The heavenly places in Christ

Good morning and a blessed New Year to you all. We're going to be exploring this Sunday, Ephesians 1, 3-10, and this is going to be done in anticipation of beginning the Book of Acts next Sunday. The passage we'll be looking at, Ephesians 1, 3-10, is where the Book of Acts is ultimately aimed. That's where the Book of Acts is headed.

What was written of believers in Ephesians 1, 3-10, was not true of the disciples as they are described and listed in Acts chapter 1. It was, however, true of them as of Acts chapter 2, but what's strange and unusual is they didn't know it. They didn't know any of it. And so we have as our third slide the former serial killer who wrote Ephesians 1, 3-10. So Jesus Christ ascended from the Mount of Olives, that's Acts 1, 1-11.

The man who later became the Apostle Paul, at that time was Saul the unbeliever, a Pharisee. He would soon begin persecuting the believers in Christ with a vengeance. In less than two years this man would be approving of the killing of Stephen. And shortly thereafter, in just over two years, he would become a believer himself. And 25 years after that, he would write the book of Ephesians. Amazing. One of the things we'll look at, we're studying verses 1 through 10. In fact, Ephesians 1, 3 through 14, that whole passage And we're not going to read all of it.

That whole passage is one long sentence in the Greek text. I have heard it said, I have not certainly read all of Greek literature, but I've heard it said that it is the longest sentence of all of Greek literature. It is a very long sentence. And of course, I relate everything to cows and farms and all that. That's just how I think of things. It's one long sentence.

It appears as though the Apostle Paul said, blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing, and he got so excited he just couldn't stop. Right? Dip, dip, dip, dip, right, right, right, right, dip, dip, dip, dip, dip, right, right, right, right, right, right. Okay? Just going crazy with it. He was so excited about what he was writing, he just barely contained himself. Couldn't stand to put a period at the end of the sentence, right?

For the reason of doing a brief introduction to this passage, we're going to be looking at that, but shortening it to just 3 through 10, chapter 1, 3 through 10. to get an idea where this book of Acts is ultimately headed. It is so stunning to think of this was not true of the disciples in chapter one. This was true of the disciples in chapter two, but they knew none of it. And by chapter three, it would be something that they would all be learning, excuse me, by the end of the book. be something they'd all be learning.

So today we'll just cover Ephesians 1, 3 through 10. Otherwise we'll have a long service. Right? Okay. So here's Ephesians 1, 3, and the way I denote it is between the punctuation marks, the first punctuation mark marks out A, and then the next one B, etc. So we'll cover things that way.

So there's Ephesians 1, 3 through 4, A and B. And it reads like this, blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ, just as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we would be holy and blameless before him.

So, blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ is actually a set of words that's found also in 2 Corinthians 1.3, but it wasn't just Paul that wrote those words, it was also 1 Peter 1.3. It also shows up in the Old Testament. And then additionally, the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, without the blessed be, is also in several places in the New Testament.

Blessed means that the Father is spoken well of. That's the meaning of the word. That's why Kenneth Weiss in places calls it eulogize, but that's a word that kind of a lot of people relate to some sort of a memorial service. But that's the idea, is it's speaking well of Him. He's the one who is to be credited with blessing us.

This is one of those places where we see a distinctive role for the Father. A lot of times Christians can get the idea, well, who's this Father guy? I know what Jesus does, and I know what the Holy Spirit does. And sometimes even books will put little emphasis on the Father. Here, the Father gets the credit. The Father gets the credit. It's the God and Father, meaning He is Deity and He is God the Father.

He is spoken well of because He has blessed us. He is specifically the one credited with having blessed us. We who are believers and in the body of Christ. Then he says, our Lord Jesus Christ. And there's several important things that come out of this set of words. One is our. He's not just the Lord Jesus Christ, although he certainly is that. But he is our Lord Jesus Christ.

