Redemption Through His Blood

Okay, brothers and sisters, if you would grab a Bible and open with me to Ephesians chapter one. Ephesians chapter one.

Paul did not write the letter. of Ephesians to solve a crisis, or fix a problem, or address a scandal. He wrote the letter to give the church a vision of what she truly is. A messy, broken community that despite its flaws is mysteriously rooted in the life and grace of the triune God. And if you've ever been disillusioned by the church, and let's be honest, who hasn't, then Ephesians is for you.

If you've ever been tempted to walk away from the faith, Ephesians is for you. And if you're still here in this beautiful mess called the church, the book of Ephesians is for you. Last week, we learned from Paul who's writing in AD 60 from prison in Rome that God has blessed, chosen, and adopted us, not because of who we are, but because of who He is.

And we learned that if God's choice of you is not based upon your performance, then it is not threatened by your failures. Amen. And this week Paul takes us deeper into this mystery by showing us that God's plan isn't just about fixing you. It's about fixing everything through Jesus. And so if you're willing and able.

Stand with me as we read from Ephesians chapter 1, verses 3 through 14. This is one sentence in Greek, and we are going in our teaching to focus just on verses 7 through 10 today. Please give your attention to it. It is given to you in love. 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.

Even as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before Him. In love, He predestined us for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of His will, to the praise of His glorious grace with which He has blessed us in the beloved. In Him we have redemption through His blood.

The forgiveness of our trespasses according to the riches of His grace, which He lavished upon us in all wisdom and insight, making known to us the mystery of His will according to His purpose, which He set forth in Christ as a plan for the fullness of time to unite all things in Him, things in heaven and things on earth.

In Him, we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to the purpose of Him who works all things according to the counsel of His will, so that we who were the first to hope in Christ might be to the praise of His glory. In Him, you also, when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and believed in Him.

We're sealed with the promised Holy Spirit who is the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it to the praise of His glory. The grass withers and the flowers fade, but God's Word stands forever. This is the Word of the Lord. Thanks be to God. You may be seated. Father, would you take your word now and would you change us by it?

Would you make us more and more into the image of your son? Would you convict? Would you deepen our joy? Would you prepare our hearts to come to this, your table? We pray in Jesus name, amen.

Have you ever started to clean up a mess only to realize the mess went much, much deeper than you first expected? I would take that as a yes. You know what, some of you have experienced this recently in your house with mold. Others of you, you go to fix a faucet and you realize that underneath the water there's wood rot and the damage is much, much deeper than you first thought.

And this is true not only in household maintenance, isn't it? It's also true, have you seen it? In your relationships, in the brokenness of the world around you. This mess that you thought you might be able to fix by reconciling with a brother or sister, by going to them to have a brief conversation and finding out, whoa, the hurt goes far deeper than you first expected.

And we think, why is it that the mess always seems to go deeper than we imagine? It's not just that the mess is around us, it's that the mess is inside us. The regrets we carry, the mistakes we've made, the things we wish we could undo, the brokenness that we can't fix. And so we're left wondering, what do we do with this mess?

Can it ever really be made right? And sometimes the church herself is actually part of that mess. Now, we know that this church, the church, is supposed to be this amazing place of grace and healing and hope, but so many times and so often it just seems like the church is just another broken institution, divided, distracted, disappointing.

Paul, friends, understood this. In Ephesians 7 through 10, he points us to God's much bigger picture, his eternal plan for his church. And Paul says, you want to know what God is up to? It's breathtaking. As we've mentioned these last several weeks, Ephesians 1, 3 to 14 is the longest grammatical sentence.

There are other places in the Bible, in the genealogies of the Gospels, where you'll find a longer, uh, list of clauses linked together. But this is the longest grammatical sentence in all of the New Testament. It's like Paul just starts to write, Blessed be God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. And then his pen just takes a life of its own as he says, Look at all that you've been given.

You have been chosen. You have been called. You have been adopted. And then today he takes us even deeper into that mystery. He's not just transforming you. He's transforming the world into something beautiful. In your life, your struggles, even the brokenness of the world around you, it is all a part of the bigger story that God is writing.

