Church, the Reigning Christ Is for You — Tim Conway

You can turn in your Bibles to Ephesians 1, Lord willing. Next week, we will be in chapter 2. I counted. I believe that this is the 28th sermon. We started Ephesians back in May of last year. It is one of the richest chapters in our Bibles.

It's hard to rate whether there are some that are better, but it is one of the best. Ephesians 1, since this is our last time here, let's pick up in v. 15. For this reason, because I have heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love toward all the saints, I do not cease to give thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers.".

Paul is expressing himself to them. He's explaining his prayer life. He's explaining how the Ephesians fit into that prayer life. And he's explaining very particularly something that he offers up petitions to God in their behalf for.

"...Remembering you in my prayers that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you a Spirit or the Spirit, capital S.". It's uncertain in the original. Different translations take it either way.

"...The Spirit of wisdom and of revelation.". So that's what he's praying for. That they would have be given this Spirit that would be opening their eyes, giving them revelation in the knowledge of God.

"...Having the eyes of your hearts enlightened.". He wants them to comprehend these realities. Three very specific petitions are going to come forth from his pen right here. As he prays for these Ephesians, he wants them to be given the supernatural ability by the Spirit of God this revelation, the eyes of their understanding or the eyes of their hearts, so enlightened, so made to see that they may know what is the hope of God's calling.

What are the riches of God's glorious inheritance in the saints. And the third here, which really is what takes us all the way to v. 23, and on into Ephesians 2. Ephesians 2 and the first half is basically going to be a developing of this power and how it manifests itself in our life.

It's not as though Paul digresses or goes on to something else. He wants the Ephesians given the ability to know what is the immeasurable greatness of His power toward us who believe according to the working of God's great might that He worked in Christ when He raised Him from the dead and seated Him at His right hand in the heavenly places 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.

And He put all things under His Christ's feet and gave Him as head over all things to the church, the church, which is His body. Christ's body. The fullness. I doubt we would have said that outside of inspiration.

The fullness of Him who fills all in all. Now, many of you are probably aware, maybe some of you have not taken notice of this, but if you read Paul's epistles, you know that some of them, I don't want to say that everyone is so clear-cut, but I think it's fairly obvious that when you read the book of Romans, as you transition from chapter 11 into chapter 12, there is a therefore.

There is a movement in the letter. We get the same thing in very pronounced fashion in Ephesians. The first three chapters of this epistle, the last three chapters, the first three we might say are very doctrinal.

We might say that the last three are very practical. That's probably dangerous to even say it that way. That's an overgeneralization. I recognize that. But listen to me. There is something that happens here.

What happens? Well, this is what happens. In the first three chapters, you have one, if I'm operating the parsing and my Bible works correctly, but you have one imperative verb. In the entire first three, an imperative.

That gives you something to do. Or we might think of commandments. There is something to be obeyed there. In the first three chapters, you have one verb like that. In the last three, you have a whole bunch.

And so basically, what we see here is that what Paul does is he gives doctrine. He gives Christian teaching. He gives things that you need to understand. And you recognize what he's doing here in the first 14 verses.

He's telling us about our glorious salvation. He's telling us about how he prays and what is important for Christians to comprehend and to be able to grasp and have the eyes of their understanding enlightened to.

He's going to go on in the first half of chapter 2 and he's going to develop this unity with Christ and being made alive and raised with Him and seated with Him and being the workmanship of God. And then he's going to go on and he's going to talk about how Jew and Gentile and it's lots of teaching.

And you see, in light of the teaching, what happens is that teaching moves us somewhere. It's indicatives. Indicative verbs indicate that which is true, that which is real. What you basically have is imperatives follow indicatives.

That is the way with the Scripture. You are this. You are that. Therefore, live this way. That's how Scripture is. It gives us a basis for what it calls us to do. God doesn't just leave us in this ethical vacuum or a moral vacuum where there's nothing going on in our brains.

It's just that your slaves do what you're told. What God does for us is He appeals to our thinking. And that's what we find. That's exactly what we find in these. At one time, you were darkness. That's an indicative.