It means we have a relationship with him. At this point, I'd like to make a distinction. To have a relationship is something that's ongoing and permanent. We have a relationship with Christ that is continuing and ongoing and permanent. It doesn't vary. And so we can say our, and then tomorrow that will also be true because of that relationship. Fellowship is something different. Fellowship is ongoing and continuing interaction on the basis of the relationship that you have. And on the elective that we start next Sunday, we'll be making that distinction and investigating that further. So, our says we have a relationship, a permanent relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ.

Lord says he is one who has authority. And there are two reasons why he has authority. The first reason is because of who he is. But it doesn't end there, because it's also what he has done. So you put that together. He is Lord because of who he is and what he has done and accomplished. His cross work and after.

Jesus says that he is the Savior. This is derived in the English, but going back to the Hebrew, Yeshua. Also carried across as Joshua, and it means either way, Savior. He became a man He died for our sins and rose from the dead. These are things that he did, he accomplished. We talked about Lord, you know, we said that he is Lord because of who he is and what he has done. Jesus speaks to what he has done. The very name, right? That speaks to his accomplishment. He became a man, he died for our sins and he rose from the dead. Christ says that he is the Messiah who will come again to reign and we with him.

So when you put those all together, every single word counts. None of them are superfluous or even redundant. Every single word there means something. Power. Relationship. Lord. Authority. Jesus. Savior. Christ. The Messiah. Every single word counts.

Here we have a kind of a chart that puts this sort of graphically here. We have in his first coming, Christ, as we said, became a man, died for our sins, and was buried and rose again, was also ascended and seated, right? In the church age, the rapture is getting closer every day.

I hope it's today. I hope we don't get to finish this service, right? I would be happy with that. So the Rapture is closer every day. We have it shown right next to the Tribulation. It could be, you know, that it's farther down the road. It seems like the world is getting to be a crazier and crazier place to live, and so I wouldn't be at all disappointed if the Lord decided to take us home before I'm done.

Now, then we have the Second Coming and the Millennial Kingdom. Jesus, that name, that fits with his first coming. He is the Savior. That is what he accomplished in his first coming. The name Christ fits with his second coming when he will come again and we with him to reign and we will rule and reign with him. Now it says then he blessed us.

God the Father is the one who is credited with blessing us with every spiritual Blessing. Most spiritual blessings? No. Every single one. Every spiritual blessing. Now, what kind of a blessing is it? Spiritual blessing. Very important. We'll oftentimes talk about, oh bless you, and we'll talk about, oh boy, I've been blessed in this way and that, and those things are true. What the Father is credited with here is every, so complete, total, spiritual blessing. That's beyond all the other ways that we are blessed or might be blessed. This blessing was gracious. It wasn't something we earned or deserved. The blessing was unconditional. Notice he doesn't say, if you guys will do all this and this and not do that and that and that, then you'll be blessed. That's what he did with the Jews, right? But it's unconditional. Paul, later on, he's going to wait until chapter 4, is going to say, now let's talk about your stealing and lying problem. Right? But blessed unconditionally.

It is unmerited. We didn't do anything to deserve being blessed. Right? Didn't do anything to deserve it. It is also complete. Every spiritual blessing. Right? It's not like, here's the down payment and you'll get the rest later. Every spiritual blessing, every single one.

That was in contrast to the Jews. They were all under the law of Moses as they went into the land. All 613 individual statutes, 365 of them, don't do this. The rest do this. There were blessings that were legal. You must do this, you must not do that. They were conditional. If you do this, you'll be blessed. If you don't do it, you'll be cursed.

They were merited. And they were confined to certain places in the land. The blessings are in the land twice. The curses are in the land twice. So it's confined to certain places and to certain people. The law was given to who? The Jews. Is the law for you? No. Is the law for me? No. The law was given to Jews as they went into the land. Now, the blessing here is in the heavenly places. The Jews were blessed in the land of Israel in physical ways. Your crops will do well. Your livestock will do well. The people of your household will do well if you do everything right. Good luck with that. Right.