He is redeeming His people together through the blood of Jesus. He is pouring out the riches of His grace upon you and all creation, and He is restoring everything in heaven and earth under the Lordship of Christ. And so we see three truths from these verses in verse 7 through 10 to show us how the riches of God's grace change everything.

First, you see that the restoration of Your redemption is through His blood. Your redemption is through His blood. You see the riches of His grace, and you see the restoration of all things. And here's the sermon in a sentence. God's plan isn't just about fixing you. It's about fixing everything through Jesus.

And I wonder if your gospel's big enough to take that in. Let's look at these three points together. First, your redemption is through His blood. Notice what the text says. Paul writes, in Him, we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses. Redemption. That's a word that we hear in church a lot, but we don't often hear it outside of church.

You might see it in the movies where a hero who's on the outs tries to redeem himself. You might see it in marketing when you buy something online and it says, do you want to redeem the coupon? For Paul, in Paul's world, redemption wasn't just a metaphor. It was a legal and it was an economic term. It meant to pay a ransom, to free a slave, or to cancel a crushing debt.

When Paul writes, in him we have redemption, he's saying, he is saying something profound. He is saying, as one who is in prison in Rome, he is saying, you want to know something? Meaning every single one of us is enslaved, locked up to sin, to guilt, and to death. And the problem isn't just on the outside, the problem is on the inside.

And the only way to be free is for someone to purchase your ransom. And so he shows us that redemption means freedom at a cost. Through his blood, he writes. In the ancient world, freedom always came with a price. A slave could only be redeemed by someone who paid a ransom, and for us, the cost was nothing less than the blood of Christ.

In Greek, you see this little word, dia, D I A, which means through. It is the means through which we are redeemed. In Greek, Paul uses this word apolatrosis, to ransom. It literally means to buy back from the slave market. And Paul doesn't just say we are redeemed, but he also tells us how. He says we are redeemed through his blood.

The redemption of things is strewn all throughout the Old Testament. You think back to the Exodus. Think about the night of the Passover. What were they called to do? They weren't to just strangle the lamb. They were to slaughter the lamb. They slit its throat and they took the blood of the lamb and they put it over the door post.

Through the blood of the lamb, the avenger of judgment passed over the houses of the Israelites and took the firstborn of those who didn't have the blood over the door posts of their home. And it would have been easy for John the Baptist when he sees Jesus to pull from any other picture of Jesus. He could have said, here comes the wonderful counselor.

Here comes the king of kings. Here comes the prince of peace. Here comes the suffering servant. But no, what does John say in John 1 29? He says, behold, the lamb of God. who takes away the sins of the world, as just to point us, even as the Passover does, to Jesus, who purchased His church with His blood.

Hallelujah. Jesus didn't pay part of your ransom. He paid all of it on the cross. Tetelestai. When He said, it is finished, He meant it.

And not only does redemption come at a cost, but redemption brings more than that. It brings forgiveness. In Greek, this next clause is an apposition. In Him we have been redeemed through His blood. And almost as though to define or to clarify or to say it another way, He says the forgiveness of our trespasses.

You're not just purchased at a cost, but you are made clean. You are made free from the power of sin. Your record is clean. To be, to be a trespasser, you see, you know, some of you, some of you have put up trespassing signs on your property. Some of you who see trespassing signs from your property to others.

To trespass means to step over the line. It means to step in territory that is not yours. It means to cross over into something that That you are not supposed to be in. That's what it means in Greek too, to trespass, to step over the line of what it means to be human. You become inhuman when you sin. It was not the way God designed you.

And Jesus on the cross said, there's good news because when he died for you on the cross, he didn't just break your chains. He didn't just free you, but he erased your guilt. And forgiveness means that God is not holding your sin against you anymore. And the Reformed theologian Hermann Bavink says that the forgiveness of sins is not only the renewal, the removal, the renewal of your nature, the removal of your guilt, but it is the restoration of fellowship with your father.

