Each other sharing your stories. If I could produce for you an
All Access Pass for anywhere you wanted to go, any group you
wanted to see, any music concert that you wanted to go through
that also included AVIP Pass, plus breakfast the next morning
with the band or with the speaker at that conference, who
would you want to see? Who would you want to go to and
have an All Access Pass? Tell somebody next to you All
Access Pass. For who?
OK, I heard up front this person said I really want an all access
pass to my own bed. I need more sleep.
You've already got one of those. You just need to arrange your
life to make the use of it. It's sort of like having an All
Access pass to the gym. You know, your friend says
you're like, oh, I wish I would go work out.
And you know, why don't I go work out?
And they're like, well, you have an all Access pass.
When's the last time you used it?
And you're like, oh, last year. I guess I'm still paying for
that. You know, it's so hard to get
out of those. Once you sign up, you're in it
for life. You have to give blood to get
out. It's so hard.
Do you know the apostle Paul is riding in Ephesians trying to
call out the called and remind them they have an all access
pass? It cost a lot.
It comes with privileges. It will rearrange your life if
you will get in there in front of the one who paid the price.
It will rearrange how you think about the troubles and problems
of your life. It will rearrange the way you
interact with others who are having trouble and problems in
their life. It will rearrange how you think
about the church if you will make use of your All Access pass
to God. The book of Ephesians is a
prayer. It's Paul's prayer meeting.
It's interspersed with teaching. He interrupts himself over and
over to remind them, I'm really praying.
I'm really praying because Jesus has paid for your All Access
Pass so that you can sit, walk and stand in this life with God.
It is a message for a group of churches that had engaged both
Jew and Gentile in the life of Christ.
People who were not family had become family.
People who were not friends had become friends.
People who were not used to hearing from others minister to
them. We're having others minister to
them in the power and authority of God, and he's just
interrupting himself over and over trying to remind them.
You've got an All Access pass. Why don't you use it?
Why don't you sit with Jesus? Why don't you walk with Jesus?
Why don't you take a stand in this world with Jesus?
Let's join him in the middle of the prayer in Ephesians chapter
3, beginning in verse one. For this reason, he says, I,
Paul the prisoner of Christ Jesus, for the sake of you
Gentiles, surely you have heard about the administration of
God's grace that was given me for you.
That is the mystery made known to me by revelation, as I have
already written briefly in reading this.
Then you will be able to understand by insight into the
mystery of Christ, which was not made known to people in other
generations, as it has now been revealed by the Spirit to God's
holy apostles and prophets. This mystery.
In other words, he says, I'm going to tell you about the
past, this mystery. When Paul uses the word mystery,
he's not talking about something that is unknown.
For Paul, all the mysteries have been made known.
And so all the mysteries he was interested in talking about was
the mystery that had been made known.
This mystery is that through the gospel, the Gentiles are heirs
together with Israel, members together of one body, and
sharers together in the promise in Christ Jesus.
I became a servant of this gospel by the gift of God's
grace given me through the working of His power.
Although I am less than the least of all the Lord's people,
this grace was given to me to preach to the Gentiles the
boundless riches of Christ and to make plain to everyone the
administration of this mystery. Your All Access Pass.
Look, it's coming. He's he's getting there, this
mystery which for ages past was kept hidden in God, who created
all things. His intent was that now through
the Church, the manifold wisdom of God should be made known to
the rulers and authorities in the heavenly realms according to
His eternal purpose that He accomplished in Christ Jesus our
Lord. In him and through Him, through
faith in Him, we may approach God with freedom and confidence.
I ask you, therefore, not to be discouraged because of my
sufferings for you, which are your glory access.
This is God's eternal purpose. Access your all access pass to
God. Let's read it together, verses
10 through 12. His intent was that now through
the Church, the manifold wisdom of God should be made known to
the rulers and authorities in the heavenly realms according to
His eternal purpose that He accomplished in Christ Jesus our
Lord. In Him and through faith in Him,
we may approach God with freedom and confidence.
It's been His eternal purpose to give you an All Access Pass to
God. Did anybody in this whole group
today say that they would really love to have an all access pass
to the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, whatever they were
doing? 1 Howard Oh, I'm so glad. 122
These are our desperate friends, something you know in the heart,
in life that says that's where I really want to be.
I know I set you up for it. You didn't know you.
You could have had that option of an All access pass.
But here's the thing. Sometimes we really do live our
lives as if we're functionally atheist, functionally agnostic.
We can go about our day and life without ever really calling out
to God and embodying in our lives the very presence of God.
