Chance? - [Ephesians 6:21-24]

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This is a historic moment in our church today. I've been here almost a decade, and what's going to happen this morning has only happened two other times on Sunday morning in the last eight and one -half years.
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Finishing a book of the New Testament. You can clap if you'd like.
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I got here and did a variety of other things, but started with the attributes of God and then writing to the book of James verse by verse.
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We then picked up Mark verse by verse as we got to see our Savior, as he would do wonderful works and speak.
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And then we have been in the book of Ephesians, and today, unless something happens, we hope to finish
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Ephesians before I go get refreshed and meet up with Kim and the kids tomorrow. The book of Ephesians, if you'll turn there, please, as we wrap up this beautiful epistle that talks about the glory of God, the glory of Christ Jesus in a local church.
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I did want to make one comment while you were turning to the book of Ephesians. I could have gone slower than finishing
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Ephesians in three years. I could have taken six or seven years. Part of the peril of being a pastor is
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I've studied so much throughout the week and I want to give it to you all, but I have to stop and not give you all the details.
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And so I could have probably spoke slower. I could have gone into other issues. But my philosophy here, and should be yours as well when you study the
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Bible, is that slower is better than faster. Deeper is better than superficial.
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The depth and riches of God, if God is what we have just sung, how great He is, how great thou art, quick, superficial, cursory scans through the greatness of God will not do for two reasons.
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Number one, that's not what Paul does when he says God is great. He works through a book like Ephesians or the glory of salvation.
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He works through a book of Romans with just detail, with painstaking, careful, meticulous thoughts.
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And it also won't do you any good if you're in a tough trial. If you have a difficult trial or temptation, do you think superficial theology will help you?
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No. And so we don't want to go through this in some kind of fruitless manner, some kind of quick manner.
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We want the rich content and the glory of God to shine forth. Now if you'll turn to Ephesians 3 just for a moment, we'll jump around before we look at the final benediction.
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But if you wanted to sum up the book of Ephesians in two words, you could do it, in Christ, all the benefits we have, all the blessings from election to redemption to the hope of heaven, to seeing
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Him face to face, to having Jew and Gentile together, all the benefits and blessings that God gives,
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He gives through and only through Christ Jesus. But 321, I think, gives us a broad summary statement of the doctrine of the glory of Christ in a local church.
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This is almost a summary. It's said in a benediction, but it's a good summary of Ephesians. To Him, Ephesians 3 .21,
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be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations forever and ever.
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The glory of God in the local church. The Bride of Christ manifests in a glorious way.
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All of redemption, all of the glory of God comes to the church through Christ Jesus in Him alone.
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And I've so loved Ephesians the last three years, haven't you? Because it makes our thoughts God -centered.
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Exalted thoughts. We live in a narcissistic age, and if I'm not careful, that's how I think. And to somehow go the seeker -sensitive route and to say,
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I'll prepare a sermon based on the congregation and what they want. If seekers come, we have to kind of dumb things down and talk in their terms.
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A, that's not good ecclesiology. It's not proper church doctrine. But second of all, you look at Paul and he writes to the church.
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Some of them weren't even literate. And he tries to raise their thoughts up so they see the glory and the effulgent grace of God in Christ.
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And I love Ephesians because it is God -honoring and God -exalting. And when you preach it, you have to preach the same way.
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We can't preach it. There are four easy steps for all your relationships this week. Five things
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God wants you to know. Four spiritual laws. Three ways to heaven. No, it's two ways to heaven.
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I can't remember all the five, four, three, two, ones. But this is a great remedy for us in our culture, in our church culture, because we fall into the trap of looking inside.
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We look at ourselves instead of properly looking at God and His glory.
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This book is about what God has done. This book of Ephesians is about God and who He is. The everlasting, eternal, thrice holy
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God and what He does with people like us. How He loves us. He molds us into Christ's image.
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The triune God. Can you imagine? We did a little detour about the Trinity, but just think about the triune
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God. Three persons. One essence.
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It's just beyond our minds. And when you start grasping with mysterious, infinite thoughts, it lends itself to worship.
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Whenever we drive by churches, and I hope you do the same, I have four little children, and my kids always ask, does that church preach the
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Word, Dad? Does that church preach the Word, Dad? Because sometimes I'll drive by a church and I'll say, Lord, I know that pastor, and I know they don't preach the
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Word. And if you give me that building, we'll preach the Word in that building. So far we're still here, but Steve Cooley's praying that also now.
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Sometimes I'll drive by Unitarian Universalist churches. You kind of have to work through that a little bit, and so I'll say to Luke, and I'll say to others in the car and to Haley, Unitarian, what's that mean?
