The Power of God Revealed in Christ and His Body

Psalm 110 and Revelation 5 as the Scripture Readings

Please stand for the reading of God's Word. Our Old Testament reading this morning is found in Psalm chapter, on Psalm 110. The Lord says to my Lord, said at my right hand, until I make your enemies your footstool, the Lord sends forth from Zion your mighty scepter, rule in the midst of your enemies.

Your people will offer themselves freely on the day of your power and holy garments from the womb of the morning. The dew of your youth will be yours. The Lord has sworn and will not change his mind. You are a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek.

The Lord is at your right hand. He will shatter kings on the day of his wrath. He will execute judgment among the nations, filling them with corpses. He will shatter chiefs over the wide earth. He will drink from the brook by the way.

Therefore, he will lift up his head. New Testament scripture reading this morning is found in Revelation chapter five. Then I saw in the right hand of him who was seated on the throne a scroll written within and on the back, sealed with seven seals.

And I saw a mighty angel proclaiming with a loud voice who is worthy to open the scroll and break its seals. And no one in heaven or on earth or under the earth was able to open the scroll or to look into it.

And I began to weep loudly because no one was found worthy to open the scroll or to look into it. And one of the elders said to me, weep no more. Behold, the lion of the tribe of Judah, the root of David has conquered so that he can open the scroll and its seven seals.

And between the throne and the four living creatures and among the elders, I saw a lamb standing as though it had been slain with seven horns and with seven eyes, which are the seven spirits of God sent out into all the earth.

And he went and took the scrolls from the right hand of him who was seated on the throne. And when he had taken the scroll, the four living creatures and the 24 elders fell down before the lamb, each holding a harp and golden bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of the saints.

And they sang a new song saying, worthy are you to take the scroll and to open its seals. For you were slain and by your blood, you ransom people for God from every tribe and language and people and nation.

And you have made them a kingdom and priests to our God and they shall reign on the earth. Then I looked and I heard around the throne and the living creatures and the elders, the voice of many angels, numbering myriads of myriads and thousands of thousands saying with a loud voice, worthy is the lamb who was slain to receive power and wealth and wisdom and might and honor and glory and blessing.

And I heard every creature in heaven and on earth and under the earth and in the sea and all that is in them saying, to him who sits on the throne and to the lamb, be blessing and honor and glory and might forever and ever.

And the four living creatures said, amen. And the elders fell down and worshiped. You may be seated.

Paul’s Thanksgiving for Faith, Love, and Spiritual Blessings

Good morning. Thank you for your singing. Open your Bibles to Ephesians chapter one, Ephesians chapter one. The end of that hymn, there's a version of it where you get really, really high. His kingdom is forever.

And it gets really, really high. Who knows that version? Who's ever sang it that way?

Am I the only one?

I'm swear, there's a version. There's, yeah, where at the end, his kingdom is forever. And then it just goes, I'm not gonna try it. But my family sings it that way. And so every time it gets to it, the kids get a little excited.

I think they get a little disappointed.

When we don't do it that way.

But it's a good hymn, nevertheless. Ephesians chapter one. We'll read 15 through 23, verses 15 through 23. Lord willing, finish the first chapter today. So Ephesians one, verse 15. The apostle Paul says, for this reason, because I have heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus Christ and your love towards all the saints, I do not cease to give thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers, that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you the spirit of wisdom and of revelation and the knowledge of him.

Having the eyes of your hearts enlightened, that you may know what is the hope to which he has called you, what are the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints, and 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 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 feet and gave him as head over all things to the church.

The church is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all. Let us pray. Father, Lord, what a passage before us and with trepidation I come now in this next few minutes that I am tasked with exegeting it, with exposing it to the people before me.

And Lord, I am weak for the task. I am unable of my own power to do anything that would be pleasing to you, but it's through Jesus Christ that I come before you, needing his grace to proclaim anything of worth.

And Lord, it is a spirit that animates the body of Christ to work in a way that glorifies the Lord for all that he has done in salvation and calling out a people. And so I rely upon him in my weakness now.

