Every Spiritual Blessing: Grace

 Welcome to another episode of the Carpefeide Podcast where if the shoe fits you wear it and if the truth hurts you bear it. I am Justin Gruber and I am Jesse Gruber and today we hope you will seize the faith. Ephesians chapter 1 we're going to get all the way to the end of verse 6 tonight. The end of verse 5 all the way through verse 6. There's covering massive ground week by week in the study of Ephesians. Total of our sermon tonight is every spiritual blessing grace every spiritual blessing grace. We're going to we're going to remind you right off the top before you even start. Ephesians 1 when it begins in verse 4 is ordered as if it's a song as if it's a poem, it's poetry. It's Paul pouring out in song the glory of what God has done in our lives. And so as we engage with Ephesians chapter 1 I'm going to remind you tonight that this is written as a song. And this is the part where if it was like it was a rock ballad, this is the part where the guitar solo would just be screaming. It's like a it's this beautiful section where Paul can control himself. So it's pretty it's pretty awesome. And you'll hopefully see the night why I couldn't just I like I said I had planned to go through the end of verse 6 last week. And I just could not do it. There was too much. President you know going from verse 4 to verse 5 and and then in verse 6 I couldn't combine it all. There was too much awesome stuff to talk about. So this is going to be an awesome time in the words tonight. This is our study in Ephesians entitled Love for the King. And we saw that because we went back into Revelation and saw that just some you know 30 some years later the church of Ephesus was still a looked like a strong church but they had forgotten their first love. And present in Ephesians is this blueprint of the love that they were called by God and their new identity to have for him and for one another. And so love for the King as our study in Ephesians. The first two verses kind of go over our new identity. They they connect us to the fact that we have been saved and called Paul has been called and we have all been called together Jew Gentile together and alike to serve this new God indeed our God in the Scripture. We saw over the past couple of weeks that we have been chosen and adopted before the foundation of the world by God our father our Abba father our pops and this has been good and great news although it has been difficult news to go through. It's been something that we've had to drill down and unpack in the word because these are big theological ideas that have huge ramifications for lives as we live them as followers of God. We saw that is indeed the mark of a Christian to refer to God as father as dad that God assumes that role for us and that though we all have earthly fathers every last one of us when we are in Christ God assumes the role of father or dad or Papa or as I call my dad pops that's who he is and he wants us to see him that way as his children that he has chosen and adopted before anything ever existed. Tonight we're going to look at the tension that grace brings in the Christian life. Grace the greatest gift that we have also brings in with it attention because we in our finiteness are being attached to the infinite God in a very real way and that causes us in our small little brain to not be able to fully understand the magnitude of who God is except that he would reveal it to us in his life. So before we examine the rest of God's actions in our texts tonight it's important to understand the tension that the for taught truth brings with our small in a small finite minds. We've talked about two really big concepts in the scripture that are hard for us to grasp one that we are chosen and in being chosen we are adopted that we are chosen and made blameless and made holy through Christ to be adopted sons into the family of God that we are God's children joint errors with Christ and those those thoughts combining with grace bring a real tension that we have to unpack. We have to understand because what's about to happen in the scriptures is Paul is going to ooze he's going to bellow out in this solo about the grace that we have received from God and what these truths are actually supposed to produce in us and they don't produce in us that thing naturally because in our small minds we start to think about these truths and we don't then open ourselves up to the glory that is present in them. We've looked at this God chose before anything God adopted before anything God did that amen that is the truth in the scriptures there is no way around it is present throughout his word that's what God does with his children but that truth causes the tension before space existed there existed the priest and family of the king of everything. I don't mean just like space I mean literally all of space right the space in this room created by material time it's it all of this and every bit of the galaxies far beyond the galaxies that we can ever hope to see or even understand before any of it God predestined his family that's what God did and because of that truth we suddenly get stuck. In this song we get stuck and it's right as Paul is about to continue unloading all of these spiritual gifts remember every