And I wonder if some of you know that. Do you know the intimacy of your father? You have been made not only free, but you have been made clean through the blood of the lamb. But how many of us still live as though we're chained to our past? I know, you know, intellectually. I know, you know, theologically. I know some of you even feel it often at times,

but you still live in the slave market. But here's the truth, in Christ, your past no longer defines you. Your sin no longer condemns you. Why? Because Jesus carried it to the cross. Your debt is paid. Your chains are gone. You are free and you are clean. And so what does that mean for us? It means that we are called to stop living like a slave.

Quit living in the slave market, y'all. You're free. I know it feels impossible to ask their forgiveness, but you can do it because you're no longer under the power of sin. Its presence, yes, will be with us until glory, but you are no longer under the power of sin. It means that you don't have to keep trying to earn God's love.

Quit acting like you're still in chains. Your forgiveness is already yours in Christ. Not only should you stop living in the slave market, acting like a slave, but you should rest in the finality of your forgiveness. Every sin, past, present, and future has been dealt with on the cross. When he said it is finished, he meant it.

And we ought to be amazed at grace. Redemption, like it led Paul, should lead us to worship. When you realize the price that Jesus paid and the grace you've received, it changes everything. Oh, brothers and sisters, you have been bought with a price. Therefore glorify God in your body and in your decisions Monday through Sunday.

The thousand little decisions that you make, you do so as a slave that's freed. I want you to imagine, and if you've ever known somebody who's been in prison, I want you to go talk to them. What is it like the first week they're out? The sense of freedom they feel is unbelievable. It can be disorienting.

And so many of you have been freed. You've been cut loose.

Quit living in the slave market and run to your freedom. But there's more. Paul goes on to show us that the basis of his unfolding plan is the riches of his grace. According, look at the text, to the riches of his grace, which he lavished upon us in all wisdom and insight. Paul doesn't stop at redemption.

He takes us deeper into the heart of the gospel. He shows us the basis of it. God's grace is the basis of your foundation. He calls it the riches of His grace. The word for riches, plautos, means that it's an overflowing and inexhaustible wealth. And what is grace? Grace is God's undeserved, unearned, unconditional love and favor.

It is God giving you what you don't deserve. It is God meeting you where you are, but refusing to leave you there. Paul says that He has lavished us with the riches of His grace. He isn't stingy. He lavishes you with it. Imagine a cold morning, Imagine that we are together, and we don't have this place to keep the wind off our back.

And imagine that Jesus pulls up, and you just have truckloads of diesel, and He pours it on the wood, and He lights the fire, and you think the fire is going to go out, and Jesus goes, no, look down the street, 76th Street, you can't even see the endless supply of diesel trucks that are ready to keep you warm.

And if we were all in that place, In this field next door, without that building, we'd be huddled as close as we could get to that fire to stay warm. And Jesus says, My grace is like that. I have lined up, I have lavished you with diesel truck of diesel truck of behind diesel truck of grace to keep the fire of my grace alive.

Flaming for you, come draw near to it. Don't be fearful of grace. It would be asinine. It would make no sense for you to go try to survive in this weather without coming near to the fire of my grace. And so also, oh Christian, don't feel like once you become a Christian you got grace to get in. You have to have grace to survive.

And you draw near to that fire. Again and again and again, He lavishes you with the riches of His grace. The great theologian Bono, the lead singer of U2, said it this way, Grace, she takes the shame,

takes the blame, covers your shame. Removes the stain. Grace makes beauty out of ugly things. God doesn't just want to give you enough grace to get by. He floods your life with it. You want to know a good, hey teenagers, you want to start a rock band in town? You want to know a good name for a rock band?

Blood and Grace. Through the blood is your redemption and He has lavished you with the riches. Oh, the riches of His grace, blood and grace go together. He didn't just take your place on death row. He didn't just free you through His blood and He didn't just lavish you with grace, but He invited you into His family.

He gives you His name, He gives you His inheritance, and He gives you all the privileges of being His child. That is amazing grace, hallelujah. Do you know it? Because he says that he gives this grace to you with all wisdom and insight. God's grace isn't reckless or random. It is not pork barrel spending grace.

He gives it with intentionality. He knows exactly where it goes. And he says, I give it to you, O my church, for my glory. Every act of grace in your life is part of his wise, loving, holy plan to make you more like Jesus. And so what are you to do with this grace? Stop living like you're spiritually bankrupt.

