of his will according to his purpose,

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Paul says, which he set forth in Christ as a plan for the fullness of time to unite all things in him, things in heaven, and things on earth.

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And so really verse 9 and 10 are the key to unlocking where the epistle is going, what the direction that Paul is going in and what he's presenting to us, this mystery that heaven and earth are to be summed up in Christ.

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He's the one in whom God centers and reunites all of creation, everything that was broken, everything, all of the the hostile and alien elements of the universe that have been fragmented because of sin, because sin has crept in and destroyed everything.

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The presupposition or the assumption is that that has taken place, and now in the person of Christ, who is both fully

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God and fully man, God is setting all things right again in this

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Messiah, in this Christ, uniting all things in him, things in heaven, and things on earth.

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He is the one, the focal point, in which all things are being brought together, unified, and also subjected to, placed under him, under him in perfect peace.

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And then Paul moves into verses 11 through 14 after he's done talking about the blessings, where all of history is going.

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He says that God predestines us and our inheritance after the counsel of his will.

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He predestines all things according to the counsel of his will. He has brought Jews into this salvation.

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And then Paul turns his attention to saying, and you, to whom the word of truth also came, when you heard this message, the gospel of your salvation, and believed in him, you were brought into this salvation as well.

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And then he moves from thanksgiving to intercession. He breaks into this prayer and he's pleading with God.

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He's asking that the spirit of wisdom and revelation would be given to the people of God so that they would understand, they would comprehend that on the basis of all of these gifts that they've been given, that they would understand a few things.

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Number one, of course, is who Jesus Christ actually is. Who is he?

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Who is Jesus Christ and what is our calling in him and who are we in him?

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What is our corporate identity in Jesus? Paul prays that we would know a few things, that we would understand the hope of our calling, our inheritance, the inheritance that is filled with the riches of Christ that are available to us.

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And then the incomparably great power that God has demonstrated and exerted when he raised

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Christ from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places, the same place where our blessings have been secured in verse 3.

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Our calling as God's image bearers is what Paul is concerned with us knowing. We'll come back to that because it's so critical to understanding where we're going to end up in chapter 3.

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But our inheritance that he's praying that we would understand, that we have in Christ, is really having to do with the scope of our jurisdiction, our authority, our ownership.

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Jesus says in Matthew chapter 5, the meek shall inherit the earth. Hebrews chapter 1 details how

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Christ is the heir of all things. He is the one who inherits all things.

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And Romans chapter 8 assures us that we have been made heirs with God and joint heirs with Christ.

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We have been given all things in him. As the psalmist says, the Lord is my chosen portion and my cup.

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That word portion has to do with he's mine. He's my possession. He belongs to me and I belong to him.

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The Lord is my chosen portion and my cup. The lines have fallen for me in pleasant places.

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That refers to in the Old Testament when the people of God were given these lines by which to measure their inheritance as they came into the promised land.

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But in Christ Jesus, Jesus himself tells us that the meek will inherit the earth.

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Not just the land, but they will inherit all things. So in Christ, Paul wants us to know that we have inherited the one who has inherited all things.

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He's ours. He belongs to us and we belong to him.

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And lastly, as it says there in chapter 1, if you want to look with me, very important.

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We hear the gospel preached this way so many times that the death, the burial, and the resurrection of Jesus and amen, we say to that gospel because that is the truth.

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Without that, there is no gospel being proclaimed. But Paul's gospel and the unanimous witness of the

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New Testament writers is that Jesus has not only been raised from the dead, he has not only been resurrected vindicating his sonship, by which his offering, his obedient life, his sacrificial death in our place have all been verified by God.

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They've been accepted. That work has been given the stamp of approval by God. But Paul says further that God demonstrated this greatness of his power, right?

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And he starts using all of these terms to describe where Christ is seated now.

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Arche, dunamis, exousia, rule, power, authority, and dominion.

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Christ has not only been raised from the dead, but he has been raised in his ascension and also sits now in his session ruling and reigning over all things.

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This is the basis for all of the blessings that we have in chapter 1. All of these blessings as we are, are seated with Christ in the heavenly places.