According to the law of Moses, all 613 laws, no exceptions. And by the way, the law could never save anybody. Even if someone was diligent to try to carry out every single one from the heart, the law never had the capacity to save anybody. It did have the capacity to kill you. And people oftentimes forget that. Oh, I got to keep the law in order to stay saved or get saved or something. No. It never even with the Jews had the capacity to save anyone. A Jew could be saved by faith and yet pick up firewood a half hour too late and be killed. How about that? Someone would be saved by faith but killed by the law. That's possible. In fact, it probably happened.

We in the body of Christ have been blessed in spiritual ways. That's how our blessings are done spiritual ways, they're completely in the spiritual realm. They're complete. Every spiritual blessing. None is missing. They're unconditional and they're all in the heavenly places, which is really, really good. In the heavenly places is really great.

Why? Nobody's going to mess with it. Can anybody else mess with my spiritual blessings in the heavenly places? Not at all. They can't touch it. Better yet, I can't mess it up. I can't mess it up, which is just fantastic. Our blessings are entirely gracious. There is no merit at all. All we did was believe the gospel, and that doesn't get any brownie points. Because believing is believing in God's accomplishments, not mine. I get no credit for believing because I'm putting all the credit to God. God says, you believe? That's it. I'll take it from there. I'll do everything else. That's exactly what he has in mind.

Here's Ephesians 2, 4 through 7, which is a wonderful passage. We can only touch on it, but it also addresses these heavenly places. So we'll just read it and let it go from there. But God, being rich in mercy, he's wealthy in this thing called mercy, because of his great love. Now notice, it wasn't because of his nominal love or because he had a little bit of love, right? Or he had some, you know, as best he could tell. his great love with which he loved even when we're dead in our transgressions made us alive together with Christ by grace you've been saved perfect tense completed past action ongoing results among the future implying permanence right and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus so that in the ages to come That's ages on into the future. Ages to come, He might show the surpassing riches. This word means overthrown. Overthrown riches of His grace and kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.

In Christ. So these seven letters with one space. This is the most massive, most overflowingly fantastic statement about our blessings that the Apostle Paul could ever possibly make. Little word, IN. Space. Christ. Five letters. Phenomenal. Huge impact. And we're going to see that IN Christ extends all the way from before God said, let there be light, on into eternity, future, and never ends.

And you've got it right now. Right now. And that's where you're at. Right now. Virtually speaking. And God pulled it off. And you can't blow it. Our being in Christ is God's accomplishment. 1 Corinthians chapter 1 verse 30. God's doing, you're in Christ Jesus. It is irreversible.

There is no verse that says, be careful or you'll be taken out of Christ. I'm sorry, right? Doesn't happen. There is no threat. You better be careful or you're going to be taken out of Christ and that's not good. There is no threat. It never ever is said to happen.

It is such an amazing character. We could study it on earth for all of our days and never exhaust the end of it. In Christ is that big. In the book of Ephesians, almost 40 times, you have in Christ, in the beloved, in him, in whom, etc. All the variations on that. It's really, really, really big. The believer is in Christ, not in everything that Christ did and said. Only in five things. Okay?

Crucifixion and therefore death. By the way, they didn't crucify anybody just kind of for fun. And then just let them off. It was the idea that if you get crucified, you're dead. And they're going to make sure of it. Crucified, buried, raised, ascended, seated. Those five things. Like I said, I'm not a tat kind of guy, but if I were to get tats, I'd have that on each of my digits, right? Yeah, that's what I would do. We just got through, a week ago, celebrating Christ's birth. And we go and we get families together and we sing songs and everything, and as wonderful as that was, we were not identified with Christ and His birth.

No, it didn't happen. Jesus went across the Sea of Galilee a number of times with the disciples and he did things with the disciples related to going in the Sea of Galilee all the way up to the time of his resurrection and afterwards where he went there. And seven of the disciples were in the boat and he performed a miracle after he asked them, do you have any fermented fish paste? But in that, all the way up to the time he was resurrected, and he was there on the shore, and as many times as he went across and they did things, they went from where Jesus fed the 4,000 on the east side of the Sea of Galilee, crossed over to a village right near Magdala, Dalmanutha, right?

But we weren't identified in that. He did marvelous things, but we weren't identified in those, as wonderful as they were. Jesus twice, from what we have record, cleansed the temple. Early in his ministry and right during crucifixion week. He may have done it other times as well.