That's why in the beginning of the book of Ephesians, you can
organize it around the idea of sit with Christ.
That is the beginning, that we must sit with Christ in the
heavenly realms, that God would raise you up and give you access
to sit with him. Jesus said it this way in
Revelation. Behold, I stand at the door and
knock, and whoever opens the door, I will come in and sit
with Him and eat with him. Sup, I'm going to have dinner.
This old King James Version is what I memorized first as a kid.
I will Sup with him. I'm going to have supper.
This is where the root of that word is.
I'm going to have supper with this person.
Jesus says I want to have supper with you, and that table is in
your heart and in your life. I want to come and meet you
there. Jesus.
Put it this way. Let's go to the number one.
Keep going back. Did we lose #1 This could be
gone. Yes, there we are #1 God really
does want to be with you. God wants to be with you.
Can you say it to yourself? God wants to be with me.
Can you say it to yourself? Make it personal.
God wants to be with me. Yeah.
This is a very, very simple serving.
We have to be reminded of the basics, that God wants to be
with us, that that's his intention.
It says that Jesus went and called his disciples so that
they might be with him. That's what he wants.
God wants to be with you. There are moments in our lives
where that seems unlikely. I've had moments in my life
where I thought I am an unlikely candidate for a supper with God,
for VIP access with God. God knows the truth about my
heart. God knows the truth about my
mind. God knows the truth about my
body. And why would God really want to
be with me? But when we understand this as
truth by the power of the Spirit in our life as a grace gift of
God, that God wants to be with me and that God has gone to
extraordinary means and ends to make that true, it begins to
change our lives. It begins to change the way we
think about ourselves. We're not just in awe thinking,
oh, I'm so glad to be here. It's sort of like Jesus took
three disciples up on a mountain so that they could be with him
as he met with his heavenly Father.
It was called the Mount of Transfiguration.
And there on the Mount of Transfiguration, Jesus turned
into this bright light. They could see his glory and the
energy of his presence and his. They struggled, I think, with
words because it's like the whitest of white light, just
shining light. Peter was so taken in that
moment that that he's like, we should stay here a long time,
Jesus, you know, because look who else has joined you?
There's Elijah and there's Moses and there's you.
So we should build 3 tabernacles, 3 tents and stay
here a while. Peter was on the right track.
He wasn't just so glad to be there.
He wanted to do something in that moment to be there.
And the fog came over that space and the voice from heaven
basically said be quiet, listen to Jesus.
He's my son. He's the beloved 1.
In other words, sit still Peter and listen to Jesus.
This is your all access pass to be in His presence.
God wants to be with you. Sometimes I have found it
helpful at the front end of praying to just remind myself,
Craig, God wants to be with you. And then I began praying and
maybe I sit in stillness in that moment.
God wants to be with you. In fact, he's running to get
you. He's like the father in the
story of the prodigal son who runs to get to the his son.
He's he's like Jesus saying I came to seek that which was lost
to me, that which was lost I came to seek and to save that
word seek. So only two times used of divine
activity specifically in the New Testament, and this is one of
them where Jesus says I came to seek because I want to be with
you. The second time is where Jesus
speaks with the Samaritan woman at the well and says, you know
the Father is seeking true worshippers.
Why? Because he wants to be with
them. They must worship in spirit and
truth. Part of our struggle in being
with Jesus is that we are not used to truth and it scares us.
But you've got an All Access Pass to an audience with God who
created you, who knows you, who loves you and wants to be with
you. The second thing about this All
Access Pass is that God is created this access to you
through Jesus Christ our Lord, that God creates the access.
You don't have to earn it. Now my my father-in-law is 81
years old and he is 1,000,000 Miller.
Anybody here know what a million Miller is?
Yeah, it was before my time. 1,000,000 Miller is someone who
flew 1,000,000 miles on Delta flights.
That's a lot of trouble, travel. Throughout Ellen's childhood,
her father travelled a lot to encourage and help churches
across the United States and around the world.
And so he, his company that he worked for would fly all of
their people on Delta. And every time you flew on
Delta, you got to collect your miles.
He became 1,000,000 Miller. He is a lifetime million Miller.
And do you know what he gets access to?
Not free flights, reduced flights, free lounge.
Hey, there's a person who flies. Have you walked through the
airport lately? And you've been in a really
crowded area and there's this door off to the side and it
says, you know, members only. Anybody been in there?
Hope a few of you. I've not been in there.
Do you know Rodney got access to that by earning it.
He earned that access to the Delta Club Lounge.
