Gooding, David: 5 - Movement One (Part 3)

We resume our studies of the Epistle to the Ephesians, then, by reading first in the epistle and chapter two. Ephesians chapter two, and we shall read the whole chapter. And you did he quicken when you were dead through your trespasses and sins, wherein aforetime ye walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the prince of the spirit that now worketh in the sons of disobedience, among whom we also all once lived in the lusts of our flesh, doing the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest. But God, being rich in mercy for his great love wherewith he loved us, even when we were dead through our trespasses, quickened us together with Christ. By grace have you been saved, and raised us up with him, and made us to sit with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, that in the ages to come he might show the exceeding riches of his grace in kindness towards us in Christ Jesus. For by grace have you been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves, God's gift it is, not of works, that no man should glory. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God afore prepared, that we should walk in them. Wherefore remember that afore time you, the Gentiles in the flesh, who are called uncircumcision by that which is called circumcision in the flesh made by hands, that you were at that time separate from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of the promise, having no hope, and without God in the world. But now in Christ Jesus, you that were once far off are made nigh in the blood of Christ. For he is our peace, who made both one and break down the middle wall of petition, having abolished in his flesh the enmity, even the law of commandments contained in ordinances, that he might create in himself of the twain one new man, so making peace, and might reconcile them both in one body unto God through the cross, having slain the enmity thereby. And he came and preached peace to you that were afar off, and peace to them that were nigh. For through him we both have our access in one spirit unto the Father. So then you are no more strangers and sojourners, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and of the household of God, being built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the chief cornerstone, in whom each several building, fitly framed together, groweth into a holy temple in the Lord, in whom you also are builder together for a habitation of God in the spirit. God illuminate our hearts and give us good understanding of his word. Chapter two of the Epistle to the Ephesians is formed of two major parts. The first part of it goes from verse one to the end of verse ten. there reaches its glorious climax with a reminder of God's new creation. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God before prepared that we should walk in them. The second part of the chapter runs from verse eleven on to the end, likewise announces one of God's great purposes, the building of an eternal temple for God's dwelling. On the surface, at least, when you look at these two parts of chapter two, you might well decide that they have a great deal in common. For both of them seem concerned to stress the situation we were in before we got converted. And the sad and dangerous and solemn state we were in before we found the Savior. And that, of course, in its way is true. That is a valid observation. When we look a little bit more deeply, however, we shall find that perhaps the differences between these two parts are even more significant than their similarities. For instance, actually, if you look at part one, it is perfectly true without reserve to say of part one up to verse ten that it is concerned with our former state before we got converted. The former state of the early Christians before they got converted, and likewise our former state before we got converted. We were dead in trespasses and in sins. We walked according to our desires, the lust of the flesh and the lust of the mind. We were by nature children of wrath, even as the others. That is as true of us in our unconverted days as it was true of the early Christians in their unconverted days. Then when you look at the second part, though it calls upon us to remember what a foretime we were, when you look at it, it's not so much talking about our unconverted days, is it? It's telling us to remember what the situation of Gentiles was before the coming of Jesus Christ into our world. Sure enough, some of it is true of what we were before we got converted. But even in your unconverted days, you weren't quite in that position, were you? For Jesus Christ had long since come into the world when you were born. But some of these early Christians had lived in the times before Jesus Christ came into the world. And what Paul is calling upon them to do is to remember the awful situation they were in as Gentiles before Jesus Christ ever came. They were separate from Israel, strangers from the covenants of promise, without Christ, without God, and without hope in the world. So there is a difference between these two parts that go up to make chapter two. What we were before we got converted, and what all Gentiles were before Jesus Christ came into the world. And then there's another difference, isn't there, if you look at the verses carefully. And that is precisely this. If we're thinking about the past