And as dynamic and dramatic as those events were, we were not identified with him in those things. We weren't made to be in Christ in those huge and pivotal and momentous events. Didn't happen. The believer is only in Christ in these five things, crucified and therefore died, buried, raised, ascended, and seated. Now it says, He chose us in Him. Now this is phenomenal stuff. The Father chose us in Christ before God said, let there be light. Wait a minute, before you say, let there be light, we've got to settle something here.

I've got to choose Morgan in Christ. I've got to choose Brad in Christ. Okay, and he goes around for each one of us. I've got to choose Stan in Christ. And then, OK, now we can create the world. And by the way, were you and I choosable apart from being in Christ? We were not choosable. That's why he had to choose us in Christ. There is no way that I'm choosable apart from that. He chose us, each of us, in Christ before he said, let there be light. The Father had your identity in mind, you, before the world even existed. And you were chosen. You, personally, were chosen in Christ. The Bible does not explain his choosing of us and how our choosing to believe in him gets worked out. The Bible doesn't explain that.

And so guess what? People come up with all these different, you know, isms. Oh, I believe in this ism and that ism and to try to explain it. And it's crazy because it's not biblical, right? It's taking what the Bible teaches and trying to reduce it so that I can understand it. It's probably wrong. Right? Because his ways are higher than my ways. Right?

There's one other thing to take a look at. There are those who will, you know, try to come up, oh, here's elect and chosen and predestined and try to draw all sorts of conclusions from it. Guess what? The Bible from beginning to end says that being chosen and elect and predestined means he loves us. Are you okay with that? Are you okay with that? You're chosen and elect and predestined. It means love. It means personal care for you. That's what it means.

Here's Deuteronomy 4.37, Because He loved your fathers, therefore He chose their descendants after them.

Psalm 78.68, But He chose the tribe of Judah, Mount Zion, which He loved. Choosing and election and predestination means He loves you. That's what it means. Not that God is so cold and logical and heartless that he says, you're going to heaven and you're going to hell. Right? The Bible doesn't say that.

He chose us in him, which is also, believe it or not, a marriage tradition reference. In the Jewish culture, who chose a wife for the son? The father chose the wife. He chose us in him. And that fits with the next part of verse four, holy and blameless. Choosing was done in eternity past, but our being holy and blameless is set for eternity future, for the eternal romance of Christ in the church. We will be presented as the bride to the son. The Father will call the time of the rapture, saying, go get your bride to the Son. Go get your bride. I hope it's today.

And we will be holy and blameless before Him in love. I get really, really excited about being married to Nancy, and here's one reason why. We get to live out one day at a time the eternal romance of Christ in the church. Holy and blameless. That is so exciting to me.

Holy and blameless is a set of words found in Ephesians 5.27 and that's the passage on marriage. That's the other place it shows up in Ephesians. Holy and blameless. And my marriage to Nancy is a living picture of that eternal romance of Christ in the church. We will be presented before Christ, holy and blameless as his bride, having been conformed and transformed into his character. We will be like him in every respect except for his deity.

Here's Ephesians 1, 4c-6, So sometimes we hear the word predestined and we think, oh, and by the way, this is the way it was taught at the seminary I went to. We think, oh, God predestines everything, and every move you make, every breath you take is all predestined, and God sets this thing in stone, and it's just like a big machine, and it happens exactly the way God wants it to happen. And ultimately, I don't get any choices. All choice is but an illusion in this viewpoint. So there are those who teach that, and we can get fearful that that's the case. But this particular predestination, notice, in love. It fits with what we looked at before.

Our election, our choosing, and our predestination are all communicating love. That means it comes from God's love for us, for you and me. Not that God puts control of us above His care for us. So we have a supplement out here that has more of the, you know, God's election and choosing and predestination and how it's connected to His love for us and His personal care, starting with the book of Deuteronomy and on into the New Testament. You hear predestination, you hear elect and chosen. That's not time to look at it and think that God's just making these cold, hard, logical decisions. What that's telling you is He loves you. That's what it's telling you. Being chosen, being elect, being predestined is all about His love and care for you and you personally.