spiritual gift in the heavenly places is ours through Christ in God our father. So the result the result intention for man is to war in our thinking about this particular idea it's a natural thing that happens because we are finite and we are not going to do that. We are finite and we are bent on sin we are focused more so on our earthly man centered kingdom than God's eternal heavenly glory and so we think about these things in the complete wrong way. Here's here's how the the syllogism goes for us in our thinking as men if God has chosen and he has God has chosen then God has not chosen others and that is true. How then can God hold anyone accountable for salvation when he chose who would receive that salvation that's what happens that's what we think that's where we get stuck and it's a real problem because Paul has written a song and we hear part of that song and we press the pause button and we pause it and pause just begun and he's already unpacked these. Deep profound glorious kindnesses from God and we immediately press pause and say wait a second is God just an unfair God is he somehow unkind and cruel why would God do this why is God operating in this way and it are small tiny finite brains. When we pause the song we have completely forgotten why God has done this what God has done and the result that we're supposed to have because of God's actions and you can feel the tension rise we covered four and three quarters versus and we want to pause Paul's song of praise to lodge a formal complaint saying I want to speak to your manager right. I have some concerns with what you have said and Paul's up here like I'm trying to sing these glories to you I'm trying to express to you something that is so infinitely amazing I'm like no no no no no no I have to write this down and put it in the comment box right this is a social media post you blowing it up with how dare you comments. I want us to understand this tension I want to deal with it so that we can sing on with Paul instead of acting like impetuous children throwing a tantrum as we kick our parents legs and so you're new clothes that's what we do. That's what we do and it's been happening for centuries centuries people have argued and fought against this truth and reality in the scriptures until they explain it away in the dumbest dumbest reasoning. And because they do that they fail to be able to continue on in verse five they fail to get to verse six they're not able to receive the result action that is supposed to come from these amazing truths. So how dare he choose. That's what it comes down to we feel that way how dare he choose some and not choose others could he not just choose everyone why wouldn't God just do that. Right that's what that's what we think we struggle with it and our small little brains get wrapped up in that little thought. We completely by the way doing that ignore what the Bible says holistically we just throw it right out because we must be able to know more we must be able to understand this better some sort of chronological snobbery gets in because we think we're so advanced we think we're so advanced because we have access to knowledge but we don't know anything. Alright how dare he choose that's not the right question it's never the right question it's always the question we ask it's the place we get stuck and it is the wrong question to ask every time every time because that's focused on our opinion of what we think God should be. And it it should be focused rather on who God is and when it's focused on who God is holy perfect glorious worthy of all glory and honor and praise the right question becomes how dare he save that's the right question. How dare he choose no how dare he save that's the right question to understand no one is worthy no one is holy we all hate God yet before there was anything he had chosen a family from people who are not worthy of all glory and honor and praise the God. A family from people that hated him how dare he save God saved before the foundation of the world we get so focused on the he predestined us chose us before the foundation of the world and forget that in order for him to choose us he must save us. Because we were dead because we hated him because of sin and so just like the choosing God ordained salvation before the foundation of the world God saved before anything. And it's present in our text we've already read it and we read it so fast we didn't fully comprehend it understand it Ephesians 1 verse 4 says just as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world that we should be what holy and blameless in order for us to be adopted as sons before the foundation of the world God was going to have to make us holy. Holy and blameless because nothing else suffices in God's kingdom but holy and blameless the problem existed the problem existed we were unholy and worthy to be blamed we received blame for what we have done we were unholy and yet God chose us to be holy and blameless salvation. And we were not present before he created this means before there was ever family there was God's family because before there was ever sin there would be salvation. Isn't that amazing? I'll give you more verses because you're like oh that's one verse we've already read that revelation chapter 13 