MESSAGE BY PASTOR ROB INRIG
FROM BETHANY BAPTIST IN RICHMOND, BC.
I invite you to pray with me, Father God hear our prayer, and we humbly cry to you as it is written in your word, Lucas 11:9:” Keep asking and it will give to you, Continue searching and you will find it, Keep knocking and it will be open for you)” We are requesting healing for our dear members of our family and also dear friends who are suffering from illnesses in their lives fighting and suffering under a lot of pain, You know them by their names; (Gaby P, Vicky O, Nancy R, Tere G, Liz N, Gloria F, Stevie A, Les N, Miguel A H, Socrates D, Sara's mom H, Sergei B, Margarita G, Fega G. Manuel D, Marlen C.) Also, some of them are tired of spiritual struggles, losing their faith in you, Strengthening their trust in you with a miracle in their lives, oh! Father God hear our prayer, and we also pray for all the people around the world especially the children, who are suffering from wars, devastation, hunger, pain, hate and disbelieve in you. Heal the Land of those Countries at war; you love them so much, oh Father God, hear our prayer, we ask you in the name of Our Lord of Lords and King of Kings, your beloved son Jesus Christ. AMEN!
Hetty Green was known as America's Greatest Miser. When she died in 1916, she left an enormous fortune, her estate valued then at $100 M. But Hetty Green was so miserly she ate cold oatmeal because it was too expensive to heat. Wanting to find a clinic where treatment was free, she neglected her son’s leg injury which resulted in amputation. Later she hastened her own death by choosing treatment that was cheap rather than effective. $100 million in her estate and leaving her estate undrawn. Holding vast resources but living as if she had none. Subsistence living when she had the capacity to live in abundance. Hard to fathom and yet?
How often can that be said of many Christians do the same - scraping by – joyless, resourceless, hopeless when we are called into the riches that are ours. In the weeks to come, we are taking a deep dive into the book of Ephesians in which Paul shows us a much different, much better way to live. For this morning, we are just stepping into the first 3 verses but don’t under estimate what this step will mean. Read 1:1-3. Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, to the saints who are in Ephesus, and are faithful in Christ Jesus: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. 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 ESV
The first thing we are called to see is:
1st KNOWING WHAT WE HAVE
As we open Paul’s letter, he immediately immerses us in the riches that are ours in Christ beginning with grace and peace, a fairly common greeting in the time he wrote. But for Paul there was nothing common about these because grace and peace are the driving themes of his life. Despite persecution, disasters, imprisonment and chains, he has been shaped by grace and because of that, he knows that even in the hard times, what it is to live with peace.
But understand, the peace Paul speaks of is only known because he had first experienced the grace of God. Jesus coming to him as a violent persecutor of Christians, to offer him what he did not deserve. Because of that, grace and peace shaped his attitudes and defined his actions. They were what he spoke and how he lived. And in short, he wants us to understand that we too will wear what we believe.
If there are essential characteristics we need at times such as these, it is to know, believe and fall into God’s grace and peace. Grace knowing God loves us, that God sees us, that God’s got us and that God will carry us. When life is tough. When things are hard. In the storm. In the uncertain. Because it’s in these places, we need the foundation of what is true.
Knowing what was true was certainly what Christians needed living in the profoundly Anti-Christian city of Ephesus. This was a city of enormous prominence and wealth where success depended on alignment with the culture’s values. That meant engaging in temple worship of Dianna – her Temple, one of the 7 Wonders of the World, 4 times larger than the Parthenon in Athens. Its pillars, all 126 of them, stood 60 tall. In the center of this temple was a statue of Artemis that had been carved out of a meteorite that had fallen from the sky. Worship of her dominated in Ephesus, so much so that later in Acts 19 we see the entire city in an uproar because the citizenry felt she was being displaced from her centrality. She was the goddess of love – sexuality, indulgence, revelry. Though Diana took center stage in the city, hers was one of many temples to other gods around which Ephesian life centered.
RUINS TEMPLE OF DIANA IN TURKEY
There was another god that demanded allegiance and that was Caesar. As we’ve previously considered, Caesar was regarded as more than mortal man. So, if you wanted to succeed in business – Caesar. Family life – Caesar. Political life – Caesar. Bow and declare.
As a result, the culture these followers of Jesus got up to every day was hardly anything marked by grace and peace. Every day they were met with hostility from friends and neighbours with whom they had fallen out of step. The world to which they once belonged had become foreign to them. It’s into this world, Paul writes grace and peace. How? by understanding that whatever we encounter, whatever we experience, know the grace we’ve been given; the peace in which we stand.