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And this would have been a tremendous encouragement for the first century church. The culture and really the spiritual climate in Ephesus was such that you had the temple

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Artemis, you had Greek mythology, you had a myriad of different spiritual influences and religiosity, magical arts, sorcery, all of these things that made the first century church begin to doubt the incomparably great power that they had in God because of Christ.

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They were doubting these things and the apostle Paul assures them, he reminds them, given the state that they live in, the spiritual climate in which they find themselves, there is no living title in heaven or on earth among the hostile heavenly powers and the heavenly places, the spiritual forces of darkness against which we do battle in this realm or on earth.

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No earthly ruler has been given a title that is higher than the Messiah, the one who is seated on his throne.

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Paul says as much. He's been seated 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.

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In verse 22, and he put all things under his feet and gave him his head over all things.

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To who? The church. Which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all

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Christ's position and our access to the power of heaven. Jesus is seated at the right hand of God, the supreme position of authority.

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In case you need further witness of this in the New Testament, of course, Psalm 110 verse 1, the

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Lord said to my Lord, sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet.

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But what Paul also has in mind here, very likely, is Psalm 8, the Dominion Psalm, in which man is crowned with glory and dominion.

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He's made for a little while lower than the angels, crowned with dominion, glory, and honor, and all things are subjected to him, placed under his feet.

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That Psalm, Psalm chapter 8, is actually applied to Jesus in Hebrews chapter 2 as well, demonstrating that Jesus is the second

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Adam, the second man who inherits all things and then all things are placed in subjection to him.

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For more on this, see Mark 16, 19, Luke 22, 69,

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Acts 7, 55, 56. Rewind this later to get these verses just so you have them in your toolkit.

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Romans 8, 34, Colossians 3, 1, Hebrews 1, 3, 8, 1, 10, 12, 12, 2, 1

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Peter 3, 22, and 1 Corinthians 15, 20 to 26. Jesus reigns now on his throne and Paul is anchoring our hope in the risen, ascended, and seated

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Messiah. He's anchoring it right there. And then, of course, we go into chapter 2, which reminds us of our depraved state before we knew

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Christ Jesus, and you were dead in your trespasses and sins following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work, and the sons of disobedience among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature little wraths.

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We were little wraths. We were children of wrath. Our position before knowing

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Christ, before being brought into this wonderful salvation, Paul calls us back to remind us of where we were, that we didn't get brought into this salvation by our own will, by our own decision, by our own choosing, because we were slaves of sin, held captive by the enemy to do his will, held captive by our flesh, our own sin, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind.

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Nowadays, in the modern church context, that becomes exactly how the gospel is explained to someone, right?

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Maybe you're in this room today, and you came to Christ. You know Him. You love Him. You have faith in Him.

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But maybe no one ever told you what miracle it was that God did when He saved you.

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Maybe no one ever took you aside and explained to you that God resurrected you.

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He gave you a new life, a new birth. You didn't choose to overcome being enslaved to the enemy, being a slave to your passions, carrying out the desires of your body and your mind.

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God raised you from the dead. Two of the most beautiful words in the entire

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Bible are in verse 4 of Ephesians chapter 2. The description of our condition comes first, in which we're dead in trespasses and sins.

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That was our former way of life. Verse 4, but God. But God, who is rich in mercy.

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Right? Paul hearkens us back to the covenantal faithfulness of God, right? God is rich and merciful.

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He's slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love. He bestows His love upon those who don't deserve it.

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Those who haven't earned it. As a matter of fact, those who are going headlong into rebellion. That was all of us before we came to know the

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Lord Jesus. But God. And then, if you're following along with me in chapter 2, verse 4, rich in mercy

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God is because of the great love with which He loved us. Even when we were dead in trespasses and sins,

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He made us alive. The term there in the text is synonymous with the term for resurrection.

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He gave us a new life. He raised us from the dead. And then there's more. He raised us up with Him, Jesus, and seated us with Him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus.

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Now, we can read that text. How many of you are doing the same page summer bible read -along?

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You've been to Ephesians twice this week, haven't you? Have you stopped right there and just meditated on how glorious that truth is?