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Uni, unicycle, one. One God, no Trinity. They deny the Trinity. And Paul is saying in the book of Ephesians, you can't praise
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God properly unless you see the triune God high and lifted up. Chapter 1, verse 3, from the gun he says, this great
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God is to be praised and blessed and honored because He's triune. Whether we can understand all the details or not, that shouldn't inhibit the praise.
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So I'll say, Son, those people in there need to get saved, and I feel sorry for them. They don't know, and they've heaped up teachers after their own desires.
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And then it only gets worse because Unitarian Universalists, somehow that they're all going to heaven, everyone goes.
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It doesn't matter if you're Pol Pot or if you're Idi Amin or anyone else, everyone goes. And here we see specifically focused in, in the book of Ephesians, the glory of God in the local church, in His beloved ones, in His chosen ones.
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No gospel apart from Christ, according to Ephesians. No salvation, no sanctification, no hope, no anything.
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All of God's purposes, all of God's grace, all of God's blessings, Ephesians says, is through and in Christ alone.
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And if you go back to chapter 1 for a moment, the point or the goal or the telos, the ending of all this discussion about the church, is so we'll praise
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God. And you'll see it three times, three refrains, if you will, to what's been called a hymn, one -sentence hymn in chapter 1, verses 3 through 14.
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You see the point at the end of each Trinitarian section.
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At the end of verse 6, after he talks about election, he says, or the beginning of verse 6 rather, to the praise of the glory of His grace.
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Why Ephesians? Why discussion here about the exalted nature of God so He might be praised?
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Well, what about the Son and His work? What about Jesus Christ and what
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He did? If you look down at verse 12, to the end that we, who were the first to hope in Christ, would be to the praise of His glory.
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This song, this is an epistle about the praise of Christ. And then finally at the end of verse 14, the third refrain, very last words, to the praise of His glory.
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And everything in this book is about the praise of Jesus Christ. How can Jesus Christ make
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Jews and Gentiles, who hated each other, who ostracized themselves from each other, and then take those two and make them into one new person, the one new man, the church?
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How can Jesus Christ take those who are at enmity with God and make them friends?
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How can Jesus Christ take somebody like Paul, a Jewish Pharisee, save him and then send him to the
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Gentiles to preach the gospel, only in Christ Jesus, to the praise of His glory? How can God take a family, a husband and a wife, and then children, contrary to everything that the world thinks and does, and put them together and represent in a beautiful way the bride of Christ, the husband representing
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Christ, and the bride representing the bride of Christ, and then redound it to the praise of the glory of His grace?
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How can that happen? And I've said it before, but I'll say it again just to reiterate.
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This book, Ephesians, shows the godness of God. It shows how He is
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God, an alone God, and He's worthy to be worshipped. It reminds me of that story. I grew up in Omaha, Nebraska, and there was supposedly a
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Presbyterian church in Omaha, and since they weren't apt to say hallelujah or praise the Lord or things vocal in that church, they were all given a balloon.
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And during the service, just imagine a helium balloon we gave them out instead of cookies and bulletins. You all have a balloon.
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And when you think you're wanting to praise God for the song How Great Thou Art, and you say with the trumpeter,
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How great thou art, you were to let the balloon go. Or you would hear a hymn, some great hymn about May Jesus Christ be praised.
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Lord, I haven't praised you like I have ought to this week, but may you be praised. God, help me to praise you this week.
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You should be praised. And you let the balloon go. And Bruce Larson says, at the end of a service, one -third of the balloons in this particular service were still held on to by the people.
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And Ephesians wants to pry that balloon from your hand. It wants to say, I know there are troubles.
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I know you're suffering. I know you're hurting. There are health issues. There are finance issues. There are relationship issues.
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There are issues. This is a fallen world. And God is trying to use His word to pry your hands out so you say,
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I don't even feel like praising you, but I'm still going to praise you because you are worthy of all praise.
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Let's look at Ephesians 6 and finish this final section, and I'll call it a benediction. I think the
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NIV says it's a final greeting, that there's no greeting. So we'll just call it a benediction. Ephesians 6, 21 through 24 this morning, as we just march verse by verse by verse through the
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Bible and just wringing out every little bit of it, almost like a cow just chewing the cud over and over and over to just extract the nutrients that are found in there.
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I'll read the passage. We'll talk about the passage, and then we'll make some comments. Ephesians 6, 21 to 24,
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New American Standard. But that you also may know about my circumstances. Of course, we know Paul is writing.
