The Lord upholds all who are falling, And brings us up when we are brought low. God has many ways of revealing his will to men. Christ is Victor; his rule has begun. This he did that in himself he might make the two into one new man, by making peace between them, and that he might reconcile both to God in one body through the Cross, after he had slain the enmity by what he did. This does not yet appear; for there is nothing to indicate to mankind what He purposes to do. Thus Israel stands in the permanent remembrance of power that redeemed them from the land of Egypt, and in the anticipation of a still greater manifestation that will eclipse whatever had been seen of old. It is a question not of acceptance before God, but of resisting the enemy who would take advantage of loose ways and a bad conscience. As to the first, he says that they were dead; and states, at the same time, the cause of the death trespasses and sins. (Ephesians 2:1). There we were, tripping right along with the crowd, as they were trying to satisfy the lust of their flesh, and the lust of their mind. Enter boldly into the sweetness of His grace and fulness of His glory. What a mystic union there is between the believer and his Lord! For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus, Nothing without Christ Jesus, you see. There is the whole Trinity in that one verse, Christ, the Spirit, the Father. We have not earned salvation nor could we have earned it. Scripturally-based resources for worship planners and leaders. Even as are the generations of leaves such are those likewise of men; the leaves that be the wind scattereth upon the earth, and the forest buddeth and putteth forth more again, when the season of spring is at hand, so of the generations of men one putteth forth and another ceaseth." How everything is connected with Christ! You did he make alive Beare pointed out that the various pronouns "you" (Ephesians 2:1,2), "we all" (Ephesians 2:3), and "us we" (Ephesians 2:4), "refer to the distinction between Jews and Gentiles only to nullify it. How did Christ destroy them? N461919. So go out and tell all of the men who are afraid to go to war to go home." Forgive the poverty of our accomplishing. But I now relate back to Jesus Christ, my Father after the Spirit. "Grieve not the holy Spirit of God, whereby ye are sealed unto the day of redemption." He was a sinner. We did not know what it was when it came; we had never felt like that before; we could not think that we really had passed from death to life; and yet, in looking back, we are persuaded that the throes within, the anguish of heart, the longing, and the pleading, and the wrestling, and the crying, would never have been in a dead heart, but were the sure marks that God had quickened us, and we had passed into newness of life. Man may cavil and murmur now in unbelief; but God will vindicate them every one when man shall be silent for ever. Satan is behind the world's fashions, the trends, directing, orchestrating those destructive, damning forces that we see pervading our society. height; and to know the love of Christ." Alas! Such an one is the harlot, from whom one's head is turned in the very street. Thus, first blessed, strengthened, and enjoying the grace and truth of God in Christ, we can then go out with the sword of the Spirit to deal with what is contrary to His nature, which Satan would use to obstruct our realization of our heavenly privileges. If you're interested in reading the results, visit here: https://pandemicworshipsurvey.blogspot.com/, We gather together in the name of Jesus Christ. That is not the result of some great effort on my part. And mark; as in the case of the maiden the sin was in the chamber, secret; in the next case it was in the open streets, public; but in this case it is secret again. We confess our trying to you, and ask for your power to be at work within us. In this passage Paul makes a kind of list of the characteristics of life without Christ. Impossible that the creature could be or do so; and therefore the creature is never said to be love. There is no escape. It is the failure in any sphere of life to be what we ought to be and could be. The door was shut in her face; but now the door was open. "The riches of the glory of his inheritance" embrace, of course, that vast scene of creation which is to be put under the glorified saints. Web(EPHESIANS 2:1718, ALT.) The one was not at all, nor was the other in such sort before. [Note: Wiersbe, 2:18.]. This he did so that in the age to come the surpassing riches of his grace in his kindness to us in Christ Jesus might be demonstrated. As the hymn has it: The Work And The Works Of Grace ( Ephesians 2:4-10 Continued). Both are now introduced by grace into an entirely new and heavenly place in Christ, which was not so much as heard of before. B. Davidson tells how he was in lodgings in a strange city. Wordsworth in the Intimations of Immortality wrote: Sin is a kind of suicide, for it kills the ideals which make life worth while. There are plenty who err in that second direction nowadays. Because if you face reality, truth doesn't exist, and thus you will only end in despair. forgiven and free, through what Christ has done for us. We must not overlook the fact that those who neglect (Hebrews 2:3) or choose not to receive forgiveness for their sins before their physical death (2 Corinthians 5:10) will experience a "second death" at the judgment (Revelation 21:8). I have heard that when a man is nearly drowned, while he lies under