And now if you turn your attention to the reading of
God's word, our Scripture reading from today comes from
great surprise, the book of Ephesians.
We are still there. Ephesians chapter 2.
We actually have the same scripture passage we had last
week. This week.
I'll do my best to to kind of go and dive deeper into the
richness that are there. But we'll, we'll have our eyes
towards verse 10 for this week, but we'll read verses 4 through
10. But God being rich in mercy
because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we
are dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ.
By grace you have been saved and raised us up with Him, and
seated us with Him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus,
so that in the coming ages He might show the immeasurable
riches of His grace and kindness towards us in Christ Jesus.
For by grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not
your own doing. It is the gift of God, not a
result of work, so that no one may boast.
For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good
works which God prepared beforehand that we should walk
in them. This is the word of the Lord.
Thanks be to God, you may be seated.
I think it's fair to say that we could all agree that there is
quite a bit of public outrage these days.
Feels like you can't escape it before the next outrage comes
out. From day-to-day could be outrage
over public speakers, moves by political leaders, outrage when
we feel like those who are called to represent us don't
embody what they feel they should embody.
Much ink could be spilled on the subject.
But I think I think that this outrage occurs because it's a
collision of two very different ideals.
The first ideal is the ideal of individualism, individual
expression as a secular society. As we move in that direction,
yes, even here in Texas, in our quest for knowledge, we have
also moved into this hyper individualism where the
individual has almost the divine responsibility to create an
identity for themselves, believe what they want to believe, value
what they want to value. This ideal is in conflict with
another ideal that we actually still retain in parts even as a
modern society. And that is the idea of federal
representation, legal representation.
That is even in our increasing distrust of institutions, I do
think we are increasing in our distrust of institutions.
We has still retained some level as a Society of representation
through others. Parents are legal
representatives of their children.
Lawyers are able to represent their clients and however good
or bad they may be, that is the verdict that is given.
Elected officials in our democracy represents their
constituents and our national governments.
Even if you don't vote for the president, you feel as if that
president represents you to the world.
We carry on this idea of a federal head, even if there's a
growing culture of distrust and we hold this idea of radical
individualism. I think this is perhaps the
reason for our outrage. They collide.
That's why we believe a public speaker at our university should
represent all those of the university.
But we also can't handle it. Their opinion they hold, it
feels in conflict with something we hold dear as individuals, and
so we land on outrage. I bring up this idea because I
want God to use His Word to shape our lives, to shape us and
to form us in light of the culture that we live in.
And I want us to see where His Word affirms, where His truth
affirms what the culture might believe, and also where it
critiques it. See this idea of someone
representing us beyond our own opinion of ourselves, that that
idea is extremely important. This dynamic of Ephesians one
and two, and really the whole of the New Testament.
And from a more theological term, the theological term that
helps illuminate the truths here in Scripture are Christ's union
with us, our union with Christ. This phrase in Jesus Christ was
all over our text. It's been all over our text.
We can't escape from our union with Christ.
So in this idea, our union with Christ commends society's
remnant belief of our institutions being able to
represent us as legal heads, federal heads.
We believe as Christians and federal representation because
without it we would be dead in our trespasses and sins.
Our union with Christ critiques secular cultures desire to say
that how we define ourselves as being the most important thing
about us because the most important thing about a
Christian is being in Christ. Our union with Him has granted
us everything we need for life and godliness in this age and
the one to come. Let's look at how our confession
of faith teaches us to understand our union with Christ
in the Shorter Catechism. Questions 29 through 32 really
do pertain to this topic. I'm just going to read questions
29 and 30 to you all. It's a question and an answer
from our Shorter Catechism. This is question 29.
How are we made partakers of the redemption purchased by Christ?
Answer. We are made partakers of the
redemption purchased by Christ by the effectual application of
it to us by his Holy Spirit. Simple enough, right?
How are we made to partake or share in these benefits and is
in Jesus Christ, in Jesus Christ that He purchased for us, and
His cross and resurrection? They must be applied to us by
the work of the Holy Spirit. But how exactly does the Spirit
do this? That's the next question.
Question 30. How doth the Spirit applied to
us the redemption purchased by Christ?
The Spirit applies to us the redemption purchased by Christ
by working faith in US and thereby uniting us to Christ and
our effectual calling. That is how we get from
Ephesians 1 to Ephesians 2, union with Christ.
Let me remind you, chapter 1. Go back just a little bit in
your Bibles, verses 18 to 20, 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 measurable greatness of His power towards
us who believe according to the working of His great might, that
He worked in Christ when he raised him from the dead and
seated Him at His right hand in the heavenly places.
This is a prayer, a doxological prayer of worship and
Thanksgiving. Paul is is making and it's all
about Christ. Christ was raised from the dead.
Christ was seated at the right hand in the heavenly places.
And then chapter 2, verses 5 and 6, even when we were dead in our
trespasses, made us alive together with Christ, by grace
you have been saved, and raised us up with Him, and seated us
with Him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus.
This should blow our minds. What was true of Jesus in
chapter 1 is true of us united with Christ in chapter 2.
