May the LORD bless you and keep you, may the LORD make His face to shine upon you, and be gracious to you. May the LORD lift up His countenance upon you and give you peace.
Awareness of Who We Are
One of my favorite passages in the Bible (there are actually quite a few favorites!!), is the one we were blessed with in the Bible reading from Paul's epistle to the church at Ephesus. According to Bible scholars, the ancient Greek manuscripts show that the passage in Paul's letter we identify as verses 1 through 14 was a single sentence (no grammar police back then!). To me it is as if the message contained in those few verses was a singular reassurance to the church, some members of which were new to the faith and/or persons who were experiencing trials and uncertainties. The letter would have been read to the church by an elder, and no doubt exegeted or expounded upon by a leader or leaders based on Paul's two-year visit with them and the evangelism/Gospel teaching he shared. I wonder how I would have responded if I were with the believers at Ephesus hearing this letter: would I have hung on every word, or at least try to commit to memory as much as I could? How would you have responded?
Even now, reading and re-reading this passage is so encouraging - especially in the midst of a dark valley or path that does not seem to have an exit ramp. On this 'visit', let us read out loud the opening words at least a couple of times, slowly. Listen to them, and let them soak in: "To the faithful saints in Christ Jesus at Ephesus." (Ephesians 1:1, NRSV)
Contrary to what some of us may have been told or taught, a Biblical saint, that is, what the Bible calls a saint is not defined as a heroic Bible character or highly pious person who has practiced good-deed-doing, or some other extraordinary act. A Biblical saint is a person made a saint (or regenerated) by God's will to become a saint - a person who He has set apart from the world culture to be holy and indwelt by the Holy Spirit, not because he or she has done something extraordinary, or has earned special merit by some other act. All who are saved and sanctified by God are saints. To be a person He has "called out" to "come in".
Yet, as early church history has shown - and even unto this day, the Roman Catholic Church has overwritten Bible theology, and in and of itself, has appointed a Roman Catholic-based group - the Congregation for the Causes of Saints (originally called the Congregation of Rites) tasked by the Roman church with the responsibility of determining if a person is worthy of canonization – i.e., the formal process to declare such person a "saint." Because of this human intervention, the church has adopted such a nonbiblical premise for awarding humans it has deemed worthy the title of "Saint." The Bible, never uses the word saint as a title, but rather as a "position", a salvific identity, given true worshipers as those God has indwelt with His Spirit and who God has redeemed by the blood of Christ. All Christians who are saved by the blood and imputed with the righteousness of Christ are sacred vessels - saints - made by God for God. Admittedly, this truth will take some time to inculcate as we have been conditioned in the opposite direction.
Further on this point: Read the following excerpt from Ephesians chapter 1, verses 3-4. "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, just as He chose us in Christ before the foundation of the world to be holy and blameless before Him in love." God the Holy Spirit, Author of the Word of God, says that God has chosen us, placed a calling on us, has set us apart from the world to become a person made new by the Holy Spirit (more of that in verses 13-14) The word "saint", which is also translated in some versions as "holy ones," appears several times in both the Old Testament and New Testament scriptures. It is derived from the Latin version of the word holy as applied to such a person (agnus), translated from the Greek word hagios, which means to be set aside or separated apart from ordinary use to be made sacred or created for a sacred purpose. A calling from God to become a Christ follower, a person who is "in Christ", is a holy calling. It is an invitation into the family of God. You and I who have been called by God to such a holy purpose, are saints made by God.
And there is more to be made aware of in the opening verses of chapter one:
The passage reveals something even more amazing: "He chose us in Christ before the foundation of the world." Before the foundation of the world. That is, before the "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth", God had already determined who would be called. This is referred to as the "doctrine of election" and if you were a regular Bible study attendee you would have heard Mr. James refer to this doctrine a number of times. It is definitely one of those hard sayings in the Bible, but the essence is that God is the One Who Saves, God is the One Who Calls us to be in Christ. This is a recurring theme in chapters 1 and 2 of Ephesians, and in my messages, will likewise be repeated.
Some of you who continue to read this message may be unsettled by what you read, as you have been raised and taught either by those who raised you, or by a minister, or by a religious rite or ritual the very opposite.
