New Testament Studies

Apostolic Succession Colossians 1:1 Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill I’d like to have a shot at it, if God gives grace on first verse of Colossians. This is where the emphasis in the church and fellowship is important. Please look at the Colossians 1:1-2, Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, and Timothy, our brother, to the saints and faithful brethren in Christ at Colossae. Grace to you and peace from God our Father.” This first verse gets you to the important book of Acts. Acts 1:12, “Then they returned to Jerusalem from the mount called Olivet, which is near Jerusalem, a Sabbath day’s journey away; and when they had entered, they went up to the upper room, where they were staying, Peter and John and James and Andrew, Philip and Thomas, Bartholomew and Matthew, James the son of Alphaeus and Simon the Zealot and Judas the son of James. All these with one accord devoted themselves to prayer, together with the women and Mary the mother of Jesus, and with his brothers.” “In those days Peter stood up among the brethren (the company of persons was in all about a hundred and twenty), and said, ‘Brethren, the scripture had to be fulfilled, which the Holy Spirit spoke beforehand by the mouth of David concerning Judas who was guide to those who arrested Jesus. For he was numbered among us, and was allotted his share in this ministry. (Now this man bought a field with the reward of his wickedness; and falling headlong he burst open in the middle and all his bowels gushed out. And it became known to all the inhabitants of Jerusalem, so that the field was called in their language Akel’dama, that is, Field of Blood. ) For it is written in the book of Psalms, “Let his habitation become desolate, and let there be no one to live in it”; and “His office let another take.” So one of the men who have accompanied us during all the time that the Lord Jesus went in and out among us, beginning from the baptism of John until the day when he was taken up from us — one of these men must become with us a witness to his resurrection.’ And they put forward two, Joseph called Barsabbas, who was surnamed Justus, and Matthias. And they prayed and said, ‘Lord, who knowest the hearts of all men, show which one of these two thou has chosen to take the place in this ministry and apostleship from which Judas turned aside, to go to his own place.’ And they cast lots for them, and the lot fell on Matthias; and he was enrolled with the eleven apostles.” That was key and key to everything that has happened since in the Church. That’s why we call it an Apostolic Church. I don’t know if you remember that Paul said I’m an apostle because I have seen the Lord. He regarded seeing Jesus on the Damascus road the same as what the others had done. That was the mark of an apostle. An apostle was one who had seen Jesus incarnate, seen Jesus alive. That was critical to beginnings of the early Church. I think we need to bring it out more in our apologetics that these people had seen Jesus alive and actually touched his body. So the apostles had that special position as evidence and that’s why the truth was never questioned in the first century. If you remember probably the last book that was written in the New Testament was John. They reckon it was written as late as 100 A.D. John himself died about 100 A.D. Through all those 100 years you had lots and lots of little churches everywhere in the ancient nations. They were all receiving letters as early as 50-56 A.D. and they were distributed around all those churches; all around the then known countries in the east. They told about Jesus being alive and there were still lots of people who were alive at that time. They could say, “My cousin was alive in Jerusalem at that time and he told me about this Jesus.” They could say it was so. On top of that they had these apostles. These men walked along side of Jesus, ate with him and known him. They were the apostles. ‘Apostelo’ means to send out. They were known as apostles, not only were they sent out, but people who had actually seen Jesus and touched him and knew that he was real. You can see that in the first century the whole thing was very solid. That’s why also it became very solemn in the second century — why even the emperor of Rome claimed Jesus to be the Son of God and proclaimed Christianity the established religion in the Roman Empire. [Constantine, 272 – 337 A.D.] There was no question in anyone’s mind that this Jesus had lived and done the things that they said. No one questioned that he had risen from the dead. It all stemmed from the respect that was given to these apostles. It was so important to them that they elected someone to take Judas’ place. There were twelve men who were trusted and known to have been with Jesus alive. That’s the kind of truth and in a sense, the same truth that God has passed on to us. This is the purpose of the first verse in Colossians. He is stating who is doing the writing here in this letter. “Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, and Timothy our brother.” They didn’t have email back then but they did the same in addressing their letters ‘To’ and ‘From’ in the beginning. They were very clear on who was saying these things and who was writing to whom. That’s the opening of all the letters in the New Testament. Paul was actually someone who had seen Jesus incarnate. He had seen Jesus on this earth, on the road to Damascus. Timothy, of course, who was his assistant and had traveled so many miles with him. The truth in Christ was always tied to these men. That has carried on through God’s grace to us. We are in the remarkable situation where God has placed us. I know many older men in the churches in Ireland who tried to get truth over to one of their children. They would say, “If he had only heard Billy Nicholson.” Nicholson was a famous evangelist through whom God had worked a lot of changes in people’s lives. I heard many older men who said if only their children had heard so and so. Here we are. I was thinking the other day, even now it is 40 years since we did the first sermon that we recorded. It is at least 40 years since some of us met for the first time. Here we are alive. Not only alive but we have 1000 presentations online in video and audio format. We hope they are good for another 100 years. In a way, we are right in line with the apostles. God has been good to us. It wouldn’t be there online if it was just me. It’s there because of you. You were there; not just Greg. We have all made it possible. There would be no one who had any interest in those things at this time. You have probably 30-40 years to tell people where they can find those sermons or those truths. Also, about 100 years after that people will be able to find those sermons and truths online. It’s a precious and noble privilege that God has given us. To us it’s nothing. Irene, being the wife of a preacher, would say you’re making so much out of nothing. But it is a big thing. God has enabled his truth to be passed on. It’s crazy but we are probably one of the first to have a complete presentation online of truth. It’s there in such a way that they can be a part of the fellowship with us as if they heard those truths. It’s very effective that somebody can see it. Don’t you think especially in these days when there is so much deception? Especially when there is so much distrust and lack of trust? We’ve all made mistakes. If it is through the ‘Basic Youth Conflicts” man or someone else who’s done something wrong and it’s questioned. Here you see the dumb guy and see the people in the congregation 20-30 years later, it builds up a great sense of truth and confirmation. It carries on the certainty the apostles carried on. A certainty that tells people they were there and saw that. They saw him alive. They ate fish with him on the beach so it must be real. That connection with actual incarnation is mighty, powerful and most influential. I encourage you therefore to carry it on. This is why we are meeting here. We have this book of Colossians because Paul and Timothy wrote this letter and he put his name on it. We can trace him back and we can track down people who refered to Paul; others that have refered to Timothy. It all hangs together and is a convincing thing that will be more and more essential nowadays when people wonder was that a movie or did it really happen. Was that news or YouTube? Is that Reality TV or real? There is such uncertainty that men and women will question what their eyes see. It will be increasingly important to have something that has all kinds of connections to fact and reality — what you can see and touch. God has made us part of that apostolic succession. It’s because of those apostles that we have the certainty that we have today. I think you know it because you are so loving, kind and respect what God has done. I would encourage you to be faithful to that until you go to heaven. Do everything you can to get all you can on your websites. The websites don’t need to be brilliant. They just have to be there so you can invite people to them. They can be anything especially if you have the side menu with all the other websites. That will assure for the next 200-300 years people will be able to see and hear the things we have seen and heard ourselves. That is very much what the apostolic church is. You might wonder why the apostolic church. Well, because it first came from those 12 men who had actually seen him and therefore had no question Jesus existed or not. On that apostolic church God has built what we see before us these days. So it is an honor and a privilege. None of us need to be brilliant. We don’t need to be wonderful speakers or writers. We just need to be the little people who get these things on the internet in all kinds of different ways. Then you really have to be thankful to God in arranging this as much as He has done. We need to be thankful to God for men like Paul and Timothy. We must be thankful even for the heat of the day when it comes. You will have to carry on in the heat of the day sometime. There will be the equivalent of persecution. It may not be the same as what John Wesley experienced where it was physical. There may not be imprisonment — though again who knows! There may not be imprisonment such as the apostles themselves faced. You will come into moments in your own life when you think is it worth it. Is it worth it? This is so boring. There will come moments where you wonder if it is worth carrying on. Oh, yes, yes! Because otherwise you break the line! You break the string, yeah. You are part of what God started in these 12 men. You are part of what Jesus established by his death and resurrection. You are a part of the apostolic succession. That is why God has created us. That’s the only reason we are here to witness to the reality of Him and of His dear Son. Of course we can all see how that will be threatened when Zefferelli produces a movie about Christ. Or someone else how makes another life of Christ. Obviously, what they do now to men and women who are famous in the world, you know you can barely recognise the person they are talking about because they have turned him into a homosexual or something else. The unreality is there whether he is an actor or a politician. It will always be that. It will be the same with Jesus. They will do all kinds of things to mutilate him and to prevent people seeing him as he really is. Part of our responsibility and privilege is to clarify that. I agree with anyone here who says isn’t the best way to do that is him living in us. Yes, of course, that’s the best way. That’s better than a movie. If they can touch Christ’s kindly tenderness in you. Of course that’s the best. It is also important to see the salutation in this letter teaches us clearly of the truth of God is dependent on the faithfulness of people like ourselves, including the faithfulness of these two. It is very difficult for any of us to think who will be here in 100 years time. But there will be somebody. There will be someone who is looking for truth as we are. God has blessed us here to bring that about. Let us pray.

Peace and Grace from God our Father Colossians 1:2 Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill Our verse today is Colossians 1:2, “grace and peace to you in God our Father.” That’s the normal kind of greeting that you find the in epistles of Paul. He always opens it like this. “Grace and peace to you in God our Father.” Of course we normally being sophisticated Americans or Westerners, we say, ‘Oh, what a nice thing to say.’ However for Paul it meant far more than that. “Grace to you and peace from our Father.” It’s really saying I wish you grace; the grace that God gives you this day. I wish that to you. May you experience that and may you have it and peace from God our Father. We usually think to ourselves good, good, I need grace. I need to say grace before meals and I need grace whenever I can get it; without grace I couldn’t do anything. But really he is saying this is this is the whole basis of your life. If you ain’t got grace, you’ve got nothing. Everything depends on the fact that you cannot explain for a moment why that goes there when I say it goes there. Or whether it goes back here when I say it goes back here. I can explain the veins, arteries and muscles that connected up but I really can’t tell why that does that — just because my mind says. I’m very aware that a million miracles take place to get that thing to go from there to there. This whole thing is moving at millions of miles an hour. The whole room is moving. Every little particle that I cannot see is whizzing around in millions of miles an hour. The whole world is in motion. The only reason it moves this way is because there is a life, strength, power and energy that is being exercised every second by the Maker of the universe who is maintaining it. So the whole thing is by grace. It’s his grace; not just unmerited favor that we have talked about before. It’s his grace as the power, ability and energy of the Holy Spirit that enables everything to happen in our world. It enables our mind to think what it is thinking. So when Paul says that he means everything that enables you to exist, may you have that and be utterly dependant on it. Of course, it throws you back to that great piece in Ephesians 2:4, “God who is rich in mercy and made us sit with him in the heavenly places.” Verse 7, “That in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable [the Greek word definition is ‘beyond anything that can be imagined’] riches of his grace and kindness towards us in Christ Jesus.” It goes back to that promise that he would give us grace for everything. What does it result in — nothing but a huge miracle. I don’t know if you have experienced much of ‘he is in me and he is able to do it.’ Those moments, those rare moments when you realise it is by the energy of Jesus that you are able to do anything. It is by his energy that you are able to do this thing. Indeed his strength is made perfect in the midst of your weakness. So it is when you are weakest that you are conscious of his grace and strength in you. It is that sense that gives anybody a feeling of ease in life. It is that ease that gives you the power to do things which you in your own fleshly strength won’t have the power to do. It is no small thing to you when Pauls says grace to you because without it you are finished. There’s nothing. It’s Jesus in you that enables you to do anything. The killer is we often don’t believe that for a moment. So we labor and labor. It must look strange to God because we are laboring to do something that he himself is actually doing. But we are laboring pretending to do it. So all our weariness comes from thinking it is our responsibility to do this. It’s by our power alone that we are able to do it. That’s what wears us down. You would say it yourself. We all know it. The old story we use in psychology: Fire — the house is on fire. The father has just managed to get out of the house barely with some of his clothes still burning. Someone says the child has not come out and back he goes. So it doesn’t matter how worn out and wearied you are — the strength is there and you find it there at certain moments. It is therefore true the whole thing is by his grace. What I can see in my own wretched, miserable example that I am, though I know I’m supposed to say, ‘Do as I do,’ it takes you back to 2 Corinthians 2:14, “But thanks be to God, who in Christ always leads us in triumph and through us spreads the fragrance of the knowledge of him everywhere. For we are the aroma of Christ to God among those who are being saved and among those who are perishing. To one a fragrance from death to death; to the other a fragrance from life to life.” It’s that. “Thanks be to God who always leads us in triumph and spreads the fragrance of the knowledge of him everywhere.” Well, how are you today? Is it going alright? Yeah, the economy is getting better. Or, it can be — great day, isn’t it? Because you feel it in your heart. It’s a big difference between what you put on your outside and what comes from inside your heart because of the fragrance of Jesus. That’s the fragrance that we are here to spread. Through us to spread the fragrance of Christ everywhere. It is a fragrance when you are living in grace; in the grace of Jesus’ strength and life within you. I’m the first to say I can end up in a strop — it’s good to exhort — it’s good to say truth and speak it. It’s good to share truth with each other. It’s better to be able to waft the fragrance of Christ. That’s the best. That’s the best when your consciousness of Christ’s strength and life in you is running things. He’s so strong that you are at ease. You are at peace and ease down deep. That fragrance comes over to others. So grace is pretty important. It’s the invisible movement of Jesus’ Spirit from your spirit to others. It connects them up miraculously with the power of God’s Spirit in the universe. That’s what happened when these men went around. Through them God spread the fragrance of Christ everywhere. People began to sense there is a power in this world that gives me strength that makes everything work together. Of course that’s why Paul said the grace and peace to you in God our father because God our father has reconciled us to himself. He has solved all these things. They are all solved. They are all already done so live in that peace. That’s why I have said to Myron and Dan because all of us are conscious when the wretched machine breaks in the middle of this order production. Or the electrical fuse box gets shorted out from something and cuts off the power to the factory. In those moments every one of us knows the panic that assaults you. Immediately those of us who are practical creatures harshly get to work by pulling the right things and make the right moves. So we are very aware of the motivation within us. You’d like to think it is motivation from the right place but it is often motivation from what are we going to do if it lasts the whole day. Or, what are we going to do if this order can’t be shipped? It’s those moments of course where you determine if you are living in reality or not. That’s it. You determine whether you are living in a world that has been reconciled by God in Christ. Or, whether you are living in the unreality that looks so real around us of a world that is falling apart — a Louisiana delta that is losing an acre every hour from the sea. Is this the world that is real? Or, is this the unreal world we are living in? It’s very real what Paul is saying here. Grace and peace from God our Father be to you. Live in that. I pray that you will be living in it every moment. Because that will spread the fragrance of Christ everywhere. It probably gets down to that simple fact. It’s deeper than what we thought when we said ‘belief’. It’s belief, it’s faith. Are you living in faith? Yes, it is. But it’s not, YEAH, I’m living in faith [shouting it out]. It is faith that knows this world around us is the one that has passed. This is the one that has been fixed by God. This is not the broken one that we look at. This is the broken one that has already been reconciled by God to his whole plan. So it’s OK we are all out. Steady — take it easy. God’s clarity and his achievement will be manifested. We really are people that are waiting for the manifestation. We have no doubt that the actual essence is already there but we are waiting for the manifestation. It’s a bit like the evidence of things not seen. [Hebrews 11:1] It is the substantiating of things that have already happened. That’s what faith is. I think it is worth thinking about these things as we receive him again today. We are receiving a living Savior. We are receiving a living person. This is not just the bread or the wine. It is not just an idea — oh what a nice idea that Jesus is in us. It’s receiving him in his grace and peace so that he will live his life in us. This will allow others to see you seem to be different. You seem to be different from so many others. You seem to walk with a peace and a freedom from anxiety that others don’t have. He’s there all the time inside us. Let us pray. Now the grace of our Lord Jesus, the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with each one of us throughout this day and week. Amen.

Faith is Manifested in Brotherly Love Colossians 1:4a Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill Please turn to Colossians 1:4 as I’d like to remind you of the verse that we are dealing with today. Obviously I’ll only be dealing with a little of it. “Because we have heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love you have for all the saints.” That’s it — “your faith in Christ Jesus” is the little part of the verse we will be talking about. It’s in connection with that that we are reading these verses in John 5. It’s part of what faith in Christ Jesus means. John 5:17-47, “But Jesus answered them, ‘My Father is working still, and I am working.’ This was why the Jews sought all the more to kill him, because he not only broke the Sabbath but also called God his own Father, making himself equal with God.” Jesus said to them, ‘Truly, truly, I say to you, the Son can do nothing of his own accord, but only what he sees the Father doing; for whatever he does, that the Son does likewise. For the Father loves the Son, and shows him all that he himself is doing; and greater works than these will he show him, that you may marvel. For as the Father raises the dead and give them life, so also the Son gives life to whom he will. The Father judges no one, but has given all judgment to the Son, that all may honor the son, even as they honor the Father. He who does not honor the Son does not honor the Father who sent him. Truly, truly, I say to you, he who hears my word and believes him who sent me, has eternal life; he does not come into judgment, but has passed from death to life.” “Truly, truly, I say to you, the hour is coming, and now is, when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God, and those who hear will live. For as the Father has life in himself, so he has granted the Son also to have life in himself, and has given him authority to execute judgment, because he is the Son of man. Do not marvel at this; for the hour is coming when all who are in the tombs will hear his voice and come forth, those who have done good, to the resurrection of life, and those who have done evil, to the resurrection of judgment.” “I can do nothing on my own authority; as I hear, I judge; and my judgment is just, because I seek not my own will but the will of him who sent me. If I bear witness to myself, my testimony is not true; there is another who bears witness to me, and I know that the testimony which he bears to me is true. You sent to John, and he has borne witness to the truth. Not that the testimony which I receive is from man; but I say this that you may be saved. He was a burning and shining lamp, and you were willing to rejoice for a while in his light. But the testimony this I have is greater than that of John; for the works which the Father has granted me to accomplish, these very works which I am doing, bear me witness that the father has sent me. And the Father who sent me has himself borne witness to me. His voice you have never heard, his form you have never seen; and you do not have his word abiding in you, for you do not believe him whom he has sent. You search the scriptures, because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that bear witness to me; yet you refuse to come to me that you may have life. I do not receive glory from men. But I know that you have not the love of God within you. I have come in my Father’s name, and you do not receive me; if another comes in his own name, him you will receive. How can you believe, who receive glory from one another and do not seek the glory that comes from the only God? Do not think that I shall accuse you to the Father; it is Moses who accuses you, on whom you set your hope. If you believed Moses, you would believe me, for he wrote of me. But if you do not believe his writings, how will you believe my words?” You can tell yourself even though those words are familiar to you that there is a whole attitude in that chapter there where Jesus is very clearly drawing them into the same experience he has with his Father. He’s concerned with their relationship with him as he is with his relationship with his Father. That’s what faith in Christ is. I bring it up now so that you will see the value of these readings and be able to think it through. The verse we are studying has Paul rejoicing and thanking them because of their faith in Christ Jesus. It’s so easy to drift right in to the common, shallow, light interpretation to that phrase. “Faith in Christ” — Oh, yeah, I have faith in Christ. You’re saved by faith in Christ. By faith in Christ I am justified.” Wesley puts it very well, “Faith is not just a speculative rational thing, a cold lifeless assent, a train of ideas in the head but a disposition of the heart.” [John Wesley’s Teachings, Volume 2: Christ and Salvation] It seems that is one of the great weaknesses in our present day and has been for generations. Faith in Christ is so often interpreted just as Wesley says “a speculative rational thing, a cold lifeless assent; a train of ideas in the head” and not as it is outlined here in this chapter — a disposition of the heart. A relationship with Jesus that is close, deep and intimate and is daily and continuous. It is what governs your life. So often it is expressed here is the secret — if you’re not sure whether something is right or wrong — think; what would Jesus do? Dear love us; bless our dear stupid hearts, we think that is deep. We say that’s it. Of course if you examine it, all it is is a speculative rational thing. It’s an assent. It’s saying I remember the kind of life Jesus lived now would he do that. I couldn’t imagine him doing that. So I won’t do that. It’s purely a human thing; purely a psychological inference, an intellectual assent. It is not a thing that comes from the heart. Of course we are busy, whether we are aborting or not aborting; whether we are supporting this subject or that subject. We are playing on that level of the mind; of the intellect and of ideas. Nothing touching the heart of the spirit. No touching of the spirit; just on that level below it. I would say the greater part of Christendom in the East and West is that. Most things come down to that. It’s the old forensic gospel: we should die for our sins, Jesus died for us, and so we don’t need to die. It’s that. It’s that building on that whatever emotion you can. Of course in today’s world building on it with whatever political view you think it supports. There’s little of the heart of Christ; little of the heart of God in it. Of course when you read chapters like this in John you realize Jesus is not saying to you, “Here this is what you have to believe. If you believe this you’ll have eternal life. Believe this little thing and you’ll have eternal life.” He’s saying this is the relationship I have with my Father and you will have this relationship with me, therefore you will be a part of our relationship. So we will all be one together. It will be a heartfelt, deep attitude that is brought about by his Spirit in us. When you talk about faith in Christ you are talking about something deeper. I came across an old commentary some years ago. Actually I was struck by it because it was such a beautiful set of books. We might have it in our library. It’s by Gill. He comments on this verse in Colossians, “We have heard of your faith in Christ Jesus.” He says, “This expresses the matter of their thankfulness or what it was they gave thanks to God for — their faith in Christ. By which is meant not only their hearty assent to the whole doctrine of faith concerning the person, offices and grace of Christ; their soundness and steadfastness in it and their sincere, constant confession of it but the grace of faith in them; the operation of Spirit of God in their souls which had not Moses or any other man but Christ for its object; by which they looked unto him as their Savior, went onto him as such, ventured on him, committed on to him, leaned and relied upon him; that grace which comes from him has him as its author and publisher and returns unto him and lives on him. I thought Gill was beginning to hit it. That it isn’t simply a belief in Christ as God’s Son or that he has worked some forensic deal with God over your sins but it is he himself is the one in whom we were made. It is in him and with him we were raised up and made part of his Father’s family. Faith in Christ has the very ‘IN” strongly in there. If you look up ‘in’ and its meaning, the emphasis is ‘not movement but position.’ It’s explaining and describing a position in Christ, really part of Christ. So faith in Christ is being a part of him. If you remember the verse in Romans which says you were ‘baptized into Christ.” The word there implies into or becoming part of him. So faith in Christ is that. Then the truth that God made real to me as I thought about this this morning — this is a difficult one to get over to you — I can feel it but how do I express that. “Christ where do you want to put that book? Do you want to put it on the table?” That attitude would be right. I know it sounds stupid. But we are in him and he in us. There is no question — if we go into a shop, I don’t trail the wife along or expect my puppy to follow me — I would ask her, would you like to go into that shop. That truly is faith in Christ where you would treat Christ as a real person inside you. I don’t know that would say your mind would be caught between thinking the thing you were concentrating on and then thinking of him but I think you can exist on two levels. I think your spirit can be in Christ and yet you can deal with the situation here. My plea is that faith in Christ is a real sense that Jesus is inside you — that this is his life — that these are his hands. He is in this, here he is today. He is here in me. He is here in me to bring his Father’s world under his Father’s will and he is in me and these are his hands. He has a say in this. I’m not involved in second guessing by asking what would Jesus do with this book. I feel he is there saying, “I’m here. Why not check with me?” I think we have grown so used to the other that we miss a lot of the joy of the Savior’s presence in us. Of course we miss the mass of the freedom from worry and anxiety that his presence in us brings. Undoubtedly we fall into all kinds of attitudes and tones of voice because we know he is somewhere here. But we haven’t much time to wonder about what he thinks about the situation. So I think we miss a lot that our faith includes. We miss a lot in our lives because of it. Of course the world misses badly his touch. I always think that if I am curt or sharp with Marty or Irene. It’s really trampling over the one within me who wouldn’t dream of being like that. At that very moment, because of his love for us, he is endeavoring to soften it and give you the patience and the forbearance to receive it and still to love me. Of course it isn’t just me. We are all involved in it in some form. It does seem to be faith in Christ is more that. That is what faith in Christ is. I do think that’s why the apostles operated as they did. You often wonder if it was both Peter and John who came to the gate and the poor man was with hand out and begging. I always wondered if Peter read it in some book or must have prepared to say that or maybe he just thought how can I get around this guy without giving him anything. Obviously when he said, “Silver and gold have I none….” it was the Savior inside him. He had no doubt it wasn’t his hand that was reaching out. He had no doubt that his hand had no power to heal the man. He had no power to heal the man. It was Jesus in him. That’s the whole meaning of the resurrection. It’s that the Holy Spirit lived now not only in Jesus but he lived in these men who believed in his Son and had received their position from him. So Jesus now lived in them. Faith in Christ means that. Of course we read in John 15:4, “Abide in me and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in me.” Without me you will not be able to do anything. So that in a sense is why we have such a powerless Christendom because there are lots of people going around saying we have faith in Christ but really they don’t have faith in Christ as the Bible uses it. I thought it was important for Communion today because that’s what we do. You have to admit it isn’t harder for the Father to make it clearer. This is my blood and this is my flesh. How much clearer can you make it to mean? Our faith in Christ means that he is in us and we are in him. In that sense we can live just as Paul said, “It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me; and the life I now live in the flesh I live by the faith in the Son of God.” [Galatians 2:20] So I put this book down — no, not I but Christ. You may say you can’t be holy, holy all the time. No, but it seems to me the more you can remember what reality is, the more really you will operate yourselves and the more realistically you will deal with each situation and each other. Let us pray. Now the grace of our Lord Jesus, the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with each of us throughout this day and week. Amen.

Faith in God’s Unconditional Love Colossians 1:4b Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill The verse that we are studying is Colossians 1:4, “Because we have heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love that you have for all the saints.” I hope to try to explain a little about the love for all the saints. But you remember last Sunday we talked about first part of the verse “faith in Christ Jesus.” Faith is often what Wesley said it isn’t, “Faith is not just a speculative, rational thing; a cold lifeless assent; a train of ideas in the head but a disposition of the heart.” I think many people reading these Bible verses about how he was glad and giving thanks for the faith they had in Christ. We know what that is — believing that Jesus is the Son of God and that he has died for our sins and because of that we are forgiven. That is regarded as the gospel in these days still. The statement of the facts that Jesus did, therefore God has done that for our sins and we are forgiven. So we can go on now and live the best we can for him. But of course faith in Christ is much more than that. You and I have spent much time in that the reality is each one of us here are God’s workmanship [Ephesians 2:20]. The world of Christendom doesn’t know anything about this next piece. They really don’t. “We are God’s workmanship created in Christ Jesus.” They do not believe that. No! You mean Hitler was created in Christ Jesus! That’s what they say all in their little religious clubs interpret it plainly. Those people who say they know where they are going; the people who are going to church; the people who are Christians. They are the ones created in Christ Jesus. That’s how they have become a new creation. Of course that is the second creation that is the new creation. Those who are truly in love with Jesus they are created in him as a new creation. This verse is saying what John 1 is saying. “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God; all things were made through him, and without him was not anything made that was made.” All things were made in him including Hitler; including all the bad people; everybody was made in the beginning in him. The ‘in him’ and the ‘Word’ in John 1 was obviously Christ. Of course Colossians says it again later on that all things were made in Christ. Of course the world doesn’t believe that. We say we have faith in Christ but it isn’t faith that we are God’s workmanship created in Christ Jesus. It’s not that. It’s faith that we will be saved if we will believe that Jesus died for us. Of course the faith that is real is the faith that we are in Christ Jesus. There is a closer relationship between me and Marty if I am made in him; as opposed to me believing that he exists. There is a great deal of difference in the two. One is a mental concept and the other is an all consuming sense that I am part of him. Of course that is what faith in Christ is. It’s faith that we have been created in Christ. Of course the sequence of that is everything we do is done in Christ. We are all very glad of that if you think of all the good things we’ve done. Oh, I’m glad it’s because of Christ that I am able to love people. It’s because of Christ that I do things for other people. But what about the bad things we’ve done. Were they done in Christ? That’s part of it. Faith in Christ is that we were created in Christ; we were made inside him and our whole life has been lived in him. The things that we do we do in him. The things we do to other people are done in him. They don’t only bear them but he bears them too. Faith in Christ is that all our lives are in Jesus. It makes for a very different attitude to him when you sense that. You realize I don’t live like that. I don’t live as if when Jesus put this book down, I put it down. Or when I put the book down, Jesus puts it down. That isn’t so. I don’t live in the sense that whatever I say I force him to say. That isn’t true. So, faith in Christ means you begin to realize, wait a minute, I’m part of Christ. Well, I don’t have the attitude that he has. I don’t feel like him about God. It begins to come in upon us that your attitude is not his attitude at all. His attitude was that his Father had made the world and his Father ruled everything. His Father loved him. You don’t have that attitude. It begins to dawn on the person, yeah; I don’t believe God has anything to do with my life. So slowly it creeps up on a person, in various ways, sometimes suddenly as on the road to Damascus, but sometimes very gradually a person realizes I don’t have any relationship with God who made this world. They begin to be concerned about that and begin to find out more about this God. They begin to realize they live their life as their own life not as something directed by him and something planned by him. They live their own life and they do whatever they want. Gradually there becomes an awareness in them that they are not living in reality. They are not living as God wants them to. They have a sense that they do what they want to do not what God wants them to do. Gradually the faith in Christ begins to develop in a person. They sense that God is not their God and they have little to do with him. There begins to come into their minds a sense they need to do something about that. They need to begin to get to know this God and to get to know his Son. Gradually they start to move toward God. He begins to work in their hearts and bring to them a sense that the only way this can work is allowing Christ to have his way in their lives. That’s the moment when they face, either an altar or quietly at night at home, they face the issue will I let this Christ have anything to do with my life. Will I let him live in me? If he is in me, will I let him live in me and I live in him? They start to deal with Jesus and then God begins to work with them. Eventually sending the Spirit of his Son into their hearts so there comes a time when they at last say yes, I will let you do what you want with my life. We often found when helping a person at the altar that people do an awful lot of crying. Then you would realize they were crying because they wouldn’t let go of their own life. They wouldn’t let go of their own will. The crying often came to an end when they at last bowed the will and allowed Jesus to come in. Sometimes you would have a situation where you might say to a person, “Well has Christ come into your heart.” They would say no I don’t sense that. Then they would pray further and God would reveal something of the will that they were not ready to bow to Jesus and then they would bow to it saying yes he’s come in. It is that element of will that is the heart of having faith in Christ. If that will isn’t there you can call it faith in Christ but it isn’t total trust of Christ and total obedience to him. So there is a sense where God tries to send the Spirit of his Son into a person’s heart but there is no room because the spirit is set, obstinate and stubborn in the will. Until the will bows the spirit cannot be touched by the Holy Spirit. There is a real change comes in the new birth when a person bows the will to Christ and allows him to live the life he had planned to live for him in the world. That’s the moment of the new birth. The moment when you know the forgiveness of your sins, you don’t just believe them. When that comes God sends the Spirit of the Son into your heart and the Holy Spirit sheds the love of God in your heart. That love there is the love he has for other people. It is the love that is supernatural because it comes from God’s Spirit into you and through other people. It is the love for all the saints Paul is talking about here in Colossians. “I thank God for your faith in Christ and your love for all the saints.” The love flows out of the faith. If the faith is a real total faith involving the will and the Spirit of Christ coming into you and you giving your own life and will over to Christ, then the Holy Spirit is ruling in your heart. That begets in you; the Holy Spirit sheds abroad in your heart the love of God and the love of other people. You can see that faith in Christ and love of one another are joined together. The one comes out of the other. Where you have a purely mental, speculative, rational thing there is no real interaction with the Spirit of Christ within and no real dealing with the will. This kind of faith is part of why so much Christianity is shot through with so much antinomianism. Antinomianism is believing in God but acting against him; mainly doing whatever you wanted. ‘Anti’ and ‘nomos’ means ‘against the law.’ It is believing whatever you do, God will cover it up with the blood of Christ so carry on doing your best but you can’t avoid sinning at times. That kind of sinning Christianity can’t produce any kind of love. That’s where you get philanthropy planted on top. Not that all philanthropy is bad. What you end up with is not real Christian and spiritual love but a kind of philanthropic attitude or sense of obligation towards other people. Often you get two levels in Christianity, mental belief in Christ as Savior and then this do as much good as you can. Much of the good works is done on that level almost on the level of philanthropy. ‘Philo’ and ‘anthropy’ means love of man rather than the love of God. It’s not a creative spiritual ministry; it’s rather something that in a way holds back the power of evil in the world. It’s part of the preserving grace of God. Where you have a real ‘New Birth’ and people who have a sense of Christ within them and allow that Spirit within to govern their lives, then you get love that is shed abroad by the Holy Spirit which is very different from ordinary love. It is a love that is just bursting out. You are full of it bursting out. You can’t hold it back. It’s natural; something that becomes natural to you. It’s Christ loving through you to them. The love that is described in 1 Corinthians 13. It is that kind of love which is beyond the ordinary thing we talk about as love which is a mixture of kindness, sometimes guilt and sometimes a desire to help the world to do good. You can see there is an almost automatic connection between real faith in Christ and the love of your neighbor. The one stems from the other. It isn’t something that has to be planted on top. The heart of it, you can see, is faith in Christ. The issue is is the faith in Christ an all consuming, overwhelming, volitional [will] act of the Holy Spirit? Is it a new birth in the Spirit or is it a reformation; a turning over a new leaf in your life and beginning to take an interest in others? The two are connected tightly. This is part of the reason why it is not just ideological or theological or intellectual to define faith in Christ but a total will surrender to Christ’s Spirit. It’s vital to hold on to that. That faith in Christ is all absorbing. Wesley used the term a recumbency on Christ; a lying back in his arms because there is nothing you can do yourself; an absolute dependence on Jesus. It is an absolute submission to him surrounding your life and being you life. There is a totality about it that’s not present in an intellectual or mental assents. So the two are very different. It does help you at times in dealing with people to see the difference. Finally it’s the Holy Spirit within that can use you to bring them further on. It is the Spirit of God needed to bring revelation that they are living the life that Christ is meant to live in them. This is an absolute slap in the face to their Maker. If they don’t see that, then they won’t make the complete surrender that is needed for God to send his Spirit into their hearts. It might help you to see that often you have many people nowadays who believe all the right things or appear to believe all the right things and make a great deal of their surrender to Christ. They believe in Christ, their Savior and they will say those words. But they themselves will not have been touched by the Holy Spirit or made alive by the Holy Spirit. Look at the statement in the Bible where Jesus says the Holy Spirit is with you and in you. We often interpret that one was the carnal Christian and other was a person filled with the Spirit (in the position of the Spirit being in them). But the truth is the Spirit being in you is the Spirit being life to you. Jesus was talking about the Spirit being with you while I am here on the earth but when I go up into heaven, I will send him to you and he will be in you. So an ordinary Christian will have the Holy Spirit dwelling in them. Now the issue is is the Holy Spirit kicked out from time to time? He will come into you and he will dwell with you and you with him. It is that issue; he dwells with you but will you dwell with him? Will you let him be the owner of the life or will he just be the consultant? That’s where the Spiritual vs. Carnal Christian comes in. Anyone who is a Christian the Holy Spirit has regenerated and made them alive inside and is in them. Therefore Jesus’ promise is fulfilled. So that, I think, is some explanation of the strange position we are in these days when so many people say yes I believe in Jesus Christ as my Savior. You can believe in him as a mental exercise and a mental assent but will you let him run your life. That’s too often thought of as the extra that comes when you are filled with the Spirit. But in fact to be born of God you can only be born of God if the Holy Spirit has regenerated you because you have submitted your will to Christ. I suppose that’s why I bring it to you again and again of the importance of Jesus being in us and of him living our lives and us doing what he wants. Is that clear? Always feel free to ask questions, I’m always ready to answer any. Irene asks: Don’t you think it is confusing when people say I am a Christian, I am born of God but I am not in the sanctification thing. So they aren’t willing to go further in faith with the Holy Spirit. They have gone up to a certain point with their wills and then no further because of their wills. So I think there is some kind of confusion there. Pastor: “Blessed are they who hunger and thirst after righteousness for they shall be filled.” [Matthew 5:6] John Wesley would say, have you a clean heart or are you going on to sanctification or a clean heart. Are you hungering for it? What you are saying is settle down; this is the level of commitment I want to make. Irene: I have gone to the point of justification but I don’t want to go that far. So you can’t actually do that. When someone asks are you going on to sanctification and if you are not, where are you going? I remember that quotation, “The love of God is shed abroad in the heart.” The Spirit in us is crying ‘Abba, Father.’ Pastor: Well, we need to be real with God. Let us pray. Dear Lord, we know that it is too easy for us to water down your truth and not live in it ourselves. So we would bow before you this morning. Lord Jesus, we would look into your face and listen for your voice so that if there is any way we are not living the way you want to live in us, we would see that and bow our wills to you. We would begin to let you do whatever you want in whatever area of our lives that is. We know, Lord Jesus, that all will be saved if all is submitted to you. All will be touched with your beauty if all is given to you. Lord, we would give our lives anew to you today so that we may have faith in you and love to all the brethren. We thank you, Lord Jesus, that your life in us is a whole. We thank you that if there is a lack of love in any way in our hearts then you yourself will pour that into us if we are willing to remove our resistance to it. So, Lord Jesus, we would trust you to give us light so that we may see clearly and surrender our lives completely to you for you to do what you want with. Now the grace of our Lord Jesus, the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with each one of us now and evermore. Amen.

Do You Love Your Brethren? Colossians 1:4C Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill There is still an important part that I didn’t expound properly in the last verse we spoke about. I hope you’ll be patient with me. I’d like to share with you what I wakened up with this morning. It’s the verse which says, “If my people who are called in my name humble themselves and pray and seek my face; turn from their wicked ways; then I will hear from heaven and forgive their sin and heal their land.” [2 Chronicles 7:14] I was thinking what can we do in this wasteland which we find ourselves in the present society. This society which seems to have forgotten the bit of religion they did seem to be practicing in many of the churches. What can we do in regard to revival? Obviously it gets kind of boring me saying, apart from anything else, pray for revival; pray for revival. What can we do? This seems to be the guideline with this verse of what we ourselves can do to enable God or to open the way or to fulfill the conditions that God requires in order for him to bring an enlivening Spirit into our society. That’s obviously what we need; we need a hunger in men’s and women’s hearts for God; a revelation; a light of the purposeless life that we are now moving into. People are killing themselves because there is no reason for living. People are bewildered not just the older ones who are coming to the end of life but even the younger ones now are drugging themselves to death. So it’s a serious situation and we badly, badly need the only one who can change the heart of the society — that is our Father. He is saying to us if my people, you are my people, if my people who are called by my name humble themselves and pray and seek my face, then I will hear from heaven and forgive their sins and heal their land. It behoves us to see in what way can I humble myself before God. What way can I seek his face? What way can I pray? What way can I turn from my wicked ways so that he will answer me? That’s what I started to do myself. It will tie up with the previous verse. I don’t have to look too far; I think you all know how many excuses we can put up before us individually and one another. We put up with it. I have all kind of things to do; I am doing business at this time; I’m doing theology or religion at this time. You can only do so much for so many years. I have kept a place of chaos. I’m sorry for the wife because she comes in to the office and my desk is continually strewn with stuff; yes, I know where everything is. It seems to me that is not the best. I can see some wicked ways I have been a long time turning from and I need to now turn from. I do think there are things like that. There are practical things that are wicked ways. I’m just talking about myself. You have to talk about yourself. There are certainly ways which are wicked? Yeah, I suppose you don’t call them wicked but really I think they are wicked as any other ways. They are not God’s best for us. It seems very important that we turn from them and they are practical things. I thought of one that has occurred to me several times over the years. It came to me when I realized I hadn’t expounded the second part of that verse. [ Colossians 1:3 ] ” We always thank God the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you, because we have heard of your faith in Christ Jesus.” We dealt previously with ‘faith in Christ Jesus.’ That has sunk into a speculative, rational thing as Wesley has said it isn’t. “Faith is not just a speculative, rational thing; a cold lifeless assent; a train of ideas in the head.” We talked about how it has sunk into that. Many people believe faith in Christ Jesus is believing Jesus died for your sins so yippee you are free from your sins. They give assent to that intellectual concept. It is the famous substitutionary three of the atonement which we have always defended strongly in evangelicalism as the heart of the gospel. It isn’t the heart of the gospel at all. It’s often been an excuse for people to say I believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. But of course it is not IN the Lord Jesus Christ; the Lord Jesus Christ is not in me. I do believe in his death for me and I do believe he has saved me from my sins and enabled me to get to heaven. He is not in me. No fear — it’s my life and I live it. Christ lives in me? No, no I live. Most Christians live in that concept. They don’t believe the Lord Jesus Christ is in them. They don’t believe they are in the Lord Jesus Christ. There is no connection between their belief and their outward life. Indeed their outward life is not affected by Jesus. So therefore a lack of the Lord Jesus Christ in their life. We talked about that last day. No, no I don’t need deep insight, I just need to remember the dishes need to be in the dishwasher. If I don’t put them in, someone else will put them in. It comes home very clearly to me — have I love for all the saints? — Yeah, for everyone but the one who has to put the dishes in the dishwasher. It becomes very personal here at home and lots of subtler ways than what I have described. That’s an obvious one I can see. I don’t want to canonize the girl here, Peg, but it can click in your mind, oh, Peggy can do that or somebody else will do that. Love for all the saints takes on a real, practical meaning when we are living together like this. I thought you almost have to say, “No, Jesus, you don’t have to pick those up. [pounding on his chest] Leave them — somebody else will get them.” You have to pause for a minute — is that what he is really thinking? — is that what he thinks? You dare not ask yourself that question because you know he isn’t thinking that. It seems to me it gets down to that kind of thing. It’s the same thing as you and I saw in each other’s eyes last night when I had a go at this lady. I may have misinterpreted this lady but I don’t think I did. I think you knew by the tone of voice, or the wrong comment at the wrong time can break that bond. You and I know it pretty well when it happened again last night. So I think it takes on very fine things; it takes on the obvious things like not putting dishes in the right place or not cleaning the drip on the carpet when you see this is my home and I should do that. That’s an obvious one. I think there are many subtler ways, many of which you and I have solved between us that refer to tone of voice, or when we speak facetiously to the other person, or, we speak a little too quickly or, we assume an authority or right that is not ours. There are many things like that that concern loving the saints. We are either by his love building one another up or making the day a little heavier. Keil Delitzsch is wonderful with his Hebrew. This morning he was dealing with the words that David’s enemies were using against him in a certain situation. He expounded the verses that made it very clear to me of words being arrows going into another person which hurt them deeply. I can see often my ‘arrows’ do that to you and you all bear it very kindly and graciously. I can see how words can be arrows that dig into you. However used to them you may get, I’m trying to correct you in a certain way and it turns out to be sarcastic — harsh, cutting and caustic way. There are many things like that that concern our love for each other and the love of the saints. I can see how Jesus within us — that’s always the question — why Lord don’t you bring revival? Because you won’t turn from your wicked ways. You still have a tone of voice or an attitude towards another person that is not love. It is not love of the saints. You are still crucifying my Son within you or destroying or repressing/suppressing him. The promise is very real here. “If my people who are called in my name humble themselves and pray and seek my face; turn from their wicked ways; then I will hear from heaven and forgive their sin and heal their land.” It seems to me that’s the answer to the questions, “What can we do to open the way for God to bring revival?” Obviously it will indeed start in our own hearts as we would abide by these verses. Because it seems to me you or I or whoever it is, as you start taking this as your home, not just the home that somebody else looks after for us. God will touch us and will affect us. There are lots of little ways. I’ll say this one if I may because I think Marty was going to do it anyway. I’ll say, “Brother, it would be good to light those ornamental deer up from the deck. It will give Peggy a lift.” It expressed the love that we have for one another. She put them out there to look at and nobody has done much with them. Where as if somebody lights them and somebody feels it was worth my while doing it. That’s part of it. As we do these little things that seem so little but little things that occur to us. Mind you, sometimes we can get so used to living in our own world and not regarding that as love that it doesn’t even occur to us to do it. There is that too. We need to pray for light for our blindness because often we don’t see these things. Often we do see them; they do cross our minds but we step gently back from them. We step back from loving all the saints, particularly the ones we live with. It comes down to either I can be softening the atmosphere so that it is easier to perceive Christ or I can be hardening the atmosphere. That’s where light comes in. Often I would say to Colleen I know you have a way of speaking but the truth even if it is an unconscious way of speaking; even if my funny remark is used to correct you, it can still cut the atmosphere like a knife. It can still harden the atmosphere. It’s interesting; even in a sense, it doesn’t have to be a conscious sin or a determination to do what you know is wrong. It can be an unknowing doing of wrong. It still brings a hardness and an insensitivity to the atmosphere. That’s why God says, “Blessed are they that thirst and hunger after righteousness.” [ Matthew 5:6 ] They that want to know more; that want to understand more so they can be like Jesus. That’s part of the love for all the saints too. Not just the avoidance of hurting a person but how more can I build them up. How can I do something beautiful or something that will lighten their life or lighten their heart. I think that is all part of, you might almost say, a Spirit of revival occurs any time someone turns from a hardness that is not of God. In a sense, every time someone turns from a hardness that is not of God. Every time someone turns towards the soft, gentle heart of Jesus himself or herself, every time comes in a freshness of the water of life that is part of the beginning of revival. A revival means ‘re’ [again] and ‘viv’ [life]; life coming again. Life comes again where there was a deadness. I think it is important that we see a sense we are living ourselves in a Spirit of revival and in the aliveness and sensitivity of revival or we are living in deadness. That’s the way we can facilitate the overall revival that is needed in our society. So I thought those were some things worth mentioning to you and particularly to myself. Are there ways, Lord, where I can love all the saints more than I am doing? Of course living together like this there are a thousand, thousand ways in which we can love each other anew and afresh. Love is always creative and always a beautiful thing. I think you are aware as much as I am that we are very privileged to be able to talk about these things together. I do not know how many husbands and wives talk about these things. I do not know how many families talk about them. I have a suspicion that in these days very few do. We are very privileged to be in the position we are in that we are still alive and still aware and conscious of these things. We can still listen to each other as we talk about them and encourage each other in our most holy faith. It’s a great privilege we have. Let us pray. Dear Father, we thank you for calling us to such a practical life with so many obvious opportunities to express your heart or to see the hardness and the coarseness of our own hearts. Lord, we thank you for what we would have avoided at all costs. We would avoid living in a fish bowl. We hate the idea of somebody seeing what we are, not only our beauties but our ugliness. We see, Lord, is it a great privilege that you have given us so that we do not have to wait for a great judgement day in order to see ourselves as we really are. You allow us to do that not simply through other people telling us but through us seeing your beauty in each other. We see in each other attitudes we suddenly realize we don’t have; seeing in each other things that are attractive and remind us of you and things we know you want us to have. Lord, we thank you for the saints you have given us to live with. We thank you for all the blessings that come through their lives. We thank you, Lord Jesus, that there is only one source that they come from and that is you. There is none good but God and no one pure and true but you. You have given us the opportunity to carry you around and to allow you to live and express yourself to our faces, hands and voices. Lord, we thank you. Now may the grace of our Lord Jesus, the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with each one of us today, tomorrow and evermore. Amen.

Rejoice for the Hope of a Heavenly Home Colossians 1:5a Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill Today’s verse is Colossians 1:5. I think I have attempted to tackle it but I am still working on it. You remember Paul, in verses 3-5, has said we always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you, because we have heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love which you have for all the saint, because of the hope laid up for you in heaven. Of this you have heard before in the word of the truth, the gospel. So he is thanking God for them because of the hope laid up for you in heaven. Of this you have heard before in the word of the truth, the gospel. Because of the hope laid up for you in heaven. One of the commentators says it isn’t the hope in your heart; it isn’t that that he is praying about. You should have faith, hope and love. There should be hope in your heart but that is not the hope he is talking about here. He is talking about a hope, not in your heart, but laid up in heaven for you. It must have been allot of verses back when I came across hope [Romans]. I thought the poor guy or child, he hoped against hope — was that Abraham — hoped against hope for a child. I think of that we human beings have of hope. We have some hope, oh, yeah, we are hopeful. It may not rain today, we hope so. It’s kind of a last hope. That’s really in the back of our minds as human beings; there is some hope for that. Of course this is absolutely different. Hope in the New Testament is absolutely different. It is a sure thing. It is something that is going to happen. It’s something that you know is going to happen. It’s like you are on your way to New York and you know you are going to get to New York. So you have a hope of getting to New York — it’s a certainty of getting to New York. It’s hope in the sense that it is future. It’s not hope in the sense I wonder if that will happen. It’s an absolute certainty it will happen. That’s what hope is here in this verse. It’s hope that is certain and sure; you have no doubt about. It is not something you hope might happen. You who aren’t miserable Methodists will fully understand me when I talk about Arminianism. Some of us would know about it. Arminianism mean salvation depends on your own efforts too. Of course that is true and Wesley used it amongst the poor and outcast people he ministered to. Probably more appropriate would be his emphasis on your life (outward actions) is a picture of your faith (inner actions). You have to will yourself to do and in that sense it is Arminian. As an Arminian, I’m always very reluctant to praise Calvin [John Calvin, Theologian, 1509-1564], but he is a dear guy and a great man. He is extreme in his negative view of predestination but very strong on his positive. Calvin said, “Hope is the constancy of faith.” The commentator I was ready said this is pretty much it. Of course it struck me as right. Hope is the constancy of faith. In other words, faith in the thing that’s going to happen in the future — it’s undoubtedly going to happen — you have absolute faith that it is going to happen. So in the New Testament sense, hope laid up for you in heaven here is sure — it’s a cert — it’s a sure thing. It helped me when I saw the European probe. Of course the Americans were startled by it. Can any good thing come out of Europe they thought? They were set back a little on their heels. We didn’t say it but all the television coverage showed surprise in America that the Europeans pulled it off. To me it was the beginning of the space age, more than all the other stuff, more than the space shots. I thought that over the period of 10 years, we travelled through space and we got somewhere over 500 million miles away. It was tremendous. We were out there in space for 10 years. We got to where we wanted to be and the thing was flying itself through thousands of miles an hour and we lit on the top of it. It was a magnificent achievement. For me, it made space smaller. It made it more manageable or it brought home to me this is all there and we are part of all this massive space. We are aware that beyond that there is millions and millions of miles beyond with more and more solar systems. Of course the theory is that it is expanding all the time. Whether it is or not, it is big enough as it is. Suddenly I realized we are part of that. Then I thought it may not be fountains and gold pavements; it may not be harps and streets of gold; it may be something different. For me, it meant our Father must have alot of plans for us. He must have. Otherwise, why have all that space out there. Even if it is spiritual space and not physical space, it’s alot. Our Father must have alot of plans. He must have with all the space out there. Space that wants to rule and fill with himself as he wants to do with this world. The hope thing for me seems very real. He has a hope laid up for us in heaven. He has a whole life for us that is way beyond anything that we have touched. I began to sense this is something to look forward to — not just to see Dad and Mom and all the loved ones we had — it is a life far bigger than this one. We will have all kinds of things to do and all kinds of responsibilities; new lives filled with new activities with fuller satisfaction than we have ever dreamed of. For me, it took on a much more concrete idea of heaven. I just thought this is great. I think you know what it is to look forward to something — something that fills you with anticipation and you’re really looking forward to it — sometimes a vacation does but there are other things. That’s what I felt. This is something we have to look forward to. It’s going to be something great — far better than this present world — it’s going to be better than the life we have at present. It’s going to be all the things we feel now; we’ll feel much more of. It is going to be wonderful. It’s something undoubtedly to look forward to. I never felt death was something to be afraid of anyway but I couldn’t see beyond it too much. Now I think it is wonderful — heaven is a hope that God has laid up for us and has prepared for us for. That’s where it came home to me — why on earth did he make us? Why did he make us? If he has all this space out there and all these planets, why did he make us? That’s what brought me back to the verse all things work together for good. [ Romans 8:28] It’s undoubtedly the biggest general statement that’s made of the purpose of the world. It’s one of the best that explains what is happening to us. “All things work together for good to them who love God.” The good is the next verse here in Romans, “that they may be conformed to the image of his Son.” [verse 29] Of course for me it jumped on to the next conclusion which follows from that. Why conform us to the image of his Son? Undoubtedly he made us in his own image so that he could love us the way he loves his Son and we could enjoy the very best that he has. The very best he has is love for his Son and his Son’s love for him. He wanted the very best for us. He made us in his image so that we could enjoy what he and his Son enjoy. That’s why he made us in his Son, so that we could have his Son’s image. We have a mind like his Son, a will like his Son, feelings like his Son, all those things. We could be like his Son and we could really enjoy their love. That’s why he put us here. The only thing he could not give us what his Son alone was able to exercise for us. His Son was able to exercise will and that’s what made love possible. All of us in this room know that. You can’t love if you have the will. You can copy; you can be dictated to. You can be domineered and dominated but you cannot love unless you are free not to love. Unless you are free to choose to love or not to love. So, he could not and would not make us with his Son’s will. He could only make us in his Son’s image and give us a will. He gave us the ability to choose or not to choose. But then that was up to us. He did make us in his own image so we could enjoy him and so we could be fully part of him but he did say, “if you want.” I did not want robots; I don’t want people who do what they cannot do otherwise. I want you to love me as I love you. So he did give us free will. That came home to me that he put us here, made us like himself so that we are free to love him but we have to choose to do it. I think I’ve shared this a little with you before. How on earth is he going to bring that about? All I saw clearly was that’s why he let us do what we have done to this world. that’s why he let it go bad so that we would see plainly what life without him was like. So that we would see we can love him or we can be like this. We have the freedom to choose one or the other. That’s why he made us and put us in this place. I don’t know if you have really, really seen the lengths to which he is willing to go. The best picture I know that I have created in my own mind is Christ on the cross and then beating him or sticking swords into his side or spitting at him and him saying I will bear this until you stop. I think that’s it. I know it sounds ridiculous. I think that’s it. I have here the verses that Jesus speaks when he talks about the worm dieth not. It’s in the section where it says it’s better to be without a hand. It’s some of the few verses where Jesus mentioned hell. [ Mark 9:43-48 ] Every theologian and Christian has to reconcile that Jesus used those words. I do have to say to you there has to be such a theological theory as accommodation. It can be explained to you by this: “Did you see the sun rise today?” That’s accommodation. I’m accommodating my saying to your understanding. But you know the sun didn’t rise today. You know the earth turned round. But you would think it silly for me to say, “Did you see the earth turn round today?” Even though that is literally the truth. That is called accommodation. So you can say that or one is forced to say that. You have to be very careful with it. You can’t do that with the normal evangelical because he insists you not only believe in hell but you believe in burning brimstone. You are foolish if you get into an entanglement with that. But if you step back from that and you are reading Jesus’ words undoubtedly it does have that feel for it. For one thing, it’s a bit casual. It’s better to get rid of a hand that is sinful than have two hands to throw into the hell fire. It’s a little toss, well, it’s a little like that. So it is possible Jesus is not saying people will burn in fire or hell. It seems the attitude of his life and his Father’s heart to us is the opposite. It seems the Father and Son are saying to us, “We will bear with you until you bear with us. We will accept what you do until you stop doing it. I will let you have your way until you start letting me have my way.” That’s the best I know with someone who allows his servants to say, “The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases.” [Lamentations 3:22 ] I think that’s the verse that made me sit up and listen as well as I could to God’s attitude to us. It seems to me his steadfast love never ceases. Never is never. It does mean that he is willing to wait and to wait and to wait and to suffer and to endure. His steadfast love never ceases. I don’t know if that’s what mansions mean. I don’t know if that is what Jesus means when he said in my Father’s house are many mansions. I don’t know if that’s what he means when he says I have sheep of another fold. I don’t know. But I can see that it is certainly possible that God keeps at us for as long as he needs. I agree I don’t think there will be any fornicators in heaven. Jesus said that. I don’t think there will people who oppose his Father’s will in heaven. I think that’s right. But whether God will give us another chance, maybe many more chances, I don’t know. Certainly you have to reconcile the statement: The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases. You have to reconcile that statement with the others that say after this life that’s it and yet take into consideration that God is eternally patient and has one desire above all others that is we would be conformed to the image of his Son and would share his love with him. I don’t think it takes anything away from the ole purgatory idea which has the same idea. Purgatory is a place where you are purified. Undoubtedly that’s what I’m saying in a roundabout way. That God will give us other chances. So it seems the best attitude we can take is that it is not given to anyone what happens there. In fact, there is strong words where Jesus says the Father judges no one but has entrusted all judgement to the Son. We are not in a position to judge. I think there is hope, maybe that’s it. There is hope; maybe it is not our place to decide whether our brothers or sisters go where they go. Maybe it is our Father’s loving heart. That seems to me to have something of his tenderness. One has to go gently at it. Undoubtedly God has made us so we can share his love, the love that he has for his Son. Therefore we can be together and enter into a whole wonderful world that he has laid up for us in heaven. We all know time is just a game and eternity is a forever now. Of course that exists at this moment. It is all around us. Sometimes I think they are sitting on our shoulders. It’s all around us. We have wonderful discussions the two of us. Irene was asking what the incentive for evangelism is. Of course, for me it purifies the incentive for evangelism because it’s no longer I’m doing this to save people but it is my Father that loves them, yearns for them, yearns for the creature his hands have made and misses them every moment and wants them in his own arms. Of course that is the greatest incentive for evangelism. That our loving Father who has given everything for us is missing this person and will miss them. Why wasn’t he happy with all the sheep, he had a whole fold of sheep? Why bother with that little sheep that is lost? The same attitude with the other parables where he talks about the lady with the lost coin. Obviously the Father’s heart misses what his heart yearns for. Of course that’s really why we want anybody to know about our Father and isn’t that the greatest reason? Do you know what he is really like? Isn’t that the tragedy? They think the fellow will throw you into hell if you don’t like him. Our dear Lord must weep and yearn for men and women who know his heart and will care about his heart. We are here to share with Britain or America God’s heart; to express his heart because we think when they see him as he is and yield their will to him, they’ll love him as we do. Let us pray. Dear Lord, we thank you for your kindness to us and your patience with us as we blunder our way into understanding you. We apologize, Lord, if we make errors or if we inadequately express your love to each other. we ask for your forgiveness and for your light so that we may speak truly and live truly. Now we pray, our Father, for all our relatives, friends and associates in business that they would do what we want them to do but that they would begin to glimpse what kind of person you are; that they would catch sight of your heart and that through us they would catch some of your tenderness and your mercy. We pray, Lord, that you would do that with us through these coming days. Then we do thank you, Father, for the hope that is laid up for us in heaven. We thank you for the part that we have to look forward to; for the Lamb’s wedding supper that will be our continual life. We thank you, Father, that we of all people have good hopes. We have the best hopes and we have everything to live for not only in this present life but in the real life that begins. Lord, we thank you for your goodness to us and for your grace in Jesus’ name. Amen.