That indicates a reality. At one time, you were darkness. Now, you are light in the Lord. Again, that indicates a reality. What's the conclusion? Walk as children of light. That's an imperative. I recognize that happens in one verse later on in the letter, but it's basically the makeup of this book of Ephesians as a whole.

We get God-breathed, glorious, glorious, inspired truth. And you know what it's supposed to do? It's supposed to excite you and motivate you and stir you to worship and to adoration and obedience, humility like James was speaking about.

You see, that's what He did to the Philippians. He tells them what Christ is like. And He says, therefore, let that mind be in you. That's the kind of teaching we get. Now look, I mention this for this reason.

Ephesians is a letter. James was reminding us in the first hour how Philippians is a letter. Here's the problem. I've been teaching on this thing since May. When are we going to get done with the first three chapters?

About when? This year? Look, you can read this thing end-to-end in 20 minutes. I know, some faster, some slower. This is a letter. This was meant to be read in one sitting. Which basically meant this, there's indicatives all the way through this, but those imperatives of the last three chapters, all that glorious truth in the first three chapters would have just been read minutes away from all these imperatives in the last three chapters.

Now that's important to remember. You know what that means? That means that when we're taking two years in the first three chapters, before we get to the last three, before we get to the heavy-duty imperatives, it means that if we really want to be faithful to the letter, we do well as we walk through these first three chapters to be looking forward.

And to be working those imperatives back in. And then once we get in the last three chapters, it's very important to keep looking back over our shoulder as to where we came. Because we want to join these things together.

Both components are absolutely necessary. We don't want to try to pursue some ethical standard without our minds set on these realities. But at the same time, we want to remember that Paul isn't just giving all this to fill our heads with theology and have us go out the door with lives that are unchanged.

You recognize these things go together. It is doctrine, brethren, doctrine that makes godly people. It is deep, solid, biblical truth. It is the apostle's doctrine that makes for the motivation, the excitement, the movement, the stirring, the impact.

It is that which the Spirit of God takes and shakes God's people with. That's what's supposed to happen. And we don't want to forget that. We need to constantly be remembering the first three chapters, the last three chapters, they go together.

They're a unit. Absolutely necessary. Look, there is a way to have deep, rich experiences in the Christian life. But I can tell you, those experiences, people don't tend to have them that aren't doctrinal.

People that aren't doctrinal tend to be shallow. They tend to just wade in the shallows of this Christianity. People have experiences all the time that are not of God. People have emotional responses.

I'm talking about God-wrought experiences. Holy Spirit-inspired experiences in the life of God's people. They don't typically happen where people are shallow. Many of you know Edwards. Jonathan Edwards.

He was all about experience. He wanted his people to have experience. He wanted his people to feel. He wanted his people to have emotional responses. But he was driven by this reality. I want to take people as high as I possibly can in their Christian experience, but he wanted truth to drive them there.

Always. When you drop the truth, you end up like the charismatic circles. And I'll tell you this, if you drop the experience, you end up with some dry, cold Calvinism that you don't want either. We want both, brethren.

We want both. Those who neglect the doctrine rarely have great experiences. No ethics and morality without the teaching or we flounder. And brethren, when I say great experiences, I'm not just talking about amazement, awe, that you have some good feeling rise up inside.

I'm talking about great experiences of victory in your life. Victory over sin. Victory over depression and self-pity and lethargy and sloppy living and mediocrity. That's what I'm talking about. Great experiences of overcoming something that has had you in its grips for a long time that you haven't been able to break away from.

You can't just say, well, I'm going to mindlessly go try to live the Christian life. No, Paul says to the Colossians, set your mind on things above. That comes before put away all the earthly garbage in your life.

Get your mind in the right place. You must consider yourself dead to sin. Therefore, stop sinning. You see, there's a mindset that goes with all this. Brethren, we're headed somewhere. And I just want to remind you, Paul is speaking about power right now not just because he wants you to have your hair blown backward and say, wow, that's impressive.

It's because he wants you to feel this reality. You see, if you were just sitting down reading the whole letter, you're going to read about the power in the second half of chapter 1, and then you're going to get to these imperatives in 3, 4, 5, or 4, 5, 6 very quickly.