the power of death, he feels little or nothing, perhaps has even pleasurable dreams; but when, in the process of restoring him, they have rubbed him till the blood begins to flow, and the life begins to revive a little, he is conscious of pricking and great pain. The central idea of sin is failure, failure to hit the target, failure to hold to the road, failure to make life what it was capable of becoming; and that definition includes every one of us. He does so by conscience, the voice of the Holy Spirit speaking within us; he does so by giving to men the wisdom and the commandments of his book; he does so through the advice of good and godly men. The first is nature; the second is relationship. We could almost have died with delight at times when we have realized the glorious things that God has prepared for them that love him. He could not speak; he was bound about in a napkin. . Evidently it was just a little bit to heavy. Wherefore remember, that ye being in time past Gentiles in the flesh, who are called Uncircumcision by that which is called Circumcision in the flesh made by hands; Remember what you were. You had nothing to do with this. You are full members of the family of God." Transgressions (false steps, cf. trespasses and sins -- The Greek words used here, paraptma and hamartia, describe the evil that controls and characterizes human life apart from God. Oh, hideous spectacle! Their very wife, when they go into the house, rushes upstairs to be out of the way. * CALL TO WORSHIP From Ephesians 2 Leader: We were once dead through our trespasses and sins when we followed the course of this world. Accordingly, when all was complete in the communication of God's plans in the Bible, there was one subject that was left a blank. Hence he says, "that we should be to the praise of his glory, who first trusted in Christ," referring to himself and any other saints who had been chosen from the people of the Jews. No God? Holy Scripture is not complimentary to unrenewed human nature. No God? Find Related Songs (Not this year) Second Sunday after Christmas Day: Whatever was the current fad, here I am, flowing with it, you know. It is used for a man losing the way and straying from the right road; it is used for a man failing to grasp and slipping away from the truth. Israel entered into a covenant with God by the sprinkling of the blood. Or secret places of the heart's own love. Then the diversities are brought before us. (E) 3All of us also lived among them at one time,(F) gratifying the cravings of our flesh[a](G) and following its desires and thoughts. Even after all our efforts we still so often feel that we have not done enough. I mention this, because it is a striking proof that an error imported into Scripture leads even right-minded men into sad evil. Men may put up their barriers; churches may keep their Communion tables for their own members. All rights reserved worldwide. The very truth which, learnt and enjoyed in the Holy Ghost, conduces to all lowliness and meekness, as it calls for mutual forbearance in love, flesh would abuse to all pride and vain-gloriousness, to high-minded contempt of others, and bitter self-confidence. And you did he make alive, when ye were dead through your trespasses and sins. Click for: HYMN No. Consequently here it is not an energy already put forth, but he pleads that Christ might dwell by faith in their hearts. Paul proceeded to conclude his revelation of the Christians individual calling in Christ (Ephesians 1:3 to Ephesians 2:10). Oh! 2:13-18 But as things now are, because of what Christ Jesus has done, you who were once far off have been brought near, at the price of the blood of Christ. But now fromEphesians 2:11; Ephesians 2:11 the apostle enters into particulars, and shows that the bringing down from God's own heights of these glorious counsels and making them thus manifest in man here below, completely sets aside the Jewish system, or rather supposes the setting aside of all Jewish elements. at the price of the blood of Christ. And you have got the wrong address. The air is represented as the seat of his kingdom: and it was the opinion of both Jews and heathens that the air is full of spirits, and that there they exercise and exert themselves. As a Christian you're going to have to learn to go against the current. Reality is hopeless. They are not a part of the original text. What has God done? IT MIGHT NATURALLY be expected that I should have selected the topic of the resurrection on what is usually called the Easter Sabbath. Now, the highest being that of the Son, we accordingly are brought into that relationship, though not, of course, in the sense in which He was eternally so. The contrast is with Adam, who had a knowledge that was suited to his own place and relationship. 