and our perilous condition, or the past and the condition of the Gentiles before Jesus Christ came, and then we ask ourselves, what made the difference? Then part one will answer to that question. What made the difference? Well, it was God made the difference. But even when we were dead, he quickened us and raised us and set us in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus. It was God who made the difference. Yes, but if you ask that same question of paragraph two, well, now this is how the Gentiles used to be, without God, without Christ, without hope in the world. What has made the difference? The answer this time will not be that it is God has made the difference. The answer will be the difference has been made by this astounding fact that the Messiah long hoped for has actually come, and God has invaded our planet, and history can never be the same again. And consistent with those differences is, of course, the third major difference. The first part, that is verses one to ten of chapter two, are in fact the climax, the last paragraph in the first great movement of the epistle. Whereas the second part of chapter two, verses 11 to twenty two, are the opening paragraph of the second great movement. And those two movements, though they have much in common, yet have significant differences. The first great movement has been concerned with the purpose of God in creation. The purpose of God that has been sadly thwarted through the rebellion of mankind and through the rebellion of greater and more powerful forces in heavenly places. And part one of our chapter two is concerned to bring that great movement of thought to its glorious climax. God had a purpose in creation. That great purpose of God in creation was for a time thwarted by the enmity of spirit powers and the disobedience of mankind. But in spite of it, the Creator has gone his way and has found the answer to the opposition, has thwarted Satan and his hosts. See the triumph of his creative plan at last, when in spite of the earlier plan being deflected and going wrong, the great Creator had another creation up his sleeve, if I might so say. And to his first creation has added a second creative power. And if the creatures of his hand were lost and dead to him in their sin, yet the creator had reserves of creation at his disposal and has created again and called life out of death, and has quickened his creatures in Jesus Christ, and raised them and set them at his own right hand. And with that deliberate and lovely mention of creation in uh verse ten of our chapter two, the first great movement of thought concerned with God's purpose in creation comes to its fulfillment. And the second great movement in the epistles is, of course, likewise concerned with the purpose of God. If you want to put it that way, a purpose of God in creation, if you care, but this time it's a different purpose. The purpose of God in creation in chapter one is that God should have us before him. And therefore you read of salvation affecting us in this way, that when we were saved, God raised us and placed us in the heavenlies that we should be before him. Ah, but when we come to the second great movement, we've not gone many verses down yet. At the end of chapter two, we shall come across it. The great purpose of God now is not so much that we should be before him, but staggering in its concept that God himself should enter his own creation and make himself room to dwell there, and set himself the task of building a temple within time and space. Did you ever hear such a story? The transcendent Lord of time and space, who created time and created space, decided not merely that we should be before him, but that he should come and enter time and space and do it eternally. Make himself a temple in which to dwell. But because that was a vast plan and purpose, movement two will remind us that God has gone about it in stages. He hasn't done it all at once, but he got himself some preliminary runs through, some prototypes, and started in a humble way with Israel's literal tabernacle of wood and gold, and has proceeded in this present age to something more glorious. And even so, the thing is not complete, nor will be complete until the Savior comes. And then the vast design that God has been erecting these many centuries will be unveiled. As the great temple and tabernacle of God, the body and bride of Christ, comes down out of heaven and permanently dwells in time and space to be God's location. To be the place where God is pleased within time and space to localize his presence and make himself known. And hence it comes to be that the second great movement in Ephesians, though of course in a way it is concerned with God's purpose in creation, has now moved further and concentrates our particular, our attention on this particular purpose of having a temple in time and space, and therefore on all those plans and purposes and methods that God has been at in the course of history, in order to achieve that purpose. And as I say, the second part of our chapter two isn't just a continuation of the early verses. It marks the new movement of thought. It introduces the new purpose. It concentrates our mind not so much on creation and its problems, but history, and the history of redemption and its particular. And what we shall find when we have persevered to the end is this, that not only does the first movement tell us that God