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. In love He predestined us for adoption to Himself 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. In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses according to the riches of His grace, which He lavished upon us in all wisdom and insight, making known to us the mystery of His will, according to His purpose, which He set forth in Christ as a plan for the fullness of time to unite all things in Him—things in heaven and things on earth. In Him we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to the purpose of Him who works all things according to the counsel of His will, so that we who were the first to hope in Christ might be to the praise of His glory.

In Him 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. Let us pray. Father, we honor You and thank You so very much for giving us another opportunity to gather together, to worship, to learn, to fellowship. We pray these moments will be beneficial to each one. Arrest our hearts, open our ears, make us, O God, able to hear the Word. Not just, Father, as it pertains to physical hearing, the sounds resonating on our eardrums, but may we hear it in our hearts and spirits through the working of the Holy Spirit, we ask in Jesus’ name. Amen.

Now the blessings—these blessings of Ephesians 1 from these passages that I’ve just read—they have some overlap. You will see that some of them, I’ve got a list of ten, but you could quibble about that and say, well, there’s eight or nine because some of them would overlap and perhaps be synonymous. But I have listed ten here, and I want to call your attention to the fact that in the Greek this is one long sentence. Paul is rambling. It’s just rolling along; it’s rolling off his tongue about how God has blessed His people. And a question that some people have: are these spiritual blessings here in the text, or are they other things in other passages of Scripture? Well, I take the position with most commentators that it is these things in the text. So let me give you ten blessings. We are not going to break these down today, but ten blessings that are found in this fourteen‑verse passage: eternal choice, loving predestination, adoption into His family, redemption, forgiveness, inheritance, truth, hope, faith, and last but not least, the Spirit’s indwelling presence.

Now at the end of the message, I have three life lessons that I want to bring to show us how these things benefit us. Before we get there, we must take a journey through a lot of other passages to lay the framework for what we will come back to. And so we will begin in the Old Testament with the book of Amos. Amos 3:7 says the Lord God does nothing without revealing His secret to His servants, the prophets. In other words, God has a plan; He makes the plan known and then He works the plan. You see this in Isaiah 46:8–11, which declares that I am God and there is no other. I am God and there is none like me; it declares the end from the beginning and from ancient times things not yet done, saying my counsel shall stand and I will accomplish all my purpose. It calls a bird of prey from the east, the man of my counsel from a far country, and says I have spoken and I will bring it to pass. I have purposed and I will do it. And 2 Kings 24:13 says Nebuchadnezzar carried off all the treasures of the house of the Lord and the treasures of the king’s house and cut in pieces all the vessels of gold in the temple of the Lord, which Solomon, king of Israel, had made as the Lord had foretold. God said this was going to happen and it in fact happened. When you go to Acts 3:18, what God foretold, spoke ahead of time by the mouth of all the prophets that His Christ would suffer; he thus fulfilled.

Now what we can affirm because of these passages and many like them is that although the Bible is more than this, the Bible is a predictive prophetic book. From beginning to end it offers futuristic predictions. For example Genesis 3:15 at the very beginning I will put enmity between you and the woman and between your offspring and her offspring. He shall bruise your head and you shall bruise his heel. Of course we know that this was a prophecy of Christ conquering Satan at the cross. It is a prediction about this in the very beginning of the Bible. Revelation 22:1–5 says the angel showed me the river of water of life bright as crystal flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb. No longer will there be anything accursed, but His servants will worship Him. They will see His face and His name will be on their foreheads; night will be no more. They will need no light because the Lord God will be their light and they will reign forever and ever. At the beginning is a prediction; at the end is a prediction. Along the way we find all kinds of other predictions. God predicts that Abraham will be a blessing to the whole world, that his descendants will sojourn in a strange land, that Joseph will rule Egypt, that David will have an eternal heir upon the throne. In the Bible God foretells and describes the lives of numerous individuals ahead of time, including Samson, Josiah, and John the Baptist. And He predicts the judgment and exile of the people of Israel, as we saw in the second‑king text above. Those who study these things say the odds of these prophecies coming to pass are astronomical. In the Bible there are three hundred prophecies about Jesus Christ. One resource said that if you took just eight of those, the odds of just eight of them coming to pass would be described this way: you cover the state of Texas with quarters two feet deep, and one of those quarters is marked, and a blindfolded person finds that quarter on the first try. That is the odds of even eight of the prophecies of Christ coming to pass. And there are three hundred prophecies about Jesus Christ. It is so very important; many people even today—modern examples cited by people as proof of God’s predictions coming to pass include the regathering of the Jewish people. What God says will happen, happens. Among biblical Christians that’s almost unquestioned. Liberal Christians may tinker with Scripture, but biblical Christians, to the last person, agree that what God says will happen will happen without fail.