verse 8. So fun to go from Ephesians revelation revelation is 13 verse 8. Here is what we read. And all who dwell on the earth will worship him everyone whose name has not been written from the foundation everyone whose name has not been written from the foundation of the world in the book of life of the lamb who has been slain. When were the names written and not written in the book of life when it's in the verse written from the foundation of the world salvation came before creation second Timothy 1 9. I just want to drive it home I want to make sure we're like very clear on this. Here's what it says who has saved us and called us with a holy calling not according to our works but according to his own purposes and grace which was granted us in Christ Jesus from all eternity. That's important see before there was anything there was only eternity you this is like scientific you understand this we cannot measure time right without space and matter they are they need to exist at the same time space time and matter. Without one you can't have the other and so we were given this holy and blameless salvation in eternity past there's there's no way to quantify when it began because before anything was there was God and before there was anything God chose us unto salvation God made salvation before there was anything else. That's awesome that that is the truly ridiculous unfair thing if you want to map out the right question it is why would God save anyone no one is worthy no one is worthy yet God planned salvation before Adam sinned. The shocking thing is not that the creator made creation for his glory of course he did that is what the creator did God created everything for his glory and that is not shocking in any way it's absolutely what we would understand and expect Romans 9 verses 14 through 15. Paul does a great job express and Romans is this I we were almost we were almost going to do it would have been a Romans for like 70 years Romans 9 14 through 15. Here's what it says what shall we say then there is no injustice with God is there may it never be for he says to Moses I will have mercy on whom I have mercy and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion. There's no injustice in God because God is the only one who could have chosen he is the only one who could have made salvation there was God and eternity past building salvation for his children before he laid the foundation of the earth where we go now verse 20 don't move same chapter verse 20 says on the contrary who are you oh man who answers back to God the thing molded will not say to the molded. Why did you make me like this will it and of course that's true when we draw a picture when we see a child draw a picture the picture does not jump up and complain that it was drawn a certain way does it that's how God created and what God creates doesn't look back at the creator and says how dare you make me this way that's ridiculous we don't think that we don't think that when you make an art and craft you don't think oh man this art and craft probably really feels bad that I made it this way no we made it we're the creator of the craft what kind of ridiculous idea is it to look at God and say how dare you how dare you do that thing why would you do that you must have done it wrong it's ridiculous to think about anybody ever been to Wheaton Village that still exists it still exists yeah my kids went there like we can village it's really like blow the glass and they make the glass and they make the glass and they make the glass and they make the glass that you would want to do that. glass? It would be infallible for us to understand this artistry that happens, which is truly very impressive, to make glass objects, right? That the glass would suddenly rise up against the one who made it. It doesn't make any sense to us. It's ridiculous to think. And yet that is what we do as the creation against God when we read the first part of Ephesians 1. Why does God get to choose? Listen to the sentence. Why does God get to choose? Because no one else could choose. No one else could build salvation. Only God could. Only God could save us. Philippians 2.13. So you can go back to Ephesians and then just flip over another book. For it is God who is at work in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure. Focus on that last part there. Good pleasure. It's going to come back later in Ephesians. It is God who is at work before the foundation in our current time, in history past, in the future. You have to come. God is the one who is at work. God is the one who actually directs the steps of man. God. It is not that we should say how dare he chose. It is crazy that he built salvation for us at all. He didn't need to save anyone. The true scandal is that he chose and made the very salvation that effectuated that choice. That's the scandal. That's the ridiculous scandal that we should struggle to understand that God saved those he chose. That God made a way of salvation for us. John, chapter 1, verses 12 and 13. We'll be in John 1 again later tonight too. John 1, verses 12 to 13. Here's what we read. But as many as received him to them, he gave the right to become children of God, even to those who believe in his name, who were born