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How I am doing. Tychicus, the beloved brother and faithful minister in the Lord, will make everything known to you.
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I've sent him to you for this very purpose so that you may know about us and that he may comfort your hearts.
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Peace be to the brethren and love with faith from God the Father and the
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Lord Jesus Christ. Grace be with all those who love our Lord Jesus Christ with incorruptible love.
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These are his closing comments. This is his benediction. Paul is writing things that the church at Ephesus and other close churches need to hear, and he ends up with the benediction like he does many other books.
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And let's kind of go through this a little bit. If you take a look at verse 21, please. Paul is using
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Tychicus as his kind of mail carrier. At this time in Roman culture, there were real mail carriers, but you could also give a letter to a friend and have him deliver it across country or across the wastelands, personal friends and messengers.
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And most likely, Paul has just completed the book of Colossians and Ephesians, and now he gives them to this man
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Tychicus to go deliver. And he says, besides delivering these letters, I want you to encourage them not only with the letters but with what
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I'm doing. So that's kind of odd. He's in jail in Rome. And I want you to encourage the people about me and what
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God is doing through my life as an apostle. It's like a missionary letter of encouragement, catching those up with the beloved
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Paul. And here it says, Tychicus, literally, the beloved brother.
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Definite article, he's a special brother. He's beloved and he's the one who's faithful. He's trustworthy.
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Colossians 4, 7 and 8 is almost exactly the same. As to my affairs, Tychicus, our beloved brother and faithful servant and fellow bondservant in the
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Lord, will bring you information. For I have sent him to you for this very purpose, that you may know about our circumstances and that he may encourage your hearts.
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Paul talks about Tychicus in Titus 3 and Acts and other places. And here was this faithful minister.
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He wasn't a deacon, but he was a faithful minister. I think if you do a word study on ministry, you'll find that the root word has a good sense of what a deacon is or a minister is.
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It means through the dust. On hands and feet, he goes through the dust to serve the local church.
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He's not an officer, but he's a faithful minister. And he says in verse 22, and I have sent him to you for this very purpose.
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You think Paul's in jail and he needs the encouragement, but he's trying to encourage the people. Always the pastor, always the apostle.
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So you may know about us and he may comfort your hearts. Too bad most missionary letters today are, we want money, but please pray for us.
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Here, completely different. He wants to refresh them. He was a prisoner. Here's what
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I've been doing. Here's what I've been saying. Here's what God has been doing in my life. And then he gives the benediction.
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Peace to the brethren, love with faith, from God the Father and Lord Jesus Christ. Grace be with all those who love our
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Lord Jesus Christ with incorruptible love. That's the end of the book.
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But that's not the end of the sermon. When the preacher preaches forever and for always, the point of his sermon should be the point of the passage.
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The congregation should be able to see that sermon comes right out of that text. And if it doesn't come right out of the text, the preacher can do that, but he needs to tell the congregation ahead of time.
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We're going to look at some principles now that come from the book of Ephesians that come out of these last three verses. But the principles that come from that, they don't exactly represent the benediction.
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So that's what I'm going to do now. I want to show you several lessons learned from these verses that don't necessarily exactly stem from these, but certainly we can get there in a biblical fashion.
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And it's almost, think about it this way. When you go to a museum, do you ever like to go to a museum and just see some neat things that are there?
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I remember when I went to the Louvre in the early 80s and I just went and saw the Mona Lisa and I just thought,
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I don't know much about art, but everybody else is supposed to like it. So, ooh. I went to Florence and saw
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Michelangelo's David and you think, that is amazing that he could see David in that block before he even started and everybody just stand around and pay money to just look in the museum and go, wow, it's amazing.
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I've been in Jerusalem and have seen the oldest extant Isaiah scroll that contains all 66 chapters of Isaiah.
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And it's up on this great cylinder, protected so much so that if there's a nuclear bomb, the entire cylinder of Isaiah goes down, down, down, deep into the ground, covers up and a nuclear bomb can't even affect it.
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And you just look and you say, that is amazing. And Ephesians has so many of those too.
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They're almost museum pieces that you look at and you say, that is amazing. And you praise those and say,
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I can't believe in the Tower of London to see the crown jewels there.
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And you think, wow. So let me give you a few museum pieces as we leave the book of Ephesians that might increase your praise to God.
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These will all, by the grace of God, motivate you to praise
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Him more. Final takeaway thoughts to the book of Ephesians.
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Number one, the first museum piece, the motivation to praise is that you should praise the
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Lord because salvation is never by chance. If you have unbelieving friends, family, children, what would you do if you were just hoping by accident, by serendipity, by chance that they'll get saved?
