Predestined by Love
Text: Ephesians 1:5-6
By: Ken McKinley
(Read Text)
There was once an older couple that had spent an exciting day with family celebrating their 50th anniversary. That night they settled into bed and wife looked over at her husband and said, “When we were young, you used to hold my hand every night.” The old man slowly reached over and grabbed his wife’s hand. She then looked at him and said, “When we were young, you used to snuggle up with me.” The old man creaked as he rolled over closer to his wife. She then looked at him and whispered in his ear, “And when we were young, you used to nibble on my ear.” The old man jumped up out of bed and made his way towards the bathroom. “Where are you going?” She asked, “I’m going to get my teeth.” He replied. (Sermoncentral.com Illustrations)
When two people are in love there should be some kind of evidence of it. It’s no different with God’s love for us. In the first 13 verses of Ephesians we can read about God securing our eternal destiny with Him – the work of God the Father in electing us, guaranteeing our holiness, and adopting us into His family. Lord willing; next week we’ll see how the Son secured our relationship with the Father through redemption, and making forgiveness of our sins a reality. Then we’ll examine how the Holy Spirit seals this union, securing our relationship for all eternity.
But I’m getting ahead of myself; let’s look at our text again (Read). Single-mindedness is one sign of being in love. We call it devotion. If you were to look in my wallet you would find pictures of my wife and my two daughters. You won’t find pictures of other women in my wallet. Ladies, if your husband or boyfriend has pictures of other women in his wallet then it had better be pictures of his mother, his sister, or his kids. A man (or a woman for that matter) whose love is not specific is not single minded. They are not devoted. And it shouldn’t surprise us that God’s love for His bride is specific. In verse 5 Paul describes God’s specific love (read).
In the original Greek text there is no punctuation and so today there is a debate as to where we should punctuate this passage. The last phrase in verse 4 is “in love,” and the NKJV places the comma after that phrase. The NIV does away with the word “Him” and replaces it with “In His sight,” and places a period after that, thus they begin the next sentence with “In love He predestined us…” Now I’m not a big fan of the NIV but that actually flows more in tune with the Greek text and the meaning of the passage. God’s love is the reason for God’s blessings. God’s love is the reason He predestined us.
Now I know that word “predestined” can be a sticking point for a lot of people. Some people don’t like the thought of God being completely in control of things, but lets remember that this predestination Paul is writing about is done in the love of God. In a sense, we are predestined by love, God’s love.
Last time we looked at that word in verse 4 “chose” and talked a little bit about election, so today we are going to look at its cousin “predestination.” Believe it or not, they are not quite the same in meaning. Paul is not repeating himself here; he’s actually saying something new. Being chosen refers to God making us His own, He has elected us to a position of righteousness, and to salvation. The word predestination comes from the Greek word pro-oridzo, which means to determine beforehand.
And the way Paul is using it here is almost as a term of affection. He says, “In love He predestined us.” In-other-words, God set His affection on us in eternity past. God’s love is specific, directed and pre-determined. God’s love is focused specifically on His people. He chose us before the foundation of the world, and in love predestined us to the adoption as His own children.
So what was the basis for this? I’ve heard people say that God; in His foreknowledge, looked down through the passage of time and saw which of us would respond to the Gospel in faith, and that’s how He chooses, that He looks through time and sees who will respond, so that He can respond to them. But that’s not what the Bible says. Turn with me to Romans 8:28-30 (Read). You see; what we often do is confuse foreknowledge with foresight. Foreknowledge is not just seeing the future, it’s knowing the future. That’s not to say that God cannot look into the future, He most certainly can, but had He just looked and done nothing else, He would see that all of us were continually being born into sin, that none of us sought after Him, that all of mankind was spiritually dead in trespasses and sin. He would see that there were none righteous, no not one. And so God; in His foreknowledge, knew good and well that salvation “does not depend on him who wills, nor on him who runs, but on God who has mercy.”(Romans 9:16).
Now I know that someone might be thinking, “Wait a minute Kenny; doesn’t John 1:12 say that to ‘all who receive Him, to those who believe in His name, He gave the right to become children of God?’” But go on to verse 13 where it says, “Children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband’s will, but born of God.”