not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God. God chose and saved and gave us life. That's what God did. We get so struggle, so stuck and struggle with the fact that God chose before the foundation of the world and yet God saved before the foundation of the world. God built his way of salvation before sin. That's the unfair thing because sin is ever present. We struggle with it. I struggle with sin today. Anybody else have sinned today that they struggle with? Yeah. Okay. Good. I'm saying not. I don't want to raise my hand. I get it. I understand. He saved us before anything ever existed. The shocking is not the choosing. It's the adopting, the salvation. We are the thing we hate in every story and yet we treat it as if God is cosmically cruel. It is a great shame to us. Every story we hear has all of the true aspects of the greatest story. God's salvation, heroic redemption, and love of adoption. It just is. It's present in all the stories we love. And yet we, I don't know, I've always found men really react to injustice in books and movies and stories that we hear. And it's natural because we were created in God's image to react to injustice. Those subtle moments in a story where the person who we know is the hero is painted as the villain by the one who's evil, right? Those they well up in us in injustice. We become disturbed at it because we know that's the hero and yet he's being painted as the villain by the guy who's evil. By the one who's the antagonist in the story. Here, here this, Christian, we are the antagonist. We are the one that makes the hero look like the villain. The one who does the injustice is us. We are that one because the hero in the story is God redeeming his people. And we paint him the villain and yet it is that very thing that we have done that he saves us from. We are the ones we hate in every story that we love. That's the truth. That's the reality. I always go back like it's one of those, I don't know why, it's the one that rings the truest. But like Batman as the hero is always painted to be the villain, right? He's the hero we need but not the hero we would choose. That kind of thing, like it's that whole aspect of the Batman story. And he is often blamed for the evil that the other villains are doing in his story. We're the villains. We're not the heroes. We have given all of our sin and evil and the hero has taken it. He has saved us before the world was it ever in existence. Before there was a thing, he took the evil so that we could be chosen. That's the truth of the scripture. That's the reality. And the shame is that we struggle in getting past these first first five and a half versus, right? These first four and three quarters versus. Because right after them is the truth of grace and what it should result in in our lives. The other side of that, that many people have voiced in some way or way or shape as a concern, right? How dare God choose? No, how dare God save? And the next part is then why even share the gospel? Why do we, why do we share the gospel? Why do we tell others about Jesus in the good news? If God has chosen, then he's chosen, right? So what do we do that? Why do we interact with the gospel? Why do we call it the good news? Is it really good news? Yes, it is absolutely good news. It is the only and good and greatest news. The first one, the first reason, and we talked about this a community group last week, so if you're at community group, we already discussed this a little bit. The first reason is simply obedience. Obedience is why we share the gospel. Absolutely. Matthew 28, the Great Commission. So from the words of Christ himself, why do we share the gospel? Because Jesus told us to. We'll start in verse 16 and go to the end. But the 11 disciples proceeded to Galilee, to the mountain which Jesus had designated. And when they saw him, they worshipped him, but some were doubtful. And Jesus came up and spoke to them saying, all authority has been given to me in heaven and on earth. Now, I just want you to take a second. I want you to read that and then understand what we've already covered in Ephesians. Right? Every spiritual blessing from the heavenly places. Chosen and adopted as sons to God in Christ. And now here again, what Jesus has just said, all authority has been given to me in heaven and on earth. How weak do we live? How weak do we actually apply our faith? That same sentence is true for us to understand as we live our lives. As we war against sin, there's that sentence. Every spiritual blessing is yours, child of God, chosen before the foundation, saved, made holy and blameless before creation. All right, I'll go on. Jesus continues on and says, go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I commanded you and low I am with you always even to the end of the age. Obedience. Why do we share the gospel? Because Jesus has told us to. Paul would say, we have been gifted the ministry of reconciliation. Why did God choose us, broken earthen vessels? I don't know, yet he did and so we do. Obedience is number one. But there's also this aspect of the mystery of saving faith that's present in God's word. Now I say the mystery because we don't fully understand it yet we believe it. It is here in the text. Romans chapter 10. Romans 10, we'll look at verses 8 