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Some of you grieve because your children aren't saved. Some of you grieve because your mom and dad aren't saved.
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Your friends. What if you were left to their... What if their salvation was left to chance?
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What would you do? How would you live? But thankfully, salvation is never by chance.
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You say chance? How do you get chance out of this sermon? Good question. It stems from the text.
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And if you take a look at Ephesians 6, verse 21, there's a man named Tychicus there. And guess what
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Tychicus' name means in Greek? Chance. Can you imagine?
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Chance. I'm going to send chance to you to encourage you. I'm going to send all lucky to you. I'm going to send fortune and he's going to go encourage you.
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I mean, at least with Paul, he used to be named Saul, Mighty One. God saved him and he was given the name
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Paul, Little One. It's okay to change somebody's name. Cephas, Peter.
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But here, Tychicus, his whole life, he's named chance and even at the end, chance. Accident.
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I'll just even read it once with his name Lucky in there, Ephesians 6. But that also you may know about my circumstances, how
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I'm doing. And Lucky, the beloved brother and faithful minister, will make everything known to you. It's funny.
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Can you imagine? We have a little thing in our church and if you don't know me very well, I really try to be nice about it, and some of you are laughing already.
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If you say good luck to me or in my presence, you know the standard M .O.
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And the M .O. will be this. What? Good luck. What?
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Are you hard of hearing? No? Oh, and then you can just see their face. Go, oh.
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Luck? We're robbing the blessings of God instead of saying God bless you? We just hope the stars are right and the moon is correct and the tides are high and everything else and by serendipity, chance, luck, fortune, accident, we hope it'll all work out for you.
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And so then when it does work out and God shows himself in a mighty way, oh, praise be to lucky.
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No, and so I even try to get people to say the right thing, not because I'm word faith and your words are vessels for meaning.
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No, I just want us to think about the grace of God because if you understand grace, you won't believe in chance.
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Salvation is never left to chance. Salvation is under the decree, the predetermined plan of God.
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If you look at Ephesians 6, 24, he closes the book with the bookend, grace, as he opened the epistle with the bookend of grace.
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Grace be with all those who love our Lord Jesus. Charis, grace.
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Actually, he says in Greek, the grace. The grace found in Christ is what he means. Grace be to you.
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Every email that I ever send out has one word greeting at the end and it'll say what? Charis, because I want you to think of grace and you need grace.
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It's like may God give you grace. Paul does the same thing here. Grace, the grace.
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Some people don't like grace. They say they do, but they don't. Listen to what a few men said about grace.
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From all copies of Jonathan Edwards' portrait of God, however faded by time, however softened by the use of less glaring pigments,
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I turn with loathing. George MacDonald. The sovereignty of God.
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The sovereign grace of God. It's a redundancy to say sovereign grace, but grace is by definition sovereign.
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Spurgeon said many men cavil at election. The very word with some is a great bugbear, but they no sooner hear it than they turn upon their heel for anger.
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Thomas Talbot said, I will not worship such a God who chooses, and if such a God can send me to hell for not so worshiping him, then to hell
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I will go. One of the reasons why
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Ephesians is written is so you'll praise God more. And beloved, our society today in evangelicalism, we have a man -centered view of grace.
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Salvation is by the grace of God alone. True or false? True. We know that.
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Do you believe that? I mean, do you really believe that? John 1, verse 13 says,
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People are saved who are born not of blood, nor the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.
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Whose will saves someone? Man's free will or God's free will. And you can't have both.
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Romans 9, verse 16 says, So then it does not depend on the man who wills or the man who runs, but on God who has what?
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Mercy. We say we don't believe in salvation by works. We say we don't believe in salvation by wages, by deeds, by goodness, by bell curve.
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But we often and too often believe that grace somehow is conditioned upon something other than God's freedom.
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Lorraine Bettner, the wonderful theologian, said, It shows us that all we are like and all that we desire we owe to His grace.
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It rebukes human pride and exalts divine mercy. One time
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I met someone and they said, You know, we don't talk about election. It was a campus ministry. We don't talk about election at all.
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Well, why is that? We talk about election later. We don't talk about election now because it's divisive.
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What they're saying is we don't talk about it because it's harmful. Election? Well, that will split a church.
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How smart do you think Paul was? Church at Ephesus. Pretty new church.
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A lot of illiterate people there. What was Paul thinking? Turn to Ephesians 1 please.