You see, foreknowledge is an act, not an attribute. Omniscience is an attribute. God is, by His very nature, omniscient, meaning that He is all knowing. But the way that word “foreknowledge” is used in that passage in Romans is dealing with the act of knowing someone – it’s talking about a relationship; those whom God knew beforehand… those are the ones He predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son. So you see; foreknowledge, like predestined, is a term of affection and love.
Think about it like this. In Matthew 7:23 where Jesus judges those who come to Him and say, “Lord, Lord,” haven’t we done all these great and wonderful works and miracles in your name? And Jesus replies to them, “I never knew you. Depart from you who work iniquity.” Now we just said that God is all knowing, but God the Son says to these people that He never knew them. In other words, He never knew them in relational way. “But God, who is rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in trespasses, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved); and raised us up together, and made us sit together in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, that in ages to come He might show the exceeding riches of His grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.” (Eph. 2:4-7)
So that love is what made us alive together with Christ, but that’s not all it does.
Ten years ago MariJo took my name as her own, she became a McKinley. 10 years may not sound like much to some of you, but that action symbolizes the truth of Scripture that in marriage two individuals become one. The goal of election is that we be holy and blameless. The mark of being elected by God is a changed life. We talked about that last Sunday. Well in the same way, predestination is a mark of God’s affection, which leads us to become an adopted member of God’s family.
Again; this is relational. We are adopted because of God’s love, because we are wanted, we are accepted, and we are loved by God Himself. I have two older siblings. An older sister and an older brother. I call them my brother and sister, but technically speaking they are my step sister and step brother. My mom had been married before marrying my dad. When he married my mother, he adopted my older siblings – even before I was born. He wanted to make sure that they were not looked on as step children, but as McKinley’s. And to be perfectly honest with you, I didn’t even know that they were my step brother and sister until I was in 7th grade.
Look at our text again (read Ephesians 1:5-6). The Bible makes it pretty clear that in us, there is no good thing. There is nothing in ourselves but sin, but because of God’s own good pleasure… His will, He has made us accepted by His grace. There was nothing in us that motivated God to do this. He was motivated by His love alone. “For God so LOVED the world, that He gave His only begotten Son…”
Amazing love,
How can it be?
That you my King should die for me.
Think about that for a moment. God created you, so that He could redeem you, all because He loved you.
All of creation exists for the purpose of praising a God who gives grace.
Paul actually emphasizes God’s grace in this passage. He says, “to the praise of the glory of His grace, by which He has made us accepted…” that phrase “by which He has made us accepted, “is also found in Luke 1:28 when the angel greets Mary and says she is “highly favored.” In other words; graced by God. It means one who has been given undeserved favor from God Himself. So we could translate verse 6 as, “to the praise of the glory of His grace, by which He has graced us with…”
Why have we received God’s grace? Because of the Son. That last word in verse 6 “Beloved” is referring to God’s Son, Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior. See verse 7 continues on by saying, “In Him…” in who? In the Beloved, in the Son.
The Father loves the Son so much that His love overflows onto all who are found in Him, If you are a Christian then you are in Christ, and He’s in you, and the love of God for His Son is so encompassing, that we too are objects of His love, because of our position in Christ. That’s one of the reasons I believe in eternal security. God will never stop loving His Son.
I honestly believe that when we begin to see the extent to which God went to secure our salvation, we can do nothing but give Him praise. When we begin to see His great love with which He loved us, we can do nothing but give Him praise. When we begin to see that predestination is more about love than about God being some kind of dictator, we can do nothing but give Him praise.
You see, that’s what it really boils down to when we have a problem with God’s sovereignty and His election and predestination. We question the love with which He loved us. Because if you believe that God is all good, that God is perfectly righteous, that God is perfectly holy and just, and that He loves us with an unconditional, unending love then why wouldn’t you want Him to be sovereign? After all He will always, ALWAYS have your best interests at heart. But if you do not see God as a loving Father, if you do not see Him as good, or if you love your sin more than you love Him, then of course you’re going to have a problem with God being sovereign.
INVITAITON AND PRAYER