has had a purpose in creation that he will yet achieve, but even more, more wonderful, God has had a purpose within history. History isn't just a muddle of things getting nowhere. History is not merely a going round in circles. There is a plan within history. There is real progress in history. And in the end, God will bring that progress to its glorious fulfillment. What an encouraging thing that is. And if you ask me, but what evidence have you got for it? My short answer would be you, and how I explain that, I'll tell you later on. But you are a striking example. I mean, you compared with the Jews of a former age, that there has been progress in history, and that there will yet be further progress. For the Christian has every right to smile. Huh? We are not pessimists. Oh, I know that when you look abroad upon the history of the world at large, you would be hard to put to it to find any purpose in it. Yes. For if you would see purpose in history, you mustn't stand merely within it. If you just stand within history, you won't see any purpose in it. Like the shining man who appeared to Daniel in Daniel chapter ten, standing above the river of history, who could see its beginning and therefore could see its end. So too you, if you would see purpose in history, must stand for a moment above history and look at its beginning and then see its end, and then you will see that indeed there is purpose in history, and as men and women who have been raised with Christ and seated in the heavenlies in Christ, if from that position you look down on history, you'll be able to see, yes, oh, look at that, there is progress. There shall yet be. And praise God, I'm part of the progress of history. So then it is my thesis, at any rate, that these two halves of chapter two, while they are similar, are even more significantly different. And we shall try to read them as we come to them against their true and proper context, against the general background of which they form part. The first part then, verses one to ten, deals with the purpose of God in creation, and in particular with what God has done with the opposition to his purpose of God in creation. When we come to the end of movement two, we shall find likewise a paragraph devoted to the opposition to God's ways in history. And when we come to the end of the final movement, we shall hear something about what God is presently doing with your help against the opposition to the new man and his session at God's right hand in the heavenly places. Well, that too is not altogether undisputed, and God will call upon your help to deal with the opposition in those exalted spheres. But in our paragraph, chapter two, verses one to ten, we have then the opposition, and the opposition in particular to God's great purpose in creation. So let us recall once again what that purpose was. Even before the foundation of the world, he purposed that we should be before him in love as sons. That was the great purpose that antedated creation and that led to creation, for creation was a means of attaining that purpose. Now chapter two tells us of the opposition to it, and the first opposition is to be found in this particular fact, and you, when you were dead in your trespasses and in sins. What a sad and a sorry situation this reminds us of. Of a God who had a plan that we should be before him, and for the sake of achieving that plan, went and made a whole universe and put us in it. Then we rebelled against the plan and became dead to all that God had intended. Dead in trespasses and in sin, not, of course, physically dead. Not even morally dead in the sense that we didn't any longer know the difference between right and wrong, before unregenerate people know perfectly well the difference between right and wrong in many things, don't they? And many of them are eminently decent people that would be ashamed of stealing or lying and absolutely horrified at the idea of murder or any of the more lurid sins. In that sense, morally alive. But dead, says Scripture, dead. How dead? Dead to the purpose for which God made them. Imagine, if you will, a father who has sent his son abroad to act for his father in the family business, with all sorts of instructions of what he is to do and how he is to go about the business of the family in that far distant world. But father hasn't heard anything from him for months and months and months and months. And wonders where the boy's got to and what the boy is doing. Has he been assassinated or something? And father writes letters but gets no reply, and father sends telegrams and gets no answer. The fathers keep pouring out the cash to maintain the boy. The only evidence that the boy's still alive is he still uses the cash. But now he can't get any answer. At last, father sends a fellow businessman to the far country and says, try to find my boy and ask the boy to call the telephone. And at length the telephone, uh, is raised, and that's the son on the other end. And father says, hello, my boy, and how are you? Very well. Well, now, um, how is the business doing? Uh, have you done this or that and the other? Look, father, I don't want to hear anything about your plans. I've got my own. Slam. Telephone down. Line gone. Dead. Or if you'll allow me to use a much more biblical, uh, parable. What about the part of the son? Who said to his father, Father, give me the portion that falleth to me, and forthwith he went