Now this adoption of sons, really interesting, Paul only used this term And it's a single word. He only used this term with the church at Rome, with the church in Galatia, and this church in Ephesians. Nowhere else. He used it in those places because they were either places of significant Roman presence, or in the case of the church at Rome, that was Rome.

And there's a reason why, and that's because it's according to the Roman adoption custom. And literally means son position. If there ever was a statement or a position in Christ, this is it. And we have the references there in Romans and in Galatians as well. By Roman law, the son who was adopted by this adoption of sons process had a position better than a natural born son.

It had to be approved by the Roman Senate. So high levels of approval. It was witnessed by seven witnesses. That person who was adopted was a full heir, irreversible. The adopted son was legally severed from any prior sonship. You know, it was legal in the Roman Empire for a father to kill or have killed his sons and his daughters.

They could even do it on into adulthood. A father could decide that at any time. But there was an exception. Actually two exceptions. And one of them is that that was an adopted son. The authority to kill was gone. Couldn't do that. An adopted son had a priority above a natural born son born before or after. This was a new process in Roman law.

It originated with Augustus Caesar, the emperor from 31 B.C. He was the emperor during the time Christ was born, until 14 A.D. He was the first one to receive it. He received it out of Julius Caesar's will. He received adoption as sons. Tiberius Caesar was adopted. He was the son by adoption of sons.

Once Augustus Caesar died, he received the adoption of sons, and as it happens, five emperors in a row receive adoption of sons by this very same process. It was to make sure that there was an heir to the throne and that heir had a solid place that wouldn't be displaced.

An example of that in the classic movie Ben-Hur, based on the novel by Lew Wallace. And by the way, I'm using the 1959 pictures here. There was one that was redone. Apparently that movie that was done, believe it or not, 2016 is last year, right? So it was done last year. The wheels fell off anyway.

So once he was once a Jewish prince from a wealthy family by a series of events involving Pontius Pilate. Judah Ben-Hur was sold into slavery, rowing a Roman military ship. The ship becomes shipwrecked, and Judah Ben-Hur, the Jewish slave now, rescues Roman General Quintus Arius. And then this movie also, of course, includes the famous chariot race scene, right? And we won't take the time for that right now. But the grateful Roman general Quintus Arius later adopts Judah Ben-Hur as his son, using this adoption of sons process. So here's Judah Ben-Hur that went from being a slave locked in chains and darkness to having unrivaled wealth and power and influence in the Roman Empire.

Now here are the consequences of adoption under Roman law. So there's four points. One, the adopted son lost all his rights in his old family and gained more rights than a fully legitimate son in his new family. Secondly, he became an heir to his new father's estate even if other sons were born afterwards. That could not displace the adopted son. The old life of the adopted son was completely wiped out so that the adopted son was regarded as a new person entering into a new life.

What that meant was all the old debts, no matter how many or large, were completely wiped out. The criminal record no matter how many crimes and whatever magnitude was also wiped out. You started over with a completely clean slate. Now isn't that not what Christ did for you? Sin was looked upon as a debt by the Jews. You don't owe that anymore. Why? Because Christ canceled out the debt note. Colossians chapter 2. You are no longer held accountable to those sins. Why? Christ paid the price.

Fourthly, the adopted son was literally and absolutely the son of his new father. So when he says we are predestined to the adoption of sons, it means God saying that is absolutely what's happening. Predestined to it. And who does the predestining? God does it. Is he going to mess up on that? No. Not at all. And it says, through Jesus Christ, it was Christ's death, burial, and resurrection that made the way for our adoption of sons. All debts canceled. All the old life gone. New life, yes, absolutely. Christ pulled it off completely.

This was all done through the kind intention of the Father's will with a specific care for you. Again, this is not God just does a broad brush and He decides, okay, these guys are going to be saved, these guys are going to hell, and I'm going to do nice things to these people, I'm going to do bad things to these people, but this is personal care for you. That's what this is about. You don't do the adoption of sons for a thousand people at once. Do one at a time. Every single believer counts.