Now we have a question. How did that happen? We all agree, or we should agree, that what God says is going to happen; it happens. But now the question is how did that happen? Are they just randomly occurring? Is it just simply a matter of God’s foreknowledge? He knows the future and He’s simply telling us what the future holds. Is that what’s going on, or is it more involved, and is it that God, in His mysterious providence, causes these things to happen?

This has implications for our salvation. Within the Protestant family there are two ways to describe how God chooses us for salvation, and that He chooses us is clear. Verse four says He chose us in Christ before the foundation of the world. There’s no question that God chose. Some people get nervous about the word election. The word election simply means choice; God chose to save us. That shouldn’t be a word of alarm. It should be a word of comfort and assurance. But within the Protestant family there are two ways to describe how God made this choice. One group says that He did it arbitrarily, without any regard to anything the person brings to the table. Some of the greater Reformed people in the past—Luther and others—have said, the only thing we bring to God is our sin. That’s the only thing we have to offer. We have nothing to barter with God about. It’s our sin. And so there is that group of people. The other group says it like this: God looked down through time, saw John Doe, and saw that when John Doe was exposed to the gospel, John Doe would believe the gospel, and He therefore chose John Doe for salvation. Now if that’s true, it only answers part of the problem; it is that God knew what John Doe would do in a particular given moment.

I have an illustration here. I don’t know how well it’s going to work, but we’re going to try it out. This has got a little bit of water in it. I could pour some more. I’ve got a cup, but it’s a Styrofoam cup. There is water here. What will happen if I turn this bottle up without the cap on? I can’t hear you. Everybody agreed? If I turn it up, the water is going to come out. Correct? Now that, my friends, is an example of foreknowledge. Infallibly what will happen when this bottle is turned upside down. Amen. See, I even got the little ones going with me. We all know this is foreknowledge. We all know that’s going to happen. Turn the bottle up and it’s going to come out, right? Let’s see what happens. We all agree, right? If it turns up, it’s going to come out. That’s foreknowledge.

Well, how come it’s not coming out? I haven’t turned it up.

Foreknowledge, infallible foreknowledge of what will happen still requires some kind of action to bring that thing to pass. And when people say, well, God knew I would believe, but here’s the problem—how did you hear the gospel? That was not a random, accidental event. Remember the story of the Ethiopian eunuch? He was saved. If he was saved on the basis of God knowing he would believe, then why didn’t he just believe? God doesn’t just leave him out there and say he’ll believe. He sends Philip to share the gospel with him.

This is the problem with the viewpoint that God knew I would believe. How is it that you were born in a country where the gospel is freely proclaimed? How did that randomly happen? What events in your life inclined you to respond? When you listen and when you talk to people’s testimonies, there’s almost always some catalyst. They didn’t get out of bed on Sunday morning and say, today I’m going to become a Christian. There was some kind of event in their life moving them to that place.

How did the church you were saved in come to exist? How did the person who led you to faith—whether it be a Sunday‑school teacher, a pastor, a friend, an evangelist, a co‑worker, a family member—become a believer? You see, to say that God looked down through time and saw that this so‑and‑so would believe says nothing about how he arrived at the place where he could be confronted with the gospel to begin with. And the point is that we might want to better say not that God simply knew that John Doe would believe, but that God orchestrated the events of his life so that he would come into an encounter with the faith in a certain place at a certain time through a certain person.

Now, it is possible for an all‑knowing God to foreknow all things. But we have a problem if that’s how he’s doing this because now we’ve moved him from being almighty to simply all‑knowing. He’s really not doing anything. He’s just sitting by and watching it happen. We’ve embraced the kind of functional deism. God winds the world up, and he leaves it alone, and that’s as far as his role goes.

