Ephesians Part 1

The Apostle Paul writes as a Jewish apostle to a mixed community of Jews and Gentiles, articulating a vision that is both continuous with the story of Israel, and radically expansive in its scope. He begins with the language of unity in Messiah, as speaking to a family: “our,” “us,” and “we.” This is a reference to God the Father and the Lord Jesus Messiah, in whom believers are sealed with the Holy Spirit (Eph. 1:13). Give a listen!

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SPEAKER_00 0:17

Welcome to the Messiah in Life Podcast, hosted by Bishop Justin D. Elwell of Restoration Fellowship International and Messiah Congregation, recorded at our congregational home in Washington Mills, New York. In this study through Paul's epistle to the Ephesians, we invite you to rediscover the beauty of God's covenant purposes revealed in Messiah Jesus. Together, we will explore the theological and covenantal foundations of Paul's letter. It's called Unity, Holiness, Redemption, and Covenant Identity for both Jew and Gentile in Messiah. This is more than a theological study. It is an invitation to see the story of Scripture as one unified testimony of the Lord's faithfulness from Israel to the nations, all brought together in Messiah. Thank you for joining us as we seek to live Messiah in everyday life. And now to Bishop Justin.

SPEAKER_01 1:21

Okay, today we are beginning our study of Ephesians. I might try to, if I can get through this particular planned section of notes. I'll probably try to do two weeks on each chapter so that we'll kind of go through follow the same pattern we did in James. There's a lot to this. It's an important, an important epistle. It's a very important epistle. So we're going to begin, obviously, in chapter one. Then I'll do a little bit of background. But as I'm going through the reading, I'll read all the way through verse 14 and I'll explain why in just a moment. But as I'm going through, I'm going to hit some highlights, tell you to underline some things so that as you read on your own, you'll learn to spot what Paul is articulating here. Beginning in chapter 1 and verse 1, Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ, Shua Messiah, by the will of God. By the will of God will be repeated at least three times in these first opening verses. To the saints, the Kidishim, the Hagios, who are in Ephesus and are faithful in Christ Jesus. Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ. That's an important phrase, in him, in Christ, with every spiritual blessing in heavenly places. Even as he chose us, underline us in him before the foundation of the world. See, that's not a singular um idea. This crosses Paul, it crosses John, that we, underline we, should be holy and blameless before him. In love, he predestined us. There again, us, plural, for adoption to himself as sons through Christ Jesus, according 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, excuse me, 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 and Messiah 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 excuse me, so that we who have 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, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit, with the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it, the praise of his glory. This is God's word. When we look at these first 14 verses, particularly verses 3 through 14, what we're seeing here is one long sentence in Greek. Obviously, in English, we can't, unless we're you know Faulkner, we really can't uh construct it that way. But it's one long, we might call it doxology. And in this, he reveals Father, Son, and Spirit. We see uh blessed be the God and Father, and then of course, um in verse five, he transitions to Yeshua, to Jesus. And then in verses 13 and 14, we shift to the Holy Spirit. So how Father, Son, and Spirit are working through redemption, bringing the fullness of the plan of God that has been from the beginning. And it's important to note how he is using language. Ephesus, of course. Well, let me put that as a thought aside just for a moment. That goes to more of the history that I want to cover. But why do we study this particular epistle at this time? Well, it's always a good time to study Ephesians, but in our congregation as well, we have so many new people coming in. Um, what is the heart of our theology? Well, the heart of our theology, we might say, we find in Ephesians. It's probably the most direct um articulation of it. And as we go through this book over the next several weeks, you'll begin to see how what Paul writes here, we try to, as closely as we can, as faithfully as we can, live that