And I pray that through your work through the spirit, you might aid me now to proclaim your word in a way that is understandable and compelling, that would grip the hearts of the people before me and challenge them to look to Jesus further and to change in the direction of his image.

Lord, I pray for the unbelievers before me too, that they would turn from their sins and look to Jesus that's found in these scriptures and know that their life is found in him and him alone. And I pray that you would be with the hearers, their hearts would be open by the work of the spirit so that in all things you would be glorified and in all things it'd be for our good, that by your power we would be the church, the body, that we would, Lord, be the fullness of Christ here on earth who fills all and in all.

We praise you for his work. In Jesus' name, amen. So here we are towards the end of chapter one of Ephesians, chapter one, and again, just to remind ourselves real quick of context, after praising God for all the spiritual blessings at the beginning of this chapter, remember we're chosen for adoption through redemption with the inheritance sealed, and we know it's from the Father in Christ practiced by the spirit.

Paul, you remember last week, moves on to a prayer of thanksgiving and petition in light of these spiritual blessings. You remember he's thankful that the Ephesians evidence their participation in the spiritual blessings by their faith in Jesus and love for the saints.

So this challenged us that we would place our faith in Jesus so we could participate in those spiritual blessings that are available to us and we would show that that's happening for our love for one another.

And so this kind of turned into a thankfulness from Paul that the spiritual blessings were shown itself in the people there by their faith and love, and also it then turns into a petition, if you remember.

In verse 17, remember he says that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you the spirit of wisdom, of revelation, and the knowledge of him. And so in other words, he wants us, he wants the people of Ephesians, he wants us, the petition is, is to know and practice the glory of the Father, if you remember.

That the spiritual blessings in the heavenlies display the glories of the Father, and he wants us to know that and practice it to know it more, to have a spirit of revelation, of knowledge, of growth in these things.

And we saw that in verse 18, it produces hope in the inheritance when that's happening in our lives. When we, you remember the pie in the sky, spiritual realities, blessings become at home in our heart and becomes our practice in life, it becomes our hope for the final inheritance.

The life that we live today of spiritual blessings in the today becomes our hope that we will get the full inheritance tomorrow. And we saw that it also gives in verse 19 a conviction when we're practicing, when we're growing, a conviction of God's power.

In verse 19, and that's where we left off and where we're gonna proceed forth, and what is the immeasurable greatness of his power towards us who believe according to the working of his might. And so this petition now is that you would grow in understanding and realizing the spiritual blessings laid up for us in the heavenlies, it would grow you in your hope and your conviction of the power of God in your lives.

And then he switches then from really petition to, he goes from petition to description of what that power is in light of all the spiritual blessings. Going forth from 20 to 23, he goes from petition to description of what this power is.

Just on the outside we need to settle on the fact that he's done this because when you read verse 19, imagine just reading it right now in your own time and you read in 19, and what is the immeasurable greatness of his power towards you or towards us who believe according to the working of his might, what do you think of when you hear the power of God for you who believe?

What do you consider when you read the power of God in you? Where does your mind go to? If you're not careful, you don't challenge yourself, your mind will just automatically think of something and you won't even consider it and you'll just keep on reading.

But it's times like that when we need to rest for a moment, especially as we have this next few minutes, where does your mind go to, oh church, when you read that the power of God is yours in Christ? I think, especially for the unbeliever, but we can be influenced as well, as is often, we can think of this power in like a genie from Aladdin kind of a thing.

And don't worry, this isn't gonna be an Aladdin series where I have these scenes from Aladdin and we talk about it and everything like that. But nevertheless, there's things to be understood. I think we can grab hold of that, that the power of God can be like a genie in which as you watch that movie, you notice that although he has great pomp and display, genie actually ends up being a very powerless person.

He's actually just enslaved in the lamp, enslaved to the human, whoever gets him out, and enslaved to do whatever they want him to do. If you notice throughout the movie, he's actually as powerful as he seems, he actually displays himself to be very powerless in the fact that he's a slave to the desires of whoever gives him out.

