Posted by Pastor Pat on October 16, 2010
Read Ephesians 2:11-22
The “therefore” forces us back into our previous thought: Therefore remember . . . . It is a call not to forget from where you came (2:1-3) and what God has now done (2:5, 6). The entire work of God is to restore the fellowship and harmony and peace that once existed but was broken by humanity’s rebellion against Him. It is only as we declare our autonomy and make the story about us that the breach is formed and conflict exists. Oh how painfully sad whenever there is conflict and strife within the body of Christ. All of the division that exists by geography, economics, gender, race, allegiance, intellect, ability, sense or the lack thereof is corrected at the cross in the person of Christ. His work makes it possible for the curse to be reversed. It does not matter how it is expressed; in God all things are (ultimately) reconciled. As far fetched as the idea appears to be, the intent of God is to reconcile all things created (not just human relationships). The cross is God’s pronouncement as it relates to this conflict.
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Posted by Pastor Pat on October 10, 2010
Read Ephesians 4:1-6
Whatever Paul brings to the table in 4:1 and following is a consequence of his previous thought. Paul begins in verse 4:1 by imploring his audience “to walk in a manner worthy of the calling with which they have been called.” Somehow we have twisted the thought of walking worthy to mean something that is meritorious and thus resulting in our acceptance before the Father. Yet everything up to this point clearly points out how our acceptance before and access to the Father is firmly rooted in and flowing from our in Christ status (1:5; 2:18; 3:12).
“He predestined us to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the kind intention of His will” (Eph. 1:5).
“For through Him we both have our access in one Spirit to the Father” (Eph. 2:18).
“In whom we have boldness and confident access through faith in Him” (Eph. 3:12).
The thought of worthy is something that is compatible with or suitable to. Paul’s simple thought is that our lives should mimic our spiritual union with Christ. Whatever we are in Christ we should be while in the world. It is His life flowing into us and thus flowing out of us. Although it might be anti-climatic, let us not forget that the “us” of Ephesians is the “we” of the church and not the “us” of isolated independent individualism.
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Posted by Pastor Pat on March 15, 2010
Read Ephesians 2:1-10
Paul continues to show the immeasurable nature of God’s redeeming grace by noting the context in which it took place. It is as if he provides the reader with a snapshot or summary of the whole story from beginning to end. It is because we were dead in our trespasses that God would have to forgive us by means of redeeming us from sin’s debt (1:7). Verses 2 and 3 describe the state of what all once were prior to their adoption as sons and daughters (1:5).
Verses 1 through 3 do not distinguish between male or female, Jew or Gentile, bond or free. All are in the same dead state brought on by trespass and sin. Paul highlights the enemies of grace: the world, the devil, and the flesh. All three work to overthrow and undercut the provision of God for the inability of man. Verse 4 acts as a sharp contrast to the initial three verses. It functions as an explosion of hope. In contrast to all that we are, here stands God who is rich in mercy and great in love. He does not allow us to continue as we were but sets us on a path of life and light. Because of who God is in essence, all His actions are inseparably linked to and flowing from this abundant resource.
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Posted by Pastor Pat on March 3, 2010
Read Ephesians 1:3-14
Throughout this short letter, Paul speaks of God’s superabundant activities flowing from Himself to His people. Such words as “rich, lavish, surpassing greatness, surpassing riches, unfathomable riches, surpasses knowledge and far more abundantly beyond all that we ask or think” (1:7, 8, 18, 19; 2:4, 7; 3:8, 16, 18, 19, 20) are employed in an attempt to capture the magnitude of God’s person and work to redeem His people from sin’s debt and to adopt them as sons. All of this was written by Him into His story (1:4, 5, 9, 11, 21; 2:7, 10; 3:11).
Paul’s opening sentence reaches from verse 3 to verse 14. Here is an avalanche of descriptive words that unveil what God did in the securing of His people for Himself. Here we read of God as a tri-unity working (energy) to secure for Himself worshipping sons and daughters. Our passage speaks of God the Father blessing (v. 3), choosing (v. 4) and adopting (vv. 5, 6) trespassers into His family. We can equally note the activity of the Son to redeem slaves by forgiving debt by means of His own substitutionary and voluntary death (vv. 7, 8). It is the Son who makes known to us the mystery of their eternal purpose (vv. 9, 10), how from rebellion, division, and damnation He brings peace, harmony, and life. It is through Him and in Him all things created find the object that silences the rage from within and the loneliness that robs and destroys. What is the outcome, the inheritance of His activity? Through Him, the alienated are adopted, the rebel is restored, the indebted are pardoned and the forsaken are chosen.