Don't be fearful that the diesel fuel on the fire to keep you warm is gonna run out. Jesus has got truckloads of truckloads of grace. He's gonna keep giving it to you. You have the riches of God's grace. Rest in it. Let grace transform you. Grace isn't just something that you receive. It is something that frees you to be gracious to others.

And when you realize how much God has lavished upon you, it changes how you live and how you love. It causes you to walk with integrity, to be held accountable. It causes you men to be To sign up for Ironman groups so that brothers are in your life and in your face, loving you, caring for you. Because as Dallas Willard said, grace is opposed to earning, but it's not opposed to effort.

And you are called to walk in holiness and righteousness and justice according to His law. Why? Because He's given you grace. And so therefore, though grace is not opposed, it is opposed to earning it. Your effort is expected. So you show me somebody who is fat cat spiritually, grace. Maybe sin so that grace may abound.

Paul says in Greek, agonote, by no means. You show me somebody who is living, striving to live a holy life in light of grace, and I'll show you somebody who understands how he has been lavished with it. Grace changes. Everything, right?

And it doesn't just change everything, it's more than enough. Let grace amaze you, let it change you, let it free you. Because number three, the restoration of all things is coming in Christ. Verse 9 and 10, making known to us the mystery of his will according to his purpose which he set forth in Christ as a plan, he's got a plan, for the fullness of time to unite all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth.

Paul lifts our eyes from the personal me, me, me, me, me, us, us, us, us, us church to the cosmic. And he says redemption and grace aren't the end of the story, they're part of something much bigger. His ultimate plan is to restore everything in heaven and on earth under the lordship of Christ. And Paul calls this the mystery of his will.

In scripture a mystery isn't something that's hidden forever, it is something that was once previously concealed that now has been revealed, the mysterion. And for centuries, Paul, God's plan was hinted at through the prophecies of the Old Testament. And now it has been revealed in Christ. And Paul says in Colossians 1, 26 and 27, the mysteries hidden for ages now revealed to his saints, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory.

And Paul adds that this plan unfolds in the fullness of time, which means all of history is moving with intentionality toward a linear, climactic event, a moment when everything will be made new. Notice Paul doesn't say some things. He doesn't say a few things. He says all things. Not just people, but all creation.

Isn't that amazing? The gospel isn't just about saving individual souls. It is about the restoration of the entire cosmos. Does your gospel, is it big enough to conceive of that? Jesus intended his resurrection not to merely be a consolation to his disciples, but a restoration of all creation, as if to shout to the world, in him we will get it all back.

In new and unimaginable degrees of glory and joy, He will bring to fruition all of the restoration of creation to His covenant people for His glory. Paul says his plan is to unite all things in Him, not just to ensure that you go to heaven when you die. And the Greek word for unite comes from the Greek word to be the head.

It means to tie everything back into the head, to bring together everything under one head, a final restoration. And right now the world is just fractured by sin and relationships are broken and creation has grown into divisions run deep. But in Christ, God is not just redeeming his people, but he is putting everything back together.

Hallelujah. Think of a shattered vase. You possibly, you can't put it back together. Broken relationships, political divisions, divisions in your family. Jesus is taking those things

and He's making something beautiful out of it. We live in the already but not yet of this restoration. Jesus is reigning now. But the fullness of His kingdom is still to come. That's why we pray in the Lord's Prayer, your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. J. I. Packer said that God's purpose is to redeem not only His creation, not only the individual, but also His creation.

And His purpose is not just to replace His creation, but to redeem every aspect of it. Paul's point here is it's not just about saving individual souls. His gospel even goes bigger in the redemption of all of the world. So what does it mean for us? It means, number one, you are to live with hope. No matter how broken the world seems or feels, God is making all things new and you can rest and trust in His plan.

And number two, you can join the restoration effort. You ever wanted to be part of a movement? Well, the Apostle Paul says, giddy up. Here we go. Because it's not just those who place their faith in Jesus. Through the power of the Holy Spirit in the church, God is redeeming all of the cosmos. And this is the bigger picture of the gospel.