In fact, he is enslaved, he has those shackles on his wrists. And I think a lot of times we can, especially the unbeliever, but even the church, when we consider the power of God, we think of him doing a lot of great powerful things, but it's all according to the whims of what we want him to do.

And so really, he's not powerful at all, he's just simply our slave. But that's not the power of God displayed in Christ as we see in verse 19. That's not the power Paul has in mind here. The power of God is something he does for you instead of something he brings, or I'm sorry, and the understanding is that the power of God is something he does for you, when really the full understanding of it is it's something he brings you to.

And I think this misunderstood power is a common theme in the scriptures, especially with Jesus and his coming. There's a misunderstanding of what exactly does it look like that Jesus has all power and authority and he has come to give us of that power or to display that power.

What does that look like? It's been misunderstood since the very beginning. Now, I think a very good example of that, if you want to go with me, go to John 6. It's a great example of that. The feeding of the thousands, 5 ,000, 5 ,000, and Jesus performs this miracle twice.

And it's in the gospels, it's in every one of them, and so it's an important event as we can see. And we see in chapter six, verse five, lifting up his eyes and seeing that a large crowd was coming towards him, Jesus said to Philip, where are we to buy bread so that these people may eat?

He said this, excuse me, he said this to test him for he himself knew what he was going to do. Philip answered him, 200 denarii worth of bread would not be enough for each of them to get a little. One of his disciples, Andrew, Simon Peter's brother, said to him, there's a boy here who has five barley loaves and two fish, but what are they for so many?

Honestly, it would be almost laughable that he even brought that up with such a great crowd. Jesus said, have the people sit down. Now there was much grass in the place, so the men sat down, about 5 ,000 in number.

Jesus then took the loaves and when he had given thanks, he distributed them to those who were seated, so also the fish as much as they wanted. And when they had eaten their fill, he told his disciples, gather up the leftover fragments.

Not only there was enough, but there was leftover. That nothing may be lost, so they gathered them up and filled 12 baskets with fragments from the five barley loaves left by those who had eaten. When the people saw the sign that he had done, they said, this is indeed the prophet who is to come into the world.

When they beheld his power, they gave that great explanation, that great understanding that they had of Messiah. Perceiving then that they were about to come and make him king by force, Jesus withdrew again to the mountain by himself.

So there we have a display of Jesus' power and the way that the people around them understood it was very much not in line with what Jesus wanted them to understand of it, and so he actually has to force them away from himself so they don't try to make him king.

And we see the explanation of that and it's an explanation that we don't get in the other gospels, but if you look at verse 24, so when the crowd saw that Jesus was not there, they wanted to find him the next day, nor his disciples, they themselves got into boats and went to Capernaum seeking Jesus.

And when they found him on the other side of the sea, they said to him, Rabbi, when did you come here? And Jesus answered them, truly, truly, I say to you, you are seeking me, not because you saw signs, but because you ate your fill of the loaves.

What's he saying there? He's saying, you're seeking me, but you're seeking me because of a display of power in which you're taking it in the wrong way. It's not a sign of me being Messiah and giving you the greater of the power, the greaterness of what I can provide you, but it's simply because I'm powerful enough to give you some food.

He says, do not work for the food that perishes, in verse 27, but for the food that endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give to you, for on him, God the Father has set his seal. So you see what he's saying?

He's saying you need to look beyond that. There is a greater power on display that you completely missed. Surely Jesus was powerful enough to give him food whenever he wanted to, but the greater power on display is that he could give them a spiritual drink, a spiritual food, that they are completely blinded to.

They are rather satisfied with a lesser display of power rather than the greater power of eternal life. And so they said to him, what must we do to be doing the works of God? Jesus answered them, this is the work of God.

This is the power, that you believe in Jesus whom he has sent. So they said to him, then what sign do you do, what do, that we may see and believe you? What work do you perform? In other words, they want more power from him.

They want more of that power that they saw the other day and be fed more. He says, our fathers ate the manna in the wilderness. As it is written, he gave them bread from heaven to eat. Jesus then said to them, truly, truly, I say to you, it was not Moses who gave you the bread from heaven, but my father gives you the true bread from heaven.