Well, that won’t work because then we have a God who is all‑knowing, but he’s really not doing anything. And I wasn’t able to get this thoroughly processed in my mind so I could explain it, and I’m trying to be better at this and not throw out too heavy abstract sayings. But if God is just standing by watching us come to salvation, how is that an act of love? Love is an action; it’s not a feeling. Love is an action. Love is something God does.

If I say, “God loved me so much he stood by and waited for me to come to salvation,” no. He acted to bring me to salvation. He doesn’t just look down through time and see that I would believe—by the way, that’s a position you should know I disagree with. But if we say that, we tinker with other things and we turn him into a God who simply knows things. He’s just watching things happen. He’s a bystander.

But the other problem is, children, that when we look at Scripture, we don’t see a God who says, “I foresee this is going to happen.” We see a God who says, “This is what I’m going to do. I’m going to make this happen. I’m going to bring this to pass.”

With all the things we’ve looked at, he doesn’t merely say, “this is going to happen.” He says, “I’m going to do this.” It is happening because God is actively working in his mysterious providence to bring it about.

He doesn’t say in that passage from Genesis 3:15 there will be enmity. He says, “I am going to put enmity between you and the serpent.” He doesn’t say to Abraham, “Listen, I know you guys are old. But if you all just keep working at marital intimacy, sooner or later you’ll have a child.” That’s not what happens. God says, “I’m going to give you a child. I’m going to do something.”

And by the way, for those of us who’ve forgotten or have never learned this, the whole story of Abraham is a parallel, a parable of how God brings us to salvation. It is a work of His where there’s nothing we can offer. Abraham and Sarah had nothing but their old broken bodies. And God does a work of miracle. And that is our salvation. It is a work of God.

He doesn’t say merely, “you’re going to have a son.” He says, “I’m going to give you a son.”

Look at this passage again from Isaiah. This time I was able to get it on the screen because I called it way down. He says, “I am God. There is no other. I am God and there’s none like me declaring the end from the beginning and from ancient times, things not yet done.” Stop.

Because that you could argue is a piece of foreknowledge—God simply knows. He’s in the past. He looks down through time and he says, “Okay, I see what’s going to happen. And I declare that’s going to happen.” But that’s not where it stops. He doesn’t merely say, “I can see what’s going to happen.” He says, “I’m going to do something.”

Listen to it. My counsel shall stand, and I will accomplish all my purpose, calling a bird of prey from the east—the man of my counsel from a far country. I have spoken, and I will bring it to pass. I have purpose, and I will do it.

It’s not just this is going to happen; it’s this is going to happen because I’m going to make it happen to fulfill my purpose in the earth. This is the God we serve—not a bystander hoping things turn out a certain way, but a sovereign God moving to bring things to pass that are keeping with His purpose and will.

Now this man from the east—the bird of prey—historically is Cyrus, king of the Medo‑Persian kingdom who releases the Israelites from their captivity. Notice what the Bible says about that.

Second Chronicles 36:22‑23.
Now that the word of the Lord by the mouth of Jeremiah might be fulfilled, the Lord stirred up the spirit of Cyrus, king of Persia, so that he made a proclamation throughout all his kingdom. Thus says Cyrus, king of Persia, the Lord, the God of Heaven has given me all the kingdoms of the earth and charged me to build him a house at Jerusalem. Whoever is among you of all His people, let him go up.

Notice it isn’t just God saying that at some point down the road a nice king will come along and let you go home. He says, I am going to stir up this king. I am going to bring this purpose to pass and he will let you go back to your homeland. It was a fulfillment of scripture. We are not free to believe this king out of the goodness of his heart deciding to let the people go. The biblical picture is that God moved him to this action. This release occurred because God ordained it, and at the right time moved the heart of the king to perform this preordained event.

You notice the passage in Proverbs that I didn’t get it on this outline, but it says the heart of the king is in the hand of the Lord. He turns it wherever he will. And this is exactly what you are seeing here with Cyrus. God is not just saying this is going to happen; God is bringing it to pass in His mysterious providence.

Scripture bears this out once and again in most of the worst and in most of the well‑known Bible stories. For example, Exodus 9: Moses was told to rise early in the morning and present himself before Pharaoh and say that for this purpose I have raised you up to show my power so that my name may be proclaimed in all the earth.