Some will point to this passage and make hard statements about election and predestination, choosing some to go to heaven and others to go to hell. By the way, during New Testament times, the Essenes, a group not mentioned by name, In the New Testament times, or in the New Testament, the Essenes were the group that believed in double predestination. They believed the Essenes are all going to heaven. Everybody else, including the Sadducees and Pharisees, are going to hell. That's what they believed. But this here speaks of personal care for you. Personal care for you. to the praise of the glory of His grace.

The praise is due to the Lord, which is why one of the things we do is we praise in our worship services, but is worship limited to just when we sing? No. Is praise limited to just when we sing? No. Glory is the radiant essence of who God is. Grace is an essential aspect of who God is, and what is grace? Grace is the unmerited favor completely at Christ's expense. Unmerited favor from God completely at Christ's expense. When it comes to grace, because what we see here, and it's not the only place, Ephesians 2, 4-7 is another place we see it, grace comes in multiple massive magnitudes. Multiple massive magnitudes.

He wasn't, and isn't, and is not going to be ever skimpy giving grace to us who believe. It's not just, here's just a little bit of grace for you. It's just enough. Right? Tiny little pinch. None of that. None of that. He's not going to be skimpy. He doesn't have to be skimpy. because he has multiple massive magnitudes of grace to share and lavish on you and me. We can never pay it back, which means that thankfulness and praise are the only reasonable responses that we can come up with. We don't owe him. He doesn't send us an invoice or a bill. He doesn't even come up and say, you owe me about that.

Here's Ephesians 1, 7 and 8a. In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses according to the riches of his grace which he lavished on us. Now we go here from position to possession. You see that since we believe by God's doing, our spiritual position is always in Christ. Since we first believe we have redemption as a possession, you notice those words?

We have. So because we are in Christ, that's position. We have spiritual possessions. And this isn't the only place that says we have spiritual possessions. The redemption, the bringing out of, and bringing into the position that we have. The redemption is a possession. We have it. It's a spiritual possession. Redemption includes every believer's forgiveness of trespasses. Trespass is falling alongside the path of fellowship. We do not have to ask God to forgive us. Ever run across Christians who ask God to forgive them? We don't need to. You don't need to do that. It's, you know, just for fun, I'll ask Nancy repeatedly, would you be my wife? But in truth she is, right? We don't have to ask for forgiveness. Why? It's already done. It's a done deal.

Ephesians 4.32, forgive one another as God in Christ past tense has forgiven you. From the overwhelming unfathomable riches of the Father's grace. He lavish lavishly gave that out to you and to me.

Here's Ephesians 1 8b and 10 and it's ABCD which will finish the passage. In all wisdom and insight he made known to us the mystery of his will according to his kind intention which he purposed in him. with a view to an administration suitable to the fullness of the times, that is, the summing up of all things in Christ, things in the heavens and things on the earth." Let's take a look at the expanded and explained, which is the last slide. I think it's also in your handout if you want to track with us there. And this kind of brings out what's the full sense of this passage in context. He, the Father, made known to us in the church.

That's you and me. through the apostles and prophets, which is now the New Testament, right? The previously unrevealed mystery, now mystery in actually the whole Bible is something previously unrevealed but now revealed, okay? It doesn't continue to be mysterious.

The previously unrevealed mystery of His will according to His kind intention which He, the Father, purposed in Christ. from the plan and perspective of God's administration of all things, which we now know includes the church, toward the full completion and final stage of the earthly times, that is, the summing up and bringing into submission of all things in Christ in the millennial kingdom.

As a matter of fact, there's a definite article there in front of Christ, the Christ, the Messiah, in the millennial kingdom, including all the things in the heavens and things on the earth. So what does this mean? It means that God is managing history to the end that everything will be summed up in Christ. It means that it's been revealed to us now that we're included in God's management of history to the end that everything will be summed up in Christ.

And that's a good thing. We look at history and often think, boy, crazy things went on and crazy things are going on. And as far as I can tell, crazy things are going to continue to be going on until Christ comes again. But there's some things for us to take a look at here.