out in a congregational setting. So this is really the most unifying epistle because Paul is speaking to a very diverse city. He's speaking into Ephesus, of course, and he's writing this from uh home confinement from Rome. That is a very important point as you read this text. He's writing this from house confinement. And why was he confined? It goes years back when he was accused of bringing a Greek into the precincts of the temple beyond where a Gentile could pass. That was the accusation. Of course, we know that wasn't a true accusation, but it was an accusation that led him to this place in Rome where he is in house confinement, and he writes this beautiful articulation of the unity of Jew and Gentile in Messiah and how that has been working through the ages, how the Lord has been working this mystery together through the gospel, through the cross. And now he is speaking, and there's there's a few points that I'll touch on in a few moments, but he is speaking when he uses the language of chosenness or election as we read it here. He's not Calvinistic in his thinking. He's not looking ahead and saying, I'm gonna agree with that great theologian in Geneva. He is using language that is consistent with the language of the Hebrew Bible, of the chosenness of Abraham, of the chosenness of Israel, and how he is working together in healing humanity. The calling of Abraham comes right after the judgment at the Tower of Babel. When the nations are divided, okay, all of the name all of the peoples who are working together with one tongue, one language, they are divided. Traditionally, we say that is divided into 70 languages. But now through the gospel, and particularly when you look at um the outpouring of the Spirit in Acts chapter 2, when we see the apostles speaking in other tongues and being recognized, we're seeing how the Lord is healing the judgment that he brought in order to reconcile humanity to himself. So Paul immediately uses the language of chosenness to speak to people who do not have that frame of reference. He doesn't have to write to Jews about being chosen, he has to write to Gentiles and say, Listen, you Gentiles were not an addition later on. The Lord didn't say, Oh, you know what I'm gonna do? At the house of Cornelius, when Peter stepped to the door, he didn't, you know what I'm gonna do? It just came to me now. It's uh it just I have a revelation. It just came to me now. No, this is what he has been working toward, and he will glorify himself through it. So Paul uses the language of we, of us, and he speaks in the plural, using pearl pronouns to speak to both Jews and Gentiles in this very diverse city, who are there in the heart of one of the most important trade centers, which also has the temple of Artemis. Artemis, you know, is a daughter of Zeus in Greek mythology, uh, akin to Diana, also the sister of Apollos, if memory uh serves. And her temple there was considered one of the seven wonders of the ancient world. And of course, that name now comes up as we sent, you know, apparently people around the moon. So, you know, I'm not very thrilled when we send, you know, on a rocket art, you know, anyway, I'll leave that aside. But Paul is speaking into this very diverse city, and he is speaking one truth about how each person, and I've said this before if you're born again Irish, you don't stop being Irish. You glorify the Lord through your Irish identity now in Messiah, and you can do that with every identity. You don't stop being who you were unless you're Jewish. If you're Jewish, you gotta become a goy. That's the law. Never mind, it'll it'll it'll make sense in the synagogue. Um but you you don't stop being the people group that you were or are. Rather, you're glorifying the Lord through it because he's calling you from that place to glorify himself, that the gospel is reaching these people, this people. And that is an important point. That's why Paul is using the language that he is. And uh, let me move along, otherwise, I'm gonna sit on this point for hours. Um again, Jewish believers that he he identifies here in a very in a very beautiful way. Um let me see here, it was right here. He speaks about those who first believed. And he's speaking of the remnant at the time of Jewish people who have believed and have received the Messiah. Because in the Messiah, all of the prophetic expectation is full. It is to him that every prophet was speaking and directing and pointing. And then he beautifully brings the fullness of the gospel to those who believe from the nations as well, and he brings this unity, this vision of unity that is only possible through the working of the Holy Spirit.