For the bread of God is he who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world. They said to him, sir, give us this bread always. We see that there has always been a misunderstanding. And we see this in a little form here with the unbelieving Jews here.

But this is not just a problem that they have. There is this understanding that God is all powerful and that he can give his power. But what we want from him, the power that we want from him is a very limited thing.

It's not the full capacity that he wants to give to his people. We see this misunderstood power, that's when we see, what does it mean that Jesus gives us power, that we are given power? We can see that many times our hearts and minds don't go to the heights of what Jesus wants and what he has in mind with that power.

Our minds and hearts don't go up to the heights of what he wants it to be in order to realize the totality of the power he has for his people. Instead, like the Jews, we can be satisfied with the things of this life, the physical things in this life.

If I just have my health, my wealth, and my prosperity, then that's the power that God has for me. But the thing is, that's a very limited power. And in fact, that doesn't always display the full power that God wants to reveal to you in Jesus.

And in fact, if your heart is satisfied with that when he doesn't give you that because it's not part of that whole power he wants to give to you, you will go away, you will flee. And so it's very important for us to know, to define what is the power that he has given us through the Lord Jesus Christ.

There's another example of misunderstanding. We won't go there. But you remember in Acts 1, let's just go there. Acts 1, Acts chapter 1, it's the same misunderstanding of power displayed from the apostles.

In Acts chapter 1 verse 6, so when they had come together, and it's the disciples, right, as Jesus is about to go up to go back to be with the Father, they asked him, Lord, will you at this time restore the kingdom to Israel?

And what they're saying is, okay, now you did this weird thing where you came back from the dead, so now are you going to do all the powerful things that we had in mind the Messiah would do? Are you gonna go to Jerusalem?

Are you gonna kick the Romans out? And are you gonna have that Davidic kingdom on display there? Is that the power we're gonna see? Again, misunderstanding of the power that God has for his people. God never had intended that his power would be revealed in such a physical way.

It is a deeper spiritual power on display. So that's why he says, it's not for you to know times or seasons that the Father has fixed by his own authority, but you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and all Judea and Samaria and to the end of the earth.

So you notice what Jesus is saying, that you will receive power when the Spirit comes and you will proclaim my kingdom through all the world and that will be the display of my power. The display of my power isn't a physical thing that you see coming in which you hope for, but it is a deeper reality, a deeper spiritual power, one of forgiveness of sins that we're gonna get to.

So the point here though is that misunderstanding of the power revealed from God is a common occurrence for all of his creation and even for the Christian, even for the believer. So when we read and what is the immeasurable greatness of his power towards us who believe according to the working of his might, locate where perhaps you have a misunderstanding of what that power is and then let the scriptures tell you what the true power is that he has in mind.

What is that power?

Well, I think 20, 21 and 22 goes from a petition to a description and chapter or verse 20 is a definition of that power. Verse 21 is the surety of that power and verse 22 is the practice of that power.

The definition, the surety, the practice. So first, what is that power then? If it's not this misconception that we can build up in our heads and hearts. And again, something I feel like I didn't probably place at home enough in you is that yeah, surely you're not sitting there thinking Jesus is gonna give me food and drink like he did in John 6.

But at the same time, we still can be enamored by this idea that I can have this wealth and prosperity in some degree in our heart. And that's located in every one of your hearts. Everyone struggles to a certain degree with that.

But there is a power that goes beyond that. And so what is that? Well, look at verse 20. What's the definition? That he worked in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places.

That is the power of God displayed in Jesus for the believer, right there. That he worked in Christ when he raised him from the dead. It is very fascinating that the power of God, the beauties of it, the full capacity of it is not the fact that he brought food out of nowhere and fed people so much they had enough of it to where there's extra.

But that a savior died. A savior died. Son of God, truly God, takes on flesh and dies. There's power right there. To the unbeliever, to the one who's not mature in their thinking, that doesn't make any sense.