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To know that everything that's been applied to Christ, the power that God has worked in raising

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Jesus from the dead, in seating Him above all rule, authority, power, and dominion, has been given to you now.

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Has that hit you? That you've been raised with Christ and you are seated with Him.

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The bible says so much about, you know, scenes of worship before the throne room of God, right?

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The people of God are seen as worshiping before the throne. But Paul even goes a step further and he says this, you've not only been brought into the throne room, you're seated with Christ.

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You're seated at His hand in the heavenly places. That's your spiritual location.

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That's your, if I could use a sci -fi word, dimension. That's where you are.

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You're with Him in the heavenly places. And what's He doing? Reigning.

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Ruling. So what are you doing? Reigning and ruling with Him.

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The bible says as much about this very thing. We're not only present in the throne room of God, but seated with Christ.

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Not only do we share in Christ's resurrection life, but also in His victorious enthronement over the heavenly powers.

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All of it. This is where Paul wants to tell us that we are. This is our spiritual location.

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Our calling. Romans chapter 8 verse 19. The creation, we're told, waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God, for the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of Him who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to corruption and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God.

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Peter describes us as God's chosen race, His royal priesthood,

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His holy nation. The kingdom of God is composed of the saints, the kingdom of priests that God has made comprised of people from every tribe, tongue, language, and nation,

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Jew and Gentile alike. Revelation 20 refers to even thrones in heaven in which the believers are sat on, executing judgment, the ones who have tasted the first resurrection, who are safe from the second death.

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We just pause on that for a moment. What does it mean to be partakers of the first resurrection? Think about in the back in the garden.

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When Adam and Eve partook of the fruit, the Bible says that they died, yes? But did they die right away physically?

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You can participate. Did they die right away physically? No, they died spiritually that day.

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So in correlation to that, what is the first resurrection if not a spiritual one?

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That we have been raised from death to life. John 5 24, Truly, truly,

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I say to you, he who hears my voice and believes in him who sent me has eternal life and does not come into judgment, but is passed out of death and into life.

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And then just a few verses later, we're told about those in the tombs that will hear the voice of the

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Son of God and will be judged on the last day. We are partakers of the first resurrection, safe from the second death.

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Just a little side note there. And we are pictured in the scriptures as reigning with Christ.

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Is that how you see yourself? And part of us, really, we can look at this and we can say, man, that awfully sounds awfully arrogant.

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Sounds very presumptuous. Administrators of the world, right, to the world, and it would be arrogant, it would be presumptuous if we were coming in our own authority.

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If we were announcing ourselves as world president, those seated with the highest patente, the sovereign rulers of the earth.

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But no, when we go forward announcing what God has accomplished in Christ in the gospel, we're not declaring our own authority.

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We're announcing God's authority that is ours by faith. And it belongs to us.

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We are the masterpiece of God's grace. We are products of grace.

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Moving on in Ephesians chapter 2 verse 8, For by grace have you been saved through faith, and this is not your own doing.

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It is the gift of God, not the result of works, so that no one may boast.

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For we are God's workmanship, His poema, right?

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His work of art, His masterpiece, created in Christ Jesus for good works.

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We're created in Christ. We're made new creatures in Christ, glorious truths.

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And then Paul moves into in chapter 2 and really a discussion about this redeemed humanity now that we've been brought into.

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This redeemed people of God comprised of Jew and Gentile. He talks about how you

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Gentiles were alienated from the promises of God. You were separated from Him, having no hope and without God in the world.

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But now through the blood of Jesus Christ, you have been brought near. He has unified into one new man by abolishing the hostility that exists between the two groups because of the ordinances expressed in commands, right?

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The holiness code that separated Jew and Gentile. And he has brought the Gentiles, aka all the nations into this promise, killing the hostility.

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Verse 16 says he has brought into one body all of us through the cross and given us access to the

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Father by the same spirit. And such we are fellow members of God's household, citizens of the redeemed humanity, and this is the best part, given the hope of the church's calling.

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What does it mean to be an image bearer of God? What is Paul really getting at here when he talks about the calling of the church?

