Text: Eph 2:4-7, Col 3:1-4, Title: Too Heavenly Minded, Date/Place: NRBC, 7/1/12
A. Opening illustration: “The strength to endure present suffering is the fruit of meditating on future satisfaction.”
B. Background to passage: Paul is exalting in the salvation that we share in Christ, mentions the reward...
C. Main thought: What reward are we to look toward to be able to choose to suffer the reproach of Christ
A. Heaven (v. )
1. In Ephesians Paul gives us a purpose clause for our salvation: in the ages to come we might show the immeasurable riches of God’s grace and kindness. The ultimate end of our salvation (although it never ends) is that we would display the endless glory of his kindness toward us. In Colossians he says that we should fix our minds on eternal (heavenly) things because our life is in Christ and when He comes we will appear in glory. Eph 1:18
2. Illustration: Heaven is not one grand, momentary flash of excitement followed by an eternity of boredom. Heaven is not going to be an endless series of earthly re-runs! some people are “so heavenly minded they’re of no earthly good.” On the contrary, I’m persuaded that we will never be of much use in this life until we’ve developed a healthy obsession with the next. Our only hope for satisfaction of soul and joy of heart in this life comes from looking intently at what we can’t see (see 2 Cor. 4:16-18; Col. 3:1-4). Therefore, we must take steps to cultivate and intensify in our souls an ache for the beauty and perfection of the age to come. CS Lewis: "Most of us find it very difficult to want 'Heaven' at all--except in so far as 'Heaven' means meeting again our friends who have died. One reason for this difficulty is that we have not been trained; our whole education tends to fix our minds on this world. Another reason is that when the real want for Heaven is present in us, we do not recognize it." “The enjoyment of him is our proper; and is the only happiness with which our souls can be satisfied. To go to heaven, fully to enjoy God, is infinitely better than the most pleasant accommodations here. Better than fathers and mothers, husbands, wives, or children, or the company of any, or all earthly friends. These are but shadows; but the enjoyment of God is the substance. These are but scattered beams; but God is the sun. These are but streams; but God is the fountain. These are but drops, but God is the ocean.” –Jonathan Edwards, joy never crests in heaven, "We will constantly be more amazed with God, more in love with God, and thus ever more relishing his presence and our relationship with him. Our experience of God will never reach its consummation. We will never finally arrive, as if upon reaching a peak we discover there is nothing beyond. Our experience of God will never become stale. It will deepen and develop, intensify and amplify, unfold and increase, broaden and balloon. Our relishing and rejoicing in God will sharpen and spread and extend and progress and mature and flower and blossom and widen and stretch and swell and snowball and inflate and lengthen and augment and advance and proliferate and accumulate and accelerate and multiply and heighten and reach a crescendo that will even then be only the beginning of an eternity of new and fresh insights into the majesty of who God is!” –theologian Sam Storms, “New ideas, new revelation, new insights, new applications, together with new connections between one idea and another all lead to deeper appreciation for God and thus fuel the flames of worship. And just when you think you’re going to explode if you learn anything more or hear anything fresh or see anything new, God expands your heart and stretches your mind and broadens your emotions and extends every faculty to take in yet more and more and more, and so it goes forever and ever.” "Monday, Feb. 13. Was calm and sedate in morning-devotions; and my soul seemed to rely on God. -- Rode to Stockbridge, and enjoyed some comfortable meditations by the way; had a more refreshing taste and relish of heavenly blessedness than I have enjoyed for many months past. I have many times, of late, felt as ardent desires of holiness as ever; but not so much sense of the sweetness and unspeakable pleasure of the enjoyments and employments of heaven. My soul longed to leave earth, and bear a part with angels in their celestial employments. My soul said,`Lord, it is good to be here;' and it appeared to be better to die than to lose the relish of these heavenly delights." -Brainerd
3. Glorification never ends. Heaven is always getting better every day. We never arrive. We definitely don’t get it “all” on the first day. We are always seeing more, knowing more, loving more of Christ.
4. And of course, in heaven there will be no sin (no rape or murder, no pride or arrogance, no hate nor oppression, no fighting or separating); there will be no sickness (cancer, diabetes, epilepsy, swine or bird flu, food poisoning, gall bladder attacks, broken bones, AIDS, strep throat, back and knee problems, or migraines); there will be fellowship with all our loved ones gone on before and saints of old and of late; there will be streets of gold and gates of pearl and every tear wiped away, but the real reason that heaven will be heaven is...