8For it is by grace(P) you have been saved,(Q) through faith(R)and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God 9not by works,(S) so that no one can boast. "We were by nature the children of wrath, even as others." Think of a great cathedral. In fact, it comes from a game in archery that the British used to have. And will you notice, yet once more, that this young maiden's death was a death confined to her chamber . The general doctrine of this morning is, that every man that is born into the world is dead spiritually, and that spiritual life must be given by the Holy Spirit, and can be obtained from no other source. This is the point. Your habits are not now commendable, you know they are not; you stand convicted while I speak to you this morning; you know your ways are evil. Neither can he describe his new birth; that is still a greater mystery, for it is a secret inward work of the Holy Ghost, of which we feel the effect, but we cannot tell how it is wrought. And so they wrote "hath he quickened" in italics in order to indicate the fact that they themselves added those words. NIV Reverse Interlinear Bible: English to Hebrew and English to Greek. But this young maiden is still caressed; so it is with many of you; you are loved even by the living in Sion; God's own people love you; the minister has often prayed for you; you are admitted into the assemblies of the saints, you sit with them as God's people, you hear as they hear, and you sing as they sing. It is revealed to us here. And as there is one Lord, so "one faith." But Biblical Christianity probes the patient to the quick. Reader 2 I try so hard, I do my best. Of all the creatures that live and breathe, man is the only one on earth that became a living soul by the breath of the Lord God, who, as it is written, breathed into his nostrils the breath of life. He gives him a glory. They had seen the ways of God with man, and with Israel; and surely they had entered into the glory of God that was involved in all His ways. Then follows a prayer of the apostle the first of those he pours out for the Ephesian saints. Here is the Pauline paradox. Corruption has not yet done its work, and tender care has guarded the body as yet from what will surely come to it; yet is there death, sure, complete death, in the one case as well as in the other. Such is the very power that has taken you and me up in divine grace, and wrought toward us. Oh, what a change from the past to the present! But this was not enough. (ii) It is life lived under the dictates of the prince of the air. It was developed in a positive and comprehensive way, as in Romans. Beloved, "It doth not yet appear what we shall be." P: Gods light has come to us! Even though trained by godly parents, though well instructed in the gospel scheme, though saturated with the piety that surrounded us, we were dead, as dead as the harlot of the street, as dead as the thief in the jail. So should our walk be. This is true of Jews and Gentiles alike. It will be as much as he can do to pull off his grave-clothes, to get rid of his old habits; perhaps to his death he will have to be rending off bit after bit of the cerements in which he has been wrapped. ), Someone can be physically alive and yet spiritually dead at the same time. The very structure of the chapter, as has been noticed, is a sort of confirmation of this. If there be a spiritual death, and you are dead, be startled; for within a little while God will say, "Bury my dead out of my sight." 13. Accelerating into traffic, I looked up and saw a billboard with 6 words, 2 sentences, 1 sign of an imploding culture in two foot high letters. Indeed, these are the very qualities of God Himself. Another of Paul's blessed "nows." 2. When the Rabbis spoke about accepting a convert into Judaism, they said that he had been brought near. So this Greek word meander is the word that Paul uses here. "You hath HE quickened." Paul uses the word xenos ( G3581) for foreigner. in the lust of our flesh, as we were fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind; as we were by nature the children of wrath, even as the others ( Ephesians 2:3 ). And then maybe we can do a little water skiing in the afternoon, and I would be looking for those things that we could really enjoy together. Here the apostle repeats that high, large, and blessed phrase already so familiar to us, "that we should be to the praise of his glory, who first trusted in Christ; in whom ye also [trusted]." It was God's gift to you. Finally, there is the activity now for others, just as before there was dependence for ourselves. In its place he put love to God and love to men. All this wondrous scheme is to the glory of His grace. Observed, 1. The Lord is just in all ways, Faithful in all things. So he came and preached peace to you who were afar off, and peace to them who were near, because, through him, we both have the right of entry into the presence of the Father, for we come in the one Spirit. But in that which comes before us in our epistle, it is not a question even of the highest creature on earth one that was called to have dominion on earth, and be the image and glory of God here below. He wrote in few words no doubt, but he has written with divine perfection, and clearly enough for those by God's grace made competent to understand, let the words be ever so few. Paul uses an even more vivid picture. Paul could not forget, because it was a fact of history, that the Jews were uniquely the instrument in God's hand. At the same time there is no exclusion of Gentile believers, but the reverse. Psalm 111: Praise the Lord, now and forever! Even the behavior of a -- Ephesians 2:1-10 -- Fourth Sunday in Lent - B -- 2003 All of these things that God has done, He has done for us, in, and through, and by Jesus Christ. With the coming of Christ the Gentile entered into that new view of history in which a man is always on the way to God. Hence the condition in which we were found here below came into view; and, as we have seen, it was total ruin, whether Jew or Gentile be looked at. (iv) It is a life which is at the mercy of desire. At first a man regards some wrong thing with horror; the second stage comes when he is tempted into doing it, but even as he does it, he is