unknown 12:53

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 12:54

So Jewish believers carried with, he didn't have to, quite often you can you can give a shorthand, you know. Um, so as Paul is unpacking this theology, he didn't have to go through the history of the Tanakh or the Hebrew Bible in order for the for the Jewish people coming to faith to understand what he's talking about. But for those who did not have this advantage, they didn't have the advantage of the Torah, they didn't have the advantage of the covenant identity of being a covenant people, he has to unpack it in a certain way that they would now understand. Paul talks about the advantages in Romans, Romans 3 and Romans 9, the advantages and the gifts that the Lord has given to the Jewish people, the oracles of God, Messiah after the flesh, and so on. And then he says in Romans 11, uh, verse, what is it, 29, the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable. Now that he did not write to churchmen originally, he wrote that to the Jewish people. And he unpacks that statement to help people understand that as for the sake of the gospel, most translations say, enemies, it's estranged. It's a marriage that is right now strained and estranged, but for but for the calling of God, they're beloved because of the fathers. So here we are uh with Gentile believers who have come from pagan religious traditions, and one of the things he has to help them understand, how do we how do we bring our worship at the temple of Artemis into our gathering for Messiah? How do we do this? Well, we don't do this, right? You leave those things behind. So he's helping them to understand who they are, and that it wasn't, again, it's not accidental. They were known and chosen before the foundation of the world, when their names were written to the Lamb's book of life. So Gentile believers coming into the faith should never believe that they were an afterthought, or that they do not have a place at the table, or that they are not welcomed. Remember, in the synagogue, God fears, which was uh someone who had not begun the process, or maybe they didn't want to begin the process of formal uh conversion, had to be in the back. You could participate, but it was from the back. In the temple, in the holy temple, we know this because, excuse me, of archaeological evidence. I shouldn't have had lunch before we did this. Um, we know that there was a sign that you know any Gentile uh caught beyond this can be punishable, you know, be punishable by death. So you could only go so far into the court of the Gentiles. And Paul has to, as he's gonna speak about, he's he has to help them theologically tear down those walls because that's what Messiah is doing, and what he has done. So the accusation against Paul that leads him to that house arrest in Rome, which leads him to write this epistle to the Ephesians, it's it's not just a theological afterthought, it is the undertone. He's writing from ch from prison. His theology leads him to being in chains. His theology, he puts his theology, you know, he puts the he puts his money where his mouth is. At any time he could have said, you know what, I've had it with this uh, you know, gospel thing. I'm just gonna go back to being a Jew, yada yada, let me go. But he sees this all the way through, and of course, tradition tells us that you know he and Peter met just before they were executed in Rome. But he sees this dividing wall and he writes from a place where he was set because of that supposed dividing wall. So when they accused him in the temple, it wasn't just um it wasn't just a procedural accusation. They were pointing out that those people do not belong, even though those people were actually just other Jewish believers. But they were pointing out to Paul's theology, the broader theology of the gospel that Paul teaches. They don't belong. Don't try to make them belong. They they're not one of us. And that's what that's the accusation that led him to where he was. And that is the background for this, and that is why there is such beauty and such depth in this epistle, because Paul is contending against not just Jewish objections or Jewish uh prejudice against the nations, but also the nation's prejudice against the Jewish people. Look what we're seeing in Brooklyn, New York right now. In our own streets, right? This is what so this these things we're seeing prophecy literally unfold on our phones, right? And our on our televisions. So Paul's imprisonment isn't incidental, it's an imperative. We have to read it or interpret it, we have to read it in that lens. Because the boundary markers between cultures was so severe that he has to point this out, he has to write against this, and he has to show the unity that we actually have in Messiah. So at its core, Ephesians is a letter of reconciliation, uh, cosmic reconciliation. When Paul uses this beautiful language of placing all things under his feet or to unite all things in him, things on heaven, things in earth. That's not just poetry. It is literally everything in creation being brought into subjection to Messiah under the kingship of Messiah. So Jews and Gentiles being brought together in this one humanity do not lose their distinctives. Paul talks about that in Corinthians, 1 Corinthians 7. But there is a new identity of a one new humanity, because in that one new humanity, the Lord is being glorified. He is being glorified. That in spite of our, that's what the whole Acts 15 Council speaks to ultimately, that in spite of our differences, we're going to lay aside our specific distinctions in order to come together in unity to glorify the Lord. So it's a radical reconstitution of identity. Our first and primary identity is found in Him, not apart from Him, but in Him. That is primarily who we are. But of course, then we find ourselves within our cultural or hereditary identity, but also within our nationalistic identity of who we are as a nation, a people. References