If you don't understand what God is doing in world affairs, in creation, that doesn't make any sense. That the power of God is fully revealed in Jesus in the fact that he came and died, but we know that he didn't stay dead.

It's that he rose from the dead and is seated at his right hand in the heavenly places. Power displayed right there. How is that? Because it's, you know, the curse that God has placed upon all humanity is death.

Because of our sin and turned away from God, he has placed this curse of death in which it's in the power of the hand of Satan. And the son of God, son of man, comes and he says, look what I do to knock Satan on his butt.

Or on his behind, excuse me, if you have children in here. I have came and I have taken on sin, not my own, but my people, and I have brought a whole curses of it that even I have died, which is the final curse of sin.

And look what I did with that. I rose again three days later. So Jesus is showing that the greatest curse ever placed on humanity, right? The greatest deviance that we could even consider that we would go away from God and sin.

He says, I place that upon myself and I conquered it three days later in my life. But you see, that's not just the power displayed though. It's not like Jesus was just like, ha ha, you guys can't do it.

And look at, I can, there's my power, ha ha. You know, we all just think, oh, we can't do that, right? But Jesus, he did. That is supposed to then come to us. The power is not just in the fact that he did it, but the fact that he did it then trickles down to us.

That power is displayed in that. And so that's why when we talk about his death and resurrection, it's always in light of how it affects us. Not that it becomes all about us, it's all about Jesus. But his death and life flows down to us and that power is revealed in that.

Look at, we see this both positionally in our righteousness and practically in our righteousness. Look at Romans 4, 24. Look at verse 22, actually. That is why his faith, as Abraham, was counted to him as righteousness.

But the words it was counted to him were not written for his sake alone, but for ours also. It will be counted to us who believe in him, who raised from the dead Jesus our Lord, who was delivered up for our trespasses and raised for our justification.

So we see that in the death and resurrection of Jesus, we see our sins being put to death with Jesus and in his resurrection to new life, we see our justification are being declared righteous in that.

And when you consider the fact that your greatest problem is not that you have a rumbling stomach right now because you might be hungry because we're getting closer to lunch, but it's because that you are not righteous before God.

That is your greatest problem. The greatest power revealed is an ending of that greatest problem. That though you were once unrighteous, you have been made righteous by the death and resurrection of Jesus.

He was delivered up for our sins and raised for our justification. So that's why that power is revealed, not just in the fact that he did it, but that him doing it intimately involves you who have faith in him.

That his resurrection means your justification. That's why we're never tired of worshiping him in light of his resurrection. That's why people ask us, every Easter you worship, you talk about the same thing.

Every Lord's Day we talk about the same thing. Every day we talk about the same thing to our soul, that my Savior died and rose again for my eternal life. This is the power of the gospel. And that's a positional righteousness.

You are positionally righteous. I am righteous positionally. I stand righteous before God the Father because of my Savior, Jesus Christ, who has rose up again for my justification. But there is a power involved beyond just positional righteousness.

And that is a practice of righteousness. Look at Romans 6. Romans 6, the death and resurrection of Jesus has power to make you practically righteous. Practically, that means your practice becomes righteous.

Again, remember this the next time you are really, well, the next time all of you who are struggling with that sin that you're struggling with right now, that the power of the gospel is revealed in the fact that the death and resurrection of Jesus changes my practice today.

And that's what we see in Romans 6, right? What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound? By no means. How can we who had died to sin still live in it? It says, do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death?

We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death and or that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory or power or revealing of the father, we too might walk in newness of life. Do you see the power revealed there?

That your ability to go from walking in sin? And if you're honest with yourself, just how powerful is sin in your heart? And just how much does it, oh, look tempting. I need to live for that. That needs to be.

I mean, every one of you, if you're honest with yourself, you know just how tempting sin is. And to live in it, it just seems like there's so much life there. But the power of the cross or the power of Christ, the power of his death and resurrection, it's according to what happened 2000 years ago that you can have a power to avoid that, to go away from that sin and live in righteousness.

That's the power of God revealed in Christ for you. It says in verse five, for if we have been united with him in a death like his, we shall certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his. We know that our old self, the sinful self, the old man, was crucified with him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin for one who has died has been set free from sin.