still unhappy and ill at ease and very conscious that it is wrong; the third stage is when he has done the thing so often that he does it without a qualm. ", In the Homeric Hymns the assembly of Olympus is charmed by the Muses who sing "of the deathless gifts of the gods and the sorrows of men, even all that they endure by the will of the immortals, living heedless and helpless, nor can they find a cure for death, nor a defence against old age.". Who could, before He revealed His purpose, have so much as conceived such a dealing possible? Remember that at that time you had no hope of a Messiah; you were aliens from the society of Israel, and strangers from the covenants on which the promises were based; you had no hope; you were in the world without God. The effect of a great love is always a cleansing thing. And as the result, the soul that sins shall surely die. It may be perverted to this or anything else; but so far is our corporate place from being put in the foreground that we do not hear one word about the assembly as such till the close of the first chapter. 17He came and preached peace(AL) to you who were far away and peace to those who were near. But what are difficulties to the Spirit of God? They said that the Gentiles were created by God to be fuel for the fires of Hell; that God loved only Israel of all the nations that he had made; that the best of the serpents crushed, the best of the Gentiles killed. Kings on their coronation were anointed; and thus Christos ( G5547) , the literal Greek translation of the Hebrew Messiah ( H4886) , came to mean the Anointed One of God, the expected King whom God would send into the world to vindicate his own and to bring in the golden age. We let cruel words slip out of our mouths, disguised as humour or opinion. Few would venture on so bold a statement as that; but if you boldly do the thing, I must speak of it. It is no use merely taking it up as a name or barren title. I am certain that no ungodly man has any conception of the joy which often fills the believer's spirit. The wrestling is not with flesh and blood, "but against principalities, against powers, against the world-rulers of this darkness, against spiritual wickedness in heavenly places." There was a lot of things I didn't want to do. He is one who does not subject himself to any authority and, therefore, practices "lawlessness." He was a resident alien, a man who had taken up residence in a place but who had never become a naturalized citizen; he paid a tax for the privilege of existing in a land which was not his own. For less than $5/mo. That would cease, for God is a Spirit, they that worship Him worship Him in Spirit and in truth. He hath "quickened us together with Christ, and hath raised us up together." What a deal of dead worship there is! The world is busy and active around it, but it is unconscious of it all. So long as the object falls upon the retina. He uses therefore the highest terms in order to express it. To those who have not, I daresay it will seem as an idle tale. But if we are to walk thus, let us not forget the prayer for the state of our hearts which precedes these exhortations. You know I would. And what a wrong concept people have of what it means to surrender your life to the will of God.For once a person does, they find as, Jesus said, "I delight to do thy will, O Lord." This is where we should be, where we may be if we are quickened by the divine life. That is exactly the right that Jesus gives us in regard to God. L: We gather to share our witness to Gods How far the person has realised it is another matter; but such is the meaning of baptism. "Be not drunk with wine, wherein is excess; but be filled with the Spirit; speaking to yourselves in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord.". It is an awful thing to have your conscience hardened, as in the very fires of hell, till it becomes like steel. There was in fact at the Persian royal court an official called the prosagogeus whose function was to introduce people who desired an audience with the king. He says that those who were far off have been brought near. And Christ appears now so glorious to him; he had heard of Christ before, and had some apprehensions of him; but now he is surprised to find that the One who he said had no form nor comliness is, after all, altogether lovely. And to show my appreciation, Dad, I just thought that today I would come over and just do whatever you would like me to do for you. Than these nothing less becomes those so blessed. 2As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins,(A) 2in which you used to live(B) when you followed the ways of this world(C) and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air,(D) the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient. ye daughters of Sion, who are ever at the house of prayer, oh! The child has a thousand things to ask; it has to learn everything. God is King! From the beginning, through all the crises of our times, until his kingdom fully comes, God keeps covenant forever. Ubi Christus, ibi ecclesia, Where Christ is, there is the Church. Angels are not the object. It is clearly not a question of righteousness here, or consistency with any known standard of judgment. Everybody is doing it, get on board.When I was a small fellow I used to often ask my mother if I could go a certain place. That not of yourself, the faith didn't come from you. This joy we never knew till we received the new life. 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