And you know, sometimes he can even take a friend with him or
his wife with him. She gets access because she's
along with him. But he earned it.
Now some of us treat. God, that way we think God's
looking for us to earn the right to come to the God Lounge, the
God Cloud Club. God that you've got to earn your
way to that VIP pass, you've at least got to pay for it.
We think God is working on the same economy measures, but the
economy of the Kingdom is different.
The economy of the Kingdom is built on the life, death,
burial, resurrection and ascension of Jesus Christ.
And that's how you get in by putting your faith in Him.
He gets you in. He's the one who says, oh, hey,
hey, you walking back there? I see you.
Come on in, come on in to the lounge, come on in to the club
you're in now. It was shocking that both Jew
and Gentile were in now through Christ Jesus and no one had to
earn it. No one had to just go the hard
way of getting it right. They were in.
No one needed the right heritage.
No one needed the right birthright.
The only birthright you need is the new birthright through
Christ Jesus our Lord, and this is how you get in.
The freedom of access and approach is in Him and through
Him in what he has done. In chapter 2 in Ephesians, Paul
goes on and on about for grace you have been saved for grace by
faith in him, you have been saved.
He's just pounding away at it over and over and over as he
keeps interrupting his prayer. It's by grace.
You don't have to earn it, you don't have to pay for it.
It's been paid in full. You have an all access pass.
Just put your faith in Him. Jesus in fact says I am the way,
the truth and the life. He's done it, He was getting
ready to do it. And Thomas says, well, we don't
know the way. And he says, don't, Don't you
know I am the way, truth and the life to the Father.
So put your life and faith in him and he will bring you in.
Do you know Paul described it another way.
Let's pretend like this is you and this is Christ, and to be to
be in Christ is to have your life put in here.
And Christ himself has ascended to the heavens.
But before doing it, Christ died on the cross, and so now we die
with him. Christ was buried in the ground,
so now in baptism we are buried with him.
But God didn't let him stay in the grave.
He was raised from the dead. So where am I?
I'm in here. I'm raised with him and now he's
ascended to the heavens and is seated with the Father.
So where am I? Hey, you have an all access
pass. He's made the way.
You just need to hitch your life with Him and he will take you on
the way. That's good news, right?
Paul says. I have the incredible privilege
of preaching the boundless riches of Christ, inexhaustible,
he said. You could not exhaust the riches
of Christ. The third thing is that God
offers us freedom and confidence in your approach to Him.
God's not looking for fans who will fawn over him.
God is looking for people who will be able to sit, walk, and
stand with Him in honesty, in humility, in gratitude, but also
in the reality of who they are. You don't have to change
yourself to get in front of God. Getting in front of God will
change you. And this is a wonderful thing.
Jesus said it this way. You can come to me like a child.
You can come to the father like a child.
You enter the Kingdom like a child.
I've watched a child running by the Delta Sky Lounge and just
went in. The parents were embarrassed,
standing there at the edge, wondering, do they grab their
kid? What do they do?
Their kids run in. The kid knew no boundary.
There an open door, a pleasant space, and in I go.
The psalmist said it this way. Oh God, you have placed my feet
in a spacious place. And this is what God wants to
do. God wants you to carry around in
your life the spaciousness of the presence of God the Father,
the Son, and the Holy Spirit. He's inviting you into that
space so that you can come with freedom and confidence.
What's it like on the first day of school, kindergarten, Anybody
remember? Did you feel free and confident?
How about how about grade 8 freedom and confident on the
first day, Grade 12, it's my school.
You know, you get to take your turn.
First day at UBC, freedom and confident.
Some of you, maybe others of us were like, no, I wasn't.
I wasn't there, but in your life with God, there's meant to be
freedom and confidence to just come to him and ask.
He says Jesus says don't you know that the Father gives good
gifts? So ask so seek so knock.
He's talking here about a prayer life.
This is our all access pass. There's a wonderful story told
about a soldier during the war in the United States called the
Civil War. And I love this story because
it's told on the Alpha course. How many of you've been on the
Alpha course? A few of you, Yeah.
So you'll know this story. There was a Union soldier who
went to the White House because his brother had been killed in
battle. And the rule was if that if you
were the last remaining child of your family, you could appeal
and get release from soldiering to go home and take care of your
family, to work the farm. And so the soldier had stood at
the gates of the White House in order to go and ask President
Lincoln for help, but he didn't have a pass.
And all of the attendants at the gate said, no, you just sit
there, you go away. And so the soldier sat there
despondent, thinking of his mom trying to care for that farm and
what it was going to cost her if he died.
