Jonathan Newlon
Uniontown Church of Christ
18 April 2020
Ephesians 1: Inheritance from God
Introduction
Have you ever received an inheritance? Perhaps you’ve had a friend or relative leave you something in their will upon their death. Perhaps it was a rich relative and you received a very large inheritance. I’m sure it made you feel special to know that someone thought well enough of you to want to leave you with something after they were gone. I want you to know something, God has an inheritance for us to receive, only we receive it when we are gone from this life. God leaves us an inheritance much greater than any we could receive from someone on this earth, no matter how rich they are! Ephesians chapter 1 tells us all about this inheritance from God. Let’s read it this morning and discuss our coming inheritance!
(Read Ephesians 1)
I. God chose mankind for His inheritance
Notice what God didn’t choose for His inheritance. God didn’t choose animals for his inheritance. This might make the folks a PETA a little bit angry, but in the eyes of God, we are more valuable than animals. This goes against what many say who subscribe to Darwinian theories. They say that man is just another animal. They say there is nothing special about us, but rather, we simply evolve just as the other animals do. In their eyes, there is no difference in value between a monkey and a man.
This simply isn’t true. God values us more than other animals. We are special to Him. Look at what the Lord Jesus has to say in Matthew chapter 6. He is making a point about now worrying because God will take care of us, but there is a mention of our value as well. Starting in verse 25, Jesus said, “Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they?”
God chose us for an inheritance, not the other animals. In fact, God chose man for His inheritance before we were even created! Look at Ephesians 1:3-4 where it says, “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, even as he chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before Him.” Now I don’t know about you, but that sure makes me feel special. God hadn’t even created the world yet, not even the foundations of it, and yet He had already chosen us.
It was God’s plan all along for us to live in glory with Him. In the passage we just read, it mentions that we were chosen to be “holy and blameless before Him.” At first, that was in the Garden of Eden. God had created a place for us to be in His presence. In fact, if you look back to Genesis, you see how God would walk with Adam in the Garden and speak with him directly. We were to live in perfection with the Lord, with His presence amongst us.
That was messed up when we failed God. In Genesis 3, we see the story of the fall of man. Satan had tricked Adam and Eve into disobeying the one restriction God had given them: not to eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. For the first time, sin and death entered into the world; mankind was corrupted. We turned away from God and sinned, and our inheritance was stripped from us. The good news, however, is that God still loved us. Because God loved us so much, the status quo wouldn’t last. Our inheritance wouldn’t be stripped from us forever. God, in his infinite love, mercy, and grace would do something about our fall.
II. God ordained a way for us to be reconciled to Him and once again receive our inheritance.
God didn’t just let us lay in our sin and be destroyed by it. He didn’t eternally condemn us without giving us a way out. Rather, God loved us so much that he gave us a way to be reconciled to Him again. He gave us a way to once again receive our inheritance. He gave us a way to be called his children.
The way given to us to receive our inheritance was through Jesus Christ. Look at verse 5 of our passage. It says, “In love, He predestined us for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of His will, to the praise of His glorious grace, with which He has blessed us in the Beloved.” Jesus’ death on the cross and resurrection is the way that God provided. Through Jesus we are adopted as children of God! Through his blood, our sins and wrongdoings are washed away, and we are reconciled with our Father.
The 53rd chapter of Isaiah contains a messianic prophecy about Jesus. It tells us what the sacrifice of Christ does for us. It shows us how we were once the victims of our own sin and transgressions, yet Jesus came and healed us through his sacrifice. Starting in verse 4, it says, “Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed him stricken and smitten by God and afflicted. But he was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his wounds we are healed.” This is just a small portion of this chapter about the plan of God to reconcile mankind with Him through Jesus. Read the full chapter sometime and you will see that this reconciliation didn’t just happen by accident. God planned it far before it was time. That is how much He loves us.
III. Who can receive this inheritance from God?
So far, we’ve talked about how God predestined mankind for His inheritance before the world was created, how we lost it, and how God reconciled us so that we might still have our inheritance. This now begs the question, who is eligible to receive the inheritance of God? At first, the Jews were the chosen people of God. God chose Abraham to become the father of Israel, through whom His people would come. They were brought out of slavery by Moses and inherited the land of Israel. Yet they kept disobeying God and it was stripped from them. They were still God’s people. Many might think that this inheritance was for them alone, but I tell you the inheritance of God now is not just for the Jews, but for all mankind!
You see, the Church in of the Ephesians was not made up of Jews. Rather it was made of Gentiles from the Greek city of Ephesus. Paul was chosen by God as the apostle to the gentiles so that we may share in the same inheritance of eternal life that He had given the Jews. Paul now gives the gentiles hope of this inheritance where he says, starting in verse 13, “In him (Jesus) 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, who is the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it, to the praise of his glory.”
In other words, this inheritance isn’t just for the Jews anymore! It is for all mankind! The fact of the matter is that anyone can now receive the inheritance of God through Jesus Christ if they hear, believe, and obey the Gospel! John 3:16 doesn’t say that Jesus died so just the Jews can have everlasting life. It says that ANYONE who believes in Him can have everlasting life! Thank God that we can all be saved, be children of God, and receive the inheritance of God! Remember what Roman’s 8:16-17 says. “The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs—heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him.”
IV. The magnitude of this inheritance
Let’s finish up by talking about the magnitude of this inheritance. This isn’t something that any of us will be disappointed with. I remember a Three Stooges short called “If a Body Meets a Body.” In it, Curly (called Curly Q. Link) has a rich uncle who died by the name of Professor Bob O. Link. They were expecting a huge inheritance, but the will had been stolen! When they found out what happened to the professor, they also found the will. Curley was very excited when opening the will but found upon reading it that he had only been left the sum of 67 cents.
Obviously, this won’t happen to us with God. God’s inheritance is nothing to be sneezed at! In fact, God already tells us what our inheritance is! It’s eternal life! It’s being glorified with Jesus Christ in heaven forever! Starting in verse 16 of our passage, Paul writes, “I do not cease to give thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers, that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you the Spirit of wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of him, having the eyes of your hearts enlightened, that you may know what is the hope to which he has called you, what are the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints, and what is the immeasurable greatness of his power toward those of us who believe...”
Paul shows here that the hope of our inheritance is a great one! It’s not the 67 cents that Curley received from his uncle. It’s eternal life with Jesus Christ! It’s eternal glory alongside Jesus Christ! It’s living forever in the presence of almighty God! What an inheritance!
Conclusion
In closing, thank God for this inheritance! Keep hope in your heart of the day when we will finally receive it. Keep your eyes toward heaven and obey the gospel of Jesus Christ until the day of His return. May God continue to bless you all.