All things are going to be summed up in Christ. There is nothing that happened last year, 2016. There is nothing that is going to happen in 2017. Or any other time that will stop or even delay things from being all summed up in Christ. Because God's managing things to that end.

You don't have to worry. This last election didn't derail God's plan to sum up everything in Christ. And didn't take us out of the picture of being a part of how God's going to sum up everything in Christ. Don't worry. You don't need to worry about it. Nobody that got elected or didn't get elected will impact that. Isn't that great? Now, God is sovereignly managing everything to the end that all things, things in heaven, things on the earth, will be summed up in Christ. You as a part of the body of Christ are definitely going to be a part of it. You don't need to worry. Yeah, that's really good, isn't it?

Alright, one more thing. This passage is where Acts is aimed. To me, I look at it and the book of Acts has stunning changes ahead for us. Here's Acts chapter 1. Here's the disciples. They're asking Jesus, is now the time you're going to establish a kingdom for Israel? And He gives them a quick answer and says, bye, I've got to go.

But all the things that we just saw in this passage in Ephesians We're not true of them yet except for one thing. God chose us in Him. The rest of it all had to wait. In Acts chapter 2, everything in this passage is true of those who believed on that day, but none of them knew it. Not even the disciples.

Isn't that astounding? Amazing. So they were to catch up with over a period of decades, what we just studied here this morning. The man who authored this passage, that I called a serial killer, he becomes a deadly enemy of those of whom these things are true. Until these things are true of the one who wrote it, the Apostle Paul. Isn't that amazing? It's an astounding, amazing set of changes that take place during the Book of Acts.

You know, this guy's going around killing Christians every chance he gets. He says, I want them dead. Every one of them. I'm going to pursue them with a vengeance. Then he becomes one of them. And all these things are true. And he even writes about it. Lastly, from between Acts chapter 1 and Acts chapter 28, start to finish, we're going to see the disciples have a series of breathtaking aha moments.

I never knew that. I never knew that. Even the Apostle Paul is going to have a series of breathtaking moments. You imagine the Apostle Paul, you know, here's one day, he says, I'm going to Damascus and I'm going to kill every Christian I possibly can.

And Jesus says, Saul, why are you persecuting me? Oh, who are you, Lord? And then he's going to turn around and write to the church at Rome. You've been baptized into Christ's death, burial and resurrection. But he's going to wait some years before he writes this book. You've been baptized in this death, burial, resurrection, ascension, and seeding. You're in Christ.

Can you imagine the mind-boggling, constantly learning new things? Like the apostles, we find that we're always catching up to what God has already done. That's what the apostles did. What was true of them was true from Acts chapter 2. It just took them decades to figure it all out.

Isn't that astounding? I have a funnel here because of my grandpa. My grandpa said, you know, for the unbeliever, life is kind of like a funnel that gets smaller and smaller. And towards the end, it gets pretty small, right? It's one reason. Imagine this is by two to one margin. Colorado voters voted in euthanasia. You want to die? Fine. It's because the funnel gets smaller and smaller.

What discoveries are ahead for us as this book of Acts unfolds? For the Christians, the funnel goes the other way. My body, as time goes on, is getting less and less cooperative. Have you noticed that? And as it does so, I still look at it and the funnel goes the other way. It gets bigger and bigger the closer I get. And I know that my body being uncooperative is one of the ways that the Lord has me look at the spiritual aspect of things and seeing the funnel getting bigger and bigger. As you get closer to the end, there is more and more to grow in and to hope for.

And that's a really good thing. So, if the Lord allows, and I hope He comes today, But if the Lord allows, we'll start an act next Sunday. Let's pray. Lord, we thank you as we look at this just marvelous, amazing, astounding truth. Things that will take the rest of our lives to even begin to absorb and to grow in and to understand. And we just thank you for that. We thank you that there are things in here that are beyond our comprehension and always will be. Though I would guess that when we see you face to face, we will say, oh, of course. Thank you for that. We pray in Jesus' name.