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How you and I in our corporate identity are image bearers of God.

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Have you ever thought about that? Someone asks you, you know, we go out to the abortion mill a lot. We're talking about the humanity of the unborn child.

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We're saying this child is made in the image of God, right? If someone asked you, would you be able to explain that?

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To them what it means to be in the image of God. Well, the answer lies in understanding the scope of the gospel in such a way as to know that when

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God saves us, he doesn't just deliver us from our sins. He doesn't just refuse to count our wrongs against us anymore from this moment on.

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He doesn't just adopt us. He doesn't just bring us into his family, but he restores us to the authority of our office.

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The office that we've been given as his image bearers. Romans 8 28

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We know that all things work together for the good of those that love God and are the called according to our, according to his purpose.

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But what is that calling? For those whom God foreknew, he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his son.

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1 Corinthians 15 49 tells us as we have borne the image of the man of dust, we shall also bore the image of the man from heaven,

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Jesus. Colossians 1 15 says that Jesus is the image of the invisible

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God. And Colossians 3 9 tells us that we, you and I, are being renewed in knowledge after the image of our creator.

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And so as creatures, our calling as image bearers is to reflect the will of God so that everything we say and do says something about God's will and purpose.

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Everything, whether our calling is vocational ministry, whether you're a butcher, a baker, a candlestick maker, whether you are a data analyzer, whether you are a stay -at -home mom, whether you are a plumber, everything that we do, everything that we have been called to do by God, we are carrying out as his image bearers.

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Jesus himself imaged God perfectly because he did the will of the

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Father perfectly. That's what it means to image God, to do his will perfectly.

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That's why it was said about him, I delight to do your will, O God. Jesus did this perfectly even to the point of, do you remember that story in Mark chapter 3 when he's ministering with his his disciples and they're going so hard that they don't even have time to eat.

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They're bringing people to them to minister to them, to give healing to demoniacs, demons are being cast out and all of this, and they send

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Jesus his own family to him. They think maybe, okay, we can, we, no one else can stop him.

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We'll send his family to him to reign him in. They'll, he'll listen to them, right, and they show up and remember they can't even get inside.

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They can't even get to Jesus. So they send a message inside and here comes the decisive moment whether or not

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Jesus is going to actually break from the ministry and the mission and leave and be done. They say,

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Jesus, your mother and your brothers are outside. And he says, look at all these. My mother and my brothers are the ones who do the will of my father in heaven, who do the will of God.

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Jesus, even, he sanctified even the closest relationships to him in the mission and the work of the kingdom and to carry out the calling as the true image of God.

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It's been on my mind a lot as we're preparing for Kauai to leave, as you know, imaging

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God accurately because the Bible tells us that we will either image God correctly according to the will and purpose of God and display him in our lives or by the apostasy of our hearts, we will distort and pervert the image of God by the way that we live.

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There's only two possibilities. Either we are living faithfully as God's image bearers or we are distorting and perverting the image of God by the way that we live, which by the way is the basis for us as the church to call men and women,

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Jew and Gentile, to repent of their sin and turn from dead works to serve a living

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God. That would only be true on the basis of God's calling on their lives as his image bearers.

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It's only true if they were made with a purpose to reflect their maker and by the apostasy of their hearts, they are rebelling against God.

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And that's why we have the license and the freedom and the authority and the power as those by God's grace whom he has redeemed to preach that message, repentance and faith in Jesus.

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Even the Imago Dei, where that phrase comes from, is an image that really has to do with coins in which the image of a leading ruler was stamped on the coins, right?

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And it would be carried by his subject, by his ambassador, by his messenger to people and that coin represented the ruler, right?

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The person carrying it, bearing the king's message would represent his concerns and even his presence.

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We are God's ambassadors promoting what he promotes to carry out his mission.

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This is what it means to be an image bearer of God and we never image

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God more clearly than when we are obeying him, than when we are being obedient to his calling in our lives.

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Something that I've been going through for the last couple months now, just asking

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God to be clear about our place, especially on the island of Kauai and it's amazing because after having actually taken the step in faith now and trusting

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God, we don't know how things are exactly going to look out there. We don't know exactly what the living situation is going to be.

