September 14, 2020
(Ephesians 1:3-6) Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ: According as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before him in love: Having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself, according to the good pleasure of his will, To the praise of the glory of his grace, wherein he hath made us accepted in the beloved.
With God as our heavenly Father and his son the Lord Jesus Christ as our Savior, we have been blessed with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ. Our problem is that we want our blessings in the here and now. We think God should give us all blessings now and even though God does bless our lives immensely in this life it is nothing to compare with all those spiritual blessings we have prepared for us in heavenly places. If we were to receive all our blessings in this life they would only be temporal, however all of those spiritual blessing in heavenly places in Christ are eternal. (2 Corinthians 4:18) While we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen: for the things which are seen are temporal; but the things which are not seen are eternal.
We are unable to see all of those spiritual blessings right now because they are eternal, but if we have faith, we will see them one day.
(1 Corinthians 2:9) But as it is written, Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him.
(1 Corinthians 13:12) For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known.
I would like to point out 3 blessings that I see in our text this morning:
- He hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world
- Having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself
- He hath made us accepted in the beloved
I don’t have space enough in this short morning devotional to fully deal with all of these, but as Bro. Ray has said, the Bible is inexhaustible. In other words, we can never grasp it all in one lifetime. But as we think about the blessing that we have been chosen by God before the foundation of the world, I am reminded that Jesus was the lamb that was slain from the foundation of the world (Rev. 13:8). God was thinking about us before he ever spoke this world into existence and desired that we all be saved from our sins, so he prepared a lamb to pay our sin debt, the Lord Jesus Christ. WHAT A BLESSING!!
Secondly, we have been predestinated unto the adoption by Jesus Christ. This means that the very moment we received Jesus as our personal savior, we were predestined to be adopted into the family of God. This does not mean that it had already been decided when we came into this world that we would be saved or lost, but once we did make the free will choice to accept what Jesus did for us on Calvary and call upon him for salvation, at that moment we became predestined to receive the adoption into the family of God. Now we are adopted sons and daughters of the living God. WHAT A BLESSING!!
As a result of this adoption, we have been accepted in the beloved. This is different than a natural born child. We had no choice as to what we were receiving while we waited for our children to be delivered. We just accepted whatever the Lord gave us. But when parents adopt a child, they already know what they are getting before the adoption is made official. God knew that he was not getting anything special when he adopted me, but he did it anyway and now I have been accepted in the beloved. One of man’s greatest desires is to simply be accepted. Children want to be accepted by their parents, men want to be accepted by their wives and wives want to be accepted by their husbands. But the greatest acceptance we have ever received was that day when God accepted us in the beloved. We don’t have to feel like a second rate child because we are now the sons and daughters of God. (1 John 3:2) Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is. WHAT A BLESSING!!
These spiritual blessings are almost too good to be true, but brothers and sister they are true and one day soon we’ll be walking on a street of gold and touring the city of God looking all around at all of these spiritual blessings that we have received. AMEN!!!
Bro. Rick