We do not, we cannot become a Christian any other way, no matter what anyone says or professes - only God alone can do this. He doesn't need help from us to make that decision. We can't inherit it from mommy and daddy, or from grandma or grandpa, or any other "ancestor". Nor does sainthood - the call to be in Christ - "rub off" on us when we are around a Christ follower; yes, we can be influenced by their example, by their sharing of the Gospel message, but it is ultimately God who chooses to stir the heart of the hearer. We cannot earn it by being "good" which is beyond impossible because we have an inherited sin nature from Adam that is anti-God. We cannot earn it through good-deed-doing; no church or religious person or religious ritual can make us Christian or saved; such activities may be able to point us to God, but they cannot usurp the power of God to save an individual. It is God alone who makes that choice - and it is God alone who has set the time and circumstance of the manifestation of that choice.
Thus, when you really sit and meditate on that tenet, that truth, can you feel the ramifications of what God has done for you and in you, if indeed you are saved, that He pierced all of eternity to choose us out of love?
Well, I can't speak for anyone else, but I'll be honest with you: I often well up with tears and a heart so full of gratitude that it overflows whenever I am hit with that reality!! He chose me - me, a nobody, a "blip on the screen of eternity". I don't deserve even a passing thought by Him. Why can I honestly say that? Because: He is a God so Holy that there are no adjectives created by man to adequately describe Him. And I (along with everyone else) am a sinner that has no inherent right to even step into a space of holiness, or even on the edge of God's shadow. (Kind of like Moses and the burning bush1/: God told Moses to remove his sandals, the identity of his walk or character, because what he was entering was holy space. If Moses had instead arrogantly stepped into that holy space with the uncleansed sinful character he had, we wouldn't even know about him, for he would have been consumed by the fire he was investigating, never to be used in the holy work of liberating the descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob from slavery in Egypt. He would have been a "blip" that immediately disappeared, never to return. But, praise God that He had already ordained Moses for this calling, so that we are here today because he obeyed by the grace of God. Just as God called Moses and planted a faith in him that obeyed the call to approach the bush, God calls us out of the bondage and penalty of sin by endowing us with the faith to respond in obedience so that we can respond by acknowledging His holiness and "take off our sandals" to be used by God.)
As the hymn says, "we are not worthy of all His blessings." yet God in His amazing grace and mercy chose us to be in Christ since before the foundation of the world. This knowledge and awareness of what God has done has to be the most awesome, most serious, solemn and at the same time, the most amazing and joyous thing that ever happened to us. The All-Knowing, All-Seeing, All-Powerful God who lives in the Eternal Present - a time frame we cannot even begin to wrap our brains around - has chosen us to become an heir with Christ - the same Christ Jesus who left heaven, came to earth, lived a life of righteousness, then died as a sacrifice for sin. *More about that later.*
Friends, please do not take this truth lightly. If you know that you are called by God, that you were chosen from before the foundation of the world -- as opposed to mere attraction or feel good vibes of a service, as a social interaction with family or friends, or as a duty to a lifestyle so that you are perceived as a good person by crossing a church threshold -- then please, please grab hold of this awareness, even the miracle of who you and I are and how we became to be in Christ, let it seep deeply, let it be digested into our souls and fill us with all wonderment and awe, fill us with overflowing gratitude, fill us with indescribable joy and peace, and anchor our trust in Him in all things. Mark this page in your Bibles so that you can return to it often, repeat it often, pray it often. May it shape our faith, nurture our love for and in Him, knowing that through Him we have not only eternal life in us in the person of the Holy Spirit, but that we have been gifted the promise of eternal life in the realm where we will see our Savior face to face. Knowing that by His choice of us and the imputed holiness - a holiness that cannot be naturally derived or developed by us, but rather be transferred to us by God - through the Spirit of Christ, we are being sanctified (another word derived from the Greek word hagios), transformed into the image of Christ until we reach the full measure and be "translated" to live in the heavenly places already designated for us.
Friends, let us believe so strongly and feel the promise in our hearts and souls so deeply so that we will be able to see our lives and humanity through a mind set on God. May we consider all our sufferings (for they can be many), all our woes, our troubles, our grief, our pains - while very and sometimes brutally real and sometimes scarring - as a "slight, momentary affliction [that] is producing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all measure," i.e., they are "slight" when compared to the eternal life with Christ in the holy realm and kingdom of God that we will enjoy beyond our earthly journey. What a day of rejoicing that will be! When we all see Jesus as He is! As the Gospel song says echoing scripture, "Don't wait 'til the battle is over: shout now!" Hallelujah!
Next time, what it means to be "holy and blameless", a "faithful saint", and what it means to be "blessed".
1/ See Exodus 3:1-22 for full text of Moses' calling.