God Yearns and Hopes for Us Colossians 1:5b Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill It’s probably a foretaste of some light God has given me. Matthew 25:31-45, “When the Son of man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, then he will sit on his glorious throne. Before him will be gathered all the nations, and he will separate them one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats, and he will place the sheep at his right hand, but the goats at the left. Then the King will say to those at his right hand, ‘Come, O blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world; for I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, I was naked and you clothed me, I was sick and you visited me, I was in prison and you came to me.’ Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see thee hungry and feed thee, or thirsty and give thee drink? And when did we see thee a stranger and welcome thee, or naked and clothe thee? And when did we see thee sick or in prison and visit thee?’ And the King will answer them, ‘Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brethren, you did it to me.’ Then he will say to those at his left hand, ‘Depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels; for I was hungry and you gave me no food, I was thirsty and you gave me no drink, I was a stranger and you did not welcome me, naked and you did not clothe me, sick and in prison and you did not visit me.’ Then they also will answer, ‘Lord, when did we see thee hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison, and did not minister to thee?’ Then he will answer them, ‘Truly, I say to you, as you did it not to one of the least of these, you did it not to me.’ And they will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.” The wise thing is to follow intelligently the sequence here even though now we should go into another hymn. I’m surprised I didn’t mention this verse when we were talking about the possibility of God having arrangements for us after this life is over to go further into experiences to make us like Jesus. Maybe there are still questions like that but certainly this chapter is definite and clear that God will make a distinction between those that love him and those who don’t love him. He states it very clearly here, whether we like it or not, that some will go away into eternal punishment. You do have to look at that and see that it is there. If you’ll forgive me from plunging right into the sermon, I would say the reason for saying anything here is I brought up to us all Lamentations 3:22, “The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; his mercies never come to an end, they are new every morning. Great is thy faithfulness.” You remember I said to you it seems to state very clearly that God’s love NEVER ceases; his steadfast love NEVER ceases. I took it further in a way; I said he keeps on loving us forever and it never ceases. So his purpose is that we all should be conformed to his Son’s image and that we should live with him forever and enjoy his love forever. It seems to me if his steadfast love never ceases, then surely that means somehow God will have some way of bringing us all into an oneness with Jesus. Of course I made the point, as far as I could see God used this present life to show us in what way we are not like Christ and in what way we are not letting him live in us and it might be he would give us future lives like that. I began to think of something that touches all of us. For me it is my brother who did not appear to know Jesus and did not respect him in that way. Of course you all have relatives in the same way. As I said that I also shared that what we were involved in is expounding Colossians 1:5. “Because of the hope laid up for you in heaven.” That’s what we were expounding last week. What we are doing now is looking at part B of that verse. “Of this you have heard before in the word of the truth, the gospel.” I thought “the word of the truth, the gospel” — that’s the heart of everything; that’s the knowledge of anything we have of God. That is what we have to expound this week. It is very important that I am expounding the word of the truth and not maybe wishful thinking of my own. That’s why I am back on this verse in Lamentations 3:22-23, “The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is thy faithfulness.” I was saying it is very plain — NEVER ceases. I think you assumed with me that if his love never ceases, he can always bring about what he wants to do. I think we all left the meeting last Sunday with a general understanding that that could be so. I’d like to pay tribute to all of you for your trust and love of me and your praying for me. Not by any means but by letting Jesus show us all. I would like to say for the benefit of those dear guys who might be alive if I’m not here, it is very good for us to have our faith in God’s creation of his Body and trust he has a set up here that will be self corrective through the Holy Spirit — IF we will continue to trust each other and respect each other — which is what you all did with me last Sunday. Thank you for that, because it allows God to work in me and you. That’s where I think we left it last Sunday. Afterwards, Peg and I shared a little. She actually expressed something that I felt too. She said you know that would be great because in some way there is a bleakness in Christians about death. That is exactly right. Often we know heaven is there and because we are thinking of our unsaved friends and relatives or why. Often there is a bleakness, not a happiness. I agree with you. Then I thought to myself even if these loved ones are not in heaven yet we know we are going to heaven, so there ought to be a brightness about that. I did notice part of what I shared last Sunday was the interest and excitement about the European probe and suddenly realized the size of the universe. It came home to me as I thought of that how God must have a lot of things for us to do. There must be a whole new life out there. So it is important for us to hold on to that truth, whatever we talk about today with our unsaved brothers and sisters. There’s no doubt that God has prepared for us a wonderful life or series of lives in a huge universe. But I think that’s where we left it last week, that that is the situation. Was I happy? I’m never very happy when my wife has unhappiness about a thing like my emotionalism. As I am myself, not very happy about it. I’m not very happy that my feeling was very strong and emotional in regard to the love that never ceases. I’m not saying there wasn’t any wisdom or insight in it. But it is enough to make me watch it with the emotions. There is only one place we find truth and that is with his dear Word. You have to stick with the word and that is what God has used through the years to keep me. I happened to pick this off my shelf and it is Wesley’s “Christian Perfection”. I have written in it ‘in memory of a work done 3 October 1964.’ There in a room in north Minneapolis the Holy Spirit dealt with me. Since 1964, I have been expounding this book [the Bible]. That’s always been my concern: I have to stay with this book; I have to confirm everything with this Bible. It was especially important when you went out on a limb in Campus Church and Fish Enterprises and all that stuff. It was very important as nobody else was doing it. A few churches had a version of it. So it was very important to know where we were going. It was like a pilot leading the crew with a map. It was clear that Luther [Martin Luther] was right — you are tied to the Word of God. That’s your final 95 theses. So that’s why I thought it was important to consider the teaching God has given us here. I began to think the thing through again. So I got Peg’s bleakness mentioned earlier and the probe to give me a taste of God’s vast universe. Then I thought it was important to leave God’s work to God’s work. It’s important to see that. I needed to see if all the evidence was in Scripture mentioned last Sunday, still even then I have to leave God’s work to God’s work. Leave God’s responsibility to God. A little light came when I saw: have we the ability to consider where our relatives and friends are going to spend eternity? Have we that right? God seems to have said it isn’t our right; it isn’t our concern. That’s what gave me a little pause in it. I thought I feel the same lightness about it as you do. It isn’t so bleak now somehow. Then I thought, is that because I will see them again. So I am kind of happy. Yeah, that’s great. But that isn’t quite right I thought. There is a mixture with all the attachment I had with Mom and Dad, all my relatives and friends. I am tying all my happiness at seeing them again into this business of what happens after death. It seems not right. In some way it is mixing up the consolation that God has given us with the future, where he alone is our consolation. That gave me some pause about it. Was I mixing truth about the future with something of the past that I had enjoyed? Was I someway mingling both and spoiling the purity of it? I was a little unhappy about that. With all those thoughts, I then went to this dear Bible. Of course God is so good — he knows how stupid we are. I went down to the library and found the theology section which deals with last days. This is only a hint. It isn’t the answer. I looked at “The intermediate state by some guy from years and years ago. The Intermediate State between Death and Judgement Being a Sequel to After Death”. I looked through the chapter headings and came to ‘A second probation inconsistent with Scripture’ heading. God knows how stupid I am and it couldn’t have been more plainly stated. Of course it is an old book and who knows what theology or background the guy who wrote it is coming from. It still caused me to pause. I thought thank you, Lord, for that little tap on the back. I haven’t read the chapter through but primarily he is dealing with people who have never heard the Gospel, or even babies who die in birth. He’s saying nothing happens and I would differ from him there. He was dealing with that particular issue, not the one we have been talking about. Our issue is with our relatives who have probably heard the Gospel and been responsible with this light. But this caused me to pause – “a second probation inconsistent with Scripture”. So I went to the dear Word. I think one would be in favor of looking at my whole theory that everybody will come. I’ll take you to the verses that I saw. Philippians 2:9-11, “Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.” That verse implies that every knee should bow and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. What I wasn’t really happy with was it can mean what it says: everyone will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, even if he isn’t Lord of my life, he is Lord. Obviously Jesus was God’s Son. I thought, now it can mean that. It can mean that everyone will see that Jesus is the Son of God. I don’t want to be light about it but “you blew it!” Of course, it is more than blowing it; it is serious. Can it mean that? You can think about it yourselves. I think it can mean that and I don’t think it is quite fair to swing it the other direction and say everyone is going to admit. So you might say that is still open and maybe it is. I was trying to find some words that very definitely state a person who in this life did not acknowledge Jesus or did not allow him to work in his life that they would be given another opportunity. You may ask, is it still possible? I couldn’t say to you, no, it isn’t. But this verse did not necessarily prove that. That’s just one verse. Turn to 2 Peter 3:8-9, “But do not ignore this one fact, beloved, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day. The Lord is not slow about his promise as some count slowness, but is forbearing toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance.” It’s very favorable but in fairness the words are “the Lord is not slow about his promise as some count slowness, but is forbearing toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance.” In fairness, it is saying that God doesn’t want anybody to perish. He wants everybody to reach repentance. But I don’t know if that is the same as God wishes that and therefore he brings it about. Because he says, “Jerusalem, Jerusalem, how often would I have gathered you as a hen gathers her chickens but you would not.” Which implies one word from us can frustrate God’s wishes. Now if you say to me, can it be interpreted the other way? Maybe you can. What I am trying to do is make sure I don’t mislead you or set you off on a path that may be wrong. So I think you would be the same as me. If you are responsible for other people’s lives, you don’t want to run them close to death. You want to keep them well away from death. I feel in my present situation I have to point that out to you. Undoubtedly that verse points to the other verse — the steadfast love of the Lord never ceases. [Lamentations 3:22] God is never glad when anyone misses the way he has set for them. Indeed he yearns for them — he yearns for the creature his hands have made. That was the great thrust that came to me from the steadfast love verse. God loves us; he wants us to become like himself so he must keep on and keep wanting that for us until it comes about. But, of course, God is the one who gave us free will. He is the one who gave us the right to say “no” to him. What we are engaged in saying is once we have said no — you have to admit that all of us have lots of opportunities in this life and our relatives too — it does seem that God does take no for an answer. There you have to think that through yourself. As somebody who is responsible as a watchman of Israel, I can’t afford to run you close. I can’t afford to say, oh well, maybe that is so. I think each of us has to find out and come to a place of peace for ourselves. That’s the second verse. There is one more. Romans 11:32, “For God has consigned all men to disobedience, that he may have mercy upon all.” What he is talking about is the Jewish nation and its relationship with the Gentiles. The whole doctrine that the whole Jewish nation has been saved, then the rest of the Gentiles will come in. That’s what he means when he says God consigning all men to disobedience — all the world is in rebellion against him. With the exception that he has chosen Israel. All are committed to disobedience; he chooses Israel and then brings Israel in and after that brings in all the Gentiles. That’s what he is referring to there. That he may have mercy upon all. I think you can interpret the “all” as the Gentiles, not just the Jews. He commits Jews and Gentiles to disobedience so that he may eventually bring all; that is, the Jews and the Gentiles who accept him. It is not saying all the Gentiles will come in. It’s just saying that the Gentiles will be given the Gospel as well as the Jews. You do need to think through those. But the verses are there. Those are the three verses that I saw. There are a few in the Old Testament that talk about all the nations. Those are talking more about everybody seeing what the Jews have seen — God is real — not necessarily accepting him. If you ask me what do you think now, I think we need to stand firmly where we have been all through our lives in regard to this issue. But I think we have to obey God where he says no one knows the time and God himself does not judge; he commits all judgement to the Son. The verse states clearly that God has limited this to his Son and nobody else is in a position to discuss it or talk about it, or to try to determine what will be done on the Judgement Day. That’s why I read Matthew 25 because it is pretty clear there what Jesus is doing. I think the import of Scripture is — this might be annoying — it’s not your business. In fairness to Peg, it was good for me to see, is my delight and joy as I think of the next life primarily connected to the wonder of the size of God’s universe and how much he has for us to do? Or, is it primarily relief that I can leave my brother; he is OK. However unpleasant it is, I have to be straight with myself about that. I have to be clear, where is my peace and satisfaction coming from? Is it what God has arranged for my life and others who love him or is it in the fact that those I loved and still love in a sense will have another opportunity? Are you asking me if I’m closing the door? You know I can’t close the door. It is you that has to see the way through for yourself. Because each of us will give account to Jesus on the last day. Each of us will have to settle things with God the Father. If you say to me what do you think, I’m not sure. I think the safest thing is the way we always thought it. That’s the safest. I certainly agree with all that we said last Sunday — that our Father loves far, far more than we do. Maybe that is the right place. They are in our Father’s hands and can I trust our Father with my brother or parent. Can I trust him? Is He where all my trust is or, is part of my trust in my own judgement about things? You might say and have seen some people use the Bible in a fleshly way. You can use the words in the Bible in a fleshly way. We have a friend who we think does this. She says we know where we are going. It seems to us not the attitude that Jesus had for Mary Magdalene that even though she was so wrong and different from him, you felt he was close to her. So you can use Scripture in a fleshly way and that you are responsible for. OK, I’ll keep quiet now. Irene: It seems to me there is encouragement for praying for them while they are alive and not that they will make a decision for the Lord which is so shallow but that the Holy Spirit, who is always working with them, and responds to your prayers and is always trying to bring them to see it is me or nothing and we do not say anything. Whereas a lot of Christian work seems to be if I just talk to my sister about the right way or show her the right thing, or send her the right sermon, then she will make a decision. Whereas trusting on the Holy Spirit’s work in them and allowing him to show you how to walk by faith and be available if they need you for whatever. Faith is believing that ‘his mercies endure forever.’ Marty: It seems, Pastor, that we can be in obedience for whatever that person might need whether it is sending a sermon, or just pray. Then God is the judge and we cannot know and we can have the expectation that they are in heaven because they have made a last minute conversion which we aren’t aware of until we see them in heaven. Or God who is the judge was so faithful in giving them every chance, his mercy did go on and he respected their free will and they still decided not to. So we can go into heaven knowing God is a faithful Father and he did everything supernaturally possible to bring them in. Perhaps the joy of being with him will take away the sorrow of not seeing them again because his sorrow is so much greater than ours. Sorrow and love flow mingled down. It is a mystery why the sorrow is overrun by the great joy. We know it will be a place of joy. Pastor: You did well to finish the sermon because I wanted to say what you said a moment ago. Karl Barth has a saying that goes somewhat like this – “who knows whether they have turned at the edge of the abyss?” That was the thing that came to me — finally only two people know: Jesus and them themselves. We cannot determine they have refused just by what they have said in this life. Irene: There was an old, old movie with James Cagney where he played a dreadful, murderous gangster who has even killed his own mother. [Angels with Dirty Faces by Michael Curtiz] In it he somewhat befriended this priest — I think this took place in Brooklyn — who always went to talk with him in jail and pray for him. At the final shoot out, where he is collapsing and where he says ‘Mother of God’ it must have been a wise director who flashed to the priest’s face at the same time and then it went blank. One never knew whether he had made it but it made a definite impression on your mind. Right up to the edge of death, he could make a decision. Pastor: You do feel a little uneasy in your mind when you start thinking where the person is because you feel you can’t touch this. You don’t know and it’s not your right anyway. It’s a private thing between them and God. You do feel, I’m on holy ground here and I probably shouldn’t be on it. Irene: Even people who have come up to you after sermons and said, “That was great. I really saw when you said such and such.” I’m listening to them and I’m thinking, I didn’t hear that. Even you have said afterwards that you didn’t think you said that. It’s revelation from the Holy Spirit to them for their conscience, their problems and questions they have had. Pastor: It certainly feels, that’s such a bad word to use, but you have used it for our spirits as well. We sense there is something more right in leaving it in God’s hands, then a simple cutting of it up into satisfactory bits. Peg: It’s like a screen on the edge of the Tree of Knowledge. Death, we are uncomfortable about it. We have to come to a place finally where we say it. It’s so funny how things stick out at you, but one thing when I went to Bill’s funeral last week. The fellow who spoke said, “He never got hooked.” If something came up to him, he would say that’s not my business. That phrase has come back to me over and over again. There are so many things where it is not our business. There’s a reason why God has hidden things from us. There are probably thousands of reasons why. It could be our downfall and trip us up and take us away from grace. I don’t know. Pastor: That’s right – what you are saying came true. There can be a false reassurance here that makes us walk less free and less joyful, and certainly less dependent on him than you otherwise would be. There can be a false comfort we recreate for ourselves that actually substitutes for the real comfort that comes from God himself. Peg: I do think the verses in Lamentations are very real and reassuring. They aren’t dependant on our judgement but are dependent on his love. Pastor: You feel that when in the Old Testament in Psalm 136 where it is repeated over and over, “His steadfast love endures forever.” It mentions all the things they go through and all the times they have rebelled against him. His steadfast love endures forever. Colleen: Two thoughts: one was in that verse in Lamentations. I was thinking about my brother’s son, Alex. He grew up in a Christian home but he rejected his family for a horrible world. I was talking to Tom and you can’t compare but I believe Tom will love him and so Alex dies to him. It’s a pain and sorrow for him but it gave me a little light on there is a God who loves us unconditionally right to the end. God respects our free will. If we don’t respond to his love, it is of our choosing. Secondly as I finished Matthew 13, the whole chapter deals in parables. It coincides with what you shared in Matthew 25. The kingdom of heaven will be populated by the weak. Then the parables which mention the good seed and the bad seed side by side, the good fish and the bad fish. The second to the last parable caught me. The kingdom of heaven is like a net which you throw into the sea to catch fish of every kind. I was reading a book which was very helpful by an author who spent a long time translating and studying the parables. The ones who throw the nets are fishers of men. Our role is to throw that net but we can’t tell what fish are going to enter that net. He goes on to say in the end it is the angels who get the right to separate the good from the bad. Finally the judgement of Jesus will come. Our place is to keep putting the net out and catching those we can because we know that churches, even Campus Church, have a real mixture of Christians and non Christians. But there was the possibility of hope and life from the Holy Spirit. It’s been helpful for me to keep casting that net in whatever way that might be. As Marty shared however God leads us to pray, speak, send to people we come in contact with. Pastor: It gets back to what you said: trusting his steadfast love. Does he love them more than we do? You get in a very dangerous position if you say to yourself he doesn’t. Obviously they are in safer hands, his hands, than they are in our hands. In a sense, it is a way of self-deification to think otherwise. We know best. Probably that’s what God gets at us in a discussion such as we have had or thoughts we have had along these lines. He is gently saying to us, now wait a minute, that’s my job; that’s not your job. Colleen: Another author helped me in some of the things we were talking about. He said the process of prayer goes like this: The Father wills something, we as his children through the Holy Spirit puts it on our hearts, then the Holy Spirit rises up in prayer in us. We pray it back up to the throne of God through Jesus from whence the thought came from. You mentioned it several weeks ago that the Father wants to work but he isn’t going to without us. Therefore, he puts on our hearts different people to pray for, joining the Holy Spirit and Jesus, for the things God wants for them. That allows God to be released to work in that person’s life. Pastor: You can see that it is part of the free will plan. He has committed himself to doing nothing by fiat. He has to have somebody on the earth who is praying and that someone is Jesus himself praying through us. Christ has to get one of us to express that prayer otherwise it gets God using us as robots. Colleen: That made me realize how powerful we could be even in this horrible national crisis. He puts things on our hearts – every one of us – and we have a great power now to protect our world through our prayers. Pastor: That’s why it is important for us to be empty of ourselves and filled with him so that it is his life within us. Well, what I thought is it is something to be thankful for that God has given us each other and put us in this relationship so that he can work among us like this. It is a great privilege we have. It’s beyond words because we all know churches that will allow the preacher to preach what they let him preach in a way. The person who speaks God’s word can only speak what the hearers will listen to. So it is very much a twofold ministry that God has called us into. I’m saying that too for the benefit of the dear hearts who will do what I am doing if I ever go, which I have no intention of doing. It will encourage them to see that God will be faithful to us all whoever is here. He’ll be faithful to us and it will work miraculously. What did you say the Scottish think? Robbie Burns says in one of his poems, “The best laid schemes of mice and men go often awry.” So maybe my plan of outliving you all will not work. Let us pray. Dear Father, we thank you for your great kindness to us and your provision for us. We thank you you’d know a thing before it is done; you know a word before it is on my lips. We thank you for your goodness. We thank you we can rest in your arms that are underneath us and that assures us we are safe and secure. We thank you for your guidance in this dear Word of yours. We thank you for it and we thank you for the humility you graciously give us through your Son, Jesus, our Savior, so that we would bow down to you and to what you have said in your word. Now we pray, Lord, for the dear hearts we know on this earth. We pray that you will move in their lives and give them revelation and light so that they may respond to your steadfast love that never ends — that never ceases. Lord, we thank you. Now the grace of our Lord Jesus, the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with each one of us now and evermore. Amen.

Is There Salvation After Death? Colossians 1:5c Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill Please turn to Colossians 1:3 in your Bibles. “We always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you, because we have heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love which you have for all the saints, because of the hope laid up for you in heaven. Of this you have heard before in the word of the truth, the gospel.” That’s it there: “because of the hope laid up for you in heaven.” That’s about as much as we can do today. It looks as if “we always thank God because we have heard of your faith because of the hope laid up for you in heaven.” It looks like that because of how the English grammar runs. It’s the hope laid up for you in heaven. I don’t know where I got it from — was it Abraham hoping against hope? Abraham hopes against hope that he would have a son. I don’t know if I got it from that or the ordinary use of hope — I hope — well, I hope. I’ m not sure but I’m hoping — hoping for the best. I think that’s where I caught it from. Hoping for the best. Even when the Bible says in Corinthians [I Corinthians 13:13] “faith, hope, charity”, I still felt hope is something you hope may happen but you are not really sure of it. Probably the whole idea of the last hope seemed to cling to it in my own mind. Hope was something you weren’t absolutely sure of. It was the best thing you could do in circumstances that augured worst. That was the best you could do. That was hope. It was something that you did but you weren’t terribly confident. It was the best outcome you could think of in the situation. You are right if you say you are wrong in that. I’m sure it is wrong to think that is all hope is. But that was my vague notion of hope. Even in the Bible we were hoping for something. I had no thought of Calvin’s statement, “Hope is the constancy of faith.” Sometimes we Antinominians think Calvin can say nothing. This is pretty good. The best I have seen about hope. Hope is the constancy of faith. I’m touched by it because the guy had deep understanding of God’s heart. I had no idea of that, none. I didn’t think that was hope. I thought hope was what I expressed earlier — your belief in the best outcome you could expect from the situation. Indeed it was something that comes along and delivers you from otherwise what seemed to be a hopeless situation. Of course it was utterly and absolutely wrong. It’s stated here so clearly. “I give thanks to God for you because of the hope laid up for you in heaven” — the hope laid up for you in heaven. Partly what began to open my eyes, quite reasonably in a way, was: can the Europeans do any good thing? Well, they sent up the probe. After ten years and five billion miles, it has landed on a comet! I can understand the Americans how they might do that. But the Europeans who could hardly understand each other that they could do it! It was a great achievement. It landed 3 weeks ago. They had sent this probe ten years ago. It’s been travelling for ten years and after five billion miles it has landed on the comet they had planned it to land on. The comet itself is moving. For me, it brought into reality and the presence what we knew. I know what you all know. It’s a big universe, isn’t it? How many solar systems there are? How many planets and it is still expanding? I knew that. There in my little head. But when this thing travelled for ten years and they showed us a picture five billion miles away, it hit me strongly. This universe is huge. It’s absolutely huge. For me, it made me realize, wait a minute, God must have some plans for this. He must have something far beyond another planet we might be able to spend another few years on. This is big! That’s where I started on the whole thing. I don’t feel I’m going tomorrow so I don’t think “I’m a little older than I was” makes a difference. I don’t feel I’m going anywhere fast. I think I am here for another twenty years. But for whatever reason, it makes you think, now what happens next? My what happens next isn’t tied to other planets but maybe some other locality. It is not the whole universe. That’s where the idea of hope began to become real to me. God has something far, far, far beyond what we have envisaged and what we have imagined. Of course it ties up with where we all go and what happens to us all. How long are we there? It comes into all kinds of verses. One baffling one, certainly, is Romans 14:11, “For it is written, ‘As I live, says the Lord, every knee shall bow to me, and every tongue shall give praise to God.'” It’s one of those verses that along with early verses in the Old Testament states David’s throne will last forever. This one is a plain one. Every knee shall bow to me; every tongue shall give praise to God. Of course, it tied up in my mind with other statements that implied everyone would bow to God and everyone would worship him; everyone would eventually see that he is true and real. At times I was touched by the statements that Jesus made which were very real. “In my Father’s house are many mansions, if it were not so I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you that where I am you may be also.” [John 14:2] I was always sceptical of the interpretations that maybe the Muslims and Hindus would be in some of the mansions. Because I believed strongly in the statement that Jesus made in 1 Corinthians 6:9-10, “Do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived; neither the immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor sexual perverts, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor robbers will inherit the kingdom of God.” I believed that strongly. I thought the idea of universalism [everybody will get into heaven whatever they are like] cannot be right. Certainly there were words like those talking about a lake of fire [Revelations 20:15] that implied there is a place that is different from heaven and not everybody will be in heaven. It did give me concern – wrongly — about my mother. My mother was a Christian and took communion and so forth. But I thought of others who never professed Christianity; never professed any faith and yet they were relatives of ours or people that we were close to. It was difficult to think that when they passed away. We’ve seen them here and that’s it, we won’t see them again. So those ideas have been in my mind down through the years. I thought it was very important to be true to Scripture and to hold to every indication of the truth that the adulterers, the fornicators and murderers will not be in heaven. But it was quite difficult for me to sort out what will happen to the people who were not truly Christian, or not really Christian. What would happen to people like my brother who never professed anything at anytime? It always touched it a little with melancholy. As I would meet other people, I would wonder. There were statements too from very intellectually balanced and intelligent people like Barth [Karl Barth, Swiss Reformed Theologian, 1886-1968] who said God does not destroy anything he has created. He does not destroy what he has created. I could see how precious human life was and how unique it was. We were made in his image. What would God do? Would he destroy all that? I always desire to hold on clearly and strongly to separation from universalism. I would hold to the normal interpretation of that. It did concern and trouble me. Especially meeting loved ones like you — there are many of us who have fathers and mothers who haven’t apparently walked the Orthodox, Protestant or Catholic route — aren’t avowedly Christian in their minds and others’ minds. It would create in me at least a sorrow. Then you come to these other verses like “every knee shall bow and every tongue confess.” You come to Jesus and “in my Father’s house are many mansions.” Then, of course, there is 2 Corinthians 3:18, “And we all, with unveiled faith beholding the glory of the Lord, are being changed into his likeness from one degree of glory to another; for this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit.” I always knew that verse but it gave me some light. Then there is 1 John 3:2, “Beloved, we are God’s children now; it does not yet appear what we shall be, but we know that when he appears we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is. And every one who thus hopes in him purifies himself as he is pure.” It seemed to me that there’s going to be movement and development after this life is over. There is going to be a change from glory to glory. There is going to be a seeing him as he really is so that we ourselves are changed by that light. I thought this vast universe of thousands of us is going to be destroyed because of our attitude to the gospel here. The whole universe is going to go on forever and they’re going to have no part in that at all. I had difficulty seeing that God would actually do that especially in this verse which gave me the greatest pause. I shared it with you some time ago, maybe months or years ago. It’s a powerful statement. It’s water to those of us who have done something wrong. Lamentations 3:22-23, “The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases, his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is thy faithfulness. ‘The Lord is my portion,’ says my soul, ‘therefore I will hope in him.;” I have dealt with the steadfast love because I felt it expresses God’s continued mercy to people like ourselves. As an English teacher I had trouble with ‘never’ because that implies more than just his present patience with me or with others. It is never. Of course the verb you can’t get rid of is — ceases; never ceases. His mercies never come to an end. More as I saw the size of the universe, it ‘jumped’ me out of my previous attitude. It kind of shocked me into beginning to see some of these verses that imply God is far, far greater than us and has far more patience than we have. He has far greater love than we have and has far more planned for his universe than the little few years we have here on earth. As I saw this emphasis of moving from glory to glory and we are becoming more like him than we are now. I saw that we are made in his image so we could be his children; so that we would be able to love him and he is able to love us. I put it to you to think through it yourself. It seemed to me he must have glorious life for us and glorious things to achieve and experience after this life is over. I knew we weren’t going to play harps but I did wonder at times what we were going to do. I have to admit the old probe thing brought it home to me; even if all we see with our telescopes; even if it isn’t true or real. Even if it is some other realm than spiritual and physical. Maybe it can have all kinds of forms. Maybe it is nothing compared with the spirit world that is so much vaster but certainly there is a lot out there that is far, far beyond the little piece we have here. Our Father must have all kinds of plans for that. Of course it began to come home to me that hope is not something to compensate us for the bad things that are happening. It is not some little thing on the margin of life that will help us to get through the present experience. I began to see that hope is what he says in that verse, “because of the hope that is laid up for you in heaven.” That there is a whole life planned for you way beyond this one. If you say to me, where does it tie up with my father or mother, or other relatives or friends who have died and seemed to have no interest in Jesus? If his steadfast love never ceases, it seems to me as we move from glory to glory, he doesn’t give up. He keeps working on us. If you say, well, do you think it’s so? Well, it fits in more with what he has been so far. It fits in more with why he has made us. He has made us all to be his children and to come to love him willingly ourselves because we want to. Maybe he has cut off the possibility after seventy years here; maybe he has. But maybe he hasn’t! I’m as critical as anybody here of purgatory [Catholic theological meaning of: A place between Heaven and Hell, where the soul is not bad enough to be sent to an eternity of damnation in Hell, but not good enough to go to Heaven, so it is sent there temporarily where the person suffers, and is purified so that it can be sent to Heaven.] and some kind of punishment that will pay you for what you have done or will be used to make you better. But I can see a Father whose mercy never ends and whose steadfast love never ceases. Can I see such a Father continuing to work with us? Well, I can. I can’t pontificate and say that is so but it seems to me very reasonable to see that our dear Father has one thing in mind and that is to have children like his Son who love him freely because they want to. It seems to me that no, there won’t be a Hitler marching destroying and hating through heaven. But can there be one who millions of years later comes through all kinds of experiences and eventually gives in to the Savior’s Spirit? I don’t know. Certainly if you say, “No, there will be no place for anybody who is not a Christian as I am a Christian” you have to face the fact that there is a wonderful life for us out there. There is a huge universe. We have had the narrow verse that has been applied primarily to the Jews. We have taken that as our best hope. We, as Christians, will rule over something. Maybe we will but maybe we will do much more than that. Maybe we will develop a universe. Maybe we will be years by our Father to do something with this vast universe that He has created. When the Bible talks about hope, it’s talking about something far more concrete than hope has been to me in the past. It seems to me that there is a whole new world as the Bible says — a new Jerusalem – a whole new earth and a new heaven as it says. There will be a whole new existence for us; I dare to say for those who we thought may not be there. You have to think through this yourselves. The whole objection to this in evangelicalism is universalism. That’s it. The objection is not what I have described here. It is the idea of universalism. The idea of universalism is all kinds of people will get into heaven whatever they are like. Heaven will be a mixture and there will be people there who don’t believe in Jesus and won’t come to believe in Jesus. Where what I am saying is, will God continue? Will that steadfast love ever cease? Will it ever come to an end? Or will it keep working even with the ones we know? The other big argument which evangelicalism holds on to, the other belief, is: we better get out there and save them from the fire! That’s not why God wants them — to save them from the fire. He wants them because he loves them. The only legitimate attitude to witnessing or evangelicalism is because of God’s love in your heart for everyone and your desire for them to enjoy what you enjoy. That has not always been the attitude of the narrowly based evangelicalism that we often have been involved in. But whatever you do with that end of it, the other is the great truth that there is a wonderful life that will begin for us after this life is over with; a whole magnificent universe that we have not seen at all. God has something for us to do in bringing this universe into harmony with himself. I’d encourage you to think and pray about those things. Let’s continue to study His dear Word to see what light he has for us. For me, it brought a much happier, a much lighter feeling about heaven and of course, especially about the people who up to now I thought might not be there. Now I think they will be there. Let us pray. Dear Lord, we thank you for your great wisdom and we thank you for your face which we have seen in Jesus. We thank you for the unending mercy and understanding that you have shown through Him to us. We thank you for his loving attitude to the people who were looked down upon. We thank you, Father, for your apparent endless forbearance with people like ourselves. We thank you finally, Lord, for your dear Word that points us to a life of beauty and peace and joy in your company. We thank you, Father, for giving us each one abilities and characters that are capable of being like you and doing your will. Now we pray, Lord, for all the dear hearts that we love and are concerned about, especially those who don’t seem to be Christians today. We pray, our Father, that the love you have put into our hearts for yourself and for them may manifest itself to them and the sheer magnanimity of your own heart and character may come over to them through us in such a way that they will be stirred themselves. We pray, Lord, that you will enable us to walk in the bigness and greatness of your vision and your plan for all of us. Even as the years go by in our lives here on earth, we may see the future as greater and bigger than anything we have ever thought before. That hope is the constancy of faith and it is the reality of life beyond this earth which is going to be far, far bigger and better than what it has been here and you have us on track to be part of that along with those we love. We thank you for your goodness to us; for this day and for your dear Word and Spirit. Now the grace of our Lord Jesus, the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with each one of us now and evermore. Amen.

Modern World View of the Gospel No. 1 Colossians 1:6a Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill Last night wasn’t just a bad night. It was a nightmare. It was wild. Somebody (who will remain nameless) made a deal to buy all the property, Garden Court, on Fourth Street. This wasn’t years ago — it was in my dream. So they moved right in and leveled one room after the other. I watched the restaurant being bull dozed off. Then they must have had more land next door because they proceeded to build a huge manufacturing operation. So they leveled everything and I walked in and they treated me as nothing. This was now their property. The building was all gone and Campus Church was all finished. So the dream finished pretty much there. It was interesting because I saw, “That’s it.” It was just a moment. It was just a second and whatever God did he did. That was it and it was now gone. No big deal in a way. It’s still a big deal for me. That’s the way life is passing in this world. Everything is eventually gone. That was the dream and I awoke knowing that’s the situation. I began to gather myself together and think about the things. I began to think especially about what one was to do now — what life was to be now — what was worth doing and what was real and true. That’s pretty much where the dream finished, not on any great note, but just here I was with no church now and probably saw the passing nature of it. That it all was a moment in time and it was gone. So I thought of what am I going to say here today. I knew what I should be doing but it was such a task that I thought, can I push out in this direction? I was helped a bit by the fact that Chris, the realtor, said to me, “I saw you on YouTube.” He wants to know more about O’Neill because he’s going to sell something to him. So he looked up Ernest O’Neill, I looked up too, and you see all kinds of things. There’s this corny operation that collects sermons, they’re no dummies, they were bright kids, I hit my picture and see what I am doing. It was a long sermon and they knew YouTube, which I don’t know, took only a certain length of video, so they cut the whole sermon into 4 parts. It’s a great sermon, Cheap Grace. It’s plain as a pikestaff, very clear. Then I knew I didn’t have much option with you lot but tackle what I was going to tackle when I saw what the next verse was. Cheap Grace is dead straight. I’m blunt, plain and simple in it. People think God once had the Ten Commandments where he said you have to obey. Now he saw we couldn’t do it so he’s changed his line now. He says, “Ok, if you believe my Son died for those of you who don’t obey the Ten Commandments, you’ll be saved by that.” So I said of course lots of people believe that and think Yippee, good, it doesn’t matter whether we obey those or not. It depends only on whether we believe Jesus died for us. That’s how we get in. That’s cheap grace. So I draw it out clearly and it’s very plain that even I can understand it. Then I knew I had no option but to tackle today’s verse. It’s Colossians — one that we have partly tackled before. It’s Colossians 1:5-6, “Because of the hope laid up for you in heaven. Of this you have heard before in the Word of the truth, the gospel which has come to you, as indeed in the whole world it is bearing fruit and growing — so among yourselves, from the day you heard and understood the grace of God in truth.” I thought, the sceptic that I am, in the whole world is bearing fruit and growing? I know in a general kind of way you can do that but, boy, here in America it’s not exactly doing that. The gospel is not bearing fruit and growing amongst ourselves, it’s probably at an all time low. So many guys that are supposed to be ministers running after other people’s wives. So many people doing all kinds of illegal acts under the name of Christianity. I wouldn’t say it’s bearing fruit and growing. I hope it is among ourselves. In general in the world, I would say ISIS is bearing fruit and growing. Of course the reason is the very thing I was preaching a sermon about. It is cheap grace. Most people don’t see a challenge in the Gospel, much deliverance in the gospel, they see something that prompts them to argue about abortion or argue about whether they believe in the Lord Jesus Christ but not much about being delivered from themselves and living a different life. I wouldn’t say the Gospel is bearing fruit and growing. Of course what I was thinking of stepping back from was doing the same thing I have done with you for what seems a thousand times, saying to you that the gospel most people think about is “believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and you shall be saved.” It’s believe that Jesus died for your sins and you’ll get into heaven. Most people think of that as the gospel. If you ask them, what do you think the gospel is, they would say it is something about how Jesus died for our sins. I think that’s what people think of. I think the moment you mention gospel on the internet, I’m sure that’s what they think of. If they are people who are brainwashed with it, they slot right in there, ready for the whole story of sin and confessing their sin. Really that’s what they think. Like the ordinary guy, Robin Williams, a supposedly ‘with it’ guy, slick, modern fellow thinks, “don’t give me that.” That’s those guys that are always crying at you, “Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and you shall be saved.” There’s little sense, what a wonderful idea; what a wonderful truth. No one thinks of that. We like to think it is; we like to think there are all kinds of people who are sinning like crazy and under terrible guilt. They are looking for some way out of that guilt. They’re not, they’re not! People are not conscious of their sinning or that they are under their guilt. When you come to them with this medicine, they say, “I haven’t got that disease. You are coming to me with something I don’t need.” I’d say to you we need to waken up and see that. The real gospel is far better than that. Paul ends with “that you understand the grace of God in truth.” They don’t understand the grace of God in truth; even we are just beginning to understand it. I don’t think people do. If you ask, do you understand grace, they would say it’s God’s undeserved favor. It’s God forgiving us our sins. Of course the grace of God is far, far more than that. So again today I would remind you, the grace of God is — our Father has a dear Son whom he loves and they are living together in peace, love and happiness. They have created a whole universe and they want others like themselves who they can share their love with and share their universe with. That’s why they made us. They knew we would never be able to share their love unless we were able to love ourselves. That is, we ourselves would be able to love other people. We could never do that unless we were free not to love because love means your own goodwill going out to another person because you choose to send it out to them. You can’t love unless you are free not to love; unless you are free to do whatever you want. They therefore determined that we would have that choice. They had to allow us to choose whatever we want. They knew there was nothing that existed outside them. There is nothing outside God. So they knew they had to let us choose nothing if we wanted to. So they did that. So our Father put us in this world and his Son could live in us to develop the world the way he planned. He gave us the freedom to say yes or to say no to that. If we wanted, to develop the world whatever way we wanted, so that we would be able to see what the alternative to him was. That is the only way we could have free will — if we were free to choose something other than him. It wasn’t free will if he said, “I’m here and I’m the only one you’ve got; now use your free will.” He had to give us an alternative to himself and that’s how they did it. They allowed us to make the world whatever way we wanted; to develop it whatever way we wanted and to do that freely so that we would see there is a choice. There is a choice here; we have to choose this way or that way. That’s the situation we are in. They have given us the freedom to choose. That meant, of course, that we would be nothing because there is nothing out there. If we chose nothing we would be nothing. So for that reason God made us inside his own Son. It’s unthinkable. It’s absolutely unthinkable. Who would ever dream of doing that, knowing these people might choose all that you weren’t. They might choose everything that you are unlike; might choose nothingness; choose the very opposite of what you are like — opposite of every virtue you have — they may choose. You make that person inside your own Son! It’s like making a person capable of getting cancer and then putting that person inside your own Son. That’s what he did. He made us inside his own Son so that we would have life — we would have eternal life — yet be able to make the choice. That’s what happens at the moment. We choose whatever we want but we do it inside his own Son and his Son has to bear that sin and bear it and bear it. Our Father committed himself to doing that forever. Now that stops a person in their tracks. Nobody knows that — I agree with you — nobody knows that. We all know fine well; we all know God and Jesus; in our own minds we know what we need if we are bringing somebody into our family. It is a dreadful blindness that prevents people even imagining this. It’s all plain sailing if you let your mind move along. It’s obvious this is what happened. It’s obvious this is what they have done because it is obvious to all of us that there is no alternative to God. There’s no alternative to him. There’s only God and not God. So he has allowed us to do that. It is staggering when then you take the next step, and you point out: when is that going to stop? When is he going to pull the plug? When is he going to stop this madness of committing himself to this kind of torture? Because, of course, it is obvious that the death of Jesus was him expressing that in a temporal life here. He was expressing in a life of Jesus of Nazareth what he endures eternally. So, when is he going to pull the plug? That’s where the whole truth is: his steadfast love will never cease; his mercies will never come to an end. Then that’s what you are faced with, that he is going to put up with my choices forever? Or for a long, long time if you want. That is grace beyond anything. It seems to me that in some way you have to present the heart of God. You have to take the plunge. I’m not bringing up the old argument of how long is forever — that’s for everybody to decide. Certainly in the Bible it is the ages of the ages. That’s the term that is used. It seems to me that you have to try to get that over. You have to sometime stop playing the game. Stop playing this forensic game which everybody is playing, even the guy in charge of the Genome Project. I can’t guarantee that he thinks it. But I do think most people are caught in the normal interpretation that if you believe that Jesus died for your sins you are forgiven. That’s God’s grace. There’s really no understanding of God’s own pain. We often talk about it. What the Catholic saints were trying to do — I joke about my stigmata — the saints tried to dwell on the death of Jesus that they would start to feel some of that. Of course that was almost a psychological experience and not a spiritual experience. What I have outlined here to us is far nearer the situation than this little forensic equation that we worked out that everybody talks about — do you believe Jesus died for your sins — yes, you’re in, no, you’re out. That’s terrible. It’s dreadful. In every way an insult; it’s not just an insult, it’s inflicting more pain on our dear Father. In some way, however big the task is (I don’t minimize it!) we have to start thinking through it. Don’t get tied up on how long is forever. Talk about the ages of the ages if you want. Don’t get distracted by technicalities. The important thing is, we know fine well that that is the truth. We know that every little girl that becomes pregnant, we know what God’s heart is doing. He is touched with our infirmities. He is touched with our tears. We remember the shortest verse in the Bible: “Jesus wept.” [John 11:35] We know fine well our Father is a tender Father. So in some way you have to start expressing that. God has brought it to our attention irrespective of how long that is going to go on. He undoubtedly feels the pain of sin. It seems to me that the sheer facts of what I just outlined which seem to me as plain as a pike staff, that is what happened, they plainly set forth the pain of God and what He is faced with. Equally important is that it sets forth what we all talk about. “God is love, God is love.” Do you think people think God is love? Do you think anybody is very concerned about God being love? They may use the term but do you think they believe that God actually loves them? They know he is kind and has given us loving gifts including the world. They know there is love in this world. But that God is love and that God loves them? I don’t think for a moment they think that. There is need. What is our job? Our job is to preach the gospel. What is the gospel? Surely the good news is that we do not have an impassive hope. We do not have a classical, Greek or Latin God who doesn’t care for us and who is way up there distant from us, knowing nothing about us. But surely our gospel is our God is the Father of Jesus. He loves us the way he loves his own Son. He feels our pain. He feels our suffering because he has made us inside his own Son and he has done this all because he wants us to live with him forever in love. I think that is why we are here. I don’t underestimate the difficulty of the task and how you have to think outside the box. You have to start thinking of images of all kinds, words and illustrations of all kinds; ways of setting it forth on your website. We cannot continue in this gospel that makes it even, however critical my comments seem to be to you, you know that I am dead right, the gospel is winning its way wonderfully, especially here in America. It’s not bearing fruit everywhere. It was, in those days, because the gospel they preached applied to the great need they had at that time. The overwhelming need of the Jews was forgiveness of their sins. Undoubtedly that was the emphasis. You cannot say that was the only emphasis in the New Testament. Again and again is expressed there the closeness that Christ is to us and that we are in Christ a part of Him. God and Jesus are very aware that we all are part of them and part of their family. They want us to be. It seems to me very important that we take the bull by the horns. That’s what I was looking at with this verse — taking the bull by the horns — this is a big one. I know your dear hearts believe what I say but we are all caught in the same thing when you preach the gospel — how do you preach it? You preach it the same way everybody else is preaching it, even though it is equally ineffective. We all come out with, “You are alright; Jesus died for your sins.” (cid:9)In truth he did die for our sins. That isn’t the heart of why he died. He died because we are in Him. He bore in a practical, realistic way every day of his life and our lives. He bears our sins. He bears them inside himself. Every time we do something insensitive to God, insensitive to somebody else, he feels that pain. He puts up with it, if you like. Except, the dear Loved One never uses those words. But forbearing, that’s what it is. Forbearance is putting up with things. We put that meaning as a reluctant ‘putting up’. ‘Hupomenai’ is the same — it’s the Greek word for patience — “hupo” is under and ‘menai’ is to remain — remaining under. Forgiveness is remaining under the thing even though it is hurting you like crazy. You stay — you bear it. That is what God is doing with us day by day. I do think it isn’t right for us to cover that up. It isn’t right for us to pretend. Even more than that, you know what people are concerned with. You know fine well why the social media is so popular because somebody knows what I am doing. If I say yesterday I went to the circus or yesterday I played tennis with so and so. Or, I just had a wonderful ice cream. Isn’t it pathetic? You put it on your Facebook page because you want somebody to know what you’ve done. You want somebody to know what your life is — how you think and how you feel. It’s what we are dying for. In a way we are dying for love. It’s really more than that. We would be amazed if we thought the Maker of the universe knew what we had done today. That’s right. They would be amazed if they knew the Maker of the universe knew what they did today. Of course they wouldn’t believe it. That’s the situation. It’s not only the true gospel; it’s the gospel people are dying for. They are dying to know that somebody knows they are here. Then if they thought the Maker of the universe put them here to express himself through them in a way that he could express himself through nobody else. “AGH! Don’t tell me lies!” That’s what they would say. You know I am right. They’d say, “Don’t tell me lies. That’s impossible. My nose isn’t right — I don’t like my hair — my body isn’t great. No — no, he does not express himself through me in a way he can express himself through no one else.” How could I put it more strongly? It’s what people are dying for. It is the true gospel. We have the wherewithal to express it. No, I agree you are not brilliant website makers. I’m not a brilliant website maker. I understand that. We are not as brilliant at any of those things as we need to be. But we do believe that God is gracious and that God will help us. He will give us the ability to do the websites. So that’s it. Be glad you weren’t in a nightmare. But I think it is worth saying. I probably know in my stupid self – no, I’m not stupid — I know in my stubborn self that I’ll keep on blasting. I do think that is why the Father has given us a little life together to do something that will undoubtedly give you a great joy in your heart and above all will give him a release of his love in this world. And in that way, enable him to fulfill the travail of his soul. Let us pray. Dear Lord, we thank you for your goodness to us. We thank you for the things that you make clear to us. Then we pray, Father, if we are wrong, you will reveal that to us as we go forward. If we are right, give us the grace and ability to express the truth and ability of your heart in a way our brothers and sisters will understand. An understanding that will bring deliverance to many of them who feel unloved and misunderstood. We pray, Lord, that you would oversee us, correct our foolish mistakes or our wrong conceptions and enable us to use the words that express most clearly and concisely the truth and your heart. We pray, Father, that you would bless and prosper the work of our hands in this regard. Enable our work in these websites to express these truths. We thank you, Lord, that you understand we are grass and we do not have all the abilities to do these things but we believe Lord you are able to impart to us the ability of Christ within us. You, Lord Jesus, are able to do these things through us and are able to correct the movement of our hands, our eyes, our ears and minds so that we are able to transmit your love to those who come onto our websites. We pray, Father, for these things so that you would be glorified by our lives and may receive some satisfaction by our wills being one with yours and our hearts being close to yours. Now the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with each one of us now and evermore. Amen.

The Modern View of the Gospel 2 Colossians 1:6b Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill Colossians 1:6, starting with the last couple words of verse five, goes, “The gospel, which has come to you, as indeed in the whole world it is bearing fruit and growing — so among yourselves, from the day you heard and understood the grace of God in truth.” I said in our last talk that today, the gospel is not doing that. Part of the reason for this is, the gospel today is so naked, so bare, and so lacking in the richness and the depths that God has put in it. Not least is the case regarding the last part of that verse – “from the day you heard and understood the grace of God in truth.” Of course, the dear souls today have no idea of the depth of the grace of God. We know a little about it when we “say grace” – “we’re saying grace.” And we know a little about it when we thank God for all that has happened to us. But to understand the grace of God in truth – they have little understanding of that. It’s a really “pat” little gospel that is preached today. “Jesus died for our sins, and so we’re forgiven. We’re going to heaven. Yippee! Now let’s get on with life.” It’s very much that kind of attitude. It’s very much, “The grace of God is that at least my sins are taken care of now. I am not right, and I do not do the right things. But – thank God for Jesus! Because his death has been for me, then I don’t have to worry about these sins.” It’s the same as a friend of ours who says, “I know where I’m going!” A little bit of the feeling comes over, “The others might not know, but I know where I’m going.” If it’s not that, it’s certainly a simplicity that is not good. It lacks depth and profundity, and really has not much idea of the grace of God. Part of it is that there’s very little interest in God’s heart. Really, I’m ashamed of myself. But only on a rare occasion did I think of the heart of God. But through the City Mission I would end up places downtown {in Belfast where he grew up} that weren’t so savory. Often they were the dear Catholic places. Often I would go into a Catholic living room, and there would be the Sacred Heart of Jesus on the wall. It made me sick of heart – but not in an encouraging way. I thought, “Uhhh! What a terrible thing to have – the heart of Jesus with his dear breast open.” But at least I saw some attempt to understand God’s heart of love. But rarely besides that did I think of the heart of God. Nowadays, what do you think the heart of God is like? Nobody thinks of that. We quote him madly – whether he’s for abortion or against abortion, or whether he’d agree with Obama on this. We say we’re interested in his opinion. But the heart of God? We’ve said it before – we have an idea why it is – because on the whole, we’ve inherited the idea of God as we get it from Lucretius, Livy, Julius Caesar and Virgil. It’s the idea of the Latin and Greek god as an impassive person – hardly a person – an impassive being. We tend to tie him up with Mars, the god of war. We think of him as somebody who’s impersonal – certainly not a human being, and not a personable person. So we in a way don’t think of him having a heart. If you press me and say, “But don’t we all talk about him loving us?” Yes, but who has any idea that he cuddles us? Who has any idea that he’s soft and gentle? We use the word gentle. We certainly wouldn’t use the word soft. We know he comforts you, “stands you up and gives you strength, and gives you backbone!” But we don’t have too much idea of a gentle, kindly, loving Father who really knows what I’m feeling. It’s not so much he’s not interested in what I’m feeling. He might be, but he doesn’t have time! I think that’s an accurate description. I think that’s what the majority of people think of when they think of God – if they think as much of him in a human way as that. To tell you the truth, I think they think of him as a bunch of beliefs — about abortion, politics, this person who is bad, or this person who is good. But I don’t think for a moment they think of him as a person. It caught you off balance, partly because the man was a scientist or a lawyer. He quoted Job: “He yearns for the creature his hands have made.” {Job 14:15} The man was a very successful lawyer. In his obituary, it said that this man, who was a Christian, was touched by this verse — that God could actually yearn for the creature his hands had made. But – who thinks that? They don’t think that. I’m not for abortion or for unwanted pregnancies. But the wee girl who finds she’s going to have a baby, and she’s not married. Why does she think of the waste basket? Why would she even think of putting it in a waste basket, of putting it in a bag and hiding it on a train after it was born? {As happened recently}. Because she is convinced that this person {God} would have nothing to do with her. So there’s a tremendous need for you to spend your life, if necessary, on the Internet, explaining the heart of God, and convincing people that our God has a heart, and his heart is concerned with our hearts. I was in the bookshop yesterday, and I saw this magazine on the shelf {holding it up}. I was looking at computer magazines, and this caught my eye on the shelf. “Jesus” Man of History, Figure of Faith.” It catches you. That picture on the cover is not the one I would necessarily have chosen. There are other ones inside that are alright, and there are a lot of other ones that we would agree are churchy ones. But the important thing is: why would they ever manage to get put on an ordinary magazine shelf? I think it’s the American Bible Society who publishes this magazine. But that’s what we want to do – put something like this on the Internet. You can see, it’s not so offbeat that they are not able to think of putting it on an ordinary magazine shelf. If you ask me, “Are people interested in God?” Of course they are. I think they always are. But what they’re not interested in is joining a mega church, or having someone try to persuade them to join a mega church. But I would say there are more and more people becoming aware that there is a huge universe out there – and it’s not beyond the bounds of possibility that some of us might get out there some time. I think more and more people are aware that the universe is vast. In their minds is the thought, “Isn’t it wonderful? Isn’t it amazing? When God has us as the few human beings that we know of in the universe – isn’t it remarkable that he has us here, and that we have a life that will go on after this life? And I wonder what we’ll do there in that vast universe.” So I think more than ever that people are interested. But I think what they desperately need, want, and miss, is the heart of God. I don’t think they have any notion. There is one guy who emailed me, who has got the important question. He says, “I would be glad if you would elaborate on the phrase, ‘created in Jesus’” – which is the phrase of the central truth I’m trying to put over! That is the most difficult one! I’ve started an answer. Somehow he’s come across this phrase. {Part of Ephesians 2:10} Of course it’s the central question of this whole gospel that I’m selling to you – because that’s the heart of it all: We are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus {first part of Ephesians 2:10}. That’s the most difficult part. I wouldn’t mind trying to answer all the other questions, but that’s the most difficult one: “Created in Christ Jesus.” But most people have no idea. I bring it before you again – they don’t even know that exists in the Bible. And if they knew – they’d just be the same as the person who asked me about it. “What do you mean? Created inside my mother, I know. But created inside Christ Jesus – what does that mean?” They have no notion that that’s in the Bible. And they have no idea that we have that degree of closeness to the Deity. None at all. So I would bring it before you very seriously: the gospel that is missing in these days is: God’s heart is real, and that we are part of him and his Son. They have no idea of that. If you just state that, they will just say, “You’re stupid!” Or they will say, “I just don’t know what you mean.” So it takes elaboration and thought to make that clear to people. But I’d bring it before you. Can’t you see how it would transform a little inferiority complex? We know a little fellow that Irene has gotten to know in town here. He’s a dear fellow – an assistant. In the world’s eyes he’d be thought of as a “little nothing.” Can you imagine how the truth I’m talking about transforms “a little nothing”? So – getting this truth out to people is worth it. I think God has given us the beginnings of an insight into him that is what the world needs. I’d say to you all – thinking about that, making attempts at writing it yourselves, watching out for images that could get it over, praying that God could give you more light on it, spending the rest of your lives getting that over to people on the Internet – would be a wonderful occupation and wonderful thing to do. Do they understand the grace of God? No idea! They have no idea that God has made us in his Son, and then has given us the freedom to do whatever we want to do, so that not even Marty can do he wants to do – but Hitler can do what he wants to do. Not only can Colleen do what she wants to do, but the guy who killed the people in the Boston Marathon – that he can do what he wanted to do. And it would all take place inside Jesus, inside our Father’s heart. He would bear that. Not only would he bear it, but he would let it go on until that person determines to stop it. That’s it. That’s at least what, “His steadfast love never ceases” means. We think it means more than that. But at least it means that. “His steadfast love never ceases.” He keeps loving the person, even though that person is killing his own Son. Then of course the obvious corollary of that is: everything that we do, he feels. We are in his Son now. In that sense, we are in him {God the Father} now. In that sense, there’s nothing that we do that he does not feel. You know what the normal view is. The normal view is, “Oh, of course God knows everything! Oh yes, he does know everything. He knows where all the winds are and all the rivers. He knows which nation is the strongest. He knows what’s happening between Germany and France. Oh yes! He certainly knows what I’m doing. He must be looking through his telescope and he sees this little beetle moving over here, and this little fly. He certainly sees me.” That’s as far as it goes. “He maybe knows when my Dad dies. He maybe knows if I ever get married. Does he know what I’m going to do tomorrow morning? Well, I suppose he does. But I don’t think he’d be interested.” But what the Bible says in Heb 4:15 was: “He was touched by our infirmities.” {Paraphrased} Maybe they’ll go as far as, “Well, that was Jesus. That was him as a Son of God and a Son of Man here on the earth. They don’t say he was play-acting, but they say, “He was being a human being. So of course he was touched by our infirmities. He wept when Lazarus died. He wept with Mary and Martha. Yeah.” “But, does he weep when I do something? Well, can you expect him – when he has so much to do?” I think I’m right, and that you know that this is it. I think they have no notion and no idea that what they do hurts God. If you use that term, “hurts God”, they agree with the term – a metaphorical term that somehow or other the actions you do either forward his cause or don’t forward his cause. In that sense, they hurt his plan and spoil his plan. But mostly it’s that kind of thing. They upset his plans. He’s thought of as a great chess player, who is moving the chessmen around. He’s not connected to the chessmen at all. He just moves them. He doesn’t feel bad when the chessman falls over! He just picks it up and moves it. There’s no feeling for our Father, no sense that our Father has a feeling for them and loves them. Yet you know fine well, that’s the heart of the apostolic gospel. That’s why Paul says, “The love of Christ constrains us, because we judge that Christ died for all, therefore all have died.”{Paraphrase of 2 Corinthians 5:14} The love of Christ constrains us — that is, drives us and motivates us to do what we do. People have no feeling of that. If you say to me, “Now wait a minute. The leading commandment is, ‘Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and strength, and mind, and thy neighbor as thyself.’ That’s right! I believe you ought to love God. And I believe if I do that properly, I’d probably obey the greatest commandment. And I do love God! I don’t spend a lot of time saying, ‘Oh, God, God.’ But I love God. I mean, I have a respect for him. I have gratitude for him.” Are you ever sorry for him? “No, I’m never sorry for him.” Do you ever feel that he would be heartbroken in this situation? “Heartbroken? No. I mean, he wouldn’t like to see all those people killed in that ferry in Korea that went down. Heartbroken? Well, maybe if a baby was floating in the water.” But, has anyone encouraged them to think otherwise? Including my profession {ministers}. Who has encouraged them to think otherwise? Not many. If you said to me, “Where does the hardness in the world come from?” Isn’t it obvious? It’s obvious. The great heart that loves it, and that so loved it that he gave his only begotten Son – nobody has any connection with that. So there’s a burning need for us to preach the gospel. I hate the term – “to preach the gospel.” There’s a burning need that men and women would begin to know and understand the grace of God. I put it to you. If you asked anybody, “Do you understand the grace of God?” They immediately say, “Grace is undeserved favor, his undeserved favor, his mercy, his forgiveness of us. Yes, I understand the grace of God. It’s his undeserved favor and his mercy.” It’s so different from the dear man washing the disciples’ feet — showing them real love, and not just “his undeserved mercy.” So – there’s a great need for people to hear about the heart of God. So I would say to you: express and explain the real gospel. That is, explain and express the heart of God. Enable men and women to know that God feels everything we do, and everything they do, and that he knows what it is, because he has made them part of his Son, and he knows his Son very intimately. He doesn’t have to say, “Son, why is your foot sore? Why is that hole in your side bleeding, and throbbing?” He doesn’t need to say that. They are so close to each other. They know each other. So it’s a great privilege we have. I’m sure you sense, “That’s right! That is where it’s at. That is where people are at. And that’s why the religious stuff that goes on today does nothing for them and doesn’t touch them at all. Because it has nothing to do with these things at all.” And yes, they get harder and harder with every divorce, and with every separation — because there’s no softening influence anywhere in the world now that is touching them. That’s why they like movies – because they see imaginary people who seem to have imaginary feelings for each other. So they kind of “wash out the inside part of themselves.” Really they don’t. They fill their inside with all kinds of imagined feelings that don’t affect anybody’s life. But it kind of sublimates their desire to have feeling, which figures so little in their lives. Of course, it’s why all the drugs are so popular – whether it’s anxiety drugs that people take, or worry drugs, or whether they’re “getting high” drugs. That’s why people take them – because they feel there should be more feeling in life! There should be more satisfaction in life than there is. There should be more excitement in life than there is! There should be more intimacy in life than there is. There should be more feeling for each other than there is. That’s undoubtedly what drives them into the charismatic worship. You feel in church there should be something more than just mind! Something more than concepts. Something more than just people standing up and singing. There should be some feeling! I don’t think I’ve ever seen two things more popular than they are now. One: the bear hug. It’s never been so popular as it is now. Two: the kiss-kiss. It’s never been so popular! And yet we all know – there’s something kind of strange about it. When we see some of them do bear hugs, we think: that isn’t natural to you. But you’re doing it, because, “That’s what the guys do! All bear hug.” Or kiss-kiss. Well that’s the European way. We kiss on each cheek.” It’s a world that is pretty cold, and pretty unsatisfied. The only thing you still get on the Internet is the intellectual religion — but what I mean is, the not really intelligent religion. I mean the mental religion – something that affects the mind and the emotions. You can see it. It’s the whole game with the psychology, the whole game with all the trouble we have with groups. We laugh about the film Romantics Anonymous. But we know more and more that’s what people try to get into – get into a group that will encourage you to relate to other people, and to occupy your whole personality with people. It’s the desperate need of the day. So I’d ask you to take seriously Colossians 1:6 – “from the day you heard and understood the grace of God in truth.” Can you now share that with the world in ways that are understood, simple, and straightforward? I think there’s a great opportunity for us. I do agree with you: “You have to think out of the box,” as they say. Really all you have to do is think straight, and think of some of those things that I’ve mentioned, and then get to work yourselves. It certainly won’t all be solved with the right pictures. But undoubtedly, if you’re going to communicate on the Internet, it will have to be with good visuals and images, with music by all means, and with words. But it needs to be something pretty plain and straightforward. But I think there’s tremendous need to enable our dear Father to share his heart with the people that he has made. Let us pray. Dear Lord, you know what runs through our minds as we each think, “Oh, but how could I do that?” We know that you have given us the answer: I can do all things through Christ who strengtheneth me. Lord Jesus, it’s our time spent with you that will enable you to do these things through us. We see, Lord, that it is just pride that makes us think of our own ability. We see plainly that we have no ability compared with you. But you do have ability, and you have said that you would strengthen us, and that your strength would be made perfect in our weakness. So Lord, we would come to you, and ask you to help us here. Help us to work out websites, images, texts, and writing, that will enable people to know, dear Father, your heart, and begin to guide their lives by what you are feeling and thinking. We know, Lord, that that’s why you put us each here – so that you, through your dear Son in us and his Spirit, could express to the world what you’re thinking and what you’d like done. So Lord, we give ourselves to you anew this day. We ask you to lead us forward. We don’t know at all how we will do it. But Lord, we will present ourselves to you so that you will begin to do it through us. Now the grace of our Lord Jesus, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, be with each one of us, now and evermore. Amen.

The Modern View of the Gospel 3 Colossians 1:6 Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill Let’s start at Colossians Chapter 1 verse 6. It runs in a continuation of verse 3, “We always thank God” for you Colossians, and then in verse 5 to 6, “because of the hope laid up for you in heaven. Of this you have heard before in the word of the truth, the gospel (which is the subject) which has come to you, as indeed in the whole world it is bearing fruit and growing — so among yourselves, from the day you heard and understood the grace of God in truth.” So he’s talking there about the gospel. You can see that’s the purpose of that whole verse: “the gospel which has come to you, as indeed in the whole world it is bearing fruit and growing — so among yourselves, from the day you heard and understood the grace of God in truth.” So it sounds like a wonderful thing. Oh, that’s great! It’s in the whole world, and it’s bearing fruit, and it’s growing among them – right from the day they first heard it and understood the grace of God in truth. It’s all growing, and bearing fruit. I just think that today people don’t think that way! They don’t think that, “Oh, the gospel! Oh, yes, it’s so wonderful.” Now maybe they do in some places, but I think in the West, they think this: “That sounds wonderful. ‘The gospel which has come to you, as indeed in the whole world it is bearing fruit and growing — so among yourselves, from the day you heard and understood the grace of God in truth.’” I think here in the West, people think, “Oh, the gospel! Oh, yeah, that’s that, ‘Jesus died for our sins.’ Oh yeah, and you have to get forgiveness for your sins.” Then immediately their dear minds go to the churches that exist, and all the activities of religion – Christianity. I’m afraid I don’t think they think of it that way! They think of it a conglomeration of beliefs, ideas, ethics, behavior, and social groupings — that somehow mean Christianity! They don’t think of it as the gospel that in the whole world is bearing fruit and growing, so among yourselves. Now maybe in China they do. But I would suggest that in our Western world, it’s kind of complex what they think of it. I think some of them may think of it as abortion. Others may think of it as our attitude to ISIS. Others may think of it as daycare at church. Others of us may think of it as the noisy, charismatic churches. Others as the staid respected churches where people go with all their prejudices. But I don’t think people think of the gospel in that joyful wonderful way! I think part of the reason is what Fromke pointed out in his book, The Ultimate Intention. He was one of those writers that we all got to know during the 60’s and 70’s. He made the point that the story of the gospel in our 20th century was a bit like somebody who had set out on the journey that had a plain and obvious ultimate intention to it — but somehow lost its way. If you remember, he had the famous diagram that he drew. I don’t have a board for writing on, but it’s easy to explain to you that the ultimate intention was here {pointing, and the starting point was here {pointing, and the journey stayed about there {pointing}. Then it was heading for something to do with God’s image and growing into God’s image. Then here it hit sin. It began to be preoccupied with its own problems and ideas, and the road bent down from this straight road, and began to twist and turn among all the versions of the gospel, and the forgiveness of sins, and Christ dying for our sins, and what we had to do in repentance to get back to him. Then it slowly began to try to find its way back to the road that lead to the ultimate intention. His suggestion was that in these days, it hadn’t found its way back. It was still on the detour, and that Christianity and the Christian churches were preoccupied with them being lost and trying to get saved from their lost condition – rather than ever getting up to what the ultimate intention was — which of course was the image of God, and his fulfillment of his plan for us all in the universe. So the ultimate intention was never reached. He pointed out that this was the great tragedy of Christianity. It was in the 60’s 70’s and 80’s that it lost its way! It forgot about the ultimate intention that God had, which is the one that is outlined in Genesis 1:26 – that we would be made in his image, like him. I’ll elaborate it rather more than is there in that verse: we would be made in his image. I always think of him turning around to his Son, and saying, “Let us make man in our image – so that they can live with us forever in love – in the love that we have – and that you can make the universe through them what I had planned it to be, and develop it.” That was the simple gospel. Of course, I think I’ve shared with you before – it seems to me there is something in that that speaks to man’s lost condition today. Because if anybody has any doubt about mankind in these days – it’s certainly not about their feeling that they don’t know where they’re going. There’s just a general feeling in the world today: “I don’t know what this thing is about! I don’t know where we’re heading!” The ISIS thing is only an obvious terror and panic for us. But the world itself is full of panic, disparate opinions, opposing views, and directions that are colliding with each other almost every day in life. Most people have that attitude to life. There’s nothing very joyful or simply wonderful or delightful about it. I would suggest to you that quite apart from the difficulty in America that young men and women have in financing their education – I think most of them don’t know what they want to do! They’re not really clear in what they should be doing in life. Everything seems to be up for grabs. Everything seems to be going in all directions, and mostly in the directions that will bring you whatever money will get you through to the next week. So it seems to me that today we have a picture of a Christian gospel that has lost itself in an emergency salvation detour that has forgotten completely why we were created in the first place. So there’s great vagueness about the gospel, and about what it is. I think that’s the great need. I would suggest again to those of us who are concerned with the Internet – I think there is a crying need for a plain simple explanation such as we have shared repeatedly. I’m sure I bore you with it! – that we are here because we have a loving Father who wants to live with us forever in love, and he wants us to live with his Son. For that reason he has actually made us part of his own Son. I’ve said to you before, “I do not think for a moment that most people think that at all.” I think they would laugh at us. You know that we are God’s workmanship. You! You and I – God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works that he, our Father, has prepared beforehand, that you should (cid:9) walk in them. {This is a slight paraphrase of Ephesians 2:10.} “I think that’s a wonderful fairy tale. I have no notion – no idea at all – that the maker even knows me. In fact, I think he exists somewhere – but I don’t think he knows me. And I certainly don’t think he’s made me in his own Son, as you say. I’m in Jesus Christ? I, who use that name as a curse word – I’m in Jesus Christ? No. Don’t be stupid!” I don’t think they have any idea. So I would suggest yet again to us that this outline of the gospel that we have in verse 6 is not a glorious thing for people nowadays. It may be talked about joyfully here. But I don’t think of the gospel as a wonderful joyful thing. I frankly think it would be refreshing if they thought the Maker of the world turned around to his Son and said, “Let’s make people like ourselves who can live together with us in love, and can develop this whole universe along with us.” I think people would go, “That’s a great idea! I’d love to be part of that.” But they don’t even know that it exists in the Bible. But even if they did, they have no notion that’s the truth. So I would actually go the other way. I would say to you: if you forget what the gospel seems to me to most people to be these days – then actually the real gospel is just as wonderful as what is described here in verse 6. It’s a wonderful idea. I think it would bring great relief – much the same as we were saying to each other – about the idea of everybody eventually getting the opportunity to come to God, even after this life. We thought — that’s interesting. The normal attitude even at a Christian funeral is kind of bleak! People aren’t really absolutely enraptured about the idea of death. They think, “We really don’t know what’s there.” I think it’s very much like that with the gospel. I don’t think they think of the gospel as a wonderful, joyful, delightful thing – because I think we have buried it under what Fromke said. I think we’ve buried it under the detour. I think that most people would say, “Oh, the gospel! Oh, yes, your sins can be forgiven because Jesus died for me, instead of me dying. Oh yes – I know that.” But I think it’s kind of a concept that they have – what John Wesley would have said, “a train of ideas in the head.” It’s not the disposition of the heart. The heart does not rise in joy to it. The mind kind of agrees with it, or considers it as a possibility – but not as a wonderful, uplifting thing. But the reality is tremendous! It’s very exciting when you read the Great Commission there – have dominion over the birds of the air, over the fish of the sea, over everything! {This is Genesis 1:26.} It seems so exciting! It looks so exciting when you see that European probe riding on the back of that comet (as happened in 2014). You feel, “Boy! That is a wonderful universe! Wouldn’t it be wonderful to be part of the people that develop that?” It seems to me that’s uplifting. Of course, that’s the truth of it. But I don’t think they even know Ephesians 2:10. And if they know it, they do not for a moment believe it. Why I’m enthusiastic about this verse today, to be able to say to you who are listening to this is: That’s what we need to get over to them! We need to have wonderful images that transmit to them the whole wonder and joy of what God has really called us to. I think it would do the same for people as we were talking about in regard to: “Is there a second probation {after death}?” as one man suggested. Is there a second opportunity after death to eventually be conformed to Jesus’ image, and eventually because of God’s love, his steadfast love that never ends, and his mercies that never cease – is it possible that there would be that kind of lightness of heart for us in reality? I think undoubtedly that is the lightness of heart that exists. I think that God is describing a party. I think he’s saying, “My Son, let us make man in our image, and let him have dominion over the fish of the sea, over all the planets, over all the solar systems, and enable you through them to develop this universe in the way I have planned.” The Ephesians 2:10 verse follows from that, that “We are (God’s) workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them,” and that that was what God was describing in Genesis 1:26 — that they would have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the air. God has planned all that. He has it all laid out already. He knows exactly what you will be doing forty years hence. He knows exactly what you’ll be doing seventy or eighty years hence. He has it all planned, and it’s ready for us. Of course that’s the gospel. But the world has no notion of that. So it’s left with this rather gray, bleak view of life after death. Yet, we have a feeling that the people whose faith and life we’ve come to respect through the years – undoubtedly had only joy in their minds as they thought of heaven. I think of my grandmother – Salvation Army lady. Oh – they just looked forward to it. They were anxious to get there! Those who know God are people who are always looking forward to it. It’s not by any means a second best. It’s what we were looking forward to. It’s the purpose of life. I would dare to say I look at it that way. I think it will be great!! I think this present life will be nothing compared with what is there for us. It seems to me that’s the gospel, and that’s the gospel that this dear guy {Paul} is describing here. That’s why he says it’s bearing fruit. It’s blossoming. It’s going everywhere! People are anxious to know it, are fired up by it, and are lifted and elevated by it. That’s what we have to put on the web. I thought so strongly about it that we should each commit ourselves to writing an email to somebody every day, saying, “Send somebody a flower today. Do something creative today. Create order today. Put something right today.” We should actually take action, and take positive action to encourage other people and ourselves to do something beautiful today, to stop saying, “Stop ISIS,” and start saying, “Start joy. Start order. Start beauty. Start peace. Start generosity, and do something definite.” Because it is possible for man to be gripped by the negative, and to be gripped by the unreal and the untrue. It takes strong action to resist this. If you say to me, “Where do all those ideas come from?” I thought — we have to do something. We have to make a start on the Internet. It’s as if we’re gripped in the present situation. It’s gripped us! And each of us has the little things we’ve done on the Internet, and we think they are quite good and not bad. But we’re in a paralysis in a sense, and we need to break out of it, and tell people what the gospel really is. It’s utterly different from what is being shared. You all probably know as well as I do: Arrrggh! It’s ordered all right – but dead order. There is a deadness to the Christian sites. There’s not a liveliness about them. I think our job is to express the joy and delight and the reality of what God has saved us for and created us for. That’s undoubtedly what the world needs. It’s interesting, isn’t it? At a time when the world is full of new things – full of fiber optic communications that are faster than ever. Full of new gadgets – new smart phones — it’s also a time where there’s kind of a tiredness in the air. Maybe not the malaise that President Carter talked about some years ago. But if not a malaise, there’s a weariness in the world that runs through many things. There’s a great need for the life of God. So I think we should pray about it, and ourselves consider seriously doing something, and especially maybe sending an email to somebody every day. “Do something creative today,” or, “Create order today,” or, “Send a flower to somebody today.” But – something that would contain that fountain that is talked about in the song, “The peace of Christ makes glad my heart, a fountain ever springing.” That is God’s norm as you see when you hear that bird welcoming you once more with his song in the morning. Or the birds that you see soaring in the air. Obviously his heart is that. So we should pray that our websites will be that – they would stand out in what is a not too exciting scene, as you look around these days. Let us pray.