Doctrine Applied Through Christian Obedience

I want you to think about some of the imperatives that are coming at us. Speak the truth with your neighbor. That's an imperative. And you notice he just says, do it. Not, oh, I understand, you're a defeated Christian.

No, if you really grasp the truths of power that are in the beginning, then when you get to these imperatives, you don't throw up your arms and say, who is he to tell me to do that? How can I do that?

Me, who's given to living this life like this? How can he just expect that I'm going to not grieve the Spirit? How's he just going to expect that no corrupting talk's going to come from my mouth? Or that I'm not going to let the sun go down on my anger?

Or give no opportunity to the devil? And no longer steal? Let all bitterness, wrath, anger, clamor, slander be put away from you with all malice. Be kind to one another. How can I be kind to one another when I'm not a kind person?

You see where all this is coming from? He's talking about Christians. You need God's Spirit to peel the scales off your eyes and cause you to recognize who you are and what sort of power is active in your life.

So that when you get here, you don't throw up your arms and say, this is impossible. Because He's just told you it's not. Walk in love as Christ loved. Sexual immorality. Impurity. Covetousness. Not even to be named among you.

Walk as children of light. Take no part in the unfruitful works of darkness. Wives, submit. Husbands, love. This is where we're headed. It's like, what? You mean I'm just supposed to love my wife? What if my wife isn't lovable?

Mine is. I mean, I just heard a man talk to me like that. How am I supposed to do this when she's like that? Because Christ is like that. It all comes back to the very truths that make up these theological foundations early in this letter.

You're not to be passive. You see, so often, we say, well, I'm going to wait. I'm going to pray. I want a blessing. I want to feel something. And then I'll go do this. But see, when Paul gets to these imperatives, that's not how he talks.

Isn't it amazing? He expects you to do it. He tells you to do it. There is an expectation. He expects you not to be passive. He expects you not to sit in your sin. We're expected to exercise the power that is at work within us.

The reason Paul is praying that you would realize what is the exceeding greatness of power that you already have that's directed towards you is so that you don't just spend your time always and forever praying for something that he's telling you you already have.

Go use it. Apply it. Church of God, arise! Arise! Because you can. You can. Don't be forever and always praying that you might have the strength and power to resist the flesh and resist the devil and kill sin.

Christian, this power is directed towards you already. And I know how you feel. You feel like I feel. I'm like you. We're conscious of our failures. We're conscious of our defeats. Solution. Yes, pray.

I'm not telling you not to pray. But that's not where we stop. Yes, pray. Ask for God's help. But you don't sit then and wait for God to somehow zap you with a certain feeling. You don't just... People, I know I hear this.

I don't think I hear it from any of you folks, but people say let go and let God. And you know, we can talk about abiding in Christ. And we have to be careful that we don't see abiding in Christ as just this kind of passive approach to the Christian life.

Like, yes, I'm just going to sit here and I am going to mystically abide in Christ and I'm praying for Him. He's going to kill the lust. He's going to kill the passions. He's going to put to death sin.

And I'm praying and I'm abiding. That's not what's happening. Do you remember how it is in Scripture? Do you remember how it always is? David takes the battlefield before the head is off the giant. It almost seems like the Lord is disgusted with Moses when He tells him, what are you doing standing there praying to Me?

Go. They go. The sea opens up before them. Do you remember how it was with the priests when they got to the Jordan? No, don't stand back a thousand yards and watch the waters recede. You put your foot in the water and then the waters receded.

It's not, Peter, you should just stay in the boat and expect that Jesus is going to cause you to float out and onto the water. Now you see, the miracle happened. Peter jumps out of the boat. This is the Christian life.

And that's why I just felt like, you know what, we've been going for quite a while and here we are, and he's talking about power and I'm recognizing this power that he is talking about directly relates to these imperatives that are coming.

I didn't want to leave that untouched as we're diving into this today. Scripture is plain and straight forward, brethren. Put to death what is earthly in you. Don't wait. Don't procrastinate. Don't make excuses.