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What was Paul thinking when he was talking about election at the very beginning? For those who think that the election is only for the mature, do not believe what
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Paul has said. We don't talk about election. The Bible says in 2
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Timothy 3 .16, all scripture is what? God breathed and then what?
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Profitable except election. Let's just put the cards on the table.
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If you have a man -centered view of election, you can't praise God like you should. What gets you to heaven at the end of the day when you stand before God and He says, why should
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I let you in? What's the determining factor for your salvation and not the salvation of others?
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Your free will? We just went through this entire corpus of the book of Ephesians and it doesn't have anything to do about the free will.
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It has everything to do with our will is bound and if our will is bound, we need a greater Savior to come and rescue us from ourselves and our sin.
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You cannot understand the grace of God unless you believe and affirm unconditional election.
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This is not a secondary issue. And so I'm going to harp on it for a while because it's been three years since we've been in Ephesians 1.
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And if you really believe that God chooses freely for Himself, by Himself, of Himself, for the glory of Himself, you will bow in wonder, adoration and praise that God would choose you or me.
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You will never get to heaven as my brother would say and when you see God, go up and high five
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Him and say, we did it! Is it difficult to understand?
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Yes, but it isn't divisive. Paul didn't consider it that way. Look at what he says in Ephesians 1 .3.
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I know everyone here believes in election because it's in the Bible. The question is, what is your definition of election? Man -centered definition or God -centered definition?
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Biblical or unbiblical? Unbiblical. And this is not one of those things where one group teaches this and another group teaches this and we've got to go for balance.
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One's right and one's wrong, but they both can't be right because if they're both right, then you're nothing more than a postmodernist. Look what he says here.
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This is the key to the whole book. Everything about it is grace. Sinclair Ferguson calls grace demerited favor towards those who don't deserve it.
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Chapter 1, verse 3. Blessed be the God and Father of our
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Lord Jesus Christ who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ.
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All of the blessings of God put up in one phrase. And blessed means to praise.
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Blessed means here, the Greek word is from where we get the word eulogy, to speak well of, ascribe praise, ascribe homage, worship.
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And then he says, here's why we should praise God. Verses 4 through 6, God chose us. 7 through 12,
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Jesus died for us. 13 through 14, the Spirit sealed us. And if you're a
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Christian, that is what God has done for you and to you. He did this freely.
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He did it according to his own free will. And he loved you ahead of time is what Romans 8 says. Now take a look at Ephesians chapter 1, verse 4.
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And let's expand this a little bit more because I want you to be able to praise God fully and completely.
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I'm not bound to any theological system or ism. You won't even hear me say those on Sunday morning. I'm bound to the word of God.
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And what does God say about election? Well, he says a lot, but let's go ahead and take a look at Ephesians in particular.
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Do you see that in verse 4? He chose us in him. It's a middle voice.
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And you say, what's middle voice? Middle voice is very important in the original language because it means he chose us for himself.
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Same word in the Old Testament is for when God chose Israel, the kind of word that means
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God can do whatever he wants and he freely chooses his own bride. And then look at what happens.
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If you have a hard time understanding election, then just keep reading in Ephesians chapter 1, verses 4 through 6.
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How can God be praised for a man -centered election? How can God be praised if he looks down the corridors of time and sees you do something positively and says, based on what you've done in the corridors of time,
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I choose you? That can't be because look at the text. He chose us before the foundation of what?
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The world. Not at the end. Not during. God chose us before the world began, before you were born, before you did anything, before you sinned, before you did anything.
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One man said, good thing God chose us then because if it was in time, he'd never choose us. He goes on though.
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For those that think God chooses based on the corridor of time, and he says, that person's holy, that person received me, that person believed in me,
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I choose them. You have to change the meaning of this next part of the verse. He chose us for a reason, not because of something.
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He chose us with the reason that one day we would be, we should be holy and blameless before him.
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It's amazing to praise God now and think, he chose me even though I was good? No. Even though I was bad?
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Yes. Even though I was ugly? Yes. He chose me anyway. I like John Calvin.
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He said, when God elects us, it is not because we are handsome. Man is unwilling to choose
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Christ. Man will never choose Christ left to his own bidding.
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God's grace is never conditioned by man's willingness to believe. Salvation is not by what you do and what
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God does synergistically together. It is by God's work alone. And sadly, many evangelicals today who tout free will and somehow that you have to go along with what
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God is doing for you to be saved, don't know church history well enough to understand that they are simply a
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Roman Catholic in 2005 because that's Rome's view which is completely different than the Protestant view.