Wisdom and Understanding Through Jesus Indwelling Colossians 1:9A Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill We are looking at today’s verse which is in Colossians chapter 1:9. “And so, from the day we heard of it, we have not ceased to pray for you, asking that you may be filled with the knowledge of his will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding.” And that got short shrift before, because it is so deep. “Asking that you may be filled with the knowledge of his will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding.” And of course, we are always used to interpreting that in a general kind of way. “Oh yes, ‘we pray that you may be filled with the knowledge of his will,’ that you will know what his general will is, “In all spiritual wisdom and understanding.” And of course it is much more than that in relationship to this holy table we are at again this morning. [reference to communion] Because it is just — Oh well, you can only say our dear Father is so thoughtful to silly little children like us, that he makes it dead easy, “As this bread comes into you, as this wine comes into you…” Well, how much clearer could it be? Here he is making it just as plain as bread and wine. “This stuff comes into you. Okay, you’ve got it? It’s in you. It’s in you.” “Oh, it’s in me. Oh, yes. Oh, so he is in me. Oh yeah.” It is just… If we just think, how kind of him! He just makes it so easy for you to understand that he means that, that his dear Son is in us. But of course he knows us so well, knows how wonderful we are at our metaphors and our picture language. “Oh, yes, it is as if he is in us! It is. It is like that. It is almost as if Jesus is in you! That’s what it is like.” And he says, “No. This bread, put it in your mouth. It is in you. Swallow it. It’s in you. It is not as if it is ‘like’ in you. It’s in you. It’s in you. Drink this wine. It is not ‘as if’ it’s in you. It’s in you. If I took a picture of your body, I could show you it is falling down.” Just so, so plain, and so gracious to give it to us — well, the Methodists every month, the Catholics, every day. Of course we all get lost in the ‘wonderful sacrament’ and all the rest of it. And of course he — ‘sacrament’, you can call it a sacrament if you want, but he says, “This is what it is. Take my Son into you as you take this bread into you. You’re taking his body into you. As you take this wine into you, you’re taking his blood into you. He’s in you!” And we say, “Oh yes, yes, yes. That’s right. Yes, nice thought, oh very nice, yes. Helps me a lot when I think, ‘Oh yes! He’s in me.’ Yes I must remember that. He is in me.” It is just so terrible, so sick, so obtuse. We are so obtuse, so clever, so sophisticated, so good at metaphorical language. And our dear Father, of course, ever practical, “No! No, I mean it. I ‘mean’ it.” And then we go out. You know how we do. I mean, we’ll face it again. We’ll go up those stairs, “That was such a good communion. And now, what am I going to do with the day?” “Yes, you’re there, of course, but what am ‘I’ going to do with this day?” “Yes, yes, I know you are there.” [coughs] A little indigestion here because he is somewhere there. But I mean, that is it. We really don’t do too much of, “Well, Lord, what are you going to do in my body? With these hands today? What are you going to do? What do you want to do?” “Well, I mean that would be talking to yourself. I mean you don’t want to be crazy.” But you can see it, yourselves. We are very unreal. And we do ignore him most of the time. And we know all this. And we understand it. And you could maybe explain this as well as I do. But when we get up and begin life, we’re not terribly aware of what he wants to do today. Indeed if somebody asked us, “What do you think Jesus wants to do today?” We might not, almost out of self defense we might not say, “I have no idea.” But we probably would be speaking the truth. “I, I’ve never thought of it.” We wouldn’t quite feel confident enough to say, “That is up to him isn’t it,” because we know that is not reverent. But still there is often a ‘slip between the cup and the lip,’ is the saying. There is often a slip between reality and the way we behave: that he is actually in us, that he is actually in us. And of course, look at that verse. That is what that verse is talking about, “Asking that you may be filled with the knowledge of his will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding.” Jesus is in you, and he has a will for you this day. And that is what fills your life with content. That is what fills your life with a sense of fullness and purpose, what he wants to do with you this day. And most of us, of course we have no idea what he wants to do with us. Indeed we are so preoccupied with responding to all the things around us and all the things that other people are doing, that our life is kind of running around like ‘a chicken with its head cut off.’ We run this way to do this and we run that way to do that, and we answer this person this way. And then we have another thing that we have thought of, “Oh we must do that!” and so we spend our whole days running around after what other people are doing, and responding to other situations. And of course we regard that as, “That’s normal. That’s what life is. That’s what life in this world is. It is just responding to the circumstances and the people around you and in doing what is appropriate for those circumstances.” And of that is why so many of us are running around having absolutely no idea where our life is going, or why we are doing half the things we are doing, or have so little satisfaction in what we are doing, or why we get worn out, because we don’t live the way we were intended to live with the Son of God having a life in us and beginning to bring the universe under his Father’s will through us. We don’t live that way. We live like the rest of mankind. They are all busy responding to each other all the time. So that’s the way we do. We operate that way, too. From time to time, because we are Christians, we do think more seriously of, “I wonder where on earth this whole thing is going. And I wonder what we could do as we do the things that we are obviously supposed to fill our lives with, what else could we do for God? And of course it is all upside down. It is the wrong way around. And that is why he prays this way. He prays that you may be filled with a knowledge of God’s will, that is, that you might actually know what God wants to do through you this day, or this moment, what Jesus wants to do through you. “That you may be filled with a knowledge of God’s will…” And then he makes it clear that this is a deeper thing than just, “Oh go there! Go here!” “…In his will … in all spiritual wisdom and understanding.” “In all spiritual wisdom and understanding.” What that refers to is the other world. The Bible often calls it “the Kingdom of God”. It is really the parallel universe. It is really the renewed earth that God has already in existence. God has this renewed earth already in existence. And he has brought it about in his Son. And it is there ready for us. We could actually enter into it at this very moment, because eternity is all one present moment. So this new earth actually exists, and God, by his own grace at times brings something of that new earth here to this earth. And that requires spiritual wisdom and understanding to know what it is. And that is why at times there are little miracles that are worked here on earth, and why at times some things go right, and why at some times you are surprised at a generous thought that you have or a humble thought that you have. Sometimes you surprise yourself. You didn’t know you were so good. And of course it is God graciously bringing some of the new person that he has already made you from the Kingdom of God, from that parallel universe, bringing it down to earth. That is what keeps this present world from breaking up completely. Those are the moments when God is able to bring down some of the new earth to hold back the powers of evil and in some way to express the Holy Spirit. So there are moments when you surprise yourself. There are moments when you are surprised to see you get a cut in your hand, and you wonder why it does not hurt me as badly as I thought it would. Or there are moments when you go through sickness and you think, “How did I get through that?” I didn’t really feel it. Well of course it is the Savior from the New Earth, the New World that is already in existence, graciously exercising that through us. God brings it from time to time like grapes of Eshcol to give us the sense that there is something already in existence that is waiting for us. And so we experience that. So he’s [Paul] praying that we would be filled with a knowledge of God’s will so that we would begin to understand the things that he wants to do through us along those lines, because at times we will be the transmitters of that kind of grace from the other world to other people. And so at times he will prompt you to speak to somebody who didn’t expect you to speak to them at all. But you speak to them and it is a word of life to them. And it is really from heaven through you to them. And that is the ministry that Jesus has for each one of us. And he is praying that we will know what God’s will is for those things. There are 2 things going on in this earth. There are 2 movements against the power of chaos and evil. One are the practical things that we do, like we drill for oil and we bring things into some kind of order with our laws. And from time to time Obama [President Barack Obama of the U.S.] gets a good law through. So there are things that we human beings do by the sheer natural power that God has given us on earth. And that to some extent holds back some of the chaos. You can see it only holds some of it because the world is more and more tipping over into chaos, but that holds some of it. The UN can control some of the treatment that is given to immigrants or some of the treatment that is given to poor children, but only a smattering compared with what is there. And so that is done. But alongside or over that come the messages or the life that comes from the New World that God has already created, the world that is in Christ “who was slain before the foundation of the world.” So it was all created back then and it has been in existence since then but from time to time God graciously sends that down to earth to do things that are done, actually by his power. It is just by his sheer power of Calvary; it is the power of Jesus’ resurrection that brings them about as opposed to the somewhat natural power that we have when we drill for oil or we organize a United Nations to take care of poor people who are immigrants or that kind of thing. So through us there is coming constantly this light from above from God’s own kingdom that he has already in existence. And Paul is praying that you will know, you will know the will of God. He has, “not ceased to pray for you, asking that you may be filled with the knowledge of his will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding.” So that increasingly you’d know why you have to do this with this person, or you will understand your friend. He will give you spiritual understanding to actually understand her. You probably will admit yourself that you don’t understand her, partly because she is from such a different background and has a whole different attitude, and probably has great difficulty separating you from a normal evangelical Christian whom she has learned to be suspicious of. So there is a whole understanding there that really is difficult for either of you, in a way, to understand each other. But he is praying that we would have the spiritual understanding to know where a person is, and then to understand why he wants us to do this, or say this to them. And it comes with people like your customer, then, for all kinds of situations that we are in, where we so often do our best. We do our best. We say what we think is the best thing we can say. But it is all ‘us’. It is not from a deep spiritual understanding and wisdom of God’s will. Indeed we probably would be surprised, “What do you mean, his will? His will is for me to bring my friend to him if I possibly can. His will is to influence this customer to draw up a balanced plan. Sure that is his will.” Yes, of course that is his general will, but he has specific things that he can enable us to see and do and understand. Not magical things, so don’t think, “Oh I’ll wait for a vision now. Now I’ll just pray, ‘Lord, tell me what I’ve to do.'” He doesn’t work that way. But he works with hearts that know that he has things. He has a level on which he works that is higher than the human level. And he can use people like ourselves almost unknown to ourselves. He can use us in that kind of ministry. So it is a deeper thing. That is the important thing. I am not saying it to well, but that is the important thing. It is a deeper thing. Being a Christian; being a witness is a far deeper thing than getting them a little tract. It is good to get them a tract. I’m not knocking it. But it is a deeper thing than that. And it comes from a life that is used to this ‘Christ within’, a life that is committed to be a ‘Christ bearer’, a ‘Christopher’ I suppose. “Fero” is Latin for ‘bring’ or ‘carry’, then ‘Christ’, a ‘Christ carrier’. It comes from a ‘Christ carrier’, from someone in whom Christ lives and is active. And Paul is praying that they will have a knowledge of God’s will for them, for their lives day by day, for their actions day by day, that they will know what God wants to do. He’s praying that they will know what Christ wants to do through them, that they will have the spiritual wisdom and understanding to know what Christ wants to do through them. It means that you have to transcend your Christianity; I have to transcend my Christianity. All our Christianities are colored by our own limitations and by our own little prejudices. And some of them serve your personality and some of them serve my personality. And it is God’s will that those would be transfigured into what he really is himself. That is the reason for dying. The reason we have to die to most of what we are is, it is so heavy on us and it is so dominating in our lives that it prevents us even glimpsing what Jesus wants to be in us and through us. So it is vital that that all dies. So actually it is good when we come up against little personality things that we all do. That of course is coming increasingly clear to the girl [reference to his wife] and myself as we spend our days, as you know, trying to prepare things for when everybody comes from England. And it becomes more and more obvious to us that there is no way in which 10 people will live in beautiful harmony [in one home] unless Christ is alive, unless Christ is alive among them. And that becomes clearer and clearer as we begin to know you all very, very well, both on the UK side and this side. And there is only one way it will work in joy and delight, and that is if Christ is allowed by each of us to transform our own personalities, and to transform them into his beauty. And that is, of course, what Paul is praying for here, “that you would have a knowledge of God’s will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding.” Spiritual wisdom is revelation by the Holy Spirit. Understanding is the mind understanding the outworking of that. So there is a definite difference between them. The mind is the connection with your body and determines what your face looks like and your smile looks like or doesn’t look like, and what your hands do. Your understanding, your mind does that, but your spirit is what receives revelation from God. So he prays that you may know God’s will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding, wisdom of your spirit by revelation and understanding by your mind. Now of course there will only be revelation from Jesus if there is an awareness that he is in you, and you get up each day expecting him to reveal his will to you. So it gives you some sense maybe of the depth of it and of the fineness of it. And of course, yet again at this holy table God gives us a chance to enter into a deeper oneness with our Savior and into a greater sensitivity to him, and therefore a greater sensitivity to each other. And that is God’s will for us, that we would be a constant balm and delight to each other, by our way, by our tone of voice, by our actions to one another, by the things we do, and in that way therefore, live in heaven. And then take that beauty of that heaven to the people that we are dealing with Monday through Friday, so that we, ourselves would have a knowledge of God’s will for us in all spiritual wisdom and understanding. So it is a deep thing. It is a great privilege that we can actually be an expression of the kingdom of God as it exists now in this new world – which it does, already. That new world is in existence. The kingdom has come. The new world is there. Christ talked about it as something that ‘is’. The kingdom of God in some sense is within you when you allow this kind of life to develop within you in some sense you are living in the midst of the fellowship of the saints and the archangels. And that is the miracle that God is able to do, to bring eternal life, the life of eternity, here into this temporal life. So it is a miraculous thing that takes place. Let us pray.

Filled with the Knowledge of God’s Will Colossians 1:9B Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill It really seems to me so vital and so much the issue in these days, this strange society in which we live today. I am referring of course to Colossians 1:9. “And so, from the day we heard of it, we have not ceased to pray for you, asking that you may be filled with the knowledge of his will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding.” “That you may be filled with the knowledge of his will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding.” And that is my job to explain to you what God’s will is. That is what is important and although I agree with the enthusiasm of us all here for obeying, “Trust and obey for there is no other way to be happy in Jesus,” and obeying God. I am [laughs] generally for that. So I agree with that. Yet I do think the great problem today is not that issue of obeying the will of God, but it is this issue of being filled with the knowledge of his will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding. And I really think most people have no idea what that is about at all. And it is too easy for us ourselves to go to that verse and come away with the idea, “Yes that is what they need. They need a knowledge of God’s will. That is really what they need. And part of my job is, as I go around selling this jewelry is to make that clear to them, make it clear to them what God’s will is, and give them a knowledge of his will. And that is why it is important to discuss this business of abortion, and put them right about it, make it very clear to them now, what is God’s will for abortion, and what is God’s will for Trump [Donald John Trump, 1946 -, American real estate developer, business author, and 2016 U.S presidential candidate], what is God’s will for the European situation, what is God’s will for mess that finances are in in the banks. My job is to explain God’s will to them,” And of course you don’t need me to tell you that so often – it is very honorable and it is admirable to be concerned with explaining to them God’s will. But you know yourselves, so often it ends up not explaining God’s will or any interest in God’s will. It ends up explaining the law to them. It ends up discussing the ethics of abortion or the ethics of managing money. It ends up with ‘things’ and views and doctrinal issues. And you finish the conversation, and you realize, “Well at least they know what I think about this subject. And I hope that I have cleared them up about some of the vagueness they have, because it is vagueness that is destroying this society. It is people not knowing what is right and what is wrong.” And I am with you. Part of the trouble is that. Part of the trouble, undoubtedly is a great ignorance. But I would submit to you that that isn’t the deepest problem that exists, and that many of them are clear what abortion is and whether it is right or wrong. And they are clear about all the other ethical subjects. And often you do just end up congratulating each other, “Well I’m glad you see it the way I do.” But there is something unsatisfying about it. I mean, you feel, “Well I did talk about important things here. And I did make my point clear and my position. So at least they know that. And to that extent I have certainly dealt with this great issue of the day that we knew would come about in the times of the Antichrist, when men would not know what is right and what is wrong. So I have contributed to that. I’ve contributed to the sense of what is right. So in that way I have borne a good witness today.” But there is still a dryness to it. I mean you still have a feeling, “Well I did my duty, and I certainly have shared the knowledge of God’s will with them as this verse says, ‘Pray that you may be filled a knowledge of God’s will.’ And I don’t know about the rest of it, but certainly they have more understanding of God’s will now. I don’t know that I’d say that they are filled with a knowledge of his will, but they have knowledge of his will, if I forget about whether ‘filled’ is important or not, they have a knowledge of his will that they didn’t have before, and to that extent they are further along than they were. I don’t know too much about ‘in all spiritual wisdom and understanding,’ but I’ve done the first bit.” 06:13 And yet you feel, “Well, I did it. They know it better than they did. They are clearer about it. There wasn’t much life in it. I don’t know that I feel they are much closer to God, but they are certainly clearer about what is what. They are certainly clear about what I think, and they probably have been helped somewhat themselves. This will maybe help them in the future.” And of course, that isn’t the problem, really. It is part of the problem, but that is not the deepest problem at all, because we know that the knowledge of his will gets back to the whole business of, “Why on earth has he made us? I mean why did he make us? I mean did he make us so that we would all put up our hands and say, ‘Yes, I’m for this. No I’m against that. No, I’m for this. No I’m against that’? Well that is going to be pretty boring if we are going to do that for eternity: ‘Oh, what do you think about this subject? What do you think about… ?’ We’ll wear ourselves out. Besides you come to the end of the discussion surprisingly quickly. So, why on earth did he make us? Why did he make us? To have debates? To have a debating society, to have discussion groups, to express our views to each other?” And of course he didn’t. Of course, we would be bored to tears with each other here, if all we had of interest was to discuss politics or to discuss this point of the law or this point of obedience. It’s that we like to be together, to enjoy each other. You just enjoy each other. It is fun to be together. You just like each other. You feel close to each other. We feel we understand each other. We think the same things and we feel the same things. And we have the same attitudes. We could happily sit with each other and not say a word. And it would be just nice to be together. 08:50 And of course we sense that is what our Father wants. That is why he made us. He made us so that we could love him and so that he could love us. That is why he put us here. And he put us here so that we would know exactly what he was like and we’d see where we weren’t like that and we would become like that. And we would be like him, and we would enjoy being with him because we were like him. And we were like him because part of him was inside us, his dear Son. And we would say, that is what the knowledge of God’s will is. It is knowing what God is after in this situation. And that is what we said last time we talked. It is knowing what God is trying to bring about, what he really wants in this situation, and what he is trying to do in this situation, and why he is doing it, why he said to us, “I’ve called you friends; I haven’t called you servants, because a servant doesn’t know what his lord is doing. He doesn’t know why he is doing it. He has no idea of what is in his heart when he is doing it. But a friend does know. And I’ve called you friends because I want you to know why I’m doing this. I want you to know what I’m after. I want you to think the same way as I think, to feel the same things as I feel. I want to enjoy just being together. I want you to be like me and I want to be like you.” And so we know that that is part of the knowledge of God’s will, that you may know what God is trying to bring about here; what is he after? Nobody has a clue. Nobody even thinks that. Nobody thinks of that. I bet you as you go around the shops they never think of that. “What is God after? I don’t know what he is after. I don’t even know why the things are happening that are happening in this world. I don’t know what he is after. I have no idea what he is — oh, I know he is my Heavenly Father or something and his Son is Jesus Christ. But I have no idea. It beats me. I don’t know why he lets half the things happen that happen. I haven’t a clue! And will I like him when I meet him? I don’t know if I’ll ever meet him. I don’t know if he would have anything to do with me if I did meet him. And I don’t know whether I’d like him or not. I just — I never think about that.” That’s it. They never think about that. And I put it to you, in Christendom I don’t think there are many people who think about that. I don’t think there are many people who think, “I wonder what God is really like. I mean it may cross their mind for a second, but that is it: a second. But I don’t think they know. I don’t think they think he is interested in what they think. And I don’t think they are interested in what he thinks. But that is what the knowledge of his will is. That is what Paul is praying for, that they will have a knowledge of God’s will, that they will understand what God is like and what he is after and what he is trying to bring about. Most of all, they will be interested. Most of all they will be interested. They will be interested in knowing, why is he doing what he is doing? Why is he doing this? Not, “Is he against abortion?” And you know that, way, way back, on either side of the abortion issue, anybody that is on either side, the deep, deep thing that nobody is much concerned about is what the wee girl feels who has been caught, what the wee soul is feeling that has been caught. And the baby? “Oh the baby, the way that it is a baby is, it is an embryo. It is a little animal.” But the baby, as a little feeling baby, I mean it would make you weep. Wouldn’t it? It would make you weep, “Baby? Who cares about the baby? Oh we all care about the baby;” that is, the baby as a thing, as a number, as another case that we can make. But does anybody really feel for the silly wee girl that has got herself into trouble or the little baby that will be…? Quite heart breaking! So heart breaking I don’t know that I’ll … I’ll tell it as quickly as I can. It is in the New York Times this weekend. What happens in China these days is many of them can’t get jobs. Oh, I’m sorry, they are way in the back and beyond in China. Chi Zhou [Anhui province] I think is the name of this little city, in a desolate part of China. And there are no jobs. So the couples end up coupling and having children. And this couple had four children. And this is reproduced all over China. They had four children and no jobs. First of all the man goes off to a distant city, miles and miles away, and gets a job. And the wife works on, but it isn’t enough money. She goes off and gets a job. And this is one instance they have outlined in the New York Times this weekend, but there are hundreds if not thousands of these going on throughout China. The two parents are working in different factories in different cities, and the four children are left in the house to go to school and to take care of themselves. The eldest is 14, the boy. The others are 6, 5, 2, that kind of thing. And they came back every year, once a year to see the children. Otherwise the children just looked after themselves in the house; went to school, etc. The wife missed one year, so she came back this last time after 2 years away. [Pastor pauses, fighting tears. Dr. O’Neill, Pastor’s wife adds] “They didn’t hurt for food.” That’s right, they had food, and they had clothes. But of course, they had nobody to look after them or be interested in them, or care for them. So the boy wrote the letter, “Thanks for your kindness,” to all the neighbors who of course, hadn’t very much time to give them. “Thanks for your kindness, but we must go now.” He drank pesticide. [Emotionally repeats] “Thanks for your kindness, but we must go now.” In another part of the letter he said, “I thought I wouldn’t see 15, so now I’ll know at 14 what it is like.” And they were cremated the next day. But it is that total missing of it that runs throughout our society. And of course we are all concerned with the social problems and this problem, such a shame, of abortion, this view or that view. But the little souls themselves, it is as if we have forgotten what a heart is. And so the knowledge of God’s will is badly lacking, but not in the sense that we all think. We all know what we are supposed to say once. We are all clear about the ethics and the politically correct views. And we all can be very clear on doctrinal issues and arguments about the Bible or about evolution. And we are all very good – and I’m sure you all have fallen into the same trap. We are all very good at advising people what they should do and how they should run their Bible study or their prayer life or what they should think of this issue or that issue. We are very good at that, but at transmitting God’s heart, at getting them even to be interested in what God feels, it is just a blankness. And you know it. There is just a blankness. Who would ever think of, “I wonder what God feels?” A very odd time we will use that phrase. But it is significant in our memories because it is so rare that we use it. Nobody is interested in what God feels. Nobody thinks, “Does God feel when a disaster takes place?” Do we all say, “I wonder how God feels when he sees these bodies scattered on the ground after a plane crash?”? I mean he made each one of them individually. He had all kinds of hopes for them. It must break his heart. Have you ever heard anybody say that? Have you ever even thought it yourself? So there is a lot to do. And of course here is the wonder of this truth, it is very manageable. It is a very reasonable and interesting talk to have, because you say something of this to a person [reference to a jewelry shop owner], and they say to you, “How can I know what God feels?” “Well, he sent the Spirit of his Son into your heart.” [You say] “What?” [Owner] [You ask] “Aren’t there sometimes when you are going to do something with a customer, and something springs up inside you. It is a kindliness. And you feel. ‘Oh for this I’ll give them this extra little box. It will help them to enjoy this gift, or they can use it to give to somebody. At times a little thought comes into your mind. You don’t know where it is from, but it is a nice thought. It is a kindly thought. It is a generous thought. Sometimes it is to your own detriment. But have you thought that?” [Owner] “Yeah, but I mean that is just conscience.” [You] “Yes but, isn’t it true that the good has to come from somebody? The good that comes into your conscience has to from somebody. I agree with you that there are many things that you do by conscience just because you’ve been taught to do it, or your society says you should do it. But aren’t there things that you don’t know where it has come from? That is God’s Son trying to speak to you and giving you a thought, an idea.” So there is a whole realm of discussion that you can enter into that is interesting. It is interesting. It is not dead. It is not dead old religion, nor ethics. It is kind of interesting. And they kind of say, “Well, yeah. I never thought of that.” [You] “Well, that is part of what it means. God sent the Bible. God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts. God has put into each one of us something that he wants to do through us. That is why you are different from everybody else.” It opens a whole world. It opens a whole world. So that is part of what this verse is about. “Pray that you may have a knowledge of God’s will”, and then, “In all spiritual wisdom and understanding.” And then you get into the whole wisdom thing and knowledge. Knowledge is truth, and wisdom is how to use truth. And you get into that whole business of situations, then, and, “What would God do in this situation?” And of course it is wonderful for a person who doesn’t go to church at all, because he can then take part in that kind of conversation. “Well, yeah. I wonder what God …” It can be kind of light in a way, and yet there is truth in it, because you have spoken to something that he has experience in his life. And of course there is a desperate need for it. There is a desperate need for some people who would be interested in what God’s heart is, and what his heart is really like, and why they are here. And of course it is what is desperately lacking in our society. That is why I told the story about the children, because our society can read that and can drop a few tears momentarily, and back we go to the normal. We just get used to it. And you have to admit, we are getting used to the shootings. We are getting used to all kinds of dreadful things, hideous situations where ministers that are living next door, as in that shooting in the prayer meeting; ministers who live in the same block as the guy who comes and kills them. So our society is getting harder and harder and more unfeeling. And it loves to discuss things. It loves to discuss abortion. It loves to discuss politics. It loves to discuss your views on this or that. But the whole realm of what our attitudes are and above all what God’s attitude is, there is great deafness and great blindness. So I would suggest to you that it is something to think about and to pray about, and to examine yourself on, because you can, in a way, you can guide a conversation. And of course this leads to an open ended conversation. There is just an openness about it, and there is no where you are afraid to go with it, because it is expressing things that ‘echo in their hearts’ when you say them. And of course, behind it all is the sense of warmth. Suddenly a person begins to think, “That is interesting. I’ve always thought religion was a kind of cold thing, a dead formal thing, a thing full of political views and attitudes. But I suppose that is right. God must be a person, and he must have feelings like us. He must have an attitude of some kind. And of course it opens the way, then, into your own attitude to him, and that he is… It begins to dawn on people, “Maybe he knows what I am doing. I wonder, does he? I wonder, ‘does he know?’ I wonder would it be OK to be with him after life. Would it be nice to be with him?” So there is a whole world of truth that this verse points to, and that I think is our real task as witnesses. I think that that is what we are witnesses to, witnesses to the heart of God. And I think that is part of what God has called us to do in our internet, to introduce people to the whole concept of God’s heart, and what is God thinking and feeling about us these days, and what does he want us to be like himself? Let us pray. Dear Lord, we ask for your wisdom. We pray for your Holy Spirit’s light. We’d ask you to guide us as we think about these things. And then, Lord, we think of these dear hearts that we meet in business, and you know, Lord, how easily the conversation can become purely ideological; it become just a mental exchange of views. And we see, Our Father, that it is far from that, that you are bending over us and them at this very moment. And your eyes are upon them, and your heart is yearning for them, and you want to express that yearning through us so that they begin to touch your heart, and be interested in what you think and what you feel. Lord, we would pray that you would use us and bring other people to the same conclusions that you are a real and kind loving father with a heart that has bled on Calvary and that is alive today. Then, Father, as we think of the dear children in China, we pray, Lord, for them. We cannot know what to pray. The situation is so massive and touches so many lives. All we can do is pray for your kindly hand upon every little one that is in this kind of situation, and that you, at that very moment of death express to them your loving heart, so that they do not have to go into absolute darkness, so that there is your kindly face, that makes the journey possible for them. We pray, Father, that you will guide us so that we may be of some help and so that you may use us to express your heart to our world. And now the grace of our Lord Jesus, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with each one of us, now and evermore, Amen.

Promises Jesus wants to Fulfill in Us Colossians 1:10A Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill The verse is so massive that it would take a lifetime to explain it. So it is, of course, Colossians 1:10. So if you would turn to that at least we can start with the words. It is remarkable. It reads, “To lead a life worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to him, bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God.” And you remember that follows the verse 9, “And so, from the day we heard of it, we have not ceased to pray for you.” And then, of course we think, “O yeah, you are very good. You are praying what we all ought to pray,” “Asking that you may be filled with the knowledge of his will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding.” “Oh yes. We are all for that. We hope that you will help everybody to understand your will and that is what you want and that is what we want.” And of course what we have begun to realize is, it is not just the knowledge of his will in, “What am I going to do tomorrow?” or “What am I going to do next week?” It is a much more complex thing than that. And you remember how we have tried to describe it. We’ve tried to remind each other, “Does God know everything?” Of course he knows everything. “Does he know everything in the present?” “Yes.” “Everything in the past?” “Yes.” “Everything in the future?” “Yes. Yes, I suppose he does. If he doesn’t who does?” “Does he know the people who will have accidents today?” “Well he knows all the protons and neutrons. He knows where every detailed particle is in the universe. He knows their tendency and their movements. He knows the laws that our astrophysicists aren’t absolutely sure of, when they come to quantum. He knows all that. Yes, yes. I suppose he does know the future. Yes, he does know what will happen.” “He knows every young man in New York that will fall this day?” “Yes.” “Every child that will trip?” “I suppose.” “Every person that will get knocked down by a taxi?” “Yes.” “Every fire that will explode in China?” “Yes.” “Every difficulty that I will meet today?” “Yes.” “And yet he can sleep at night?” “Yeah, I suppose.” “How come he can sleep at night?” “Well, because he has set the thing up so that we have free wills, and he, himself knows what those free wills will do. And so he knows how it is going to go.” “And he just lets it go?” “Eh? Yes, he lets it go because we have to see that we are responsible for our actions and for our lives.” “And that is all he does?” “Well no. I can’t see how he will do that. He certainly didn’t do it when he came to earth in the person of his Son. When his Son saw somebody who was sick he laid his hands on them and healed him.” “So, what about God? How does he operate? If he knows everyone that will fall, everybody that will trip, everybody that will have an accident, everybody that will do something wrong, does he pass by on the other side?” “Well, no. If Jesus said, ‘He that hath seen me hath seen the Father, and the works that I do, my Father does, or the works that my Father does I do also.’ No, he must be like Jesus.” “Then, what about all these things?” “Well, obviously he has acted upon them, in whatever way he believes is best for the person to grow up in him into a full person; enables the person to achieve the things that he has planned for him in his life. He obviously acts. He takes that wrong action or that unexpected event and he works it into the counsel of his will. I mean, that is what it means that, ‘He was in Christ reconciling the world to himself.’ He was reconciling all the things that the world does into his own will and his own plan, so that it will all come together.” “Then that is what God does day by day?” “Yes, that is what he must do day by day.” “Then the things that I will hit tomorrow, that will work to pull my life apart or to run me off the rails, he will act on that?” “N-n-not ‘will act’! He ‘has’ acted already, because he sees everything. He sees the end from the beginning. ‘A thousand years is like one day in his courts.’ He sees everything in a present moment. So he ‘has’ done it all. I mean that is why he said to them, ‘Behold, I ‘have’ given Jericho into your hands. All you have to do is march around it. The marching around hasn’t a thing to do with powers that bring down the walls. I have already brought down the walls. I just want you to march around in obedience to me. I will do the work of — I have already done the work. I foresaw this about Jericho millions of years ago, I saw it. And I dealt with it then.'” And I think that is what we have begun to see. But you really have to run it through your head, because we are not used to it at all. We’re just so ‘woman centered?’ so ‘man centered’. We are so ‘human centered’ that we look at everything from our point of view. And we have to remind ourselves, “Now, wait a minute. The truth is God knows all this. And he sleeps well at night because he has fixed it all. And he is simply allowing these things to take place so that we’ll see what life without him is like and how impossible it is. And we’ll see the difference between what is not him and what is him. And that is why he allows all these things to happen. He has already dealt with them all. How else could he sleep at night when he sees all the agonies of the little babies that are dying this morning, unless he has affected it all to bring it all into the council of his will? So that complicates things considerably. That gives meaning to this. Then we can’t read that with the old ‘cliché ridden’ interpretation. “And so from the day we have heard of it we have not ceased to pray for you, asking that you may be filled with the knowledge of his will.” And that is why he goes on to the next bit, because we might say, “Oh the knowledge of his will!” I’ll just ask my father what he did in this situation or ask my pastor what he would do in it. Or I’ll look up some book and I find, “What would God do in this situation?” Or I think the thing through myself. It is not that at all. So that I will know his will. I’ll know his will in the light of what he has done already. I’ll know his will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding. I’ll know in a spiritually wise way what God is after here and what he has done, and I’ll understand it. Why? So that I can walk around the walls of Jericho, because that is probably the most bewildering part to us. We are always looking at, “Oh! I wonder if there was something in their hands when they touched the man with leprosy.” Was there was something in their hands that went from their hands into the man who was paralyzed, so that hey touched him and it actually was a physical transfer of power of some kind? Of course the Father is trying to get home to us, “They do that act because I tell them to act, but that act doesn’t cause anything. The work is already done in my Son on Calvary a million years ago. That man has already been dealt with. I foresaw that. I’ve set that thing all in motion. I am telling you to lay your hand on him as much for your benefit and the benefit of those who are watching as it is for the man himself. The sick man is already made well. I’m simply revealing what has happened in eternity, revealing it in time at this moment, and because I tell you to put your hand upon it, it seems that you have caused it. But actually it is just that the two things have come together at the same moment, the moment that I have released the power from the risen Son of God at the right hand, released that power down into the man’s body at the same time as you touch it. They are concomitant acts. They are not causally related.” And of course it is a whole understanding of our work and our service to God that is utterly different form the normal. But that is what is at the back of this. It is not just, “I’m going to pray for you so that you will know God’s will. I’m going to pray for you that somehow you’ll come across a passage somewhere in a book and you will know what you should do.” Or, “I’m going to hope that somebody that you counsel with, they will tell you.” It is not that kind of prayer. It is a prayer that you may deeply understand that God has already fixed all these things. He is in control. And he has the right moment when he will reveal this in time. And he may use you to signify it. And that is why at times in the Bible they call miracles, “signs”. At times Jesus said, “You will see signs,” because it is a sign of the power of God, rather more than just an overcoming of natural laws. And of course that is why we are here. But we get all mixed up. We say, “Oh, no. We’re here to do some good for God.” Or, “We’re here to do what the non-Christians do anyway.” No, no. You can end up doing, apparently the same thing as a person who doesn’t know God. But if you do it by God’s revelation and insight and the work of his Spirit within you, it is an entirely different operation. And it is a different glory to a different person. And so it is in that spirit that he says, “Pray for that you may be filled with the knowledge of his will.” And then I would say that the word “filled” is far more important than we think of it, because the works that men and women of God apparently do – and I say “apparently” because the work is already done by him. They just signify it as God tells them he is going to manifest it in time. But those works are under God’s control and they come from his will and they come from his power. And they are different from the works that are done by ordinary human beings. So when it comes to being filled, it is being filled with him and his mind and his heart. Any work that a child of God appears to do comes from a fullness within of God. So first you have to be filled with him and filled with his heart and his love, and then out of that come works. But the filling is important, “That you may be filled… That you may be filled with the knowledge of his will.” That that will preoccupy you above everything else. That will occupy your mind more than everything else. Then out of that will comes action that is the action of God, himself. So, in a way, there is no work done by a child of God without a filling. You are filled from the inside and then that spills out through you. So it is not a preoccupation: “O Lord, help me with this problem that I have. Help me with this money difficulty,” with a whole concentration on the problem, the problem, the problem. It is being so filled with the assurance of God’s presence in you and of his complete ability to supply everything. That is what brings forth the action then. And then the action is entirely different. And that is why there are two actions that go on in the world all the time. There are the guys who are drilling for oil, because they have used their machines to find the oil. And then there is the guy who drills for oil because God has actually implied that he should do it at that spot. So there are actually miracles going on all the time even though we don’t know them. But there are people that – it isn’t people, both those who are known as God’s people and those who aren’t, receive all kinds of little intuitions from God, himself, who do things that turn out wonderfully. And you say, “Oh, how could they know that?” I’m not saying that the “twig” guy [water divining with a tree branch] is part of that, because that seems more connected with the elemental spirits of the universe than anything else. But there are many other actions that are taken that do not seem practically the appropriate ones. And there does not seem to be obvious reason for doing them. And you cannot, at times, even justify them. But they come from God to his people, and they come from that fullness that takes place in his people that enables them to know, to have a knowledge of his will, and a spiritual understanding. You can see the importance of it, not only in business, but you can see it in human relationships. As we joke, Sellers [Peter Sellers, 1925-1980, British film actor, comedian and singer] said, “There is a time to laugh and a time to cry, and this is not one of them,” you remember; Peter Sellers in one of his funny movies. There is a time to laugh and a time to cry. And there is a time that is right to do a thing and a time that is wrong to do a thing. And God’s ways are often very different from man’s ways. So working by God’s direction and out of God’s fullness is entirely different from working from man’s own emptiness and his best perception of what is in the world. God allows both to go together, because in a way they do the same job as all his works, “The left hand of God are the things that he permits, and the right hand the things that he definitely desires. Some of the theologians use that distinction. And so there are many things in his left hand that God allows to happen. And so he allows many people to do things by natural powers, because that again sets forth the difference between his work and their work. Because there is a tendency of men to spell God with 2 o’s [good], that ‘goodness’ is the same as God. Well, no. It isn’t always. There are many good things that are not necessarily of God. And the Father is always involved in giving us discernment and understanding about that. So he allows, often, very good things to be done by power that is not his. Yet it originally comes from him for he has made human beings, but they are not directly a work that he has done on Calvary. But then there are Calvary works. And that is what we are involved in. That is what God has called us to. That is why it is important that we come to a fullness of knowledge and wisdom and spiritual understanding, because that is how you do the things that God himself has done. So there needs to be a closeness between us and our Father so that we see things from his view point and are preoccupied with him and not with the problem itself. And that is what he [Paul] is praying for, “That we would have that knowledge, a knowledge of his will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding.” So, I hoped to be further on with that than I am, so I’d better move to verse 10. [Galatians 1:10] “To lead a life worthy of the Lord.” Now, normally, you see, we think, “Oh it is a much humbler thing to say, ‘Oh, I couldn’t do it like Jesus would do it. Oh no. ‘To lead a life worthy of the Lord?’ Who could do that? Who? Who could live…?” We can get uppity and quite pious about it. “Who? Who would dare to say he is living a life worthy of the Lord? I mean, the Lord alone could lead that…that… Um, wait a minute. The Lord alone could lead that? Oh, yes, I see. Oh…” There is only one way to live a life worthy of the Lord, and that is the Lord leading it. “Not I, but Christ.” But that is what he prays, “That we would lead a life worthy of the Lord.’ [says it emotionally] I cry because of our ridiculous stupidity and proud stubbornness in this regard. Because we can be so humble about our own failings. “Well, I’m just trying to be the best Christian I can.” Well, yes. How about stepping aside and letting him do it himself? So we are called to lead a life worthy of the Lord. And I think where we get into trouble is, we decide, “Well, we can’t obviously do that. So we’ll do our best.” We’ll do an imitation. We’ll do a close copy. “Well, you know, I couldn’t do it like Jesus would do it.” So then it is not far from that to slipping into an apologetic excuse for our failings. “Well, you know, I can’t do it the way Jesus would do it. I’m just a foot soldier. I’m just doing my best.” But that is not what the Father says here. He says that you are to live a life worthy of the Lord. “Your life is to remind people of the Savior, not remind people that you are a good person, not to draw their attention to you and your faithfulness or your religiosity, or your Christianity, or your ethics, or even your faithfulness to your Lord. Because that is all still concentrating on you. You’re here so that a person may see right through you and see something divine, something above the norm, something that comes from another world. You’re here to live a life worthy of the Lord. It is actually worthwhile even to change our minds about that. It is worth our while. You cannot produce it by your own right thinking, but you at least can assist it. At least you can stop opposing it by thinking, “I am not just, even the representative of Jesus. I am the only glimpse of him they will get today. And of course it lifts everything away from your obedience and what you think of this situation and whether you are comfortable with it or not, or whether you are happy with it or not or whether it is an easy thing for you or not. It lifts it all up. You think, “Hey, that is unimportant. The Savior, Lord, it’s you. This is your act. This is your situation. Here, here’s my hand. You do it the way you do it, the way you want it done.” So it is part of that selflessness. It is part of that abandonment of self. It is part of that indifference to self that enables you to lift right above your own little preoccupation with your comfort or what you’d like or what you prefer. And it lifts you out of that miserable, crawling, self-centered, ego-centric existence. And you realize, “I’m just the expression of Jesus here. It is what he wants that counts.” So that is why he says that. “I pray that you may live a life worthy of the Lord,” because no other life is worth living, because it is your own only, but to “live a life worthy of the Lord.” And that is why it goes on. You know it is ridiculous, “Pleasing to him.” “Fully pleasing to him!” “Fully pleasing.” You know yourself, you’ve had it if you’ve ever tried to describe the victorious life. “Well, now. You don’t mean you have to be perfect.” “Fully pleasing to the…” “Fully pleasing…” “Fully pleasing to the Lord?” “To lead a life worthy of the Lord? Fully pleasing to him?” “Impossible. It’s impossible to be fully pleasing to God. We’re imperfect beings. We do our best, but we cannot live a life fully pleasing to him.” Well, this is what he says. But I think that is what it is. It is that God would look down upon us and he’d see his Son in all his beauty. That is it. That is the plan. And each of us are pathetic little creatures, I agree with you. And I think we’re nothing. But God looks upon us as his Son. And he looks to see his Son’s actions and his Son’s attitude, and his Son’s feelings, and his Son’s will. And that is why this man prays, “That we may lead a life worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to him, a life where Jesus is not uncomfortable, where he does not feel embarrassed, where he does not feel ashamed, where he does not feel pain, but a life that he is pleased with, where his Father looks upon him and he is well pleased. I agree with any of you. We are all brought up in the same society. I agree with any of you who say, “This is ridiculous! This is not possible. You always need his blood to cover you sins.” Well, we always need his blood, but our sins are what he took away. And we are meant to be fully pleasing to him. So it is very strong. “Fully pleasing to him.” And then of course, you can see where it all comes to. “Bearing fruit in every good work.” And of course it reminds you, “You are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works which he has prepared before hand that you should walk in them.” [Ephesians 2:10] It is all there; all these things have been done in Jesus. These things have been done in Jesus. These works are prepared beforehand; only “that you should walk in them.” You don’t need to do them. You lay a hand on the person, but that is not what does the work. The work was done on Calvary. It is a work that has been done already, a work that has already been achieved. It is part of the perfect world that God has already built in another part of this universe. It is the new Jerusalem that is already in existence. It is the heaven that is already real and alive. All the works have been done there. They are already accomplished. And all you have to do is walk in them. So, “Bearing fruit in every good work;” every good work that God has already done and he is expressing and revealing it through you. So it’s more than just the usual interpretation. And of course you can see an increasing in the knowledge of God every time understanding God more and more. Every time you do his will, every time you act in a situation according to his intuition within you, you understand him better; you know him better; you know more the kind of person he really is. You more and more bow lower and lower because of the love and grace that is in his heart. And of course as you see — well it is the same you see anything. I remember the dear guy that built the hole in the wall for a certain person to put their books in, you remember, as a Christmas present. And you had to be touched by that fellow’s thoughtfulness. Terrible! Ridiculous, but thoughtfulness as he did that. And so it is with God. Every time you take part with him in something you have a greater knowledge of him; you understand more how dear a God he is. Every time you see a Yorkshire terrier beg, who could make a little creature like that? He must be very loving and very kindly. And so it is with God. You grow in the knowledge of God every time you take part with him in something that he has done and you see its effect here on earth, you realize how detailed he is, how tender he is, and how understanding, and how real is his practical concern for us human beings. And so it is a life that is fully pleasing to him, and that bears fruit in the good works that you walk in. And of course that gets the heart of it, doesn’t it? Because that’s what we all are concerned about. “By their fruits you shall know them.” And bearing fruit means of course, seeing the life of God spreading to others and seeding them and creating the symptoms of Jesus in the world itself. And that is why we are here. We want to bear fruit. We want to see others come into Jesus and come into his reality. And that you can see is the difference between a work that God has already done on Calvary and that we are simply manifesting and an ordinary good work of human effort that is done. So two people can be the cause of healing in somebody’s life, but one bears fruit as he does it and the other simply creates gratitude to the person for his help, because one comes from the power of God that did the real work and therefore glorifies God. And the other takes advantage of that and appears to take the glory of it to himself, and therefore does not bear fruit. So there is a difference between fruit-bearing work and work that isn’t fruit-bearing. And it seems to me that ties up with our own work particularly, because they can be impressed with your honesty; they can be impressed with your good business acumen; they can be impressed even with your kindly voice or your understanding ways; they can be impressed by your helpfulness. But then it is a different thing for them to bear fruit, to come into touch with the Savior within you. And that is a different matter. And that is determined, not by the act or the word that you spoke to them, but by where it came from. And that ties up with your fullness of Jesus or your fullness of yourself. So it is interesting. Anyway, God is good. Let us pray. Dear Father we thank you for your goodness and your light. And we thank you that you have called us into such a life, so full, so thorough and so detailed and extensive, and then, we can see, so genuine and real. And so we thank you for calling us to this. And we thank you for the opportunity we have through these days to touch other lives. And we see that the only reason for it and the only purpose is so that you, yourself can touch them, and that your life can flow from what you have already done through us and into them. So, Lord, we give ourselves again to you today and trust you to lead us into such a preoccupation with you that we do become fully pleasing to you, living a life that is worthy of you, and bearing fruit in every good work. Lord we thank you that that is your will for us, and we would trust you to bring it about in this coming week, for your glory. And now the grace of our Lord Jesus, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with each one of us, now and evermore. Amen.

A Life Worthy of the Lord Colossians 1:10B Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill It is just a massive verse really. Colossians 1:10. And of course it is Paul’s prayer and it starts on verse 9. “And so, from the day we heard of it, we have not ceased to pray for you, asking that you may be filled with the knowledge of his will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding, to lead a life worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to him, bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God.” It is just such a mouthful that I just thought you have to take that very slowly, because, of course, the whole heart of it is, it is Jesus in you and in me. That is what he is talking about. He is talking about Jesus in you and Jesus in me. And he is talking about the kind of life that that will bring about. And so the verse 10 is overwhelming, “To lead a life worthy of the Lord.” I mean to live a life ‘worthy’ of the Lord! And when you think about it a little, it just causes you to stagger, “Who could live a life worthy of the Lord? Worthy of Jesus, who could live a life that is worthy of him? You talk about having something that is worthy of another person or another thing. And it means, of course, that it sets forth them. That is what it means. A life worthy of somebody else is a life that sets them forth. It’s like having them there in person. That is the only way you can live a life worthy of him. And we always think of it that way. If you do anything worthy of someone else you think, “Oh! How could I ever live up there?” And that is what this verse is saying, that we would live a life that is worthy of the Lord. A life that the Lord, himself would not be ashamed of. [Speaks with emotion] It is beyond words, a life that he would be proud of, a life that he would be glad to own as his own. So you just think – well to tell you the truth it is overwhelming unless you just do away with it, and think, “That is a mistake. How can anybody live a life worthy of the Lord? It is impossible.” And yet here he is saying it. He is praying that you may lead a life worthy of the Lord. And so I just thought, Oh, it is just so bewildering. (And of course I couldn’t find the white board. I suppose someone has carefully packed it up.) Of course I had to resort to this as every teacher does. They write on anything you give them, cigarette papers if that is all that he has. I thought, those [Col. 1:9 & 10 hand written on a large stiff card everyone can see] are what he is saying. It is overwhelming but those are what he is saying. He is saying, “From the day we heard of it, we have not ceased to pray for you, asking that you may be filled with the knowledge of his will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding, to lead a life worthy of the Lord, pleasing to him, fully pleasing to him.” I mean, [does he really mean that?] “Bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God.” To tell you the truth, after I wrote it earlier this morning, I thought, “It is just… It is a different kind of life.” The best I could do was put a square around that [indicates his writing and reads what he has written], “To lead a life worthy of the Lord.” But then it came to me very clearly, this [indicating the written words] is a Christ-centered life. What you are looking at here is the description of a “God centered life.” That is what it is. It is not an Irene centered life, or a Peggy centered life or an Ernest centered life, or a Marty centered life, or a Myron centered life, or a Marty centered life [2 different Marty’s in the group]. It is a God centered life. I mean it is a life that is lived outside itself. It is a life that is centered on God and what he wants. It is centered on Jesus and what he wants. It is just a different kind of life. It is in no way describing a Christian life that is trying to succeed or the life of a ‘good Christian’. This is a different life entirely. It is just not any way a humanity centered life or a self centered life. This is a God centered life, one that is filled with the knowledge of his will. And we talked about that. His will is what he has already done, what he has already done. It fits in with so many of the verses, “We are God’s workmanship created in Christ Jesus for good works which he has ‘prepared beforehand’ that we should walk in them.” [Ephesians 2:10] And of course it is the whole truth that God saw what has happened to the world, knew that this had happened to it, recreated it completely and has planned that recreation to be worked out in our lives. So that he already has done all the work. The work is there. It is a work that we simply walk in. It is a work ‘prepared beforehand’ that we walk in. He saw a thousand million billion years ago; he saw the difficulties that you will face next week. He saw this person that would say something outside his will to you and that would bite deeply into your own heart and feelings. He saw that and he bore it in his own Son on Calvary on the cross and the death died from before the beginning of the world. And he cured that and pored in his own soothing softness and reassurance and comfort. So that it is a work that is prepared beforehand for you to walk in. All you have to do is walk in it. You don’t have to produce the soothing and take care of yourself. He will bring that to you. He has already done that work. And so you are filled with the knowledge of his will. You know, “Ah! This is his will in this situation, and this is the way through on this. And this is what he wants me to do in the light of that.” And so in the light of the cancer that is eating away at you, you know God has already born that in himself. And he has a right attitude for me to take to this at this moment. Or, if he has arranged for a surgeon to go in and cut it open and cure you, then you will know that, too. And you will be content with that. But you will meet a work that he has already prepared beforehand. You will not meet an event or an accident that has happened by chance that is a surprise to everybody. You will meet a work prepared beforehand. And that is what it means, “To be filled with the knowledge of his will.” To have that quiet confidence as things happen to you, “Ah, this is the will of God for me in Christ Jesus. I can give thanks in all things, ‘for this is his will for me in Christ Jesus,’ and he has already dealt with this issue and has already solved it. And he has something for me to do. I don’t actually need to solve it. I just need to do what he tells me to do.” That is what Peter said, “I don’t need to heal this man. I simply need to put out my hand and touch his body. God has done the healing in his Son.” So that is part of what it means to be filled with the knowledge of his will. And that is the basis, of course, of the whole life. You are filled with the knowledge of his will. You are not ducking accident after accident, uncertainty after uncertainty, disaster after disaster, unpleasant person after unpleasant person, obnoxious conversation after obnoxious conversation. You are meeting a way that has already been dealt with by God in Calvary from the beginning of the world. Why? Because God sees the whole thing in a second. He doesn’t need to make the whole thing and then watch, “Oh-oh! I wonder what will happen? I wonder what will happen? Will that guy hit…? No – Oh, oh! No he won’t hit that brick wall.” The Father sees it all in second, in a mille-second. He sees it all in a moment. And he knows it all, and he has dealt with it all from before the beginning of the world when Christ was crucified, and that is all settled for each one of us. So we come with a bundle of so-called ‘difficulties’ the world calls them. We come with a bundle of events that God has already dealt with himself. And he will tell you what you need to do in it. And that is why often you, yourself know that most of your ‘big disasters’ are solved by somebody else. Most of your big moments of crisis are solved some other way than – it is rarely that you are, what you do, seemed to make a difference to them. Often the thing is solved either by the timing or by someone else’s attitude or the thing not happening the way you thought it was going to happen. Because, in fact, God has dealt with all those things, filtered them through his loving hands. And that is why it is so wise to take seriously that you are “created in Christ Jesus for good works which HE HAS PREPARED BEFOREHAND THAT YOU SHOULD …Do them?” No, that you should ‘walk’ in them. All you have to do is ‘walk’ in them. And so, “filled with the knowledge of his will in all spiritual wisdom.” The kind of thing I’ve shared with you a little, a poor sharing of some of the spiritual wisdom that is needed. An understanding, the understanding comes in because the wisdom is the revelation of the Spirit, the insight that the Spirit gives you into it, and reminds you that all that has already been dealt with by God. Understanding is the ability of the mind to apply that to what you have to do, “Oh, I see, Lord! So you’ve solved this. You have already done it, but what do you want me to do?” “Oh, just keep quiet.” “OK, I’ll just keep quiet.” “No, no, I want you to lift down that book.” “OK.” And you do it. “And understanding.” “To lead a life…” And only in that way can you lead a life worthy of the Lord, because this is all the Lord Jesus’ work anyway that he has done from before the foundation of the world. And so a life worthy of the Lord can only be lived in the light of what he himself has done. And that means ‘living a life worthy of the Lord. This is a kind of life that is worthy of the Lord. It is a life that is steady and settled and at peace and content whatever the situation, because Jesus has already dealt with it all in the “Lamb slain before the foundation of the world,” when the world was crucified in Christ and was actually made new. And that is why to me it is quite exciting when they talk about Pluto because somehow it is in a physical form that the astrophysicists understand even. In physical form it’s obvious: this universe is massive, absolutely massive. And Pluto already looks as if it might have some of the weather that possibly could support our lives, maybe it won’t at all, but it is remarkable in how many ways it is like the earth. 385 days it takes to go around instead of 365. But it is close to it. And it brings home to you how God has filled the whole place with all kinds of planets, all kinds of climates, all kinds of things that we don’t know about at all. And certainly he has lots more for us to do if he has made such a big place. It just doesn’t make sense to keep us huddled on this little planet here. But it all makes it more possible in my mind that, “Yes, of course this is it.” One has to look at the thing from the view of — I hesitate to say even ‘eternity’, because we have the idea ‘eternity’ all goes on for ever and ever. Eternity is ‘above time.’ That’s it; it is above time. It’s the life above — it’s real life. The life of eternity is real life. And we often think, “Oh, you will get eternal life, that is, you will live forever.” But we’re in the midst of eternal life. It is life now, and eternity is a ‘forever present’. So it is a ‘life worthy of the Lord’ in ‘that’ world. ‘Fully pleasing to him’: how else could it be fully pleasing to him? How could you live a life fully pleasing to God, unless it is Christ, himself in you? That is the only way that you can live a life that is fully pleasing to him. But it does bring home — I think it brings home to you, “Now wait a minute, is that the way I think of my life? When I get up in the morning, [pause] ‘Ernest O’Neill!’ ‘Marty Poehler!’ ‘Peggy Coleman!'” Full of ourselves! So, almost irrelevant! But we are full of irrelevance. That’s it. We are full of our little selves and looking at our little selves as little animals here on earth trying to forge our own way. And of course, it is not so. We are a carrier of the incarnate Son of God. We are a body in whom Christ lives. This is Christ’s life and his day. And he has things that he wants to do today. And I get the fun and the satisfaction and the enjoyment and the fulfillment of doing them with him. And that is a life that begins to be pleasing to him. His own life! That is really what it is. It is giving his own life to him. It is acknowledging that. It is living in that reality and not living in the unreality that you are this little person with your name on it that is trying to make its own way through the world. It is him alive in you; ‘uniquely’ alive, you are right, in you. You are the only version of him that exists. So you are unique in that way, but you are him. “It is not I that live, but Christ that lives within me.” And that is the only way to live a life pleasing. And then, “bearing fruit in every good work,” and I take it that the fruit is the benefits that come from God in you, and the good things that come to other people’s lives and the beauty of Jesus that comes through you, because the fruit of the Spirit is also by love, joy, peace, long suffering, gentleness, faith, meekness and temperance. These are the fruits of the Spirit. And those are what are borne as Jesus walks around in you. He bears longsuffering and gentleness and goodness. He expresses faith and meekness and temperance. And, “Increasing,” then, growing all the time, “in the knowledge of God.” That is the purpose of it all. This life is so that we will know God, so that we will know him, and know what he is like and be at home with him and be used to him and really, reflect him back to himself. “Increasing in the knowledge of God:” understanding God better, but “increasing in the knowledge of God,” also in the ‘friendship’, the personal oneness with him, because that is the magic of it. I mean that is the miracle that you can know and have been made to know God, because he wants ‘you’ to know him. And he wants to know himself in ‘you’. And that is why you have been made. So you are different from everybody else in the universe. And God would miss you if you weren’t here. You are vital to him, and he enjoys knowing you and looks forward to knowing you thoroughly and looks forward to you knowing him thoroughly. So that knowledge is important. It is not just a knowledge of God: “Oh well, I know the way he operates. I know the way he thinks.” No, no! I ‘know’ him. “This is eternal life, to know Jesus, to know God, and him whom he has sent, even Jesus Christ.” That is eternal life, to know God. It is the ‘knowing’ that you are made for. It’s not just the understanding or that you are of use to him. He doesn’t need you. He doesn’t need me. He wants you to be part of himself. He made you to be part of himself. He made you because, “He yearns for the creature his hands have made.” [Job 14:15] So when he makes you, he doesn’t make you as, “Oh here is a funny little thing, and here is a funny little thing that will be able to do this kind of thing.” Not at all! He makes you in his own Son so that you will be dear to him, and a precious part of him. So this is in every way a supernatural life. And it can only come about if you let Christ have his central place in your life, and you exit out, get out of it and allow him to be himself; in all his beauty, because his beauty is way beyond our beauty, and way beyond what we can be. But it is a wonderful life. Shall we pray? Dear Father, we thank you for your will for us, so beautiful and filled with grace. We see, Lord, that it is far beyond what we would produce with our little imitations. And so, Father, we would give up the imitating and the trying hard. And Lord Jesus, we would thank you for how long you’ve been willing to stand in the shadows as we do all our ‘great’ things. We would welcome you Lord, into the center of our lives. And Father, we would begin the life that is worth living, the life that is an expression of you each moment, a life in which we discover more of you and are lifted and exalted by what we see of you through our own actions and words and thoughts. So Lord, we would give ourselves to you so that you can live your life, a life that is fully pleasing to you, that is filled with the knowledge of your Father’s will, a life that has all your own beauty in it, a life that is prompted by your desires and your wishes, a life that expresses you in all your fullness. Lord we thank you that you have called us to a life that we cannot live ourselves but only you can live through us. So we would give ourselves to you for that purpose. Now may the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with each one of us now and evermore. Amen. . And now the grace of our Lord Jesus, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with each one of us, now and evermore. Amen.

Fully Pleasing to God Colossians 1:10C Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill Galatians 2 goes: “Then after fourteen years I went up again to Jerusalem with Barnabas, taking Titus along with me. I went up by revelation; and I laid before them (but privately before those who were of repute) the gospel which I preach among the Gentiles, lest somehow I should be running or had run in vain. But even Titus, who was with me, was not compelled to be circumcised, though he was a Greek. But because of false brethren secretly brought in, who slipped in to spy out our freedom which we have in Christ Jesus, that they might bring us into bondage — to them we did not yield submission even for a moment, that the truth of the gospel might be preserved for you. And for those who were reputed to be something (what they were makes no difference to me; God shows no partiality) — those, I say, who were of repute added nothing to me; but on the contrary, when they saw that I had been entrusted with the gospel to the uncircumcised, just as Peter had been entrusted to the gospel to the circumcised (for he who worked through Peter for the mission to circumcised worked through me also for the Gentiles), and when they perceived the grace that was given to me, James and Cephas and John, who were reputed to be pillars, gave me to me and Barnabas the right hand of fellowship, that we should go to the Gentiles and they to the circumcised; only they would have us to remember the poor, which very thing I was eager to do.” “But when Cephas came to Antioch, I opposed him to his face, because he stood condemned. For before certain men came from James, he ate with the Gentiles; but when they came he drew back and separated himself, fearing the circumcision party. And with him the rest of the Jews acted insincerely, so that even Barnabas was carried away by their insincerity. But when I saw that they were not straightforward about the truth of the gospel, I said to Cephas before them all, ‘If you, though a Jew, live like a Gentile and not like a Jew, how can you compel the Gentiles to live like Jews?’ We ourselves, who are Jews by birth and not Gentile sinners, yet who know that a man is not justified by works of the law but through faith in Jesus Christ, even we have believed in Christ Jesus, in order to be justified by faith in Christ, and not by works of the law, because by works of the law shall no one be justified. But if, in our endeavor to be justified in Christ, we ourselves were found to be sinners, is Christ then an agent of sin? Certainly not! But if I build up again those things which I tore down, then I prove myself a transgressor. For I through the law died to the law, that I might live to God. I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me; and the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. I do not nullify the grace of God; for if justification were through the law, then Christ died to no purpose.” Obviously they had quite a disagreement over it, where he had to be very strong in what he said. In most things the truth has to be fought for, has to be established, and repeated again and again. It seems to me that’s the situation we have. We can be “nicey-nicey” little people doing our little bit for Jesus, or we can deal with the world as it is and face the fact that there is tremendous confusion and chaos in everyone’s understanding of all things. The abortion issue is a small part of it. But there’s dreadful misunderstanding of ALL the truths of the gospel. So we have to choose for ourselves: are we going ourselves to go on just as if our place is just to do our little bit? Or, are we going to take hold of this thing, and make clear what God has made clear to us? I think however much we all know in detail of the heart of what we’re saying over these years – you all are aware – it’s very different from what people are normally saying is the gospel. Normally they’re giving out tickets to this religious club: “If you believe in the Lord Jesus Christ – thou shalt be saved.” The wee souls have NO idea of what they’re talking about – except the world has managed to confuse the whole thing into: believe in Jesus and not Mohammad. So the pre-occupation has been in WHO you believe in. Of course that’s not the issue. The issue is not believing in this one or that one. It is in fact: we are made inside the Son of the Creator of the universe. We are made inside him! That’s the issue! Preach that, and then you’ll find what opposition is. So we need to be very clear in our own minds. It’s very easy for us in our vagueness, and our — dare I say it – dunderheadedness. Is that an Irish term? You’re dunderheaded! It means you have an empty, hollow head up there that has few thoughts in it. It seems to me we have to decide, “No, we are not dunderheaded. We are not going to babble away here, knowing that they’re interpreting it in the same way that they’re misinterpreting the rest of Christianity.” We need to decide, “Are we going to make this clear? This is what we have given our lives for. This is why we live together. This is truth. Are we going to make this clear, however inadequate we may feel we are? However much we may say to ourselves, ‘Oh, we’re poor little souls. Never been to seminary. We don’t know this and we don’t know that.’” No – but we’ve talked and listened to this for twenty, thirty, or forty years. So we do know what we’re about. What we’re saying clearly is, “You – you dear Muslim that you are – dear Buddhist that you are – you were made inside this dear man that we’re talking about!” That’s what we have to say. “You are inside him! And even now you are inside him, and he feels what you do. He senses what you’re like, and he and his Father feel the pain of that.” Now that’s news! That’s something different. But I think it will be increasingly important when this idiot {referring to himself} leaves and goes {dies}. OK — are you being faithful to the gospel that God has made real to us, the gospel that has made life real and meaningful for us? Or are you padding along with the rest of the Christians, repeating the same mumbo-jumbo that is not worth fighting over? Believing in the Lord Jesus Christ will do you no good. Even the demons believe – and tremble! {Paraphrase of James 2:19} So it’s not that. It’s that you yourself have been made in Christ. You are part of him. You are part of the Son of our Maker. Everything that you do – he feels! You are what this word says: you are his body. You are the body of Christ, and you’re individually members of that body. That means you individually are a part of Jesus that nobody else is. That’s news! That news that they have no notion of – none at all! So all the dear hearts that you saw over the past week in different situations, dying in rubber dinghies or plastic boats trying to get over to the Greek island, others who are dying in the midst of the stampede of the Muslims, because they’re the ones that we’re responsible also. Those thousands that you saw lying on the ground that other people had trampled over. No! We cannot say, “Oh, that’s them. That’s what they get for their stupid religion.” No – they are our responsibility. They were made in the Savior. Each one of them brought pain to him. He lay there in each one of them. Yes. That’s not poetry! We were made in Christ. We are all a part of Christ. That is our hope of living forever, that we are part of Christ. But that’s news. They have no idea – none at all! The little beggar in India – the little person who has just had a baby out of wedlock and doesn’t know what to do because the stupid theaters are closed and they can’t do anything. All those dear hearts are in our Savior. So we have quite a job. I started the sermon early. We need to see that it’s a very different gospel. It’s not a variation on the Christian gospel that everybody else is preaching. It’s very different. It is that you who are not a Christian at this moment, you who actually hate gospel and religion and hate the West, you were created inside this dear person, this man. He came as Jesus of Nazareth 2000 years ago. He had you inside himself, and HAS you inside him at this moment. You are part of him, and he wants to be himself in you. That’s why you’re here on this earth. Now that’s news. THAT will cause them to laugh at you! That will cause them to rebel against you – in pride and indignation. THAT’LL get you persecuted! But “believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved”? It’ll get you into an argument. But they will be able to see it doesn’t necessarily mean anything for their life. “But you say I am part of this gentle person that we read about in the first century? This person that was crucified on a cross – that I am part of him? That he knows me? No – I don’t believe it.” Then your work begins. But it does seem to me that it’s a very different gospel. I’m sure you’re like me. I’m sure you’ve never thought, “Oh, there’s no discussion about this. There’s no debate about it.” But Galatians 2 sets it forth very clearly. There was quite an argument in the early days about what you had to preach. It seems to me that’s what we face today. We’re missing something if we think the things we share, the things we talk about, and the things the majority of these books {pointing to the library books} write about again and again – if we think that all that is what the churches are preaching and that is what people are thinking of as Christianity – you’ve missed it. No. It’s very different. Because truth is a unit, I can slip right into today’s verse, because it brings up a whole different attitude to God by us. It’s Colossians 1:10. The statement is one we started some weeks ago. Colossians 1:3: “We always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you, because we have heard of your faith in Christ Jesus, and for the love which you have for all the saints, because of the hope laid up for you in heaven. Of this you have heard before in the word of the truth, the gospel which has come to you, as indeed in the whole world it is bearing fruit and growing — so among yourselves, from the day you heard and understood the grace of God in truth, as you learned it from Epaphras, our beloved fellow servant. He is a faithful minister of Christ on our behalf, and has made known to us your love in the Spirit.” “And so, from the day we heard of it, we have not ceased to pray for you, asking that you may be filled with the knowledge of his will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding, to lead a life worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to him.” That’s the heart of it. “To lead a life worthy of the Lord.” Why “worthy of the Lord”? Because you’re a bit of the Lord. “I’m a bit of the Lord?” Yes. That’s why he prays that you’ll lead a life worthy of the Lord – because who could lead his life, except the Lord himself? So if he’s saying that you lead a life worthy of the Lord, it can only be because the Lord is in you and you are in the Lord. That’s why he says to you you’re called to lead a life worthy of the Lord. Of course they have no idea of that – none at all. If you say to them, “live a life worthy of the Lord,” they say, “I have to try harder. That’s what you’re saying to me. I have to live and do the kind of things that Jesus would do, so I have to try harder. I have to be like that person who is the only perfect human being in the whole world. I have to be like him. I have to try harder.” No – he’s saying “live a life worthy of the Lord” because that’s who you are. You’re in the Lord and the Lord is in you. So you’ve to let that out. You’ve been made in Jesus, and here you are in this earth to allow his uncreated life to flow through you, and to do the things that he intended to do through you. That’s why you’re here. That’s what he means to live a life worthy of the Lord. To live the kind of life that Jesus himself lives – because he’s in you. So he says that to everybody. That’s everybody’s calling – to live a life like Jesus, because in fact that’s the reality of their situation. To live a life worthy of the Lord – and this is the phrase for today – “fully pleasing to him.” I submit to you that even people like ourselves who have listened to the gospel for so many years rarely think in those terms. If I’m in conversation with Peggy, I would not dream of saying, “Your mother is one of those dumb Presbyterians that really don’t know what’s what.” Why? Because I love her. Of course the statement isn’t true any way. But I wouldn’t dream of saying that, because I love her. If you say to me, “Oh you want to do everything she wants done. So you want to please her?” No. I don’t want to be in that kind of unreal relationship with her. But yes, I do want to please her. But not because I want her favor or I want her approval. I want to please her because I love her. As far as I am able, I wouldn’t dream of saying something that will cut her. When I say a thing that does cut her and is unfair, then when I become aware of it, as you with me I think, when we become aware of it, we’re not long before we’re back to each other and saying, “I’m sorry. I did not mean that. I hope you didn’t misunderstand me.” In that way, when you love each other, you would please them. That’s the thing you think of. If you say to me, “Oh no. You do it just because she’s giving you the rules that you have to follow in relationship with her.” No. Or, “You’re doing it just because you’re afraid of what she might do, or the advantage she might take of you.” No! Or, “You’re doing it because everybody else is kind of nice to her.” No. I want to please her because I have a relationship with her, I love her, and I care about her. I don’t want to hurt her. That’s why I do everything that I can to please her, and things that I know she likes, and that she doesn’t dislike — to do things pleasing to her. That’s it. You’re to live in such a way that you are pleasing God. That’s it. You are part of his Son, and he is in you, and his Son has that attitude to his Father. His Son loves his Father, and wants to please his Father. Then you think of it with your own parents and with others that you love. You know you don’t need to be told, “Do this, because this person believes it’s right.” It’s something that comes from inside you. You want to please them! You want to do everything that’s pleasing to them – because you want them to be happy and at peace. So you do everything that is pleasing to them. But do you see that so often we’re not thinking in those terms. We’re not thinking, “This dear Father – he’s given me this life and he keeps on giving it to me whether I’m doing what pleases him or doesn’t please him. And there isn’t a thing that I do in this life that he doesn’t know and feel. He knows a word even before it’s on my lips, so he knows every movement of my mind.” “He knows all my failings and he has certainly had to put up with a lot of my misdoings. Yet he keeps on giving me life. How dear can you be? How kind can you be? How gracious and loving can a person be to another?” There rises up therefore in your heart a desire not to do a thing just because he tells you to do it, or not to do a thing just because other people say, “This is what God wants.” But you do it because you have a dear Father who you know loves you, has taken care of you all through the years, puts up with all the things that you do, and overlooks them and forgives them — and yet still all the time continues to give you life and breath. What else can you do but want him to be happy, and want him to be pleased? That’s one of the differences in what God has shown us – that we live a life that pleases God. That is, we are concerned: does he like what I’m doing? “Lord, is this OK? Father, is this the right way to go about this?” That’s it. I think I’m a dreadful husband; dreadful in all kinds of other ways too. But I can see that when you love another person, you’re thought is not, “Do they agree with this or do they not agree with that?” Your thought is not, “What will they do to me if I don’t do this?” Your thought is not, “How can I manage to maintain this relationship in some way?” Your thought is, “They’re heart of my heart. They’re eye of my eye. They’re head of my head. They’re part of me.” Why would you ever destroy your own body? You think of the other person as part of yourself, and you want to please them. You don’t want to displease them. The result is, you kind of keep an eye out for it. Do I know when this lady {referring to his wife} is not happy or disagrees? Sure I do — in a flash! So I don’t need to do too much looking to see, does she or does she not? I know. Let’s say it’s a bit of a crisis for me to act against that — in my own heart. She’d put up with it anyway, so I’m not concerned with that side – but in my own heart. Why would you do it? You wouldn’t do it – not if you love a person. Would I go down a path that I know she disagrees with? Not without saying to her, “Love, I know you don’t agree with this. I know you differ on this. But I do think that this is the right thing for me to do.” But I wouldn’t dream of bouldering down any direction when I know that she is not for it. That’s the relationship we have with our Father. We want to do everything that pleases him. We don’t want to do anything that displeases him. That’s the attitude our heart has to its Father. Why I even bother to outline that is, that’s not the normal attitude of Christianity today. After they’ve said, “Would Jesus do this?” the normal attitude of Christianity today is, “How can I keep myself pretty safe here? Is this a no-no, or is this something I can do without any repercussions from the ‘man upstairs’? Is this something that God does not forbid? Is this something, not quite what I could get away with, but is this something kind of neutral?” Of course this attitude expressed in this verse is entirely different. “That you might live a life worthy of Christ, and pleasing in all things.” That’s what the Greek is. It’s “in everything” — “pan” — such as in “pandemic;” and “pantheist” is the world — everything. The Greek word means “all.” So: “live a life pleasing in every way.” In other words, because Christ is in your heart, what rises in your heart is, “Lord, is this OK? Do you like this? Would this please you? Is this what is right?” It’s a natural desire to please our Father. I would go further than this. I would go back to the relationship I used here. I don’t need a telegraph from my wife that she disagrees. I’m not that dumb. I know it pretty fast. Indeed you might almost say there comes a time when you know it – in actual fact we have our experience ourselves – I know when you’re not with me, and I think you know when I’m not with you. We know it in our hearts. We have a sense of each other. You can say it’s miraculous. Maybe it is. It’s certainly a bond of love that you have for each other that enables you to sense what the other would want. It’s as if both your hearts are tuned to the same heart. It’s as if both want the same thing, and know what the other heart wants. It’s a little bit of a strain not to do it, because it’s almost schizophrenic. But when there’s a relationship between you, then there’s a oneness of heart, and there’s desire to be pleasing to each other. It’s quite interesting, because you can see it brings a deeper level of oneness. It’s not simply, “Am I avoiding doing anything I know they don’t like?” It’s more than that. It’s at a deep level, heart beating together with heart – an intuitive natural sense of what the other person wants. That’s what it is with our Father. It’s almost as if as you go along – “I wonder if he’s smiling?” “Well, our Father would smile at that.” Or, “Is he not smiling?” That’s the relationship that God has given us in his Son. It’s that kind of intimate relationship between us and our Father. It’s at that level that God has made things real for us. That’s the level that Paul is talking about here – that you’d live a life worthy of the Lord – not just a life that nobody could say about you, “Oh, they’re not a Christian. Oh, that’s not a very Christian thing to do.” It’s not just that. It’s that you live a life pleasing to him in everything — that your concern is, “I wonder if he’s pleased. Lord, I hope you’re enjoying this. Father, I hope you’re glad of the way I’ve lived this day.” So it’s a different level of life – a life that is pleasing in every way to him. So you can see that rather than it being a test of our orthodoxy, or a checking out if we’re REALLY sanctified or if we REALLY live the life we preach – it’s far deeper than that. It’s a oneness between us, the child, and the dear Father whose arms are round about us and who suffers so much day by day on our behalf. It’s a loving relationship of a child to his father. That’s one of concern, heart with heart. I suppose I could end it there by saying that’s really the central issue that we’re called here to bring to earth – the heart of God – to talk about life lived that is dear to God’s own heart, and our preoccupation with God’s heart ourselves. A concern of, “Is he pleased, or is he hurt by this? Is he glad of what we’re doing today, or is he not?” It’s a personal sense of oneness with our dear Father. That for us is our faith and our Christianity — how does God feel about the way we are this day. Let us pray.