through 17, a good big chunk. Good big chunk. So, so hunger down. Here's what we read. But what does it say? The word is near you in your mouth and in your heart. That is the word of faith which we are preaching. That if you confess with your mouth that Jesus as Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you shall be saved. For with the heart man believed resulting in righteousness and with the mouth he confesses resulting in salvation. For the scripture says, whoever believes in him will not be disappointed. For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek. For the same Lord is Lord of all, abounding in riches for all who call upon him. Forever will call upon the name of the Lord will be saved. How then shall they call upon him in whom they have not believed? And how shall they believe in him, whom they have not heard, and how shall they hear without a preacher? And how shall they preach unless they are sent just as it is written how beautiful are the feet of those who bring glad tidings of good things. However, did not heed the glad tidings for Isaiah says, Lord, who has delivered our report, who has believed, who has believed our report. So faith comes from hearing and hearing by the word of Christ. This is the mystery of salvific faith. And yet it is revealed for us how this tension between he has chosen, he has saved before everything yet if you confess your mouth that Jesus is Lord and you believe in your heart that he has risen from the dead, you shall be saved. Here's the thing. That truth that Jesus Christ is capital L-O-R-D and that Jesus Christ conquered death and rules and reigns at the right hand of the Father is not a truth we wish to accept. It isn't. And only those that God has saved can even understand in grasping. They can even enter into that faith. It is not possible why because we all reject it. We would all reject it if God had not saved us before the foundation of the world. Now the ministry of reconciliation is simple. We are not God. Amen. We have no idea who is in God's family. But one day we will. But because we are not there yet, we obey and share the good news so that those who are even capable because God has saved them before the foundation of the world might confess with their mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in their heart that he has risen from the dead. That's why. That's the truth of the Scripture and the mystery of faith revealed. You are able to accept the faith of salvation because God saved you before anything ever was. We experience salvation not as chosen before the foundation but as being resurrected to new life. That's how we experience salvation. When I was saved, I did not think God has chosen me before everything. I thought I am an evil dead sinner and God has resurrected me to new life. Amen. That's how we experience salvation. That's the joy of the new life of salvation. That is the effectuation of salvific faith produced by God and completed by God. An act of obedience and faith expressed in the actions of enemies turned airs by the revealed mystery of our great enemy turned father. That's what happens. That's the reality. We are sitting here experiencing the salvific faith that God has given us and then warring against the idea that he chose us but we would not be able to engage with the faith of salvation if he had not saved us before the foundation of the earth because we did not live as if God was our father. We lived as if he was our enemy. We did not live as joy and airs of Christ. We lived in war against him and it is that moment where faith is actuated in our lives that we realize God is not enemy. He's dead. It's that moment where we realize I'm not an enemy. I'm a joy in air with Christ. I'm a son of the living one true God. Now that's mysterious and absolutely true. We could not have faith in Christ if God had not saved us before the foundation of the earth. It's not possible and yet we pause, pause song to argue with our dad. That's what we do. It's not new. It's been happening for centuries. Christians with the best of intentions have ward against the truth that God had saved them before he made anything because it's so hard in our small mind to grasp but it's so clear if we just read dad's word. So I want to unpause the song now. I want to I want to having dealt with that reality. I want to unpause the song because in order to get to the result of what it means that God has chosen, adopted and saved us before anything you have to press play again because the result is expressed by Paul in the next verses and Ephesians. So now I got to flip back to Ephesians. All right, let's finish up Ephesians 1 5 C. It says, I'll read the whole verse because it just makes sense. Verse 5, Ephesians 1 verse 5, he predestined us to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ to himself according to the kind intention of his will. According to the kind intention of his will, why did God save you? Why did he predestine you? Why did he choose you? We've talked about it. It's not because we were worthy and it's not because we would ever choose him. It is according to the kind intention of his will. It's the good pleasure of his will. Why did God choose you? Why did he save you? Why did he adopt you? God did so because it was