A child running around the White House, going in and out through
that gate, noticed the soldier and came and talked to the
soldier. What are you doing?
What's your story? What's going on?
Oh, you need to come in. And so he grabbed the soldier by
the hand and brought him through the gates.
The guards at the gates waved them through.
They came to the front steps of the White House and they waved
him through. He made his way through the
White House to the very room where his father was standing,
President Lincoln of the United States of America.
Hey Dad, you need to hear from the soldier.
And the soldier in disbelief, told his story and young Tad
Lincoln stood there proudly as his father granted this soldier
his request. He was released from soldiering
and was able to go home. Tad that's, that's like a, you
know, in English we talk about a tadpole, a tad.
A little tad is just a, a little person.
I don't know what they were thinking when they named him
Tad. He's just a little thing.
But Abraham Lincoln loved his son.
And when his son came with the request, he listened and he
heard and he treated the one that he had brought.
Tad was the all access pass. He just brought him in because
he knew he, he was loved by his father.
He knew he had authority and rights and privileges.
And I want to tell you church, we need to be more like Tad.
We need to be more like Tad that we know our Heavenly Father now
through Christ we have an all access pass to bring other
people in their troubles before God.
This is what Operation 1516 is really about is how do we invite
others into the life of Christ that we have just a tad of faith
is all it takes. Jesus said small like a must,
mustard seed. It just takes a tad to bring
someone else into your life and pray for them, to listen to
them, to pray for them. And our heavenly Father may
answer their request and need, but we'll meet them.
They will have the experience of being heard and brought before
the throne of God, the God who loves them.
Be more like Tad. Tell your neighbor, be more like
Tad. You see, this is what we have
been given. This is God's eternal purpose.
This is His intent. Let's read it again.
His intent was that now through the Church, the manifold wisdom
of God should be made known to the rulers and authorities in
the heavenly realms according to His eternal purpose that He
accomplished in Christ Jesus our Lord.
In him and through faith in Him, we approach God with faith or
freedom and confidence. This is His intent, that the
Church would now display the manifold wisdom of God, and it's
going to be displayed in three areas.
Just look at this real quick. That's our slide, our
invitations. Are you inviting others into
this life? Paul says.
This is what's changed my life in the way I view troubles.
One of the surprising things about this text is that Paul did
not view himself as a prisoner of the state.
Instead, he viewed himself as the prisoner of the Savior.
Well, that's a different view of my troubles.
I'm not a prisoner of the state. The state isn't in charge of my
life. The Savior is in charge of my
life. And so now Paul says, I'm a
prisoner of my Savior, Jesus Christ our Lord.
That's different. And so our invitations and our
struggles is that we invite others into the experiences
we've had of God, transforming our struggles and our
difficulties, our sufferings. Later, Paul would say, I don't
want you to be discouraged by my troubles, my tribulations, my
sufferings, because they're for your glory, and said you can be
proud about it. You can be proud that our
leaders in the church go through troubles and maintain faith.
It's not that somehow our leaders in the life of the
church have no troubles. It's that the leaders are on
display with the church that in our troubles we have met the one
who triumphs over troubles. And that is where our hope is.
And because we've had that experience, we can invite others
in your trouble. There's one who triumphs, it is
Christ Jesus. Second thing is that in our
fellowship, in our fellowship, we have been drawn into the very
fellowship of God the Father, Son and Holy Spirit in unity.
And the great divide that was there between Jew and Gentile
had been changed by Christ. And so there was an invitation.
Hey, come and join our fellowship.
Come and get in this fellowship too.
Come with me and experience our fellowship.
Jesus says you'll be known as my disciples because of your love
for one another. Your All Access Pass invites you
into the school of love and there you will learn.
And then our third thing is that you get invited to do our
rhythms of prayer. We're not going to hide our
prayer from you. We do have a secret prayer life,
but we also have a public prayer life.
Sometimes you might invite someone into your secret prayer
life and share something out of your journal and your life and
your experience with God and your prayer language that you
have with God. But you also get to share with
people the public life and experience of prayer, to invite
them into our rhythms of prayer. Quick to pray, slow to complain,
quick to pray. For many years in my life, even
as a Christian and as a follower of Jesus and being involved in
in ministry as a young adult in university, I resisted the quick
to pray. I was like, we need to get on
it. I got action.
I have things that need to be done and I'd be frustrated with
those in my fellowship who would say, hey, hold your horses.
We need to pray. I'll be like, we got to get
something done. We need to pray.
So there is tension there.