Strengthened with God’s Power to Bear Fruit Colossians 1:11b Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill Let’s look at Colossians 1 which is part of the prayer that Paul is praying for the Colossians. He says in verse 11, “May you be strengthened with all power, according to his glorious might, for all endurance and patience with joy.” It’s so rich that it’s very difficult to deal with it in a half an hour. Paul’s talking of course about what they are going to spend their life doing and what they are going to face doing it. They’re going to spend their life doing everything they can to complete the creation that God has made, to bring about his will on this earth and to fulfill his plan for the earth which is to complete the earth in whatever sense he needs it completed. And he says, “May you be strengthened with all power, according to his glorious might, for all endurance and patience with joy.” It might be good to remind you that there are two things going on in the world today. There are the guys that are fracking — digging up the coal and oil for commerce of all kinds. Then there is taking place in the world by God’s own power a fulfilling and developing of the order that he has planted in the world but has been momentarily torn apart and desecrated by man’s own selfish will. The problem of pollution is part of that. Man has begun to pollute the earth pretty thoroughly rather than to develop its purity and power. And there are all kinds of other situations where that’s happening. Syria was not meant to be pouring its people into Croatia and then trying to get up into Germany. That was not the plan at all. The plan was for the Syrians to develop their land with all the riches that God has planted in it. It wasn’t to be for their own selfish development and purposes. This is what has brought about the pollution, fracking and other mess that society is in. It’s because we are using the earth for our own uses (despite what it does to other people) that many are suffering while a few get the benefit. God has planned it that the many suffering will eventually weigh so heavily on the earth that it will fall into absolute chaos from which only he can deliver it. But God’s plan was that it be developed so that the earth becomes a beautiful place for us to live in harmony and love with one another. There are two developments going on the in world today. There is the development that we carry on with the desire for self- satisfaction. Then there’s a quiet power that God has planned but rarely takes place. You can’t even say that the “Doctors without Borders” express that. They just cause a little pause in the general distraction by the little bit of love for other people that they exude. But generally there is very little of God’s way going on. I’d like to mention to you very clearly the basis of God’s way. God’s way will involve us probably discovering further details of the atom and of the particle world. It will probably mean developing far more quantum theory and the invisible things concerning the cells of human beings. We are only beginning to touch upon these in our research. It will probably concern many of the invisible things that the world holds and contains, such as energies that are there that we know nothing about at the moment but at times stumble upon. We discover some cure that was there all along. But there are things like that planted in the world by God. Now it is good to look back to the basis of that development of the world which is in Ephesians 1:21 — a verse we all know very well because it is one of those great prayers of Paul. He’s praying that you may know the power that God has. Let’s start at Ephesians 1:18-23. ? “….having the eyes of your hearts enlightened, that you may know what is the hope to which he has called you, what are the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints, ?19? and what is the immeasurable greatness of his power in us who believe, according to the working of his great might ?20? which he accomplished in Christ when he raised him from the dead and made him sit at his right hand in the heavenly places, ?21? far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and above every name that is named, not only in this age but also in that which is to come; ?22? and he has put all things under his feet and has made him the head over all things for the church, ?23? which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all.” In the millisecond of eternity (that is the constant great present NOW that exists this moment in which all who have died for centuries are) he has put all things under his feet and has made him the head over all things for the church. We often overlook that verse. But what it’s saying is that God has taken all the things that are wrong in the world and all the things that have resulted from the world’s independence of Him and he has taken all those things (whether they be cancer or whether the greed that dominates the disposition of wealth in the world), he has taken all the powers and chaos, all the diseases that people have in their own minds and bodies and he has put them under the feet of his son. That has been done, that victory has been won and that health has been wrought. Those discoveries have been made and now exist in eternity above time. And that is what we are called to minister. It is that power that we touch and that God has called us to communicate to this world in different ways. We think when it was said, “In the name of Jesus Christ be healed,” that that was an unusual miracle. No, that was an unusual sign. Yes, it was a sign but it also came from the fact that that healing had already taken place in Jesus above time. That sickness had been put under his feet. And what was happening was it was being manifested through Peter or through the disciple that touched the man’s head. That’s what we are called to do. We are called to be used by Jesus to manifest the things that he has already achieved. We think that when a human being changes from being a bitter, self-absorbed individual to an outgoing loving person that that is due to the influence or your example or character on them. Or it’s due to what they read in a book about how live above self. But it actually is a miracle that God achieved in his son before the world was. And so when we talk about service or works or ministry we are talking simply about the way in which God will use our cooperation to manifest something that he has already done. And so our calling is to that kind of ministry. There are things that God has done in the person that you are going to visit and try to sell jewelry to. There are things that he has done in her battered and twisted life that he has fixed in his son. And he is able to manifest some of those things through you to her. It is a miraculous work and that’s what Paul is talking about here — that you will be given this supernatural strength and power from God himself to do this kind of work. It lifts it all from this little admirable idea we have that they’ll see the kind of Christian that we are and they will be drawn to that whereas other Christians put them off. Or they’ll see the practical people we are in regards to business and they’ll throw away their idea that Christians are useless people that live off of others. And they’ll have a new respect for our Savior. Not so. They may do all those things but those things do not involve the spiritual change that God has done through his son by putting that under his feet. There is an invisible ministry of life that God has called us to that involves taking the things that he has done – you notice that he has put all things under his feet for the church. He has made him head over all things for the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all. So it’s Jesus as the head of his body who has achieved that need to be achieved and they are manifested through our ministry. That’s why he prays that we will have all the power from above that we need and that that is what we need above all things. So it does lift it all into what it really is – a supernatural ministry of God’s own life. It lifts it out of the realm of just us doing the same kind of thing as the last help yourself book did. It’s not a temporary do-it-yourself thing. We operate in a different realm. We are men and women really much like the story of “The Little Prince” by Oscar Wilde. Briefly there was a statue made of jewels and emeralds. The birds used to take an emerald from the prince and leave it with some poor person who could then sell it etc. It’s not a variation of the human side of that. It’s the supernatural side of that. Christ is there and he is the one. We are taking a bit of him and distributing that to different people. We are applying to different ones what he has already achieved on their behalf. So it is a supernatural work. But it does require what Paul is praying for in Colossians 1:11 because it does require that kind of supernatural power. “May you be strengthened with all power, according to his glorious might, for all endurance and patience with joy.” The patience with joy is possible because it isn’t work that you are doing yourself. It’s a joyful sharing of a reality that has already taken place. And so when you go out into the shops you do so not to achieve something for God or to do something that he will be able to bless. Instead, you go out with a joyful heart knowing that this is all done. “Lord you have fixed things in this person’s life, you have made everything right and I am there simply to share the light heartedness of that.” That’s why it’s done with joy. When it’s not done with joy you know it’s your own work. It’s heavy, wears you out, and tires you. When it’s his work and you’re simply distributing what he has done and you’re conscience of that then that is joy and that provides patience. Without that you have trouble with patience. The Greek word for patience is remaining under a thing that has become grinding day after day. You get into the car and drive mile after mile with your strength and your effort trying to do something for God. That is grinding and wears you out. It’s hard to stay with it and so patience grinds on you. You think I’ve done it before and how often have I done this? When it’s a joyful, delighted sense you think, “Lord you have made the whole world right in yourself and have put all things under the feet of Jesus. This thing is right and I am here to let them know that this thing will go alright and has already been fixed.” Then it is a joyful thing when you are sharing a rejoicing achievement. So it is very important to see what is your work. Is it your job to make that sale? Or is it your job to share the confidence you have that God sees what is needed here, has already made what is necessary to be made and has already completed the sale that has to be completed. Now your job is just to go in there and present. It’s the difference between the joyful sense of a thing done and the burden of responsibility — of trying to bring about this massive task that you have to do. It’s important to think through it. That’s why Paul says, “May you be strengthened with all power, according to his glorious might…” I don’t know if you know the importance of glorious. We have a tendency to think it’s people yelling, waving flags and praising the other people. That’s glorious. It’s not. Glorious in the Bible has the meaning of the thing that God has already done in Jesus. It’s all that he has already set at his right hand. He has set Jesus at his right hand. In himself at God’s right hand is all power and all achievement. So glory is something he has done, that has been achieved, that is already over. So it depends very much on where you live or as Watchman Nee said, “Position is everything”. Are you at the right hand of God in Jesus? Or are you down here slogging it out? I certainly know for myself that it’s a real problem when I spent all my time down here. It gets very heavy going when you get preoccupied with what has to be done down here. But when you begin to spend some time at the right hand of God you ask questions like: “Is Ernest O’Neill dead or is he alive? Is this creature with his bank accounts alive or dead? Is this creature who is slightly overlooked dead or alive? Is this my life that I have to somehow make right? Is this my job that I have to somehow do? Is this my reputation that I have somehow to look after? Is this my position that I have to watch and protect? Or is that poor creature crucified, dead and done away with? I exist as a bubble here in this world that is really part of Jesus. So it does make all the difference whether you see yourself down here slogging it out or whether you see yourself at God’s right hand. So, that’s why Paul prays, “May you be strengthened with all power, according to his glorious might…” I am most hesitant to read this because it requires great love of the English language with compound, complex sentences. It was written by Alexander McLaren. He is one of the greatest expositors and he writes long sentences. “Strengthen with all might. This is still a continuation of the apostle’s prayer for these believers. Having prayed for an increase of spiritual knowledge and that this might be put into practice he proceeds to pray for strength for them so that they can practice what they have knowledge of and to walk worthily, to please God in all things, to bring forth fruit with patience, to preserve in knowledge, and practice fruitfulness. It implies that believers are weak in themselves and insufficient to do and bear anything in themselves but stand in need of strength from above, even of all might and all kind of spiritual might and strength proportionate to the various kinds of services, temptations, and trials they are called into and exercised with. They have need of every kind strength in order to resist the temptations of Satan, to stand against them and bear up under them, to oppose the corruptions of their own nature that great company which comes upon them, wars against them, threatens to carry them captive (I think he means there the weaknesses of the body, the things we inherit as human beings) and destroy them against which they have no power of their own. To bear the cross without the presence and grace of Christ is very heavy and includes all afflictions and adversities of every sort which are grievous to the flesh and that which it recoils. To perform the various duties of religion and the whole of the work of their generation they have a will to do yet often know not how to perform. They want renewed strength with their souls and also to persevere in faith and holiness and hold out until the end. That which strengthens they cannot expect to have from themselves or from any creature but according to his glorious power — the glorious power of God. Power belongs to God. It’s a perfection of his nature and has been and is gloriously displayed in many things as in the creation of the heavens and the earth and the upholding of all things in their being.” This week when I was doing my exercise of rowing my right knee was giving a little problem. I saw, “Lord Jesus, you are at our Father’s right hand. This is your body and this is your knee. Thank you Lord, that this is your knee and we’re at the right hand of your Father.” And with that revelation I blasted on with the rowing and as you can guess the knee came alright. So it’s very realistic. Is he in me or has he left this body for me to look after? Is this his body or is it mine? And so it is very real. It’s Christ in you who does it. He does the miracles and he is that glorious power from on high. The apostles were endued with strength to do what they did and it’s by the same spirit that believers are strengthened with might in the inner man. And so it is a very real thing that you may be strengthened with might through his glorious power. They connect up directly with the right hand of God. God wants you to be strengthened with might at his right hand and that you live there in your own mind. When I faced my knee situation the other day it was very real. This is either his body or it’s mine. He is the one who holds the sky up at this moment; he is the one enabling those birds to fly. That is your energy and that is the energy you have in me and so I thanked the Savior for it. That’s what takes you above the holidays or vacations. You can’t live it by depending on your own human strength. You can only live it if he is in you and if you are leaning on him. If you are, then that glorious strength will give you a power that is not your own and will lift you above yourself. Undoubtedly that will give us pure joy. Every moment that comes when you sink down to this earth, it becomes a message from God to “look up!” That’s all it is. The message doesn’t need to be there. But God sees that you need it to “look up!” That’s why it’s there. So far from looking on a hardship, pain or a downer as a problem or as something opposing you that’s a loving message from your Father. “I’m here! Just look up and it will be gone.” It’s real that you will be strengthened with might in his glorious power. It’s all just to get us to live in him. It’s not what you achieve by doing it, but to give you the fun of living in reality. Let us pray.

Empowerment Through God’s Promises Colossians 1:11c Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill Colossians 1:11, “May you be strengthened with all power, according to his glorious might, for all endurance and patience with joy.” I would start us in our thoughts in Genesis 1:26 which is the call to dominion that God gave to mankind. “And God said, ‘Let us make man in our image, after our likeness; and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps upon the earth.” So that is God’s commission to us to have dominion over the earth. It’s the perversion of that that produces the Hitlers. It’s the perversion of that sense of authority that God has given us deep down over the world. It’s that, that is perverted by egotistic man into dictatorships and into all the ways that they want others to do what they want you to do and taking away individuality. So that’s the perversion that has taken place. It does connect up with our verse in Colossians because it brings us to the fact that God has actually arranged our lives to take part in that dominion. He has called each one of us to be part of his son and to help him to bring into the order of his will all that is here on the earth and probably eventually all that is in the whole universe. It’s in connection with that that we have any kind of authority at all. It’s in connection with that that the promise is made in Ephesians 2:10, “For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.” And it’s that commitment that God has given us in Jesus. There are good works that we are made to walk in and there are works that he has prepared beforehand. In other words, he has not thrown us into the world and said, “Clean this place up. Do your best.” He hasn’t done that. He has foreseen the whole situation and he himself has cleaned it up. He has prepared works beforehand for us to walk in. They are works that he himself has already accomplished but he wants us to be part of his son and part of himself as he completes the universe that he has made. And so each of us have works prepared beforehand that we are to walk in. We are free to agree with his plan or to disagree with it. But in a sense our life is already prepared for us and we are prepared for our lives. So he has not thrown the whole thing into a washing machine and then waited to see what it turns out. He has in fact made us in his image for a purpose that he has in mind and at any point we can say, “No, I don’t want that purpose.” That’s what is happening all over the world and has happened constantly down through the years. And he has committed himself to bearing that and bearing it until the very edge of nothingness. He has committed himself to bearing it until the very end. I have put it in these terms. It’s like God is saying, “Hit me until you want to stop hitting me.” So he has expanded what free will means. He has gone beyond what anyone could expect anyone to go in order to give us the realization that we had free will. We could even kill his own son. So that’s the situation we are in. We are in a place where our life is laid out for us and prepared for us but we are still able to say “No, or Yes” to it. So each of us have works prepared for us that we are intended to walk in but we can refuse to walk in them. But they are no surprise to God. He has prepared them ahead. And so when he talks of us doing things, they are things that he has already planned and worked into his overall program for the universe. It will fit into not only his glory and enjoyment but into our glory and enjoyment. So that’s part of what this call to dominion means. We have a life laid out for us that we can refuse if we want to refuse it. But also a life that we can walk in if we are willing to walk it. We can therefore walk in a known way and a sure path. We can walk in a confidence that we cannot produce ourselves. And so it’s in the light of that we are looking at the verse before us. There are works prepared beforehand. That is, there are things that have to be brought into order in this world that are already laid out for us to walk in. Now the other mystery is that he has already brought them under his control. They are where they are by his permission. He is the once that says, “Seas, stop, come no further. Waves, stop there and go back.” He is the one that controls the limits of this chaos or this order. And so he is always there with his hand carefully on it in love. In that sense he has already done the work. That ties up with Ephesians 1:22. It is talking about Christ’s ascension to the right hand of God. Ephesians 1:21-23, “far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and above every name that is named, not only in this age but also in that which is to come; and he has put all things under his feet and has made him the head over all things for the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all.” And he has put all things under his feet. That’s one of the things that God did when he raised Jesus from the dead and destroyed death. He put all things under Jesus’ feet — all the things that are chaotic — all the things that are in rebellion– all the things that have fallen apart. He has put all those things under his feet. He has made him head over all things for the church. So God has put all things under Jesus and he has made all things right in Jesus. He has taken all the pollution and nuclear explosions that man has created and put all of those under his feet. He has made Jesus head over all those things. And those are the things many of us are involved in tackling each time we clean a toilet. In some sense we are dealing with what is not like God — things that are dirty or corrupt or have deteriorated. We are part of him bringing that into the order and beauty of his mind and heart. That was put under the feet of Jesus. Jesus cleaned that toilet before we ever got near to it. He cleaned up the ocean before BP ever started to clean away the oil spill. He has done all those things. They are only possible to us human beings because God himself has already done them in eternity and that’s what we all have difficulty with. We talk glibly about Einstein and the space world. But we are very slow at grabbing hold of the fact that eternity is now. This is it. It is now. It is a great eternal present moment and time is something that God has actually allowed for a little bit. He has taken a little bit of eternity and called it time. But actually it’s all one great moment. That fact is what explains how Christ has actually done all these things. He has already cleaned all these things up and brought everything into order. He has already met the person that you are going to meet tomorrow who says, “Your jewelry is terrible. It’s miserable and not sold for me.” He has already dealt with that and brought it into order under God’s will. Because he subjects all things to the counsel of his own will. That’s why God can sleep at night because he has brought all things into order. God has touched everything and brought everything under his own control. To us it’s a mystery but God is able to bring all things under his will. And that’s what he did in Jesus. That brings us to the kind of thing that you face every day. It’s back in Colossians 1:11. “May you be strengthened with all power, according to his glorious might, for all endurance and patience with joy.” “May you be strengthened with all power…..” What Paul is saying is, “May you yourself be strengthened with the power that God has already exercised over the chaos of the world and that he has already applied to the works to which you are involved day by day. May you be strengthened with that power that he has already exercised in Jesus when he put those things under his feet. The person who said to you, “Your jewelry is so dull and old fashioned”, at that very moment the whole wrong attitude has been dealt with by God our Father. The answer has already been designed by him so that he will lead us in triumph in all things in Christ Jesus. He has already done that and Paul is praying that you will receive the power that that has been exercised against that lack of God’s will in the universe. And you will receive that power and will experience it in that situation. That power will lift you above that situation. He is saying, “May you be strengthened with all power, according to his glorious might.” His glorious might is the might that he has exercised in Christ at his right hand far above all authority and dominion and power. That’s what the glory means. It’s that place that is above the earth and its limitations. May you be strengthened with all power according to his glorious might for all endurance with patience with joy. It separates you from the miserable little thing inside where you are thinking, “Oh she thinks that jewelry isn’t very good. Maybe it isn’t good. Maybe it is old fashioned. Maybe it won’t sell.” It lifts you above all of that and enables you to endure all that with joy instead of with fear. You are not a little nobody who is trying to pander a few bits of jewelry to a shop owner but you are with Jesus at God’s right hand far above all authority and dominion and power. That’s what the glory means. It’s that place that is above the earth and its limitations. May you be strengthened with all power according to his glorious might for all endurance with patience with joy. It separates you from this miserable little thing inside where you are thinking, “Oh she thinks that jewelry isn’t very good. Maybe it isn’t good. Maybe it is old fashioned. Maybe it won’t sell.” It lifts you above all of that and enables you to endure all that with joy and not with fear. You are not a little nobody who is trying to pander a few bits of jewelry to a shop owner but you can operate with endurance and joy. You know that God foresaw this work. He planned for me to walk in it and he is certainly not going to walk me into a wall. He’s never done that before. He has a way for me to walk through this and he has a way forward. And that’s what he means, “May you be strengthened with the power and the might at his right hand.” God gives us the power to see these works and to walk in them in joy. Not a false joy, but a certain joy that he has solved this in reality. This has been solved. This is a temporary moment in time but this has actually been solved and he has already carried your own life beyond this and into victory in his son. You are already at his right hand and he already has his hand on your shoulder. And it’s that that Paul is praying for — that you’d be strengthened with that kind of power. Colossians 1:11 “May you be strengthened with all power, according to his glorious might, for all endurance and patience with joy.” It’s because all of it has already been done and has been solved. The situations that you walk into day by day are already written in his book, every one of them. He has already examined each one and worked out how he is going to weave it into the pattern he has for your life. Paul is saying may you be strengthened with power that has brought order into all the things that you come up against in your day by day life. May you be strengthened with that power so that you can walk with endurance, with patience and with joy. And it’s again what Watchman Nee says, “Position is everything.” Am I really this poor little Midwesterner with a little bag of jewelry trying to pander some stuff over to a buyer? Or, am I God’s child whose life has already been written clearly in his book and who has been raised up to sit with his son at his right hand and has already taken part in the victory over the world and the bringing into order of the world itself. So the issue is, “Are you walking in things for the first time trying to find your way through this muddle or are you walking in works that God has already planned for you and the solution that he has already worked out?” It’s a matter of which is which. He’s praying that you’ll know what is true and that you live in victory because all of it has already been done and has been solved. The situations that you walk into day by day are already written in his book, every one of them. He has already examined each one and worked out how he is going to weave it into the pattern he has for your life. Paul is saying, may you be strengthened with the power that has brought order into all the things that you come up against in your day by day life. May you be strengthened with that power so that you can walk with endurance, with patience and with joy. So it’s interesting that all the things that you and I meet day by day are old stuff to the Father. They are things that he has already settled in his son. They are things already under his Son’s feet. The last important point to make is, “How do you know what to do in that situation?” And that’s where he prays for the Holy Spirit to give you light so that you can see that he has already done the work and then in the light of that what you’ve to do. Your reaction is very different if you know he has already solved this. Your response to the person in that situation is very different from your response if you’re wondering, “What is the answer to this? Maybe they’re right. Maybe this jewelry is the pits. Maybe it won’t sell.” That’s a different situation entirely. Then you have a whole problem inside that you struggle with and you fight and have conflict within. So it’s very different and that’s what he is saying, “See it as it really is. See it as something that is under the feet of my son, that I have already solved and believe me it’s beautiful jewelry.” And God is able to help you to see reality, to see things as they really are. That’s what he is praying for here, that you’ll be strengthened with the power to respond in the light of the reality with the power that comes from how things really are rather than from the way you think they are.

Strengthened According to God’s Glorious Might Colossians 1:11d Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill Let’s read Colossians 1:11, May you be strengthened with all power, according to his glorious might, for all endurance and patience with joy.” It says, “May you be strengthened with all power, according to his glorious might.” God just brought to my mind again the meaning of that which we touched upon a little last time. May you be strengthened with all power according to his glorious might. So often we think of that as just according to God who gives you might. But really the important thing about it is that the might is in a certain place and it’s back there in Ephesians 1 and it’s really part of that great prayer of Paul’s. Ephesians 1:15 -22–For this reason, because I have heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love toward all the saints, I do not cease to give thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers, that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you a spirit of wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of him, having the eyes of your hearts enlightened, that you may know what is the hope to which he has called you, what are the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints, and what is the immeasurable greatness of his power in us who believe, according to the working of his great might which he accomplished in Christ when he raised him from the dead and made him sit at his right hand in the heavenly places, far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and above every name that is named, not only in this age but also in that which is to come; and he has put all things under his feet and has made him the head over all things for the church.” And we often read that off and say that it’s a nice way to put it. He’s put all things under his feet and has made him head over all things for the church. That’s a nice picture and I’m sure it is true but it has really very little practical outworking. And of course the fact is that’s the base of everything. He has put all things under his feet and has made him the head over all things for the church. In other words the whole world has fallen apart into chaos and God has put it all in his son and has put him head over all the chaos and has put all the chaos under his feet. He has dealt with all the unknown invisible powers, all the principalities and powers, all the great powers of darkness. He has put them all under his son’s feet. He has seen all that. He knows that there are mighty powers such as you glimpse a little in the cruelty of Isis. But really that’s one of the more obvious ones. The fact is there are all kinds of deception and lying that are going on continually. For instance, take the administration that runs New York City where the deal fellow Silver had a whole system of lies and deception that governed all kinds of contracts that were made over 20-30 years. And so throughout the world there are all kinds of invisible spiritual powers and deceptions going on. All deep cruelties and intense hatreds that we don’t see at all but are underneath, God has seen all those develop. He has not only foreseen the things like the mess pollution makes of the world, or the things that happen when we do certain things to our oceans. He has not only seen all those but he has seen all the invisible, spiritual powers that have become twisted and corrupted and that are set against him and against his way of doing things. In other words he’s seen that there is a whole series of substitute powers that claim to do what he himself does in his purity. And he has put all those things under his son’s feet. He has worked great spiritual transactions in eternity that has meant that all those things are destroyed. And that’s what we fight not only in our dear friends. I could put it into a very personal way. My brother was so bad tempered. He specialized in choosing my mom’s beautiful vases and throwing them at me or something in the house. And the dear fellow would come after me with swords. I had a bathroom door with a whole in it because he was coming for me with a sword! There were no psychologists or psychiatrists in those days and so you can imagine what my poor mother was going through. Our family doctor, who probably knew nothing about psychology, was the one my mother went to. What could she do? Here was a fellow who was out of control and she didn’t know what to do. At one time my father theorized about the moon. Did it happen at the time of the full moon? Our little problems were nothing compared to the difficulties that other people had. We both knew drunken families where the husband would come home and beat up the wife. So there are all kinds of powers underneath that are working all the time in the world and our poor family doctor didn’t know what to do with my brother. And it carried on like that right until even his death in a sense. What was working there was something deeper and that’s what we often face. We are often face things that are far deeper than the outward symptoms of the situation. This is why I thought we should touch upon this today. It’s very easy to think that God will strengthen us with might to put these things right and do the things that we’ve to do. We’ll say this to this person and that to that person. We’ll go to this country and distribute Bibles. Or, we’ll give money to this source to solve this problem. And we think that’s doing the work of the Lord. No, the work of the Lord is deeper than that. God has sent us here so that his son in us could deal with these invisible powers. With these unseen forces that are the real cause of the difficulties that we come up against that’s why he sent us here. That’s why often even among ourselves we talk a lot. Sometimes we don’t talk when we should but often we talk a lot. E. Stanley Jones said, “If you talk less to other people and talk more to God about other people and talk to other people less about God you’d see more work done.” That’s because the real power that is needed is the power that God has put under Christ’s feet. It’s a spiritual power and that’s why it’s called a glorious power — his glorious might. It’s a power that is greater than our psychological influences or our verbal comments. And God has put us here to express and administer that power. Your point is so relevant about really going to Jesus about a person. It’s not going nominally to Jesus and asking him if he’d like me to say something to the person. It’s not asking the Lord to give you the words if he wants you to say anything. That’s the way out. It’s not asking God to klonk us on the head so we can know if we should say something. It’s not in those outward things that God works. He is sending us so that Christ can do a work through us that is a continuation of the victory that Christ has won already. That’s our place. You can see how weak our position is, how hopeless it is because we interpret it in a shallow way. Oh yes, I’m here to do things for the Lord or for the Lord to say certain things through me. Or we think, “What would Christ do in this situation? That’s what I have to work out and then I have to do that.” We are so often playing games and we know we are playing games because we see no change. We see nothing changed. We just say to each other, “Oh he’s a bit better than he was. Or the situation is improving. You know these things take time.” But the real fact is that we are not involved in spiritual work at all. We are not being strengthened by his glorious might. We have no idea what Christ put under his feet in this situation because we never talk to him about it. And so often there are all kinds of attitudes and spiritual positions and deceptions that continue even as we are doing our outward work with the person. It can be in regard even to our own situation here. We can be saying the right thing to each other but it doesn’t make any difference. Could it be you weren’t saying anything relevant at all and that wasn’t the issue? It’s something that the Savior would explain to you if you would wait upon the Lord. They that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength. They shall rise up wings as the eagles. They’ll understand and be able to discern. So really what I ask you to do is just to grasp mentally that fact that being strengthened by the glorious might of Christ is knowing what Christ has put under his feet in this situation, understanding what the heart of this issue is and knowing that and then receiving from him wisdom to minister and build on what he has done. So that there is work coming from his spirit inside the person. Or, there is work coming from his spirit against a certain spirit or atmosphere in a situation. Then, there is revelation by you in even your face, sometimes by your smile or your general attitude, sometimes maybe even by a word. But it needs the inner working of God’s spirit in the person and a work is done. So, I thought it’s so important that we should go back on it and see what that is, “strengthened by his glorious might”. It’s the might that he wrought from his position of glory at God’s right hand. Where God raised him up and made him sit with him in heavenly places and at that moment put all things under his feet and made him the head over all things for the church. We are distributors of a power that Jesus himself has wrought in the situation. That’s why he talks about patience and joy. You find it’s a joyful thing and not something you are strained about. It’s a thing you have infinite patience for because you know it’s been done. It’s one of joy because Jesus’ spirit passes through you and that brings the joy of God. You feel the joy of Christ when you are exercising his power. So it’s something deeper than just a message from the Lord. It’s worth taking very seriously when you think of those problems that we call chronic, either chronic physical problems, or chronic problems or chronic spiritual problems. It’s not a matter of continually hammering along with your human equipment. It’s finding out from the Lord what he has dealt with in that situation and receiving from him any directions that he has for any part that you should play in that. It’s very much you and him, him and you. It’s very much your relationship together and that’s where the ministry is. You can see a little how this touches upon the whole business that we are involved in. The father is so kind. He appreciates anything we do. He is so generous to us. He sees our bumbling ways. But why continue to bumble and go through motions when the real work of God has already been started by Jesus. It’s a lot more than, “Lord, I’ll be talking with my customer Jean Brown and showing her our new jewelry. Will you bless our conversation?” It’s much more having a concern for Jean Brown. Do you really care for Jean Brown besides getting a sale and have you expressed that to Him. Have you talked with Jesus about Jean Brown to see if he has anything to say about her to you before you see her? It’s something very fine and noble. It’s something refined and much subtler than our ideas. So that’s Colossians 1:11 “May you be strengthened with all power, according to his glorious might, for all endurance and patience with joy.” That’s what God has for us. Let us pray.

Christ Is the Firstborn of all Creation Colossians 1:15 – 23 Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill Let’s turn to Colossians 1:15-23. It is one of the clearest statements of the gospel that we have. “He (Jesus) is the image of the invisible God, the first-born of all creation; for in him all things were created, in the Heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or authorities – all things were created through him and for him. He is before all things, and in him all things hold together. He is the head of the body, the church; he is the beginning, the first-born from the dead, that in everything he might be pre-eminent. For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross, And you, who once were estranged and hostile in mind, doing evil deeds, he has now reconciled in his body of flesh by his death, in order to present you holy and blameless and irreproachable before him, provided that you continue in the faith, stable and steadfast, not shifting from the hope of the gospel which you heard, which has been preached to every creature under heaven, and of which I, Paul became a minister.” One of the things that give me difficulty as I tried to deal with the gospel and its meaning after I became a Christian at 13 first and then really at 17 years of age – was that Jesus bore our sins. I believed it because that was the gospel but it actually bewildered me. I thought he bore my sins in 29 A.D. but I wasn’t even alive then. I hadn’t time to do anything wrong so how did he bear my sins? I believed what everyone said that you take it by faith and so for a long time I tried to do that. I thought a bit like the illustration that Paul Little gives. There’s a little boy in Sunday school that is asked, “What is faith?” He then says, “Faith is believing what isn’t true.” I was a bit like that. I thought you are saved by faith and although I didn’t say that faith was believing what isn’t true, it’s really what I meant. I believe that Jesus bore my sins, even though I hadn’t committed them and didn’t live till thousands of years later yet I believe in some way that he bore my sins. So to tell you the truth, the result was that throughout the years I didn’t really understand what you meant when you said that. It still baffles me when I read a man as bright as Francis Collins. Francis Collins wrote The Language of God and he is the top scientist that is heading up the genome research in America for the government. He is much respected and The Language of God is a very good book. It’s very clear and has a C.S. Lewis approach to the reasonability of believing in God. Yet, in one sentence he passes over it when he says, “Of course this wouldn’t be possible if we didn’t believe that Jesus died for our sins.” His statement was right enough but to me I thought it was funny that he didn’t go into it any more. Maybe he chose not to because he was dealing with a different subject. But it has surprised me how many people toss that off — Jesus died for your sins – of course he did, yet I’m sure there must be many people who think the same as me. And so I got into all the theories. Well God paid Satan off by offering Jesus as a ransom for our sins. So it was paying a ransom to Satan for our sins. And of course that was baffling because it made Satan equal with God. Yet that ransom theory was “the” theory in evangelical circles. So all down through the years I’ve had difficulty with that. In what sense did Jesus die for my sins if he actually died back then? Did I ever read these verses? Yes, a thousand times I have read these verses. Did I understand them? Not for a moment. And I’m daring to say this morning that great parts of Christendom have no idea what those verses are about. They are absolutely bewildering. They are so “Einstein”. It’s the whole truth of infinity. It’s the whole truth that God sees the whole of history as one second. And that the final reality is that this is all just one present moment that we are experiencing. I’ve tried to put that in my writing where God kindly plays back that one second in century spaces so that we can appreciate it. But the actual reality of life is that it’s one eternal, present moment. And that’s what these verses are getting at. I don’t think many people understand the verses. You know what the gospel is but most preachers don’t touch this at all. I can understand because it’s difficult to get over to an ordinary person the idea of eternity as being one present moment. God sees everything in one second. In other words what Einstein says is true. Time and space are relative. If you go up to the top of the Foshay Tower the clock is going faster than it is at the bottom. According to where you are in space, your time is goes faster or slower. There is a place therefore somewhere in the physical universe where time virtually stands still. But that’s what these verses are talking about. I agree with you that it brings up a lot of other difficulties. Let’s look at it and I’ll share as clearly as I can understand. First of all it is talking about Jesus. What do people think of when they think of Jesus? He’s the man in the long garments in the Middle East, in the first century with a beard. And they think that’s Jesus. They think he was a local preacher in the first century and he lived for 3-4 years as far as ministry was concerned and he was crucified and then rose from the dead. But they think that that’s Jesus. They don’t think of him as much more than that. If you said to a person that he is really at God’s right hand they would say, sure. But they don’t think of him as the image of the invisible God. They think he is like God but he’s the perfect image of God. He is the image of the invisible God – the God that made the whole universe. He’s exactly like Jesus. Jesus is exactly like him. The next clause is just a phrase. He is the image of the invisible God, the first-born of all creation. You feel like hitting yourself on the head. What a minute – he’s the first-born of all creation. He’s either born or he is created. Which is he? Of course it’s plainly saying that he’s the first-born. Of the whole creation of life he was the very first and he was born. He wasn’t created, he was born. So he was part of God. That’s why we call him the only begotten son. He was first-born. He came in 4 B.C. but that was when he appeared on earth as the first-born of all creation. Before there was anything, there was God and he had an only son, Jesus. Jesus was born of his father. He was the first-born of everything. Now, I submit to you I don’t think people think that way for a moment. I don’t think they think that Jesus was actually born and had a life. They know that we talk about Jesus and his preexistence but it’s kind of a theological phrase. Yes, he was preexistent. Obviously if he had anything to do with God then he was preexistent. But they don’t really grasp that he was born of his father before there was any creation. Why am I bothering you with this? To tell you the truth it’s important that sometime we start sharing things as they really are. First of all it would deal with a lot of people who have had the same problems that I have had. Certainly it would be right along with the theoretical physicists and their belief that Einstein was right. Time and space are relative and time hardly exists at all. So, it is important that sooner or later we start trying to deal with this in our websites and with the things that we are sharing. I feel a bit like the man who said, “If you preach the gospel about everything but the center of problems in the age in which you live you haven’t preached the gospel.” It’s really important that we preach the gospel in a way that deals with the present atmosphere in which we live. Why people like Dawkins can make so much trouble for truth is because we are not sharing the gospel and explaining it. I agree with you that it takes a bit of work. So let’s go to it. He is the image of the invisible God, the first-born of all creation. For in him all things were created. You mean Jesus with the long garments and beard? In him all things — I know that you’ll say they do believe it but they don’t. Nobody really believes that. They read that and say that John already said that. “In Him all things were created. Without him not anything was made that was made. In Him was life and the life was the light of men.” They remember those verses of John but also that things were created. They remember that and treat it as more of a general, philosophical statement. They don’t treat it as being the Jesus that we see in the gospel. In him all things were created. Hitler? Yes. You? Yes you and me. All things were created. We were created in him back then….. Our moms were a way of God getting us onto this physical planet but we ourselves were created in him. For in him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible. Whether thrones or dominions or principalities or authorities— all things were created through him and for him. He is before all things and in him all things hold together. And so everything was made inside of Jesus. He must have had a lot of sins to bear. If it’s up to us we would deal with a bunch of criminals by building steel fences and arming with guns so that we keep them well away from us. We would not bring them into our own home. We say, “Sure give them free will and let them do what they want. The only way they’ll ever be able to appreciate me or to know me or to be like me is if I give them free will. But I’m not going to live with that.” But that is what God did. He made us all inside his only begotten son. I dare to put it this way and I know it’s extreme and provocative but God did what he did so that he wouldn’t lose us. I think that’s what was in his dear mind. I’m with everybody here who says you have to have faith to appreciate it but your faith won’t make it true unless it is true. He made everything inside of his son. You will not be lost because you are not in his son. You’ll lose the reality of it maybe……I don’t know. You’ll lose the perception of it if you don’t have faith. Faith creates nothing. It just recognizes what is truth. But that’s where you and I are today. Hitler – I just pick him because he is one of the worst. God put all things in his son and it’s not just his son that bears the sins. Our dear father bears them every day. Everything each of us does occurs inside of him. There isn’t a thing that we think or a feeling that we have that he and his dear son do not know. Of course you can see it begins to make sense of all kinds of things. It begins to make sense of that cry of forsakenness on the cross. “My God, my God why has though forsaken me?” Well, obviously it was our father being torn apart by his love for us and yet it was taking place inside of his son. Why I think it’s worth the trouble to work out how to express this because people don’t know our God. They don’t know their dear Father. They don’t know what he has done and what he does every day. You see the way it goes on… “All things were created through him and for him. He is before all things and in him all things hold together.” As this little insect tries to get into this part of his body and poison the blood, he restrains it in order to keep the blood flowing to all the other parts. So he is continually working to hold his own body together in the midst of all the desperate elements that are trying to destroy it and to break it up. He is before all things and in him all things hold together. We casually wonder why Bearden stepped back at that moment. Or why did the invasion take place just like it did on D-Day? Or why did such and such a things happen? Boy wasn’t that lucky. It wasn’t lucky at all. It was our dear father who has continually, again and again, repeatedly held things back. Why was I lying on the gurney waiting, when a surgeon passes by and happens to notice my chart? There are thousands of things that could have occurred. He is the head of the body, the church. He is the beginning the first-born from the dead. Yes, the ones that died in him he raised them up. Calvary was just the outward historical expression of the agony that he had been bearing for centuries. So there is a whole reality that God has born everything that every human being has ever done. He has born that in his only son so that he could give us the chance to accept and to turn and to live. Very few people are thinking about that. In fact what Christendom did to the gospel was to destroy the idea. Patripassianism is a well-known heresy meaning the “father suffering”. The issue was not just that the father was suffering but they believed the father could not suffer. They believe the Latin and Greek deity was the right one. God was a person who was impassable or impenetrable and could not be touched by the failures or the imperfections of humanity. And so we were brought up with the idea that God was way up there and he was untouchable. Mary was in some way touchable but God himself was not touched. We were trying in some way to protect the absolute holiness, purity, and indestructability of God. So we emphasized that the deity is untouched by us. We are influenced by the statements in the New Testament that he was touched by our infirmities. Statements like Jesus wept when Lazarus had died showed that he had been touched in sympathy but they themselves were not touched. We certainly don’t believe that all the worst in the world was right in the heart of his son which he felt every day. And so the world has little idea of God’s heart. It has very little idea of what their dear creator is like. It doesn’t matter if it is the abortion issue or all the other stupid arguments that people have about god as if he is a “thing” to talk about. Instead he is the dear person who has held us in his heart from the very beginning. Think about it because we need to begin to share some of this. I understand that it’s often possible to slip over into Satan’s extreme. You have to try to state things as honestly as you can but I would say it’s unthinkable that you won’t touch it. I agree with you that we should talk with each other and describe how we are going to say things. We should do what we can to help each other to put it rightly. But certainly it begs to be shared. Men and women do not know how dear our Father is. Yet, it’s here and you can see it. You can’t make any sense of it except to ignore it. And that’s what most people do. You can just ignore that piece and other similar pieces in the Bible. But our Father is really something. He is so kind. Of course you’re right. It’s very near to universalism except that universalism says that everyone is going to be saved whatever their attitude. No, our Father is going to keep on keeping on. He will keep on keeping on until eventually we turn. The Protestants have kept things as a very tight club. God has not born all our sins. He will bear your sins if you confess them at an altar, if you do this and do that…. No. Our dear father has been bearing them faithfully from the very beginning. We have a friend that says, “We know where we’re going!” But God has us in his heart and he will keep on holding us there until we eventually believe and see and open our hearts to him. So in a very real way there will be no drunkards or robbers in Heaven. There won’t. God will bear with them until they change. Because the steadfast love of the Lord never ceases. His mercies are new every morning. His mercies never come to an end. So you can see that it’s something very precious that God has given us. We have this silly computer system and we can ask for his grace to begin to share some of this to others. Let us pray.

God’s View of Reality Ephesians 1:1a Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill We’re going to start Ephesians. If you open your Bible into Ephesians, we’ll try to begin. I’ll explain a little of the historical and geographical end of it, loved ones. [Pointing to map in the Bible:] That’s Italy of course, and then Greece comes down there and then you’re over and down in Jerusalem. That’s the Mediterranean. This is Africa, and here’s Rome and there’s Ephesus and Antioch. This is Palestine here and Jerusalem is down here. About 54 A.D., Paul started his third missionary journey. [Still pointing to Bible map:] I believe he went like that, and then up around there, and back. He arrived in Ephesus. The journey went on to about 58 A.D., and he arrived in Ephesus and spent from 54 to 57 in Ephesus — so probably longer than he had spent in any other church. He established a church there and was there roughly two years. And then you remember, he was arrested and taken to Rome. In 62 A.D., he wrote three letters and one of them was the letter to the Ephesians. So that’s a little of the background. As we go through Ephesians over the next 10 years or as many years as it takes us, we’ll talk more about the background of the church, but those are the historical issues. He did three missionary journeys and it was during his third one that he traveled to Ephesus, spent two years there in a church, went on around, then came back, and then was arrested and taken to Rome in probably about 60 A.D. He was allowed there to remain in fairly safe house arrest and it was during that time that he wrote many of his letters — and one of them he wrote to the Ephesians. The church at Ephesus was quite mature and therefore there were not a lot of problems in it. In the letter to the Corinthians, he had to deal with the man who was living with his father’s wife and all that kind of thing. They had problems over communion and the celebration of the Lord’s supper and so he was dealing with specific issues there. But in Ephesians he isn’t. The church at Ephesus had not a whole lot of problems. Old Luther described the letter to the Romans as the purest and plainest expression of the gospel that you could find — and that’s one of the reasons I attempted to expound it over those years. But I think Lloyd-Jones is right in saying that if Romans is the purest and plainest exposition of the gospel, then Ephesians is the sublimest and the most majestic. It is a wonderful book and it’s only when you begin to see the complexity of the old Greek sentences that you realize how full of eloquence it is. You begin to see this is not an ordinary exposition of the gospel at all. You could in fact say there are many characteristics that it has, but one of them certainly is that it’s reality described from the standpoint of God. It’s reality described from the standpoint of God. Actually, it’s describing reality from the heavenly places and so it is more real than most of what we are concerned with. We’re concerned with, “What can the Lord do for me? What has the Lord saved me from? How is the Lord going to help me in this situation?” I remember the gentlemen, Edwin Ore. I think he’s now with Jesus. He was a very intelligent, very scholarly man from Belfast who went to Cambridge University, had two or three Cambridge degrees, and then traveled all around the world in the 1920s and ‘30s, believe it or not, as an evangelist having very, very large meetings in America, and Britain, and in Africa, and in Europe. So really, he was a very powerful man. Many years ago, when Irene and I met with him for lunch in Los Angeles, I remember him saying, “So much of today’s Christianity is like the song, ‘Is there anyone around who could lift me off the ground?’” I think that that describes a lot of what we call, Christianity”. It’s very egocentric. It’s utterly preoccupied with, “Was it a good meeting?” not, “Did it bring glory to God?” but, “Was it a good meeting in that it brought satisfaction and pleasure to me?” And, “Was this a good prayer meeting?” usually means, “Was I inspired by it? Were there a lot of emotional prayers that lifted me up?” So often we’re thinking in terms of, “What can the Lord can do for me? Or, “I’m not going to that church anymore because the teaching isn’t as good as I want”, or, “I’m not going to THIS church anymore because it isn’t doing anything for me.” So we’re utterly preoccupied with ourselves. It’s really atheism, but we give it the name of “Christianity”. Well of course, Ephesians is a complete corrective to that. It talks about reality from the point of view of heaven, the “heavenly places”. It’s full of language that defies the use even of ordinary adjectives. So you find that Paul piles adjective on adjective on adjective because he’s really beginning to hit those things that no one can describe in ordinary human words. It has another great corrective to our attitude here because he makes no excuse for saying, “There’s a mystery. There is a deep mystery in God. There is a mystery that we will never completely understand.” Of course, we silly little people have said, “Oh, there must be no mystery. We must understand it fully otherwise, we can’t accept it.” We understand little of it because we’ll only accept what little we understand and we will not go on trust at all. We miss all the glory, and the beauty, and the wonder of what God has for us because we’re always analyzing the thing, taking it apart, finding out how you do this. Think of how often you hear: “How do you pray? How do you get filled with the Spirit? How do you speak in tongues? How do you witness?” We’re always talking about “how to” — how to so that somehow we think we can do it. Well of course, Paul says, “There is a great mystery here. There is a mystery, some of which you will never plum, and you will need to trust your Father.” Of course, often we end up in our methodological atheism because we will not accept there is a mystery and we won’t trust our Father. We’ll only trust ourselves and our pea brains, because that’s about the size they are compared with his. That’s why we often see our Christianity as so human or so humanistic. It’s really deteriorated into a kind of atheistic salvation much like Buddhism. Ephesians, of course, changes all that because Paul says, “It’s God. It’s GOD that matters. God is the center of everything. God is the controller of everything.” We always want to control. That’s why many of us end up with tranquilizers and many end up in psychic wards — because we try to control our own lives the way WE want. We want to control everything, every little thing. We grow tighter and tighter and we actually shrink more, and more, and more until actually, we don’t have a very large sphere of reality at all. It’s a very small sphere. We live in a very tiny world and inside that tiny world, as Chesterton said, “The insane are very logical and they’re very logical inside their own insanity. It’s just they don’t reach out to reality.” So we’re very logical in that. That’s why people shrink and grow smaller, and smaller. I didn’t catch it completely, but I think Sheila was saying that some guy killed an old age pensioner by pushing a grocery trolley into him yesterday. That’s why we do this kind of thing. That’s why we have road rage because we have this tiny little world that gets smaller, and smaller, and smaller, and we alone matter — nobody else matters. It’s utter unreality. God, of course, is allowing dreadful things like that to happen — to give us warning, “You’re shrinking into a hell of unreality.” Ephesians takes it out into reality and Paul says, “God, GOD is the one who controls everything.” Why did Jesus wait for 2,000 years to come after the century began? Well, because God times everything. God times things. God determines things. But you know, we have learned even to rebel against that. We want, “Oh, but why did he? Why did he?” And so dumb-dumbs like me try to explain why he did — but finally, it’s right what God has said in Ephesians, God is God. He owns the thing. He owns the whole thing. He’s made it all. It’s his. He can do what he wants. He can turn the thing upside down if he wants. So of course, we have turned it upside down by putting our mighty selves, all the little dwarfs, standing on the communion table. That’s what it’s like — lots of little pigmy’s saying, “Me, me, me.” Underneath is the Christ who has bled, who is the one who has made the table, has made the dwarfs, has made everything. So, it’s utter unreality the egocentricity of our Christianity today. Ephesians of course says, “No. God is the one who has control over time. He has predestined you to be his sons through Jesus Christ from before the foundation of the world.” It’s that great realm of eternity that Paul begins to deal with in Ephesians. It is a mighty gospel. Those are some of the characteristics of it, but let’s begin right at the first verse. You see it there, Ephesians 1:1, “Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, to the saints who are also faithful in Christ Jesus.” An “apostle” of Jesus Christ is that word, “apostolos” (ap-os’-tol-os) in Greek. You can see it (“apostle”) in English. Paul, first of all, calls himself an “apostolos”, an apostle. What is an apostle? Well, you can look at it there as he describes it in 1 Corinthians 9:1, “Am I not free? Am I not an apostle?” And then he gives the first characteristic of an apostle, “Have I not seen Jesus our Lord?” In the charismatic circles, they say, “Oh, that’s an apostolic work.” I remember one dear fellow came to me come from Nelson Publisher. He wanted me to write a book in the old days in Minneapolis. He said, “You’re involved in a real apostolic work.” (I didn’t take him up on it.) Well, we’re not talking about that kind of apostle. They mean by that, “That’s very remarkable work”, or “That’s a work” — they dare say — “on the same level as the apostles” — which is ridiculous. So, it’s not that use of the word apostle. It’s “apostle” in the sense, “I saw Jesus. I saw Jesus. The disciples saw Jesus alive physically. I also saw him. I saw him on the road when he struck me blind. I saw Jesus.” So a historical apostle is, first of all, one who has personally seen Jesus. That’s why they talked about the apostles and that’s why we talk about the Apostles’ Creed. It’s tied to those days when Jesus himself was seen physically by men. So first of all, “Am I not an apostle? Have I not seen Jesus our Lord? Are not you my workmanship in the Lord?” The second characteristic of an apostle is that there are people who have received Jesus and been changed in their lives under his ministry. That’s why he says, “If to others I am not an apostle, at least I am to you; for you are the seal of my apostleship in the Lord.” So an apostle is one who has seen Jesus alive and who has also seen God work in other’s lives through his ministry. There’s something else about an apostle, that comes from a Greek verb that looks like that, “apostelo” and it means “to send”. Look at Mark 6:7, “And he called to him the twelve, and began to send them out two by two, and gave them authority over the unclean spirits.” It’s someone that Jesus has sent. It’s not someone who has seen a need. It’s not that. It’s not someone who has seen a need, has seen the poor children in a certain city and felt, “Somebody should try to help those.” It’s not somebody who sees, “That place needs a church. I think I ought to go and found a church there.” It’s someone who is sent by Jesus. An apostle is not someone who says, “Well, I have this talent,” and then it really is like this — I know we don’t say it like this, but it is like this — “How shall I use it for the Lord?” I mean, we’re so pathetic, but it’s not that. The apostles had none of that. They didn’t get together and say, “Now Peter, you’re good at this. Now Paul, you’re good at this. Now you’d be good at this. The Lord must mean you to do that.” They didn’t – they didn’t even think of talents. They knew talents were of no value in doing God’s work, so there’s no thought of that. There was only one thing that made them an apostle and that was they were sent by Jesus. Nor was it that they thought, “Well, I think that ministry would fulfill me. I think I’d feel fulfilled if I were doing that. As I imagine myself, day-by-day counseling, I think that I would feel fulfilled. I think it would make me feel I was doing something worthwhile. It would give me a sense of satisfaction. I could go home at night and feel that was a good day’s work.” What would you do as you wipe the blood off from the stones? What would you do as you pulled the sword out of your side? Would you feel, “I fulfilled the day? I feel I fulfilled my ministry?” In other words, the apostles didn’t feel that way at all. They knew they had one thing ahead of them, and that was probably not simply discomfort, but probably suffering and death. The only reason they were apostles is they were sent by Jesus, not because they felt they would be fulfilled, not because they thought, “This would be a nice life.” It doesn’t take me to paint it too vividly for you to see, of course, we’re way off-beat. We’re completely off-beat. We’re completely self-centered. “Well, I think I’m a good speaker, so I’m a good preacher.” “Well, I think I’m good with young people, so I should work with young people.” “Well, I think I’m a good musician, so I think I should be on the music ministry.” “Well, I would like to go there.” “Well, that place has a need for the kind of person I am.” None of that. An apostle is one who is sent by Jesus — that’s it. One who is sent by Jesus. That’s why Paul says, “An apostle of Jesus Christ.” “Of Jesus Christ” means belonging to Jesus Christ. It means somebody who is owned by Jesus Christ completely. It’s not just somebody who was SENT by Jesus Christ, but someone who is actually OWNED by Jesus Christ. It’s someone who for him to live is Christ. He thinks of nothing else but Christ. Does he think about whether he can do some good in this church? No, he doesn’t. Does he think whether he can fulfill himself in this ministry? No, he doesn’t. Does he think whether he can fulfill a need there in that country? No, he doesn’t. He sees only one thing, Jesus Christ. You’re right — his world is small but it’s bigger than the universe because Jesus Christ is the one who originated it. To just have your eyes full of Jesus Christ is to be full of reality in a way that is far beyond even an awareness of the world around us or the universe around us. An apostle of Jesus Christ is someone who belongs to Jesus Christ, who is owned by Jesus Christ, who is preoccupied by Jesus Christ, who is obsessed with Jesus Christ, who pleases no one else but Jesus Christ, who wants only to be close to one person above all others and that’s Jesus Christ. So he’s Jesus, Jesus, Jesus — Jesus until you think the guy is crazy with Jesus. That’s what an apostle of Jesus Christ is and that’s how you can ever know if Jesus sent him. I think all of us get into trouble when we think, “Well, how do you know you’re sent?” Well, if you’re that close, if you’re utterly preoccupied, if Christ fills you completely — of course you know the blink of his eye, of course you know the beat of his heart. You feel like him. You sympathize with him. You want what he wants. So of course, he’s able in a moment to gently transmit to you what he wants you to do — so that is there any doubt? There is no doubt. “Woe is me, if I preach not the gospel.” [1 Corinthians 9:16] It’s not, “Oh, I’d like to do a little preaching.” It’s, “I will die if I don’t preach.” That’s it, “I’ll die if I don’t do what God has called me to do.” So an apostle of Jesus Christ is one who utterly belongs to Jesus Christ. Now, I think there’s an important verse in connection with that that we ought to just look at for a moment because I think that it may help us ourselves and it may help us in our dealings with others. Romans 8:9, “But you are not in the flesh, you are in the Spirit, if in fact the Spirit of God dwells in you. Any one who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him.” An apostle of Jesus Christ, one who belongs to Jesus, has the Spirit of Jesus, and I think that’s a fair way to just look at ourselves from time-to-time, and certainly a fair way to ask of others — have we the Spirit of Christ? Have we the Spirit of Christ? Are we meek? He said, “I am meek and lowly of heart.” Are we meek and lowly of heart or are we proud? He was humble. He kneeled down and washed the disciples’ feet. Are we humble or are we arrogant, self-assured, and self-righteous? Are we merciful and have we tender mercies? Have we a gentle and soft kindliness to others? Have we a hunger to be with God? Do we enjoy prayer? Do we enjoy being with him, with our Father in heaven? Have we the Spirit of Christ? There are two kinds of people who fall. I think one falls, sins, does something wrong and well, they’re annoyed with themselves. They think they’re partly wrong and they’re going to try again next time to do better. And then I think there’s another who has the Spirit of Christ and they fall and their hearts are filled with tears. They are disgusted with themselves. They know they’re wrong. You only have to say something that is in accordance with Jesus’ will and they say, “Yes, that’s what I want.” So they have the Spirit of Christ. So, anybody who belongs to Christ has the Spirit of Christ. If a person hasn’t the Spirit of Christ they may believe in Christ, they may try to serve Christ but they don’t belong to Christ. If you belong to Christ, Christ fills your whole being and he is the fountain and the source of all your feelings and all your attitudes. An apostle is one who belongs to Jesus Christ and has the very Spirit of Jesus Christ — and then you can see what Paul does is that he really reinforces that. In Galatians 1:15 you can see it, “But when he who had set me apart before I was born, and had called me through his grace, was pleased to reveal his Son to me, in order that I might preach him among the Gentiles.” Verse 15 again, “But when he who had set me apart before I was born.” That’s what he has just said in Ephesians: “An apostle of Jesus Christ, by the will of God, when he who had set me apart before I was born.” Not, “I’ve had such and such an education.” Not, “I’ve had such and such an upbringing.” Not, “Because, I have these talents.” That’s all such silly, foolish, temporal stuff. “When he who had set me apart before I was born called me.” In other words, God knew each one of us before we were born and he foresaw our lives. He planned what we should do. The only thing we need is not talents, is not ability, is not to know what our interests are, or what our major is at university, or how we come across to people, or what we like to do, or what we would feel fulfilled doing — the only issue is, what did God set me apart for before I was born? That’s it. We’re in the same situation. God knew why he sent each of us to earth and he set us apart for that before we were born. All we need to do is find out what that is and then, that’s what we do because it’s God’s will alone that matters. It’s not what we’re like, or what abilities we have or what talents we have. It’s what God’s will is for our lives. That’s the only thing that matters. And so actually, today you can see it’s not, “What would I like to do this afternoon? What would give me pleasure? How could I help somebody even?” — it’s, “Lord, you saw this day. What did you have in mind for me this day? Rather, Lord, what did you have in mind for your Son Jesus using this body that I used to regard as mine?” That’s it. That’s reality. That’s God-centered. That’s God-centered. We only got half a verse done today, but let us pray. Dear Lord, we bow before you. Oh Father, we want to see the world the right way up, not this upside down world that we have been brought up in where we have put ourselves in front of everything else, in front even of you. Lord, we want to come into reality. We also want to be able to say, “[Our name], an apostle of Jesus Christ by the will of God.” We ask you to bring us into this reality Holy Spirit. Now the grace of our Lord Jesus, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with each one of us now and ever more. Amen.