his way into a far country and was lost to the father. So that when at length he came home, the father, talking to the older boy, said so graphically, this thy son, my son, this my son was dead. And is alive again. Was lost and disarmed. Ephesians two tells us of a sorry story, how that the purpose of God in creation seemed to go utterly astray. For man went his own way, regardless of the creator's. And that isn't the only thing that is said about it. We might ponder the solemnity of it, to think of ourselves on a planet that we didn't make. A planet that we cannot ultimately control. And yet unconcerned about the God who put us there. Were it not the normal way that unconverted folks go on, you'd think it were a breed of insanity, wouldn't you? But it is such the normal way of living that people come to look on it as ordinary and are inclined to think that the people that take God's purpose seriously, that they're the insane ones. Just imagine, if you can, an astronaut or two in a capsule circling around Saturn, but they can't land, what is, and they can't get out because it's lethal outside, but they've come to the view that what Houston or anybody else down in Texas wants is absolutely irrelevant. They take no notice of any signals coming up from below. They're doing their own thing. I've now persuaded themselves that there is no Houston or anything down there whatsoever. I can't get out of this capsule thing. But they have no ultimate plan where they're going to end up. Because they said that that's lunatic. Not half so lunatic as to be on planet Earth. And you never got yourself there, did you? And you can't get out. That's lethal. And to be unconcerned about the purpose of the one who made the planet and you. And to be unconcerned about why he put you there and whether you are fulfilling the purpose, and utterly unconcerned about the goal of it. Say, if we weren't used to that situation, we should count it utter lunacy. How about there is worse? The opposition to God's plan didn't begin in man's trespasses and sins, but began a bit further back, wherein he says, in your trespasses and sins, you walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, of the spirit that now worketh in the sons of disobedience. Dark and solemn statements, let us take them slowly and carefully. According to the course of this world. You will notice the emphasis on the this, won't you? Here are men and women living in this world as though this world were the only world. Maybe they got it into their heads that could, there could possibly be, when life is finished on this world, there could be a life after. Yes, they possibly got it into our heads, but the notion that there is another world already. Another world with which they ought to be in contact already. No. They live their lives as though this world were the only world there was. And not from the beginning of the day to its end do they ever make contact with the other world. And they live, moreover, says Paul, as though this world in its present phase were going on forever. They walk according to the age, the present phase of this world. Yes, and it's not only the folks who don't think that go about like that way, is it? Not merely them. I remember attending a very learned seminar in philosophy that had a good deal of theology mixed in with it too. And the purpose of the seminarist was to inform us that when the Bible talks about creation, it doesn't mean that creation once upon a time happened in the past, and since we've moved on in time from that. No, no, this world in its present form is eternal. But it isn't. And to live as though this present phase of affairs, in which you have a rosy little world called planet Earth, is a permanent and eternal thing, is to live under a grave misapprehension. By the evidence around us, if you'll consult not the theologians but the scientists, the evidence around us is that this world is a temporary affair. It had a beginning. It will have an end. And the phenomenon of human life as we now know it on a planet where you have to have air to breathe and so to live. The very phenomenon of human life is only a temporary thing. It won't always be so. Sure, there will be a new heaven and a new earth, but that new earth will be different from this one. And creation around that, and creation's handmade physics and chemistry tell us every day of the week that the phenomenon of human life on this planet is only a temporary thing. There will come a time when human life as we now know it, exactly as we now know it, will not be anymore. And to shut your eyes to the combined testimony of Holy Scripture and, uh, science, and live as though this world were a permanent thing that's always gone on and always will go on. That is to be foolhardy in the extreme. Why has man come to such a sorry state of affairs? Why, says the apostle, because they walk not only according to the present phase of this world, but according to the prince of the power of the air. And why is he called the prince of the power of the air? Well, I presume it is because in humble language, condescending to our lowly state, God is indicating to us what has been the effect of Satan's own rebellion and his capture of our planet. He has become the prince of this world and the god of this world. And like some foreign invader who has come to a city and invested the city and encircled it, so that none shall get in and none shall