He's redeemed us through Christ. He's revealed his plan to us in Christ, and now he's restoring all things in Christ. And that's the story we are living in, and that is the story we are to carry out into the world. And in closing, let me just say that that is also the story that you long for, isn't it? God has given us a love letter in Scripture that tells us that he has redeemed us through his blood.

That He has bought us back, that He has lavished upon us the riches of His grace, and that He is restoring all things in Christ. Does this not leave you lost in wonder, love, and praise?

The way the Ephesians might have originally heard this letter might have even been more personal than the way that we read it in English today. And I want you to imagine. I want you to imagine the way it might have sounded to the Ephesians when they first heard this letter read to them. It might have sounded something like this, Dear John, Quentin, Will, Shanda, Alice, Chris, Janice, Ben, Augie, Scarlet, Since before the foundation of the world God His plan for the redemption of all things is greater than you could see right now, but he longs for us to trust that he is weaving your story beautifully into his, even when the threads feel tangled or frayed.

You may not yet see the beauty of the pattern of the ups and downs, but He does. And it's as though He says to us, every joy, every ache, every question is being stitched together in my love. And I will not cut corners on my glory or on your good. I love you too much to let any harm come to you. When you smiled after passing that class, I was there, delighting in your joy.

When you were accepted into that school, I celebrated with you. When you met your spouse, I smiled because I knew how your story was unfolding, and at your wedding, my spirit hovered close, whispering my blessing over your vows. But I know that there have been shadows, too.

I didn't explain the miscarriages to you. the way that you wanted me to, but I was with you in every tear, holding you closer than you could feel. I didn't answer all of your questions when your parents were taken from you so early, but in your grief, I never left you. I didn't answer every question about your child or your grandchild's sickness, but I appreciated your anger, your prayers, and your tears.

I held you close. I know being adopted felt confusing, and it was my love that brought you into a family. When your children walked away from the faith, I heard every prayer that you prayed for them, and I have continued my quiet work in their hearts, even when you couldn't see it, even if you don't believe it.

And when you cried out to me about losing the job that you depended upon, I was sitting beside you absorbing your emotion and that desperation cry in the car, in the parking lot, in those moments of guilt, even in those moments of shame, I've been with you, holding you together, lavishing you with grace.

And here's what I want you to know, my child. I'm not in a hurry. I am not rushing your growth or your healing or your understanding my ways are not your ways I am making you into something eternal Something beautiful something glorious something more like my son, and I am doing the same for those around you who trust in me In the silence you couldn't understand and when you you were surrounded by Others to carry your grief and even when you didn't recognize it as my care.

I was there whispering you are chosen You are adopted. You are mine. This is one reason why I've given you this church. To show you the larger story that you can't yet see. To immerse you in my covenant rescuing love. Together you are being shaped into a holy, set apart, counter cultural community for the common good.

To be a foretaste of my kingdom to the world. So, rest, my friend, my beloved. You don't have to understand it all right now, just let me lavish you with the riches of my grace. Until you see it all, trust me. Walk with me and my people. Don't pull away. Lean in. Let my spirit work in you and through you and through this church to hold you into the joys, into the questions, and into the wonder.

You will be thankful. That it all played out the way that it does. In fact, in the end, you'll be grateful it didn't happen any other way. Through every high and every low, I am making everything new.

So what is God doing in you this morning? He is redeeming you and His people through the blood of Christ. He is lavishing you with the riches of His grace. And He is restoring all things in heaven and earth. under the Lordship of Jesus. That's the story we're living in. That's your story.

That's the good news. God's plan isn't just about fixing you. It's about fixing everything through Jesus. Amen. Let's pray.

Father, to you who are able to do abundantly more than we could ever ask or think according to the power that is at work within us. To you be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations forever and ever. And take the works of our hands, take our tithes and offerings. Take the thousand decisions that we make this week, and would you use them, weave them.

Thank you that you have called us since before the dawn of time. You know every second of our life, and you whisper over us, you are chosen, adopted, and you are mine, and may we rest in your lavishing grace as your people in this church. And may we run to you, knowing that our identity is fixed in the heavens.

Mystery of mystery, glory hallelujah, amen.  

Transcript is computer generated.