Called to be Saints Ephesians 1:1b Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill We’re studying the letter that was written in 62 A.D., the letter to the Ephesians. You know the facts that Paul probably established the church maybe around 57 to 61 A.D. on his third missionary journey. You remember [pointing to map] that the toe of Italy comes down there and then around to the Mediterranean. You have Jerusalem there and you have Antioch there and Ephesus there. Rome is over here. The third missionary journey was like that. It was during that time that Paul established the church. We dealt with the first part of verse 1. We talked about Paul, an apostle, and that was the Greek word “apostolos”, which is just “apostle” in English. It means “one who is sent”. We talked about the fact that you do things for God because you are sent to do them, not because you’ll be fulfilled doing them, not because you’ll have a nice life doing them, not because you’ll use your talents doing them, not because you’ll be able to give something to God but because you’re sent. Jesus calls you to it and that brings a stability that nothing else brings because finally, in every situation, you will end up in a position where you don’t feel fulfilled, where you’ll be washing dishes, or you’ll be serving tables and you’ll think, “What about all my brilliant guitar work or my great speaking ability?” There’ll always be times in your life — indeed, you’ll probably spend most of your life — doing things that you don’t feel really fulfills you. It’s remarkable that when you look at the outside world outside Christianity, most people are doing exactly the same thing. Most people are involved in work-a-day repeat situations that don’t require a lot of the brilliance that they think they have. Particularly, that is the situation with Jesus. Would you like to have walked up Calvary Road? Would you have liked your mother to see you with the cross on your shoulders? Would you have said, “I am fulfilling my potential, mother?” Most things in this present sinful world involve us forgetting what we would like to do, forgetting what we think we’re good at and doing and doing what God sends us to do. I think you remember we talked about that and I’ll just move on from there because we’re moving onto the second half of that first verse. If you turn to it in your Bible please, it’s Ephesians chapter 1 and what we would call in, I suppose Bible reference, 1b. It’s Ephesians 1:1b. Paul has just said, “Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God.” He did that in all his letters. It doesn’t matter which ones you look to, he always begins like that. Look at the next book — you can see it in Colossians 1:1, “Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, and Timothy our brother.” So he writes all this letters like that with his own name and then the people to whom he sends it. You can see back in Ephesians 1:1b, “Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God,” 1a and 1b, “To the saints who are also faithful in Christ Jesus.” The footnote says that the oldest manuscripts add “At Ephesus and faithful.” So “at Ephesus” is in most of the oldest manuscripts, “To the saints who were also faithful in Christ Jesus at Ephesus.” “To the saints” — we think that “saints” is a word to be applied to Saint Thomas, or to the other saints that are listed in the Catholic church, but this was the normal world that was applied to Christians in the first century. They just referred to them as saints. You’ll see it in Acts 9:13, “But Ananias answered, ‘Lord, I have heard from many about this man,’” that was Saul, “How much evil he has done to thy saints at Jerusalem.” So that’s the way they referred to Christians in the first century. They called them saints. You know that in our century we think, “Ah, nobody is a saint.” Indeed, when you call somebody a saint you usually are making fun of the person. And then there is this ridiculous attitude that Christians have to themselves, “I’m not saint.” That fits with that bumper sticker, “Christians aren’t perfect — only forgiven.” You know how my comment usually goes after that. All the other people wish they were perfect, that they weren’t just forgiven. But the Christians love to say, “We’re not perfect. We’re only forgiven.” In other words, there’s developed an unscriptural attitude among Christians to themselves. They think they should not be called saints. Why? Partly because it’s easier to be somebody who is always making mistakes, and always sinning and always being forgiven. But the fact is that it isn’t scriptural. In the first century Christians were called saints. The word is “hagios” (hag’-ee-os). It means “the holy people”. It refers usually to absolute ethical perfection and wholeness, freedom from moral evil. That’s the way the early saints struck the rest of the people in the first century. For instance, at a time of plague everybody said, “Get out of the city! Get out of the city!” because the medicine was so poor that they couldn’t do much in a plague, “Just get out!” So they all got out — even if your mother was dying they’d say, “Get out, leave her! Don’t touch her, otherwise you’ll die too!” So that was the practice in the first century when the warning went out that there was plaque in the city. Everybody left leaving the dead and the dying behind. Parents left children. Children left parents. Everybody was left who was sick or touched with the plague. The healthy people got out except for these people [points to whiteboard diagram] who also went back and tended to their relatives and their friends. They looked after them even if it meant them catching the plague. So everywhere, these people began to be called, “saints” because of their moral rectitude and their concern for other people. “Hagios” was the name that was given to them. It’s an interesting word because it means actually two things. First of all it means what was implied in Exodus 20:8, “Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy.” “Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy.” That is, “Six days you shall labor, and do all your work; but the seventh day is a sabbath to the Lord your god; in it you shall not do any work, you, or your son, or your daughter, your manservant, or your maidservant, or your cattle, or the sojourner who is within your gates for in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day; therefore the Lord blessed the sabbath day and hallowed it.” Therefore, you ought to remember it to keep it holy, keep it separate from all the other days. “Set it apart” — that’s the first meaning of “holy”. Set it apart from all other days. Set it apart from all other days. Really, it means set it apart from the world. That’s what saints are. They’re people who are set apart from the world. They’re set apart from the ordinary uses of the world. They’re set apart from ordinary human beings. They don’t work just to get money, or to get clothes, or to be successful, or to be happy. They actually don’t care about what the world thinks. They don’t care what the world does. They are set apart from the world. They’re different from the world. They’re set apart from achieving anything in the world. “If my [Jesus’] kingdom were of this world then my disciples would fight — they know that their kingdom is not on this world. They are not here to make a mark in this world. They are not here to become famous in this world. They don’t care if they ever fulfill their potential in this world because they are set apart from the world.” To them, the world is still this “evil generation” that Jesus talked about. It’s still a place that is condemned. It’s a place that isn’t what God wants it to be so they have no interest in succeeding in that world. That’s why it’s normal for “hagios” to look at their peers and see their peers getting cars, and clothes, and all the things they want — and the “hagios” don’t have any of those. The “hagios” take that for normal because they are set apart from the world. They’re not like the world. The “hagios” don’t get together and say, “Boy, we’re missing out here. We really are. I mean, by giving our lives to God like this, look what we’re missing! We’re not able to have our own homes. We’re not able to have our own apartments. We’re not able to have our own lawnmowers. We’re not able to have our own vacations. We can’t do what the rest of the world is doing.” Amen, praise God that you can’t because “hagios” are people who are set apart from the world. They’re different from the world. Now, that’s the first part of being holy. Some people have said “it’s the human side”. Sometimes it’s been called by a word that is taken from the Latin, “consecrate”. Often people say they are consecrating themselves. The “hagios” are regarded as people who consecrate themselves. They set themselves apart from the world and the emphasis is on “from”. It’s the human side of holiness and of being holy. That changed after Jesus’ death because then we became aware that being set apart from the world involved an inner miracle that he had wrought on Calvary. You’ll find it mentioned in John 16:33, “I have said this to you, that in me you may have peace. In the world you have tribulation; but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world.” Jesus overcame the world and when he was crucified before the foundation of the world as the Lamb that was slain, all the “hagios” were crucified with him and they were in his miracle, set apart from the world. You remember, it’s like that old cigarette commercial, “You can take Salem out of the country, but you can’t take the country of out Salem.” The world is in us. The world is in us through and through and through. We often talk like the world. We often think like the world. We’ve often inherited a lot of the world’s attitudes. We have little ways of expressing ourselves. We have little ways our eyes blink in certain situations. We have little anxieties that spring up almost automatically inside us that we have no control over. We have knee-jerk reactions that we produce just because the world is in us, through us and in us all the time. We have lots and lots of bits of the world, ways of the world, habits of the world and thoughts of the world that we don’t even know about. In other words, there are things in each of us that we need to set ourselves apart from. They’re so much a part of us that we don’t even know that they’re there. That is part of the miracle that was wrought on Calvary. In other words, you can only say that’s true up to a point. You have to say that setting ourselves apart from the world is also something that Christ did and that his Messenger, his Colleague, his dear Counselor can only do in us. So if you’re concerned to be a “hagios” and you want to set yourself apart from the world, you can only do it if you begin to deal with this dear Person –to begin to believe that this dear Person, inside himself, took all of the worldliness in you and crucified and destroyed it. So it’s not a simple thing to “set yourself apart”. We tend to make it so. We tend to say, “Oh, consecration — consecrate all your talents, consecrate your time, consecrate your thoughts, consecrate your money and consecrate your future.” So we all try to do those — then we wonder, “Now why can I not come into the fullness of the Holy Spirit?” Well, it’s because we have persisted in acting as if we can do this ourselves. In other words, our human pride and our human self is still standing up and saying, “Oh yes, well I can set myself apart from the world. I will! I will set myself apart from the world’s plan for my career. So I will set myself apart from that. I will set myself apart from the possessions that the world thinks I should have. I will set myself apart from the ambitions that the world has.” And we go through them all and we think, “Now I am consecrated.” In fact, no one can be fully consecrated without the work of Christ on Calvary and the work of the Holy Spirit. Now, if you say to me, “Well, what’s the difference?” Well one is a self-assured, confident, self-examination, and introspection. The other is a humble, submissive, self-despairing, seeking of Christ and the Holy Spirit — and that alone brings this separation from the world — that is the first part of being holy. The second part of being holy is that we are sanctified to God. You can say, “separated” to God but it is such a work of God that probably this is the better word to use, “sanctified” to God. In other words, after we’re set apart from the world, then we are sanctified to God, “sanctus Deo” two Latin words which mean “to be made”. This is the passive of “facio” — “to do or to make” — to be made holy. We are to be made holy to God. Holiness is the attitude of God himself, “Be thee holy as I am holy.” It is God’s inner character and being sanctified to God is the second part of being holy. First, set apart from the world then sanctified to God himself. You know there are many instances of that, but you certainly find it in Matthew 5:20 where the need for it is stated very clearly because Jesus defines the righteousness that “hagios” have. Matthew 5:20, “For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.” So the holiness that “hagios” has is even here different from the Pharisees because it is something that is revealed by the Holy Spirit — but here it is utterly different from the Pharisees. Why? On the outside, they cleaned the cup. On the inside, it was filthy. That’s why Jesus says, “Unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will in no wise enter the kingdom of heaven.” [In other words,] “Unless your righteousness means your heart, and means a clean heart, then you are not entering into all that I have done for you.” And so, to be sanctified to God is an absolutely divine act that God does through his Holy Spirit and through his word because he’s dealing with that [draws heart on white board]. The Bible puts it clearly. Look at Galatians 5:19, “Now the works of the flesh are plain: fornication”. Well you see that’s an outward act of immorality — but “impurity”. Impurity is the thought life or it’s attitude, impurity of thought, impurity of attitude, thinking dirty thoughts, having sexual imaginations — that’s what it is. “Licentiousness.” We always think of it as somebody getting drunk or something, but it’s coming to those moments in your life where you say, “I want to do what I want to do.” It’s an inward attitude that often doesn’t express itself outwardly because we know it would offend everybody, and we’re not supposed to be like that. But inside our attitude is really, “I’m going to do what I want to do.” “Idolatry, sorcery, enmity.” Enmity is having bad thoughts about another person. Enmity is feeling, “The other person is my enemy.” Enmity is having an attitude to the other person thinking, “They’re against me. They’re against me. That’s what’s wrong.” Enmity is, “I don’t like that person.” That’s enmity. Enmity is feelings of antagonism towards another person whether you express it outwardly or not. [Galatians 5:19, continued] “Strife.” Strife is an attitude, actually inside in your heart. Strife occurs inside. Before you get into an argument with a person there has to be strife in your heart. You have to have that attitude to them, “I disagree with them strongly and I’m going to tell them that.” That’s what strife is — it’s an inner attitude. “Jealousy.” Jealousy is saying, “I’m jealous of that person because they’re more popular than I am, or they seem to be liked by everybody, or they look better than me, or they seem to do their work better than me.” Jealousy is wishing that the other person was not as good as they are. Envy is wishing you were like them. Envy is wanting what they’ve got. Jealousy is wishing they haven’t got it. Envy is wanting it for yourself. It’s envying someone’s position, or someone’s looks, or someone’s clothes, or someone’s performance. “Anger.” Anger is inside. It’s being angry with people. Jesus said, “You’ve heard how it was said of old time, if you murder you’re guilty of the judgment but I say unto you if you’re angry with your brother you’re guilty of the judgment.” But anger is having temper, having bad temper, or feeling you’re just bursting with anger, or feeling a real seething anger underneath because somebody has asked you to do something that you think is not right, or because you are dissatisfied with some situation, or the way somebody else has treated you. “Selfishness.” Selfishness is looking after yourself. That’s why I mention table manners to you at times because actually, if you grab the sauce for yourself instead of looking first at the other person, you’re being selfish. That’s it. Our simplest mothers told us that if you go for the thing first and don’t ask the other person do they want it, that’s selfish and that comes from selfishness inside — that comes from thinking, “Me, I alone count. I’m the important one in this world, to me. Other people may be important to them, but I’m important to me, and what I want is what counts whether it’s for my future, or whether it’s for my present. What I want for myself, that’s what is important.” So really, selfishness is an attitude where you make yourself the center of the world and you make everybody else serve you. Your automatic first thought after the service is, “What do I want to do? What would I enjoy doing?” Or, when you get to a table it’s, “What would I like?” It’s not, “What would that other person like?” It’s, “What would I like to have? What do I feel like eating?” When you go out to have a day out together your thought is not, “Now, I want this person to enjoy themselves. Now, I wonder what they would like to do? Oh, I bet they would like to go there.” But selfishness is, “Well, what would I like to see here? What do I want to do.” Selfishness is a whole attitude that just circles around self all the time. This is a work of the flesh. The Bible says that if that is in you, “you will not enter the kingdom of heaven”. [Matthew 5:20] That’s what it means. A “hagios” is one who has a clean heart. A clean heart — not only a clean life, but a clean heart. That is something that can only be wrought by God through the Holy Spirit. If you look at Acts 15:9, you’ll remember that you see it stated very clearly. You see the agent of the cleansing miracle there. Peter is talking about what happened to them and in Acts 15:8-9, he says about the Gentiles, “And God who knows the heart bore witness to them, giving them the Holy Spirit just as he did to us; and he made no distinction between us and them, but cleansed their hearts by faith.” That’s the only way to get a clean heart, to have the Holy Spirit cleanse your heart by faith. The Holy Spirit is the one who does it but he does it by applying again the work of Jesus on Calvary in whom our old self was crucified. The Holy Spirit applies that work miraculously to our hearts. When does he apply it and why does he apply it? Because we’ve been willing for him to set us apart from the world. In other words, here he has said, “Are you willing to be looked down upon by everybody else for my glory?” And we say, “Yes Lord, I am. I’m willing for them to despise me if it’s for your glory.” Then the Holy Spirit is free to cleanse you from envy, and jealousy and pride — and that’s the way it works. If you are willing here [touches heart], the Holy Spirit cleanses you here and fills you with himself. “Hagios” are people who have experienced both of these. If you want to be clean inside and holy, then this is what you do with everything in your life that God has shown you is wrong. You deal with each part of your life and you ask the Holy Spirit, “Holy Spirit will you show me where the world is still in me? Will you show me where I’ve to set myself apart from the world and where you Lord Jesus, have already set me apart from the world but I don’t see that? Show me where that is.” And he’ll show you and show you. Of course, we’ve all talked about the layers and layers of the heart that he has to go down and down. He gets down to there [points to part of heart on diagram] and then it’s not enough — and then down to there, and we ask to be filled with the Holy Spirit — and still nothing happens. And then we go down another layer and finally, you get down to the ground of your heart. John Wesley calls it, “the ground of your heart”. That is God’s will. That is why the early Christians were called “hagios” because they were “hagios” outside, but most important, they were “hagios” INSIDE. They were sanctified inside as well as outside. So loved ones, that’s what Paul means when he says, “To the saints who are in Christ Jesus,” because all this happens in Christ. If Christ has not crucified us with himself and raised us up with himself, then there’s no way in which we can be holy — but that’s what he says, “To the saints that are in Christ Jesus.” The last word of the verse is the word “pistois” and it means not just “faithful” in the sense of people who are loyal and keep on being loyal, but people who are actually trusting today. The only way to be a “hagios” today is to be actually trusting at this very moment, moment-by-moment, moment-by-moment trusting in these two things and then in these two kind and loving persons. Only by trusting daily and moment-by-moment are you able to be continually “hagios”. That’s why God has called us. That’s why the businesses are so important because people need to see saints living in the midst of the world. They need to see saints, and so we are the people that Paul is speaking to, “Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ to the saints who are trusting in Christ Jesus in South Mimms. Let us pray. Lord, we see that you are totally different from the world. We have been created in you. We have been crucified with you, and raised together with you and made to sit in the heavenly places. We also see Lord, that we are totally different from the world. Holy Spirit, we ask that you make us so — and begin the work in us today and graciously reveal to us where the world is still in us. Make it clear to us what we need to be willing for so that the crucifixion of the world can take place in us that has already taken place in Jesus. Oh Lord Jesus, we look to you. Nothing can happen unless it has happened first in you. Oh Lord Jesus, show us what part of us you bore pain for in your crucifixion. Make us aware of what part of us caused you pain, and what part you have destroyed forever and you want us now to separate ourselves from it. Holy Spirit, show us that — and then we ask you when you see that, at last, we are ready to be cleansed, will you mightily cleanse our hearts by faith so that we are holy inside and out? Now the grace of our Lord Jesus, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, be with each one of us now and ever more. Amen.

God’s Will for You: Grace and Peace! Ephesians 1:2 Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill Will you turn to Ephesians, the book that we’re studying? Last Sunday we studied Ephesians 1:1b, “to the saints who are also faithful in Christ Jesus”. I’d just call back to your mind how we said that “the saints” is the word “hagios” and it means people who have set themselves apart from the world, and then people who have been set apart by God’s Holy Spirit to God. So there’s a human side and a divine side and yet even the human side has a great deal of divine power in it. I would just mention to us to remain commonsensical and practical about the setting apart. If you set yourself apart from the world and you set yourself apart to God, that means you set yourself apart in regard to your time and the way you think. We need to be practical about that. Even though you may like planes and I may like boats, we set ourselves apart from the things we like and we set ourselves apart to God in Jesus so that he comes first. So it’s a very practical thing. It comes down to the way you spend your afternoons, the way you spend your evenings, it comes down to time. So I’d just remind us of that. Don’t be theoretical about this. Let’s see that setting ourselves apart is a very practical thing and it is not just a wish or intention. This might be good to say to you too — holy intentions never saved anybody. Now, in the Catholic Church we have the importance of purity of intention but still holy intentions themselves do not save a person. Act, will, change in your behavior, that’s what saves. All that I said is just in relationship to last Sunday’s verse. Now this Sunday’s verse is Ephesians 1:2. You can see it there, “Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.” Just keep your finger in that page and turn over to Romans 1:7b, “Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ,” it’s the same greeting. Then turn to Philippians 1:2 “Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ,” the same greeting. Then over the page to Colossians 1:2b, “Grace to you and peace from God our Father,” the same greeting and the same greeting in Corinthians. Now it’s easy because of our own miserably passive minds to think, “The guy’s typewriter is stuck, or his Dictaphone is stuck. He just repeated the same thing and it’s just like, ‘Hi, how are you. Hello.’ It’s not. Every word in scripture is inspired by God and is profitable for teaching, for training in righteousness and for rebuke and reproof. So ever word of scripture is what Jesus said. Not an iota or a dot shall pass from the law until all is accomplished. An Iota in Greek is just like a little apostrophe. It’s a tiny little thing. But Jesus said that every word is precious. So when we’re reading the Bible every word is full of meaning. This is not just a kind of conventional greeting that Paul raps off but it has great meaning. It actually is the whole gospel. That’s really what he’s preaching when he says that, it’s the whole gospel. Because, it’s grace that brings the results of peace and the whole gospel is really grace and peace. So let’s just look at it a little more carefully. The Greek for grace is “charis” and “humin” is to you. In a way it doesn’t give you the kindliness and softness of it unless you have an Italian tenor who can sing “Charis Mia”. That’s because “charis” is the same as my Cheri, my dear, or my love. You can see it even more in the English word caress. And then the “char” is found in the word charity. And that’s what grace is. It’s not something cold and theological. It’s Paul saying not even, “I hope that you will have grace,” or, “May God’s grace be to you”. He’s saying, “God’s love to you. God is caressing you at this moment from heaven. He’s caressing you with his love. At this very moment God’s love is surrounding you and caressing you, and he’s talking to you and saying, ‘My dear.” That’s it. It’s very dear, and very kind. So what is his grace? Grace is such that though God needed nothing, (he needed nothing because he didn’t exist in isolation, he had Jesus his Son and the Holy Spirit, he was utterly complete in himself and self-sufficient), even though his heart was filled with love, yet he had people to love in his Son and in the Holy Spirit. But his love overflowed into a desire to make other people and other beings that would enjoy his love and that he could enjoy loving. Now, he could have made a lot of little animals, and he could have made lots of constellations and universes. He could have made things that wouldn’t have given him much trouble, things that he could control, things that he could enjoy looking at much as collectors collect antiques, or pictures, or cameras. They enjoy looking at them. They can take them out, they can put them where they want them to be and they do that, they’re just inanimate. Or, a little dog, or little birds, you can control. So he could have made just other creatures like that. But his love is the kind of love that is even prepared to be hurt in order to pour itself forth. It’s not the kind of love that defends, or holds himself away from things that might hurt him. It’s the kind of love that is willing to give the very best that it has and that’s what he determined to do. He determined not to give something less than himself. Now, when you think of it, it was an unbelievable risk to take. He is God, there is none beyond him. He is the one. He is the only one. It would be perfectly reasonable in our minds that he should not give something as dear as himself, or give someone the qualities that he himself had. But that’s what he determined to do. He determined to give life to other beings, the same life that he had and so he actually made us in his own Son so that we would have actually the same life in us that he and his Son had. He wanted us to have the very best that he could give. And of course, that meant self-determination because he himself can do whatever he wants to do. He’s free to do whatever he wishes and so he gave that capability to us inside his Son. If you don’t choose him, there’s nothingness. I mean, there is nothing, there is not an alternative. There aren’t other gods. There’s just God himself and if you don’t choose him, you actually choose nothingness and therefore extinction. And of course, he himself had to plant within us a self-destruct capability because otherwise we would have wandered forever in nothingness and darkness in an extinguished state. And so he planted within us what is stated in that verse in Romans 6:23, “The wages of sin is death.” And so he planted within us a death that would take place if we actually choose nothingness and extinction instead of him. Really, whenever we choose ourselves, we choose nothingness and extinction (because we actually have no life apart from Jesus). And so he planted within us that self-destruct mechanism. He not only did that, but remember where he placed us. He made us inside his own beloved Son and he did that on purpose so that we could choose ourselves if we wanted to. We could choose death and extinction if we wanted to but he was continuing to choose his Father, and would overcome our death and extinction and would raise us up in his own life. It’s unthinkable but the closest I can come to it is swallowing a hand grenade. The blessed Savior was swallowing not just the six billion explosives for the people that are here on the earth at present but the billions, and billions of little beings that his Father made inside him, each one of which had the ability to choose themselves rather than God and to experience that death and destruction which would have wiped them out completely. Christ bore it in himself and raised us up. He bore the tearing apart inside himself and yet raised himself up because of his love, affection and trust in his Father and raised us up with him. That’s part of what the grace is. It’s played out over the centuries, but it all took place in that moment in eternity. Every time a savage murder takes place in New York every couple of minutes, every time a caustic, sarcastic, cutting comment is made in the sophisticated business or social circles of London, the Savior bears that explosion within himself and negates it. That is the grace. He negates it so that we continue to receive grace from our Father. That’s why, the Bible says there in Romans 5:8 that God commands his love towards us in that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us. Even as we are sinning Christ is bearing the penalty of that, the extinction of that, and the death and loneliness of it. That is why he cried, “My God, my God why hast thou forsaken me?” He has to cry this every time we act for ourselves and act apart from him. Yet the Father continues to give grace and this in a sense is unmerited favor. God continues to stream down his unmerited favor upon us. If you say to me, “Do you mean that whatever I do God still keeps me alive to do it, still loves and accepts me?” Yes, that’s right. If you said to me, “Even if I don’t believe in him?” Yes, at the moment, in this life, in these saving days, yes. There will come a time for death. The Bible says, “Then comes the judgment”. But in what are called saving days in the Bible, Jesus does not condemn us but instead saves us every second. If you say to me, “Do you mean that if I am thinking a thought that is evil and filthy, I am actually cutting Christ?” Yes. He has one dear hand up to shield himself and the other dear hand around our backs, to draw us into himself. That’s it and that’s the grace. That’s the unmerited favor that is coming to us every moment. It’s so ridiculous, such an insult, and so cruel when anyone says, “I can’t get God’s forgiveness. I somehow can’t get his forgiveness.” How can you not get his forgiveness when at this moment he holds you in his arms and is loving you even as you’re rejecting him? That’s grace loved ones and he gives us that day, after day, after day. He has that same unmerited favor towards us. So that’s part of what grace means. And what Paul is saying is, “Grace to you – this is what God is sending down to you every moment. This is from God your Father. You have his unmerited favor every moment whatever you are doing because his dear Son is bearing that.” I think during the Second World War, there were a few instances when a hand grenade was tossed into the trench with about 20 men in it. And one guy went down on top of it. Of course he was killed, but his body kind of smothered the hand grenade. That is what it is, except it’s a poor illustration, because the soldier had one moment of agony and it was gone. The Savior’s agony has continued all down through the years. In a sense the Mass is right. We used to say, “The mass is the repeated sacrifice of Christ and that’s not right because it was done once for all.” Well it was, and in a sense it was finished. In a sense God himself experienced the whole thing in a moment. The lamb was slain from before the foundation of the world. But in time that pain has been expressed down through the centuries and that is the massiveness of the pain. It is not just one moment for God, it is all eternity, all the years that have gone by. So that’s the grace. I don’t know how often you’ve found yourself in this position, but you can make a choice between doing something that is very good and commendable but does not risk anything for yourself and then you can do something that is not only very commendable but actually puts you at risk — either your money, your clothes, your property, your life, or your future. God chose the second — a mighty event that has taken place in his heart. It is not something that cost nothing. It is a mighty event that is taking place to enable us to experience that. So that’s one thing that grace is. But grace is also his enabling power and that’s part of what Paul is saying. Grace is not only God’s unmerited favor to us, but it’s his enabling power. Grace is streaming down from God to us every moment. And even as you lift your hand to strike his Son, you lift your hand by dint of the enabling power that he has given you. So he is actually giving us the life to either live in trust in him or live in trust in ourselves. And so grace is his strength and his energy. We’ve said before that that table is not really solid. It consists of lots of protons and neutrons that are spinning around each other and held in position like that. And of course, our bodies don’t seem as solid as that and are just protons and neutrons spinning around. During the explosion in Nagasaki the heat of the bomb was so immense that it just burned a person right where they stood. For a few minutes after the explosion you could see the whole person standing there but just as a cinder. That brings it home to you how transient and temporary the body is. It can all appear to be there, charred and blackened but really is a cinder, and then it collapsed like ash. And that’s what our bodies are like. They consist of billions and billions of protons and neutrons that are spinning round and held in position by his enabling power. We talk about sight. There’s nothing to sight. It’s just like a little camera inside. But we never think of all that connects the camera to the person I am looking at and the fact that God is holding all those things in position. We talk glibly about radio waves. We think we can go buy the antenna and that’s how the cellular phone works. But who holds in position the atmosphere and all the waves so that they continue to work? It’s the Father. His enabling power holds the whole thing in position. We think it’s an amazing fact that the earth that is spinning around the sun like that and staying in orbit. It’s magnetic, of course but we just give a name to something we don’t understand. We think, “Oh, that’s the only invisible means of support that we can see.” No, our lives are full of it. Our lives are surrounded by God’s enabling power that is keeping us alive. So that’s the love of this dear Father. That’s where you get the term, “charismata”. It becomes our word charismatic. They are not only the gifts that are mentioned there in 1 Corinthians 12 but they are all the abilities that God gives. That’s part of his enabling power. Whether James Galway at this moment acknowledges Jesus or not, when he plays the flute it is still a gift that God gives by his enabling power. You’re singing ability or the ability to play the guitar is a gift. We’re continually surrounded and empowered by his “charismata”. We have mutilated the whole thing by talking about charismatic people as something special. But actually we have gifts that we’re using every second of our lives. So that’s part of what Paul means when he says, “Grace to you.” He is saying, the unmerited favor of your Father is upon you every moment and you live every second by his enabling power.” Now if you live as if you’re on your own, if you live as if there’s no God looking after you, if you live as if you’re your own God, then of course you end up having to protect and defend yourself. You end up trying to make the world actually what you want it to be. You try to make it as convenient for yourself as possible. That’s one of the things those of us that have lived in family (community) like this for years realize. It is hell on earth to live in a situation like this if you’re still trying to protect yourself because, so many things are wretchedly inconvenient. I mean, people want to do things when you don’t want to do them. People ask you to do things when you don’t want to do them. So, it is hell if you still are in the situation where you’re your own God and you want to have things just the way you want them. But if you’re in that situation, (as most men and women are), then you have to exercise your will to get your own way at all costs. The dreadful thing is that there are six billion others trying to do the same thing. With six billion people in the world trying to get things the way they want them to be, standing up for their rights, trying to have their own way, and trying to make the world in their image, you’re bound to end up with strife, fighting, and disagreement. Of course that’s what the world is full of. The very air is full of straining and striving. Most men and women are tackling it like a wrestling match. You’re looking at the other guy to see where you can get a good hold and then you grab it and kill the strife right there. Most people have an eye out for their best chance. They say, “How will I work this set of circumstances for my own advantage? How can I arrange this so that I have some semblance of comfort and ease? How can I do this so that I grab what that guy is trying to grab before he gets it?” Most of the world is filled with that kind of striving. Now, Paul says that all changes when you realize that your Father has set his love upon you and that he is giving you his enabling power. When you realize that then you know, “I don’t have to fight. I don’t have to strive. I don’t have to look out for myself. Whatever he wants me to have he will ensure that I get.” And that’s what Paul means when he says, “eirene”. The meaning of the word “eirene” is peace. And that’s the result when you receive God’s grace day after day. Suddenly you don’t have to protect yourself. You don’t have to beat other people to the punch. You don’t have to look for the best chance with another person. You don’t have to wrestle everybody else to the ground. You don’t have to get your way. You can trust God and a deep peace comes into your whole being and fills you with a rest. “Eirene” is actually a cessation of striving. Whenever you sense striving then it’s good to spend a little time with the Father and ask his Holy Spirit to reveal to you why he is not able to bring you into peace. Peace is two-fold; it’s first what is spoken of in Romans 5:1, “Therefore, since we are justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.” Peace with God is something we have through our Lord Jesus Christ. That’s because we are in Jesus and he has borne all the consequences of our independence. And so we have, at this moment in Jesus, peace with God. At this very moment we’re all sitting in this chapel and God is not condemning us. At this very moment God is looking upon us as his own dear children because Jesus has borne the death that we deserved. So we have at this very moment, peace with God. You’d have to wipe out Jesus’ death in order to disprove that. In other words, for you or I to become uncertain of our peace with God there’d have to be no Jesus, there’d have to be no death. But God will not kill two people for the one sin. He will just destroy one person and that has happened in Jesus. So at this very moment we have peace with God. But I think what we’re talking about here, is our own need to have peace in the midst of the business world. It’s this peace of God and that Jesus talks about if you’d like to look at John 14:27. “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you; not as the world gives do I give to you.” The only peace that the world can give is to make the circumstances fairly favorable to you, but Jesus’ peace is deeper than the circumstances. It is consistent with the crowds jeering at him and throwing insults at him on the Calvary road, “Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid.” The peace that Jesus gives is a grace of the Holy Spirit. At this moment Jesus is not sweating. He’s not uptight, he’s not worried (even though he is bearing all that pain), and he’s not troubled. He is at ease because whatever his Father wants for him he’s content with. He doesn’t feel the crown on his head and say, “Thank you Father,” and then feel the thorns on his head and say, “Oh, what have I done wrong? Why has God done this to me?” He looks up and he says, “Thank you Father.” He doesn’t experience the palm branches thrown at his feet and the crowd hailing him as the messiah and say, “Thank you Father,” and then as he goes down the Calvary road and they thump him with their fists and they spit on him he doesn’t then say, “What have I done wrong?” He says, “Thank you Father.” That’s because he believes that everything comes from his Father, everything is under his Father’s control, and everything is an equally good gift from his Father. And what he wants us to do is abide in him and accept that too. The moment you accept that with your Savior, his peace, the peace that he enjoys with the Father floods your heart. So that’s what Paul is saying when he says, “Grace to you and peace”. Then he says, “From God our Father and our Lord Jesus Christ,” because that’s where it all comes, from God our Father and our Lord Jesus Christ.

Blessed With All Things Ephesians 1:3a Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill The most real thing that I think we could do at this moment is for you to think how much you paid for your shoes. How much did you pay for those shoes that you’re wearing now? And if you’ve settled that, then think how much did you pay for your nose? Now how much did you pay for your eyes? Each of us can give some figure for our shoes but our nose, even though we know there is cosmetic surgery possible, yet the whole nose and all that it does for us we would answer, “Well, I don’t even know where I’d go to buy one.” And then when the question of the eyes comes up we say, “Well, I couldn’t get eyes like this. Probably if I had all the money in the world I couldn’t get eyes like these.” And then I ask you how much did you pay for your left leg? And you say, “Well, I could not get a left leg. They would fit me with some kind of wooden or metal thing. I couldn’t buy a leg like this. Even if I had the money there is no place I could buy a leg like this.” And then you go on to the utterly impossible things — your brain, how much did you pay for your brain? And then how much did you pay to get to see yesterday’s sunset or sunrise? And you say, “Nothing, I just looked out and there was the sunrise. I didn’t pay anything. And that’s probably one of the – if not the most important thing– we can settle in our own minds at this moment. All these things that you and I have that we could not buy anywhere, they have been given to us. And we probably wouldn’t dream of selling even one of them because they’re our very life. And some of the most beautiful things that we see like the sunrise cannot be imitated and yet we do not pay anything to get to see them. And I think that’s why there is only one attitude that we can have each moment of every day. And that is continual thanks, “Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you.” Every time we see bricks, every time we see a table, every time we speak we say, “Thank you, thank you, thank you. I couldn’t do this if you didn’t give me this and if you didn’t maintain it in working order day after day. I couldn’t do these things. Thank you. Thank you.” And that’s what we talked about last time in the third study of Ephesians. We talked about blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. There was only one attitude that was legitimate and justifiable for men and women like ourselves. That attitude was just, “Bless you Lord. Bless you, bless you, bless you. Thank you.” And part of the reason I bring it up is because it’s so easy to slip into the attitude that the first man and woman expressed. You know the attitude. We may not use those words but it was the attitude found in Genesis 3:1, “Now the serpent was more subtle than any other wild creature that the LORD God had made. He said to the woman, ‘Did God say, ‘You shall not eat of any tree of the garden’?” And it’s easy to slip into that. “Yes, but I have a wrinkle here.” “Yes, but why didn’t he give me a husband?” “Why didn’t he give me some other situation that I would enjoy better?” “Well, why couldn’t I do what so and so does?” When you look at it, it sounds ridiculously ungrateful. It sounds the meanest, pettiest, small minded attitude that you could imagine.” All these trees are here in this garden but has God said, “Is there any tree that you can’t eat? Did he say any one? Did he give you them all?” And it’s so easy instead of having our life a continual benediction to the Father, with continual joy, continual thanksgiving, continual gladness, it’s so easy for it to be filled with, “Oh, I resent that I didn’t get this.” Or we complain that, “I don’t have that.” Or we worry that, “I won’t get this.” And it’s so easy for the life to sink into headaches and worry so that vaguely life leaks away. Maybe it’s not quite as bad as that but there is a vague kind of satisfaction but with a bit of discontent. But most importantly our attitude is not what is normal, and natural, and reasonable in the light of the fact that, “I have fingers that I couldn’t buy, I have a hand that I couldn’t buy, I have legs that I couldn’t buy, I have eyes that I couldn’t buy. Father, thank you, thank you, thank you. Lord, thank you for this wonderful life that you’ve given me. Thank you that I can see, that I can hear. Thank you Father that I can think. Thank you that I can walk.” It’s probably good, just as we think of what we studied the previous Sunday, to check out the posts and see, “Now what is the mark of my life? Is the mark of my life praise, delight, and joy, or is the mark of my life a kind of grudging, ‘Well I’ve got something but Lord, help me to be better, help me to be happier.’” Is it always, “Lord, give me something else. There’s another tree that I haven’t got. I’ve got all these trees, but help me to feel this.” There’s a sense in which it’s just ungrateful and petty. It’s ungrateful and it isn’t what’s normal or natural in the situation. And of course, you realize it every time your dad goes into the hospital. I remember my dad saying, when he was in the hospital, he said, “Oh, if I could only feel the rain in my face.” And that’s what always happens. You don’t realize that delight of a rainy day until you’re stuck in a bed and can’t move. We need to look above it all and not say, “Yes, I better be grateful the way pastor says.” No, it’s not that. Rather, look up and see, “How much more could this dear Father give us? How much more could he give us?” And, “How much more understanding or how generous or magnanimous could he be?” It seems to me that when you see that then your life is marked with just an unselfish joy and delight in him. You’re not filled with your own mighty virtue, or your own stoical wonderful promethean struggles to be a virtuous man or woman. It’s then that you see, “I am nothing and everything that is good is what has been given to me. He’s maintaining it every day, thank goodness, because I couldn’t maintain it.” And that’s the spirit, that the dear Apostle Paul is expressing, “Blessed be the God and Father or our Lord Jesus Christ.” And then you remember, if you look at the next verse it’s the second half of Ephesians 1:3 that we have the privilege of looking at today. Ephesians 1:3, “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,” and then, “Who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places.” And the bewildering and startling thing about this verse is the tense of the verb. It throws you completely and it’s what tumbles us into the depths of this remarkable book of Ephesians. The tense, you can see in the English is, “who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places — who has blessed us. And we normally think, “Well, doesn’t he understand Greek? He should say, ‘Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who will bless us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places.’ That’s obviously talking about the time when we get to heaven and God is going to bless us in Christ in the heavenly places and that’s what the verse should say, ‘Who will bless us in Christ in the heavenly places with every spiritual blessing.’ And at that time we’ll receive all the spiritual blessings that we’re missing now. We’ll enjoy them, and we’ll experience them fully and freely. And that’s what he should be saying. Paul just has his tense wrong. He means who will bless us.” No, the Greek is very clear. It’s eulogesas. If you were going to parse it, the subject of the sentence is masculine because it applies to God, and the Greek word is past tense not future tense. The Greek word is past tense and it means who has blessed us. What it does is it gets us back to what we’ve mentioned before, that God and Jesus, and the Holy Spirit had everything that they needed in each other. And God our Father resolved that he would share that with other beings like himself and his Son. But he knew if they were to be like themselves they had to have free wills. The Father did what he did because he wanted to. And Jesus does what he does because he wants to. Our Father knew that to have beings like himself he had to give them free will. But that meant that he had to give them the freedom to kill and destroy him, and to choose themselves. And that meant that he had to be in a position where he could destroy them. That’s because, if he was destroyed there’d be nothing. But he could destroy them and yet raise them again. He could make them alive again so that they saw a real choice. They saw what life was like apart from God and they saw what life was like with God. So he turned to his Son and he said, “My Son, will you become the first of these beings? Will you allow the others to be created in you so that when they have to be destroyed you will bear the pain of their destruction? And then because of your love and your life for me you yourself will raise them back to life again inside yourself.” And our Savior said, “Yes, I will. Into thy hands I commit my spirit.” And at that moment, in that millisecond, in the heavenly places, in eternity, God did all that. I think you can see that it happened there because God conceived it all in a millisecond. And the moment he conceived it, that moment he experienced all the pain, agony, and the destruction of that. And so it all happened back then. That’s why for Greek scholars, this is so important. I’d point out to you that you know, the ordinary past tense is not “eulogesas”. It’s “eulogekas” with a k not an s, which is the ordinary perfect tense. Strictly speaking the RSV would be better translated, “who blessed us”, rather than “has” because in English we tend to express the perfect by “has blessed” and we do that because we say the emphasis is on a past act that has brought about a present state. It’s a past act that has brought about a present state. But the Greek word eulogesas is a special past tense that means “just blessed”, a past single act. The emphasis is on the past single act rather than the present state. Let’s say this is the timeline. The past is one end of eternity and this year is another end of eternity. Let’s say you go back to the beginning of Old Testament history and then you go back to the creation of the world itself. In this, (what you can only describe as infinity) eternity of time, in the heavenly places, the lamb was slain from before the foundation of the world. And God blessed us in Christ back there with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places. In other words — in Christ himself Joe, in Christ himself Greg, in Christ himself Joanne — God blessed each one of you in Christ with every spiritual blessing in these heavenly places. That’s what the verse says. Back then, before the creation, before any of us were born, we were blessed in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places. That means with every spiritual blessing, everything that we would need. That’s what the word is in English transliteration epouraniois — those are the heavenly places. These are the places in eternity, where God himself dwells which is our real home, not this little plot of time that we call this present world. This isn’t our home. This is our home here. This is where we were created, this is where we will live forever with God and it’s here that God blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing. God has blessed every man and every woman with everything that they need. When we get sick God blessed us with the spiritual blessing of healing in Christ and the Holy Spirit is able to administer that to us here in time. But we do not need to reach up to it and pull it down because God blessed us with it in Christ. He blessed us with every spiritual blessing. It’s the same with forgiveness. Sometimes we take the unreal attitude, “Oh, I need forgiveness.” But the fact is, God blessed you with forgiveness even when you were yet a sinner. If you say to me, “You mean he paid us before we did the work?” That’s right. However, stupid we think that was, he paid us before we did the work. He bore the pain of our destruction and our resurrection before ever we knew anything about it. He gave back these things to us this before we had even started to cut his Son. That’s what it is, God blessed us with these things even before he had any guarantee that we would turn towards him at all. Indeed, in the case of (as far as we can see, and we have to be careful) but in the case of Adolf Hitler it never happened. Now, it appears there are millions that not only spat upon Jesus but ground his blood into the dust. Yes, that’s our gracious God. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who blessed us back then with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus. And so there is nothing that any of us need today that God has not already given to us in Jesus. And it’s important that you see that. “You mean he’s given it to us in Jesus?” He gave it to Jesus in you and he gave it to you in Jesus. Whatever Jesus has you have. Whatever spiritual life and rest that’s needed, you have already got. That’s where we can take such an unreal attitude in regard to the second rest of the people of God. We say, “I’m trying to get into the second rest. I am. I’m trying to get into the baptism of the Holy Spirit. I know that’s what I need. If I only had the baptism of the Holy Spirit.” If you had only the baptism? But you have. God gave you that in Jesus. “Well, I know but I really have to…,” “You have to explain it to him?” “Yes, I have to explain it.” But, it is yours. Are you willing for it? Are you willing to be in the baptism of the Holy Spirit? Are you willing to rest from your labors? “Oh, well if I could only rest from my labors it would save me such worry and such anxiety.” “But you wouldn’t have the credit for your labors.” “Well, I don’t need the credit.” “Well then, why don’t you rest from your labors? Why don’t you accept that God has blessed you with a second rest of the people of God? Why don’t you accept that you are nothing in Jesus, God has destroyed you in him, Jesus alone lives in you and he will do all the living for you? Why don’t you accept that?” Well, it’s not so easy. Well it is. It’s not a matter of us trying to get the baptism of the Holy Spirit, or trying to get the second rest of the people of God, or trying to get forgiveness, or trying to get regeneration, or trying to get conviction of sin, or trying to get an awakened spirit. These we have all been blessed with in Jesus. All we have to do is be willing for the life that results from those. You remember the two men that used to ride to church on a pony cart for years in the states. They attended a church where holiness of heart was preached, where the clean heart was preached, where sanctification, the fullness of the Holy Spirit, the second rest of the people of God, the victory over sin, the ability to do what you knew was right, and that we are not to be continually saying, “The good that I would I cannot do.” And these men went there every Sunday and sought for a clean heart, and sought for entire sanctification. They sought for years, and years, and years and then one of them entered in. He was picking up the other man to take them both to church as usual, and the other one said to him, “John, how did you enter in?” And John looked at him and said, “I just got honest with God.” And that’s it. It is not that we need something more, we need to just get honest with God, stop playing around, and stop saying, “Oh, I’d love to be free from my labors.” All we mean is, “I wish we hadn’t so much trouble with myself. I’d love to be free of having so much trouble with myself.” Yes, but are you really free from making yourself the important person? Are you willing for Jesus to be the only one? God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in Christ from before the foundation of the world. You are blessed with it, it is yours now, and you’ve only to live in it. Let us pray.

Blessings From the Bounty of Heaven Ephesians 1:3b Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill I think Ephesians is really the most complex book in the New Testament and probably in the Bible. I’m not really a Greek scholar though I can read Greek, but even I can see how the Greek is intensely condensed. It is very, very complex, Greek. And Paul tries to express thoughts that are really quit infinite, and so it is a very complex book. I would say it is much more difficult Greek than the book of Romans. It is more complex in a way then Romans though in a sense not as complete and absolute a presentation of the gospel as Romans. But Ephesians is certainly a much deeper book, and so it’s a book where you need to spend a lot of time depending on the Holy Spirit, trusting him to show you at what level you can understand it. It’s not to bend your mind out of shape trying to understand what maybe I understand, or what somebody else understands. But you need to ask the Holy Spirit to show you what you need to understand of it at this time. I think what we’ve done is get to about verse 3, so let’s plunge into it. Ephesians 1:3, “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us.” You keep getting that three times in this verse, “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places.” It’s good to see that each of those ‘blessed’ give you the feel of the book — blessed be the God and Father, who has blessed us, with every spiritual blessing. The Greek is just the same actually, it’s that word eulogetos. And it keeps repeating. Even those of you that know a little Greek, know that logetos is speak, and eu is well. So blessing is speaking well of. But you can see that the whole verse is a positive. It’s all bless, bless, bless be the God and Father of the Lord Jesus, bless does with every spiritual blessing. So this verse is gospel all the way. Now what I’d like to draw your attention to is the third part of the verse which we’re dealing with today, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places — in heavenly places. The rare expression there is epouraniois. It occurs actually just four times in the New Testament, and those four times are in Ephesians. It is a remarkable expression, and has several different meanings. I thought Lloyd Jones had a very deep insight and then I was looking up my own special computer commentary and there it was right there so I know what he got it from. But heaven can mean the earth’s atmosphere. And you’ll get that if you like to look at it in Genesis 2:19. This is one obvious example of that word in Hebrew (though it’s not translated heaven there in our English). Genesis 2:19, “So out of the ground the LORD God formed every beast of the field and every bird of the air.” And “of the air” is actually every bird of the heavens. So you can guess the atmosphere is a where our friends the birds fly. And so that’s one meaning of heaven. E. Stanley Jones points out another meaning of heaven — that is the stellar heavens. This is just beyond the earth’s atmosphere where the stars are. You find that in Matthew 24:29, “Immediately after the tribulation of those days the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light, and the stars will fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens will be shaken.” Heavens — that’s the place where the stars are, the stellar heavens, the great areas of space. And the third heaven is of course paradise itself. And that’s what Paul was talking about that we read in 2 Corinthians 12, “I knew a man who was called up to the third heaven,” he was speaking of himself and of a very elevated, mystical experience where he was caught up into heaven and he saw what heaven was like. And so paradise is the third meaning of heaven. Now what I’d like to show you and you’ll have to think about this a little more — light, travels at 180,000 miles per second. Light travels 6 trillion miles in a year. So when you’re talking about light years that’s the kind of distance you’re talking about. Now do you see that if you’re standing here on the earth, and there’s a star out here, and its light is traveling at 6 trillion miles a year. In one year its light has got to there. And in another year its light has got to there. And eventually what do you say? They calculate it now with the radio telescopes, but by the time it gets to here it’s ten thousand years later. So Colleen sees this star, but really she doesn’t. She sees the light of the star that has come in these little bits and it eventually gets to here, and she says, “Look at that star”. But really what she should say is, “Look at that star that was!” Because many of the stars have died, and all we’re seeing is their light traveling towards us. Now if you can hold your mind together let’s just go back to there. We go back to that point many thousands of years back there. If you could get out into space there, (you see why they talk about time machines) you’re seeing something out there that has happened eight thousand years ago. I am no astronomer at all and I don’t know the details of these things, but I can begin to grasp that that’s where time and space affect each other. I think you can see that by going to a different place in a vast universe like ours, you actually travel back in time or forward in time. And you can actually see things that have happened ten thousand years ago, twenty thousand years ago, or as many thousands of years ago as God has arranged. Can you see what I’m saying? There seems to be some remarkable place there. I don’t know if that’s at all what Stephen Hawking (a scientist in the U.K.) hopes to get at, the unique theory of everything, but you can see that there’s some spot out there at the end of this stellar space and beyond this atmosphere where space and time fade into paradise. Now that’s what this verse says, the word for blessed in heavenly places is eulogesas. The aorist tense is a past tense but it’s a past tense with the emphasis on back there. The perfect tense is a past tense, but it emphasizes what has happened in the past and what is the present state that is the result of that. So when you say “He has blessed”, you really are laying the emphasis on the present state that is the result of the previous blessing. You’re laying emphasis on the actual event in the past. And what God is saying is that he blessed us in Christ, in the heavenly places back there. Back there he blessed us in the heavenly places, which are beyond the space and time that we can see and measure, he blessed us in Christ thousands of years ago. Away at the beginning he blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing. I think you all are able to get over the obvious question, well how could he have blessed us if we didn’t yet exist? It’s because we were created in Christ Jesus, and we were created in Christ Jesus way before the beginning of the world. And it was at that time that God blessed us in Christ in the heavenly places. In other words, when God resolved to make us part of the Trinity family he knew that he would have to make us free agents. And at that moment he knew he would have to make us free agents who could kill God. He had to face the worst possibility that he gave us, and he had to make us free agents that could kill God. Yet God himself would rise from the dead, and would in turn be able to destroy the evil in us that killed him. Yet at the same time he would be able to raise us up so that we would have a chance to choose him or ourselves. And then God turned around to his son and said, “Son, will you let me create these dear children inside you, so that you will bare their destruction and in turn raise them up by your own life so that they will have the opportunity to choose me or themselves?” And God did all that back there, that’s what Paul is saying. God blessed us in Christ in the heavenly places — where time is one great eternal moment, where time has faded into eternity — all that has been done. What’s the importance of it? The importance of it is that too many of us think, “I can’t get forgiveness, I can’t get sanctified, I can’t get baptized with the Holy Spirit.” You don’t have to because you already were. God already did that. And if you say to me, “Well why am I not in it?” Yes, why aren’t you in it? Why aren’t you? That’s really all you have to say, why aren’t you? It’s not because you can’t get in so why aren’t you? The only answer is, “I’ll ask the Holy Spirit why I’m not.” It’s certainly not because God has’t done it. It’s been done. That’s why the verse says, “God blessed us in Christ in the heavenly places, with every spiritual blessing, (every — the Greek word is very clear). It’s every spiritual blessing, it’s the same word as you get in pantasocracy or pantheos. The word is “pas” it’s every spiritual blessing, God blessed us with every spiritual blessing, in Christ, everything that we needed — what are they? You see it in Ephesians 2:1. These are the spiritual blessings that he blessed us with at that moment. “And you he made alive, when you were dead through the trespasses and sins in which you once walked.” Even when you were dead he made you alive in Jesus. He crucified you in Jesus and made you alive in Jesus even, “When you were dead through the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience. Among these we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, following the desires of body and mind, and so we were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind.” Even when that was the case, God who is rich in mercy, out of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead through our trespasses…..even back there, when God saw that we were out to kill him, and to live with ourselves as God, even when we were dead through our trespasses back there, God made us alive to together with Christ, and by grace you have been saved. It is all by grace, because you couldn’t do anything back then at all. It was by God’s sheer generosity that he foresaw what your attitude was, and he took action. He wiped it out and raised you up despite your attitude. By grace you have been saved, and raised us up with him and made us sit with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus. Why? That in the coming ages, he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace and kindness toward us in Christ Jesus, for by grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not your own doing, it’s the gift of God, not because of works lest any man should boast. But we say, “Lord, what should we do to get forgiven? What should we do to get sanctified? What should we do to be baptized with the Holy Spirit?” And he’s saying, “Can’t you read? This was all done by grace. I did this all to you in my son. I have raised you up and made you alive in him. That’s all done, and this present world is a world that lifts apart from that to show you what the alternative is. Now you can see what the alternative is. But I’ve put you in my son and I’ve put my son in you, and now I want you to live that way.” That’s it, the whole thing has been done, and that’s what the verse is saying. Bless be the God and the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who blessed us with every spiritual blessing in Christ Jesus in the heavenly places, and then has let us come and visit earth for a short time. But actually that’s where we are, sitting with Jesus in the heavenly places at the right hand of God. So you can see that you actually have to decide and the decision is a very simple one. You have to decide whether you are going to believe that this passing ‘schema’ (Greek for outer appearance) is passing away. You have to decide is this outward appearance the real reality? Is this the final truth or in fact is this the final truth? You have to decide which one. We can decide it at every moment of our lives. Somebody cuts us dead and at that moment you can decide, is this reality or have I been raised up with the Lord Jesus? Are the angels, archangels, St. Patrick and St. Thomas Aquinas are they all here? Which is reality? We can decide that and it is incredible. I’ll ask you to think about it. I think it’s interesting to see how even from the little bit of knowledge we have of astronomy we can see how people like Einstein, are breaking into some of the truth of reality. Dear Lord, we thank you for your great grace. We thank you Lord that the very powers of heaven are not only around about us but within us. We thank you Lord that we are not what we seem. We are not little creeping insects, here on the surface of a planet. We are caught between the moon and heaven, caught in our dear savior, made to sit with him in the heavenly places, far above all rule and authority in dominion and power, and above every name that is named not only in this age but that which is to come. We thank you Father, that this is reality. So Lord Jesus we look up to you now to praise and thank you. Lord we would breathe freer and fresher air where we are in you; far above the clouds, far above the smoke, far above the mirrors. In the clear light of reality we would dwell here with you moment by moment. But for the rest of the short time here on earth, may we live in the glory and the beauty of your presence and allow that to shine out through our eyes and our hands to the dears hearts in the café and the offices, and in the stores, so that your will Father will be done on earth even as it is done in heaven. Now the grace of our Lord Jesus, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with each one of us now and evermore, Amen.

Pre-Determined as Sons Ephesians 1:3c Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill Will you take a Bible please and turn to Ephesians 1. I think you remember the illustration that goes something like this; there was a group of blind Indians and they had never seen an elephant before. One of them brought an elephant into the village and while they couldn’t see it, they felt it. One felt the side of the elephant and said, “It’s a wall.” And the other felt the big ear and said, “No, it’s a leaf.” And the other felt the foot and leg and said, “Oh, it’s a big tree.” Another felt the trunk and said, “Oh, it’s a rope.” And of course the illustration shows that if you only look at a bit of a thing you don’t see the whole thing as it really is and you can be totally deceived. This ties up with reading scripture. We’ve all learned about reading in context and remember the context. One of the dangers of the careful analysis of a book verse-by-verse is that you get wrapped up in that verse and lose the sense of the argument or the trend of the whole book. So I thought that we ought to look just at the verses we talked about so far just to catch up together. There is a progression in them if you look at verse 3, thinking of verses 3-5. Ephesians 1:3, “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places.” I think the word that’s used is “eulogos” . You remember, we said that it’s the first aorist tense. In Greek the first aorist means blessed at a definite moment. We often translate it as “has blessed” but really the emphasis is on the definite moment of blessing. And what Paul is saying is, that’s the timeline. This is 1997 and this is 4 BC and in 28 or maybe 57 AD he’s saying, “God blessed us in Christ in the heavenly places.” The heavenly places are what we call heaven where God himself is. God blessed us in Christ in the heavenly places. He blessed us at a definite moment in the past. And that’s what he’s saying, after this definite moment here, “God blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing.” That is really the gospel, that God has already done that, that he’s blessed us with every spiritual blessing. Spiritual blessings – you can see some of them are in Psalms 103. Psalms 103:1, “Bless the LORD, O my soul; and all that is within me, bless his holy name! Bless the LORD, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits.” And these are some of the spiritual blessings, or benefits, “Who forgives all your iniquity, who heals all your diseases, who redeems your life from the pit, who crowns you with steadfast love and mercy, who satisfies you with good as long as you live.” And what Paul is saying is, God blessed you in Christ with those things in the heavenly places. They are ours and so you don’t have to strive for healing. You don’t have to make healing occur by the strong exercise of your faith. You simply have to have faith and believe that God gave you healing in Christ. That’s done and it is yours. It seems to me vital in all cases of sickness or physical weakness, to set our minds clearly upon that. That is what faith is. It is to take our minds well away from the symptoms whether they’re appearing or disappearing. And I think that applies to all kinds of sicknesses, aches and pains, back aches, and all the things that we have that are normally part of our life. It seems vital to see that that is the truth, that it’s in the heavenly places. That’s pretty important to see. “Ouranios” is the Greek word. It means “in heaven”. There’s a verse in Colossians that I think is as good a direction about how to exercise faith as any. If you look at it, it’s Colossians 3:1-2, “If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your mind on things that are above, not on things that are on earth.” It seems to me when the pain comes and you allow your mind to be drawn to the pain, at that moment you’ve ceased to exercise faith because you’re looking at things upon the earth not on things in heaven where you have been blessed with every spiritual blessing. I don’t think it’s a question of saying, “I have no pain, I have no pain.” I think it’s a question of setting your mind plainly and clearly in the place where God has blessed you with every spiritual blessing. He will make that real here on earth as he pleases. Sometimes by removing the symptom of the pain, sometimes by giving you strength to go independent of the pain. But faith is setting our minds on the place where we have received that spiritual blessing and that spiritual blessing has been given us already in Christ. It seems always wrong to think, “Am I healed? Am I healed?” It seems to me that’s a direct contradiction of the gospel. The gospel is, “God has blessed you at a definite moment,” and we see that moment more clearly in a few minutes, “God has blessed me at a definite moment in Christ with every spiritual blessing. And that spiritual blessing includes this one of healing my diseases. Therefore my job is to set my mind on that.” If you say to me, “Well, what about medicine and all that kind of thing?” I think that’s really a separate world. By all means do what you think there but be very clear where the healing comes from. Some of us are guided therefore to take action, on some things some of us are guided not to take action but in both cases the one thing that is necessary is faith. Jesus did put mud on a man’s eyes. That was a kindly gracious act. It wasn’t the mud that healed him but he did something to help his faith. So it’s not unbelief or lack of faith if you go to a doctor. God guides us all differently and some of us do go to a doctor in certain situations and some of us don’t. That really is irrelevant. The important thing is that you set your mind firmly on the heavenly place, on your position in Jesus, on the fact that God has blessed you with every spiritual blessing in Christ. You set your mind upon that and you thank him for that. It seems to me that’s what faith is. Faith is not throwing away your glasses to get healed. Faith is not going to the doctor. Faith is not all those outward things. Those are really irrelevant. Faith is setting your mind on the things that are above where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. It’s believing the gospel that God blessed you in Christ at a definite moment with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, and there’s where it is as opposed to earth. Obviously, God allows the pain to come for really only one reason. It’s so faith will be exercised, because that is the key to all our knowledge of him. So often, he allows things to come day after day that will drive us into that. Of course, you can think of other things besides healing of sicknesses. You can think of finances, or you can think of your own personal life, or you can think of things that you’re doing or trying to achieve in your work, or in your writing, or in your reading, and they’re all in the same situation. God has blessed you with every spiritual blessing so it’s the same with money. If you set your mind on the pain then you’re not exercising faith. If you set your mind constantly on the lack of money or the problems with money, then you’re on earth and you’re ignoring and indeed rejecting reality. Reality is that God has blessed you in the heavenly places in Christ with all that you need there. So, I think one of the old saints said in regard to the beatitude, “Blessed are the poor in spirit”, he said, “We are beggars that expect to live off the wealth of God. So it’s turning your mind away from all the lacks and inadequacies that you feel on earth and turning it up to the true situation in heaven. That’s a definite act and you can actually do that in all kinds of situations. You open your eyes in the morning and it’s a grey rainy morning. The elemental spirits of the earth pour in and say, “Monday, it’s terrible.” And what’s the thing you have to do at that very moment? You can choose. You choose either to set your mind on those things, on unreality, (on something that is passing like weather) or, you take your mind off that and set your mind there. So faith is always setting your mind on the gospel. And the gospel is that God has blessed you in Christ with every spiritual blessing — everything that you need in Christ. Now, it’s quite interesting because the second verse takes it a step further and if you look at Ephesians 1:4. Verse 3 is, “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him.” And so the verse knocks it back one step. Here is the blessing but it knocks it back to that fact that God chose us before the foundation of the world. So here is the “foundation of the world” and “blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing” just the same way as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world. He chose us in him before the foundation of the world. In other words, God saw us in Christ and chose us in him even before the world was founded. And because of that, he blessed us in Christ in the heavenly places with every spiritual blessing that we need. But it’s quite important for us to see that that’s when it happened. God did not send us down here as little bits of flesh to float around and get ourselves into trouble and then he rescued us. God foresaw the whole thing. He foresaw the pain that you would feel next year. He foresaw the financial difficulty that you would face next week. He foresaw the people that we would meet tomorrow who would be awkward and difficult to deal with. God saw all those when he choose us in Christ from before the foundation of the world. And it takes away that feeling, “Well, I’m fighting a battle here day-by-day. Sometimes I’m winning, sometimes I’m not. When I’m winning I’m really in Christ and in the Spirit and when I’m not winning I’m really down.” It’s not that at all. God chose us in Jesus. He put you and me in Jesus before the foundation of the world and blessing us with every spiritual blessing occurred there at that point. And so we have had all we’ve needed all along. Where we trip ourselves up is when we immediately think, “Well then we should get it whenever we need it and we should see it evident whenever we want to see it.” And that’s where we get ourselves into trouble because that’s what causes the skepticism in us. We say, “Wait a minute, he blessed us with every spiritual blessing but I haven’t had every spiritual blessing that I needed. At times I’ve been in real trouble.” Yes, but you’re judging it from your point of view. You’re saying, “Wait a minute, God has the right to manifest those blessings when and in the way that he chooses. But the fact that he’s done it, the fact that he has already delivered me from all kinds of sickness problems, all kinds of financial problems, all kinds of emotional difficulties, all kinds of personal problems, the fact that he has done that, that is clear. That is done. It is up to him how he applies it. My job is to look at that fact and to be confident of it.” When somebody says, “Yes, but look at the wounds.” And you say, “Wounds? But they’re nothing. Jesus had wounds. He had open holes but he still stayed alive. That’s the life I live. I may still have the apparent inadequacies other people have but it doesn’t stop God from fulfilling his plan for my life and it doesn’t stop me marching on as if those were not there.” So that is part of the firmness of faith. But it’s interesting, these verses take it back another stage when you go to the next verse. Ephesians 1:4, “Even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him.” That’s the way the Greek goes, it is “exelexato” and it’s the aorist participle. And so actually the other translations do it more correctly when they say not, “he destined” but “having destined” so that the verse reads like this, “Even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world that we should be holy and blameless before him having destined us in love.” The word in Greek is “exelexato” and it’s predestinated. You also get it in almost all the other translations — predestinated, having predestinated us. So he chose us in Christ because way back he had already predestinated us. And that’s the way we’ve explained it before. The millisecond in which God conceived of his only begotten Son Jesus, the Bible is saying at that same millisecond, or if you like to put it for the sake of our weak minds, a fraction of a millisecond after that millisecond, God conceived of us as his sons and daughters in Jesus. He predestinated us at that point to be his sons and daughters in Christ. And so it’s going way back into the very heart of the eternal God. It’s saying that at the same moment he conceived of his only begotten Son, he conceived of us in his Son, and as part of his Son. He predestinated us at that point to be adopted as sons. The Greek is actually predestined us to adoption as sons. And predestinated means planned beforehand. Indeed, the root meaning of it is “determined beforehand”. And so what his word is saying is, “He blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places. He chose us even as he had already chosen us in Christ having before that predestinated us or determined beforehand that we should be adopted as his sons in Christ.” And so God had an only begotten Son and a millisecond after he had his only begotten Son he determined beforehand that you and I should be his children in Christ. That’s how close we are to the Father’s heart. That’s how fixed and certain our position is. This does not cause that. This appreciates it, or this allows it to be manifested here on earth, but this does not cause it. We are not saved by our faith but by God’s grace. What he has done through our faith is manifested here. But the work itself is God’s. And so each of us is a son and daughter of God. A moment after he conceived of his only begotten Son, he conceived of Greg Leitschuh. God determined beforehand that he would be adopted as his son in Jesus. That’s how much of a part we are of God and of his dear Son Christ. The last time we studied this verse we said that the Roman concept of adoption was a legal one and it meant that the child that was adopted had all the rights and privileges of a natural born son. You have all the rights and privileges of Jesus. I know it’s overwhelming, but that’s what it means. And it’s repeated again, and again. Christ became what we were so that we could become what he is. But that is the truth of it. Long before the foundation of the world God determined that he would adopt us into his Son Jesus Christ and give us the same rights and privileges as his Son. Satan’s job of course, is to get us to disbelieve and to question it, and to therefore try to bring it about. But God has said to us plainly, “This is reality and I want you to live in that reality.” Do you see what doubting God is? Doubting God is just rank unbelief. It’s rejection of God and it’s total unreality. That’s why the Bible says whatever is not of faith is sin. Doubt is not of faith. We’ve all wrestled ourselves into positions where we’ve wondered, “Am I really in Christ?” But you can see now that it is simple rejection of what God has done when you question that. The only position one can take that is realistic is to set our minds clearly on the fact that God did bless us in Christ, with every spiritual blessing that we need. Just in the same way as he had chosen us in him to be blameless before him having already predestinated us even before the foundation of the world to be adopted as his sons in Christ and to have all the rights and privileges of his only begotten Son. And so when God looks upon the apple of his eye, he looks upon you and me and that’s how dear we are to him. That’s how much he has made available to us — all that we need. That’s why I read that chapter on faith, because I saw again that that’s the only realistic way to live. Satan’s method is to get you to let your mind drift off to enjoy the comforts or the “benies”, or the weekend at Lille France, or the holiday, or even just each other. He pulls you along gradually and gets you more and more to enjoy the “sense” things, the pleasure things and material things. Then he whacks you because he takes one of them away and tries to get you to go down with it. And so it’s vital in good times as much as in bad times to live by this and to live with our minds set on the reality that is clearly in Jesus himself. Let us pray.