Put it to death. This is no vain call for you to do what you cannot do. This is what you say to people. Look, you say these kinds of radical statements to people. It's the kind of thing that you say to people that are convinced of the truth that believers in the Lord Jesus Christ have an exceeding greatness of the power of God that is directed towards them, that's connected.

That is part of the power that raised Christ from the dead. It's an expression of, if not the very thing, if not the very power that raised Him from the dead, like I said last week, pulls all of us up.

We're pulled up with Him. We've been made alive with Him. We've been raised with Him. We're seated in heavenly places with Him in Christ. This is the reality. People who really recognize that, then you come along and you say radical things to them like this.

Wow! There's such a power at work in my life. It doesn't mean you go around feeling some pulsating power going through you. We live by faith, brethren. We live by faith in these realities. Not by feeling.

Not by sight. You see, if you wait for the electrical current to flow through you and you feel the blessing, then you don't move. It's by faith. The whole book. But these first three chapters are for your faith so that when you get to the imperatives, you move in faith.

You're trusting. To our text, brethren. Look at v. 19. So the third of these three specific petitions about this knowledge of God that He wants them to have revelation of and their eyes open to it. We've been looking at it for a number of weeks.

Resurrection Power and the Ascended Christ

What is the immeasurable greatness of His power toward us who believe? According to the working of His great might that He worked in Christ when He raised Him from the dead. Now what's very interesting is this.

We think about resurrection power. Oh, that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection. I want you to see something. I want you to notice something. There is tremendous power associated with the resurrection.

You see that throughout the Scriptures. He's declared to be the Son of God with power. It comes back to the Spirit of holiness and the resurrection being raised from the dead. Tremendous power. But as He talks about power here, He talks a lot more about the ascension and the reign of Jesus Christ.

He elaborates on that more. Now, He's not digressing. He's not chasing rabbits here like preachers do. It's not just that He got lifted up into glory thinking about the resurrection and the ascension, and so He feels like He has to bust loose in worship and take us in a different direction.

Paul bursts forth in worship in some of these and undoubtedly his heart is very full as he's saying all this. But I want you to recognize, it's not like suddenly he digresses from the subject matter at hand.

This power that he is talking about is very much manifested in the ascension and the reign of Christ. He's talking about the power of God in the life of the believer. And he says, believer, if you want to believe that, if you want to see that, if you want to comprehend that, here is the resurrection and here is the ascension and here He is seated at the right hand of the Majesty on High far above all rule and authority and power and dominion and above every name that is named.

And he wants you to see that. Why? Brethren, that is going to impact whether you're kind to one another. Now, I'm not saying he says that only so that you be kind. He's saying that undoubtedly will lift us up in worship.

Undoubtedly to see the greatness of Christ. Undoubtedly. But he's headed somewhere. And this reality, that matters. When you go out there and you face the temptations, Christ being there matters. And He's unfolding this for us.

For us. I want you to grab three words here. And all your Bibles have them. Unless you have the Holman Christian. Notice the last three words in v. 22. To the church. Holman says, for the church. Same meaning.

Christ's Reign as a Gift to the Church

To the church. Now there's a number of prepositional phrases here. We can move them around and do no damage to the text. You see how it reads. V. 22, He put all things under His feet and gave Him as head over all things to the church.

Just flip some of those prepositional phrases and you have this. God has given Christ to the church as head over all things. To the church. The church is the recipient of the gift. It is Christ as head.

Not just Christ. It is Christ as head with all things under His feet. That's what the gift is. The gift is the reigning Christ. What sort of gift is that? Paul prayed for the Ephesians. God, give them eyes to see it.

God, give us eyes to see it. Listen, think with me for a second. God has put all things under the feet of Him who you are one with. He is head. You are body. There is one. There is union. You are united in Him.

You are with Him. The power that raised Him raises you. You are raised with Him. You are given life with Him. You are seated, it says, with Him. We're one. You are one with Him who loves you. You are one with Him who died for you.

You are one with Him who suffered the wrath of God for you. And He is reigning as a gift for you. That means you benefit. That means it's for your sake, brethren. It's for you that He reigns. It's for you that all things are put under His feet.