B. Christ Himself (v. )
1. Being in the presence of Christ will be the most glorious part about being in heaven. Why? Because he is the most awesome being in the entire universe! He is the most satisfying, therefore no sin nor pleasure can out satisfy Him. And the reason that we don’t know that is because we don’t go deep enough in our relationship with Him to experience any sort of ecstacy. We are never enraptured by Him when we spend time with Him. As it might be with a young couple engaged to be married: they just love being together so they spent have their time decided how to spend all their time with each other. And sometimes during those times together, passion and desire erupt and long to be fulfilled. Don’t think anything is wrong with me describing our relationship to God in sexual terms; God does, read Ezek 16, one of the most sexually charged passages in the OT, and it deals with God and His love affair with Israel in very graphic terms. Now all of you all are going to go read biblical pornography ☺. But this helps you understand how the satisfaction that we derive from being with Christ is most powerful that the other things of this world. But to not be satisfied in Him (find your joy in Him, experience ecstacy with Him) will cripple our resolve to choose pain over pleasure, choose Him over sin, choose the best over the good. In fact, if you think about it, you are actually choosing greater pleasure over a lesser pleasure. If pleasing Christ and knowing Him is the greatest desire and satisfaction of your soul, you will do whatever is needed to attain your desire. If you greatest desire is life, sex, toys, success, you will strive for it. And because Jesus is your joy and satisfaction, you will use whatever means provided for acheiving that purpose, even if is pain. Pain becomes a vehicle to reach your highest joy and deepest satisfaction. So WHERE IS YOUR DEEPEST JOY AND DESIRE FOUND? Read from the books. Read the names and Titles of Christ.
2. Phil 1:23, Col 1:27, 2 Cor 5:8,
3. Illustration: Speak of home with Christ, liken it to going home after a hospital visit. “I must confess I’ve grown a bit weary of the sermon series that repeatedly exhorts people to pursue God and be committed to God and make a choice to serve God rather than the flesh but never proceeds to tell us what it is about God that makes him worthy of this devotion. Exhortation to pursue God that is not grounded in instruction about God eventually wears people out and leaves them grasping for something solid and substantive to lay hold of...don’t be afraid of diving into the deep end of the knowledge of God. It is, says Edwards, “a bottomless ocean of wonders that we can never comprehend, but yet may with great pleasure and profit dive further into”
4. There are a couple of ways to increase your desire for Him. First, we must realize that to know Him is to love Him. If you think about it, this is logical. If He the greatest and the highest and the best, the more we know about His flawless character and endless love and infinite glory, the more that we will love and desire Him. Therefore, your fight to desire Christ above all things (for your ultimate joy and satisfaction) is a fight to see Him better and more fully. So pursue this knowing God through His self-revelation. Read the word! Let your insatiable hunger for knowing Him fuel your passionate quest in the Word. As you see Him and know Him, you will be satisfied at greater levels, thus creating more desire. Your stomach never gets too full of God to have more! Do you really want to know Him? Are you really reading your bible toward that end? The second thing that you must do to increase your joy and desire is spend time with God. Practice the presence of God through prayer. Seek intimate communion with Him. This is how you find joy with your spouse or friends or toys or pets – spend time with them. And don’t leave until He arrives and ravishes your soul. Pray until He comes! Enter into your closet with the full knowledge that He will come, and the full intention of waiting until that happens! Nothing fancy or secret: prayer and the Word of God. No shortcuts or bypasses or easy outs or loopholes or cliff notes or pages in the back of the book where you can get the answers. But it is worth it!!!! Seek Him! He is the best!!!! The satisfaction you long for is found in Him! All the emptiness when you don’t get what you think you need, or the emptiness that comes with getting what you need, and it not delivering or delivering very long, looking for love in all the wrong places. Fight for your joy in Him! Then choose pain and transcend it, and make it your slave for satisfaction in Him! Note: lost must deal with sin first.
A. Closing illustration: “If we consider the greatness and the glory of the life we shall have when we have risen from the dead, it would not be difficult at all for us to bear the concerns of this world. If I believe the Word, I shall on the Last Day, after the sentence has been pronounced, not only gladly have suffered ordinary temptations, insults, and imprisonment, but I shall also say: ‘O, that I did not throw myself under the feet of all the godless for the sake of the great glory which I now see revealed and which has come to me through the merit of Christ!’” Martin Luther
B. Recap
C. Invitation to commitment
Additional Notes
● Is Christ Exalted, Magnified, Honored, and Glorified?