It is not God simply showing up one day and saying, “Okay, what, this is how it’s going to happen.” No, it is God making it happen. Listen to Genesis, because in Genesis 400 years earlier, God says this is what’s going to happen. Genesis 15:13‑14.

The Lord said to Abram, “Know for certain that your offspring will be sojourners in a land that is not theirs, and will be servants there, and they will be afflicted for 400 years.” But I will bring judgment on the nation that they serve, and afterwards they shall come out with great possessions. This is the Exodus—God predicting the Exodus hundreds of years earlier.

And the whole story after this, where Joseph goes to Egypt, he has these dreams, his brothers… These are all God’s ways of getting them into Egypt so He can deliver them out of Egypt. It is not accidental; it is God knowing what will happen. It is God performing His perfect will.

Proverbs 19:21. Many are the plans in the mind of a man, but it is the purpose of the Lord that will stand. Isaiah 55:11. So shall my word be that goes out from My mouth; it shall not return empty, but accomplish what I intend and succeed in the thing for which I sent it.

Another one of the most well‑known passages in all the Bible is Romans 8:28. We know that for those who love God, all things work together for good, for those who are called according to His purpose. The King James says pretty much the same thing; newer translations render it differently because bad things do not accidentally turn into good things.

He’s not merely a bystander saying, hang in there. I foresee that down the road things will be better for you. He’s saying, hang in there because I’m with you and working on your behalf. I am taking all these bad things and weaving them into a tapestry of hope and celebration. And it is true that this is at the end—a good, eternal outcome.

Finally, 1 Timothy 1:9. God saved us and called us to a holy calling not because of our works but because of His own purpose and grace given in Christ Jesus before ages began.

Now we’re back to our chapter one of Ephesians. Because we have purpose, we have grace, and we have the choice in eternity past. This is the concept: God is not merely telling us certain things are going to happen. He’s ruling; He’s a king ruling the earth and the universe.

Paul uses this word purpose in Ephesians 3:9‑11 to bring to light for everyone what is the plan of God. He’s got a plan, working His plan. The plan of God who created all things so that through the church—

The church is important to God and should be important to Christians. We have a plague in our culture and in the American church, but it doesn’t matter. I believe God has a plan for the church that was started in eternity, stretches into eternity, and we need to recover that in our hearts.

The plan of God—now the wisdom of God might—through the church, the manifold wisdom of God might be made known. This was according to the eternal purpose that we realized in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Now let me say to you before we get to our three life lessons: salvation is not merely a matter of foreknowledge. It is not simply a prediction that comes to pass. It is a purpose that God is bringing to pass. He has made a plan and is going to rescue people from sin. He’s bringing that to pass. It’s not a hope; it’s more than that.

Let me give you three life lessons from this: the basis—three life lessons, as I said. The basis of our hope is God’s unfailing accomplishing of His eternal purpose. Your hope in salvation is not your eventual perfection. Our hope in salvation is the full work and satisfaction of Christ.

I wanted to read a couple passages from this book this morning, which is by Rankin Wilborn, who pastors Pacific Crossroads Church in California. It’s on union with Christ. I bought three new books on union with Christ because I wanted to talk about the subject. One writer puts it this way: many acknowledge that we are justified by the righteousness of Christ, but seem to think at least that they act as if they must be sanctified by a holiness they themselves have acquired. This has been called the key error of the Christian life, grounding our confidence before God and others on the sinking sand of shifting performance.

On the days we do well, we feel great: we start the day early in prayer, help a stranger at the supermarket, find a clever way to introduce the gospel into conversation. We check, check, check. We’re flying high; we’re great Christians. But just a day later, you wake up late, are short with a coworker, blast the horn at someone on the road who turns out to be the neighbor you shared the gospel with yesterday. You crash down and wonder what kind of Christian you are—up, down, up, down…

He says this is how many of us live, and it can only result in feeling defeated. I’ll never get there; cynical; nobody gets there; or resigned. Why even try? That’s the result. If you’re trying to live this thing in your own strength, we have to rely on God’s strength.