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Protestant view is man is bound. Man's will is bound. And the
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Catholic view is man's will is free to cooperate with. Turn to Ephesians chapter 4 and let me show you my resume and your resume.
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God looked down the corridors of time and He saw this. He saw a group of people that needed to be saved and rescued and delivered, not a group of people that were going to cooperate with Him through the freedom of their will.
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By the way, free will, do we mean to say that we are free from God's influences, Satan's influences, the world's influences, our own sin's influences?
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May it never be. And look at Ephesians chapter 4 verses 17 through 19. There are many descriptions of the depravity of man, the corruption of man.
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But may I show you that this corruption is complete. It saturates the mind, will, and heart of all humans.
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So this I say and affirm together with the Lord that you walk no longer just as the Gentiles also walk, the unbelievers, in the futility of their mind, being darkened in their understanding, excluded from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, because of the hardness of their hearts.
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And they, having become calloused, have given themselves over to sensuality for the practice of every kind of impurity with greediness.
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And so He says, that's what unbelievers were like. And by the way, if God looks down the quarters of time, this is what
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He sees. So how could He see somebody doing this and say, well, they believed in me, I pick them. I think we often in our church say,
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I'm so glad Jesus died for me. But we tiptoe around on broken glass and don't say, not only did
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Jesus die for me, I praise you, God. Not only did the Spirit make me born again,
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I praise you, God. But we don't really want to talk about the election thing because our minds view election as cooperation versus reception.
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So how can we praise God for election when it was really us choosing Him first? You know the old adage, the incorrect adage,
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God chooses you for salvation, Satan chooses against your salvation, and you cast the deciding vote.
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If that was true, no one would be saved because you vote like I do.
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You always vote no. And yet God would save us anyway. That redounds in the praise of God.
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Election is part of salvation. When was the last time you got down on your knees and said, God, thank you for choosing me?
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And if you haven't, could it be that your view of election is a meritorious view, a conditioned view on your own obedience versus the real grace of God?
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You say, Pastor, predestination is unloving. He didn't choose some.
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If He chose me, that means He passed over others. He didn't choose them. That's unloving.
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I can't get it through my mind. Well, let me help you because the Bible never talks about figuring out why
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God didn't choose some. The wonder of it all is that God would choose anybody, and it's called love.
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Look at the passage. Ephesians 1 .4, just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world that we should be holy and blameless before Him, in love
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He predestined us. How about that? Election is not unloving.
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Election is not divisive, or it should not be. Why would the
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Holy Spirit inspire this unless it was for our good? God loves you so much that He loved you before.
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That's what predestination means. He loved you before and carved you out. The analogy doesn't fit all the way, but when
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I first met Kim, she knew some of my past, but boy, if she would have known all my past. We dress up and go out on dates.
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You don't want to tell them everything. You're never going to get married.
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If she would know everything I ever thought or did. It's like when the couple's in premarital class.
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Well, we're just going to tell each other everything we've done, including all the sin. Just don't. It's enough to know you're a sinner and God saved you.
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Yes, they don't need to have the resume because I hate to quote the theologian John Lennon, but John Lennon said, you can't unknow what you already know.
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Everybody's a theologian, just a good theologian or a bad theologian. I don't think
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Kim would have picked me. I don't think she would have said yes. Some of the things I have thought, some of the things that I have done, shame.
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Can you imagine God? Knew everything about us. Knew every sin that we would ever commit.
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Knew every time we didn't love Him with our heart, soul, mind, and strength. He knew ahead of time, every time we didn't love our neighbors, ourselves.
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He knew that if it was left up to us and we lived in the time of the crucifixion that we would have been there spitting on Jesus just with the next guy.
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We would have been struggling like a rock concert to get to the front to hurl insults at Jesus. And yet He picked us anyway.
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Tell me that does not elicit praise. He loved me.
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He chose me. And the text, I remember James Montgomery Boyce at 10th
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Presbyterian who is now with the Lord. He was the instructor and the educator, the theological guru behind Bible Study Fellowship for the
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Book of Romans. And so the Book of Romans will teach you that God conditionally chooses?
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No, He unconditionally chooses in love before the foundation of the world. And so when someone at Bible Study Fellowship, a
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Methodist or those believing in the cooperation of the grace of God said, yeah, but what about James Boyce taught the
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Bible Study Fellowship leaders to do this? That may be true, but what does the Bible says?
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Put your finger down in verse 4 and verse 5 and what does it say there about love? In love
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He protested us. And Boyce was trying to get the people always back to the Bible to submit themselves to what the
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Word of God says, not what we think about as free. We'll have no sovereign over us. This is New England. We have a vote.