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We don't understand how the full measure of our provision is going to be given to us. We don't understand how the church is going to grow.

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We don't understand how the conflict that exists now between us and those who live on the island that are angry with us is going to go.

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We don't foresee the full weight of all the spiritual attacks that we might come into contact with as we already have.

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We don't see those things. But I do know now, having taken the step of faith, seeing what

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God has provided and trusting him, not knowing everything and having all the answers yet,

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I do have more clarity now after having taken this step of faith, just an inch more.

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And isn't that amazing in our lives? You know, we're presented with all these decisions we have to make in life. What university we're going to go to?

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Should we buy or should we rent? Should we get married right this moment? All of these decisions that we're faced with in our lives that are good things.

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It's a choice between two wonderful things either way. And so we come to God and we want him to be clear.

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We want to ask him, Lord, please be clear in this. Please be clear. I want to know your will. I want to do it. I want to obey you.

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I want to image you most accurately and most faithfully according to the manner which you've called me to.

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It's amazing that when we actually take that step forward based on what we believe

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God is doing and trusting in him, how we do have that small measure of clarity now that we didn't have before we took that leap.

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So that's my encouragement to you. If you are going through something like that right now in your life, step out in faith.

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Step out in faith despite the fear knowing that your God takes care of you. And if your desire is to image him faithfully and accurately, there is no wrong choice.

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And so we go back to chapter three. Chapter three, after Paul has brought us through our benefits of our election, the power that's with Christ, us being seated with him in heavenly places, all things being reconciled to Jesus, put underneath his feet.

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What is the mechanism or the vehicle by which God's purposes come about in the world?

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That's the question. Or better yet, what is the purpose of our election? What were we elected to as the church, as God's called out and redeemed people?

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Because, you know, as image bearers of God and as the true image bearer of God, Jesus saw all of life as being restored to the

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Father. And that took place by plundering the prison house of his adversary,

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Satan. Plundering the spoils of Satan. Jesus interprets his own ministry in the same way as plundering

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Satan's prison house. Luke chapter 11, verse 21. When a strong man, fully armed, guards his own palace, his goods are safe.

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But when one stronger than he attacks him and overcomes him, he takes away his armor in which he trusted and divides his spoil.

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You think about those first, the 12 disciples, they were called out for this very purpose. And even during their ministry, they run back to Jesus and they're ecstatic.

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Even the demons and the spirits are subject to us. Right? They're excited. They're going back to the Lord with this authority that they have.

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And he tells them not to rejoice that the spirits are subject to them, but rejoice that their names are written in the book of life.

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But this authority and this calling that God gave to them, he has given to us.

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Paul has told us this by virtue of where our blessings are located, above every realm of authority, power, and dominion.

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Jesus came to destroy the works of the devil. John tells us in first John. Think about this even.

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In Isaiah chapter 53. How do we all know that passage? Traditionally, we know it as the passage of the

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Messiah as presented as the suffering servant of God. Right? He's pierced for our transgressions. He's crushed for our iniquities.

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The punishment that brought us peace was upon him and by his wounds we are healed. But if you look forward and even that prophecy about Jesus in verse 12, it says something phenomenal that I really think we just jump over sometimes.

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It says about him that he will divide the portion with the many as he divides the spoil with the strong.

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God will divide him, the redeemer, the one who is suffering, a portion, an inheritance, with the many.

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You and I. And he will divide the spoil with the strong. What is the spoil of Christ's conquest if not the shattered kingdom of the adversary?

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The Bible does not present Satan as an all -powerful foe, brothers and sisters.

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It presents him as a deposed enemy. As a defeated and vanquished adversary.

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You notice that when Jesus showed up on the scene, in the New Testament, that's really the first occurrence of demonic activity that's explicitly named that in the scripture.

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In the Old Testament, we do see spirits, dark spirits, but never explicit in that way. Jesus shows up on the scene to do his ministry and he's met with spiritual opposition and oppression, demonic oppression.

