Praise the Lord!

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ: according as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame
before him in love. (Ephesians 1:3-4)

          Mention that you’re a Presbyterian, and there’s a decent chance the person to whom you are speaking will furrow his brow, pucker his lips and say disapprovingly, “Oh, you people believe in predestination, right?”

          Well, we do, because God’s sovereignty is taught clearly throughout Scripture. But far from being a cause for concern or for unrest, St. Paul teaches us this morning that predestination is actually a reason to praise the Lord.

          Today we’re going to examine Ephesians 1:3-4 – the initial “call to worship” in what is one of the most-complex and richest sentences in all of Scripture (the sentence runs from verse 3 all the way to verse 14!). St. Paul’s point in the entire passage is that you and I are to praise the Lord for the innumerable blessings He has lavished on us in Christ.

          This morning’s text calls you to praise the Lord for blessing you in Christ generally and for electing you to holiness in Christ specifically. When you consider the magnitude of God’s grace to you in Christ, predestination will not make you pucker your lips in disdain. It will open your lips in praise.

          Paul calls you to praise the Lord, first, for blessing you in Christ.

          As we noted a moment ago, “praise the Lord” is the central theme uniting verses 3 through 14. To “bless” the Lord is to praise Him and to speak good of His Name; while His blessing of us involves all the good gifts He gives you and me in Jesus Christ. Those gifts are the subject of verses 3 to 14, and we will examine them in the next few weeks (Lord willing).

          In verse 3, Paul exhorts you and me to praise the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every heavenly blessing in Christ. One cannot help but be impressed by the importance the apostle places on the Trinity and in particular on the work of each person of the Trinity in salvation. Certainly Father, Son and Holy Spirit all deserve your praise; but Paul’s emphasis falls here on the Father, whose primary role is to create, beget and foreordain all things that come to pass. It is the Son, not the Father or the Spirit, who redeems; it is the Spirit, not the Father or the Son, who proceeds, regenerates and sanctifies. In Greene County, some institutions – they biblically do not qualify as churches – deny the reality of the Trinity. When they do, they not only turn from the true God to worship worthless idols; they also deny the very possibility of salvation! The work of salvation can be accomplished only by a triune God, as we will learn in Ephesians.

          You are to praise the Father for the blessings He has bestowed on you in Christ. As we shall see in the weeks to come, those blessings include His foreordaining you to salvation in Christ, His adopting you in Christ, His forgiving you in Christ and His giving you eternal hope in Christ. As we examine verse 3, however, observe three things about the blessings God lavishes on you.

          For one, these blessings come to you “in Christ”: in fact, they can come no other way. “In Christ,” which is a shorthand way of referring to the believer’s union with Christ by faith, is a central theme in the epistle. When you look to the Lord Jesus as your Savior, trusting in his righteousness alone to get you into Heaven, you are united to Jesus by faith. It is only in union with Jesus that you are accepted by the holy Father, brought to new life and blessed (gifted and graced) on your way to Heaven. Jesus, not you or I, deserves all the glory for our salvation and for our relationship with God the Father. He alone is righteous and worthy, and blessings from the Father flow only through the Son.

          Note also that these blessings are comprehensive: you have been blessed with every spiritual blessing. In St. Luke 11, after Jesus taught his disciples the manner in which they should pray, he encouraged them to ask great things of the Father, who knows how to give good gifts to His children in Christ. If you and I, Jesus said, know how to give our children a fish and not a serpent when they ask for a fish, how much more does our Father in Heaven know what we need? The blessings we’ll be studying in Ephesians – foreordination to life, forgiveness, adoption, hope of glory – answer your deepest needs as a fallen sinner. In a world in which fathers and mentors and husbands let you down, rest assured the Father has blessed you in Christ with every spiritual good you need.

          Observe also that these blessings are “in heavenly places.” This is Paul’s way of saying your spiritual blessings flow from the triumphant Lord Jesus Christ, who conquered sin and Hell and who sits even now at the Father’s right hand (the place of preeminence) in glory. The Christians in Ephesus were surrounded by idol factories (literally), and adherents to those idols believed their statues could meet their needs. Of course, those idols couldn’t offer a single blessing to their worshippers – only curse after curse. The forgiveness, adoption, purpose and hope you and I enjoy in Christ come as a result of his mighty victory over sin for us. In a world of empty promises, God’s spiritual gifts to you in Christ are real.

