Blessed beyond measure

By Jim Killebrew

[January 16, 2015]  In Ephesians 1:1-14 the Apostle Paul reveals the grace of God in such a beautiful way. The Apostle shares with each of us who read the passage how God bestows upon each of those who accept Him the spiritual blessings that are found by being in Christ. As Christians read and study Paul’s letter to the Christians who lived in Ephesus, they will be blessed by knowing how much God cares for us, even before the creation of the world.

God has blessed us with spiritual blessings. He prepared for our salvation long before the world was created. The plan of redemption was placed in motion in eternity past. At a perfect point in history God’s plan unfolded and redemption was achieved by the very Son of God giving His life as a sacrifice for all mankind. Then in our personal past history beginning with our conversion as we accepted Him in faith, God planned for us to receive the gift of His Holy Spirit. We praise God because we were chosen to take part in His Plan before the world began.

In His sight we are holy and unblemished from within His love. Christ is the unblemished paschal lamb who was the sacrifice for the sins committed by mankind. When we accept Christ as our Lord and Savior we are viewed by God positionally as being in Christ and in turn there will be a time when we become like Christ and will be made without blemish as well.

We have been adopted as His children through Jesus Christ…just because it is God’s will. In the position of adopted children in Christ, we have the full rights of inheriting the gifts that God has made available, not the least of which is eternal life in Him. As part of the family of God we enjoy the benefits that God has offered. Our inheritance is part of the plan of God that was devised by Him before the world began.

Our purpose is to praise Him because He is our Father. We are given God’s grace because of what Jesus His Son has done. Only when we are in Christ and remain in Him will God bestow His grace on us as heirs of salvation. When God sees us He sees the blood of Jesus and the sacrifice of the unblemished lamb that is Jesus.

It is by His Grace that He has given His Son, Jesus so we might have forgiveness. Jesus is the substitute and served as the sacrifice to pay the price of our sin. So it is the blood of Jesus that has bought the redemptive act that saves us; that is the sacrificial death of Christ on the cross. It is by His Grace that He has given His Son, Jesus so we might have forgiveness.

It is through the blood of Jesus that we are redeemed, and all because there is no end to God’s Grace. To sum it up and make sense out of what God has done for us, and to make sense out of what we have when we are in Christ, we must realize that all things in heaven and earth have been given to Jesus Christ, and at the fullness of time He has been exalted and appointed as ruler or head over all things in heaven and earth. Those who have accepted Him and are in Him constitute the church and come under His subjection.

He communicated to us the secret of His will that He had established long before the world began in Christ His Son. When the time is right all things in creation will reach a climax and be led by Christ that includes the way He has it in heaven and on earth. God has claimed us in Christ long before our birth and has given us a purpose that is within His will to accomplish.

When we set our hope on Christ and accept Him in faith because of what He has already done through the shedding of His blood for us, we offer up our praise to Him and become the praise of His glory.

From the time we accepted Christ by hearing the Truth of His gift for us, and we believed through faith in Him, He marked us with a seal of the promised presence of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit in our lives is a down payment toward our inheritance as adopted children, and is paid in full when God redeems us as His possessions and we live eternally with Him to praise Him forever.

[By JIM KILLEBREW]