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What do the demons say as he approaches? What have you to do with us, O son of God? Have you come to torment us before the appointed time?

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The arrival of the true and obedient and faithful imaging of God, the son of God, caused the demons to cry out in terror by his very presence on the earth because they understood that it was over.

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That there was no longer any stopping the progress of Christ's mission and the advancement of his kingdom.

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And that is the same authority and calling that God has given us.

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Colossians 2 .14 it says about Jesus that he canceled the record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands.

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This he set aside, nailing it to the cross. He disarmed the rulers and authorities and put them to open shame by triumphing over them in him.

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And how could that be? The crucifixion was an instrument that was reserved for humiliation and making a public spectacle of traitors.

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But this text says that Jesus made a public spectacle of the rulers and the authorities in the heavenly places.

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How is that possible? When it looked like Jesus was suffering, dying, which he was, when it looked like he was losing, when the adversary was glorying over his mangled body on that cross as he hung there and bled and suffocated to death, celebrating, the

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Bible says that Jesus was actually winning. And he was winning in such a way as to make an exhibition of the powers of darkness.

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To make an example of them. To make a public spectacle of the rulers and the authorities in the heavenly places.

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I just started and finished for the first time ever. I know, it's terrible. The Chronicles of Narnia.

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The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe. And you think about all of the rich imagery in that passage, right? You think about how

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Aslan, who is the portrait of Christ, offers himself in the stead of a traitor.

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Right? That character that you just, you grow to hate as you read the book, right? He's just a weasel.

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Right? He's ratting out the brothers and sisters. He's lying. And they just,

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Lewis just makes you come to a place where you really just don't like him. And he's the very one that Aslan, who is the type of Christ, ends up dying for.

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Dying in a traitor's stead to reverse death, Aslan offers himself willingly to the

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White Witch and all of her minions and the forces of darkness. His mane is sheared, symbolizing his humiliation.

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He is beaten and mocked and ridiculed and scorned and kicked while he's on the ground.

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And he is sacrificed and all the powers of darkness gloat over his dead body. And then light comes forward through darkness and raises

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Aslan from the dead. He's resurrected. And where does he go right after his resurrection? He goes into Paravel, which is the source and center of the

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White Witch's dominion. And he starts breathing on all of the frozen creatures there and brings them all back to life.

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He goes into the graveyard of dead frozen people and he breathes on them and brings all the creatures back to life.

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Man, if that isn't a picture of what Christ has done and is doing in the gospel through his people, proclaiming liberty to the captives, leading captivity captive in the person of Jesus, then

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I don't know what it is, honestly. In the last few minutes here, let's back up in chapter three here and finish.

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In verse six, we'll read from there. This mystery, again, the mystery referring to all things that have been hidden by God in the past and his secret counsel, but now that he's revealed to his church and he's commissioned apostles like Paul to make this mystery known.

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This mystery is that the Gentiles are fellow heirs, members of the same body, right?

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That in the sense now there is a lawless gospel, that we are justified and declared righteous by faith.

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There no longer remains any distinction between Jew and Gentile. We're all one in Christ Jesus now.

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The Gentiles, the nations, are fellow heirs, members of the same body and partakers of the promise in Christ Jesus through the gospel, through the proclaimed word of repentance and faith in Jesus, peace with God, and the reconciliation of all things.

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Paul says in verse seven of this gospel, I was made a minister according to the gift of God's grace, which was given me by the working of his power.

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Right? Three times in that section of verses, he says that this ministry that he's been given is a gift.

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Right? Three times. It's a gift of God. To me though, I am the very least of all the saints.

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This grace was given to preach to the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ.

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And really this word has to do with the counsel of God. Right? God has said in the

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Bible, in the Old Testament specifically, to have an inscrutable counsel. Right? We can't figure out what he's doing.

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His secret will, right? That he's known and declared from all eternity. This unsearchable counsel, this inscrutable will that he has.

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Paul says that preaching to the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ, and here it is, bringing to light for everyone what is the plan of the mystery hidden for ages in God, which

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God? The God who created all things. So that through the church, the manifold wisdom of God might now be made known to the rulers and the authorities in the heavenly places.