Think with me about what that means. That means that every obstacle that stands in your way to overcoming whatever sin is in your life, that is under His feet. Every temptation, under His feet. The devil is under His feet.

The demons are under His feet. Everything is under His feet. Your flesh, under His feet. This world, under His feet. He has His heel. Everything's under His feet. When you think about the obstacles, the enemies, you can imagine Him digging His heel in.

That's for you. That's what we're getting here. It's all for you. Your lusts, under His feet. The things that tempt you, under His feet. I know the devil taunts you. I know he molests under His feet. There's attractions out there in this world.

Under His feet. It's all under His feet. Christ, we are told in Scripture, has been given a name that is above every name. We see that God has exalted Him above every name. Given a name above every name that every knee should bow and every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord.

What we're being told here at the end of Ephesians 1 is church, it is for you. It's for you. We need to live in the power of that. And all that may help us is under His feet. I think of angels ministering spirits under His feet.

Brethren, what it's saying is it's for you. It's at your disposal. I even think of the picture. I was thinking this morning about this picture that we get in Revelation 12. And I know there's all sorts of symbolism going on here.

But what you have is the woman who I believe is a picture of the church, the people of God, the true Israel. And there she is in Revelation 12. And what's happening? The devil is after her. The devil shoots this flood out of his mouth.

What comes out of his mouth? Lies. It's the heresies and the lies of the devil. And he seeks to sweep the church away. But what happens? The earth opens up its mouth and swallows the river and the woman's saved.

Everything that can help you under Christ's feet. The world. Everything. That's the idea here. Everything at His disposal. Christ is all-powerful for you. This has everything to do with the power He's talking about.

And Christ is ruling and reigning. He's at the right hand of God. And it is for you. We need to really grasp this. Christ mastering. Christ ruling. Christ reigning. It's for you. Brethren, live in the power of that.

This is no small thing. Don't you recognize? Your flesh is no match for Him. Your lusts are no match for Him. Your evil desires are no match. Whatever sin, no match. The devil himself, even if you had the Prince Himself of the power of the air.

No match. He is stronger than the strong man. He binds the strong man. And what we're being told is it's for the church. It's for you. See, let those three words go out of this place with those three words ringing in your head.

It is for you. It is for you. It is for you. Christ is the head. We are the body. We are connected to Him. We are one with Him who has His foot on the neck of all. It's for us. Brethren, do you hear me?

There's no excuse to live a defeated life. And what are you going to say to these truths? You see, if you go and you try to love and put off sexual immorality and walk as children of light and love your wife and submit to your husband, if you try to do that in a theological vacuum, it doesn't work.

It doesn't work because all you'll try to do is this thing in your power and gritting your teeth. It doesn't work. It doesn't fly. But it's in light of these vast realities. You come face to face with it and you see it's faith.

Christ is at the right hand of the Father over all rule and authority and power and dominion. He is over all. And it's for me. It's for me. What excuse do I have then to not love my wife? What excuse do I have then not to walk worthy of the calling to which I have been called?

What excuse can we come up with? Brethren, this is the kind of thing you think over to Romans 8. There's a place there where Paul says, he says, Christian, you are no debtor to the flesh. Have you ever thought about that?

What's he saying? It doesn't own you. You don't owe it anything. You're not subservient to it. The flesh, you don't owe it anything. You don't owe it any allegiance. You can walk from it. Let me tell you something.

You don't owe the devil any allegiance. You don't owe your sin any allegiance. You don't owe your lusts any allegiance. You don't owe your flesh any allegiance. You don't owe this world any allegiance.

And there is One who is on the throne to give you power to walk away from the grip of all of it. Paul says there in that same portion of Scripture, sin shall have no dominion over you. Why? Because Christ is on the throne.

Brethren, this is the very truth that we find embraced in the Great Commission. All authority, all power is Mine. Therefore, go do the impossible. I'm with you. You see, He's yours. He's with you for your sake.

Go make disciples. Have you ever tried to make a disciple in your own power? How are you ever going to do that? But you see, he says this, all authority, I'm on the throne. It's all Mine. My Father put it under My feet.