go out. So Satan, so to speak, has filled the air and placed him and his hosts between our planet and God. It helps you to think in physical terms, also think doubtless these were meant in spiritual terms. But even as metaphors, they'll help us to understand. Satan has, so to speak, invested, besieged our planet. And casting round that his power has effectively stopped communication between God and men. Let me use an illustration. Pardon my rather so evidently homemade illustration. Hmm, but here's a bus. The bus driver and his pal. Little bus, modern bus, airtight windows, air conditioning, and all the rest. And the bus has been sent by its owners on a journey. They are to go from A to Z. And they are to go by this path. Ah, but yes, when they get along the road some way, the both of them are tempted to go around a side road. And the side road where now they go goes by the side of a very deep lake. And presently, an accident occurring, the bus leaves the road and plunges right down into the The deep zinc lake. lake. Now it sinks, and around it is the water. Sunk without trace. Nobody knows where they got to. People scratch their heads, why don't they turn up at the, uh, appointed, uh, rendezvous? But no, they don't turn up. But where have they got to? They disappeared, or where have they gone? Nobody knows. And nothing's been heard of them. Ah, but now I did you think of those chaps. They're the big bass. So though they're down in the water, the windows being airtight, they've still got some air to breathe and will have for an hour or two yet. Mm. So now, they're alive. Look, they're walking up and down the bus. But you say, this is terrible. Don't they know what's going to happen? Yes, the very bus that should have been the vehicle to lead them to their destination has now become their prison house and presently will be their coffin. And they're out of touch with the real world outside. It's gone. And they're surrounded by this foreign element. Allow me to use it as a parable of what's happened to our planet and men on it, the very planet that God created as the bus, so to speak, for men to be on, that would take them to their destiny. Has, because of their disobedience and Satan's rebellion, been engulfed by satanic power and opposition to God, and now becomes man's prison house and his coffin. You say, but that's a modern bus, isn't it? Yeah, it's a modern bus. Well, haven't they got a walkie-talkie thing, a radio or something? Or why don't they use it to get in contact with base and say, hi, we're down here in the middle of the lake. Come and get us. Ooh, but they could have done, perhaps. I don't understand these scientific things, but whether they could have done or not, they're not going to. Why? Because the bus driver has read a little science, and he's now arguing with the other chap that all that idea of a world outside was an illusion. There isn't any world outside. And the notion that they were meant to be on progress to some God-given destiny, no, that was an illusion too. They were always meant to be down here. And the limit of their life experience, the length of the bus. So where are they going? Up and down the bus, playing the scientist and the engineer, examining the works. Not quite come to the notion of where it came from, and certainly no idea where it meant to go to. But they're walking, and could you see them? They're walking up and down the bus, and they've persuaded themselves that this is all there is. Sad, isn't it? It's only a faint picture of unregenerate man on this planet. Out of touch with God and the prince of the power of the air enveloping them and coming between them and God and cutting them off. And as if that were not enough, notice what next his satanic majesty has done. If one can give full weight to the cases in Hellenistic Greek, I don't know whether we can, but if we can give full antique weight to the cases in Hellenistic Greek as we give to them in classical Greek, then these verses are saying that the prince of this world has control of a spirit. Whose particular task it is to stir up within the human heart opposition to God and his purpose. Notice what next his satanic majesty has done. If one can give full weight to the cases in Hellenistic Greek, I don't know whether we can, but if we can give full antique weight to the cases in Hellenistic Greek as we give to them in classical Greek, then these verses are saying that the prince of this world has control of a spirit. Whose particular task it is to stir up within the human heart opposition to God and his purpose. It is not merely that the prince of this world has surrounded the planet with his felt influence and power. It is that the prince of this world has a spirit that actually works inside the individual, stirring up disobedience against God himself. It is a sad and an exceedingly sorry and terrible thing to have to say about anybody, but really, how else would you, uh, explain it? Here's a delightful girl, delightful, pretty as they all are, but a beautiful musician. Her fingers and her ears and her heart graced with the gifts of the Creator, more than many, delights in her music and delights everybody who listens to her. And you try to talk to the woman about God and about the delights of the Creator and ask her if she knows the Creator who invented music and the whole idea was his and gave her the gift. She doesn't want to know. She said to