So too, for us – right here, right now. When peace is in short supply and where the grace we know is dependent on the availability of goods. But the grace and peace Paul speaks of are far deeper than the things gathered or the resources stored up. As he makes clear, grace and peace are resourced in God and knowing we are in Him. But Paul draws a distinction between knowing what we have and taking possession of those things so they:
2nd POSSESS WHO WE ARE
Interestingly, to the Ephesians, Paul does not say, remember you are Christians rather he tells them, remember you are ‘God’s saints.’ In other words, God’s ‘set apart ones’ – in a world where they are vastly outnumbered and seemingly, set aside. The word saints or hagios is used more than 60 times in Scripture, where you’ll find the word Christian only 3 times. So what is Paul saying? Remember you are called by God, favoured by God, chosen by God, so possess and live out who you are as you step into a world of other gods.
RUINS OF THE COLISEUM IN TURKEY
You are His saints. As you go about your day; as you work, as you study, as you parent, as you trip over each other in close, confined living. God’s saints. Not saints bound in some marble carving in Westminster Abbey or waiting for some future time. But His saints, here and now. At this time. In this moment. Addison Bevere observed, “Satan doesn’t want us to wake up in the present and see that this moment is the most significant thing. All we have is the present. If he can steal the present from us, he can undermine our sense of value and frustrate our efforts.”
Here and now, - mistake prone, ‘work in progress’, saints. I’m sure you, like I, looked in the mirror this morning, and sure didn’t see anything saintly looking back. And based on what was done last night, last week, or last month, there sure wasn’t anything in us that felt saintly. But as a recipient of God’s grace, God has declared you and me saints. Not saintly because you are good but saintly because you are God’s. Not saintly because of miraculous deeds but saintly because you are His child. And because of that, He calls us to dive deeply into the depth of His grace and to rest in His peace.
Saints - as God placed people - in a world committed to its own gods of success, pleasure and abundance. Gods that often seem to be serving them well. A world in which we at times, may feel very out of step with. Certainly that’s the picture Ephesus presented.
Even in its ruins, Ephesus is one impressive city. Among her remains – the facade of a large impressive library. Immense Corinthian pillars, carvings elaborate – testimony to the artistry of its builders and inside was said to be a collection of twelve thousand scrolls – the 3rd largest library in the Roman empire. Close by an intact coliseum where vast crowds once gathered to celebrate and play. And nearby reminders of the harbor that made Ephesus a cosmopolitan city, welcoming people who came from everywhere in the known world. Your first look at Ephesus was the walkway with pillar lined colonnades that extended from the city center to the harbor from which Ephesus grew rich in trade. No doubt many walked these roads celebrating their prosperity. This city had it all – wealth, intellect, play, entertainment – all clear demonstration of their achievement and prominence in the known world.
However, if you were to visit today, what is telling is what you won’t see at the end of this road - the sea that once served as Ephesus’ highway to wealth. Slowly and imperceptibly as the citizens reveled in their wealth and bowed before their gods, needing nothing, needing no one; the harbor was silting up, choking off the city and eventually entombing the lifestyle and the gods before whom they bowed. The identity they worked so hard to achieve came to nothing. All their wealth and achievement gone. The city abandoned.
RUINS OF WALKWAY EXTENDED FROM THE CITY CENTER TO THE HARBOR
BUT AS PAUL MAKES CLEAR, YOUR IDENTITY AS A FOLLOWER OF JESUS IS SOMething that will never diminish. And what God has prepared for His saints is something that will never lose its wonder.
The idea of being a saint seems so far removed from who we are and in truth, for some of us, who we want to be. The word sounds so religious, so dull, so lifeless. The life I’d much rather have is a life that’s gutsy and attractive; a life worth living with exploit and challenge. And I would suggest to you that’s exactly the life to which, we as saints, have been called. But we miss it, because we’ve allowed Satan to misrepresent who God is- instead of understanding that our God is the One who created our hearts of adventure; who created our drive to excel; who created our passion to celebrate. He gave us our desire for wonder and our spirit of excitement when we are amazed. He gave us joy and laughter – all part of His good gifts.
Because these are all attributes of God Himself – a God of laughter and joy. A God of celebration. So can His children – His saints be anything other than a reflection of these?
Saints we immediately became when we put our trust in the Lord Jesus to forgive our sins and make us new. Saints of God - not having to wait until the addiction is conquered or our anger is wrestled under control or our troublesome behavior is no more. Not someone first needing to be cleaned up. The cleaned up is what God does and is doing through the Cross that gave us a new identity in Jesus. And in that Cross we have been given the resources and riches of Christ that change us as we cooperate with Him. But possessing our resource and laying claim to and living in the power of those resources is not the same.
During the Depression, there was a man named Yates who owned a sheep ranch in Texas. Yates wasn’t able to make enough on his ranching operation so was in danger of losing his ranch, his family was living on government subsidies. One day an oil company asked permission to drill a well. Yates agreed. At 1,115 feet they struck a huge oil reserve. The 1st well came in at 80,000 barrels a day. Subsequent wells were twice as large. 30 years after the discovery, a government test of just 1 well showed it still had the potential flow of 125,000 barrels of oil a day. This huge oil reserve is known today as Yates Pool. The day he bought the land he owned the oil and mineral rights. Yates became a multi-millionaire overnight. Yet, he’d been living on relief.