All of it's Mine. Therefore, you go. Well, what good does that do Me if you have the authority, but you're telling Me to go? I'm going to be with you. It's for you. I'm with you. No excuse, brethren. No excuse.

No excuse for your sin. There is no excuse for you to live defeated. None. None. Christ is over all for us. This is why Paul can say, put away everything earthly. This is why James can say, resist the devil.

This is why John can say, don't love the world. Why? Brethren, you have the power. This is at work in us. And Him being there, He rules for us. Just listen to this. This is precisely how Paul lived his life.

Colossians 1 .29. For this, I toil. Paul's toiling. This is Paul's life. Now I know he's speaking about something very specific in the context, but this basically summarizes his life and all Christian life.

For this, I toil. No passivity here. Toiling is not passive. That's work. That's get to work. That's what Paul's saying, I work. I toil. I put everything into this. That's what he's saying. For this, I toil.

Struggling with all His Christ's energy that He powerfully works within me. All has been put under the authority of Christ. And He's with us. Therefore, we live. You see the therefore? Therefore, we do.

The indicative. The imperative. The indicative is there He is. The imperative, live your life like you believe He is there and everything's under His feet. You're seated with Him. Not only are you seated with Him, have you ever noticed how it says that the God of peace is going to shortly have your heel on Satan's neck?

What a picture. Everything's been put under His feet and yet we find the master of deception. We find the archenemy Himself. God's going to put your foot. You see, we're one with Christ. He's with us.

And He's with us to empower us. Before I move off of this, I want you to think about something. Notice the text again. Ephesians 1 .22, "...And He put all things under His feet.". Now notice that part of it.

"...And gave Him His head over all things to the church.". We don't want to pass over the significance of that enormous statement. Paul didn't invent those words. He read them somewhere else. You know where he might have got them from?

Anybody have any idea? Genesis. I can see why you say that and there's definitely a connection there. These words right here are actually a quote from Psalm 8. They are quoted somewhere else in the New Testament too, but I just want to read to you from Psalm 8.

You don't have to turn there, but listen very carefully to this. Verses 3 -6. David says, "...When I looked at your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars which you have set in place...".

What is man? Now you recognize what's happening. David is blown away by the night sky. The hugeness. The vastness. You look at that sky for very long and you start to recognize how big God is. And you start feeling pretty little.

That's what's happening. And he says this, what is man? What is man that you are mindful of Him and the Son of Man that you care for Him? "...Yet, you have made Him, man, a little lower than the heavenly beings or the angels and crowned Him with glory and honor.

You've given Him dominion over the works of your hands.". Here it is. "...And you have put all things under His feet.". I want you to see the connection. What God has given to the church in bringing Christ up from the dead, soaring through the heavens, and seated in glory.

You need to feel it for what it is. He says He's put all things under His feet. What God has given to the church is the Man Jesus Christ to rule over all rule and authority and power and dominion. It is under the feet of a man that God has placed all things.

It is the preeminent glorified Man who has been exalted up on high next to the Father. You need to feel this. This means that human nature has been raised to the surpassing height of glory. It is a Man who is up there.

Do you recognize that? Do you recognize the significance of that? Or consider these words. You can turn here. Turn to Hebrews 2. Because these words are more extensively quoted and clearly Christ is seen in these words by the author of Hebrews.

Hebrews 2. Verse 5,. For it was not to angels that God subjected the world to come, of which we are speaking. It has been testified somewhere. But we know where, right? He did too. It's been testified somewhere.

What is man that you are mindful of him? Or the Son of Man that you care for Him? You made Him for a little while lower than the angels. You have crowned Him with glory and honor, putting everything in subjection under His feet.

Sound familiar? Very familiar. Everything in subjection under His feet. But now notice the author of Hebrews. Now in putting everything in subjection to Him, He left nothing outside His control. That's an interesting statement that he makes.

Nothing is left out. But then the author of Hebrews says, but I look around and I'm troubled. Because what I see doesn't seem to line up with what I read. This is basically what you have happening here.

He says, at present, we do not yet see everything in subjection to Him. But then he says this, but when we look around, we also see something else. We see Him, Christ, who for a little while was made lower than the angels.