mind your business. She's not interested in God. And she didn't invent music herself, did she? How do you account for the animosity? I suppose it can have all sorts of causes, at this among them. Fair maiden though she is, the prince of this world has a spirit whose job it is to sow in that young heart enmity against God. I'm saying the same kind of thing for the scientist that now is reveling in the fun of finding out how creation ticks. Talk to him about God, and he's not even interested. Why not? Then it would be all the more wonderful. If this marvelous cell that you're studying down here is marvelous because it came from the mind of a creator, what other cells might he not have up his sleeve, old boy? No, no, no, no, no. I'm not interested in God, and I'll tell you it outright Outright flat. flat. Why's that? Well, ultimately because the prince of the power of the air has a spirit whose job it is specifically to work inside the human heart and mind and stir up disobedience and enmity to God. The prince has been at it ever since he invaded the Garden of Eden and used the delightful fruit of the garden to draw man's heart away from God and make man think that God was his enemy. Well then, if man therefore is dead to God and God's plans and isn't concerned with them, if man has come under the domination of Satan and his hosts like that, what actually moves him in life? As this is the saddest of the lot. Instead of being moved by some glorious divine plan of God that spans the whole ages of time and space and was formed before the world was founded and has plans for eternity, no, the man is just moved by the desires of the flesh... and the mind. Fallen nature moves him. And then the habits of a lifetime that fallen nature, reacting on the world around, has produced in his mind, build up patterns of behavior. They are his ultimate motivation. And worse even than his actions is the sorry fact that his own very nature is fallen. By nature, he's a child of wrath. That is, confessedly, a hard word, isn't it? That all men by nature, and at this very juncture Paul includes himself, all of us were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest. When one's pauses to think, how could it be otherwise, children of wrath, would you have God content? Would you have God create a vast universe in order to achieve the purpose on which he set his heart, that man should be before him? And would you have man go astray and fall under the power of his own enemy and be lost to God, and ruined in his nature, and become futile in his motivations, and hopeless in his goal. Would you have God sing hallelujahs over it? And would you have God say, I don't care? No, indeed not. The God who made man does not so easily surrender his purpose and say, after all, it doesn't matter what he does. God's wrath rests upon it. You'll think I've got bus drivers on the train- brain, won't you? Well, I did happen to meet a real bus driver the other week, and he and I got talking after, after the little meeting we'd had in somebody's house, and he wasn't a believer, really, and he had all sorts of difficulties, and he thought I was taking things far too seriously. I said, old boy, suppose you made a motor car. Well, he thought he could. And I said, suppose it went, uh, five times where you wanted it to go when you'd made it, and five times refused to go where you wanted to go, but went its own way. Well, he grinned. He thought, I gone lunatic now, but real good this time. So I said, take me, no, take me seriously. Suppose you could make a motor car, and five times out of ten it went where you wanted it to go, but the other five, pull on the wheel how you like, press the old accelerator, pull the gears, put your hands out right or left, the thing took absolutely no notice and went its own way. What would you do with it? Well, it was so daft to his idea, he couldn't bring himself to reply, but even eventually was, uh, induced to say what he'd do. Scrap the thing. I said, my dear good man, the Bible tells us this, that all we like sheep have gone astray. We have turned everyone to his own way. I said, my friend, you want to be careful God doesn't do with you like you propose to do with the car and put you on the scrap heap of eternity. God is under no obligation to maintain a planet for the benefit of those that don't want anything to do with God. And God is under no obligation to create a heaven alternative to his own heaven. Alternative heaven. Anybody that doesn't like me, here's a heaven for them without me. God is under no such obligation. And he who created the world for the purpose of his own plan has every creatorial right to be angry when that plan is thwarted. As John the Seer was given in the book of the Revelation to see the coming judgments that shall deluge our world and finally destroy it. John tells us he listened to the reasons that heaven itself gave why that judgment must first come. And the first reason that he heard from heaven itself as to why the judgments of God must come to put an end to our present age. It was this, says John, I saw a throne and I heard the living creatures in all their pulsating life. Life glorious and wonderful, living creatures with head of man and ox and eagle and lion, life in its steaming variety, and I heard life saying at its highest intelligent point, worthy art thou to receive the riches and the power, for thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they