Jesus Thought of Us Before Time Ephesians 1:4a Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill This is to see if you’re awake, when did Paul write the letter to the Ephesians, what year? You’d be embarrassed. No, ’57. Oh, I’m sorry ’62, you were right. What a way to start a class. Who’s awake now? (lots of laughter) This is just a sermon, it’s not a class. That’s right. I’ll watch you because you’re like that little guy in the back that has all the answers except you’re a big guy. Well loved ones, will you turn to Ephesians chapter one. That’s what we’re studying and we’re about the fourth or fifth Sunday into the study of Ephesians. And you’ll remember that the last verse we studied was verse 3. Ephesians 1:3, “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places.” And of course, the surprise to us is the past tense there; who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places. We usually expect, “Oh blessed be our Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who will bless us, in this life, with every spiritual blessing. But here Paul says, “Who has blessed us,” it’s already done. Of course, that is startling to us and we wonder, “Does he just mean the Ephesians? Is he just talking to the Ephesian Christians?” He’s saying, “Now, you’ve all been born of God and you’ve received the blessing of regeneration. Therefore you’re now experiencing the blessing of sanctification, you’re now experiencing the blessing of healings and gifts of the spirit, and you have now been blessed in these past years with every spiritual blessing.” Well, they all didn’t have every spiritual blessing so he can hardly mean that. Then he adds, “Who has blessed you in the heavenly places with all these spiritual blessings.” So he’s obviously talking about more than just what a pastor would say to his flock, “Now listen, since you came to Jesus you’ve had many spiritual blessings.” He’s saying more than that. I wouldn’t say to you, “You’ve had many spiritual blessings in the heavenly places.” You’d say, “No, we’ve had them right here on earth.” But Paul says, “You have been blessed, not with many spiritual blessings but with every spiritual blessing. Every blessing that you need you have already been blessed with it, in Christ, in the heavenly places.” And you remember how we went into this whole business of the heavenly places and what that word meant. And it begins to bring enlightenment to us because we realize that heaven, among the Jews, had three meanings. One — it meant broadly speaking, the atmosphere where the birds fly. The astronaut who answered the question right at the beginning would say, “Where the planes fly, whatever that height is.” I think we fly at 37,000 feet or 39,000 feet when we’re flying across the Atlantic. Well obviously, you can go up several miles, but it’s the atmosphere and that’s the first meaning that the Jews had for heaven. And then there is the stellar, or stella. This is just the Latin word for star, so it’s the starry heavens, the places where we see the stars. And then the third one was of course, what Paul talks about as the third heaven. It’s what the Bible refers to as heaven itself. And you remember we got some light on this whole verse as we talked about the incredible distances that are involved in the third heaven, or even in the stellar heaven. Here you have the earth, and here you have a little star way out here. And you remember we said that many of those stars died thousands or millions of years ago so that what we’re seeing is just the light that is coming from them. We said that light travels at 182,000 miles per second and therefore in one light year you’d travel six trillion miles. So really we’re saying that this star is an incredible distance from the earth. We also said that after a year it would have traveled six trillion miles, so the star itself might have died six trillion miles ago, or a light year ago, but the light has just reached that point. Then in another six trillion miles it would have reached there but of course 12 trillion miles back the star would have died, or two light years ago the star would have died. And yet, we’re experiencing something that was experienced back there two years ago. Well then of course, as you multiply that you begin to realize, “Wait a minute. Depending on what point in the universe you were in, it would determine what you were experiencing. If you were back here you’d be experiencing what was there back there.” And you start to realize that even in our own physical universe we can perceive without even going into this spiritual dimension, which is obviously a different kind of existence completely. But even in this one we can see that there is the possibility of time being transcended and of you actually experiencing things depending on where you were in the universe. In a sense God can transport us to some place here where that has just taken place in his heart, where the lamb has just been slain in his heart. God is able to transport us to a place where all that has just happened. And of course, for most of us, the easier way to see it is still the illustration of the little guy, who is down here watching through the hole in the fence. He’s watching the precession coming and here is one, two, three and four. He can just see those and maybe also five and six. He just sees a little bit. With us it’s just 80 years of life. But perhaps we extend it to the life of mankind and we say it’s 4,000 BC to beyond 2,000 AD. But he just sees that little bit. But his elder brother, climbs onto the roof and his elder brother can see everything that is about to come and everything that is passed. And there is a place where God is, a place in the third heaven, a place in the heavens, where everything is seen as one present moment. And that’s what Paul is pointing to when he says, “Who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus.” We have already been crucified, and raised up and made to sit with God in the heavenly places. We have already experienced that there. And then God has created a little physical universe where he can play it out second-by-second so that we have the chance of appreciating all that and entering into it. But it all has already happened. God has already blessed us in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus with every spiritual blessing. Of course, the great advantage and blessing of it is we are not down here trying to shoot ourselves up into God. We’re not down here trying by faith and belief to shoot ourselves into Christ. We have already been blessed with every spiritual blessing in Christ. We are in Christ. The issue is not how do you get into Christ. The issue is living in that reality now and that’s what faith is called. Faith is not creating in yourself a feeling that you’re in Christ. Faith is living in reality, living in the fact that you have already been blessed with every spiritual blessing. The struggle in being healed is not a struggle of trying to feel healed. It is simply a struggle to see what reality is and to live in that reality. So we have been blessed in Christ with every spiritual blessing and that’s what Paul is saying. We’ve been blessed with every spiritual blessing in Christ Jesus. Every spiritual blessing? Yes, every one. God who is rich – out of the great love with which he has loved us, who is rich in mercy towards us, even when we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. God enabled that to happen even when we were yet sinners, even back here in the lamb slain from before the foundation of the world. Now you might say, “Well wait a minute. ‘Who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus’, that doesn’t necessarily mean before we were made. I know Psalms 139 seems to imply that God saw our unformed substance and that he had every day of our lives written in the book before there were any of them, but still this verse just says God blessed us sometime in the past in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus.” Let’s look at today’s verse, “Even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world.” It’s just so blatant, and so simply stated that it’s very hard to get around it. “Even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world.” There’s nothing mysterious about it. That is the Greek, this is the Latin and the vulgate for it sicut. That’s it. Lloyd Jones is right, he translated “according as”. Actually it’s quite interesting because he says, “How are these blessings to become ours?” And he says, “God gives the answer in the next few verses.” They become ours even as he chose us in Christ, according as how he chose us in Christ. Sicut in Latin really means “just as if”, or “just as”. Just as he chose us in Christ before the foundation of the world. How do those blessings become yours? Because God chose you in Christ. No, no, they become ours as we have faith. No, that’s not what Paul says. He says, “They become yours because they’ve been given to Christ and God has chosen you in Christ before the foundation of the world.” Those of you who know a little Greek know that exelexato – would be transliterated like that, and so that it’s God elected you, he chose you, he selected you, and he elected you in Christ before the foundation of the world. So these blessings are ours because they belong to Christ and God chose us in Christ before the foundation of the world. And if you want to know, “Well, wait a minute is there some way around it in the old foundation of the world?” No, catabolic is actually – those of you who know a little Greek will know pro – means just before, and here is “katabole” in English letters. “Kata” is down and “bole” is “to throw”. I suppose hyperbole comes from. But it means “throw down”, or “cast down”. So it’s a foundation, something that you cast down or you throw down. So that’s what it means, “God chose you in Christ before the foundation of the world.” Before there was any world God chose us in Christ. Now, just going back to my attempt to tell the story simply — when our dear Father conceived his Son Jesus, he conceived his Son Jesus not only as his divine Son who would dwell with him in eternity, but at that same moment, he conceived of us. I know it just humbles you. He conceived of his Son as the one who would be the first born of all creation and in his Son he conceived of us, other children that would share his fellowship and would be like him, and would love him. And we would do that inside his Son. That’s why he conceived of us in his Son. I don’t know what you think but I always thought, not quite that we were an afterthought, but I always thought of the Father having a whole life with Christ for millions or billions of years and then suddenly he thought, “Oh I must make some others.” Well of course it’s hard for us to conceive of eternity but God obviously thinks of everything at the same moment. We’re engaged in silliness when we talk this way because what do we know about infinity or eternity? But obviously God doesn’t think sequentially, “Oh, what will I do next?” He sees everything at once. So the moment he conceived of his Son in that spaceless, timeless existence of eternity he conceived of us little human beings. He conceived of his son therefore as the first-born among all creation, as the first among many brethren. Then Ephesians 2:10, “You are God’s, workmanship, created in Christ Jesus.” In other words, he created us in his Son Jesus and in that way he chose us in him before the foundation of the world. He made us part of his Son. He knew what we would do. He knew that if he was going to give us freewill he had to give us the freewill to actually kill him and yet in some way he had to retain his life. He actually was committed therefore to destroying us and yet in Jesus, allowing us to be raised up again. And all that was conceived before the foundation of the world which is why the Bible talks in revelation about Jesus being the lamb that was slain from before the foundation of the world. This is why Romans 6 talks about we were crucified with Christ from before the foundation of the world. All that took place in Jesus. In other words, the Father said, “My Son will you allow these dear hearts that I have made inside you to exercise their own free will? It’ll result in your death, it’ll result in pain, and it’ll result in me being in you reconciling the world to myself on that cross. I too will suffer what you suffer but it’s the only way we can be real about this. It’s the only way in which we can make men and woman and maintain our own integrity and they maintain their integrity. They must be free to do their worst against us. But my Son, I love you and I love them and I want them to be with us. So will you bear them and raise them up because you deserve not to be killed? And then you remember, it says, “He made him to be sin who knew no sin.” Jesus did not deserve death himself. He died because he was full of us and we had to die. And so Jesus said, “Yes, Father you know I will because of course they’re one.” Then all that took place at that moment before the world was. Then it was played out here in this temporal existence so that we could each one say our “Amen” or say our “No” to the thing. But that I think is part of the explanation of this mighty verse. These blessings are ours because God has chosen us in Christ before the foundation of the world. The great thing it does is deliver us from this dreadful subjectivism. Subjectivism is one of the weaknesses of the Pentecostal movement, our own evangelical movement and certainly parts of the Methodist Church. There’s a strong temptation for us to be preoccupied with our subjective experience, “Have you faith? “No, I haven’t faith.” “Well, you have to get faith.” We have to see that faith is not what saves us. It’s by grace that we are saved through faith. But we’re saved by grace. We’re saved by God planning all this before the foundation of the world and graciously providing and giving all that we needed, while allowing us at this moment to live in the midst of all of that and reject it all if we choose. Or, by faith — by simply recognizing, accepting, and living it, we enter into it all here on earth. So this is part of what is involved in this verse. I would ask you to think about it because you’ll see that there is not only great truth in it but great strength. The issue is not, are you sanctified or are you justified. The issue is, are you living in the reality of what God has done for you and to you in Jesus? Are you living in Jesus? Rather indeed, is Jesus living in you? Is Jesus living his life in you or are you living your own life trying to imitate him? So it is a great blessing. I ask you to read that verse again and think about it according and as he has chosen us in Christ before the foundation of the world. It’s interesting that you can see there’s no emphasis on predestination where they say “He’s chosen us but he’s rejected everybody else.” No, what the verse says is he has chosen us and Christ has died for all, therefore all have died. That’s what it says in Romans 6. We judge that if Christ died for all then all died – I think it’s 2 Corinthians 5, that all have died. And of course, that’s the horror of it as we think, “you mean Hitler died? You mean OJ Simpson died? You mean the person that murdered that person last week died?” Yes, yes, that’s part of the agony of God that he has suffered all that is needed to enable every one of us to live in the glory and beauty of Christ. He has borne it for every man and every woman. That’s the wonderful gospel and it’s mighty because it’s why these people suffered to share the good news. That’s why, because they were telling everybody, “God has done everything to you and in you in Jesus that is needed. It’s all yours. It’s still yours even as you’re rejecting him at this moment, it’s still yours. It’s yours until the very end.” There finally comes a time where of course, you can hold out against what God has done but that’s the good news. That’s the good news that the man that comes to deliver the meat, doesn’t know. They may know about Jesus Christ, and God, but they don’t know that. They don’t know that and they don’t even suspect that that’s possible. They just think they’re poor little creatures that are their mother’s sons and that have a short little life here, 70 maybe 80 years, and they’ll go out like a light. But they don’t know this, and that’s why the good news is such good news. That’s what God has given us to live and share. Let us pray. Dear Father, we thank you for the wonder of this. We thank you Lord, for the immense, overwhelming, magnanimous generosity that has prompted you to love us like this and give us everything that we need in Jesus — to give us a free place at your right hand, to give us at this moment, your willing readiness to provide all that is needed in this life freely, because you love us. Oh Lord, we thank you for such kindness. We thank you Lord, for delivering us from such a long uphill struggle to try to get into heaven. We see Father, that you are greater than our hearts. Even if our own hearts condemn us, you are greater than our hearts. You have lifted us above even our own favors and you look upon us as your own dear Son, as the very apple of your eye. And you continue to give us freely all the grace, and strength, and power that we need. We thank you Lord. Father, we can only think of one thing to do and that is bow down before you and thank you and begin to walk in the glory of this. We thank you Father in Jesus.

Swimming into Cleanness Ephesians 1:4b Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill God had a son and he made you part of his Son. You are personally known by God, and you have the eternal life of his Son. You have unique qualities that he has planned to express through you in earth and heaven. That’s the good news. And really you could end a sermon there, I could just say go and live in that faith and that truth. Just go and have the time of your life, and that’s really it. If you want to know how Satan steals that good news from you, he does it by getting you to add conditions to the good news. That’s it. He does it by getting you to add conditions to the good news. It’s a deception and a lie, but he persuades you to add conditions to something that is simple good news. Something that has been called the gospel from even before Jesus himself was born on earth. You can’t add conditions to good news. You can add conditions to a promise, but you can’t add conditions to good news, and this is good news. So just look at it in Ephesians 1:4, and see again that it isn’t a promise, it’s news, it’s a statement of a fact. Ephesians 1:4, “Even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him.” That’s good news. God chose you in Jesus, before the foundation of the world. That’s a fact. And the reason we don’t whoop it up is because for years we’ve been deceived by Satan into adding conditions to that good news. You know the newspaper sellers in London, “The trains will not run today,” that’s news. It doesn’t say underneath, “If you didn’t eat your cornflakes.” It just says, “The trains will not run today,” and you know, “The trains will not run, I’ll have to find some other way to get into London.” Or, the good news, “The trains will run today,” and you know you can walk down to the station and you can get on the train. That’s what news is. The good news is that God had a Son and he made you part of his Son. He knows you personally. He knows your name, and you have his Son’s eternal life. You also have unique qualities that no one else has, that he has planned to express through you on earth and in heaven. That’s the good news. That’s it. And what we do is add conditions to it. We say, (and I know this is startling to you) “If we have faith.” And then Satan gets hold of you, and he pulls you over the coals on whether you have faith or not. And the fact is, the trains will run or won’t run whether you have faith or not, whether you have your conflicts or not. God has had a Son whether you have faith or not. God has made you in his Son whether you have faith or not. God knows you personally whether you have faith or not, and God has planned to express certain unique qualities of his own Son through you on earth and in heaven whether you have faith or not. That is good news. That is the gospel, it is not conditional, and it stands there whatever you say. We so often deal with each other conditionally, “If you love me, I’ll love you. If you give me this, I’ll give you that. If you forgive me, I’ll forgive you.” We deal with each other conditionally, but God deals with us unconditionally. It would be the same as me saying to Trish’s mother, “I will give the daughter that you are going to have 25,000 pounds.” That’s news that the birth of the daughter really doesn’t have much effect over, the news is there. The daughter doesn’t do anything for that, she just is born, and it’s news. God did that with us even before the foundation of the world, even when we were dead through our trespasses. God made us part of his Son, and even while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. Before we could fulfill any conditions of faith, or belief, or obedience, God did this in Jesus. He has done this for us, even before we were born. It is there in several places, even before we were conscience. Ephesians 2:5, “Even when we were dead through our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ.” And the emphasis there is in the parenthesis, “By grace you have been saved.” It’s by sheer generosity, not by anything that you have done. It’s not by whether you have faith or not. You remember Romans 5:8, you used to quote it often as one of the four verses that you’d use to present the gospel to someone who was not saved. Romans 5:8, “But God shows his love for us in that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us.” From before the beginning, God knew that you and I would not be able to bear the death that he would have to impose upon us to protect his own nature, and to destroy ours. He knew that. He knew we wouldn’t be able to bear that death, so he made his own Son to be sin, who knew no sin. So in his Son we died, even before we could say, “Yes, we’ll accept that,” or, “No, we won’t accept it.” The news is that God has done this. If you say to me, “Don’t you think he’s put himself out on a limb?” Yes, that’s right. It’s a limb that you and I wouldn’t think of putting ourselves on. We wouldn’t dream of it. But you’re right, he has done that. He has made us in his Son, he has destroyed what we chose to be in his Son, he has remade us in his Son, he has given us a place at his right hand in his Son, and then he has set us loose to do our worst. That’s right. That is what God has done. He has made us in his Son, and he has raised us in his Son irrespective of what our attitude to him is. But Satan of course, tries to persuade us to add conditions to that and say, “God has done that if of course, if you believe. God has done that of course, if you obey. God has done that if you live the way he wants you to live.” But that’s a lie and a deception. God has done this whatever we are like. He has already done this, and therefore it is natural for us to live a certain kind of life. But Satan tried to deceive us into thinking, “No, no, we are not in his Son. We are not in Christ until we do this or we do that. And until then we are children of wrath, and we just need to live like children of wrath.” All the time God has made us part of his Son, and it is natural for us to live like his Son. It is natural to live the way his Son lives because we are part of his Son. And that’s why we are so baffled about faith. How can a person be healed by faith? Well, they’re healed even before they have faith. It is not the faith that heals them; it is what God has done in Christ in them. That is what has healed them. It would explain why at times there are healings almost apart from faith. There are remarkable changes that take place. Some of it we call the cancer receding, or going into remission, but other healings take place that are just out of the blue and you can’t explain them. And it happens of course, because God has done this for all of us. And all that life is around about us just like the air. We say, “I can’t breathe, I can’t breathe.” God says, “Breathe the air that is all around.” You say, “You’re right the air is all around me all the time. I thought there was no air there.” “Yes, there’s air all around you. Christ is all around you, all the time.” His own power and his own life surround you, and flows through you, because you are in him, and it’s natural to be like him. That’s why we’re good. We’re good because God has put us in his Son and because there’s none good but God, there is none good but his Son. We’re good because God has put us in his Son. We don’t get into his Son because we’re good. We have been made in Jesus and adopted as God’s children, and because of that we are like him. It’s not because we are like him we then are born and adopted as his children. That’s the lie that Satan tried in the Garden of Eden, “Surely, when you eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, you will be like God, knowing the difference between good and evil.” The reply that Eve should have given was, “Like him? I am like him, how can I be other than like him? I am in him, I am part of him, and I am part of Jesus. What else can I do but be like him?” That was the answer she should give, but of course she was deceived by Satan’s suggestion. “Yes, maybe I’ll get like God if I do this.” There isn’t a condition. It’s God that has made us in his Son, has crucified us in him and raised him up in him. Now, all we do is live like that. It’s quite interesting the numbers of places in the Bible where it’s made plain that God has done the work and then as result of that we are sanctified and saved. You might like to look at some of them. 1 Peter 1:2, “Chosen and destined by God the Father and sanctified by the Spirit.” All those things were done first. Chosen is past tense, destined by God the Father, and sanctified by the Spirit are all in past tense, “For obedience to Jesus Christ and for sprinkling with his blood.” The implication is that you’re first chosen and destined by God the Father, then sanctified by the Spirit and as a result of that you’re able to obey Jesus Christ, and you’re sprinkled with his blood. So often we turn it round and we say, “Well if we obey Jesus Christ, then we’ll be chosen by God.” And we get into the “works” circle. 2 Thessalonians 2:13, “But we are bound to give thanks to God always for you, brethren beloved by the Lord, because God chose you from the beginning to be saved, through sanctification by the Spirit and belief in the truth.” So he sanctified you by the Spirit. The only ones who can believe in these truths are the spiritual men, those who have been touched by God’s spirit. They can believe in the truth. So in a sense unless God does something there’s no way in which we can rise into him, unless he chooses us from the beginning to be saved through sanctification by the Spirit. And of course it’s not only us, but all men, because Christ died for all, therefore all have died. And then you come to today’s verse, Ephesians 1:4, “Even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him.” The phrase, “Even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world”, is virtually a principle clause. A purpose clause if followed by a result clause, “That we should be holy and blameless before him.” That purpose or result clause follows the principle clause. The principle is the gospel, “He chose us in him before the foundation of the world. He made us in Jesus before the foundation of the world. God crucified us in Jesus, raised us up in Jesus, and brought us into his sanctuary at his right hand in Jesus, for the purpose that we should be holy and blameless before him. But, what is very plain is that our holiness and our blamelessness stem from our state, from our place and our condition. Our holiness and our blamelessness stem from our position in Jesus. And you can see why we get into such a vicious circle and such a frustrated system of thinking. We see that we ought to be holy; we ought to be blameless if we’re in Jesus and so we must try to be. And subtly, at that moment we step aside from Christ. If we’re going to be in Jesus we must be holy, and blameless. So we say, “Let me be holy and blameless so that I can be in Jesus.” And we turn the gospel upside down. The right position is, “Lord Jesus, I am in you. I am part of you. Oh, let me live in you, let me enjoy you. Let me live in this wonderful place that I am in with you at our Father’s right hand.” Then as a result of that we will be holy and blameless.” That’s it. The word in the verse is “hagios”. Hagiography you remember, is the study of the saints. “Hagios” means holy. It’s especially inner godliness. It’s something deeper than just morality. It’s like God’s own nature. It really is God’s own nature, and that’s why we get into such frustration when we try to be holy. We’re in Christ, here you are and you say, “To be in Christ I must be holy, and blameless.” And so we step outside of Christ. This little creature steps outside of Christ and tries to walk in holiness and blamelessness so that he will get into Christ – that’s ridiculous. He steps out of reality into unreality and in the unreality he tries to be like what he is naturally in reality. And of course, all he has to do is abide in or just stay where he is, stay where God has put him. But Satan’s desire is to get you to doubt that God has put you in Jesus. Satan’s desire is to get you to think that you’re a little thing independent on your own, and you have to somehow get into Christ. God is saying, “I have put you in Christ. I’m the only one who can put you in Christ. You cannot change your divine nature because I myself have put you in my Son from before the foundation of the world. I have done all things that are necessary. Now please, just live in that.” And then the Holy Spirit alone can bring about that holiness. I think one of the reasons we are able to bluff ourselves on this is because we reduce this to an outward thing. It’s not, it’s an inward thing. It’s every thought, and that’s where we go astray. That’s where we satisfy ourselves with a human imitation of holiness. That’s where we think somehow we’re managing it and pulling it off, but we’re not at all. We’re just living at a much lower level than Christ himself is. The Bible says, “Bring every thought into the captivity of Christ Jesus,” but far from that, we allow thoughts that are not Christ’s to dwell for a second in us and we get used to that. “Why did she do that?” That’s spat out right away, because nothing can dwell there like that so it’s pushed away immediately. It’s just a temptation that is resisted. Here it is dwelt upon for a couple seconds. It’s Monday and we give ourselves just two seconds of depression. But here of course, in Christ, there is no depression because Jesus is on the wings of clouds in the Father’s presence. He is filled with the wonderful things that the Father is doing, or is about to do, and so depression is unknown. It may be a thought of depression for a moment, or a thought of worry for a moment but it’s rejected immediately. But down here it’s dwelled upon, allowed, and permitted to spread. We know so little of inner holiness, where every attitude is filled with light. And actually we know it ourselves, because we know we have troubles with that. Those wonderful phrases in Philippians, “Whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report, if there be any virtue, if there be any praise, think on these things.” We think, “Yes, that’s heaven.” And that is the life that is there in this great true man, Jesus. Down here, this little guy says, “Well I must, I ought to be thinking whatsoever things are true. Yes, I should, and I ought,” – and so we miss all the glory, the wonder and the beauty of cleanness. I don’t want to bore you with all my repetitive phrases, but you remember the Second World War poet, had that foolish, idealistic attitude to the First World War that, “It was at last bringing an end to all the selfishness and all the nothingness that was filling the world along with the lack of excitement.” And he likened the people to the soldiers who went to war in the First World War. This was the disastrous irony of it; he likened it to “swimmers into cleanness leaping.” Of course, it was leaping into death, darkness and despair. But, that’s what this is, “swimmers into cleanness leaping.” God has put us in cleanness and we leap – well, we don’t even have to leap into cleanness because we’re in cleanness. God has put us in cleanness. Our answer is to be, “We are in cleanness here. We are in a pure atmosphere of a pure man. We are part of Christ. I have no time Satan for that. I have no time world for that. I am in Jesus. I am clean in him,” and so that that fills our whole being. That’s why when they discuss about the fullness of the Holy Spirit; they talk about the fragrance of Christ. That’s what begins to fill our lives, an inner fragrance. It’s like the lady who broke open the alabaster box of ointment and anointed the Lord’s feet. The room became filled with the fragrance of the ointment. That’s our heart, our spirit, our emotions, and our whole beings become filled with the fragrance of Jesus’ presence. And then, this house becomes like a place choking with orchids. The beauty and the smell of roses are overwhelming. That’s really what it’s like. That’s what holiness is. And that’s the holiness that comes because we’ve been placed in the midst of holiness and we dwell in that holiness. The other word is the word “amomos”. It’s like that in Greek: ‘amomos’ and it’s actually the word ‘blameless’. Then the last two words in Ephesians 1:4 I can put into the Greek word, ‘katenopion’. It’s quite interesting as it means, ‘before him’. It’s blameless before God. It ties up a little with the verse, “The spiritual man is judged by no one, because he is governed by the Holy Spirit.” The Holy Spirit is the only one who knows what he has impressed the spiritual man to do and therefore is the only one who can judge whether he has done it or not. So in a real sense, we are blameless before God. Other people may not think we’re blameless. But the importance of this holiness that results from our being in Jesus is that it is related to God’s judgment of us, his approval of us, and the things that he has told us to do. This actually can be more demanding in one way and less demanding in another. I may point the finger at Joe, (I shouldn’t because I’m pointing at myself), but one may point the finger at Joe for something that you judge that he should do, but you don’t know what he has been told to do by God, or not told by God to do. On the other hand, he may have to do things that we wouldn’t require at all. We might think, “Oh you’re being silly. You’re being too careful. You’re being too discriminating. You’re being too scrupulous.” But that is the life that we have in Jesus. It is a life where our holiness comes from Christ himself into us through the Holy Spirit. And the Holy Spirit is the one that we listen to, not man, and not man’s laws. In other words the only way to be holy and blameless is to walk. And you remember it actually occurs that way in the Bible, “Walk after the Spirit.” That’s what is normal and natural for men and women who have been made in Christ Jesus. It’s just a natural way to walk. Let us pray.

God’s Adopted Children Before Time Ephesians 1:5 Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill Ephesians 1:5, “He destined us in love to be his sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will.” You can see that there’s a little footnote “b” after the word love, and if you go down to the bottom of that column you can see that “in love” can be translated, “before him in love having destined us.” So it’s quite interesting when you go to the Greek because, you can see there some of the reasons why it’s good to be careful about the Bible translations. And I’d encourage you especially, now that they are proliferating and there are so many of them, it’s very easy for God’s word to be trivialized. So it is good to be careful of the translation you’re using and to try to have two or three reliable ones. It’s interesting for instance, the RSV which is usually very good, leaves one word out completely, and it’s this word “huiosthesia”, the word for adoption. It would go “huios” which is “son” in Greek, and then “thesia” is “placed”; placed as a son, and it means adoption as sons. And strange enough the RSV doesn’t even mention it. “He destined us in love to be his sons through Jesus Christ,” but doesn’t mention adoption at all. The King James Version reads like this, “Having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ himself.” And children isn’t in the Greek at all. “Huios” is the word for Son as we see in Jesus Christ Son of God Savior, (ichtheous or ‘fish’ is the Greek for Jesus Christ Son of God Saviour). And this is Jesus Christ of God the Son Savior and so it’s this word that is the first word in son here. So it means placed as a son literally, or an adoption of sons. But it doesn’t mean children at all. So the King James version is not quite right in it’s translation as children, and the RSV leaves the word adoption out completely. The American Standard Version reads like this, “Having foreordained us unto adoption as sons, through Jesus Christ unto himself, according to the good pleasure of his will.” So it translates it according to the Greek. And the New American Standard translates it, “He predestined us to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ himself, according to the kind intention of his will.” So it is just interesting to be careful and realize the versions do vary. For instance the RSV, as Martin Lloyd Jones points out, does translate adoption in another place in Galatians. It actually translates the word there, but for some strange reason it just leaves it out completely in this translation. So adoption as sons, that’s one word that is worth thinking about. Adoption as sons is a term that Paul took really from Roman law. Roman law had this concept that you could adopt a child who was not your own blood son or daughter, and if you adopted them then they had all the rights and privileges that you yourself had. So they had a right to all your property. They had a right and a privilege to all the things you had. So adoption was a very clear, simple, and well defined forensic term in Roman law. And you can see that it wasn’t concerned with your blood relationship to the father or the mother. It was all concerned with your rank, or your position, or your privilege. So adoption as sons refers to that. It refers to the rights, ranks, and privileges that we have. And of course what this verse is saying is that we have the same right, rank, and privilege as Christ. It is an unbelievable thing for God to do, to adopt us as his own children. And actually in the Greek there is the term eis auton. “Eis” means into and “auton” means himself. So he adoped us as sons into himself. The term is through (dia) Jesu Christos which means through Jesus Christ. So he adopted us as sons to himself through Jesus Christ. It’s remarkable that God has given us all the privileges, rank, and the relationship to himself that Christ himself has. That’s what we all have. That’s the position that we have with God, and nothing less than that. It’s the rights, the privileges, and the rank that Jesus himself has. And then the other word that is important in the verse is this word a “proorizo” and it means “to determine beforehand”. In a way the RSV translation is quite good in verse 5, “He destined us in love,” in a way that gets over the meaning a little better in these days. Because predestination has in all our minds such a strength of meaning as to make us robots, or forcing us to do it. We will think of predestinate as, “Well we’re made to do this and there’s no way we can change it, that’s it.” Well really that’s not the strength of the word. The strength of the word is that God determined beforehand. Sometimes I think this would be a better translation, predesigned, he predesigned us. He predesigned us through Jesus Christ, he predesigned us in Christ to be his sons. But that certainly is the literal meaning of it, that Christ determined beforehand. If you have seen the musical, Fiddler on the Roof, you know that the life of the little Jewish village under the Czar was very uncertain, and unstable. That’s the whole theme of the musical that life there in their little village was very uncertain, and very unsure. It was like a fiddler on the roof. Some of the musicals show the guy on the roof playing his fiddle right on the eave where you could slip either way in a moment. And of course the truth of it comes home to you as the musical ends. They are all wheeling their hand cards out of Anatevka to a new place because the Czar had come in and thrown them out. Many of us are like fiddlers on the roof in regard to our eternal destiny, and our relationship with God. That is we’re a bit jittery, we’re a bit uncertain, and the reason is that we depend on our feelings that God has accepted us. And if we feel he has accepted us then we’re steady. But as soon as our feelings begin to feel that we’re not accepted by God then we’re unsteady. And our problem is that it’s not just that we’re depending on feelings instead of faith, but it’s that our faith is in our feelings. Faith itself is nothing. You probably realize that, faith is nothing itself. I mean, if this chair does not hold me, and is not solid enough to hold me than it doesn’t matter what faith I have in it. My faith is only as good as the chair. In other words you could say that your faith is only as good as the object it’s placed in. So often the object of our faith is our feelings. We look inside and think, “Do I feel that God approves of me? Do I feel the way I would feel if God approved of me?” And of course it’s hopeless, because the feelings are dependent on your physical condition, your physical environment, and very often on the general emotional atmosphere in the room or in society in which you live. So putting your faith in your feelings is putting your faith in a “fiddler on the roof”. Now faith has a solid object. Its solid objects are the solid historical facts of how God has dealt with man down through the years. We have the solid historical facts of his own statements to us. Our faith has that as its object. And here’s one of those historical facts or those statements. It’s in verse Ephesians 1:4, “Even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him.” That was last week’s verse. “Even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world,” that is before the foundation of the world God chose us in Christ. Before the foundation of the world is before we had any feelings, before our feelings were even alive, God chose us. Now that is the object of our faith, that God says he, “Chose us in Christ before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him.” And then verse 5 says, he did it even before that. He did it even before that, even before he chose us before the foundation of the world. Even before that, “He destined us in love to be his sons through Jesus Christ.” He planned beforehand, or determined beforehand, in love that he would adopt us as his sons through Jesus Christ. That was settled before you and I were born here on earth. Each of us was made in Jesus. The very moment God made us in Jesus as part of his Son (whom he had already designated as the first human being), he chose us in him, and predetermined that we would be his sons and his daughters in Jesus. He did this long before he chose us from before the foundation of the world. So this is what God did way before the creation of the world, way in the depths of eternity. It’s here (pointing to a timeline) that God chose us in Christ. Here he predetermined that he would choose us. Here Christ was begotten by the Father. And it’s back there that it all happened. Karl Barth actually says, “There is one human being that has been predestinated. God predestinated Christ, and then God made us in Christ, and so we are predestinated.” It seems that this is what God is trying to make plain to us in this verse. It’s that he determined long ago, (before the foundation of the world, long before even he chose us in Christ), that he would adopt us as his sons and daughter in Christ Jesus. And adoption means that we have all the rights, and the privileges of God’s children. We don’t have his nature. And I think it’s important to see that. His nature comes to us through the new birth. We are born of God and then God sends the Spirit of his Son into us and changes us. He changes our nature from being children of wrath into children of God. So God changes our nature through the new birth, but he adopts us as his sons and daughter independent of that. And that’s important to see. Hitler died as an adopted son of God that would not believe. Hitler did not die because Jesus had not borne his sins. Hitler did not die because Christ was not all around and with him. He died because he would not believe that. But all of us have been adopted as God’s sons and daughters and so every right and privilege that Jesus has, we have, and God yearns for us to exercise that in Christ Jesus. That’s the significance of Galatians 4:1, if you’d like to look at. It’s quite interesting, “I mean that the heir,” (that is the adopted one, the one who has been adopted and has been given all the rights and privileges to all the property of the owner and the father), “I mean that the heir, as long as he is a child, is no better than a slave, though he is the owner of all the estate.” And so you can be the adopted child and yet if you don’t come into a belief in that or a confidence in it, it’s just sitting there unused. “But he is under guardians and trustees until the date set by the father. So with us; when we were children, we were slaves to the elemental spirits of the universe. But when the time had fully come, God sent forth a Son, born in woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons.” And so when Jesus was born, it became clear to us, that in him we were God’s own sons and daughters. So it would be good to think that over in regard to your own position in God. And especially, if you get caught up in the confusion about, “Do I feel as if I’m born of God? Have I behaved like a child of God today?” It isn’t how you have behaved, it isn’t how you feel, it is what God has done. The fact is, that God has determined beforehand, that you would be adopted as his child in his Son Jesus Christ. He has acted and executed that, and that is your position this morning. You are the adopted son, or daughter, of God and you have all the rights, the privileges, and the rank of Jesus Christ himself. It take your breath away but that is our position. You can see yourself why it’s not a matter of keeping up appearances or not letting your mom and dad down — it’s far beyond that, it’s our God. He has given himself to us as our Father, and that’s the other part of the Roman law. The child has all the privileges, rank, and responsibility of a child, but the father, the person who adopts, has all the rights, responsibilities, and privileges of a father. That’s our position. Sure we should not let our moms or dads down, but our moms and dads are like us in that they will die, and leave the earth. But you are the adopted children of our God, of our Father himself, and he has given you all the position of his Son Jesus. Let’s pray.

Glory and Praise in Trials Ephesians 1:6 Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill I’d like to get down now to serious study of Ephesians over these next weeks and so I’ll expect you to stay awake and I won’t spend too much time trying to keep you awake. But, since I’m Irish and can’t abide anybody sleeping, I’ll probably try to waken you. But really, what I’d like you to do is just give yourself to the truth, and let me concentrate on sensible exegesis of scripture. The verse that we’re studying this morning is Ephesians 1:6, and you see the way it runs there in the Revised Standard Version translation, “To the praise of his glorious grace which he freely bestowed on us in the Beloved.” And beyond just confirming with you the actual Greek and the literal translation, that’s all we’ll do until nearly the end of the presentation. But the Greek in it is like this, it’s “eis” (and I hope some of you will begin to get to know Greek a little) and that’s to or into. And “epainos” is really the word for praise and it has that smooth breathing sound. Then “doxa” is the word for glory. I don’t know where that appears in English but certainly doxology, comes from “doxa”. But “to praise of glory” and notice there is no article in front of glory. It’s just “to praise of glory”. So it really has the effect of drawing these two together as you’ll see when we end the study. “Teis” is simply “of the” and “charis” (sounds like Pastor is saying CARE I TOS) is the word for grace. And I think you can see cara mia from that. I’ve told you about Cara mi mine, the words that come from “charis” and Cheri dear is in French my dear, my darling, and to care I suppose comes from the same root of “charis”. To praise of and “outos” is actually “of him”. So, it’s to praise. This is the word for ‘the’ and this is the word for ‘grace’, and this is the word for ‘his’. In Greek you always put ‘the’ and ‘his’ even though it really is translated ‘to his’. So “to praise of glory of his grace” and then the word really to express the relative pronoun is “heis e karitos” and you can see it’s the same kind of word really, it’s the same root. “Karit” — which he bestowed on us and this is the word “for us”, “haymas”. Then the last important one is “en to” which is in the Beloved “agapetemo”, “in the Beloved”. So it’s, “to praise of his glory which he”, and then this word is translated at times “freely bestowed”. At times it’s translated the same as that word that every Catholic knows, you know, the address of the angel to the Virgin Mary, “You whom the Lord has highly favored.” And that can be translated, “to praise of his glory with which he has highly favored us in the Beloved.” So that’s the literal translation of it and the RSV version is quite good, “To the praise of his glorious grace,” as it does try to join glory and grace. It doesn’t do it exactly correct but it does try to make the point that these have no article and therefore it’s almost to the glory praise of his grace. You’ll see the point of that towards the end of our study. “To glory praise of his grace which he has highly favored us with in the Beloved.” So that’s really the translation of the verse. A square circle is an impossible concept for us to grasp because of the limitations of our human language and presumably the limitations in our own intellect. And it’s similarly quiet difficult to grasp what Eric Sauer talks about. He says, “What did God do before he created the world?” It’s quite difficult for us to grasp that. Now, what was it like before he created the world? We’ve been gathering some clues about it in our study of Jesus himself and who he really was. One of those verses is important in this regard. It’s John 1:18, “No one has ever seen God; the only Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, he has made him known.” And of course you can see who is at this moment, in the bosom of the Father. That we do know about Jesus, he was and is now in the bosom of the Father. I think most of us know that bosom is not so much the sense of breast as much as it is heart. He was in God’s own heart. And we think of Jesus that way. We are in God’s arms but we feel Jesus is the only begotten Son; he’s in the bosom of the Father. He’s in the Father’s own heart. And that’s where Jesus was before the foundation of the world. He was in God’s own heart. So, there’s a way in which we are created that Jesus isn’t. The creeds always put it, “The eternal generation of the Son.” This implies that the Son is eternally generated from the Father. He’s eternally born of the Father. Some put it in Greek, “there was no time when he was not”. And of course, all we can say is that there is no time that we can conceive of with our limited minds when Jesus did not exist. As far as we understand he was there all the time. We’re getting into a realm that we cannot explain and so we say, “Yes, Jesus was in the bosom of the Father, as far as we know, forever.” So he was very intimately part of his own Father. Then you remember, John 17:24 explains it a little further. John 17:24, “Father, I desire that they also, whom thou has given me, may be with me where I am, to behold my glory which thou hast given me in thy love for me before the foundation of the world.” And that’s that verse that teaches Jesus’ preexistence so clearly. Jesus says that, “They may behold the glory that you gave to me in love from before the foundation of the world,” implying that Jesus obviously was with the Father and they had a whole life together before the world was ever created. And so, that’s the way we think of Christ himself, as the only begotten Son of God who is intimately part of God in a way that no one else can ever be. And yet of course, we’ve in recent months, we’ve seen that an unbelievable event took place. It’s the one outlined in Colossians 1:15 — that incredible verse that sends you back on your heels. Colossians 1:15, “He,” Jesus, “IS the image of the invisible God.” That’s virtually what we’ve been saying. He is the only begotten of the Father. He is the image of the invisible God, but then the next phrase just bewilders you, “The first-born of all creation.” You suddenly realize that God, at some point, turned to his Son and said, “My Son, will you be the first man? Will you be the first human being? Will you be the one in whom I can create all kinds of other beings like you?” That’s the only explanation of it, to say that Jesus is the first-born of all creation. It wouldn’t be so bad if it were just saying, “Jesus is the first-born”. We could then say, “Oh yes, he’s the only begotten Son of the Father. He dwells in the bosom of the Father; he’s been with the Father from before the foundation of the world, so obviously he’s the first-born.” Except that the following phrase makes that impossible as an explanation. That’s because it says “the first-born of all creation”. Creation is something that we essentially think of as connected with the things that God has made, the universe itself. And so you’re driven into an explanation that is only further confirmed as you go on in scripture. Jesus was not only God’s only begotten Son who dwelled in the bosom of the Father from before the foundation of the world, but he also was the first-born of the new creation that God made when he made the universe. And then the next step is in Ephesians 2:10 which runs, “For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.” God then, inside his Son who was the first-born of all creation, who was the first great human being, inside him God made all these little ants, made all these little beings, all of us. He created us inside his Son Jesus. And that’s confirmed in other verses like John 1:3. “Without him was not anything made that was made and anything that has life was originally life in him.” This implies that all of us who exist here originally existed inside Jesus as part of his life and so we were created in him. The reason for that is in Romans 8:29. “For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the first-born among many brethren.” That was it. God made us in Jesus so that Jesus would be the first-born among many brethren. It’s in that sense that we wretched people are in some ways brothers and sisters to our Savior, even though we are reluctant to use the term brother. We were created in him. We often feel closer or further from our brothers and sisters as the years go by but there always remains a sense where we still feel that we were once tucked up in the same bad, a time where we were very close together and in some ways you can’t forget that. And it’s like that. God cannot forget that and we if we’re facing reality, cannot forget that. We are in a deep way, flesh of his flesh, bone of his bone. We are made out of his life. We are created in him. We are some of the brethren of whom he is the first-born. And there’s no way in which you can get away from that. That’s the truth of it. We were created in Jesus and this all happened from before the foundation of the world. I agree with you, Christ was conscience all that time. We obviously were not. We were not conscious, yet we were obviously created in him. Ephesians emphasizes that if you glance at those first verses that we’ve already looked at. They are some of the strongest declarations of what happened before the foundation of the world and what God planned ahead of time in Verse 3, “Blessed be the God and Father our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world.” He chose us in him, “That we should be holy and blameless before him. He destined us in love to be his sons through Jesus Christ.” All that fits in with what we’ve just outlined. Now, Verse 3 is, “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places.” In other words, that states that God has provided everything in Jesus that we need. How did he do that? We are dealing with God who sees all the ages in one single moment, who sees the end from the beginning. Look at Psalms 139:13, “For thou didst form my inward parts, thou didst knit me together in my mother’s womb. I praise thee, for thou art fearful and wonderful. Wonderful are thy works! Thou knowest me right well; my frame was not hidden from thee, when I was being made in secret, intricately wrought in the depths of the earth. Thy eyes beheld my unformed substance.” We’re not talking about the embryo or the little baby inside the mother’s womb. It’s not that, it’s before that. “Thy eyes behold my unformed substance; in thy book were written, every one of them, the days that were formed for me, when as yet there was none of them.” When I put the knife on the table, I can pretty well assure you that that knife is not going to move unless I move it. If I had a little ball bearing and put it on the table I could tell you, “Well, that may move.” And if I knew that the table was sloping that way I could say, “That ball bearing is going to move that way.” So even a limited human being is able to foresee what a certain object will do in the light of the knowledge he has of its attributes. You can see how much more with God who makes every vein, every artery, every little piece of flesh, every nerve, and every cell in every body of every human being whom he creates inside his only begotten Son. Well obviously, the Father is able in a moment to see the whole thing. He doesn’t have to make us and then wonder what we will do. He knows. He knows what we will do and his one desire is that we will become free beings who love him because we want to. And that is the mystery of the miracle that he performed. He did in fact make beings with free wills and then maintained their free will while he, at the same time, held together the world that they set about destroying. That is the miracle of what God had to bring about. That’s why he foresaw all that would be needed to bring that about and he foresaw what had to be done in his Son Jesus. He foresaw what his Son Jesus would have to bear that we could not bear and he provided all that at that moment. In other words, it’s our limited little minds that think, “Well, the suffering for God began on that day when Jesus was arrested in the garden.” Well, it didn’t. God foresaw all this agony that would go on down through the centuries in the world. He foresaw all that in one moment. And at that moment, he and his Son bore all the pain and the agony of that. And so that’s part of what it means that God provided every spiritual blessing in Christ way back then. It is all already done. How does it work out? Well, here’s the way I tried to put it. Some things I write because I think they’re important to express very carefully. In effect, in Ephesians 1:3, he gave us in Christ all that we needed to reverse the effects of our and other selfish free wills. Not a day of our lives has past that Christ himself did not live and bear for us providing the antidote of his own generous life. He has borne countless mortal diseases that have appeared to us as mild sicknesses. You know the way we say, “Oh, I can’t tell all the accidents I could have had.” Especially after a close accident we say, “It comes to me how much God must save me from that I don’t know about.” Well of course he does and I’ll show you why that is so in a moment. He has borne countless mortal diseases that have appeared to us as mild sicknesses. He has turned away thousands of death dealing accidents, balanced hundreds of payables and receivables that we don’t know about, and set up numerous chance meetings. Have you ever thought about how anything orderly can ever happen in your life? When you stand back, it’s just miraculous. How could anything orderly happen? How could you get a sequence of events going along in an ordered way in this chaotic world? Even in an ordered world, how could you ensure when you think of the chain of events that make up your life (how little control you have had of them and how many of them have just happened to you), how on earth has there come an order of any kind in your life? Because, there is someone who bore the chaos that our free wills created. Someone has balanced hundreds of payables and receivables, set up numerous chance meetings, and smoothed our path years ahead. Why did he have to bear all those things? It’s because you’ve been angry with your brother. I’m sure at some time you’ve been angry at somebody and you’re guilty of the judgment. And I’m sure you’ve probably said “raca” fool to your brother and that makes you guilty of hell fire. The Father had to set up an ordered series of cause and event that would produce the ordered world and the heaven that he wanted for us. And that meant that sin had to be dealt with when it occurred. But if your sin and my sin had been dealt with when it occurred we wouldn’t exist now because death is the consequence of most of the things that we have done. Look at Deuteronomy 28. It’s terrifying actually when you look at it. It’s alright if you don’t think you’ve been guilty of any sin. But Deuteronomy 28:15 says, “But if you will not obey the voice of the LORD your God or be careful to do all his commandments and his statutes which I command you this day, then all these curses shall come upon you and overtake you. Cursed shall you be in the city, and cursed shall you be in the field. Cursed shall be your basket and your kneading-trough. Cursed shall be the fruit of your body, and the fruit of your ground, the increase of your cattle, and the young of your flock. Cursed shall you be when you come in, and cursed shall you be when you go out. The LORD will send upon you curses, confusions, and frustration, in all that you undertake to do, until you are destroyed and perish quickly, on account of the evil of your doings, because you have forsaken me. The LORD will make the pestilence cleave to you until he has consumed you off the land which you are entering to take possession of it. The LORD will smite you with consumption, and with fever, inflammation, and fiery heat, and with drought, and with blasting, and with mildew; they shall pursue you until you perish. And the heaves over your head shall be brass, and the earth under you shall be iron. The LORD will make the rain of your land powder and dust; from heaven it shall come down upon you until you are destroyed.” And it just goes on like that. That is what we deserve. That’s the only way God could stop the destruction of our selfish wills, utterly destroying his universe. He could not withdraw that without making foolishness of the whole thing. I think you can see that. God can’t say, “This is who I am and this is what I must do against anything that would destroy the truth that I have.” He can’t swing around and then say, “No, no, forget it. Forget it I was just fooling you.” It can’t be. If that is real then we have to cease to exist, or the one in whom we were created has to cease to exist. But something has to be done. God and his Son committed themselves to that. That’s part of what we mean when we say everything has been provided in Christ. The only reason our lives have any sense to them at all is that Christ himself has borne and is bearing for us things that would utterly destroy us. So that’s part of what Ephesians is saying. God has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places so that all of that is taken care of. And actually, he has done more than that because in Ephesians 2 he states that he has not only provided the antidote for the chaos that our selfish wills introduced into our lives, but in Verse 5, “He destined us in love to be his sons through Jesus Christ.” He destined us in love to be his sons. The word in Greek is adoption. He destined us to adopt us as his sons through Jesus Christ so that we inherit everything that Jesus has. We inherit all that Christ himself has. We inherit his home, and his heaven. We inherit his powers, and we inherit his joy. We inherit his confidence that all has been reconciled to his Father and everything has been done to make this world heaven. We are heirs to that and we inherit that. That’s why this verse follows, “To glory praise of his grace which he has highly favored us with in the Beloved.” This is what we’ve explained up to the moment. This is the grace that he has bestowed us in Jesus. The Savior has borne all the agony and we have borne the crown. Why? For this reason. “For this glory praise.” It’s not praise, “That’s a good boy,” or in our case, “Good dog Choux”. So often we think of it that way. Or, maybe we elevate it a little and we think of the teacher who knows that praise is encouraging for students. And that’s a more dignified thing, but it’s not even that. Can you praise God? Can you say, “Not bad, pretty good, very good?” The lesser cannot praise the greater. What’s that mean then? Glory is this, “Earth hath not anything to show more fair; Dull would he be of soul who could pass by, A sight so touching in his majesty:” (This is Wordsworth standing on Westminster Bridge in London.) “This city now doth, like a garment, wear The beauty of the morning; silent, bare, Ships, towers, domes, theaters, and temples lie Open unto the fields, and to the sky; All bright and glittering in the smokeless air. Never did sun more beautifully steep In its first splendour, valley, rock, or hill; Ne’er saw I, never felt a calm so deep! The river glideth at his own sweet will: Dear God! the very houses seem asleep; And all that mighty heart is lying still!” Even a city like London in the early morning expresses a beauty that’s part of glory. Glory is the beauty of God shining through. Here’s a different poem entirely, “Daffodils” by Wordsworth, “I wandered lonely as a cloud, That floats on high o’re vails and hills, When all at once I saw a crowd,— A host, of golden daffodils, Besides the lake, beneath the trees, Fluttering and dancing in the breeze. Continuous as the stars that shine And twinkle on the Milky Way, They stretched in never-ending line Along the margin of a bay: Ten thousand saw I at a glance, Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.” That’s glory. That’s God’s glory. That’s what this means. We have been blessed with every spiritual blessing. We have received God’s grace. We have been highly favored with his generosity in Jesus so that his glory would shine out from us in his praise. When? When the espresso machine breaks in the restaurant. Greet it as pure joy when you enter into various trails. At that moment we can say, “Lord, thank you that you foresaw this. Thank you that you provided for this a million years ago. Thank you Lord, that you have this under control.” That’s the glory praise shining out. That’s to God’s glorious praise. That’s it. Yes, our words are good. Praise him, praise him, hallelujah. Yes, the words are good but what is best of all is glory shining out from our lives. Glory expresses the truth that we have received every spiritual blessing in Jesus and that he has already borne everything that needed to be borne. He has already reconciled the whole world to God his Father, and he in fact has done what he said he did. He said, “You may have peace in me. I want you to know this so that you may have peace in me because I have overcome the world.” And similarly in the business, when you come to four o’clock and you have 100 pounds sales at that moment, glory praise breaks out as you look up to the Father and you say, “Lord, I thank you that this is all I deserve myself but it is not what you have given me. I thank you that you have taken this day too and you have reconciled it in Christ. Lord Jesus, you have overcome the effects of this day and I thank you for that. I have confidence that you will express that in your own good time.” That’s the glory praise. It’s never reacting to the world that has been crucified in Christ, but always responding to the truth that we ourselves have been raised up in Jesus and made to sit at the Father’s right hand out of God’s sheer generous grace. And it’s not because of our faith or because we’ve made a decision for Christ. It’s because from the foundation of the world God created us in his Son. From the foundation of the world his Son was crucified as the lamb slain, and from that early time the world was overcome by God. And all our crooked paths were made straight and our rough places were made plain. And that is what this means, this is how the glory praise shines out from us. So it’s really a very realistic life activity of ours that happens moment-by-moment as the day goes by. Let us pray. Dear Father, we thank you that you have not put us here to make the best of it. You have not set some hurdles up here for us to leap over. You have not given us a competition or an obstacle race. Instead, you have laid out before us a smooth and a plain road that has been prepared by our blessed Savior. He has borne all that we deserve to have borne and has overcome it. He has given us back our lives unstained, unbent, free from twists, free from crooked corners. You have given us back our lives clean and clear and victorious with all the powers that you Lord Jesus yourself have. And above all we have the great liberty and freedom of taking everything that comes in this world with joy and delight because we know that it has already been dealt with by you in Calvary. So Lord, we thank you for the chance to live out practical lives in victory every moment of every day. Now the grace of our Lord Jesus, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with each one of us now and ever more.

Golden Chains of Love Ephesians 1:7a Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill Will you turn loved ones to Ephesians 1:7a and we’ll just do a third of a verse. Ephesians 1:7 reads like this, “In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace.” You can see yourself that that verse contains three massive concepts that are really the basis of the gospel and so we’ll only be able to cover the first one today. Ephesians 1:7a, “In him we have redemption through his blood.” You remember the man up in Scotland who took the guns and shot the children in the school? Well just project your mind into what might have been the mind of his father, when that happened. What would his father have felt? And I think all of us would say, “Responsible. Responsible.” Whether you think that’s fair, or just, or not he would have felt responsible. He would have felt, “I wonder what I did when my son was growing up? What did I do that brought this about that made him the kind of person that could go in and shoot little children in an infant school?” Or, if you think of a pit bull terrier that had maybe savaged a little child, what would the owner feel? Well, I mean, he’d feel the same. If you were the owner of a pit bull terrier that savaged anybody you’d feel, “I’m responsible. It’s my dog. I’m responsible for its existence, I’m responsible for him being able to do that kind of thing and therefore I’m responsible for the consequences of that.” Now that sense of responsibility we get directly from God, because that’s his whole attitude. When he resolved to have children like his Son whom he could love and who could love him, and he gave them free will so that they could do that, God himself felt responsible for all the consequences that would come from that. And I think you can easily grasp that yourself. You can feel, “Yes, well that is what I’ve come to believe God is like. That God is not somebody who just makes a lot of little creatures with free wills and lets them free in the universe to do what they want and then watches the consequences and thinks, ‘Oh well, that’s good. That’s bad, that’s good. No, that’s bad.’” I think we’ve come to believe that’s what God is. No, God is the kind of person that feels responsible for all that he has done and particularly of course, because he is the final resort. There is none behind him. He is the one whom there is no greater. So when God conceived of making us and making free willed human beings, he decided that he would bear in himself every consequence of that action. That he would face it all. He did not want to create something that he himself was not willing to bear, and that’s why he made us. You might say, (because it’s really true), inside himself, and that’s why he made us inside his Son. It was not a matter of making something that he could keep out there that could do what it wanted and he wouldn’t be affected by it. He determined that he would be affected by it. This was his dearest wish. He wanted others like his Son Jesus and he determined he would face all the consequences of that, whatever they were. Therefore he would not make them out there apart from himself. He would make them inside here in his own Son, in his own heart, in the heart of his own home and his own family. And that’s part of the meaning of that verse that you know so well. “We here are God’s workmanship, created not outside himself but created in Christ Jesus for good works which he has prepared for us to walk in.” But also for the bad works because God did see that there would be bad works. He did see that there would be bad consequences and that’s what he prepared himself to face. So, when we think of this verse you begin to see that what God did was he paid the price of that choice. He paid the price of his vision. And that’s what that word that we translate redemption, really means. In Greek it’s “apolutrosis” and it means ransom. Redemption is made up of two Latin words “rede” and “emo” which is to buy. So it means to buyback. And that’s what that verse means. God was prepared to pay the price for this decision to make other free will agents who could chose to love him or not to love him. He determined that in his own Son he would pay whatever it took to buy those people back from the consequences that might follow from that creation. And so when we talk about redemption we’re talking about this word which really means a ransom. It really means paying something to get someone back. They’d use the word, in a pawn broker’s shop where you would be out of money and you’d have a watch that you thought was worth so much. You’d take it into the pawn broker and you’d say, “What would you give me for that if I deposit that watch with you?” And then he would give you four or five pounds. Then whenever you got the money again, you’d go and buy that back from him. That’s what this word means. It means that God himself determined that he would pay whatever price was needed to make freewill agents. He wanted freewill beings who could chose to remain in his Son, become like his Son, and then to allow his Son to live in them. And that was part of the price that needed to be paid. And that’s why we say that God saw that price from the very beginning. He foresaw all of this. He foresaw what would happen, but his own nature and integrity requires that he pay the price of every action and word that flows from people like ourselves whom he created. And so that’s the kind of truth you get, in Matthew 20:28 if you’d like to look at it. Matthew 20:28, you remember are Jesus’ words, “Even as the Son of man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as ransom for many.” Part of what that means is that every caustic word that we speak, every attitude of pride that we have, every moment that we waste, every fear and anxiety that we have, every selfish action that we do, every secret critical attitude that we express is borne by the one in whom it is done. It is borne by Christ himself and therefore by God. There’s a verse, you remember, in a poem by Tennyson, that I won’t remember precisely but it runs along the line of, “Let thy voice rise like a fountain to me night and day in prayer because the whole earth is tied to the feet of God with chains of gold.” I think that’s it. And of course, the whole earth is chained to God’s heart. Everything that happens in this earth reverberates right through those chains to that heart of God. Everything that we human beings do is borne by Christ right at that very moment. And that’s part of the price that God in Jesus has borne and paid. There’s another verse that says the same kind of thing in 1 Corinthians 1:30. “He is the source of your life in Christ Jesus, whom God made our wisdom, our righteousness and sanctification and redemption.” God made Jesus our redemption. Therefore Jesus is the one who, is paid over the pawn broker’s counter. And if you say, “Is it paid to Satan?” No, it is paid to the inner integrity, honesty, truthfulness, and responsibility of God himself. That’s it. God’s own character requires that he face squarely, plainly, and bluntly all the results of what he himself has done. And of course, he did all that in that moment in eternity. Why? Because, of Psalms 139:4 if you’d like to look at it. “Even before a word is on my tongue, lo, O LORD, thou knowest it altogether.” “Did you know Lord that this person would curse that person?” “Not only did I know it, but I felt it in my heart a million times more than the person who was cursed. I felt it on Calvary. The moment I conceived of creating all of you, I felt it at that moment on Calvary from before the foundation of the world. Then Psalm 139:16, “Thy eyes beheld my unformed substance; in thy book were written, every one of them, the days that were formed for me, when as yet there was none of them.” “You mean the day those two boys in America killed their parents, you saw that day?” “I saw that day before the earth was made. I saw that event. I not only felt a million times the pain of the father and the mother, but I felt the agony that the brothers would feel afterwards. I felt all that. That was done in my Son. My Son felt that far more than any human being would do.” And that’s what happened from before the foundation of the world and that’s part of what this means, this apolutrosis”. God felt it all. But, it goes further than that because the rest of the verse in Greek is “Dia tu hymatos”. This is the word that means “blood” and this is “through” of course. God doesn’t only face personally the consequences of his actions. If he doesn’t act against that evil he himself will be destroyed and the whole universe will be lost in chaos. So, it is not as if he is just an individual person. He is also the final protector, the final guardian, the final guarantor of the whole universe. The only way he can do that is to destroy what opposes the good that he has in his heart and that he has in mind for all of us. And the only way he can do that is by death. That’s why when we were learning gospel verses to explain the truth to others we learned Romans 6:23, “The wages of sin is death.” In other words, sin automatically brings destruction in a world that is created by a good and loving God. If he’s good and loving at all it has to be because he knows if he lets it carry on it will simply destroy other people and he’s responsible for them. And so death was the only thing that could come to that sin. In other words, when God saw you or me being angry, sarcastic, cruel, unkind in our actions, unclean in our thoughts, filled with covetousness, or lust in our feelings, he immediately had to act to destroy the person in whom that originated. In whom did it originate? His own dear Son. Everything that you and I have done we have done inside the one in whom we have been created. You and I could never have born God’s burning wrath. But we didn’t have to because the one who surrounded us was the one who bore it. That’s why we talk about redemption through the blood of Jesus, because the blood is the outpoured life. It was his actual death that saves us. It’s not even God being prepared to bear the effects of what he has done but it’s him in his Son bearing destruction itself in a way that is beyond us. God actually bore his own death in Jesus. The meaning of that we can only guess at when we here Jesus cry, “My God, my God why hast thou forsaken me.” But that’s what we mean when we say we are redeemed. We have redemption through Jesus’ blood. Of course, there are many verses that state that but maybe you’d like to look at 2 Corinthians 5:21. It states the unthinkable really. “For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.” And what that verse is clarifying is that because we did all that inside Jesus, that was experienced by Christ himself. Even though he himself knew no sin yet he felt all the dirt, and the evil, and the uncleanness of sin itself. On top of that he experienced its destruction. So the creation of free will agents in the gospel are not just games. They are the price that our Creator paid to make people like ourselves who were free to either love him or not to love him. Yet he preserved in us (even after we had ceased to love him, even after we had deserved only destruction), the chance of looking at it all and coming round again to accept what he had planned and done. So that’s what the verse means in 1 Peter 1:18-19. “You know that you were ransomed from the futile ways inherited from your fathers, not with perishable things such as silver or gold, but with the precious blood of Christ, like that of a lamb without blemish or spot. He was destined before the foundation of the world but was made manifest at the end of times for your sake.” So our own lack of love for our neighbor, or our lack of sensitivity to our customers has been destroyed in the one in whom it was allowed to take place, in our Savior. Let us pray. Father, we hardly know what to say. We see plainly that you’re certainly not going to require further destruction. We see that it has been done once and for all and so you do not intend to bring it about upon us. Lord, what can we do but look up to you in gratitude? Thank you Lord Jesus, dear friend and Savior for bearing the destruction of not only every sin that we have committed but the whole attitude of wanting to stand apart from God and wanting to be on our own and do whatever we wanted. Lord, you have borne the overwhelming pain and destruction of that inside yourself and now you hold your arms out to us and say, “Come unto me all that you that labor under heavy labor and I will give you rest.” Lord Jesus, we do not know what to say. We can only thank you and say that our life is yours. We owe you everything. You made us and bought us back. We are not our own because we have been bought with a price, the price of your own blood, your own life. Father, we thank you and we thank you Lord Jesus. We give ourselves anew to you today to be at your disposal for whatever your plans are. The grace of our Lord Jesus, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with each one of us now and ever more. Amen.

Grace to Begin Again Ephesians 1:7b Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill When our little Yorkshire terrier died we really did miss him. When my dad died it was as if the world would never be the same. It’s probably the same with you. The dog was dear to us but detached. Your dad or your mom are kind of part of you so you feel it as part of yourself. God made dogs and rivers, but you are not a dog or a river. To some extent the dogs and rivers are detached from him, they’re things — creatures that he has made, but they’re not part of him. When he made you, he made you part of his own Son. He made you part of himself. He gave you his own life. He gave you his own heart. He opened his own home to you and so you are part of him. He feels the same way about you as we would about our fathers or our mothers. He actually opened himself to be hurt by you because he gave you free will — free will to accept him or to reject him. And when he did that he gave you the freedom to crucify him. That’s what giving free will necessitated. He had to be prepared to accept the worst that you would do to him. When you think about it if he was really going to give us free will, he had to give us free will to do what we wanted even if that meant to crucify him. And he had to be prepared to take the worst that we could do to him. That’s what we were really talking about last week when we said that in him, in Jesus, we had redemption through his blood. Part of the cost and the responsibility that God accepted when he made us in his own Son, gave us his own life, made us part of his own home, and gave us free will like his own, was being prepared to allow us to do the very worst that we could do to him. And that meant if necessary, destroying him. And if that was all we could have done, that would have been the end of everything for all of us, including him. And so God had his own Son, and asked him to take that destruction. But he himself in his son was reconciling the world to himself and bearing that destruction. It’s just that he was still the Father. He was therefore able to raise the son, but he couldn’t raise him without raising us also. And so he raised us up with him. So when we talk about redemption through his blood, we’re talking about the thing that was necessary for God (being who he is), to make free will agents (like us), he had of necessity, to bear the worse that we would do. In other words, he is not the kind of God who can allow you to march through the world murdering and destroying. He himself has to be inside that person that we destroy. He himself has to be in his Son in every person that died in misery in the concentration camp. He has to be in the little guy in your school that you spoke to so cruelly. In his Son, he had to be in that little fellow. He had to bear the worst that the people whom he made could do if he were to be true to himself. Because he is not the kind of God who can make the rivers and just let them go. He can’t make the people and just let them go and do what they want. He has to bear the worst that they could do and that’s what he did. And so when we talk about redemption through his blood, we’re talking about the fact that not only was Christ bearing the worst that we could do to him and his Father, but he was in us bearing the just wrath of his Father upon mankind. So Christ was both God and man at that moment. He was God bearing the dreadful things that we have done to him. As Jesus said, “If you give somebody a cup of water in my name, you do it unto me.” Then when you give somebody a cut across the face, or you give somebody a cruel word, you similarly give it to Christ and therefore to God. So Christ was not only God bearing the worst of our sins, but he was also us because he is all of us. We were all created inside him so he is us also bearing the destruction that God had to work upon that evil. And it’s because of that that it’s possible to talk about redemption through his blood. Now, it’s good for us to see that that’s what had to happen if God were to do what he all along wanted to do. God, because of his mercy and his loving heart, all along wanted to forgive us. But he could not unless all those things we talked about were satisfied. All those were involved. That’s why we talk about that as atonement. Somebody has said, “It’s at one. It’s the bringing into at onement of God and man.” That’s what happened, not just on Calvary, but in the heart of God when the lamb was slain from before the foundation of the world. That’s where God faced all that was involved in giving us free will. He had to drink to the dregs of everything, the very worst that we could do to him. And we had to drink to the dregs the very worst, or the just thing that he had to do to us. We drank neither. Our elder brother stepped forward for us and drank it. That’s what we call redemption or the atonement. That’s universal and for everyone. The atonement has taken place for every man and woman that has ever lived or will ever live. All of us were in Christ in that atonement and that’s what we talked about last day. Today we talk about the second half of the verse which is something that is conditional upon repentance and faith. But it’s something that is possible only in the light of the atonement. In other words, God could not forgive unless all that was dealt with. If he had forgiven when all that was not dealt with, he would have been pretending and he would no longer be the God of purity, love, and justice. He would no longer have human beings who had free wills and who could enter into a loving fellowship with him. The whole plan would be destroyed right then because he would simply be indulging us in what we wanted to do. There would be no reconciliation, no coming together of him in his reality and us in our reality. I’ve often said to you, we need to be honest with each other. We need to be real with each other. We need to say what we really think to each other. That’s partly because that is what God is. God is real and true, he cannot act against his own nature or apart from his own nature and so all that was needed. Now, what we come to today is what is called the forgiveness of sins. So look at Ephesians 1:7. Verse 7a is about universal atonement, “In him we have redemption through his blood”. We are bought back through his blood, through his death. Then secondly, we have, “the forgiveness of our trespasses”. That is concerned with our response to the work of redemption, the forgiveness of our trespasses. It’s interesting that the word for forgiveness is not “paresis” which is found in Romans 3:25. Romans 3:25 says, “Whom God put forward as an expiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God’s righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins.” Passed over is the meaning of the word “paresis”. It means overlooking. You remember there’s another verse that talks about God winking. It isn’t quite the same as that because that is concerned with a time of innocence when men didn’t even know what was wrong. But overlooking applies to those who know the law, (in the Old Testament), who disobeyed and God overlooked their sin. That’s what “paresis” is. Or, it’s similar to the word Passover. It’s a passing over of their sins. Why? It’s because, the blood of the lambs and cattle that were sacrificed in the Old Testament were simply symbols of the actual death of us in Christ. And that death took place in the “lamb that was slain from before the foundation of the world”. And so the Old Testament people did not really know clearly that that had happened. They simply knew that the blood of the sacrifices stood for something. They would often think, “Well, that pleased God.” But because Christ had not yet been proclaimed clearly to them, God was able only to passover their sins. He overlooked them as the angel of death passed over the houses of the Israelites in Egypt. He passed over, he overlooked them. So in some sense the Old Testament people never really did experience forgiveness. They experienced an overlooking of their sins. From time-to-time you found men like David who seemed to experience the reality of the lamb that was slain through supernatural revelation of the Holy Spirit. But the bulk of mankind experienced what Romans 3:25 calls the overlooking, or the passing over of the sins. Now, that’s not the word that is used here in Ephesians 1:7b. The word for forgiveness is “aphesis”. The last four letters are the same but it’s called “aphesis”. It’s the same thing that happened in the Old Testament ritual where the priest had two lambs. He laid his hand on one lamb so as to impart to him the sin of the congregation and then sent that lamb out into the wilderness. The other lamb was sacrificed. This is from a Greek verb “aphiemi” which means to send away. Because of what has happened to us in Jesus, God sends away our sins. Another explanation is that the sins are removed from the mind of God. They’re sent away completely so that they no longer exist. Some of the passages are very clear. Psalms 103:12 is one that we know well and when you see the implications of it, it brings it home to you. “As far as the east is from the west, so far does he remove our transgressions from us.” That’s far. It’s quite interesting that one of the commentators says that it’s “not as far as the north is from the south but as far as the east is from the west.” That’s because, the north and the south is a finite distance that is measurable. But as far as the east is from the west is infinite. It’s that far that God has sent away our sins. He’s removed them absolutely and utterly as if they never were. It’s as if they never existed and are never to be dragged up again. That’s what forgiveness is. He sends our sins utterly and completely away. Another verse is Micah 7:19 says, “He will again have compassion upon us, he will tread our iniquities under foot. Thou wilt cast all our sins into the depths of the sea.” That’s what forgiveness is. God casts our sins into the depths of the sea so that you cannot get them up again. And that’s what Christ made possible for us on Calvary. It’s that kind of absolute doing away with our sins so that even the memory of them is wiped out. So it’s a complete and an absolute change. It’s something that God does in a complete way. The word for trespasses in French means to “fall off”. It’s a falling off, a falling of, or a falling beside the way of right. It is important for us to be real about those because the forgiveness is conditional upon our repentance and our repentance of course, is conditional upon us knowing what our trespass was. We often think of trespass in the legal sense of trespassing upon somebody’s property. But trespass is actually a finer word than that. In the heart of the word falling is the heart of the word parallel – or the geometric symbol of it. So it’s just falling almost beside the road of right. It’s just falling off the road of right. It’s not plunging over a cliff; it’s just falling to the side of it. I think each of us know how easy it is just to step a little aside, “I’m not just rejecting God but I’m stepping a little aside. I’m not disbelieving in him but I’m believing just a little more in my own existence at this moment.” That’s what a trespass is. It has something of the meaning of the other word that is used for sin “hamartia” and it has the meaning of an error. It is an error. It’s interesting; the translation is an error in the intention of the heart. So, trespass has some of that. It’s not just murdering, it is not just cutting the person apart with a knife. It is an error in the intention of the heart. I suppose Karl Barth would say it’s just living as if you’re on your own. And that’s where all our misery comes from because our full joy comes from realizing that everything is Jesus Christ. Everything is our Lord Jesus Christ. For me to live is Christ. Then you’re living on a holiday from yourself and joy just flows over you. But when you live as if you’re on your own, there’s a heaviness about you and you’re weighted down with the cares of this world and all the things you have to do. So God is so gracious to us, he gives us all kind of signs that we’re falling off the way. But the great thing is, that when we realize that (i.e. that we are falling away) and we turn from it to the Lord and say, “No, we do not want that Lord,” then, because of what Christ has done, God forgives us that trespass. He sended it away as far as the east is from the west. He casts it even into the depths of the sea. That’s the complete change that God brings about and that’s what is possible in Jesus, because he has been in a sense both the victim and he has also been the judge on Calvary. He was God himself taking from us the worst that we could give him, and he was also us taking the full brunt of God’s just wrath. And because of that we owe everything to our Savior. Let us pray.