Listen: your faith is absolutely necessary, but it is the object of your faith, not its strength, that matters most. My faith is in Christ. And when my faith—when the strength of my faith is weak—He remains unmoving. Your confidence that God loves you is grounded outside of you in the one who sits at God’s right hand.

And that means you cannot mess it up. Not only did He stand in your place 2,000 years ago; He now stands in your place before God the Father. That means God’s benevolence toward you is as sure as Christ being fixed at God’s right hand.

Now this is where I want to bring out the union in Christ concept: God’s benevolence toward you is as sure as Christ being fixed at God’s right hand, and He will not be moved. You remember the song? “I shall not be moved.” Just like a tree planted by water.

You really ought to think about an extra gift on the offering plate today because of that performance. But nothing wrong with it. You’re singing it in your own strength; I’m determined I will not be moved. The secret and source of not being moved is because I am one with Christ, not because I am super Christian.

Consequently He is able to save to the uttermost those who draw near to God through Him. What security? Eternal security when we forget this and look instead to our circumstances for assurance that God is pleased with us—we are easily swayed. We assume God must be pleased when things go well, and disappointed when bad. We’re on a roller coaster.

I use this illustration Wednesday night: the Christian life is like this; God’s love does not change in valleys or peaks; our faith, trust is in Christ’s work, which cannot be added to or subtracted from. We assume God must be pleased when things are good and disappointed when bad—that shows we think we approach God on merit.

That shows we do not understand the gospel. We don’t know Jesus is seated, enthroned; He is our high priest. Ten times Paul says in Christ blessed us with all spiritual blessings in the heavenly places where Christ is seated at God’s right hand. That is our strength and hope: a product of God’s unfailing accomplishing of His eternal purpose.

Notice His purpose was our adoption as children. His purpose to unite all things in Christ. And his purpose gives us, in verse 11, an eternal inheritance. This is the purpose God has brought to pass. It’s not something we hope to get done; it is His purpose that He has brought, and that’s where our hope lies.

Number two: life lesson two. Thank you, whichever did that, me, or God. God has purposed the accomplishing of all these things to bring glory to Himself.

I know this is hard for modern western American Christians to get. You are not the central thing in God’s salvation plan. He loves us and will save us. His central purpose is His glory. The Bible makes this clear again and again.

You remember Psalm 23? “He leads me…” No, he leads me in the path of righteousness for His namesake.

Notice verses: 5 and 6 predestined us for adoption to the praise of His glorious grace. Verses 11–12: we have an inheritance to the praise of His glory. Verses 13‑14: sealed with Holy Spirit to the praise of His glory.

He predestined, adopted, filled with His Holy Ghost to do what? To bring glory to His name, not just to live only for ourselves in this life.

God has a purpose. God has a plan. Our salvation hinges on accomplishing His purpose and that He will not fail. He will not fail.

In life lesson number three: there is no glory in unaccomplished goals. Nobody gets credit. In real life, in the spirit world, in church, in kingdom of God, nobody gets credit for what they wanted to do.

When you come to the end, it’s not “I really wanted to go here.” It’s about having achieved glory.

Years ago Will now says that he was probably just speaking as an arrogant young person. He said: “Dad, the difference between you and me? I talk about the things you want to do, and I talk about the things I’m going to do.” That hit me wrong way. Since then I’ve worked on getting stuff done.

God says He’s going to save a people for His glory. There’s no glory if people aren’t saved, not sustained, not brought through trials…

We are living with God’s plan, working it out; He will be glorified because He achieves His goal.

Now I have to pause and give you one last thought. Many people in our culture, especially church, feel alarmed. We don’t read when we recite the Apostles’ Creed, we do not say the Holy Catholic Church… Because that word “Catholic”…

There are a lot of people uncomfortable when you say the word Catholic. We don’t recite Holy Catholic Church in the Creed for that purpose.

Here’s a word in this text that puts some people on edge: Predestination. But I want you to listen. Paul says it’s an act of love. In love He predestined us for adoption as children, to make us His own. That should not be a word that causes alarm.

I know there are difficulties and complexities and we can’t in this life understand them all. But it should not cause alarm because what it reminds us is God has a plan, He’s made a choice, He will not fail in accomplishing His plan. And giving us this glorious future that He details in these 11 verses.

Amen.