are and were created. And the solemn thing is not that men murder each other, though some men do. And the solemn thing is not that men get swamped in the embittered mire of immorality, though some men and women do. The solemn thing is that we and our world were made to fulfill God's plan, and in our unconverted days, the lot of us had gone our own way. Sooner or later, God will not wait anymore. Be men ready or be men unready, God will proceed to the fulfillment of his plan. How what shall the end be of those who would not. How about I have a better story to tell? If that was what we were in our unconverted days, then hear the other side of the story. But God, when we were dead, even when we were dead and hadn't a notion in our head of how to get out of the difficulty, then God showed his magnificence. No contingency plan this thought up in a hurry. But a master stroke, albeit it had been kept up God's sleeve, but a master stroke. To defeat the purposes of the opposition. Even when we were dead, he quickened us together with Christ. And raised us and set us in the heavenly places in Christ. You are his creation. And we may notice to start with, the terms in which our salvation are here put. It doesn't say that being terrible sinners like that, God forgave you, though that is perfectly true. Uh, scarce meet the bill, would he? You imagine the owner of that bus. Remember that bus? Went off into the lake, that bus. Yes, it's down there in nearly the bottom of the lake, you know, and here comes the owner. Caught you at last down there. Well, of course, you shouldn't have disobeyed, should you? Shouldn't have gone on the side road. Shouldn't have gone your own way. Now you've got yourself in the soup, haven't you? Well, I forgive you. You forget me. Because they're down at the bottom of the lake. A desperate need is not merely for forgiveness, but something to be done to get them out. They're unconscious already, uh, if they're not brought out, they'll be dead completely. They need new life, they need getting out. That's what we needed, nothing short of it. That is what God has done. Given us new life, he's quickened us, got us up, raised us, seated us in the heavenlies in Christ Jesus. And he's done. But mark it, he's quickened us together with Christ. In that, there is a long story, isn't there? If we were given new life along with Christ, tell me, how did Christ become dead to start with? So that he could be made alive, and we made alive in him. Mm, that's a long story, you know it better than I. God's great hidden plan. How his own incarnate son pierced the glue that surrounded our planet and actually came right through the enemy's ranks into our planet. And lived here in the pestilential atmosphere of our world, and lived in it utterly holy. And watch Satan coming at him in the great temptation, if he possibly can, to drive a wedge between him and God. And the Savior defeating him at every turn. All but man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God. I shall worship the Lord thy God. Thou shall not tempt the Lord thy God. And Satan being powerless to drive the wedge between him and his God. And the way opened up. What a lovely breath of heavenly fresh air there came down, didn't there? To where we putrid sinners were. I love that story. You can picture it in your mind. I'll use it as a parable by your permission. There was our Lord standing by the grave of his friend Lazarus, and the stone rolled away, and Lazarus stinking. Ah, what a sad result. The Savior turns his eyes to heaven. He said, Father, thank you that you've heard me. I know that you always hear me. The line kept open between our planet Earth and And heaven. heaven. That Savior dead upon the cross, when Satan thought he'd squashed his life out, in God's plan, showing us men and women not only there was a God, but exactly what that God is like. Or if I speak to somebody here not yet a Christian, and your reason is that you think God has been hard against you, I bid you look at Jesus Christ on that cross once more. This is what God is like. He's a God that rather than you perish, would himself perish, were that possible. Or you got against him? And it's the story how when Jesus Christ died under the burden and guilt of our sin, that we might bear the wrath of that God, we who were the children of wrath, but he bore the wrath for us. That God, of his own grace, raised him from the dead and set him at his own right hand. Demonstrated not only is there a heaven, but man can be taken there. And at this moment, man is there already. Ah. Oh, what a victory. An actual man who walked with two legs on our earth. Utterly undefeated in faith. Spotless in life, triumphant in dead, and now raised to the right hand of God. What does it mean? Why, if only you trust him. The way has been opened. With life already, the airline, so to speak, has come. You've got the life. Being indissolubly linked with Christ. You too, in spirit, are seated with Christ at the right hand of God. It isn't merely that one of these days you're going to heaven, when this life ends. It is as you sit on this seat, as you work in your kitchen, the way has been opened, and you now know there is, there is another world. And you're in touch with the other world. And the old planet goes spinning round under your feet. All right, it's been spinning a long time. You know, one of these days it'll