God’s Uncreated Life Lavished Upon Us Ephesians 1:8 Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill You’ll remember that Jesus said, “Not a jot or a tittle will pass from the law until all this is accomplished.” It’s reasonable to think of the jot or tittle almost as an apostrophe. This is the word for God, Elohim. And this would be the tittle and this would be the jot. This is the letter in Hebrew for a long I, and a short I would be that. So Jesus said, “Not a jot or a tittle will pass from the law until all this is accomplished.” I think as a Biblical scholar you have to take seriously that every word in the Bible is important. Every word is intended by God that he has written in the Bible. I think when you take it that way; you receive real food from it. That’s why you have to be careful about modern translations. Many of them are just paraphrases and they don’t treasure each word in the same way that say the Revised Standard, or the American Standard, or the New Revised Standard, or the King James do where every word is precious. Many of the paraphrases get the sense of it. But I think what Jesus was implying was every word that is here is intended by my Father for you to study carefully because it will enable you to keep the right balance and the right perspective in your own life and your own faith. That’s why it’s important to take such care over the words of scripture and that’s what we’re going to do today with the next verse in Ephesians. It’s Ephesians 1:8, “Which he lavished upon us.” It’s a subordinate adjectival clause, not even a principle one. The previous clause we dealt with was, “According to the riches of his grace.” And now this verse is, “which he lavished upon us.” Why I emphasized taking each word seriously is that word lavished is actually “eperisseusen”. And the word riches transliterated to English letters is “riches”. It’s actually “charitos” the word for grace. Every one of these words emphasizes God’s rich grace and generosity to us. The meaning of “ploutoz” is riches, wealth, an abundance of, a great amount of, and extreme value of something. And so the Bible is saying, “According to the riches, the amazing abundance, and the great amount of.” Then grace is, “A quality that adds delight or pleasure, graciousness, attractiveness, charm, goodwill, or favor. It’s God’s attitude towards human beings of kindness, grace, favor, helpfulness.” And the exceptional effects produced by God’s favor are ability, power, and enablement. So it’s all the extreme abundance of God’s complete provision which he has lavished. And lavished is, “provided for in abundance, caused to increase, caused to abound”. The whole emphasis is that God has given us more than we need, far more than we need and that’s what the verse is saying. We are the recipients of the riches of God’s grace which he has abundantly lavished and does lavish upon us day after day. I’d like to remind you of that grace because I think it’s overwhelming as you begin to think of it. First, we wouldn’t be here if he hadn’t made us. So we first have his grace in making us. We can’t imagine what it like is to not have consciousness. But we would not have a consciousness of our very existence here if it were not for God. And God did not do what we would do. We’re such controllers that if we make anything we like to make something that we can control. But God didn’t do that. He gave us his own life. Who here would have questioned him if he had made us just a little one up on a dog or a cat? But he didn’t do that. He gave us his very own life so we have the ability to think like he thinks and to feel like he feels. We have the ability to understand the things that he understands. It’s unbelievable. You could not imagine a God doing that — i.e. making other beings that had the same abilities as him and had his very own life. He did not make us little playthings that he could play about with. Indeed, that’s where he got himself into all this commitment. Once you make beings like God, they have to be dealt with in the same integrity that God himself deals with himself. Now, I don’t know if you’ve really thought through that. God is not able to make a group of free willed agents, let them tear the whole place apart and then just blot it out and forget it. I think it takes you to think through that a little because we, with our more casual attitude, tend to think, “Well, now wait a minute he made us okay but we turned out bad. Well, he could just wipe us off the face of the universe and start again.” He cannot do that. Why? Because of his own integrity. When he commits himself to some line of action he is bound by his own integrity to stand by that and follow it right onto the end. Now we have trouble with that because we think, “No big deal. If you mess it up then you wipe it out and go again. You’re the God of the universe. You can do what you want.” Yes, that would be true unless you were God and are the kind of person he is. God has no shadow of turning or change with him. Therefore, when he made beings like himself he was committing himself to all that they would choose to do and to dealing with it not pretending that it simply didn’t exist. God cannot allow Hitler to exterminate millions without him being in each one of those millions. I think we don’t catch that. We keep thinking, “No, wait a minute. God is way up there and all these millions are down here and it’s Hitler that chose to do it and he did it against God’s laws so what’s the situation? Not one of those millions went fearfully into a lion pit, or into a gas chamber but God himself went in inside them. Why? Because he has to be responsible for all that he does. He has to be responsible for all that he has made. He would cease to be his own integrated self if he didn’t do that. And so it’s quite important that we grasp what he committed himself to when he made us of the same nature of himself. He was committing himself. He was committing himself to dealing with everything that we did and to face it with us. He faced it as the person who was responsible for originating it. Now I think I tried to bring that home to you last day by pointing out how a parent feels responsible for what a child does. It’s especially so if he ends up as one of those murderers who has shot down children in a school or something like that. But that’s small compared with God’s own situation. The parent doesn’t actually face the electric chair. The parent doesn’t have to go to jail in spite of the fact that they might feel very much with the child. He doesn’t actually have to do it. God himself does. He made us, and gave us existence but he didn’t give us existence as little animals or playthings that he would play around with and then wipe off the chess board and start over again with. He made us the same as himself. He gave us his very own life. We’ve said it so often that “we are God’s workmanship created in Christ Jesus. He actually made us in his own son. It’s very hard for us to express the truth of that. We’ve touched it a little, when we’ve said, you have to be quite wise about who you receive into Christian Corps because we’re much closer to each other than a normal organization. We live together, we eat together, we sleep in neighboring rooms and sometimes in the same room. We work together, and our finances are together. Whatever a person does they affect the whole atmosphere in the home. We have caught something of that, and can see a little how in an ordinary human family they protect themselves because they don’t normally take outsiders in unless they adopt a child or have visitors from time-to-time. But they don’t actually bring someone inside their home. And we’ve seen how important it is to be sure you receive the ones that Jesus wants. But they’re still not inside you. Even if they come here to live with us, they’re not inside me. I am able to get into my bed at night and to think some thoughts that they don’t know about. Now what happens when they’re inside you? You can’t even liken it to a mom and a baby. You can’t because while the mom feels the little baby kicking inside she really doesn’t know all the baby’s thoughts. In fact, the child, as far as we know, doesn’t have any conscience thoughts so the mother doesn’t feel all the feelings that the child feels or all the anxiety. But Jesus does. We were created inside Christ and everything that we feel, everything that we think he experiences. And so when God created us he created us with a great generosity, a great grace. Any of us could have said, “Look, it’s enough if you give us this beautiful world, if you give us this universe, if you give us these skies to fly in and these roads to walk, that’s wonderful.” But above all that he gave us his own inside. His own insides he gave us. He brought us not just into his own home, he brought us into himself. I don’t know if you’ve thought through the incredibility of the fact that virtually the same millisecond that God conceived of his only begotten Son, he also in that same millisecond conceived of his only begotten Son as being the great human being in which then God created all of us. In other words, we were not an afterthought. We were not something that God decided later on. We are an integral part of what God and his Son are. That is startling. I always thought there was God and then he had his Son and the Holy Spirit somewhere way back in infinity or eternity. Then at some point later on he thought of us. So in that way I felt we’re important to God but we’re something that he created outside of himself. But you can see that isn’t so. We were adopted as his Sons from the very beginning. And as his children we were created inside himself. The first moment he had the opportunity to create us in Jesus, he created us. So that is it. You’d feel you were insulting God of course and you were being unjustifiably independent, but you almost feel like saying it wasn’t necessary. But see God knows it was necessary because he wants children who are close to him. He wants others like himself and his Son. He does not want little second rate citizens that will somehow be let into heaven by the back door and play around the edges. God himself has made us an integral part of himself and of his own Son. But that’s only the beginning of it. God wasn’t caught out, the same way even we and our little human mental abilities are not caught out. A little dog can obey you or it need not obey you and for human beings it’s the same. A human being with a free may do what you want them to do or they may not do what you want them to do. So even we, with our limited abilities, can foresee. We can actually go further than that because sometimes we say, “I’ll tell you what that guy will do. As soon as he gets hold of that car he’ll take himself into a wall.” Or, we can foresee what other people will almost certainly do. That’s the whole basis of advertising. It’s the ability to foresee and anticipate what people will do when they see a certain picture in a magazine. In fact, you could say the whole basis of our manufacturing process is foreseeing what people will want to use, what they will need so even we human beings can do that. Obviously, God with his infinite mind saw the whole thing in a second. He doesn’t need time. Time is simply a gracious creation of his. It’s a temporary arrangement so that we, with our slow little minds, could follow what he sees in a second. Even we with our computers have started to make fun of our own minds and the slow motion within which they move. But God himself is infinite and in a millisecond he saw the whole thing. Yes, he saw Marty Poehler’s great great great great grandfather and then his great great great – and he saw what Marty Poehler would do today. He saw the bumper that you bumped into. He saw everything. He saw everything in a millisecond. Why? Because, God knows the whole potential of every person. Yet the miracle is that inside all that foreknowledge and all that understanding he made us with a free will. It’s remarkable. And we have trouble with that because we think, “If I had to make someone I’d make them do what I wanted them to do if I had the power. But God didn’t. And God doesn’t because he’s more committed to others who love him and others whom he can love freely than he is to having everything go his way. And so he foresaw all that our lives would do. He foresaw all that we would do except that it could only take place in one place — the place where he had put us in Jesus. Could you look at your only begotten Son and infect him with aids? It’s in those terms that you have to begin to see God’s commitment to making us in his Son and yet giving us free will, allowing us to do whatever we wanted. I’ve likened it rather pathetically to little vermin inside the body, eating away at the appendix, eating away at the arteries, and the blood vessels. I suppose like a cancer maybe, except that it seems to be a living thing, and there are millions of those. Some of them are Hitlers, some of them are Stalins, some of them are more clever and deceptive than that, but they’re all eating away at each other because every time they eat each other they eat the person that is in them, and that is Jesus. So they are actually eating away at Jesus. The Father saw that all in a millisecond and that is the agony of Calvary. He committed himself to that and was willing for that. And that’s grace that is beyond anything that you can imagine. But then he went beyond that because his own Son was human as well as divine. Even as his own Son was eaten apart and had to be destroyed so we all could be ended, Jesus obeyed perfectly and was in love and trust with his Father. Christ’s divine side, had victory over the destruction that took place in his humanity. His divine side rose up and God at that moment, when he could have let the human side be destroyed, lifted the human side back into Jesus to give us the chance that we now have. And if you say, “You mean we started it all over again?” Yes, we started all over again. He brought us into his Son and raised us up with him. Except that the life that he had foreseen us live with all its mistakes, disobedience, confusion and chaos was borne by him and God reconciled all those things to himself. He bore them, accepted them, and then laid out a life for us that had all those things corrected. In other words, God foresaw the whole of life that we would live. It was a bit like sending his Son out along a path strewn with trees that had fallen across it, with rivers that had burst over it, and with pieces of the roadway that had fallen away. His Son went along and lifted every tree out of the way, all the roadway pieces and then he left the appearance of the tree there. So he left a shadow lying across the road, he left what appeared to be a hole in the road. Then, when we came along, if we obeyed him and put our hand to the tree, it was false and the difficulty was lifted out of the way. When we came along to the water, we were able to wade through it easily. And so we had a charmed way where the road has been made smooth and all the crooked things have been made straight. So God lived that whole thing in his Son in a millisecond. We then would have this opportunity to walk a life that’s spread before us, out of which all the dangers have been taken. There is the appearance of danger so that we will exercise our faith in God. But all the dangers have been removed, all the problems have been solved, all the sicknesses have been borne, all the challenges have been met by Jesus. All we have to do is walk in the good works that have been prepared beforehand. Every work has been prepared carefully beforehand by Jesus so that we just walk in the work. We don’t actually do the work we walk in the work. That’s part of the riches of God’s grace that he has lavished upon us and is lavishing upon us now at this very moment. So it’s unbelievable but that is how gracious and how generous God is. Of course, you can see how silly we are to wonder, “Will, God will forgive me?” Will he forgive you? The dear Father has already borne all that. He has not only forgiven but has provided an easy way forward for us. You can see too why it is such a shame for us to get up any morning in depression. It is dreadful for us to spend a second in anxiety. It is a crying shame that we do anything but laugh and rejoice all day because the Father has provided the whole thing for us. Let us pray. Dear Father, we thank you for the riches of your grace which you have lavished upon us. We thank you Lord, for the abundant, generous gifts of energy, freedom, liberty, and joy that you shower upon us every second. We thank you Lamb of Calvary. We thank you blessed Savior for bearing all of the darkness for us so that we could walk in constant light. Thank you for bearing all the death for us so that we could walk in daily life. Lord, we thank you. Amen.

The United Family of God Ephesians 1:10a Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill Will you take a Bible please and look at Ephesians 1. Let’s just look today at Ephesians 1:10, “As a plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth.” Now it’s important in order to get the continuity of Paul’s revelation here to ask what is “as a plan for the fullness of time? What is it that is a plan for the fullness of time? And you get it if you read the previous verse, “For he has made known to us in all wisdom and insight the mystery of his will, according to his purpose which he set forth in Christ as a plan for the fullness of time.” So you can see it’s his purpose which he set forth in Christ as a plan for the fullness of time. So that’s what the plan for the fullness of time is. It’s the purpose that he set forth in Christ. Fullness of time is probably when time will change into eternity. The Greek word fullness means “a completion” or the wrapping up of time as we know it. It is the opening out of what is final reality and what is real around us —eternity, the eternal present moment. So it’s a plan for that time, when we will begin the real world, the real eternal world that is a glorious joyous present. And the purpose that he set forth in Christ is a plan for that. Now what is the purpose that he set forth in Christ? Well, you’ll see it in Romans 8:29. It’s that famous few verses, “All things work together for good to them that love God,” and then in verse 29, “For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son.” Now that is obviously what Paul is referring to in the previous verse. The previous verse runs, “We know that in everything God works for good with those who love him, who are called according to his purpose.” So that’s what we’re studying, the purpose that he has set forth in Christ and this is the purpose in verse 29, “For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the first-born among many brethren.” Often we say the purpose of God is that those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son. And of course we can get into a work kind of salvation. We can say, “Our purpose is to be conformed to the image of Jesus, so that’s what I must work at through this life here on earth. I must work at being conformed to the image of Jesus.” It’s very easy for us when we put the emphasis on that to end up emphasizing what we do and how we’re to improve our prayer lives and how we’re to become more loving to our neighbors and how we’re to become more pure in our thoughts. And so we can end up in a preoccupation very easily with ourselves and with our own spiritual progress. But it’s quite interesting to see that that in itself is a secondary purpose. The primary purpose that God set forth in Christ you can see in the purpose clause – “in order that”. In Latin it’s the word “ut” and we describe it as “so that” or “in order that” in English. So we’re predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son. Why and for or what purpose? Because there’s a purpose beyond that. It’s in order that he might be the first born among many brethren. In other words, you and I exist so that Jesus would be the first-born among many brethren. The purpose that God has set forth in Christ for you and me is that we would be Christ’s brothers and sisters. In fact, it’s that he would have brothers and sisters, because that’s the way that reads, “In order that he might be the first-born among many brethren.” Now I don’t know if you can see how that changes the whole emphasis of the purpose of our lives, but the reason you and I are in existence at all is so Jesus would have brothers and sisters. And I don’t know if you see how safe, and solid, and assured that makes our position? God is not going to disappoint his Son and to him his Son’s brothers and sisters are part of him. He wanted to have an only begotten Son but he wanted to have many brothers and sisters for that Son — people that he could love and take care of and treat the same as he did his own Son. And so far from making us seem just an ancillary to Jesus, it ties us up with Jesus’ own life and with his own eternal existence. And that’s completely different from the idea that we often have that Christ’s value to us is that he is our Savior. He saves us from this dreadful raging sea of sin and self. And so often we see Jesus as only the one who saves us. He has many other things to do but among those many other things he also saves us on the side. But this presents it in a completely different way. This shows us that for us Jesus is our elder brother. He is one who is related to us and we to him. We are not just little creatures that have gotten into trouble through our sin and our selfishness. We are his brothers and sisters. We are actually part of his eternal existence. And through the past months, I’ve tried to say that in a way that would be vivid and clear. It’s obvious that we are not an afterthought of God. I thought it was glorious to be an afterthought. I thought, “Well, that is a great privilege. God first of all had his only begotten Son in eternity before the world was and then he thought, ‘Oh, I will make other people and other worlds through my Son.’” And I thought, “Well, that is glorious that he even thought of something further than his only begotten Son.” But suddenly it becomes clear to you here and in other verses that the reason God made us in his Son Jesus was because he thought of us from the moment he conceived his only begotten Son. That is so staggering that it is almost impossible to conceive. Little Marty Poehler, little Ernest O’Neill, little Joanne, little Trish — when God almighty, the Father of the whole universe thought of his only begotten Son he thought right down through eternity to Trish. He thought right down through eternity to Marty. It’s almost so ridiculous that you think, “Well it’s a dream.” Except that as you begin to look at God’s word carefully you see that it’s written into it. That we might be conformed to the image of his Son, so that he might be the first born among many brethren, so that there would be many people who would have Christ’s spirit and Christ’s heart within them. I think we’ve often talked about the fact that God obviously did not make us as an afterthought. He obviously did not make us as little playthings. He did not make us as little experiments. He did not make us in a kind of trial and error kind of attempt. He did not make us as something that he would try out and see if it worked. He made us as part of the Son that he had begotten in his own heart. In that way he opened his own heart to us and he opened himself to us. He opened himself to all that we would do, all that we would experience. You probably have to be careful that you catch this rightly, but in a deep way God made us for keeps. He didn’t make us with the idea of losing us. He didn’t make us with the idea that we were something that didn’t matter too much to him or that he could do without. I’m sure you have to be wise about your reaction to all of that, but he didn’t make a deformed Son. He didn’t make a Son who could afford to lose his legs, or his toes. He made a Son whom he loves as the apple of his eye, and a Son whom he will do everything to preserve. And so when we were all placed in Jesus, God committed himself to whatever that would cost him. And I think you can see in a way that he couldn’t choose not to be affected by us. A Father can’t chose not to be affected by what his children do. A mother of course can’t because that child is part of her body. But you can see that our Father has made us part of his only begotten Son. It is not just a matter of losing a glove off Jesus’ hand if Joe is lost. It’s not. It’s part of his only begotten Son. He made us part of his Son so that he would feel everything that we felt and so that he would have to deal with everything that we dealt with. And he would have to put up with all that our free will exercised and brought about. And that’s of course, another reason why he gave us free will. We had to be like Jesus, because we were spirit of his spirit, flesh of his flesh, heart of his heart, and will of his will. We had the same freedom as he had to love his Father or not to love. And the possibility of that meant God was opening himself to all that we would do as a result of that. In a deep way we’ve said, “Yes, Jesus did bear our sins on Calvary. But Calvary was just the particular place where we cut the tree in 29 AD and you see the rings there. But if you cut the tree back in 400 BC, there are rings also in the tree. It doesn’t matter, I suppose how far down the tree you would go — right to its root. But at the very root of Christ’s birth inside his Father, there were rings around that tree. The pain of bearing our sin was right there in the heart of the beginning of creation and so God actually has borne the pain of our sin, our selfishness, and our rebellion right down through the centuries. And you could say, in a sense, he continues to bear it now. I think we’ve talked often enough how that had to be. He had to be real. He could not make us and then throw us away. If he had then we would have meant nothing to him. But because we’re part of his own Son we mean everything to him and so he cannot separate himself from us. And that’s what he has done. He has borne and borne with us as a father bears his dear child. He has borne everything that we have done and of course, his blessed Son has borne it intensely. But that’s the purpose then that God set forth for us in Christ, that we might be part of his Son and that we might be brothers and sisters of his Son. And then inside his Son he provided everything that was needed. It’s important to grasp, that God did not put us inside his Son and think, “Well, these children of mine will perhaps not want to obey me. They will not want to trust me as my Son does.” (I suppose he called him Jesus). He said, “Jesus my son, they may not want the same thing as you. Will you bear that in yourself? Not only that, but if there’s to be any hope of them becoming like you, we have to bear the pain that they produce. We have to bear the pain of destroying all that and remaking them in you. Now that will mean the death of your own physical body. And the only way that you yourself will live is because of your spiritual heart and life. What I’m asking you to do is to live and triumph over the death of your own physical body and over the death of all their lives, raise them up willingly with yourself and create them anew so that they will be able to look back and see what they would have been without you. They will have a real choice between that and what they actually are in you now.” And of course Jesus said, “Yes, I will.” And that is what has happened. I know it’s changing the whole atmosphere of our discussion but in a way, but it’s like the Japanese having a virtual pet with their computers. You can buy software that is a virtual pet. It requires you to feed it, give it water and whatever is needed. In a way what we see here in our own present life is the virtual self, the self that would have existed apart from God, and lived outside Jesus. That’s the self that we see and it’s an unreal self. It is a self that has already been crucified in Christ. The real self is the one that now exists in Jesus; that has been raised up and made alive in him. That’s the real self. The virtual self or the old self is the self that was crucified in him. But that’s the self of course that we see first of all here on earth until we begin to become aware of what God has done for us in Jesus. But in that way, God planted everything in his Son and he planted also the antidote for all that would go wrong. So in Christ it’s not only our old self that was crucified but the world itself was crucified in him. The world itself was destroyed in him and remade in him. And so in Jesus everything was turned around. Everything has been turned around which is why we say the difficulty that you will have with your car tomorrow has been foreseen by God in Jesus and has already been rectified by him. And whether that is someone coming along who will help you to repair it at the right moment, or whether that is you getting it towed into a service station, or whether that is you happening apparently by chance to see what is wrong under the hood, God is the one who has already provided the answer for that. There is nothing that comes in our lives that God has not crucified in his Son and remade in him. My own example is plain and obvious. Oh the day when God saw Ernest O’Neill was going to die, and his heart was going to stop (it was the 10th of March 1995) God had lined up from eternity for me to have a position in the queue so that there was a surgeon ready to do a heart bypass. God had lined up a place for me so that I could be tested out thoroughly. Everything was arranged and in position. That’s what it is with every little thing in our lives. We of course, in our naivety say, “Oh, I was really lucky or it’s remarkable what has happened, or God has been good. Well, God is good in every little thing that happens. Have you ever thought of the million things that have to go right for you to get out of the driveway here every morning? It’s just unbelievable all the muscles that have to work right, all the breaths that have to go just right, all the blood that has to circulate, all the equipment that has to start, and all the coordination of your eyes with the gatepost there that have to take place. It is just unbelievable. And then you begin to realize, “Of course, there is some loving hand that is not only making the obvious things right but that has provided for the unexpected things.” And that’s part of what this verse In Ephesians 1:10 is talking about, if you go back to it. “As a plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in him.” When Stephen Hawking (British scientist) talks about the one great principle that will draw everything together, he just says it on the basic of his understanding of the physical makeup of the universe. When scientists or cosmologists say, “Oh yes, they’re seeking for what they believe exists, one great principle that will unite everything together,” they say it because they’re experiencing the shadow of that. They’re experiencing the vague outline of that that they see built into reality. God unites all things in Jesus, “Things in heaven and things on earth.” In Christ God unites everything. He brings everything beautifully together. There’s no place for us as we go into next week, to think in terms of the virtual self, or the old self that is part of this fallen world and that lives as if there is no God. There is no place for us thinking the way it does, “Oh, how am I going to face this person in the store? How am I going to solve this problem? What am I going to do if this happens?” That is unreality. Reality is that God has already united all things in Christ. He already has all our life planned. He has already the solutions made so that in actual fact we can live as free liberated children enjoined. We do not need to live as the poet Auden describes us human beings, “in headaches life leaks away”. “In worry and in headaches life leaks away.” There’s no place for that. That is the life that was crucified in Christ. But for us, there lies out before us a flowery path, a way of joy, a way of delight, a way where everything has already been united in Christ. Now maybe one of the best expositions of this is just the few verses that we so often treasure in Colossians 1:5, because it summarizes all this. “He is the image of the invisible God, the first-born of all creation; for in him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or authorities—all things were created through him and for him.” It’s important to see that, “Whether thrones or dominions or principalities or authorities.” Satan was not God’s will. But his existence was God’s will and when Satan rebelled against God, God held him within his own sphere. He holds even Satan within the sphere of Jesus. He controls and limits even Satan’s power and ability. So all things were originally made in Christ and Christ has borne the pain of reconciling all those things to his Father. “All things were created through him and for him. He is before all things, and in him all things hold together. He is the head of the body, the church; he is the beginning, the first-born from the dead, that in everything he might be pre-eminent.” That he might be the first-born among many brethren, “That in everything he might be pre-eminent. For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him to reconcile to himself all things whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross.” And God in Christ has made peace by the blood of Jesus’ cross. In Jesus all the things that have gone wrong in this world have been borne and destroyed and remade new again. He has united everything himself and has made peace in every situation through himself. Which is why we say that Jesus’ promise is so real where he said, “Peace I leave with you. I don’t leave you a world that you have to put together. I don’t leave you a life where you’re going to have all kinds of disruption that you have to somehow resolve. I don’t leave you a life with all kinds of difficulties that you have to overcome. Peace I leave with you. I leave you a life that has been reconciled inside me to my Father’s will. It’s a life that has been fixed, a life that has been put right. All I ask you to do is walk in the good works that my Father has prepared beforehand for you to walk in.” And so it lifts from us the sense that we have to somehow do this ourselves. We have to bring about what Christian Corps is meant to be. No we haven’t. God has already brought that about in his Son and he will unfold that to us as day follows day. But our privileged position is simply to walk in that. Why? Because, he has set forth the purpose that he has for us in Christ to be part of his brothers and sisters as a plan for the fullness of time to unite all things in heaven and things on earth. Let us pray. Dear Father, we thank you that you have not given us an impossible task. We thank you that you have given us only a privileged position and existence to be the brothers and sisters to your beloved Son, our Savior Jesus. All you want us to be is part of our dear Savior, as his brothers and his sisters. You want us to allow him to live in us, to have his own life using this body, these brains, and these hands that you have lent to us for this short time on earth. Lord, we thank you that all you’ve called us to do is to let Jesus be himself in us. Thank you Lord that you’ve shown us that what the world knows us to be and has seen of us is just a virtual and unreal self that no longer exists. We thank you for allowing the shadow of it to appear before us in this life so that we would see what the real choice is. We are able to turn away from that old self and to accept that it no longer exists, because you have destroyed it. The old self is something that you could not tolerate or accept. We are able to turn to this new being that you have made us in Jesus, a shining marvelous person who is full of your love and is quietly trustful of your power and protection. Lord, we thank you for that. Now the grace of our Lord Jesus, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, be with each one of us now and ever more. Amen.

All Things United in Christ Ephesians 1:10b Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill I think you’ve probably all realized very clearly that Ephesians is just a very different book from Romans. The book of Romans is complex but Ephesians is the Greek condensed and the thought condensed more than in any other book. Probably, we’ve said before, it is the most difficult Greek that Paul wrote. The reason for it is he’s looking beyond time. It’s in a way, new for us because we haven’t talked much about these things over the past years, but it does seem God’s time for us to look at it. I remember when it first occurred to me that there was a difference in the way you looked at things according to the stage of life you were at with Jesus. You remember it’s that verse where John speaks to the children and then he speaks to the fathers. He says, “I am writing to you, little children, because you know your sins are forgiven.” [ I John 2:12] Then he says, “I am writing to you, young men, because you have overcome the evil one.” [ I John 2:13] I think it must be in 1 John somewhere, and then he says, “I am writing to you, fathers, because you know him who is from the beginning.” I always wondered, obviously, the fathers are regarded as pretty advanced and then obviously that has some meaning who is from the beginning. But I really probably have not begun to glimpse that until these recent two, I suppose two or three years now we’ve been talking about this kind of thing. So that’s what Ephesians is talking about. It’s really trying to go beyond the veil and through the veil of the temporal and into eternity. That’s part of the reason why it’s so deep and stretches us a bit. And that’s another of the reasons why I think Paul often uses different words to say the same thing, or goes round a thing again. Of course, I’ve said to you why Barth goes round, and round, in convoluted sentences saying the same thing again and again. I’m afraid it’s why I end up going over the thing again because I think you’ll be like me, you’ll get hold of it bit-by-bit. And bit-by-bit, you’ll begin to put one thing together with another and you know how that goes, here you see certain things that I say or certain things that somebody else says, but it’s really when you’re on your own in the car, maybe driving to an appointment, or when you’re at home, or in bed, certainly things begin to gel and you begin to see the thing as a whole. And so I’m praying that that will come to you. So what we’re at loved ones, is Ephesians and I think we’ve reached Verse 10 and we’ve already spent one, at least one Sunday on it. Ephesians 1:10, and here is where Paul says, “As a plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth.” Usually, even in Romans over those years we would first of all try to understand the plain meaning of the words. So, that’s what I just remind you of again, the word for plain is in the Greek. It’s actually “eis” is “for” and “oikonomia” for “economy.” It will remind you actually those of you – well, in Irish schools we used to have domestic economy classes. Not now in Ireland, but domestic economy was cooking, and sewing, and all the things that the girls had to do in those days when they were unliberated. I don’t remember any day when they were unliberated but – and you’ll get it there. That’s “oiknomia” so that’s where it becomes economy. So it’s “oikonomia” for the economy to “pleromatos,” that is “the fullness.” We probably have that in English somewhere. “Of the times” is from the Greek word, “kairon.” So the two words translated are “in the fullness of time.” Now, I just wanted you to see that that’s the word that most of the bible translators -– that certainly the RSV translated as “a plan” for “oikonomia.” Well, “oikonomia” is combination of “oikos” [house] and those of you who know the Greek a little know that “nomia” is law. So it’s the law of the house. Then it comes to be the way that you run a house, and then of course, it becomes the supervision or the administration of the house. That’s how it eventually becomes in the RSV as a plan for the fullness of time. The King James says, “That in the dispensation of the fullness of times.” So dispensation is another English word that is used to express the same thing. All of which can mean dispensation or the government of the thing, the way of running the thing. And the American Standard Version is the same, “Onto a dispensation.” The New American Standard is, “With a view to an administration suitable to the fullness of times.” With the view is that word for, “An administration suitable for the fullness of times.” Which is quite interesting. And this – ours, is, “As a plan for the fullness of time.” So what we’re talking about is then a way of governing life at the time of the fullness of times. Now, this is quite important, it’s times, in the fullness of time Jesus came. It is time in the singular. The time before Jesus is regarded as one time. After Jesus rises from the dead then there are times, times of the Holy Spirit, the times of the persecution at the end of the world, the times of the judgment. So that’s where the idea of dispensation of times comes in that there’ll be different times. Here, of course, it’s talking about not just about the different times but the fullness of times. So you know, if you had a timeline, you’d go from infinity there and you’d come to – well 6 BC when Jesus was born and then you’d come to 39 AD and then that would be the time and then these are the times, and then that’s the fullness of times. So, this is a way of administering or the way that God has of working. Or, the thing he has in mind for the end of the times. That’s what it is. So that’s what we’re talking about. Paul is saying, “As a plan,” as God’s way of arranging things, as God’s arrangement for the very end of everything, “To unite all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth.” Now I’ll just remind you the way we went back grammatically on it, what is as a plan for the fullness of time? Well, it’s the previous verse [verse 9] shows you that, “For he has made known to us in all wisdom and insight the mystery of his will, according to his purpose which he set forth in Christ as a plan for the fullness of time.” It’s his purpose which he set forth in Christ as a plan. That is as a plan. So, the purpose set forth in Christ is in fact, God’s way of completing everything at the end of the times. Now what was the purpose set forth in Christ? Well, an easy way to find it was Romans 8:28, 29 really, because it states it pretty clearly there, the purpose that God set forth in Jesus. Verse 28, “We know that in everything God works for good with those who love him, who are called according to his purpose.” Now, what is his purpose? Well, “For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son.” And usually we have said, “Oh, that’s his purpose, that we might be conformed to the image of his Son.” But no, there’s a further purpose, “In order that,” introduces a purpose clause, we’re to, “Be conformed to the image of his Son,” for what purpose? “In order that he might be the first-born among many brethren.” And that’s where we left it last day that our purpose, it is glorious to say we’re here to be conformed to Jesus’ image, but in fact, that is secondary. We’re here first and foremost to be brothers and sisters of Christ so that he will be the first-born among many brethren. We’re really here so that he himself will be utterly and completely fulfilled. And I think I said to you that to me, that’s very reassuring. I’m not a little insect, a little Irish Ernest O’Neill trying to be like Jesus, I’m not. I’m somebody that God sees as part of his own Son and God has built my future into his Son’s future and what his Son’s fulfillment will be is partly through me. And it’s really quite important for you, yourself, to grasp that about your own life. You are not just here by any means as your mum’s little girl, or your father’s little boy, or friends of all the others here in this chapel but you are an integral part of God’s plan for his own Son Jesus and so he has much more than a passing interest in you. That’s where we get back to the strong verses in Colossians which set forth all that very clearly in Colossians 1 describing Jesus. Colossians 1:15, “He,” [Jesus] “IS the image of the invisible God, the first-born of all creation; for in him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or authorities—all things were created through him and for him. He is before all things, and in him all things hold together. He is the head of the body, the church; he is the beginning, the first-born from the dead, that in everything he might be pre-eminent. For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross.” Then I’ll just say it simply even though I understand the import of the words, it’s almost beyond human speech. When our dear Father conceived of his Son Jesus from before the foundation of the world, sometime in eternity, at that same moment he conceived him as the first born of all creation. I know that’s very hard for us in a way to grasp, that at the same moment that God conceived of his Son as his only begotten divine Son, at that same moment he conceived that his Son Jesus would be the first-born of all creation. Would be the first-born, would be the first-born in the earth, would be the first-born – he would be humanity. Our Father conceived of his Son and of the beauty and glories of the Son as being displayed in such a way that he himself would enjoy them and that his Son would enjoy them. So that’s why in Christ he made all things. And you remember in John it says, “There was not anything made that was made but was made by him and made through him.” Here it says in verse 16, of course, “In him all things were created and in him all things hold together.” So God conceived at that very moment when he conceived Jesus, his Son he conceived of us, us who would be his workmanship. Ephesians 2:10, “You are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good words, which he has prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.” God conceived of all of us inside his Son. He conceived of the earth, and the world, and the planets inside his Son. He created them inside his Son. He created even the principalities and the powers it says, were created in him, and through him, and for him. So everything that God made was made inside his Son because our Father is real. He’s real. He did not want little playthings that he would make and look at from a distance and would not be touched by. He cannot do that. He is not that kind of person. He has to be totally responsible for all that he does, and thinks, and feels, and he has to face the consequences of it all. Actually, we know that in our own hearts because we’re made in his image, we feel that that is right. Yes, that is right. Our parents used to say, “Now you’re responsible for what you do,” and we didn’t like it too much, but really we do believe that, that you are responsible for what you do and you have to be responsible for facing all the consequences of what you do. Sometimes that’s what maybe makes it a little hard even on parents, because we feel, “Well, you know, they are your children and that’s what you signed on for when you had them.” And part of that feeling we have of responsibility comes because that is our God. Our Father, cannot decide to make a lot of funny little human beings, or funny little Martians and let them scoot around the universe and then when everything goes bad just wash his hands of them. He can’t. That’s why he made them all inside his Son. He did not make us outside himself, he made us inside his Son because he knew that if he was going to have brothers and sisters of Christ they had to be true brothers and sisters. They had to be as free as his Son was, as free as he himself is. He knew immediately that once he gave them freedom they could do anything. Of course, I think what we’ve often said is hard for us to realize, or to understand is that God, because he has an infinite mind, could foresee everything. He could foresee everything. Which in a way, is not unreasonable because most people who would make that guitar would sense what its capabilities are. Indeed, the great violin makers undoubtedly chose the wood and chose everything else because they know what the potential of it will be. We ourselves, when we make things, we make them for a purpose and the more expert we are the better we know what their full potential will be and we know what they will do under certain conditions. So it is not foolish at all to believe that God, of course, with his infinite mind, foresaw everything that would happen. Foresaw it all and yet was committed to one thing above all else, to maintain our free will. Why? Because if we ever lost our free will we would cease to be brothers and sisters of his Son. We would cease to be able to love him. We could cease to be able to enjoy him. So God made us inside his Son with the same freedom of will and determined that he would bear whatever took place. He would bear whatever took place. That’s what he did, he has borne everything in his Son, Jesus. He has borne every harsh word that you and I have spoken to each other, or to our parents, or to anybody else, he has borne every cruel thing we have done, every careless heartless thing we have done, he has borne every little Jewish child that Adolph Hitler destroyed in the gas ovens, he has borne every one that has been murdered in New York City this past week, he has borne every child and every little one that has died of Aids. Our Father, in his Son has borne all that pain down through the centuries and bears it even today and still holds us inside himself, still holds onto us. It has to be like holding sulfuric acid in your hands, as it burns through your hands you still hold onto it. It has – well, that’s a pathetic example but it has to be that kind of thing. He has held onto us and borne us down through the years so that his Son who set forth all this plainly on Calvary, so that his Son who would allow all that to be destroyed in his own human self, and his own spiritual only begotten being would rise above it, and raise us up with it, and give us another chance. Of course, only that way were we ever able to have a true choice in a way. In a way you were only able I suppose, to have a true choice when you could see here in this life the life that you would have lived outside Jesus. Then we all see that, I mean, we’ve seen it over the past years, the life that we would live outside Jesus and then we see that that is the life that has been destroyed in Christ on Calvary. That is the life that has been put to death on him, in him and the life that we now have is the life that has been renewed and raised up in him. That’s the life that Jesus will raise up at the end of the ages. Now, you can see a little more why this verse runs as it does, “As a plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth.” Because, Jesus was in Himmler. Himmler sent thousands of Jews to the gas chambers, but Jesus was in each Jew. Jesus is in the murderers bearing all the pain, all the agony, being forced against his will into this terrible life and he is also in the victim of the murderer. And in the fullness of times, our Savior will unite all things in himself. Now we cannot tell the destiny of everyone, but we can see that this scripture teaches clearly that at the end of everything all things will be united in Jesus and he actually will be the only one who has the right or the ability to unite all things, because he will be the only one who has been with every little widow that has wept to her death at the end of her life. He is the only one who will have been with every little seven year old boy that has died unexpectedly through some dreadful disease in India. He will be the only one who has been in Al Capone as Al Capone has gunned down the American policemen. But he’ll be the only one who has been in the home of that policeman when the widow heard of the death of her husband. Jesus himself is the only one who has been in every situation that has ever existed in the world. So he is the only one who can unite them all in the end and make sense of them all. Even Satan himself works under the control of Jesus and of his Father. Even he can only do what his Father allows him to do in Jesus and that’s why Jesus often implied that he was held back, that Satan was held back, would be released at a certain time and then would be once and for all thrown into the lake of fire. But maybe that will help you a little to begin to think of the truth that Jesus is going to be the one that finalizes everything and he is the one that holds all things together inside himself. And that’s all the more reason for getting to know him intimately because, obviously, he’s the one that will make the decisions, and he’s the one that will decide what’s going to happen. So the more we understand our Savior the more understanding we’ll have of what will happen at the end of the days. But certainly, God states plainly that, “That’s my purpose in all of this, to unite all things together in my Son, things in heaven and things in earth.” So of course it shows us plainly that Jesus is the center of everything. You know he is the reason for everything. Everything leads to him. Everything has come from him and everything will return to him. He is the one in whom we live and move and have our being. Let us pray.

Anxieties and Cares Reconciled in Christ Ephesians 1:10c Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill Would you take a Bible and turn to 1 Corinthians 15:20? “But in fact Christ has been raised from the dead, the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep. For as by a man came death, by a man has come also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive. But each in his own order: Christ the first fruits, then at his coming those who belong to Christ. Then comes the end, when he delivers the kingdom to God the Father after destroying every rule and every authority and power. For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet. The last enemy to be destroyed is death. ‘For God has put all things in subjection under his feet.’ But when it says, ‘All things are put in subjection under him,’ it is plain that he is accepted who put all things under him. When all things are subjected to him, then the Son himself will also be subjected to him who put all things under him, that God may be everything to every one.” That is the heart of this verse we’ve looked at in Ephesians. If you look at it again, Ephesians 1:10, “As a plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth.” It’s interesting that one of the words that is used for uniting is a word that consists of several Greek words, “ana” and then the next one is “kephalai.” It is a word that means – I suppose it must occur in some of our medical terminology – head. It’s to unite or to head up all things in Christ. What is interesting is this word here means “again.” So actually the verse means to unite all things again in Christ. It makes the point, obviously, that everything was originally headed up by Christ, and was included in him. And that all things, whether in heaven or earth, principalities and powers, all things were created in Christ, so all things were at one time united in him. That’s why this word is used, because the obvious import of it is that everything was in Christ at the beginning. Then, of course, there was war in heaven and Satan rebelled and was permitted to tempt man, causing the fall of earth and man. So, in a sense, heaven itself was touched and fell. Christ himself held all those things inside himself as he himself went down into the tomb, and then was raised up, and with him he raised up everything, earth and heaven also. That’s why those verses occur in scripture showing that the earth itself will be totally redeemed even though it now groans to be redeemed. It will be completely redeemed and even heaven itself will be completely restored. And God, in fact in Jesus, has disarmed the principalities and powers. Everything will be united again in Christ the way it was before. Of course, it’s our privilege through faith to experience this back here in these days. That’s why Hebrews 11 is so important. It’s by faith that all these things are experienced here. What God showed me to share with you today, is that everything in your life and mine has been united in Christ. Everything has been brought back under his headship. So everything that occurs to us everyday has already been foreseen by our Father and has been brought together in Christ. That’s the import of verses like “Every day of your life has been written in his book even before there were any of them.” It’s the meaning that God has foreseen everything that will come about in your life and in Christ he has reconciled it to himself. That is he has brought it back under his own will. What I saw was it really means that there’s no cause of being anxious. If we’re going to live in reality there’s no cause for even that millisecond of anxiety. That it is not just the power of positive thinking that we give a little whistle when something goes wrong, but it is in fact reality. There is nothing in the future, there is nothing tomorrow, there is nothing in the next few minutes that God has not foreseen and has already dealt with in Jesus. So Christ holds our whole life, the beginning of our life, the present events of our life, and the future of our life, he holds it all within himself. He has reconciled it all together in himself. When he and his Father look out on our lives, they look at a life of peace that has been reconciled and that is the reality of it. It is Satan’s job, of course, to test our faith by saying, “No, this has not been reconciled. This you have to deal with yourself by the strength of your own right arm.” But the truth is that it has already been reconciled and has already been dealt with. So I don’t know if you can think of the things that bring a moment of fear, or even a second of anxiety, or even a millisecond of apprehension, those things that make you just tense up for a moment. Those are the unreal moments in your life. Those are the moments when you’re believing the lie that Satan feeds you that you have to somehow sort out this thing. You haven’t. God has already foreseen that. He has already dealt with it in Jesus, and it is his will that we would move through each day in absolute peace. Now I know it sounds funny but it really applies to everything. To dropping the tray in the café, it applies to that. To that moment behind the counter when it seems to be getting away from you, at that moment God is saying to you, “I knew this. I knew this moment would come and I have a way through it, and I have reconciled it to myself so just be steady and do what is before you.” It’s the same in every situation, whether with our finances or with our relationships. It seems to me we can easily allow our relationship to cause us some consternation and cause us some worry. It’s madness because God has already foreseen every little tendency in everyone else’s attitude to us, and our attitude to everyone else, and he has already reconciled it in his son and made it right. So, in Jesus, everything has already been dealt with, and we live in the midst of a quiet and peaceful person who holds us in his own arms, and there is not a cause for any alarm or any fear. So it would be good just to be realistic with ourselves. Now I want to be realistic with myself and see, are there any such moments in my life? Well then there’s some place there that God has a deeper place for me in his Son, because all that has been dealt with and I am just wasting energy and wasting good physical life to hesitate for a moment. Now in a moment we’re going to take him into us. So take him in and let him govern our feelings and our attitudes every second. Let us pray.

You are Appointed by God in Christ Ephesians 1:11 Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill The past few weeks we’ve been talking about God’s plan to bring everything together in Jesus at the end of the world, and I think that was Verse 10. Today we will begin the next verse which talks specifically about our own lives and particularly about the plan for us and I think it runs this way, and I’ll just give it as literally I translated the Greek before we look at the Revised Standard Version (RSV), “Inside Jesus and in connection with him we were assigned a lot as predestinated according to the purpose of the will of him who works all things according to the counsel of his will.” So that’s as literally as you could do it from the Greek. In Jesus, in connection with him, and inside him we, ourselves, have been assigned a lot as being predestinated or as having been predestinated according to the purpose of him who works all things according to the counsel of his will. That’s it and you’ll see the importance of the translation in a moment when you look at the RSV [Revised Standard Version Bible]. The RSV puts in the next verse those words, “We have been assigned a lot as having been predestinated.” It puts that into the next verse as, “We have been appointed and destined.” So that’s the way it translates and that’s why you’ll miss those words. At first I thought, “Oh, the RSV has left out a whole important phrase,” but it puts it into the next verse. So let’s look at the RSV and at least start there and then we can get down to the details. It’s Ephesians 1:10. And so God has said through Paul, “This is a plan that I have at the end of the time to unite all things in Christ, things in heaven and things on earth.” And then in Verse 11, “In him,” that is in Jesus, “according to the purpose of him who accomplishes all things according to the counsel of his will.” So it puts in the next verse the “we have been given” or “we were assigned a lot.” So first of all look at the words “in him.” “In him” means – well, it can mean two things, it’s really just in Greek, it’s just that, it’s just the “in him” which is “en” and probably we would translate that we are actually in Jesus — in him. It means in Jesus in the sense that you are God’s workmanship created in Christ Jesus for good works he has prepared beforehand that you should walk in them, in that sense first of all. Inside Jesus, we are inside Jesus at this moment and that’s why it still is effectual for us, because we are in him. So it’s inside Jesus and it can mean secondary in connection with Jesus. In other words, it’s really because Jesus has experienced this that we also therefore experienced it as part of him. You’ll see what we experienced in a moment because the word is a Greek word. It’s “klerothemen.” “Klero” is the side that means ‘we’ and this is the side that means we were ‘assigned a lot’ and that’s a very literal translation of – of the verb “proorizo” is a lot, where you cast a lot. But we were assigned a lot means we were given a function; we were given a part to play. Now, you’ll notice that actually RSV later on and other versions translate it we were given a heritage or we have inherited, we have received an inheritance. And in a way, that’s true that in Jesus we have received an inheritance but really the meaning of it here in this particular verse is we were assigned a lot. That is, we were given a part to play. We were given a function and we were given it in connection with Christ. We were given a function or a lot in connection with Christ – it’s the same as somebody giving you, “You’ve to trim the front hedge once a month.” It’s being given a definite thing to do. It’s being given a definite responsibility, a definite part to pay and so that’s what it means, we each one were assigned a lot, we were given a part to play. But you were given it in connection with Jesus. You’ll smile at this but the nail on Jesus’ toe is Marty and Jesus’ leg, foot, and toes, and nails have a whole life to live here on earth and the nail has a part too in the life of it. So in connection with Jesus, we each one were given a part to play. We’ve been given a thing to do. We aren’t sent here to try to find out what we can do for the Lord. We aren’t. We aren’t sent here to try to work out our natural talents and abilities in some way that will bring glory to God. We aren’t. It’s much more different than that. In Jesus, in whom we were created before the world was, in him, we as part of him have been given a part to play, a function. It was all planned from the beginning and that’s what that means. It means that you and I come – we’re really as Wordsworth said in his poem because we “come trailing clouds of glory.” We come from heaven as children trailing clouds of glory. We come trailing behind us the Savior. We come as a bit of Jesus with something to do. Not something that you and I have to do individually, but something that we do as part of him. Something actually that he does. It’s something that he – he did not come to earth to think, “Now, what will I do? Will I become a mighty preacher who will live for hundreds of years and preach to thousands of people generation after generation? Or, will I die on the cross?” He didn’t come not knowing. The Bible says quite often you remember, “He came to die.” He came with a definite purpose and a definite function. Now, we come just with as definite a function. That’s what this verse is saying. We were assigned a lot. It’s actually even more than the example I used of going and trimming a hedge because the word that follows ‘eklerothemen’ is the word ‘prooristhentes’ and ‘proorizo’ is that word predestined and this is actually the aorist verb tense. The aorist is the past tense in Greek that lays emphasis on the past event whereas the perfect tense lays emphasis on the present state that is the result of that past event. So this is a very historical kind of emphasis. It emphasizes, “This happened.” Having been predestinated, even though we translate it that way, it is the aorist. Having been predestinated, it’s the aorist part of the verb — having been predestinated or having been predestined. In other words, we were assigned a lot in Jesus, before the world was, having been predestinated the same way that he was, having been predestinated for a certain purpose. And that’s the lot that we’ve – we’ve been assigned a lot, having been predestinated. In other words, we were designed for the job that Jesus intends to do through us. We were designed for it. The job was designed; the whole thing was planned carefully. It is not due to your mother having blue eyes. It is not due to your father being a sinner — you’re a sinner. There is only one reason you are what you are, you were assigned a lot in Christ having been predestinated for that. Now predestinated means the path, the path is there. The path – each step, God knows, he has foreseen it. You are created in Christ Jesus for good works which he has prepared beforehand that you should walk in them. This is not – this is not a wide desert and you are here and will you go there? No, you’ll go there. No, you’ll maybe go there. No, it isn’t that. It is a path; you’ve been assigned a lot having been predestinated. Now you’re the same as me because for years I just reacted in a knee jerk childish way to that. Actually the Bible doesn’t have any of that kind of reaction at all. Well, you know the reaction, the reaction is, “Oh, I’m predestinated so I’m a machine so that means it doesn’t matter what I do I’m just like the Buddhist, or the Hindus. I’m just like Allah, praise be to Allah. Fate rules, I’m a fatalist. There’s no point in me doing anything because what is going to happen is going to happen.” So you come up with this whole reaction against this and you say, “No, no, there is no such thing as predestinated in that way. No there isn’t, because it would take away my free will and it would make me just a machine in the hands of an unfeeling God.” We react that way. The Bible of course does not say that at all. Why? Because it is absolutely sure, as any commonsensical person would be who doesn’t get into our kind of thinking. It is just absolutely sure that the infinite mind of God is well able to bring about his will and at the same time give our free wills full play. Every lady who asks, “Would you like to go downtown?” Now I won’t dare to say Marty or Greg, I’ll just say Ernest, “Would you like to go downtown, Ernest?” “No, I wouldn’t.” “We could pass that motorcycle shop.” It just has that kind of atmosphere to it because we humans need the perfect love of our Father but we have our ways of getting things. But even we can make sure that the other person has their free will and they exercise their free will, and they are well able to say no. And yet we are able to lead them in a certain way. Obviously, there are ways in which we can exercise our will over them that are not fair and that steal their free will from them. So really, the rightness, or the fairness of it will finally depend on the person who is exercising that power. But that’s why the verse in a way goes on to say, “According to the purpose of him who works all things according to the counsel of his will.” What is his purpose? Well, just look at it. It’s expressed in so many places but probably none more beautiful than Matthew 18:14. Matthew 18:14 — maybe you should go back to verse 10 as it gives you the whole spirit of it. Matthew 18:10, “See that you do not despise one of these little ones,” Jesus says, “For I tell you that in heaven there angels always behold the face of my Father who is in heaven. What do you think? If a man has a hundred sheep, and one of them has gone astray, does he not leave the ninety-nine on the mountains and go in search of the one that went astray? And if he finds it, truly, I say to you, he rejoices over it more than over the ninety-nine that never went astray. So it is not the will of my Father who is in heaven that one of these little ones should perish.” That’s it. That’s the purpose of our Father. According to the purpose of him that works all things according to the counsel of his will. Who is this one that has assigned us a lot having been predestinated in Jesus? Is he a Hitler? Is he a Stalin? Is he a dreadful cruel independent creature who has no love? He is the one who says, “It is not the will of our Father that one of these people cherish.” So the purpose of him who works all things according to his will is filled with his grace and his love so we’re in the hands not of some insane maniac who wants to make us robots. We are in exact opposition position of that, we’re in the hands of a dear, loving Father who will suffer himself so that we will have free will to choose to love him. So, this is the one who works all things according to the counsel of his will. The Bible sees no contradiction between God having a plan for our lives and yet taking care to ensure that we exercise fully our free will. How does he do it? Well, loved ones, we of all people should have no difficulty with it. I forget what is the last combination of parallel computing that they have pulled off but it was just maybe two or three months ago. No, maybe a month ago and you know what they’ve found now instead of Cray’s Supercomputers by linking lots of computers together in parallel, they can of course perform far more calculations. I forgot the number of calculations but it’s millions. This system can perform millions of calculations per second. The Bible assumes very reasonably that the infinite mind of the Creator of the universe is well able to perform millions, infinitely millions of calculations per second. And, “I’m going to pray Lord. Well, no I haven’t time.” “But I knew that.” “Yes, but now I feel guilty and I feel I should make time.” “Well, I knew that.” “Yeah, but there’s somebody at the door and I can’t.” “Well, I knew that.” “Well yes, but that person is reminding me that it’s time to pray.” “Well, I knew that.” You see, the Father knows. Our Father with his infinite mind can see every event you have happen to you. Our guarantee that he preserves our free will is not at all in our ability to out commit God. It’s not at all in some mysterious and I would say dangerous situation that he creates where he makes a lot of little things and has no idea at all what they’re going to do and just has to catch them as best he can when they occur. Our confidence in the freedom of will is not built on those ridiculous scenarios. The confidence that we have that we have free will is in our Father’s loving heart and the troubles he has gone through with Jesus to ensure that we could even kill him if we chose to do it. That’s why it seems to me, utterly safe to take this at its face value that each one of us, we’re assigned a lot, we’re assigned a certain life to live and certain things to do in Jesus, and we were predestinated. “Proorizo” actually is a Greek word that also has the meaning of designed, when we’re predesigned for it. You are just right for it. Your weaknesses are just right? Yes, you’re weaknesses are just right. Your strength is just right? Yes, your strengths are just right. Yes, everything that you are and have at this moment is just right for the lot that God has assigned to you in Jesus. You’ve been predestinated for that, according to the purpose of him who works all things according to the counsel of his will. And you know if you say, “Well, yeah but look at all the other people in this huge world — there are six billion of them and they’re all doing things that are impacting my little life in all kinds of ways.” Yes, but the Father is able to do an infinite number of calculations and he foresees every one of them. And can he effect these things in such a way that his will for you will be fulfilled? Yes he can. What is the great value of this? Well, of course, first of all the truth, it’s truth. That’s the value of it. But certainly it brings a completely different feeling in your own heart if you begin to realize, “You mean, I am here with something definite that God wants to do through me and that Jesus is going to do through me? You mean that there is a definite plan here and I can exercise my will freely and as I’m exercising my free will, lo and behold, it is Christ himself exercising his will. But what if you exercise a will that isn’t his?” But you can’t because God has foreseen that, and that, and that, and that, and that and so the two go along together. I know it’s – it’s difficult for us to grasp because we have difficulty in time getting away from the idea of sequence — of one thing following another. But in eternity, there is no sequence, everything is one great eternal moment and so God sees it all at that moment. I suppose it is – I suppose you could use the illustration that we’ve used before about a procession. The little guy looking through the hole in the fence and seeing just the trumpets going passed, and then the drums go pass, and the soldiers going passed. His brother climbs on the garden shed and there he can see not only what the little guy can see through the hole in the fence, but he can see the people who haven’t passed yet, who are on their way. He has seen the people who have passed and on their way there. And obviously, he can see that his crowd is going to have difficulty getting through this gate so he can arrange for somebody else to open that gate for them. God sees the end from the beginning and our lives are not just little wisps of smoke that might go this way or might go that way, our lives are definite paths that Jesus is planning to walk and he can only walk it if we walk it fully and freely. In fact, the difficulty that we present to him is when we are worried about what the next step is and our mind goes off the joyful present and goes onto this unknown future, or goes into the past that cannot be changed. That is a moment when we make it very difficult for Christ to get us onto the right track. But it is his will that we should walk every moment joyfully in the present. The examples are all through the Bible. Joseph was sold into slavery by his brothers out of jealousy. You remember, he was thrown into prison. It looked as if everything was finished. God already knew the outcome because God knew in his mind that he had to actually bring the Israelites into slavery in Egypt to work what he had to work in them. Then he had to get them back from Egypt and back up to the Promised Land. So, Joseph eventually rose into favor of Pharaoh and Pharaoh appointed him as the governor of Egypt. And as the governor of Egypt, he was looked upon as the one who distributed all the food to those who had famine and of course, his own brothers and his father, they were in the midst of famine back there in the kingdom. And they came down, and you remember the rest of the story. That was an example of God working all things according to the counsel of his will that is obviously, his glory and is obviously, his prosperity. But we make a great mistake if we judge whether God’s working all things according to the counsel of his will and what we see in this present short term situation. We make a grave error if we do that. We’ve real trouble with Calvary — real trouble with crucifixion if we’re interpreting it just in the short term. It looks as if God has not worked all things according to the counsel of his will. Another example, if you want to look at it is in Acts 7:54. Stephen is preaching. Acts 7:54, “Now when they heard these things they were enraged, and they ground their teeth against him. But he, full of the Holy Spirit, gazed into heaven and saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing at the right hand of God; and he said, ‘Behold, I see the heavens opened, and the Son of man standing at the right hand of God.’ But they cried out with a loud voice and stopped their ears and rushed together upon him. Then they cast him out of the city and stoned him; and the witnessed laid down their garments at the feet of a young man named Saul. And as they were stoning Stephen, he prayed, ‘Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.’ And he knelt down and cried with a loud voice, ‘Lord, do not hold this sin against them.’ And when he had said this, he fell asleep.” If you judge that according to the short term, God certainly isn’t working all things according to the counsel of his will, but the next verse, “And Saul,” the young man who was standing by his garments, “Saul was consenting to his death.” But if you ignore it, verse 58b, “And the witnesses laid down their garments at the feet of a young man named Saul.” You’d say, “Oh, this is just unmitigated disaster. This is one of the moments when certainly God has not worked all things according to the counsel of his will.” Yes, but God was doing it at His own time and His own way. So it’s very important in our own lives for us not to look at things in the short term but to see that yes, God is here and he does work all things according to the counsel of his will. Karl (Charles) Gutzlaff [1803-1851] was an old German, a very intelligent man who long before Hudson Taylor started the Chinese Mission was working in China. Gutzlaff was there really almost before anybody and he created a European mission to China and he himself interpreted, acted as interpreter for the British government in negotiations. Unfortunately in some of the negotiations even regarding heroin. But all the time he himself was – night and day he would be going around door-to-door in China with tracts and he would be writing and translating the Bible into Chinese. So he was way ahead of everybody else. Eventually, there was a disastrous publicity situation that occurred because some of the men that he had trusted had been coming back to England and giving all kinds of false accounts each showing testimonies that people were writing of receiving Christ and then they would collect the money and go back. There was a story that all the testimonies were a bluff, there were no people converted, that it was just all made up by the mission. On the surface, Gutzlaff was a brilliant man but what became of his mission regarding the whole vision of China was false because of others. The “success’ was based all on his work. So it’s important for us to see that this is true whether we can prove it at this time or not. It is true that each one of us, in Jesus, and as part of him, have been assigned a lot as having been predestinated according to the purpose of him who works all things according to the counsel of his will and that’s why we’re here. Let us pray.

The Reality of Christ Living in Us Ephesians 1:13a Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill Please turn to Ephesians and we’ve reached Ephesians 1:13. You can imagine Paul up to Verse 12 talking about us. You can see that starting in verse 3, “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. He destined us in love to be his Sons.” Then he goes on down like that to verse 12, “We who first hoped in Christ have been destined and appointed to live for the praise of his glory,” and then he turns around and he says, “In him you also,” you Gentiles, you members of the body here in Ephesus, in whom you also, “Who have heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and have believed in him, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit.” So there is that change that Paul turns round and talks to the Gentiles. What he has been saying all this time is he’s been describing what God did before the world was ever made. That’s the bit that I think is probably new to us and probably that wasn’t preached in that – as clearly probably, even those of us who were at Campus Church. We knew that God had done many things in Christ, but I don’t know that we were very clear about the fact that he had it all arranged before we ever hit this earth. The result was that all of us felt, “Yes, we were born here on earth but now we have to work together with God’s Spirit to try to make us what he wants us to be.” The result of that is that it produces a lot of effort, and those of us in the Catholic Church would certainly know the whole burden of works, but really those of us in the Protestant Church were involved in the same thing with praying right, and reading the Bible right, and witnessing right, and all the things that we felt we ought to do to show our faith. In reality the truth is, as Paul outlines here, that the whole thing had been done, “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. He destined us in love to be his Sons,” way back then. And so the whole emphasis of those first 13 verses is that God did this whole thing, he set it all up before we ever hit the earth. Of course it takes us awhile to get hold of that, because we still feel, “No, I mean, there’s something here that we have to do to struggle up from where we are to where we ought to be.” It’s very hard for us to grasp the massive power of God’s infinite mind. But in fact, the truth is that God foresaw everything that you would do, Sheila, everything that you would do. Marty, everything you would do. Trish, everything that I would do, he foresaw it all from the very beginning. Which is very reasonable, I mean we’ve talked about that before, it is very reasonable to believe that, “If God doesn’t know, who does know? We’re in real trouble.” If he doesn’t know I think the even old Einstein says, “I do not believe the Creator rolls a dice.” So even Einstein from his theological view point makes it very clear, “Look the God who designed all this universe so carefully certainly does not roll a dice about any part of it.” Yet there is often in us the feeling, “Oh well, wait a minute, so that we could have free wills, he must roll a dice. He must kind of wind us up and then see, ‘Which way will they go? Oh, ok their going that way, I didn’t expect that.’” Well of course, that’s our belief as to the only way to preserve free will, because of our very limited minds and very limited love. Often we can’t imagine having enough love to let somebody put a sword into our side. But in fact of course, God has that kind of love and God is able to foresee everything that we would ever have done. Yet he is able so to work things that our free will is preserved even as he, in his infinite mind, is able to see what that free will, will choose. And indeed he has made – that is part of the miracle of his creation. So God has done all that already for us, so that we come really with everything that we need. That’s the truth of it, we come to earth with everything that we need. We come to earth with a mind that is capable of not making mistakes, and we come to earth with Christ within us who has born the consequences of our mistakes, and has worked them round according to the council of his Father’s will. So we come not only with a mind that can avoid sin, and avoid mistakes, but we come due to God’s great kindness to us. We come with Christ within us, an antidote for all our sins, and all our mistakes. Not only an antidote for all our sins and all our mistakes, but one who has borne the consequences of those mistakes, because that had to be borne. God could not be real and just wipe out the mistakes and wipe out the consequences. God could not be real and wipe out, just say, “All the people that Hitler murdered, they weren’t murdered.” That wouldn’t be reality that would be a game, it would not be God’s own mind and character. God had to bear the pain that all those people bore in order to be able to wipe out the effects of that and to bring people to himself. So we come with everything that we need. It’s very hard for us to realize that and that’s really what Paul is saying to the Ephesians. He’s saying, and we’ll go into a little more detail, he’s saying, “In him you also who have heard the word of truth.” It’s just useful maybe – one of the benefits of the Greek is it can force you out of your miserable little thought patterns. And the fact is that “logon” is the word. It the accusative of “logos,” that’s the word there used for “Word.” In fact “aletheia” is the word for truth. And actually, the meaning that is given in the dictionaries for aletheia” is, “Of what has certainty and validity, of the real state of affairs especially as divinely disclosed truth. Of the concept of the gospel message as being absolute true, of true to fact statements.” So really what we’re saying here is that you’ve heard and “logos” of course, is reasoning or explanation, you who have heard the explanation of reality. And that’s what we’re saying this is that this is the explanation of reality, this whole truth that God had his Son Jesus, his only begotten Son, and as he had him he planned that he would be the first-born among many brethren. So, at that same moment he created us in Christ Jesus for good works which he prepared beforehand that we should walk in them. And at that same moment he foresaw what we would do, and so he saw that Christ himself would have to bear us and all our doings inside himself and God committed himself to bearing that pain with Jesus. Now it seems incomprehensible to us because we have the feeling, “Ah, I’d spit them out, I’d get rid of them. If this were my son and all these vermin were eating away at his insides, I’d spit them out. Or, if they were doing things that I did not want, and they were doing it inside my own dearly beloved son, I’d get rid of them.” The Father did not do that, and he has still not done it, and he still has us inside his Son. We could in fact do the things that we have done, and yet still have life, and still have existence, and still be within his love. That’s what he did in the beginning which is part of that – those verses in Ephesians 2 mean, “That God who is rich in mercy out of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were yet sinners, made us alive together with Christ and raised us up and made us sit with him in the heavenly places.” He even while we were destroying his Son, he allowed his Son to bear that destruction, and then to bear the pain of us being recreated even while we were yet sinners, even when we were destined to come to earth 500, 10,000 years later and do these things that he had borne the pain of in his Son. That’s the explanation of reality, and that’s why in this present situation, we have arrived. We’ve arrived. That’s the explanation of reality, that’s what reality really is, God in Jesus has borne all the things that we have done and has negated them through Christ bearing the consequences of them. So we are back where we started at the beginning. So we come — Wordsworth is right — we come trailing clouds of glory from heaven. We come here made new completely. That’s what Paul means when he says, “You’ve heard this explanation of reality,” and then he goes on and he says, “The gospel of your salvation.” Again it’s really the same truth – the old Greek helps. “Euaggelion” is undoubtedly means “well”, or “good.” This “aggelion”, is the same word for angel, and it’s “message.” Actually in a way, in a strange way it kind of dulls our minds when we translate it gospel because it’s really the good news. It’s the good news of our deliverance and “soteria” is the word there that is – always we translate it as salvation, but it is actually a rescue. It actually means to rescue or deliver. And so Paul was saying, “You’ve heard the explanation of reality, the good news of your deliverance of your rescue,” and of course that’s the truth of it. At this very moment God has his arms out to you and me and says, “Of course, come in my son. Of course, I have everything done. Everything is done, that’s all you need. Everything is done, I have borne all that you have done. Yes, you see the pain it cost me and in my Son in Calvary. I have borne that, but you are mine. I have never let you go. I have you in my arms. Come now, here sit with me and my Son.” That’s the good news of our rescue. That’s the good news of our deliverance. He’s saying, “That’s what you’ve heard, you’ve heard the explanation of reality, and you’ve heard the good news of your deliverance, and your rescue. Now,” he says, “You were sealed. You believe in him, you believe in Jesus, and you were sealed with the Holy Spirit.” Its interesting maybe just to point out that all these words are what they called aorist tense. “Akousantes” is the aorist, it looks like that. The aorist in Greek you know is an action in past time that is completed, so it means having believed. So he’s saying, “You’ve heard, you have heard that’s done. The explanation of reality. The good news of your deliverance. And you have believed in him, and everything.” I don’t know what you thought, but I used to think the old gospel direction, “Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shall be saved.” You know, “Believe in him,” and it was just believe him. But of course you can see the “in” has real meaning for us, because we have no life apart from him. I mean, it is like Jesus and there are you, there am I, and there’s Trish, and there’s Marty, there’s Irene, and there’s Myron and each of us is in Christ, we’re part of him. So, we believe in him not just in the sense of, “Oh yeah I believe him. I believe what he says.” Or, “Oh yeah, I believe he’s real.” But believe in him, “Every action that I do is in him. I not only believe in him, believe that he’s real, believe that he’s the Creator of the Universe, believe that he’s the master of everything, believe that he’s what keeps my heart beating at this moment, but I’m actually in him when I believe.” So our whole life is encompassed in him. Of course, the reason we get nervous, or anxious, or worried is we dumb people think we’re out there and we have to somehow get into him. And of course, the reality is we’re in him and we’ve never been out of him. We were created in him and we were redeemed in him and everything that has happened to us has happened to us in him. So it’s in him that our whole life is lived. We get anxious and worried when we imagine that we can somehow stand out here apart on our own or we treat ourselves as ourselves. I mean, that’s – it’s obvious why that occurs, because the rest of the world thinks that way. And whether it’s Tony Blair, or whoever it is, everybody thinks of themselves as individual little beings outside somehow in a Darwinian evolutionary system and we’re little creatures on our own. But there’s no excuse for us actually, because we have heard the good news of our deliverance. We have heard the explanation of reality and actually everything that we do is in him. When you believe that, when you think this through yourselves and you think through this whole reality, “I see, you mean, God made me in Christ so I’m actually part of him? And, he has let me stay in Christ, in fact, he saw what I would do in Christ and it was his plan to keep me in Christ and it’s been his plan all along to bear what I did in Christ and yet to hold me in despite that and to love me, and to keep me whatever I did.” As that begins to dawn on you, there gradually comes upon you a different spirit. Your whole being relaxes and you begin to sense, “This is true. I’ve really arrived. My Father does love me. Not only does he love me but he’s foreseen everything that would happen in my life so he knew that I would be here today and he knows why he put me here. Even if I make errors tomorrow, or mess things up, he has foreseen that.” Gradually there comes a great sigh of relief and it’s like a different spirit comes into your heart. That’s part of what is meant by that statement. It’s just we somehow can take all the reality out of it by making it theological and we can get into all kinds of complexities over what it means to be sealed with the Holy Spirit, but actually the truth is whenever you examine this explanation of reality, and you see that it is true, there just comes into your whole being a relaxation. It’s a bit probably, like being in a deep steam bath or in a hot bath, suddenly all your defenses can be let go. All your worries go, all your anxieties, because your father has it all planned and he has everything arranged and there comes into you a spirit of gentleness and a spirit of kindliness, and a spirit of joy, and peace, and freedom from worry and anxiety. That’s part of what it means to be sealed with the Holy Spirit. It’s probably – even though it’s been pictured by us in the New Testament as God coming along beside you or the apostles coming along and putting their hands on you and something mechanical happening or something emotional happening, In reality it all flows together. It just flows out of this reality. It just flows out of the truth situation. It’s a real situation. So it’s Paul encouraging us to see that you’ve heard this explanation of reality. You’ve heard the good news of your deliverance. Just live in that and there will come upon you a different spirit, a holy Spirit, a spirit of humility and kindliness, a spirit of gentleness, a spirit that is free from anxiety, and frenzy, and worry. A spirit that is free from driving ambition, just a spirit of kindly love, and that will begin to pervade your life, and that actually is the part of the sealing of the Holy Spirit and obviously is what the world needs, but that’s an incidental. It’s what God has for us this morning. Let us pray.

