Sermon Central
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Ephesians
Contributed by Chris Appleby on Oct 18, 2000 (message contributor)
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1. God's Eternal Plan - All Things United Under Christ
Contributed on Oct 18, 2000
Here we have a wonderfully concise yet comprehensive summary of the Christian gospel and its implications. Here we discover the wonder and intricacy of God’s eternal plan for his world and especially for his people.
You may have been following the reports, over the past few months, of the State Government Report prepared by Sir Rod Eddington on Melbourne’s East-West transport needs. The one thing that seems to have come out of that exercise and particularly since the Eastlink toll road opened is that the need ...read more
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2. The Saving Grace Of God
Contributed on Oct 18, 2000
Those who are outside the people of God are in rebellion against Him and are therefore spiritually dead. But God makes them a free offer to bring them back to life. All that’s needed to receive all of the bounty that God offers is to believe his promise,
I guess everyone in the world is aware that not all is right with either the world or themselves. If I were to ask you to name 3 things that were wrong with the world, I imagine that most of you would answer within a few seconds. If I were to ask you the same question about yourself you might take ...read more
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3. Paul's Prayers For His Converts
Contributed on Oct 18, 2000
Paul prays for power, for inner strength, a foundation and experience of love and an awareness of the fullness and glory of God.
One way of telling what a Christian’s chief concerns and priorities are is to study the contents of their prayers. We all tend to pray about what concerns us, and tend to forget to pray about the things that don’t. At the same time it can be good to listen to others prayers so we can learn and ...read more
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4. Unity And Diversity In The Church
Contributed on Oct 18, 2000
So how can a diverse body like the church achieve the sort of unity that God desires? By growing up. By becoming more like Christ as we grow into him. So speak the truth in love, and grow into Christ who is our head, Do your part in bringing the church to
Paul has spent the first three chapters of this letter explaining the mystery of God’s eternal purpose for the world as it’s being worked out in history. He’s given us all the theory, he’s even given us the prayer he prays for his converts, and now he goes on to speak about the practicalities of ...read more
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5. Be Who You Are Created To Be
Contributed on Oct 18, 2000
Be who you were created to be. We were created to live in the Truth - to be in Christ. As we live in this decaying world, let’s together fix our gaze on our Father. Let’s imitate God and allow Him to transform us to become more like Himself.
In 1962 the "Australian Social Studies" magazine, distributed to school children had as one of its first articles "The Christian Way of Life". To quote from the top of the article: "This is a picture of Christ through whose teachings we began a new age - the Christian era. Two thousand years ago, a ...read more
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6. From Darkness To Light
Contributed on Oct 18, 2000
How are we to be people of integrity in a world that’s opposed to God? By being children of light, and living as light in the world. That means ensuring that the things we do are things that we’re proud of, things that we’d gladly do in the presence of Go
What does it mean to be a person of integrity? Well, the word derives from the word integer, which means something that’s complete or whole in itself. So when you’re reading a letter like Ephesians, which concentrates so much on unity in the Church, it’s appropriate that we think about unity of our ...read more
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7. A New Way Of Relating - Mutual Submission
Contributed on Oct 18, 2000
The key to relating in God’s church is mutual submission. This aaplies to everyone in the church, young and old, male and female.
We come today to one of those difficult passages, that most preachers would prefer to avoid if at all possible. What we find here isn’t particularly popular in today’s world. Ours is an age of liberation. The idea of submission to authority is at variance with modern ideas of permissiveness and ...read more
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8. Be Strong In The Lord And In His Mighty Power
Contributed on Oct 18, 2000
never take for granted the victory over sin that Christ has won for us. Never underestimate the devil. He’ll oppose us at every opportunity. Never give up in the fight against sin and evil. But always remember the power of God and the armour with which he
We come today to the end of our series of sermons on the book of Ephesians. One of the things I hope you’ve noticed as we’ve gone through this book is the breadth of Paul’s horizons. He began by pointing us back to before the beginning of time, when God established his plan to create a single new ...read more
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9. A Single New Humanity
Contributed on Apr 27, 2003
In the past we were alienated from God and from others, but now we have been reconciled to God through the work of Jesus Christ, so let’s seek to live for the future, for a time when all of God’s people will be joined as one, in a new heaven and a new ear
One of the things we love to do is to remember the past. We keep journals and photo albums, we tell stories and reminisce, all to preserve our memories. On the other hand there are some memories that we don’t want to remember. Memories of past hurts, of things we’ve done that we’re ashamed of. Some ...read more