Remember, these are past tenses of the verbs.
This has already happened for believers.
You have been made alive. Do not forget it.
You have been raised, you have been seated, and this expresses
our union with Christ. But how are we to understand the
nature of our being made alive together with Christ, being
raised, being seated with him? I think this is important
because we know, and we must say because what the Scriptures tell
us, Christ was literally dead, physically dead, and then was
made alive. His heart was beating.
Cycles could touch him and feel him.
He was alive and we also know Christ was physically ascended
into heaven. It was a physical act.
It was a moment of wow and amazement.
And we know that Christ is seated at the right hand of God
in heavenly places. We have been united to Christ
but are being made alive. Being raised and being seated in
this earthly life is in the spiritual sense and in the legal
sense. Because of our union with
Christ, we have been made spiritually live.
We've been spiritually ascended and spiritually seated with
Christ. His righteousness has been
imputed to us. It has been granted to us in the
legal sense, in every sense of the term.
Because of His representation, we are called innocent.
We are called forgiven. We talked about last week how
Paul, he made-up these three verbs, made a new word using
some verbal conjunctions that the Greek, the original
language, allows him to do. Made alive together, raised
together, seated together in the past tense.
He does so by adding the prefix sin syn.
We use that prefix in some of our English words still like or
the same. Paul has done this throughout
his letters. He does it in other writings.
And so these are the other ways in which he's made us together
with Christ. Galatians 220 we have been
crucified with Christ. Romans 64 We have been buried
with Christ and share with him in his death.
First Corinthians 39 and Philippians 2IN different parts
we work together with Christ. Pastor Rob mentioned that in our
in our time of confession, Philippians 310 we imitate
Christ and are conformed to who he is.
Past tense of the verbs that now makes sense of a present tense
reality of being Christ's workmanship.
Look at me Ephesians 210. For we are his workmanship
present tense. We are his workmanship created
in Christ Jesus for good works which God prepared beforehand
that we should walk in them. I think that first phrase of the
verse, it enlightens much of what we're to gain from the
Scriptures today. We first person plural, not just
Paul, not just an I, but a we. That is what has been given to
the church, to the apostles in the Apostolic ages, now made
true for all those who are in Christ.
We are present tense. It is real right now, and it's
not a it will be or when we're made perfect, but it's actually
right now. We are his workmanship, His
union with Christ. Again, we are His because he has
made it so. Workmanship, the expression of
his work of salvation. It's the collective body of
Christ, exemplifying his glory on earth as it is in heaven.
This word for workmanship in the original language is poema.
It's actually used only one other time in the New Testament
from the first chapter of Romans, and it's actually very
simply stated there that just things that are made.
It's used in terms of the general revelation, special
revelation topic of 1st and chapter 1 of Romans, things that
are made. It's very simple noun.
What makes the difference here and why it's translated
workmanship is the presence of the possessive pronoun His.
We are His thing that was made, but in a special way.
We are His workmanship. We're not just anything that was
made, but we are His that was made.
He who united us to Christ is also the one who made us.
Created for good works in Christ Jesus union.
Again, being united with Christ is the best work that God could
ever have prepared for us beforehand.
And also as we are to understand this truth that is lived out, we
see that God uses that plan for His glory here on earth.
I heard a beautiful, beautiful testimony this week from a
brother, a fellow member of our church.
He actually serves as a chaplain in the hospital.
And as a chaplain in the hospital, he's often meeting
people in their worst moments in life, a time when diagnosis are
given, the time where life actually ends.
He's often in the room with them and always trying to assess what
is the situation of the room that he's going into because he,
he never knows. It's often the first time that
he meets them and that's when he's called to serve them.
This particular time recently, he was called as a patient was
getting ready to, to die and the, and the family was present.
And so he didn't know what to expect.
What he entered into, though, was a time of worship.
This family knew that their loved one was united with
Christ, and that union was about ready to be made more full.
So how they expressed that was by singing hymns.
And the hymn singing lasted for probably 45 minutes straight.
This member of our church didn't know what he was stepping into,
but as he walked into that room, the hymns just began to come out
of him. He didn't know what hymns they
were singing next. And he said he knew those hymns
because he learned them at this church.
He remembered being a part of the children's choir, and those
hymns were taught to him from a young age.
And so imagine the God that we serve that knew that this young
man, probably ages of five and six, was learning the hymns that
would then be giving God glory many decades later as he's
serving him in the hospital in this room of worship filled the
air in this moment that could be seen as a moment of sadness, but
they were giving glory to God who is uniting this brother or
sister in Christ to him. This brother walked out of the
hospital room and said that the the doctors, the nurses, the
texts, they had never seen something like this before,
singing that did not stop for that period of time, and that
Matthew got to join him in that process.
God has prepared good works for us, and because He has prepared
those good works for us, which is ultimately that we are united
with Christ and will be in the heavenly places.