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Posted by Pastor Pat on January 23, 2010
The church of Ephesus played a significant role in the life and ministry of the apostle Paul. By simply noting the occurrences of the city in the New Testament it becomes apparent that the church of Ephesus was a prominent center for the apostle Paul and the apostle John. Let us consider the following verses as they are found in the New Testament record:
1. Paul’s first visit to Ephesus happened in Acts 18:18-21.
This is the first occurrence of the word in the New Testament.
2. In Paul’s absence, Priscilla and Aquila instructed Apollos (Acts 18:24-28).
When you read the narrative it is straightforward and clear.
3. Paul returned to Ephesus, taught the disciples and evangelized the unbelieving (Acts 19)
1. Taught on Spirit baptism (Acts 19:1-7)
2. Taught on the kingdom God for two years (Acts 19:8-10)
3. God performed extraordinary miracles through Paul (Acts 19:11-22)
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Posted by Pastor Pat on December 8, 2009
Read Ephesians 5:1-6
There is an element of perplexity offered to us in the text. Is it possible for those who have the inheritance to become disinherited? Is it possible for those who are citizens of His kingdom to be expelled from its realm? There is a weight to what faces us in this text that must not and cannot be negated. Paul speaks to the Ephesians and reminds them that if in Adam behavior characterizes their lives then they are in real danger of losing their inheritance and becoming outcasts of His kingdom.
Let us attempt to put his charge in its literary context. Paul speaks of those whom God as a Trinity secured to become sons and daughters by fully engaging all that He is in His essence and all He has at His disposal. All the resources of God were deployed for the purpose of redeeming the sinner’s debt and adopting the orphaned. Everything in chapters 1 through 3 speaks to the new man created when God acted. It is from this tree that unity, purity and charity now flow. In the absence of individual purity and charity, the unity secured by the cross is in jeopardy of failing. This failure refers to its manifestation in the community of faith. Nothing can ever undo what God did. Yet it is possible to speak and live so poorly as to significant obscure the manifestation of the cross in one’s community of faith.
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Posted by Pastor Pat on November 20, 2009
Read Ephesians 4:17-32
The intent of this article is to show how what we once were in Adam we no longer are, but still have. Paul’s point from the beginning of the letter all the way through chapter 3 is to note how those who were once in sin’s debt and alienated from God are now redeemed from sin and adopted into God’s family. He is their Father and they are His children.
Paul is clear in verses 17 through 22 as to what this in Adam condition looks like both as a state and as a function. I would like us to consider the graphic nature of Paul’s language in describing those apart from Christ. There are several descriptive phrases that help us mark the unbelieving state and practice.
First, there is the futility of their mind (v. 17). The word “futility” speaks to vanity, emptiness. “The word contains the idea of aimlessness, the leading to no object or end.”[1] It is the same word used in Romans 8:20 (“For the creation was subjected to futility. . .”) and in 2 Peter 2:18 (“For speaking out arrogant words of vanity. . . ”). There is emptiness to the conclusion drawn by those who do not and will not acknowledge God. Because there is no fear of God within their thinking, they have no wisdom (Ps. 111:10; Prov. 9:10). This is the manner of life that characterizes the unbelieving.
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Posted by Pastor Pat on November 5, 2009
Read Ephesians 1:15-23
In order to treat this passage appropriately, it must be read in light of what was just stated in 1:3-14: God as a trinity in the totality of His essence and energy redeemed His people from sin’s debt by forgiving their sins and then adopted them as His sons and daughters. All of this was freely bestowed and lavishly dispensed.
As those who are sons and daughters, Paul now prays for their continued growth in the knowledge of Him. Just as God can bless because He is blessed, so can He now give knowledge of His glory because He is the Father of glory.
Whatever the weight of the information given in verses 3-14 it is now expressed along three distinct petitions. The two ideas (vv. 3-14 and vv. 17-23) must be seen as complimentary and parallel. First, Paul prays that his audience would know the person of Christ. Christ as the agent through whom the Godhead works and reveals is central to the entire story. Unless and until we grasp this, nothing else matters. And when we do grasp this, nothing else matters. It is impossible to overstate the issue. If Jesus is not the centerpiece of one’s own personal story, then there is nothing but ultimate darkness and despair. The story of God was written in such a way that it cannot make sense apart from Jesus Christ as the cornerstone on which the entire structure rests, or as the linchpin that keeps the wheels from falling off the axle of life.
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