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We do have a vote and the vote was always crucifying. And then to think
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God just pours it on. Let's see, who do we have here that's adopted? Would you mind raising your hand or would
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I embarrass you? I know several. What's the kind of the back row Baptist adoption over here? Wow!
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Is there some kind of theological, psychological thing where the Baptist adopted sit in the back?
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And we have more. Doug, I think Bruce Binney, he would raise his hand. His email is twice adopted. How much praise is there?
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How much thankfulness is there in the Jeffries household or we could use the
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Farah household or the Dunn household. I forgot your maiden name. It would have been the Dunn household.
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How much praise there would be if you'd be thinking, you know, let's use Naomi for an example.
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I could have been chosen by any family. How could I be chosen by this family?
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A family that loves the Lord, strives to obey, that loves me, that's cared for me and I got chosen by them.
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God, I can't believe it. Versus Naomi saying, this is the family that I chose and I cooperated with and we kind of did it together.
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We did it. Look what it says here in verse 5.
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He predestined us to adoption as sons. Doesn't say robot last time
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I checked. We're robots. Oh, this whole thing of God's got free will then we're robots. The Bible never says we're robots.
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It says we're sons. We're adopted. Furthermore, Romans chapter 9 says that we are like clay in the potter's hands but never robots.
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And the adopted son gets all the rights of the natural born son by the grace, the parent.
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It's the same thing with God. We are Christians totally by the grace of God. We recognize the
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Spirit's working by grace, the Son's working by grace, but the Father choosing, we want to somehow march hand in hand.
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And Paul will not let us because he knows it takes away the glory of God. And if the glory of God found in the local church needs to be focused on exalting
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God, we have to have a high view of God. Look at verse 5 as we keep going. According to the kind intention of His will.
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I've just read John 1. I've just read Romans 9. It's not about our will. Our will is bound to the praise of the glory of His grace which
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He, what? Freely bestowed. Not what we did with Him. Samuel Davies, the
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Princeton theologian, wrote a hymn. And the first stanza is this. Great God of wonders, all
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Thy ways are matchless, godlike and divine. But the fair glories of Thy grace more godlike and unrivaled shine.
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Spurgeon said, if they, the church, could know but that the
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Lord had chosen them, it would make their hearts dance with joy. God, You chose me.
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It is my conviction that Paul is teaching if you do not understand the free election of God, you don't understand grace.
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And Paul wants you to get grace. Grace from beginning. Grace from end. You say, what about my duty to believe?
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Well, we have the duty to believe, but Paul's not even talking about that. Paul's talking about the grace of God. And if God graces you, you will respond.
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But that response even, repentance is a gift. 2 Timothy 2. Faith is a gift.
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Philippians 1. Verse 29. The old reformer said, we shall never be clearly convinced as we ought to be that our salvation flows from the fountain of God's mercy till we are acquainted with this eternal election.
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You say, I still struggle with it. Maybe talk to Nate afterwards about books that you can read. We want you to understand the election of God, the grace of God, because it elicits praise.
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You say, it's hard for me to get my arms around. Do you believe other doctrines that are hard to get your arms around?
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Who wrote Ephesians? Paul? God? Paul wrote verse 1.
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God wrote verse 2. You subscribe to dual authorship, don't you? Paul and God?
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How about Jesus? 99 % God, 1 % man. You affirm that, don't you? 100 %
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God and 100 % man? Do you affirm that? Yes. Figure that out. You affirm infinite things, but why we don't affirm that God unconditionally chooses us is because it is a pride crusher.
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It lays us out. I used to play football. It was always beware of that block that somebody came alongside and got you because you couldn't see.
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You could see this way, but you can't see out through your ear hole too often. And I remember once,
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I was on the kickoff team and I was running straight down. I thought, I'm going to just clock this guy. I'm going to hit him.
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The ball's going to go up in the air. I'm going to catch it and run in for the touchdown. I was running full blast and I had a beeline on the guy and I was anticipating where he was running and where I was going to go and I didn't see out of the corner of my eye.
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Another guy thought, I'm going to make a beeline out of that guy. And here he comes and he hit me just right and it was
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Tweety Bird. Na, na, na, na, na. Some denominations in Christianity think there's a second blessing and so you get saved and then at a subsequent time you get a blessing of tongues and we could debate that.
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But in my life, it was the second blessing of realizing that grace was exactly what it was, grace. That God did everything.
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That He's the author and that I'm the finisher of salvation. No, that He's the author. He's the finisher.
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That it was Jesus Christ's death on the cross plus nothing including my will that saved me.