We can wait for that with patience, with perseverance, as
we wait for being united with Him physically and fully
forever. I say that because I think the
encouragement that we have here from verse 10 is if we're being
honest in our following condition, we don't always feel
like the good works are being produced and we're tempted to
either feel bad or feel good about that truth.
The good works aren't always being produced or sometimes they
might be there in parts and we're tempted to not see the
good works in Christ Jesus, but to see them for just what they
are, good or bad. We actually read in our Easter
Whitney today a little bit about what happened to with Jesus and
how he angered. We use that phrase a lot for the
words of John Christostum. Let me just read it one more
time. By descending into death, he
made death captive. He angered it when it tasted of
his flesh. It was angered for it was
defeated. It was angered for it was
mocked. It was angered for it was
abolished. It was angered for it was
overthrown. It was angered for it was bound
in chains. So as we think about being
encouraged about the works before us, want to remind us
that we are in a battle. We are in a battle with our
flesh. And I was reminded of my late
professor from seminary, Doctor Tim Keller, and how you used to
talk about this battle with sin before being in Christ and after
being in Christ. And he often used the imagery of
like a bear, a bear that was in the wild in our Easter Whitney
here today. That reminded me of this as
well. Doctor Keller would say before
our sin, it sort of lied dormant.
It sort of did what it wanted in the wild.
It wasn't too bothered as it just roamed around.
And that was like our sinful nature before we were in Christ,
because remember, our eyes had to be opened.
The Spirit had to renew our wills in such that we could
actually see our sin for what it was, sin, and agree with God
that it was bad. But before that it was roaming
around like a bear in the wild. What happened though?
We became alive in Christ. It was like that bear was shot
with a gun. What happened?
It became angered, It didn't like it.
It became aware that it was sin and it tried to attack.
Doctor Keller would say that this is when the real battle
with our flesh ensues. Before we are numb to it.
We didn't have a category for it.
But now that we are alive to it, we also have to realize that
it's been taken a shot at and the ultimate shot.
We know that Christ's death on the cross was the ultimate shot.
It's nothing it can actually do to harm us.
But as we wait for our full reality of that, it's angry.
It's waging war against our spiritual nature.
Spiritual nature has its legal standing united with Christ.
There's nothing that can be separated from it.
But our flesh is angry. So I believe this message is for
those Christians who feel discouraged in the battle.
They feel like they are losing it.
This is who Paul is writing to be reminded, dear brother, dear
sister, of the past tense nature of reunion with Christ.
It is already happened and let us be renewed in our minds that
our good works are in Christ. There are results of reunion
with him, not on our actions here today.
The radical nature that we were dead and that he made us alive
is meant to be an encouragement in our battle with sin to
confess, persevere and endure until Christ comes back again.
Spiritual maturity is not purely sinning less, but it's
shortening the amount of time between sin and confession,
celebrating our union even quicker with Christ by going to
Him and talking to Him about our battle with sin.
But I also believe this message is for Christians who are
feeling overconfident in their battle with sin, like they have
it under control. But I believe this is because
their good works are not in Christ Jesus, but are in the
flesh. This is also who Paul would be
writing to. If we are overconfident in our
good works, it's probably because we think that we are
earning something to God by doing them.
If you heard these words today that God had prepared good works
for us, and you think about it, you say, wow, I must be really
good at this. There may be a sense in which we
don't understand how dead we were, which is just dead,
period, and how radical it was that God has imputed His
righteousness to us. How we had to forsake His Son on
the cross to do it. And how even each week as we
practice offering to God a portion of what He's giving back
to us, there's nothing that we can do to offer back to Him
anything to make it equal. Celebrating our union with
Christ allows Christ best work, His work on the cross to shine
in our lives and help us as we are tempted to be overconfident
in our battle with sin. In my list of new verbs that
Paul made-up with us, I left one off the list.
I think it's important to us as we close and as we look to the
table, and it comes from Romans 816 to 17.
The Spirit himself bears witness with our Spirit that we are
children of God. And if children then heirs,
heirs of Christ, heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ,
provided we suffer with him in order that we also may be
glorified with him. That's sin doxid, sin doxid.
So that's that with glorified with him has that sin prefix.
And you hear that word that we say often in our Church of
Doxazo. It's our what we use for our
doxology means to give glory, to give praise so that we will be
Co glorified with Christ and all of our battle with sin.
Even though the simple nature persists, even though we have
been united with Christ, because we've been legally counted
righteousness in Christ and all of that, God also tells us that
we'll also be glorified with Christ, the reigning Son of God
and the ages to come. Let that encourage us as we
March forward towards that reality.
Let us pray God has become to the table.
And as we ponder Your word for us today, let us be reminded of
these truths in a way that would give you glory.
God, our feeble minds are weak to comprehend and to respond to
these beautiful realities that we see in Scripture.
And so I thank you for any little bit of the Holy Spirit
illuminating it to us and making it real to us and applying it to
us and reminding us that we are yours.
It's in Christ Jesus that we come to this table, as in Christ
Jesus that we desire to live lives of honour and glory,
giving thanks to you, our Heavenly Father.
And it's in Jesus Christ name that we pray, Amen.