Now, if we have died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. We know that Christ being raised from the dead will never die again. Death no longer has dominion over him. For the death he died, he died to sin once for all.

But the life he lives, he lives to God. So you, notice that power is not just found in Jesus and just look at what he did, but it actually flows down to us in that power. So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus.

There is this definition of power. What your mind needs to rest on when you see that the greatness of the immeasurable greatness of his power towards us who believe is that he worked it in Christ first when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places.

Now, seated him in the right hand of the heavenly places is exactly what I was just saying, that it goes down to you. That he didn't just die and that's it, but he has now a kingdom from on high. He is at the right hand of the father that denotes his power and authority.

That he didn't just do the work, but he went up to be with the father and now he reigns with that power and he gives it on high. So in other words, that's what Jesus is doing right now. That's what his power's revealed and changed lives from his body and from his people.

That we would go from dead to sin alive in Christ and he does it all by being at the right hand of the father reigning supreme. So he has done the work and he reigns on high to make sure that power is then revealed in us now.

So that goes on to our next point, the surety of this power. In verse 21, far above all rule and authority and power and dominion and above every name that is named, not only in this age, but in the one to come in eternity.

So Paul right there is basically saying there is nothing, no power, no authority, no nothing that is higher than Jesus or at the same level they are all under him. Now why is that really nice to hear?

Because in the day of battle against sin in which you failed and you're thinking I am so weak, where is the victory? I can't do this. That is when you need to know exactly what Jesus Christ has done for you.

The power is found in him. He's at the right hand of the father reigning on high and that kingdom is to give you righteousness both positionally and practically. So that him reigning on high above all everything, there is no power too strong for him.

So your ability to fight your sin is found in the fact that Jesus is above it all. There is no name above him. And this is why Romans eight is so good. And this is exactly what Paul gets at in Romans eight.

Go there with me please.

Romans eight.

Romans 8 .31. What then shall we say to these things? And what I love about good theology is that these verses that are like on mugs and on our refrigerator, that we say oh that's cute, it actually becomes powerful.

This is one of those things where it's like we loved to hear this for sure but it can become kind of just like a saying that you see all the time and it's just a cute saying. But whenever you solidify yourself in proper theology and you're preaching to yourself, this stuff becomes alive again, right?

What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? What does it mean that he's for us or against us? It means that we are found righteous in his sight. That's what it means to be for us.

That although we were once lawbreakers through Christ, we become righteous in him. He is for us. He who did not spare his own son but gave him up for us, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things?

Who shall bring any charge against God's elect? It is God who justifies by the death and resurrection of Jesus. Who is to condemn? Christ Jesus is the one who died. More than that, who was raised. Who is at the right hand of God, who indeed in his kingdom is interceding for us even now.

Who shall separate us from the love of Christ then? Shall tribulation or distress or persecution, famine, nakedness, danger, sword? It is written, for your sake we are all being killed. We're being killed all the day long.

We are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered. No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor heights, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God that's in Christ Jesus our Lord.

And this is the same mind as we look at the surety of the victory of the power displayed is that Jesus is far above all rule, authority, power, dominion, above every name that is named, not only in this age, but the one to come.

What he's probably referring to there with rule, authority, power, dominion, is the heavenlies, the spiritual dominion, the satanic realm, the demons, the angelic beings, the point is that his kingdom is so above us that to think of it in just physical senses is ridiculous.

He's far above the spiritual kingdom of darkness that the physical kingdoms can't even touch. That's why when Pilate asks, are you a king? And Jesus says, not in this world, the spiritual world, Pilate didn't even have an understanding.

Of what that even means.

In fact, so much so that he says, I don't see any fault with him. Jesus was saying that I am king beyond anything you can even imagine, Pilate. You think the emperor is someone? I am everything. I am above the physical realm.

I am in the spiritual realm. I'm above the spiritual realm. That's a surety of power that will be displayed that the physical kingdoms, what is that? Not even the spiritual kingdom of Satan can touch his power.