pleasing to him to do so. We spend the whole of a faithful Christian life seeking to please God. Understand Christian. God was pleased to save you. There was pleasure in God to will your salvation. And Colossians 1 19 through 22. This should be commonplace for the ladies, right? Colossians 1. All right, Colossians 1 verses 19 through 22 says this, 4 it was the Father's good pleasure for all the fullness to dwell in him. That's Christ. And through him to reconcile all things to himself. Having made peace through the blood of his cross, through him, I say, whether things on earth or things in heaven, and although you were formerly alienated and hostile in mind, engaged in evil deeds, yet he has now reconciled you in his fleshly body through death in order to present you before him holy and blameless and beyond reproach. God took pleasure in your salvation. Do you see why you don't pause the song to argue with God? Because you miss the joy God was pleased to save me. And all of you that know me would not have. Because you know me. And yet God took pleasure in my salvation. It brought God pleasure that I, by faith, was made holy and blameless. That's amazing. That's crazy. God did all this for his good pleasure. It was good and pleasing to God to will salvation for his children. It is just that simple and it is just that glorious. Before anything in eternity past, in an absolutely uncalculable time where the will of God, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit existed in perfect harmony, in total oneness, and in complete perfection. He was pleased to save us. It brought him pleasure to orchestrate salvation, to will it to be so. We can't understand it. We are too finite to understand it, but that is the truth. We don't understand what it would be like for God, right? Perfect and complete to experience pleasure. Because we only understand pleasure in an earthly, carnal capacity. The glimpses we have into it are those moments of spiritual enlightenment through the power of the Holy Spirit, the truth of his word, and the community of his saints. And those are small glimpses that we get. Yet that is the good pleasure God took when he willed our salvation. That's amazing. And if you pause the song and start arguing with God, you don't understand that he took pleasure in saving you and you were hating him when he took pleasure in doing so. Takes us to the beginning of verse 6, where we experience grace upon grace, the intensely, truly unfair act of grace. It's not fair at all. And yet we receive grace upon grace. If he's in 1 6, just the beginning. I got to turn back because I was in Colossians. Here's what the beginning of verse 6 says. All right, according to the kind intention of his will to the praise of the glory of his grace, which he freely bestowed on us. This whole beginning of the verse is just grace and grace and grace and grace. This whole beginning of the verse is about grace. According to the kind intention, the good pleasure of his will to the praise of the glory of his grace, which he freely bestowed on us. This is where Paul, he's just letting it fly. He is belting out the notes of this song. He's singing deeply and passionately. He can't stop. The whole rest of the chapters is just all of this grace in the plan of salvation that God has gifted to us. He drives it home in this part of the song to the praise of his glorious grace, which he freely bestowed on us. Another way, he's saying, praise his glorious grace, which he begraced us with. That would be a very literal translation of what we read here. Praise his glorious grace, which he freely begraced us with. It's all grace. That's why we don't argue with God. It couldn't be anything other than grace. Like the biblical understanding, mercy. Mercy is the withholding of what you deserve. A person who has guilty of a crime can receive mercy. Once justice is enacted, there can be mercy. We talk about things like mercy without justice, which is impossible. You must first have justice. You are guilty, and then you can receive mercy. You are guilty. You deserve this, but mercy being granted withholds what you deserve. Grace is ridiculous, because it is giving you something you don't deserve. It goes beyond mercy. Mercy is the blood at the cross paying for your sin. The empty tomb is grace upon grace. Not only does God withhold the guilt we deserve, grace goes beyond it and brings us into his family all present before he made anything. Grace upon grace upon grace for his children. And Paul can't stop. Paul is just like, praise his glorious grace, which he graciously graced us with. It's all grace. We don't deserve any of it. We didn't deserve to be chosen. We didn't deserve to be predestined. We didn't deserve to be saved. We didn't deserve to be adopted. All is grace. And Paul here is crescendoing, and he won't stop. He won't stop for the rest of the chart. He's just going to keep going, because how amazing is grace. It is glorious grace that we are graced to receive. It is truly grace upon grace. John chapter 1 again. John chapter 1 will look at verses 14 through 16. Just to be clear, it's all throughout the scripture. We argue with Ephesians and Romans. These concepts are not, they are holistically always what God has been saying. John chapter 1 