Chosen By God

Chosen and Redeemed

Ephesians 1:3-14

September 8, 2019

Today I’m going to do a different kind of sermon. I truly have no clue if this will be a 15 minute message or go on for awhile. Although I suspect it won’t be 15 minutes! They never are!

A few weeks ago in Bible study we were talking about Ephesians 1 and I just kind of started talking about the passage from Paul. He wrote this while he was in prison in Rome. My plan for this morning is to simply to in a sense of Bible study of the first part of Ephesians 1. Firstly, let me simply read the passage for you, then I’ll start to break it apart. Also, I’m not going to touch on every verse, just some of the main points and how important they are to us.

I believe it’s a great passage reminding us of what we have when we say yes to Jesus. So, let’s look at Ephesians 1:3-14 –

3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with EVERY spiritual blessing in the heavenly places,

4 even as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before Him.

In love 5 He predestined us for adoption to Himself as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of His will,

6 to the praise of His glorious grace, with which He has blessed us in the Beloved.

7 In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of His grace,

8 which He lavished upon us, in all wisdom and insight

9 making known to us the mystery of His will, according to His purpose, which He set forth in Christ

10 as a plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in Him, things in heaven and things on earth.

11 In Him we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to the purpose of Him who works all things according to the counsel of His will,

12 so that we who were the first to hope in Christ might be to the praise of His glory.

13 In Him you also, when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and believed in Him, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit,

14 who is the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it, to the praise of his glory. – Ephesians 1:3-14

OK, there’s so much meat in this passage, and I’m just going to break it down. Maybe not so quickly since the Colts don’t play until 4 PM today.

Let me give you a quick background about these verses. In the original Greek this was one sentence. Imagine writing that in school. Our Bibles often change the sentence structure and punctuation for understanding. But if you are reading this - as it originally was, it’s one long sentence.

It’s as if as Paul was writing, he simply became more and more excited and passionate as he wrote. It’s been said of this passage, “it’s a kaleidoscope of dazzling lights and shifting colors” or “it’s like a snowball tumbling down a hill, picking up speed and volume as it descends” OR “it’s like a racehorse speeding onward at full speed.”

So, in verse 3 - Paul tells us we are blessed. But not only are we blessed, he goes beyond that to tell us we are blessed with every spiritual blessing.

3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with EVERY spiritual blessing in the heavenly places,

Paul starts out by blessing God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. That’s always the start and finish, isn’t it? We start by praising and blessing God, simply because He is, but beyond that for the gift of His Son, Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior.

To go beyond that, Paul has blessed God who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing.

Think about how blessed we are! We often don’t stop and consider this. But it’s beyond amazing what God has done for us. Notice how many spiritual blessings we have! Can anyone tell me how many spiritual blessings God gave us? NOBODY CAN! Because we can’t add that high. We can’t conceive of God’s blessings, because we often sell God short. We don’t hold onto those blessings, we deny them, we don’t believe they’re for us. We think they’re for the more spiritual person, but friends . . . we need to stop and reconsider, rethink and re-believe this thought . . . because these blessings are for us.

Paul doesn’t give us a list, but in a sense he gives us a short list, because this verse is really the basis for the entire book of Ephesians. He’s going to outline who blessed we are by the spiritual blessings of God.