that work here, and trust me, don't work there. So we we have to speak within the context that we find ourselves. So we find as we look at the layout of this book, chapters one through three, we might say is what the Lord has done. The divine plan of salvation, emphasizing the Lord's eternal purpose to unite all things in Messiah, including the full inclusion of Gentiles as fellow heirs, joint heirs. Chapters 4 through 6. We have what is our response? How do we respond to the work of the Lord? So the practical outworking of all of that unity, calling believers to walk in humility, love, and mutual submission as one body. That's what our response is. To what he has done, this is how we respond. And it's non-negotiable. It's not negotiable. We either come in line with the stream of his will or we are out of order. And I don't say that to uh but for judgment's sake, but for the sake of glorifying our messiah. How did Messiah say that the that the world would know that the that that the Father has sent him by our love for each other, by our unity? That's how he knows. But what does the world immediately, those outside the church, what do they immediately do? Look at all your divisions, look at all your denominations. There's 10 million denominations and all these exaggerated numbers. They immediately go to our divisiveness, not to our unity. You know, so we have to we have to be very prayerful about that. So what the Lord has done, what he has done, not what you have done. That will lead us into the beautiful articulation of salvation. Ephesians 2, uh 8 through 10. What he has done. And then ultimately what our response is. Our response is not according to social convention, not according to what we want our preferences to be honored by or how. It is entirely based on what he has done and what he expects of us. Again, that'll lead to a radically different perspective. And I can tell you, the ultra-conservatives won't be happy, the ultra-liberals won't be happy. Nobody is happy in this. Nobody. Because it speaks against every convention that we have. So Paul's language dismantles all of the former categories that we have. As you know, as he says in Galatians, there's neither Jew nor Gentile, slave nor free, male nor female. Obviously, they we still have those categories. But there's no social advantage. Why? Because men, we mattered. Women, you didn't. Slaves didn't matter. Free mattered. Jew mattered. Gentile didn't. Everybody thought that this is this is my advantage. I'm a male. Hallelujah. I'm gonna be saved more than that female over there. That was the idea. And Paul says, no, all of the none of that matters. You're all we are all saved the same way. So he changes the terms as we look through this letter from strangers, aliens, far off. We see that in chapter two. You were strangers, you were far off from, and then he begins to use the language of citizens, household, temple. Why? Because that's one is language of disconnection, one is language of connection. Once you were disconnected, now you're connected. Once you were far off, now you are brought near. So he's speaking into a fractured world, but also a fractured congregation because of the dynamic. And we we see this today as well. This is not just something of antiquity. You have entire movements fractured because of some type of social distinction or some type of political distinction or some type of uh preferential distinction that honestly has very little, if anything, to do with the gospel. Right? Really not much to do with the gospel. So Paul doesn't write as some distant Ivory Tower theologian, he's writing where he has no freedom, according to man. But yet he is still free and Messiah. He writes as an apostle, but he is in chains. You know, he's under house arrest. So he's not writing as a distant theologian, he's writing as a pastor, he's writing as an apostle. And he embodies the very message, uh, the suffering that his message brings to him. So his vision is unmistakable. In Messiah, the dividing lines that once defined human identity are not just softened, they are decisively overcome. And if you can get your mind around that, a lot of the arguments that we have today begin to fade away. So it's an important introduction, this little you know historical sketch that we have, but to move into actual talk, uh I'm actually doing that bad on time, so that's good. Um to go back to the text now. What we're seeing in chapter one, he starts out with this incredible doxology, and it's a glorification of the Lord, and as I said, it's uninterrupted. He doesn't bring it, he doesn't bring it to a conclusion until verse 14. Period. Right? And it's all the glorification of Father, Son, and Spirit, the work that each aspect of the Godhead is doing. How are they working together in unity to bring about this divine plan? So he's he's revealing this to us in an incredible fashion. So the apostle um he writes as a Jewish apostle, right? He is a Jewish apostle. And he's writing to this mixed community of Jews and Gentiles. Now, how do you bring two together as one? That's the whole Acts 15 uh argument. Now, part of the when we think of um this book in its entirety, how do we kind of date it? How do we understand it? You know, when we think of the Acts 15 Council, Galatians speaks directly. I'm of the opinion that that was immediately before the council. And this would be, you know, he doesn't reference it. It was, I think, definitively kind of following after that. Um so he's speaking into this mixed community and he's articulating this vision in a way that is continuous with the story of Israel. Okay, it's not a separate story, it's the story of the covenant people of God radically expanding in scope. Now, to understand that, you have to go back to the Ere of Rav of Exodus, the mixed multitude that came out with Israel. And this week in Borsha uh Barmidbar, we have um the counting, one of the one of the accountings of the children of Israel. So when we think