verses 14 to 16. And the word became flesh and dwelt, tabernacled, lived among us. And we beheld his glory, glory as of the only begotten from the Father full of grace and truth. John bore witness of him and cried out saying, this was he of whom I said, he who comes after me has a higher rank than I for he existed before me. Four of his fullness we have all received and grace upon grace. Jesus was the word. The word was with God. The word was God before there ever was anything. And then he became flesh. And then he dwelt among us. And then we were able to behold him. We were able to see him. And then he lived completely in accordance with the will of God. And then he died and resurrected so that we could understand the fullness of grace upon grace, upon grace upon grace. And in three verses we've gone from before time to salvation in our hearts now. And it's always been that way in the Scripture. There's nothing to war against here. There is nothing for any man save for grace. The final part of Ephesians chapter 1 verse 6. We'll start again according to the kind intention of his will to the praise of the glory of his grace which he freely bestowed on us in the beloved. This last part in the beloved is also the transition. In this next phrase, while Paul begins to transition to his next verse of the song in the beloved. Grace upon grace. Praise his glorious grace because it was his good pleasure to save us in the beloved. All this comes about through the only possible way of salvation. I should have capitalized way there. John 14 verse 6. What does Jesus say? Jesus said to him, I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father but through me. Acts 9-2. The first time we understand what it truly means to be in the way. Acts 9-2. This might feel a little out of context but I want you to hear it. I'll read verse 1-2. Now Saul, Saul, the guy who wrote Ephesians, I mean before he was Paul. Saul still breathing threats and murder against the disciples of the Lord, went to the high priest and asked for letters for him to the synagogues of Eskis so that if he found any belonging to the way, both men and women, he might bring them bound to Jerusalem. Jesus is the way the church followed the way. And there's only one way to the Father through the beloved. In the beloved God has predestined, chosen and saved us before there was anything. Jesus is the beloved of the Father. He draws us back to sinless holiness. Turn to Genesis 1. We're almost done. I know. I promise. I promise we're almost done. Got you doing Bible gymnastics from the back to the front. Literally been in revelations and now we're going to go way back to the first. Genesis 1. Now I'm not going to read all these verses. I'm just going to point out the reality of what's present in them. It's sometimes really hard to get right to the first chapter of Genesis way back at the beginning. All right. Genesis 1. Now present in this verse, 10, 12, 21 and 25, you'll see that as God creates, right? He calls the creation good. He calls it good. But in verse 31, at the culmination of creation, it says, and God saw all that he had made and behold, it was very good. And there was evening and there was morning to six day. Now Jesus is the beloved and he rolls back sin back when there was sinless perfection. Matthew 3.17. Matthew 3.17 and we see Jesus come out of the water of baptism by John. And you hear these words from God, his father. And it immediately makes me think of third John. I can think of nothing more that brings me pleasure than to hear that my children walk in the truth. And then I think of as a dad, it just makes me think of that because I think of it as God the father saying these words about his son. Matthew 3.17 says this, and behold a voice out of the heavens saying, this is my beloved son in whom I am well pleased. Very good. When creation was perfect, it was very good. And it wasn't yet until Jesus, God, took on flesh that anything was truly by God. Very good. He undoes the sin. He rolls it back for us in the beloved, holy, blameless, chosen, adopted, saved before there was anything. Jesus was and is the beloved. He was the way of salvation. He is the air that makes joint heirs. Hebrews 13 verse 20, our last passage. Now the God of peace who brought up from the dead the great shepherd of the sheep through the blood of the eternal covenant, even Jesus our Lord. Eternal covenant. You were saved in the beloved before there was anything. God's covenant through Jesus Christ was eternal. And so in response we must not pause the song. We must sing along with this praise and we must draw others into this praise. Grace upon grace, Christian. You were saved before anything. You were chosen before anything. And when you were saved, you had no idea. This is a clear biblical teaching so that when you are saved, you can know your father chose you before there was anything. And we can celebrate that grace. We can praise that grace. We can rejoice in that grace. And so it's time for response. Yes, repent and turn and then sing of this glorious grace. Because you were chosen, adopted, made holy, made blameless. You were saved in the beloved before you ever were. That's awesome. So let us response with the same praise that Paul has tonight as we pray to our father.