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That it made me sit there sometimes and stay up all night thinking, I can't believe God chose me.
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And I'm just reverting back to Kim again. Sometimes I'm still wildly praising
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God that Kim would still say yes to me. I think I told you I kind of gave a few of those trial balloons will you marry me kind of thing that guys know so when we really ask, we kind of know what they're going to say versus we ask and we get dumped unceremoniously.
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So I gave a few trial balloons out. I thought she was going to say yes and so I asked her. I said, you know, whatever
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I said up at the beginning, will you marry me? And she said, yes. I said, that's wonderful but I'm going to ask you again because I can't believe what
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I just heard and I want to seal it. Two or three witnesses where two or three are gathered. No, it's wrong context.
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So she said yes again and it was May 6th.
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So let's get married September, October, something like that. I'm not big for long engagements and week goes by maybe end of August and that might be good.
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You already said you're going to marry me so why wait around? One week later, about July sometime, one week later.
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How about next week? June 6th we were married. I didn't want her to find out the real me.
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And just think, God knows you intimately. He knows everything about you. He knows what you did, will do, wouldn't do and God said,
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I love you anyway and I'll prove that, that I'll give you my son. I'm going to punish him instead of you.
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I'm going to treat you like my son and because of what you are now in Christ, I love you as much as I love my son.
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Now, beloved, that whole house of cards comes tumbling down if somehow you think you're arm in arm with God and somehow you get to heaven and say,
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God chose me based on what I would do? Really? We did it?
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Before the foundation of the world that you will be or should be holy and blameless.
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In love He predestined us. You say, well what about the other portions of the Bible? You'll find the exact same theme taught from the choosing of Israel to the choosing of us.
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You might live in a society where the bride is chosen for you by your parents but God never bows to such a society and He always chooses
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His son's own bride. Pride comes before a fall and I had four takeaway points for Ephesians and that was one.
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I had two options. We've got to finish Ephesians. I shouldn't have said all those things that I did at the beginning.
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I'd go to Ephesians 6 .24 just for a second and I seriously think we might have to have one more sermon.
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For the sake of looking stupid I will finish the epistle when
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I return with depth and without being superficial and I'm not going to start the
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Sermon on the Mount until September anyway so I was going to do a few selected Psalms and Hebrews and other things but I've got to tell my wife this today too.
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And the reason why we want to go one more week is 6 .24 says,
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Grace be with all those who love our Lord Jesus Christ with incorruptible and love's not in the text.
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So is the grace incorruptible? Is the Lord Jesus incorruptible? Or should your love be incorruptible?
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And why would it say that? And we need to know because it's a good challenge for our congregation but basically what it is it is a response to the grace of God.
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How we respond. For those of us who think it's all election I don't have to do anything. Election and duty it's a both and deal it's not an either or so when
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I return I think we'll just look at that and you can put it in a special series if you'd like and if you want to say we're done with Ephesians we can but it will be under special series.
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Your homework is would you please study chapter 1 verses 3 through 14 and see if I'm right and if I am would you bow your knee this week and say
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God I can't believe you chose me. The angels all sinned and did
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God give them a plan of salvation? No. Was he unjust? No.
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All of us Romans 5 says sinned in Adam by action by word by deed
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God said he federally considered us in Adam and we in Adam fell. And God could have said it's over.
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No salvation. Yet God said out of those fallen ones I will show my glory not only in the damnation of the fallen ones but in the rescuing saving delivering grace for these that I choose to be near me.
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So study Ephesians chapter 1 verses 3 through 14 and then get down on your knees and say
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God I cannot believe you chose me. My problem is I understand it but why am
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I not so shocked like I used to be? I couldn't get over it that God would choose me. I cannot get over it
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God chose me and then now God chose me. Well let's pray.
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Lord thank you for this day and Lord what a blessing it is to think that you chose us for those of us in the congregation that are having a hard time with this.
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Father I would pray that their thoughts about this doctrine would come from the Bible and not from their old pastor not from me not from their denomination not from the guy on the radio not from anyone except from the word of God through your prophets and then finally through Jesus and his apostolic messengers.
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Father we want to be biblical and we know we don't come to salvation and know everything.
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Father give us the grace to repent if we believe somehow your salvation is conditioned on us even though we might use other language to try to make it seem like we've received it all.
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And Father may we be a congregation that exalts in the grace of God even that you would choose us and that we would preach the gospel to others not knowing who you have chosen but you have told us to preach the gospel and Father we're quite confident that as we preach the chosen ones will come to faith and there won't be one who gets to heaven by chance.