spin right out. Ha. Won't be there anymore. And what do you care about that? Because you have that eternal life already seated in the heavenlies. Then rise, my soul. Behold, 'tis Jesus. Jesus fills thy wondering sight. See him now in glory, where thy sins no more can rise. That's what God has done. Why did he do it? Why'd he do it? He did it that throughout all eternity there might be one special exhibit in heaven. That in the ages to come, he might exhibit the riches of his kindness towards you in Christ Jesus. Why did he? I think it's somewhere in the second book of Samuel that we are told, when the rascally old Joab committed the appalling offense of assassinating Amasa, recently appointed commander of the forces under David. And Amasa lay on the ground wallowing in his blood. Then everybody that came up stood still and looked at him. My good Christian friend, when you get home to eternity, I don't know how many other companies you'll find there, but every angel that comes across you will stop and look at you. Exhibit number one. So this is a somebody. Come on, let's look at this. Do you know what? This is a somebody from that curious planet Earth that rebels against God. This is a somebody from that planet Earth where the Almighty's own son was sent down to, incredible story, and there was no salvation for angels that sinned, as far as we know, but how come it that God had mercy on them? And the very angels of God will stop as they pass by you. And he turned as he had this permanent ex- exhibit of the riches of God's kindness towards him. What did he do? How did he do it? Well, he did it all himself. Were there ever such lovely verses as the verses that say, by grace you are saved through faith, and the whole scheme not of yourself, it is the gift of God, not of works, lest any man should boast. No, no more lovely verses in the whole of scripture, but pray, look at their context. Tells me I'm not merely forgiven, but I sit at the right hand of God now in Christ already. And it tells me that this vast triumph of God's grace, that that was not by my merit. But he did it. Did it all? Why, of course he did. For it was new life. How could any but the creator do it? Oh, get a hold of it. These verses are not exhortation. They do not come and address themselves to me and say, ho, you who are sunk in the despondency of your sin, try to rise. Indeed, what a mockery such a thing would be. They tell the likes of me that in Christ I'm already made alive and risen and seated. As joined to Christ, and God has done it from first to last. His workmanship. Ah, but just like when God created Adam in the first place, he didn't create him. Well, he did create him to be a gentleman, but, uh, not to be that kind of a gentleman that sits at home and does nothing. No, God created man and then gave him a whole garden to develop so that Adam should work as gentlemen should and have Eve to work alongside with him. Lovely works. God had already prepared them for him to do them. Yeah? Well, perhaps you don't like gardening. Well, all right, don't like gardening, but then you haven't seen real gardens. When God Almighty planted a garden and Adam first opened his eyes and saw it. Oh, what a lovely thing. What a lovely gift to be given, a garden to look after. So first of all, God gave him life. That was the creator, wasn't it? Adam didn't, uh, work in the garden in order to get life, did he? No, he had to be created first, was given life, and then he worked in the garden, which God had foreprepared for him. And now the verse is telling us that God has a salvation. He's given us new life and seated us with Christ in the heavenlies, all of his own creatorial grace. We just have to take it as bankrupt sinners by an act of faith. It doesn't mean that when we get home to heaven, you know, we should be sitting around doing nothing, feet up on heavenly poufes. That isn't even true now, or it's not meant to be. The doctrine of God's grace isn't that we go and do nothing. It is that, having given us life, God has already prepared a program of delightful works, both here and hereafter, for us to work in. And with the works, the ability given. I wonder what those works are going to be when I get home to glory. God, if they're going to be anything like the Garden of Eden. Well, myself, I still hope it won't be a garden, because I don't know about gardens, but uh, but I leave it to God's good imagination that the works he's prepared, that I walk in them, will be of the same dimension and quality as the grace of his salvation. By way of practice, there are already some works I could be doing, aren't there? And you know what they are. Let's pray. Our Father, we have dwelt long at thy word. The memory now seen from our advantage point of salvation of what we once were, chills our very hearts. But at the same time, it magnifies within us thine inexhaustible and infinite grace. And now, through Jesus Christ our Lord, we offer thee the gratitude of our hearts. All the triumphs of thy grace. We turn our very sinings into an eternal exhibit of the riches of thy grace. As now we bow gratefully before thee, we pray that thou wilt not allow our gratitude to run away fruitlessly into the sand and come to nothing. Help us to find those good works that thou hast before prepared, that we walk in them. And by thy grace, help us to do them now, as thou shalt to all eternity, through Jesus Christ our Lord.