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Okay, so stop for a moment. Do you understand what this is saying here? Do we comprehend that the church by nature of our very existence, so the fact that you and I exist as God's called out people, as his redeemed people, we are a visible reminder that the hostile forces in heaven, on earth, have been defeated and their power broken, which means, brothers and sisters, that Satan, the adversaries, these hostile powers cannot thwart the great commission, cannot thwart the calling of the church.

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Long before the foundation of the earth, God declared that his people would be the mechanism and the vehicle by which these unsearchable riches of Christ would be made known to the rulers and the authorities in the heavenly places, that our very existence would be to shout to the principalities and powers that God's purposes are triumphantly moving towards their destination.

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That's our calling. That the Christ of Psalm 2 has come, right, the one who has been made king, that we are to wrest from his possession those who have been taken captive by him to do his bidding, to do his will.

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The adversary, the enemy, is a deposed enemy. Yes, he is still active, but his activity is restricted.

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The Bible tells us that he can no longer deceive the nations. He can no longer restrict the preaching of the gospel.

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The gospel is not bound, and neither are we. We have been given a hope, the hope of our calling, an inheritance that is imperishable, unfading, and unspoiled, that is kept for us with God in the heavenly places, among with all of our blessings.

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And we have been given, through the proclamation and through the administration of the preaching of the gospel and the word of God, incomparably great power.

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And this power that we have is so much greater than anything that our adversary can do to try to limit or to restrict or to stop the great commission, the preaching of the gospel, to all nations from being fulfilled.

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He is deposed. And so, last thing here, what's my hope for the

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Hawaiian islands? Because, really, when you think about this, you think about this analogy.

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What if, as a part of an army, your general, who had already gone ahead and won the decisive victory, who had struck the decisive death blow already to your adversary, and left the enemy incapacitated, had ordered his troops to advance, and we decide that we're going to play defense?

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This is you and I. Our enemy has been incapacitated. He's been dethroned.

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He's been cast down, the ruler of this world. The kingdoms of this world have become the kingdom of our

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Lord and of his Messiah, and he will rule forever and ever. And we will reign with him on the earth.

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Our enemy has been incapacitated, and we are commanded to go forward and to advance and to preach this good news.

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What reason do we have to fear? What reason do we have to doubt God's supreme power and authority?

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This is what the Ephesian church and all of the churches in that area needed to be reminded of, was that God's position and our position in him now is so powerful and so far above rule, authority, and dominion, there is no power that can touch us or can stop our mission from being completed.

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So my hope for Kauai, I'll just read to you here in Acts chapter 28.

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Acts chapter 28, right at the end of Acts, the last few verses here. Paul's already told us in Ephesians that all the peoples are coming to God.

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All the Gentiles, all the nations, they're coming. This is what he says at the end of Acts chapter 28, verse 28,

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Therefore, let it be known to you that this salvation of God has been sent to the

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Gentiles. They will listen. What is my hope?

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For knowing the opposition that awaits us in Kauai, for knowing the spiritual forces of darkness in the heavenly places that know our names, that are hell -bent on making sure that the great commission is not fulfilled here, that those who are trying to poison the well against us right now, what is my hope?

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The nations will listen. They will hear, and they will come. Let's pray.

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Father, I want to thank you for the word that went out. God, all I can ask is that you're glorified and that your spirit applies it to your people today in their mind and in their hearts.

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Thank you for the opportunity again. Thank you for this office that you've given us as your image bearers,

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Lord God. Thank you that you've given us an inheritance that is eternal. You are our portion and our prize.

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We belong to you and you are ours forever. And we thank you, God, for the incomparably great power that is available to your church through Christ Jesus because of where he is now reigning and because of where we find ourselves reigning with him in the heavenly places.

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Let that basis be the source of our confidence in what you've called us to do,

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Lord God, to proclaim the unsearchable riches of Christ, to make known among spiritual forces of darkness this light,

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God. All the riches of Christ that this manifold wisdom of God, this tapestry of wisdom that you've woven together, that should be made known to these rulers and the authorities in the heavenly places and nothing will stop us from that,