Because he didn’t know what he had. It begs the question, do we really understand who we are and what we possess as children of the most High God? Hosea 4:6 “My people are destroyed for a lack of knowledge”
But in :3-14 Paul answers this in one long, run on sentence, his response praising Jesus for all he has done, centering on the riches we have been given in Christ
As God’s child, you are the recipient of God’s lavished grace; the recipient of God’s peace in places where storms gather and in places where you have been pushed out and pushed away. You and I don’t need to pray for more of God’s grace or more of God’s peace. Rather we need to throw ourselves into the Grace that is already ours - grace in hard places when life isn’t all well and good and peace even when waters aren’t always calm and footing isn’t always sure.
Paul is saying 1st know what we have; 2nd possess who we are and lastly,
3rd PARTAKE IN WHAT IS OURS. And that means moving from possession to practice:
I think it begins with what we are given in :3 BLESSED be God – our call to praise. Our call to praise the one true God.
Hulk Hogan, commenting on the time during COVID, expressed it well, as he observed, “In three short weeks, just like He did with the plagues of Egypt, God has taken away everything we worship”. God said: ‘You want to worship athletes, I will shut down the stadiums. You want to worship musicians, I will shut down Civic Centres. You want to worship actors, I will shut down theatres...’” You want to “worship money” - it’s why the economy is collapsing. He probably could have added, ‘You want to worship just by ‘playing church’ I will shut down your places of empty worship’. Hogan concluded, “Maybe we don't need a vaccine, maybe we need to take this time of isolation from the distractions of the world and have a personal revival where we focus on the ONLY thing in the world that really matters. Jesus”.
Jesus is why we praise. Throughout Scripture, God makes it clear, if you want to experience the ‘fulness of joy’, come into His presence with praise. If you want to know the goodness of God and the victory he gives – praise Him Ps 34. If you want to defeat your foe, praise Him Ps 8. If you want to be filled with joy and put anxiety to flight, praise Him. Ps 33 Why? Because God tells us Ps 22:3 that He, INHABITS the praises of His people.
In Lk 19:37,39,40 NIV the whole crowd of disciples began joyfully to praise God in loud voices… Some Pharisees said to Jesus, “Teacher, rebuke your disciples!” “I tell you,” he replied, “if they keep quiet, the stones will cry out.” Again, Why? Because praise reorients us to what is true and as we praise, it moves truth from head to heart.
In our praise we embrace God and for who He is and what He’s done. The praise I’m speaking of is far greater than great music or good words, though the songs we sing and the words we speak are the language of praise that MUST be expressed. No matter how off key our singing may be, no matter how confused our words may feel – praise is not something that is to be kept silently within. When we do that, we rob ourselves of the power God wants to give; more than that, we rob God of the praise He deserves. Simply put, praise must be expressed.
But praise is far more than song. It’s the praise of calloused hands of those who work the mill, pull the nets, and drive the rigs. It’s the praise of saints faithfully living out in a world bowing to other gods. It’s the praise of doing what’s right when you know what that right will cost. It’s the praise that lives out hope and joy that comes from a place far deeper than circumstance.
Praise that is the worship of our lives not merely the expressions of our tongue. It is living in the awareness that our lives are Christ’s and that means living out Jesus in the marketplace and in our homes. It means living out Christ in what we value and what we pursue. People who: live out grace and peace; who live out being ‘set apart’ as saints - known for whom we live AND people who live out praise that reflects the grace and peace of the resurrected Jesus we serve.
It's knowing that we have been the recipients of a grace that is so beyond our understanding, so beyond anything we deserved. It truly is falling before the AMAZING grace of Jesus taking upon Himself our sin - all the hidden, all the lies, all the thoughts, all the actions that we know fall short of what a Holy God should accept, can accept. But those things paid for and forgiven by Jesus’ shed blood.
That is why we can live in peace. Because of Jesus, There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the Spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death. Rom 8:1,2
Grace and Peace – the high water marks of what we have been given in Jesus.
That is why I started this series beginning with the end in mind. That fundamentally the last thing the enemy wants us to lay hold of is an understanding that we are a grace given, peace filled, hope looking people who have been made victorious in Jesus. This victory not just for some time then but for this time now, the full assurance of that to be realized in a time not yet.
So root yourself firmly in this.
This is why we are to arm up. This is why we are to stand. Not because we are a defenceless people fending off the bad but because we are Grace Victorious, Peace Given, God Chosen people who have been made new in Jesus because of His amazing love.
Thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.
Therefore, my dear brothers and sisters, stand firm.
Let nothing move you. Always give yourselves fully to the work
of the Lord, because you know
that your labor in the Lord is not in vain. 1 Cor 15:57,58.
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