God Wants Us To Know The Power Of His Resurrection Series

God Wants Us to Know the Power of His Resurrection

Ephesians 1:13-23

Sermon by Rick Crandall

Grayson Baptist Church - May 19, 2013

(Revised from sermon preached at McClendon Baptist Church - Nov. 1, 2009)

*I know my wife. Except for the Lord, I know her better than anybody in the world knows her. I know the schooling she has had, the jobs she has held, and the honors she has won. I know her mother and her brothers, where she lived growing up, and the name of the family dog she had as a kid.

*In addition to all of the facts about my wife, I know her life. I was there when she gave birth to our 3 children. I was there when her daddy died.

-I know her hurts, habits, hang-ups and happiness.

-I know her quirks and her pet peeves;

-What makes her laugh; what makes her cry.

-Her work and her worries; her strengths and her sins.

*I could tell you how God has worked in her life, and how she has worked in my life to bless me beyond measure. I have known my wife in a close, personal way for almost 40 years.

*Church: That’s the way Jesus wants us to know Him and the power of His resurrection. Think about God’s resurrection power as we look into His Word today. (1)

1. First: His resurrection power is available.

*God’s resurrection power is available to you and me. He makes the infinite power of His resurrection available to anyone who will trust Jesus as their living Lord and Savior. That means believing in Jesus’ death on the cross for our sins, believing in His crucifixion and in His resurrection.

*As Christians, we believe what God’s Word says about Jesus back up in vs. 7. We believe that "in Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of His grace."

*The Apostle Paul wrote this letter to people who had believed in the Lord. As he said in vs. 13&14:

13. In Him (i.e. in Jesus) you also trusted, after you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation; in whom also, having believed, you were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise,

14. who is the guarantee of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession, to the praise of His glory.

*It is vitally important for us to understand that when we receive Jesus, we receive the power of His resurrection. From that moment on, we are in Christ as a partaker of His crucifixion and resurrection. Paul explained this to Christians in 1 Cor 12:13, where he said: "By one Spirit we were all baptized into one body (i.e. into the Body of Christ) . . ."

*This reality of Christians being in Christ is so sure that in Ephesians 2, Paul said:

4. . . God, who is rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us,

5. even when we were dead in trespasses, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved),

6. and raised us up together, and made us sit together in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus,

7. that in the ages to come He might show the exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.

*Christian, you already have the power of Christ’s resurrection in your life. When you have Christ, you have the power, because right now you are in Christ. That’s why when Paul prayed for these Christians here in chapter 1, he did not pray for them to get the Lord’s resurrection power. They already had it!

*So Paul prayed that they would know the resurrection power that they already had in Jesus Christ. Starting in vs. 16, Paul said:

16. (I) do not cease to give thanks for you, making mention of you in my prayers:

17. that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give to you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him,

18. the eyes of your understanding being enlightened; that you may know what is the hope of His calling, what are the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints,

*There in vs. 18, Paul prayed for them to know 2 things:

-The hope of God’s calling...

-And the riches of the glorious inheritance we have in Jesus.

*But starting again in vs. 19, Paul prays that we would know:

19. . . what is the exceeding greatness of His power toward us who believe, according to the working of His mighty power

20. which He worked in Christ when He raised Him from the dead and seated Him at His right hand in the heavenly places,