Title BLESSED BE GOD FOR BLESSINGS GALORE!

Focus: We praise God for his past, present and future work of salvation.

Function: To move the people to embrace with joy God’s mysterious work of salvation from which we draw daily strength and encouragement.

Text: Ephesians 1:1-14

            Many Christians from different faith communities think of John Calvin, the 16^th century Reformer of the Christian Church, as the theologian of election or predestination. Many, in fact, do not just think of him that way; they blame him for coming up with the doctrine of predestination.

And since the teaching of election presents us with an unresolved, rational tension, and since it minimizes our own work in God’s salvation, many Christians reject or refuse to ponder the significance of the doctrine of election. Such a response is also common among members of the Reformed communities of faith. Today we do not have robust affirmations of God’s work of election. The silence is deafening, I think.

Of course, such silence does not mean that Christians do not struggle with the tension found in the Bible’s teaching on election. More often, I think, the silence is an awkward way of acknowledging that we are dealing with mystery.

Reading Paul’s letter to the church in Ephesus, however, should break our silence. In fact, Paul shows the most proper response to God’s blessing or work of predestination: It’s joy, praise, and affirmation! We are to praise God for his past, present, and future work of salvation, which is all rooted in divine election. God’s awesome work of election results in blessings galore. And we may draw daily strength and encouragement from these blessings.

Verse three sets the tone for the entire letter: “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessings in Christ.” We can capture these blessings under the heading of “God’s work of salvation” or simply “God’s blessings.” And these blessings center on (1) God’s work of election in the past (vs. 4-6); (2) God’s work of sonship or adoption in the present (vs. 5-8); and (3) God’s work of reconciliation or unification in the future (vs. 9-10). Let’s consider God’s work together. (credit to John Stott’s commentary on Ephesians)

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            Listen to God’s work of election: (vs.4-6) “For (God) chose us in (Christ) before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight. In love he predestined us to be adopted as his sons through Jesus Christ in accordance with his pleasure and will….” We notice that this work of election took place before the beginning of the world, before time, before any creature was around. That should make us cautious and humble. We are dealing with mystery.

This much is clear: before the creation of the world, the eternal God issued a decree within the fellowship circle of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. And that decree concerned the work of God’s hand—his creation and all his creatures, including you and me. The Father chose us to be adopted through the Son, the Lord Jesus. And this election would be worked out and applied by the Holy Spirit in due time.

            Let it be clear that God’s work of election or predestination is NOT the concoction of some human brain such as John Calvin or St. Augustine. Calvin himself, in one  of his sermons on Ephesians, said this: “Although we cannot conceive either by argument or reason how God has elected us before the creation of the world, yet we know it by his declaring it to us; and experience itself vouches for it sufficiently, when we are enlightened in the faith.”In other words, Christians should affirm God’s work of election without any reservations. God’s Word reveals it to us as such.

            Some people have come up with strange notions, saying for example, that since God has elected us from before the creation of the world, we are free to live as we please; after all, God has secured our eternal future before the creation of the world.

            The Bible’s teaching on election, however, does not give us the freedom to sin; rather, God’s work of election is with a view toward holy and pure living. The text tells us, for example, that God “has chosen us before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight.” In other words, God’s work or blessing of election comes to us with the call to live our lives in accordance with God’s revealed will and law.

            God’s work of election is not a cause for pride, but for humility and gratitude. Paul reminds us in the text that God’s election was in himself; that is, it is in love that God chose us—not on the basis of anything that we may have done. God’s love, God’s grace, God’s will, God’s purpose and God’s choice—these are the mirrors that Paul holds before us in this passage. I like what Stott says in his commentary: “…the truth of God’s election, however many its unresolved problems should lead us to righteousness, not to sin; and to humble adoring gratitude, not to boasting.”

            God’s work of election in the past, then, confronts us with mystery and calls forth from us humility and gratitude. We stand in awe and wonder. God’s work of election merges or spills over into God’s work of sonship or adoption. That work of God is something that we experience in the present.

            Listen to God’s work of adoption: (vs.5-8) “In love (God) predestined us to be adopted as his sons through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will—to the praise of his glorious grace, which he has freely given us in the One he loves. In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, in accordance with the riches of God’s grace that he lavished on us with all wisdom and understanding.”

            We do well to embrace God’s work of election as a mystery and simply move on to welcome and experience this adoption as God’s children. For that’s why God elected us. Election is with a view to adoption. God chose us to become part of his family. God seeks to bring us into his fellowship circle of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

            Let me say something about that word “sonship” or “adoption.” The N.I.V translation simply translates the Greek word (uiothesia) as “adoption of sons.” That’s a good translation. It’s too bad that so many Christians (men and women) fail to grasp the significance of God’s work of sonship. For example, today many women feel excluded when they read that God adopted us as sons. Some may say “Wait a minute? Where does that leave us?” But do you realize what Christian men (Jews and Gentiles) were saying when they read the all-inclusive word “sonship”? They would be shocked. For what the text is saying is this: Everyone who is elected in Christ is now privy to the benefits of sonship.

            In the days of Paul, males were granted the right of inheritance. Not females. Women did not have much of a legal status at all. That was the case in society as well as in the homes and families. But now we learn that the division and classifications between men and women is taken away: All those elected by God in Christ Jesus are entitled to the adoption rights of sonship: men and women will equally inherit eternal life; they will equally have redemption and forgiveness of sins. This was a shocking revelation to the people in Paul’s days.

That’s why Paul can say elsewhere that the divisions between Jews and Gentiles, slaves and free, male and female are taken away in Christ. In Christ, we are all one—part of the family of God. Women, too, are accorded the right of sons or sonship. The church does well today to practice the mutuality of relationships within the family of God. Racism, slavery, and sexism are notions that God abolishes in his work of sonship.

The work of God’s election in the past and his work of adoption in the present will climax in God’s work of unification or reconciliation in the future. Listen to the text: (vs.9-10) “And (God) made known to us the mystery of his will according to his good pleasure, which he purposed in Christ, to be put into effect when the times will have reached their fulfillment—to bring all things in heaven and on earth together under one head, even Christ.”

Right now, there is conflict in our world: powers of hatred, greed, and envy. These powers create havoc among us all throughout history. Sin—in all its visible and invisible manifestations—is pervasive among us. These powers are also at work in the invisible realms—the heavens. 

Christ’s work on the cross has broken the reign of these powers of sin and death.  God is now at work to bring all of creation and all of the heavens under one supreme head—the Lord Jesus Christ. Jesus is the head of all that is created, and Jesus is the head of the new creation, especially the church, the people of God.

The great blessing or work of God’s salvation is this: That he will live in our midst; heaven and earth will be reunited; and all the powers, and all the people will bow before him and serve him forever and ever.

The is the inheritance God’s people will receive, and of which Paul spoke in the text when he says (vs. 13,14) “And you also were included in Christ when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation. Having believed, you were marked in him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit, who is a deposit guaranteeing our inheritance until the redemption of those who are God’s possession—to the praise of his glory.”

I wish that our historic 450 year old confessions had captured this fullness of God’s blessing more clearly. God’s blessing of salvation contains many “puzzle pieces”—each piece deserves attention—the pieces of our sin and guilt, as well as the pieces of God’s mercy and justice; the pieces of such doctrines as incarnation, redemption, justification and sanctification—they all have a place, but we must see the pieces together form the larger picture of God, in Christ, bringing all things together.

Blessed be God for blessings galore! And blessed are all who turn to Christ and are found in him!

Amen.