          If Paul calls you to praise the Father for His comprehensive blessings to you in our victorious Lord Jesus, in verse 4 he offers a second reason to praise the Lord: He has chosen you in Christ.

          One of the spiritual blessings mentioned in verse 3 is your election in Christ in verse 4. Here our friends tend to make a sour face, because the very concept of God electing some to salvation and not others disturbs them.

          In fact, it should comfort them – and you and me.

          We should note that God’s choosing (or electing) you and me is in Christ – he is truly God’s elect, and as we mentioned earlier, spiritual blessings come only in Christ – and it is eternal. Paul says the Father chose you and me in Christ “before the foundations of the world.” That’s a Hebrew way of saying God chose you and me before we even could choose Christ. We saw this truth in the account of Jacob and Esau, and Paul again brings it to light.

          Before you object to God’s sovereignty – “That’s not fair!” – remember that God is in control and can do whatever He chooses. Recall too Paul’s spiritual biography, which we noted last week: Paul once was Saul, a Christ-hating, Christian-murdering, self-righteous Pharisee who happily was on his way to Hell. Saul could not have chosen Jesus as his Savior. In fact, he ridiculed the very notion!

          The good news, as Paul knew well, is that the question is not, “Did I choose Jesus?” None of you ever could or would; you are born spiritually dead in your sins. The issue is, “Did Jesus choose me?” And if you trust in him as your Savior, you should rejoice that God the Father indeed has chosen you in Christ – something you couldn’t have done for yourself.

          The Father’s election of you in Christ is eternal, based on His love and good pleasure. It is also personal: the Father chose you, and He chose you in Christ “to be before Him in love.” In other words, the Father chose you from all eternity out of a personal love that would not be satisfied until you were declared holy in Jesus and enabled to live in His holy presence forever.

          Psalm 139 speaks movingly of God’s forming you and me in our mothers’ wombs, and Ephesians 1 illustrates that same personal love that the Father has for His children. Election is not a dry doctrine that ought to frighten you; it is a comforting doctrine that ought to fill you with a sense of worth before God and with purpose in life and in eternity. The Father has elected you to salvation in Christ so that you may live before Him in love forever!

          Your election in Christ also is purposeful. Paul writes that the Father chose you in Christ to be “holy and without blame”: that is, free of all sin, cleansed by the blood of Jesus and set apart completely for God’s service. Without holiness, no one may see the Father – but if you are clothed with Jesus’ holiness, which you receive by faith in him as Savior, you are able to dwell before Him.

          You were elected to be holy and, Paul observes, “without blame.” Moses uses that same word to describe the animals to be offered in the Levitical sacrifices for sin. They had to be without blemish or blame in order to bear the spiritual blemishes of God’s repentant people. Of course, only our Lord Jesus – the Lamb of God – was without spot or blemish, but when you are elected in him and thus united to him in faith, the Father washes you clean of all your sins, faults and blemishes in the blood of Christ.

          It also bears mentioning that election is provable. While you and I won’t experience perfect holiness, spotlessness and intimacy with the triune God until we reach Heaven, our lives now should reflect God’s holiness more and more. As you turn from pet sins and old habits and grow in Christ-likeness, you are demonstrating that you have been elected of God from all eternity unto salvation. Election is unto holiness – both in this world and in the world to come.

          The doctrine of predestination should not scare anyone, especially believers.

          Sure, each of us wants to be in control – to be the “master of my ship.” Yet when it comes to salvation, you and I invariably would meet with shipwreck.

          At the same time we dislike the truth of God’s sovereignty in salvation, you and I – along with the people around us – long for such things as purpose, a feeling of worth, a sense of belonging, a reason for hope.

          Spend time praising God your Father, because by His electing you in Christ, He has lavished all these blessings upon you. All in His strength – because you and I had none.