Sealed with the Holy Spirit 1 Ephesians 1:13b Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill Let’s just remind ourselves of the verse again, Colossians 1:15. Colossians 1:15, “He is the image of the invisible God, the first-born of all creation; for in him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or authorities – all things were created through him and for him. He is before all things, and in him all things hold together.” And I think you’ve begun to see too the great relief that that is. The whole – I suppose it’s the whole truth of seeing more than just that. I think 1970 was when we started Campus Church, or then it has to go back further than that, about 6 AD and on back, it’s the whole truth of seeing more than just this 1998 and then the year 2000, and then whatever the last year will be when the last one of us totters down the driveway, with the last cassette to send to someone. But it’s such a relief to really get up there because that’s where that verse is looking from that Christ himself is the first born of all creation and in him all things were created. At that very moment when all things were created, what we’re seeing is that God, from that point, could see all of it. And I think we knew that in our heads probably but it is startling to begin to see what that means. That God at that moment saw every life, every life that has ever been and will ever be. Of course, he saw our tiny little lives that go from wherever I – of course, I think of myself as 34 but some of you are 45, or 55, or whatever it is. But the little life that we have he saw that and he saw the life of our grandfather before that, and he saw the life of our great grandfather, right back to Adam he saw everything. And not only Adam you know, but he saw before the world was and so God saw everything in one second. At that same moment it’s so good to escape from this little sequential idea that, “Oh God first of all had Jesus and then he thought, ‘What will I do with this wonderful Son I have? Oh well, I’ll make,’” – well it’s so silly. Obviously, he saw everything in a second. He saw everything in a millisecond. So he saw Christ then coming to earth and creating the earth, and then dealing with the earth at each point and eventually bringing the earth to completion, and eventually making a new heaven and a new earth. That means that he saw Christ in this little guy who was born in ’34, or this little girl who was born in ’45, or this little girl who was born in ’55. He saw Christ living in that person and achieving the little bit that he was able to do with that person, that little bit, the little articles that that person was able to write, the little bit of work in the café that that person was able to do, Christ did all that in each one and so Christ actually lived all those lives in a millisecond. That’s why that Psalms says that every day of our lives was written in God’s book before there were any of them because obviously, the infinite God could see it all in a second and he sent his Son Christ in each one of these lives. [Psalm 139:16] If you say, “In Hitler?” Yes. Yes, in Hitler, Christ was trying, was straining to get out through that man and to take over, and to express his love. Christ was trying in each life; each life that was ever lived, Christ was in that life and Christ has lived it. That’s the glory of it. Christ has already lived your life, it’s not a surprise. Just think of it for a moment, it cannot be otherwise. You cannot have the God of the whole universe wondering, “What is this little creature that I have made going to do?” You can’t have that. He has to know what that little creature is going to do and yet he has to be working it all according to the counsel of his will in such a way that that little creature is actually able to exercise his free will but that God saw all that in a moment and that Christ saw all that. Of course, it’s a great relief to us because it gets away from the whole idea that Christ is up there and we have to somehow get up to him and that God has put us away down here, and there’s the sky in between, and there’s all kinds of things in between, and we have to try to forge our way up through these things to Christ. No, we are in Christ. We were each one created in Christ Jesus and we are part of his very body and all that has been done. Indeed, did Christ live through our sin and our rebellion? Yes, yes, and God saw that and God saw the effect that that would have on our bodies and our personalities, and God foresaw all that and even when we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. Even in the midst of that, Christ died and renewed all that so it’s all been done. So all of that has been accomplished. And I don’t know about you but it’s brought a great rest and relief certainly to my heart and mind that this is not some salvation that we’ve to achieve. This has been some salvation that God has already achieved. Everything has already been done. Indeed, it does say in the Bible that God came to the sixth day and then on the seventh day he rested and other pieces of the Bible imply that we are now living in the time of God’s rest and that God himself is living in his Sabbath. The work has been accomplished and now he is resting, and he is at peace, and he has reconciled the world to himself. He has done everything to bring this all into order and the outworking that is taking place at this moment is exactly what he has permitted and the things that seem to be still going wrong, those are the things that he allowed to go wrong because he is going to use that to bring men’s minds to himself and to accomplish all that he has planned. So in God’s eyes there are no stray lines, or stray strings, or threads that have not been woven into the pattern. In God’s mind it is all like that Indian rug and a little wrong thread comes in and the guy does not take it all off the loom he weaves the wrong thread into the pattern, so that the whole thing goes right and it’s like that. God has woven the whole thing into a pattern and it has all been done. Now, that’s the kind of thing that we have just been reading there in Ephesians. That’s the whole heart of these early verses in Ephesians and you know them of course well. That Verse 3, “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places.” All it means is that God has already seen everything and Christ has already lived that for us and redeemed our lives and everything is already in Christ for us and it’s all available to us. There’s nothing that is not available to us at this moment. If there’s any tendency for us to say, “Oh well, what Paul’s saying is he’s talking to the Ephesians locally and he’s saying, ‘You have become Christians, God has blessed you in Christ.’ You know, it’s just a temporal thing.” No it’s not that at all, look at Verse 4, “Even,” lest you tie it down to just a few years, “Even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world.” So it’s made very plain there that the meaning of God has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places is that God had done that before we ever appeared on the earth. Just the same way as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world. And I think that certainly helps any of us here who wonder, “Well, are we really Christian?” Or, “Are we really saved?” It just is plain and obvious, God chose us in Christ from before the foundation of the world. Of course, there’s no doubt of it. Of course, we are in Jesus. Then in Verse 5 it’s so plain, “He destined us in love to be his sons,” lest we think, “Oh well, it’s just we were his creatures, we were made creatures in Christ.” No, “He destined us in love to be his sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will.” Then in Verse 7, “In him we have redemption.” “According to the riches,” you remember, “of his grace which he lavished upon us.” It’s already been done. So, the whole emphasis of these early verses is that all this has been accomplished. That we’ve been created in Jesus, we were made part of him, that God foresaw that we would reject that and Christ determined that he would bear that rejection and he would bear the sin, he would bear our sins in his own body, and he would hold onto us. And then when he was raised up we were raised up and the Bible is very clear on that that Christ rose from the dead and we were raised with him. God out of the great mercy with which he has loved us, even when we were yet sinners, made us alive together with Christ. When? Before the foundation of the world and we’re silly if we keep holding onto the little temporal and time thing and say, “Well now wait a minute, how could he raise us up before we were born?” Well, because God saw it all in a millisecond. We’ll see when we get to heaven that the whole time thing is an image, is a mirage, that there’s no such thing as time, that everything is one eternal moment. We can’t even know age difference at the moment. Do you feel any different from what you did when you were 18? I can tell you, I don’t, and I don’t feel any different from what I was when I was 18. I mean the mind is not able to perceive any time difference because actually it’s all a mirage. Really, if the hair wasn’t grey and the wrinkles didn’t come you wouldn’t know and that’s why heaven will be so wonderful because there’ll be none of that and you’ll realize it is all one eternal moment. So what we can see plainly from here is that that has already been done. God foresaw what we would do, he planned therefore that Christ would bear that and he himself was willing to bear it, and bear the pain of it, and to hold it unto us and then to raise us up in Jesus and make us new, and that is what has happened. If you say, “Well, how do you explain the present situation?” It’s obvious, so that we would all see plainly, so that it would be an obvious choice. It would be the tree of life or the tree of good and evil. It would be an obvious choice, “Here’s what life would be like if you weren’t in my Son.” And every time we see some terrible thing happen in this world, every time we see ourselves do something wrong, we see what life would be like outside of Jesus. And so that’s the purpose of allowing this to take place, but it is not that God has not already dealt with that. Now, it’s quite interesting how that is brought together in this verse that we’re studying at the moment. Maybe you’d look at it in Ephesians 1:13, “In him you also, who have heard the word of truth,” — that is you, who have heard this explanation, you have heard that God has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, having destined us in love to be his sons through Jesus Christ, you who have heard this explanation of reality that you were created in Jesus and that you were raised up in Jesus and made new in Jesus, and that all that has already happened. “Who have heard this word of truth, the gospel of your salvation,” — the good news that you’ve been delivered from yourselves and you’ve been delivered from what you’d otherwise be, and you’ve believed in him, you were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit. See there’s no question of whether all that was done to us. There’s no question of whether we were created in Christ. There’s no question of whether we were put to death in Christ. There’s no question of whether we were raised in Christ. There’s no question about whether Christ has already lived our lives for us and has smoothed every path and made all the crooked things straight. There’s no question of that, that’s a fact. Faith can’t change that fact. Faith can’t make that fact real. But when you have belief in that and when you have faith that that is the situation and that you are in Jesus and Jesus is in you, then there comes down a sweet spirit of peace, and rest, and joy, and God sends the Spirit of his Son into your heart and you are sealed with the Holy Spirit. It’s quite important to see that that that’s what the sealing of the Holy Spirit is. It’s not sealing whether this thing has been done or not. That has been done whether or not you are sealed with the Holy Spirit. That has been done. You have been created in Christ, you have been crucified in Christ, you’ve been raised up in Jesus, and he has lived your life for you. He has it all planned moment-by-moment, that all is fact but having heard that explanation of reality and having heard the good news of the deliverance that that brings you from your own little self, and having believed that and put your trust in Christ himself, then there comes into you a sweet spirit that is in accordance with that reality. That expresses that reality in you and in fact, God sends the Spirit of his own Son into you so you are sealed with the Holy Spirit. We’ll talk next day about when that occurs but that’s the relationship of the sealing of the Holy Spirit to the fact of your salvation. I think what Satan tries to do at times is to confuse the two in our minds, “Well wait a minute, am I sealed with the Holy Spirit? Well, then if I am then those things must have taken place and if I’m not sealed with the Holy Spirit then those things must not have taken place.” No, those things took place. This is all reality. It’s simply that when you hear of that explanation and you realize that that has delivered you from your own self-centered self and from your own little life and you are actually part of this great Jesus, you are actually a little bit of the Son of God. You’re delivered from all the smallness of being your own tiny little self. When you do that and you realize that, “My life is nothing but Jesus. I have then no life but Jesus. He who shines the sunshine upon us, he who makes the flowers, he who makes the birds soar, he is my life. I have no life but him. He is my life.” And that moment there comes into you a spirit of spaciousness, of magnanimity, a spirit of greatness, a spirit that lives above the world, the Spirit of Jesus himself and you’re sealed with the Holy Spirit. Dr. Martin Lloyd Jones [Welsh Protestant minister, 1899-1981] says some good things that I thought are worth mentioning first, “A seal is that which authenticates or conveys authority. Two men may draw up an agreement, it may be to sell a house, or arrange a business, or something else in that realm, they have agreed about the terms that have been written or printed but as we know that document is not really valid and neither man is going to be content with it unless and until it is signed and sealed. You need the seal in addition even to a signature. It makes it more authenticate, it makes it more absolute. Signed and sealed.” Now he doesn’t say it means the thing has taken place whereas before it’s signed and sealed it hasn’t. It has taken place actually, they have made the deal, but it makes it authenticate when it’s signed and sealed. “A seal therefore is that which conveys authority or establishes the authenticity, the validity, the truth of a document or statement.” So in other words, the Holy Spirit seals inside you that all these things are true but they are true whether they’re signed and sealed inside of you or not. The sealing of the Holy Spirit is an authentication inside you that these are true. That’s why often people say, “The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are the children of God.” It kind of gives an assurance within us. But, we do need to keep distinguishing between the assurance and the fact itself. And it really gets – it can get back in a strange way to – I forget how many engines and how many carriages the little train has but isn’t it fact, and faith, and feeling that’s the way – I think it’s something like that, fact, and faith, and feeling. [Reference to a tract illustration] And of course, so often we make this the engine. Next is the feeling and we say, “Oh if the feeling isn’t there then, of course, the faith comes off the rails. Then before we know it the fact seems to have gone.” Of course, the right way around this is where this is not the engine but the fact is the engine. This is what pulls everything and the fact comes first, and then the faith, and then the feeling may come or it may not come. But of course, the real danger is that we will get them confused and we will allow the one to affect the other and it can’t be. He says, “Another meaning which attaches to sealing is that it is a mark of ownership. This is also used in the case of animals, the owner or the man who buys the animal puts his mark or seal upon them to indicate that they belong to them. The same is done with property or again with documents. It’s to indicate that something, whatever it is, belongs to and is the property of the person who has used that particular seal. The seal has a particular image on it which belongs to no one man only and therefore when you see that seal or image on anything you know that it is the property or possession of one particular person. So I agree with you that the sealing with the Holy Spirit will often bring then the fruits of the spirit: love, joy, peace, long suffering, gentleness, goodness, and those will be the marks and witness of Christ within you.” But again, it’s very important to see, these are facts whether those are in your life or not. These are facts. You may say, “You mean that Christ has borne me and has borne the pain of my sin whether I know it or not?” Yes, yes. “You mean he has borne this for me even if I curse him?” Yes. So it’s very important to keep the thing in the right perspective because this is the basis of our salvation. This is what everything hangs on. This is the most vital thing to retain, that this is fact whatever you have done with it. Lloyd Jones continues with, “Furthermore a seal is also used for the purpose of security. If you desire a parcel to go carefully by post or by train you not only tie it up but you melt sealing wax onto the knots and then stamp the wax with a seal. If that seal has in any way been broken or marred it is an indication that someone has been tampering with the parcel. There’s an instant of this in the New Testament when our Lord was buried the Roman authorities and the Jews were concerned as to what his followers might do with his body, so they rolled a stone over the mouth of the grave and then sealed it to make it secure.” So he’s saying the sealing with the Holy Spirit is a mark of the ownership of God on that life and in a way it seals it and secures it. There is that real sense that a person who has not sealed with the Holy Spirit finds themselves often in what we call the position of a carnal Christian who “For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I do.” [Romans 7:19] So there’s great uncertainty and doubt in their lives. The sealing of the Holy Spirit brings a sense of security, a sense that my life corresponds with reality. Of course, that’s what it’s really all about living moment-by-moment in the light of the fact that we have been created in Jesus, that we’ve been crucified in him, that we’ve been raised in him, and that we’re secure in him. And from that flows a peace in your life in all kinds of situations. I think my wife said something about some people who had suffered greatly during the war, perhaps in concentration camps. It was that kind of thing and then their comment afterwards was, “Ever after that none of us sweat the small stuff. None of us sweat the small stuff.” In other words, nothing worries you because you’ve faced death and you’ve faced the greatest misery you can ever imagine in a life so after that nothing is difficult to bear. Well really, it’s the same thing. “Thus we find that there are three meanings to this term sealing: authenticity and authority; ownership and security; and safety.” Then he just says at the end, “Westcott [B. F. Westcott, British theologian and former Bishop of Durham, 1825-1901] sums up very well the meaning that He, God the Father, has sealed by saying that it means solemnly set apart for the fulfillment of a charge and authenticated by intelligible signs. The Father had authenticated the Son by intelligible signs, the miracles, the works, and the words, everything about him having been given the Spirit in all his fullness he had been sealed and had been authenticated.” He says, “We have seen then the meaning of the term as it is found in common usage and also in scripture and we found that they coincide. In the case of our Lord we are told that a declaration was made saying, ‘This is my beloved Son.’ And that that was confirmed by his words and works.” It’s the same with us. The sealing of the Holy Spirit is a seal that we are God’s. But it’s very important to keep the thing the right way around. This is fact. Whether there is sealing or not this is fact and it remains fact all the time. And the sealing is something that follows and should follow but it’s vital for us to keep our eyes on the fact and say to ourselves, “Now what does this mean? You mean, I’m part of Jesus and he has actually lived this whole life that I am destined to live here on earth? He has actually lived it already? He has not only lived it but he has faced all the intractable inconsistencies that I am going to face tomorrow and the next years of my life. Jesus has faced all those and he has passed them through his own hands and through his own death and has taken the sting out of them all so that I simply have a peaceful open untrammeled road to walk right straight home to heaven? Well, if that’s the case why sweat the small stuff? I mean, whoopee there’s nothing that we need fear.” That’s what happens, we suddenly realize that and the joy of the Holy Spirit comes upon us and we are sealed with him. Let us pray. Dear Lord, we thank you that we see it all true and plain and that there’s nothing for us to do but to walk joyfully the road that is set before us looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith. Lord, we thank you that that is the road that we have and that we can walk on this year and then the next few years until we walk into your eternal ever present presence. Lord, we thank you. We bow to you Lord Jesus, our very life, and the world within which we live. Thank you Lord. Now the grace of our Lord Jesus, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with each one of us now and ever more. Amen.

Sealed with the Holy Spirit 2 Ephesians 1:13c Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill Today we’ll make a gentle transition back to Ephesians. If you’ll turn to Ephesians 1:13, where we were some weeks or months ago, “In him you also, who have heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and have believed in him, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit.” We’ve talked a little about the word of truth that we’ve heard and another possible translation that gives a slightly different view of it is you’ve heard the explanation of reality. The explanation of reality is – starts with John 1:1, if you’d like to look at it. John 1:1, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God.” So at the very beginning, and you can’t really say at the very beginning of God because that’s beyond us to speak of, but in the beginning before there was any earth and I presume before there was any universe, then there was the Word. And the Word was the first – thing is the wrong word but it was the first expression that ever came from God that was just in himself and then he spoke forth his Son, his only begotten Son Jesus and that was all there was. That’s it. The Word was with God. The best we can do in theology is to say the Word is co-eternal with God but we know that in some sense the Father is first. There’s that piece in Corinthians that says, “Then Jesus will render all things up to the Father.” This implies that Jesus is the second and that the Father is the first. But at that time there was just God and Jesus his Son. There was nothing else. There were no creatures, and no angels, and no universe, there was just Jesus there with God. We have talked about the next step and you don’t need to look at it because we’ve read it often before, but it’s Colossians 1:15 where it says, “That Jesus is the express image of God.” He is like God in every way. He is God’s only Son and he is all the likeness of God. Everything that God has, Jesus has. Then, of course, comes that shattering phrase, “He is the express image of the invisible God, the first-born of all creation.” That’s the first hint that you get that Jesus has anything to do with any existence outside himself and his Father. That’s the first time it occurs to you that Jesus has anything to do with creation. Of course, for years I think you were the same as I was, you read that verse and you just took it for what it was, a kind of abstract statement that you couldn’t make sense of. We, of course, have begun to realize that it means what it says, “That Jesus was God’s only begotten Son.” Then it seemed almost at that moment, though there we’re losing ourselves in the language of time, when we’re really talking about eternity. At that very moment, Jesus was destined by his Father to be the first-born of creation and that God in that sense, and it’s so difficult for us to grasp it, God projected himself out of himself into something that was separate from him. That is he projected himself into what we know as creation. He did it in his own Son. His own Son who was invisible, and eternal, and purely spiritual also at that moment became the first-born of creation. Now we know what we call that first-born, but of course then – well, it was a contradiction because it meant he became the first man. That’s what he showed himself to be thousands of years later in Palestine. He showed himself to be a man like us, a human being like us men and women. So, at that very moment, Jesus became the first human being. We have gone a step further in that, because shortly after that statement in Colossians, the goes on, “He is the image of the invisible God, the first-born of all creation.” Then in verse 17, “He was before all things.” He was before everything. And then, “In him all things were created.” At that moment then, everything was created in Jesus. The world, the planets, the stars, all the beings, and most importantly, we, ourselves were created in Jesus. Because you remember, Paul says to the Ephesians, “We here, we’re God’s workmanship. We were created in Christ for good works which he has prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.” [Ephesians 2:10] We were made inside Jesus. We are so used to living in this fallen world; so used to accepting the absolute lie that we are separate creatures that we have to think about it a bit to really accept that we were created in Jesus and indeed, that we are still part of Jesus. Now I’d just remind you of that, if you’d just maybe look at Colossians because it makes it so clear there. Colossians 1:15, “He is the image of the invisible God, the first-born of all creation; for in him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or authorities—all things were created through him and for him. He is before all things,” and then this is the verse — the clause that I thought was important to look at in black and white, “And in him all things hold together.” Of course, we’re so used to looking at each other and seeing, Joe is defined by the perimeter of his body and that is Joe, and that’s Martha, and that’s Trish. This is Ernest, and that’s Joanne, and we’re defined by this self-contained creature that of course we have so long ignored the reality that it’s very – it takes an effort of our minds to grasp — that we are still in Jesus. It is in him that we hold together. We are held together here, if you’d like to put it crudely, our bodies, the atoms of our bodies are held together in this particular shape inside him. He is at this moment – it’s as if he has a lot of little plastic balls here that are the shape of Greg. He holds them up all together and if he let go for a moment, these would fall away. We all hold together inside Jesus. We are inside Jesus. We are nothing apart from Jesus. And we’ve read that John 15 so often that we kind of use it as a mantra, “Oh yes, he’s the vine, we’re the branches,” and we believe, “Oh, without me you can do nothing. Oh yes, we need your help.” But it’s literally true, without him we don’t even exist. Our only existence is inside him. You can see how complete has been the lie that we’ve accepted because of course, we’re absolutely sure that we are separate creatures and that our job is to try to link ourselves up with Christ. At least in our attitude to things, and if possible our hearts, and maybe sometime in the future after this life is over, we’ll somehow be absorbed into him. But it’s false, we are in him at this moment. We are part of him. You are nothing but a bit of Jesus. I am nothing but a bit of Jesus. You can see what we’ve done with that dear statement about the body of Christ. You know how we’ve done it, “Oh, it’s as if Joanne is a leg, and it’s as if I’m an eye and it’s as if Trish is an ear and we all have different functions.” And we’ve reduced it all to our function and we’ve treated that whole mighty statement as if it were just an outline of the ministries inside the body of Christ instead of seeing we are literally a bit of Jesus. Yes, Joanne is a finger of Christ. Yes, Joe is an arm of Christ. Yes, we are nothing apart from Christ. We’re nothing apart from Jesus. We don’t exist apart from Jesus. What we see here is a shadow but in him is our reality. So that’s why we get lost in this land. That’s why we get lost in it, because we believe the lie that we’re separate creatures and then we start with the aid of counselors always, and our examinations, and our schools, we start trying to find out what we would be good at and we try to create something that we would be good at. Of course the fallen world has a whole organization that is planned to prove that we can sin and not die and so the whole fallen world has a pseudo organization that is outside heaven and so we fit into that. We fit ourselves into places where they all persuade us that we’re of some use. We persuade ourselves that we’re of some use but finally, the whole charade breaks down. It certainly breaks down at retirement but it breaks down for most of us long before that because we get bored with the whole thing and it does not seem to be the glorious thing for which we were made. And so we sense that, but we get into that whole game instead of entering into the reality that God has created for us. He has sent his own Son Jesus to this earth in the name of Marty. It’s typical I suppose of the way we misuse biblical phrases because we’re always talking about doing something in the name of Christ as if it’s primarily us that do it but we do it in his name and that makes it of value. Of course, he is so kind and so meek and lowly of heart that he lives in our name. Imagine, he lives in our name. So God has sent his Son in the name that Greg uses. He has sent his Son to earth here in him to do something that only he can do. How will you ever find out what Christ has come here to do inside you? And that’s what brings the verse together, “you who have heard the explanation of reality,” and have believed the good news of your deliverance from the frustration of the old autonomous separate life and have believed in him were sealed with the Spirit that he promised. It is the Holy Spirit of Jesus within each of us that can lead us moment-by-moment, day-by-day and increasingly as the weeks past into the actions that Jesus himself is speaking – is doing and the words that Jesus himself is speaking. The Holy Spirit alone, because it is the very Spirit of Christ himself, the Holy Spirit alone can lead us out of these pseudo lives that we live and into the life that Jesus himself has planned from eternity to live in us and that’s why he seals us with his Spirit. That’s why Paul says to the Galatians, “God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts crying Abba! Father!” That’s the only one who knows. It can’t be you and me doing what we think is Christian. It can’t be you and me doing, in a human way, with our human effort, what we think Christ wants to do, or what he wants done which is worse. Where we talk about, “We’re here to do Christ’s work.” It’s all foolishness. It’s a much finer, and more beautiful, and more sensitive, and deeper thing than that. It is Christ himself inside you and that’s what gives you existence, Christ inside you and you inside Christ. It’s him in his Spirit beginning to do and say the things that you do and say. That’s why things, the works of the flesh are wrong. It’s not just because they’re nasty, but anger is wrong because it’s you behaving as if you were outside Christ. Christ has no trouble with a storm on a lake, let alone somebody treating him the wrong way, or something not going right the way he expected it to go. He has no difficulty with that. His heart is filled with confidence and peace that his Father in his death put those things right. So, of course, his whole heart and spirit has no anger in it at all. So, the anger is wrong not because it’s a nasty thing, or one of those terrible bad works of the flesh. But because it is us behaving utterly in contradiction to reality. It is us behaving utterly in a dream world, utterly in a world of deception that was destroyed in Calvary before the foundation of the world. It’s the same with all the other sins. Of course, that’s why the pride is so ridiculous. You remember, I think it’s probably Milton called pride the greatest sin. The early church fathers would have called it the father of all other sins. Well, of course, part of that is because it’s so utterly contradictory to reality to be proud of what you can do, to be proud of your singing, or to be proud of your abilities, or to be proud of what you’ve achieved so far, and within you is the one who not only made you but who holds you together. He’s the one who enables your voice to make a noise. He’s the one who enables your mind to think. It’s like you out here showing all these wonderful things and he’s passing them to you behind the stage. He’s saying, “Here this is mine. Here this is mine.” It’s so – it’s just so ridiculous, it’s so contradictory to reality and that’s what’s wrong with all the works of the flesh that they’re just blatant disbelief, they’re just blatant rejection of reality. They’re living not only in a fool’s paradise but in the paradise of the damned really — a place where unreality was destroyed millions of years ago by God in Calvary. So, I certainly can see myself that there’s one way – I have one responsibility and that is to listen to the Savior every moment and to respond immediately to his Holy Spirit so that his life will be lived and so that he will be fulfilled. You can see it yourself in a thousand ways, because you can see all the ways his dear mind goes, and all the terrible ways that our minds go. So, of course, there’s only one thing to do, that is to walk close to this dear Holy Spirit of his that is in us and abide in him. Let us pray. Oh Lord Jesus, we are ashamed of the way we thrust ourselves forward. We are ashamed, Lord, of our rash life that we live, the way we cast ourselves into words and conversations, the way we engage in actions that are filled with ourselves and filled with the stupid common sense that we think we have when all the time within us is your still small voice. The sound of gentle stillness who has things to do, and things to say, and things to think in us. Then we see Lord, the irony of it, things you have to do, and say, and think in us for our happiness and for our benefit. You see Lord when we are your enemies we are our own worst enemies. We miss the life of beauty, and peace, and love, and joy that you live and that you have planned to live in us. Oh Savior, we look to you now when we see we have no existence outside you. You are everything and we are fulfilled when we live that way moment-by-moment with you as everything and what we used to be as nothing. Lord, we thank you. Dear Father, we thank you for sending the Spirit of your Son into our hearts and for sealing us with your Spirit. And we thank you Holy Spirit, that you alone are able to quiet us, restrain our words, keep a lid on our foolishness, and lead us in paths of pleasantness and ways of peace. Now the grace of our Lord Jesus, the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with each of us throughout this week. Amen.

Sealed with the Holy Spirit 3 Ephesians 1:13d Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill I’d really like to go over again what we talked about last Sunday. Two reasons, one very practical one is I hadn’t the mic on last Sunday. The second is that it seemed to me in a way full of reading a lot of quotations from Martyn Lloyd Jones so that I think that it is worth thinking of again and being clear about it. You may remember, the life that we’re living at this very moment is the fallen life. It’s important to say that because we’re brought up to believe that this is normal life but in fact we’re living a fallen life in a fallen world. So we aren’t really surprised when people say, “Oh how could a good God make a world like this?” We know that he didn’t make it like this at the beginning but it’s a fallen world that we’re looking at where disease and earthquakes occur and where all kinds of murders and wars take place. But it is good for us to remember that our own lives are actually fallen lives. What we’re looking at in our present life is the life that we would have lived if there’d been no God, or it’s the life that we would have lived if we believed that there was no God. And that’s the life that everybody is living here on the earth outside Jesus. They’re living a fallen life. They’re living the kind of life that results from living as if they are not in Christ. Of course, what we’ve talked about is that real life is different from this. So as you and I meet our own frustrations and come face-to-face with our own selfishness, and our own pride, of course, we have learned now that what we’re looking at is a shadow or a ghost and that that is not actually real any longer but that that whole life, part of which we watch from time-to-time when we slip for a moment into the unreal life, that whole life has actually been destroyed in Jesus. Of course, that is the heart of what we call the gospel, the good news, that the fallen life that we live was foreseen by God and was dealt with by him in Jesus before the foundation of the world. He simply lets the thing play out through time so that we can see it and so that we can agree to reject that and accept the real life that he has created in Christ for us. But it’s probably good to emphasize that again because I think we often fall into the trap of thinking that, “Yes, this is the fallen life and somehow through the exercise of my faith and my determination I’m going to climb out of this fallen life and I’m going to climb into the real life that God has prepared for me in heaven.” As we think of it that way, a great burden falls upon us of the need to produce works, or to produce the effort that will transform this life into the life that it should be. Of course, the good news of the gospel is that God is not stupid — God did not make you with a free will and then fail to foresee what you would do with that free will. God foresaw that and God, in his Son Jesus, provided for that. From before he even created the earth he provided for that and he remade you in his Son. Now what he’s done is he’s given you – in a way he’s given you a playback video of the life that you would have lived apart from him. Except that that playback video is what’s being played in apparent reality here in this earth. He’s giving you that and he’s letting you watch it, and he’s giving you the opportunity to turn away from that playback video which is just a video of what is to be. It’s a video of that life that was crucified and he’s giving you the opportunity to turn from that unreality and live the real life that he has now given you in Christ where everything has been fixed and repaired. It’s quite important for us to grasp the reality of our deliverance from the life that we would have lived apart from Christ. It’s important to see that that’s the life we have been living until we heard this good news of salvation that’s exactly what the verse says in Ephesians 1:13. That is the introduction to the study today. Ephesians 1:13, Paul is of course speaking to the Ephesians as well as now to us, “In him [in Jesus] you also, who have heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation [the good news of your deliverance] and have believed in him, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit.” It’s that last clause that we’re dealing with today, “We’re sealed with the promised Holy Spirit.” It’s good to see that one of the distinctions that are made here is between being a believer and for instance being baptized in the Spirit. It’s important to see that whosoever is born of God will not commit sin [I John 3:9] and that new birth is talked about you remember to Nicodemus in John 3:1-15 where Jesus said to him, “You must be born anew. You must be born of the Spirit from above.” Also, when he talked to the disciples in the upper room he breathed on them the Holy Spirit. Yet in spite of that, he implied that there was a further experience of the Holy Spirit beyond that so that’s what we’re talking about — that sealing with the Holy Spirit. You remember how the disciples had believed Jesus, they had confessed him to the public, they had forsaken all their occupations and families and even cast out demons and yet he spoke to them and very clearly told them that they had to wait for the promise of the Father for some experience of the Holy Spirit that was beyond what they had. So maybe the first thing we should see clearly is that being born of the Spirit is a matter of hearing the truth and the gospel and believing it, and then you’re born of the Spirit. The Holy Spirit is the one who convicts you of your sin. When the Holy Spirit comes he will convict the world of sin. He is the one who regenerates you. You are born of the Spirit. He is the one who even enables you to believe. We experience the action of the Holy Spirit upon us otherwise we would never become Christians. But it’s important to see that having experienced all those things, the disciples were still told by Jesus, “Wait for the promise of the Father.” And it’s vital to see that the sealing with the Holy Spirit is something that is beyond the new birth and yet you can be born of God and perhaps not have yet experienced the sealing of the Holy Spirit. That’s what we need to study today. So, you remember the way Martyn Lloyd Jones begins to deal with it, he starts to look at the verses that over the years we have looked at so repeatedly. One of them, the obvious one is in Acts 1. And in Acts 1 it is very clearly set forth the words of Jesus to the disciples. In Acts 1:3, “To them he presented himself alive after his passion by many proofs, appearing to them during forty days, and speaking of the kingdom of God. And while staying with them he charged them not to depart from Jerusalem, but to wait for the promise of the Father, which, he said, ‘You heard from me, for John baptized with water, but before many days you shall be baptized with the Holy Spirit.’” These are his own disciples he’s speaking to. These are people that we would say they’re Christians. They have forsaken all and they have given themselves to Christ, and they have confessed that he is the Son of the living God, and they have put their faith in him and yet Jesus says to them, “You ought to wait for the promise of the Father which he said you heard from me.” That’s especially impressive to all of us who know that actions are very important and that this was a massive crisis that had taken place when Jesus not only was crucified but raised from the dead. The natural tendency would be for the disciples to go out and tell people immediately that this man that you crucified is now alive. It was in that situation that Jesus told them that the Holy Spirit is something that Jesus thought as absolutely essential before they could do anything. You get it emphasized again, of course, in Acts 2, “When the day of Pentecost had come, they were all together in one place. And suddenly a sound came from heaven like the rush of a mighty wind, and it filled the house where they were sitting. And there appeared to them tongues as of fire, distributed and resting on each one of them. And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues as the Spirit gave them utterance.” And we know from reading the gospels that they had not experienced that before. You know, there is no story of that before. There’s no mention of them being filled with the Holy Spirit in that way and so that’s a definite event that appeared after they were children of God. Then it’s stressed again in Acts 8 where you read about the converts that Philip had. Acts 8:12, “But when they believed Philip as he preached good news about the kingdom of God and the name of Jesus Christ.” So you can’t say these people were baptized by John the Baptist. They heard the name of Jesus Christ. They were baptized both men and women, “Even Simon himself believed, and after being baptized he continued with Philip. And seeing signs and great miracles performed, he was amazed.” Yet you get this following sentence, “Now when the apostles at Jerusalem heard that Samaria had received the word of God,” you would have thought they would have just rejoiced and been glad that there was another source of Jesus’ life there in Samaria. But no, “They sent to them Peter and John, who came down and prayed for them that they might receive the Holy Spirit; for it had not yet fallen on any of them, but they had only been baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. Then they laid their hands on them and they received the Holy Spirit.” This was a definite instance of not the disciples this time but people who were converted after Christ’s resurrection and yet they had been baptized, and had believed, but they did not receive the Holy Spirit at that time. Peter and John had to come down and pray for them that they would receive the Holy Spirit. So that’s the truth that we’re talking about — the sealing with the Holy Spirit. And I thought it was useful to mention it again using the words of somebody other than myself because I had – I think, it’s good to hear someone else explain the thing and it’s good if only for me to hear it explained by somebody else in words that maybe we haven’t used before. That’s why I thought that it was good to look at Martyn Lloyd Jones who has a commentary on the book of Ephesians and he begins his discussion of the sealing of the Holy Spirit with these words, “Now in order to get at the meaning of this term sealing still more clearly, let us consider when it takes place. Where exactly does the sealing come in the life and experience of the Christian? This is proved to be an interesting question and indeed to some, a problem. The Authorized Version reads as follows, “In whom also after you believed you were sealed with that Holy Spirit of promise.” [Ephesians 1:13] The English Revised Version reads, “In whom also having believed.” The Revised Standard Version is, “He also who have believed.” Now, the participle is “having believed” but it’s the King James Version that says, “After you believed.” Not just having believed but after you believed. “The question therefore arises to which translation is correct. When does this sealing with the Holy Spirit take place? Does it take place at the same moment as one believes or is it subsequent to belief? The Authorized Version which is not only a translation but also an exposition clearly indicates that it is something that follows believing as the King James Version says, ‘After you believed.’ The others say, ‘Just having believed.’ But the King James Version says, ‘After you believe.’” So that’s why Lloyd Jones says, “The authorized version which is not only a translation but also an exposition clearly indicates it is something which follows believing, that it is different from, separate from, distinct from believing and not a part of believing.” And of course, why he’s making such a big thing of this is he’s speaking as one of almost the foremost spokesmen for Evangelical Christianity and the heart of Evangelical Christianity even in these days were after so much emphasis on the charismatic experience, the heart of it is that you’re filled with the Holy Spirit when you believe. You’re filled with the Holy Spirit. You’re not just born of the Holy Spirit but you’re baptized with the Holy Spirit when you believe. That’s really what he’s speaking to. “The authorized version which is not only a translation but also an exposition clearly indicates that it is something which follows believing, that it is different from, separated from, distinct from believing and not a part of believing. Soon we are faced with the question, is this sealing of the Holy Spirit a distinct and separate experience in the Christian life or is it something that happens inevitably to all who are Christians so that you cannot be a Christian at all apart from this sealing?” That is the normal Evangelical position, i.e. you can’t be a Christian apart from the sealing and it’s something that occurs the moment you believe, the moment you’re converted. “The prevailing common teaching at the present time and especially in evangelical circles is that the second alternative is the correct one. That is that you believe and you are filled with the Holy Spirit at the same moment. It is a teaching which says that the sealing with the Spirit is something that happens immediately and inevitably to all who believe. But I cannot accept this.” I am sure this surprised a lot of the people who looked to him, “But I cannot accept this and to substantiate my opinion I mention the teaching of,” and then he doesn’t mention the teaching of the people that you know, we have studied from the Wesley Arminian side like Arthur Skevington Wood [1916-1993], or even the Dutch Reformer people like Andrew Murray. Lloyd Jones mentions the old evangelical scholars. “I mention the teachings of the 17th Century puritan Thomas Goodwin and to a lesser extent that of his contemporary John Owen. Also the teaching of Charles Simeon of Cambridge two centuries ago and of Charles Hodge of Princeton USA in his commentary of Ephesians in the later 19th Century. These teachers draw a sharp distinction between believing, the act of faith and the sealing of the Spirit. They assert that the scripture teaches that while it is true to say that no man can believe without the influence of the Holy Spirit nevertheless this is not the same thing as the sealing with the Spirit and that sealing with the Spirit does not always happen immediately when a man believes. They teach that there may be a great interval, that it is possible for a person to be a believer and therefore to have the Holy Spirit and still not know the sealing of the Spirit. It is surely obvious that the godly men who gave us the Authorized Version held that view because they deliberately introduced the word “after.” Which is just interesting. “It is generally agreed that the epistle does not say, ‘In whom also believing ye are sealed with the Holy Spirit.’ The word is in the past tense. It is not as you believed or when you believed, it is at the very least having believed.” And it is ‘pisteuósantes’ in Greek. It’s the participle “having believed.” “The revised version suggests the past “having also believed you were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise” and I suggest that even the phrase ‘having believed’ suggests that these two things are not identical. That when you say, ‘Having believed,’ you were then sealed.” It implies that they weren’t the same experience. “The sealing does not immediately follow the act of belief. What makes this so important is that it is assumed that the sealing of the Spirit or the baptism of the Spirit is something which every Christian must of necessity have experienced.” And I think this is the heart of the problem. “It is assumed that the sealing with the Spirit or the baptism with the Spirit is something which every Christian must of necessity have experienced. It is maintained therefore that this is not something that happens in the realm of consciousness or in the realm of experience, it happens to all believers unconsciously. Therefore, they are not to seek it and the result of not seeking it is they do not experience it and the result of that is that they live in a state of believism saying to themselves that they must have had it and therefore do have it.” Of course, from our angle I can see the danger with us is that if we believe that you’re not a Christian unless you’re baptized with the Holy Spirit, then there’s a real problem with any of us who feel we may not be baptized with the Holy Spirit here in this family. It’s very easy for us to say, “Well, wait a minute if I say I’m not baptized with the Holy Spirit then it means I’m not a Christian.” Well no, it’s very important to see that the disciples were followers of Jesus and they still had not been baptized with the Holy Spirit. The converts of Philip had been baptized in the name of Jesus and yet they had not been baptized with the Holy Spirit. So it’s quite important from both angles to see the truth. The ordinary evangelical can get himself into the position where he says, “Look, the baptism of the Holy Spirit is something you get when you’re converted. I don’t know whether I have it or not but you get it when you’re converted so I must have it.” So, of course, that brings about a readiness and a disinterest in seeking it in his mind. But then people like ourselves can get into the opposite situation, we can say, “Oh well, you’re not a Christian unless you’re baptized with the Holy Spirit.” “Well I can’t say I’m not a Christian because I do know Jesus and I do want his will in my life, so I must be baptized with the Holy Spirit.” It’s very important to see, no, you can be a Christian, you can be born of the Spirit, you can want Jesus, you can be in the position where you want to do what is right in your life and yet you may not be sealed with the Holy Spirit. So it’s important to be in a position where you can be honest about the thing. This is my situation or this is not my situation so I can respond appropriately, but not be paralyzed by non belief in the truth that the two things are separate. “Thus they continue,” Lloyd Jones is speaking of the many evangelical Christians, “Thus they continue to live without ever experiencing what was experienced by New Testament Christians and also by many other Christians in the subsequent history of the Christian Church. So I assert that the sealing with the Spirit is something subsequent to believing, something additional to believing.” Then, of course, what he does is he goes through some of the verses that we’ve gone through. Then he comes to deal with one we didn’t deal with because I thought I’d let him say it in his own words. We come to that Acts 19 that we read in the lesson this morning. “Another example of this sealing is found in the 19th Chapter of the Book of Acts. Paul arrived at Ephesus and finding certain disciples he said to them, according to the Authorized Version, ‘Have you received the Holy Ghost since you believed?’ But the Revised Version and the Revised Standard Version gives a translation which reads, ‘Did you receive the Holy Ghost when you believed?’ So you see the King James says, ‘Have you received the Holy Ghost since you believed?’ Which implies pretty clearly, you know, ‘Alright now you believed but since that time have you received the Holy Ghost?’ Whereas the Revised Version translates, ‘Did you receive the Holy Ghost when you believed?’ Which opens the way – I think Lloyd Jones is right — it doesn’t really open the way but it appears to open the way to the idea, “Oh, they expected to be baptized the moment they believed.” Whereas the King James implies very definitely that it’s afterwards that you’d be baptized with the Holy Spirit. “There can be no doubt that this latter translation is the correct one.” You see he says, “The Revised Standard Version is actually the right linguistic translation. Many feel that that settles the matter and proves that believing and receiving the Holy Spirit are the same. They regret that the other translated versions have led so many into thinking that it is possible for one to believe and not to receive the Holy Spirit until afterwards.” So he’s saying that many people take the RSV translation and they grab onto that and they say according to this linguistic translation which is really more true to the Greek than after. So there it is. “Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed? That’s the way you’re supposed to do it, you’re supposed to receive the Holy Spirit, be baptized with him when you believed. But this did not solve our problem. Indeed I claim that far from supporting the idea that receiving the Holy Ghost always follows immediately upon believing, this correct translation of Acts 19:2 does the exact opposite. I confess that at one time I myself fell into error on the matter. A little booklet bearing my name entitled “Christ our Sanctification” includes the argument that if we but follow the Revised Version instead of the Authorized Version we shall see that there is no time interval between the believing and the sealing. I confess my former error.” Which I think is something significant for a gentleman like him to make it very plain like that. “I confess my former error. Actually, I fell into it because I was concerned to show that sanctification is not an experience you would choose to be received after justification. This I still assert.” But he actually believes the same as Wesley when you go into his explanation of that. “But I was mistaken at that time with regard to the sealing as I proceed to show.” And then this is his explanation, “When the apostle put his question to these disciples, ‘Did you receive the Holy Ghost when you believed?’ The implication surely is obvious, it is that men may believe without receiving the Holy Ghost.” Do you see that? He wouldn’t even ask that question if it was just a fact that you always received the Holy Ghost when you believed, then he wouldn’t ask that question at all. But the very fact that he asks it implies that men may believe without receiving the Holy Ghost. If the two things happened together inevitably it is an unnecessary question and the apostle would simply be asking them whether they were believers. But that is not what the apostle asked them. His question is, “Did you receive the Holy Ghost when you believed?” In other words, when he spoke to these men he saw at once that they had not had the seal of the Spirit. They had not received the Holy Ghost so he says to them in effect, “Now look, you call yourself believers but did you receive the Holy Ghost when you believed? Have you received him at all? You claim to be believers. I suggest therefore, that the correct translation actually indicates quite clearly that there is a distinction between these two things. We believe, and of course, we can only believe as the result of the operation of the Spirit, but still we may not have received the seal of the Spirit. The subsequent events in this story about Paul and the disciples in Ephesus [Acts 19] make it yet clearer. The apostle begins to examine him and he asks, ‘Unto what then were you baptized?’ They say, ‘Into John’s baptism.’ Then said Paul, ‘John verily baptized with the baptism of repentance saying unto the people that they should believe on him who should come after them, that is on Christ Jesus. When they heard this they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus.” Paul would never have baptized them unless they had believed. They believed and accepted what the apostle said and so were baptized. Whatever they were before they were not clearly believers. But then we read, “And when Paul had laid his hands upon them the Holy Ghost came upon them and they spoke with tongues and prophesied.” They had believed but they still lacked the sealing of the Spirit. The sealing only happened to them when Paul laid his hands upon them. Surely this incident proves that the men who gave us the Authorized Version were interpreting Ephesians 1:13 correctly, they were theologically correct in saying, ‘In whom also after you believed you were sealed with the Holy Spirit promise.’ There was an interval between their believing and their sealing as there was in the case of Paul himself and all the apostles, as there was in the case of the disciples in Ephesus.” And so he comes right down the line and says very clearly that the sealing with the Holy Spirit is something that comes after you believe, after you have become a Christian, after you have repented from your sins, after you have received the Lord Jesus, after the Holy Spirit has regenerated you. Then the sealing of the Spirit is something that comes after that. Normally, we wouldn’t argue about that at all because it seems so obvious to all of us that the Day of Pentecost followed after the disciples had been with Jesus for three years. But I think probably Satan has created all kinds of subtle arguments to get us to miss the one gift that we cannot do without. I think it’s true that the moment you begin to believe that God has made you in Jesus, and that Jesus has not let go of you but has held onto you inside himself through all your wanderings, and all your rebellions, and has made you completely new inside himself, and borne the cost of that in his own crucifixion, it’s very easy then to think that that is true and to feel a completely different attitude about everything. And to sense, “Well, this is wonderful. Then God is not against me he’s for me. He’s forgiven me and not only that but I now live in the victory of Christ and I have no need to worry about things that I worried about before.” So it’s very easy for us to sense that the Spirit of his Son that God sends into us has done everything that needs to be done. But the fact is, of course, we have actually been translated from the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of his beloved Son. We’ve actually been transformed from time into eternity. We’re living in time in this fallen world but the moment we believe, we’re transformed into eternity and it’s possible to believe that to bring all the attributes of eternity and the eternal life down into us there has to be a mighty operation of God’s Spirit. There has to be a mighty sealing of his Spirit to make all of it a reality. Lloyd Jones at the beginning of his sermon says, “That I think the apparent lethargy of the church today and the weakness and inability of Christians to transfer their truths to others is due unto the lack of this baptism of the Holy Spirit.” So there is necessary a sealing of God’s Holy Spirit that can bring to us all the mighty qualities and attributes of eternity into this temporal life. And it’s good for us to see that. That God did not leave the disciples with just their own unaided mental and emotional capacities to tell the world about the mighty change that had taken place in mankind in Christ’s crucifixion. He ensured that they were equipped with a supernatural power to do that and it’s important for us to see that we have the same need for that supernatural power. Just because we’re in a store talking to a person rather than preaching in a street corner, it does not mean that we have any less need for the same power so that those realities will become real to them. And I think often we kind of – it’s easy to excuse ourselves, it’s easy to say, “Yes, well my job is simply to be what God has made me in Jesus.” That is true, if we take that in its wholeness to be completely what God has made us in Jesus. But to be completely what God has made us in Jesus is to be sealed in the Holy Spirit. Jesus himself was sealed with the Holy Spirit at his baptism when the dove came upon him. Then Lloyd Jones says, “However, let us make it clear that though I am emphasizing there is a distinction between these two things and that there is always an interval, that sealing does not immediately and automatically happen at believing, I would not be understood as saying that there must always be a long interval between the two. It may be a very short interval. So short as to suggest that the believing and the sealing are simultaneous but there is always an interval. Believing first then sealing. It is only believers who are sealed, and you can be a believer without being sealed. The two things are not identical. It is believing that makes us children of God, that joins us to Christ. It is the sealing with the Holy Ghost that authenticates that fact. Sealing does not make us Christians but it authenticates the fact as a seal always does.” So it’s just good to think quietly through the things and if necessary – well, if necessary read Lloyd Jones’ book [God’s Ultimate Purpose, Exposition of Ephesians by Martyn Lloyd Jones] and study most of all the passages of scripture and be clear yourself on what you believe God has for you in regard to his seal by his Holy Spirit.

Sealed with the Holy Spirit 4 Ephesians 1:13e Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill Let’s look at Joel 2:28, “And it shall come to pass afterward, that I will pour out my spirit on all flesh; your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams, and your young men shall see visions. Even upon the menservants and maidservants in those days, I will pour out my spirit.” And it’s one of many quotations in the Old Testament where God promised that he would pour out his Spirit upon men and women. And that’s the meaning of part of the verse that we’ve been studying in Ephesians during these weeks. In Ephesians 1:13, “In him you also, who have heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and have believed in him, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit.” And the Greek makes it very clear that this was actually literally the Holy Spirit that was promised, and it was promised in verses like this one in Joel and if you look at Ezekiel 36:25 you see it there also. “I will sprinkle clean water upon you, and you shall be clean from all your uncleannesses, and from all your idols I will cleanse you. A new heart I will give you, and a new spirit I will put within you; and I will take out of your flesh the heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to observe my ordinances.” So those are some of the promises that are mentioned here and then in this verse, “You were sealed with the Holy Spirit that was promised.” What we had started to talk about was the meaning of the sealing of the Holy Spirit, what it really meant to be sealed with the Holy Spirit. Martin Lloyd Jones has some comments that might give us all light just because it comes in different words. He says, “In what sense then can it be said that the Holy Spirit was not given until the day of Pentecost?” Because obviously what we’re saying is this Holy Spirit was promised and its coming was on the day of Pentecost.” And so he’s saying, “In what sense can it be said that the Holy Spirit was not given until the day of Pentecost?” Because he’s saying that obviously there was activity by the Holy Spirit before the day of Pentecost. He says, “Clearly, it does not mean that the Holy Spirit had not been given at all or in any sense until the day of Pentecost. That cannot be the case because we find that even the men of the Old Testament dispensation had the Spirit. The one thing that David most feared after he had committed the terrible sins of adultery and murder is seen in his prayer, ‘Take not thy Holy Spirit from me.’” So obviously people in the Old Testament had experience of the Holy Spirit. So when God gives us the promise that the Holy Spirit will come upon us, then he’s obviously meaning something beyond what the Old Testament people experienced of the Holy Spirit. And then he [Martin Lloyd Jones] says too, about the disciples, “The disciples of our Lord had already received the Spirit in that sense long before the day of Pentecost. They were believers, and in a certain room our Lord had breathed upon them saying, ‘Receive ye the Holy Ghost’ and this was before the day of Pentecost. They had not only believed already, they had been enabled to do certain great works and yet he still promises them the Holy Spirit. To these same men upon whom he had breathed the Spirit on that occasion he says, ‘You shall receive this Holy Spirit. You will be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days hence.’” So obviously to be sealed with the Holy Spirit is something different from just having the Holy Spirit, because the Old Testament people had the Holy Spirit and the disciples themselves had received the Holy Spirit as Jesus breathed him upon them. And then he says, “The Holy Spirit was not yet given because Jesus was not yet glorified.” That’s John 7:39 and you might want to look at it. Despite the fact that the Holy Spirit was obviously possessed and experienced by the Old Testament prophets and despite the fact that the disciples had in some sense received the Holy Spirit, yet in John 7:38 it says, “He who believes in me, as the scripture has said, ‘Out of his heart shall flow rivers of living water.’ Now this he said about the Spirit, which those who believed in him were to receive; for as yet the Spirit had not yet been given, because Jesus was not yet glorified.” So there’s obviously an implication that this coming of the Holy Spirit cannot take place until after Jesus is glorified even though men and women had experienced in some way the Holy Spirit. In some way he had been able to give the prophets the ability to foresee the future, in some way he had been able to give power to Moses to perform miracles, in some way he had been able to even give the disciples power, the seventy who went out and said the demons were subject to them. In some way they were able to experience the Holy Spirit and yet there is some sense in which the New Testament implies the Holy Spirit will not be given until Jesus is glorified. Until Jesus, that is, is raised from the dead. So that’s what Jones is bringing up. He says, “In what sense then is this sealing of the Holy Spirit different from what people experienced before?” The first thing he says is, “It isn’t just regeneration.” He says, “The disciples were clearly born again well before the day of Pentecost and had received the Spirit. They believed in the Lord, they had repented, they had received new life.” And he points out that the Samaritans were in that position and the Ephesian disciples in Acts 19; that they had both had Jesus preached to them and they believed in him, but they still had not been baptized with the Holy Spirit. So being baptized with the Holy Spirit is not just being born again because obviously, these people had been born again and yet they were told to wait for the coming of the Holy Spirit. He then says something that we don’t talk about much — unction. You may have read about it – those of us who have read Power Through Prayer by Bounds would have heard of unction. He says, “Secondly, the fulfillment has no reference to the unction that is given us by the Holy Spirit or our spiritual understanding. That the unction is from the Holy Spirit, Paul makes abundantly plain in this first epistle of Corinthians Chapter 2, the princes of this world did not recognize our Lord and did not believe in him, but we do both because the Spirit who reveals all things, even the deep things of God has enabled us believers to do so.” So you remember that part in Corinthians where it says, “You could not understand because you were natural; these things are perceived by the Spirit.” “You have unction,’ says John in his first epistle. Clearly this sealing with the Spirit does not apply here because you can have this unction and spiritual understanding and still not know this sealing.” He gives an example of it. He tells how Jesus explained the scriptures to the two disciples on the road to Emmaus: he opened to them the scriptures and they obviously had received spiritual understanding of the inner meaning of the scriptures and yet they had not yet been baptized with the Holy Spirit. So the baptism of the Holy Spirit is not just the unction that even a born again person has – a person who has come spiritually alive. In other words in [Charles] Finney’s terminology it isn’t an awakened sinner; it isn’t even a regenerated sinner it’s something beyond that. Even an awakened sinner has some sense of his need for repentance and a conviction of sin. Even a regenerated sinner has some ability to say, “The scripture has come alive to me. I can understand it. I can see it. I have spiritual insight.” But he’s saying it’s not just that. Then he says, and this is useful I think for us, this piece, “Thirdly, and particularly important, the sealing with the Spirit is not sanctification.” And you have to make a distinction between the entire sanctification which is what we often talk about in regard to the baptism with the Spirit, entire sanctification and sanctification. Entire sanctification we talk about as the inner heart and the cleansing of the heart. But he’s making the point, “To believe that it is, has been the chief error in connection with the subject. That sealing with the Spirit does not mean sanctification can be proved by the fact that there is no gap or interval between justification and sanctification as there is no gap between regeneration and sanctification. The teaching of the scripture is that the moment a man is born again his sanctification has and must have started.” Well it obviously has; when a person is born of God, he sees certain sins in his life that are wrong and he does away with them. His sanctification has begun. Already in the new birth a person has to some extent received some of Jesus’ beauty and that’s why we say even a carnal Christian has some of Christ’s life in him because the sanctification has begun. It’s different from his entire sanctification but the sanctification has begun. And he’s saying, “The teaching of the scripture is that the moment a man is born again then his sanctification must have started. The process of making him holy and separating him out to God has already begun. There is no greater error than to teach that the coming of the Holy Spirit is just sanctification.” No, sanctification begins when you’re born again. Entire sanctification is another matter that we need to talk about. But sanctification is there.” Then he says, “It’s not just the manifestation of the fruit of the Spirit. The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, long suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance. I hold that you can manifest such fruit without of necessity knowing the sealing of the Spirit. For the springing forth of that fruit is a part of the work of the Spirit within us which goes on steadily and constantly in the process of sanctification.” And I think that’s true. We would say that there are many Christians, even carnal Christians who manifest some of the fruit of the Spirit. Now, that’s not a constant thing in their life, but they do manifest some of the fruit of the Spirit and all he’s saying is don’t say that baptism with the Holy Spirit, or sealing with the Holy Spirit is just the fruit of the Holy Spirit. That is present even in a born again believer. This I think is useful to us because we’ve sometimes talked about this but I have not actually seen it expressed so clearly by one who is regarded as a normal evangelical. “Once more negatively saying the things that it is not, the sealing of the Spirit does not mean assurance of salvation as the result of our believing the word, or as the result of arguments worked out from the word.” This was always to me a very questionable approach, you remember it accompanied the “bridge” illustration in Campus Crusade and was used quite widely. And I’ll just read it to you again, “Once more negatively, the sealing of the Spirit does not mean ‘assurance’ of salvation as the result of our believing the word or as the result of arguments worked out from the word. The common teaching concerning assurance of salvation is that the way to give people assurance is to take them to the scriptures and then ask them, ‘Do you believe this to be the word of God?’” This sounds so familiar to us: “Do you believe this to be the word of God? If they say that they do it is then pointed out to them that the scripture says, ‘He that believeth shall have ever lasting life.’ With many other such passages. For example, ‘He that believeth shall not come into condemnation. God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son that whosoever believe with him shall not perish but have every lasting life.’ They are then asked, ‘Do you believe in him?’ If they do they are again told, ‘The word says that if you believe in him you have ever lasting life.’ So if they believe they must have ever lasting life and that becomes the basis of their assurance of salvation. It is deduced in that way from the scriptures. But that is not the sealing of the Spirit.” Though he says – so you know what he says, “Though it is quite right as far as it goes.” But he’s saying, “That is not the sealing of the Spirit.” And that is in a way a certain kind of assurance, but he’s not backing it pretty much. [There is a missing portion here] “obtained by reasoning from the first epistle of John which is mainly concerned with the question of assurance of salvation. According to John there are a number of tests which we can apply in this respect. For instance, we know we have passed from death to life because we love the brethren. Another is that we know that we are Christians if we keep his commandments and if we believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and so on. If we can say honestly that we love God’s people and prefer their company to any other, we must be Christians. And if we arrive at a similar satisfactory answer to the other questions, we can be assured that we are true Christians whatever doubts may arise in our hearts. These tests of the first epistle of John are more thorough and better tests than those which are objectively based on the Bible. But the two taken together gives strong ground of assurance and yet I am suggesting that the sealing of the Spirit is more than we have so far considered. It is a yet stronger and higher form of assurance. It includes the blessings mentioned but goes beyond them. It is the Spirit in us that enables us to do what I have already described. But the sealing with the Spirit is something additional to that and is something done by the Spirit to us.” So it’s to think through that again and maybe even to listen to this again if you need to. He then takes another example which I think helps us to think more clearly about it. “My last negative is to say that the sealing is not the fullness of the Spirit, for later on in the epistles to the Ephesians we shall find that the apostle gives a commandment, an exhortation in which he says, ‘Be filled with the Spirit.’ Which means, go on being filled with the Spirit. That is something therefore which you and I can control. In any case, it is something that is to be a perpetual state and condition. We are to go on being filled with the Spirit.” That’s what the Greek means — be filled with the Spirit, go on being filled with the Spirit. We need to go on being filled with the Spirit all the time. And so he’s saying sealed with the Spirit is not that. “That is something therefore which you and I can control. If we grieve the Spirit or quench the Spirit we shall not be filled with the Spirit. In any case it is something that is to be a perpetual state and condition. We are to go on being filled with the Spirit. But here in describing this sealing the apostle refers to something that has happened in the past, you were sealed.” Not something, you see, that is happening now or that we ought to be doing not, but something that happened, “you were sealed.” . But the sealing with the Spirit is something additional to that and is something done by the Spirit to He says, “You know that it has happened and furthermore it was something that was done to you not something that you do.” So it’s something that was done to you, not something that you do. “So I suggest that we must draw a distinction between the sealing of the Spirit and the fullness of the Spirit, or being filled with the Spirit.” And then he finishes off with, “In the first Chapter of Acts, the Lord promised the disciples that they should be baptized with the Holy Ghost not many days hence. But when we turn to chapter two and to the great events on the day of Pentecost, we found that the fulfillment of the promise is described not as baptized with the Spirit but as being filled with the Holy Spirit. What happened there is the fulfillment of what our Lord prophesized as, ‘You shall be baptized with the Holy Spirit.’ But the word baptized is not used in Acts chapter two, the word used is filled. Clearly, the terms are used interchangeably.” So he’s saying the sealing of the Spirit is not just a matter of being filled with the Spirit which we are often told to go on being filled with the Spirit. But he’s making the point that “filled with the Spirit” has at times been used in the scripture to mean baptized with the Spirit. “Immediately after it referred to the same promise; Jesus said, ‘Don’t leave Jerusalem until you receive the promise which you have with the Father where you will be baptized with the Spirit’ and then in Acts 2 it says they were all filled with the Spirit.“ Well obviously, it means the same thing in that particular context. But still, he’s saying being filled with the Spirit is not normally being sealed with the Spirit. “The explanation seems to be that the baptism of the Spirit is the first experience of the fullness of the Spirit. It is the Spirit poured upon us in in this exceptional fullness. The first time something outstanding happens it’s always unique. It happened to the apostles, it happened to Paul, it happened to Cornelius, it happened to the Samarians, it happened to the Ephesians, it happened to the Galatians, and it has gone on happening to Christians throughout the centuries as I shall show. I am suggesting therefore that the baptism of the Spirit is the same as the sealing with the Spirit. But someone may well ask, ‘Why use two different terms then? If baptism is meant why does it not say baptism, indeed why did not Luke use the word baptism in the second chapter of Acts?’ The answer, it seems to me is, that in the first and second chapters of Acts we are being taught the doctrine of the Spirit directly so baptism is used. The object there was to emphasize this giving of the Spirit, the fulfillment of God’s promise and it is called a baptism because the Spirit was poured out upon men and women. But here in Ephesians Paul is talking about inheritance. He desires us as Christians to realize we are inheritors, that we are about to enter into the possession of a great inheritance and his concern is that we shall be absolutely sure of the fact that we are inheritors. So his teaching is that the baptism of the Spirit is the sealing that God gives to his promise that we are going to enter into this inheritance. Here of course, the term sealing is the more appropriate term. When we are talking about buying or selling property, or giving someone the promise of an inheritance, we produce a document and we put our seal upon the document as we have seen. So it is obviously the appropriate term to use here. It is right to regard the blessing as a sealing because it seals the promise. But what seals the promise is the baptism of the Spirit by which the promise of the Father receives practical expression. It is that giving, that special giving of the Holy Spirit that our Lord spoke about on the last day, the great day of the feast. So let it not be confused by the terms but realize we are dealing with two different ways of looking at the same phenomenon and describing it in an appropriate manner in each particular given setting.” And then he finishes the chapter, “Having thus established the doctrine, we are in a position to go on to deal with the thing itself, to consider what the scripture tells us about this wonderful, this glorious sealing that made such a difference to the apostles and others. Acts 15:8 will help to lead us into it, ‘And God who knoweth the hearts bore them witness giving them the Holy Spirit even as he did to us.’ It is God’s action in which he bears witness that we are his children, that he is our Father and that we are heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ. It is God’s authentication of the fact that we really belong to him.” Let us pray.

Sealed with the Holy Spirit 5 Ephesians 1:13f Sermon Transcript by Rev. Ernest O’Neill Will you take a Bible please and turn to Ephesians 1:13. I know we’ve been on this verse maybe four or five times, but Ephesians, we’ve said, is the most profound of the books in the whole Bible, and certainly the most profound of Paul’s writings. And anyway the Bible has depths and layers of meaning and of light that it takes you a long time to plumb and I think it’s better to do a few of those layers of light every Sunday rather than try to do them all at once, so that’s why we go back and back again to certain verses. Ephesians 1:13 reads, “In him you also, who have heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and have believed in him, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit,” that’s it. And I‘ll just mention to you, and you can count them yourself, but from verse three to thirteen which is I suppose eleven verses, “in him” or “in Christ” or “through Christ” is mentioned ten times. So that’s how largely that truth figures in these first eleven verses. And “in him”, means this: that God, before there was ever a world down here, he in fact saw Christ, and created him, and in him created all of us in him, the billions of us were all created in him. And God saw what we would do in Christ, and then Christ descended into death with us in him, before the foundation of the world. And then by God he was raised up to God’s right hand with us in him, and then all of that was moved into the world and took place whenever the creation occurred. And then his death on earth was in 29 A.D. and then his resurrection in I suppose 33 A.D. or thereabouts. So that’s how it took place and what is important for us to grasp is that everything that happened to him happened to us because we were in him. Everything that happened to him happened to us. Our creation took place in him, our crucifixion took place in him, our resurrection took place in him, where he goes we go, and it is not possible for one of us to be outside of him – separate, by ourselves. We can believe the lie that we are outside and separate from him if we want, but it’s purely a lie. There is no possibility; you’re in him or you’re simply not in him, but in fact you are in him and whatever happens to you happens in him. Actually a possibility of not being in him is not a possibility. It’s not a possibility because there is no life outside him. God hasn’t arranged for the continuation of any life outside Christ so everything that happened to him happened to us. And that’s the importance of that, because of the great egotistic attitude that we have inherited from our forefathers that thinks it has to “get into him.” We’re almost born with that legalistic belief th