of the Erevrov, the mixed multitude who exited, that's who were these were the slaves from other nations. Where did they go? Did they go out in the camp and well, here are the twelve tribes, the Lord at the center, and then the Erevrov is out, you know, a quarter mile down the road. No, they became part of the family, they were mixed in with the family, they become, they become one people, and that is you know an important backdrop here as he is unpacking this theology. Again, he's he is seeing this unity of the Lord's called people coming together in one camp. So he begins with the language of unity, he speaks in the language of family, us, our, we, and then he uh concludes with this we were sealed in him, were 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. Beautiful language there. We'll get there in just a moment. So again, Paul introduces himself as an apostle by the will of God, not his will. He was happy being a pot uh being a prosecutor. He was fine. He was he was probably well paid. He got to travel, see the world, beat the heck out of people. He was good. He got to live in Jerusalem, he got to socialize with a high priest, he was fine. And then the Lord interrupted his life, right? And made it even better with shipwrecks, beatings, stonings, snake bites, arrests, ultimately, you know, it went it went radically uphill from there. Um so it's not just a claim to a title, it's a prophetic vocation, really, is what Paul is is engaging in here. This prophetic vocation. And he understands his calling to be, again, divinely initiated and covenantally grounded. He begins that to understand to unpack that in this way. When we look at the phrase to saints who are in Ephesus and are faithful in Messiah Yeshua, this has to be heard through a Jewish lens. To the Kiddishim. There's a portion called Kiddushim, holy ones, right? So those who are, let me just kind of amplify this in this way, to the saints, to the set apart who are in Ephesus and who are uh emunaying, who are faithful, right? It's just emuna, it's faith. They're faithing in Messiah Yeshua to uh grace to you and peace. So the action of grace that is moving, be a peace from that, be be be well, be whole here. So saints again is echoing Israel's identity as a holy people, being set apart. When you are set apart, you're set apart from and to. So we're set apart from humanity to the Lord. Now, not to separate from humanity, but to work among humanity, so we can be both separate but in the midst of without being, uh, Lord willing, uh unduly influenced or um contaminated, we might even say. But this is identity that is unique to Israel, and he's saying it to this mixed body of believers who are now one in Messiah. So it's not just they who are holy, it's all of you who are holy. So he's extending that uh Israel's calling to a community now composed of both Jews and Gentiles. So it's critical. The ecclesia, the outcalled, is not a replacement of Israel, but participation in Israel's covenant calling now opened to all the nations through Messiah. Okay, that's a very important point. Ecclesia to be called out. But where are you called out to? So the announcer would go through the streets and call out to assemble. Where did you ex do where did you assemble at the synagogue? At the synagogue, the place of assembly. So the outcalled assembled together. We didn't assemble apart, right? That's an important point because a lot of people today, because of church hurt, it's not Christ hurt, it's church hurt. Did you see that? You know, it's hurt that we do among each other that we need to repent of and be forgiven for. But we assemble together. He didn't call a bunch of wayward sheep, he didn't call a bunch of, you know, a bunch of us to be wayward sheep, I should say, or a bunch of us to be lone wolves. No, that's not anybody's calling. We're called into one body. So the reconciliation, you know, all of the nation, you know, the nations and Jewish people coming together is for uh the reconciliation of humanity through Messiah. Let me move on to verse 3 and then on a little bit from there. Blessed be, this is the language of Bracha, this is the language of Jewish prayer. Blessed be, we say, you know, uh Baruch every week, right? You hear it probably a dozen or more times. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Yeshua, Messiah, Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ and Messiah, with every spiritual blessing in heavenly places. So Paul's using this very familiar Jewish form, uh construction of Jewish prayer. So it's the it's a it's a beginning formula. There are hundreds and hundreds of prayers that um begin with Baruch. So it but it's a blessing that is now reframed in light of uh Messiah. So blessed is uh uh God is blessed because he has acted decisively in Messiah, not indecisively, to bestow every spiritual blessing in heavenly places. That is not abstract language, I'll get to that in just a moment. So heavenly heavenly places is the language, it's really the eschatological language of the temple. So it's the prophetic view of the end that the temple is supposed to realize in image. So where heaven and earth meet is is the vision of what the holy temple is supposed to be. So when Paul talks about uh with every spiritual blessing in heavenly places or to unite all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth, he's speaking in prophetic language that is consistent with the prophets of Israel. And it all comes to full in Messiah, as the author of Hebrews tells us, our great high priest. So there is an earthly temple, but there is a greater temple. There is an earthly priesthood, but there is a greater uh priesthood. There is an earthly Moses, but there is a greater Moses. There is an earthly uh high priest, but there's a greater high priest, and so on. Oh, you've heard of angels, because angel worship at this time was a thing, unfortunately, and it went on for centuries and centuries. Oh, you're into angels? Guess what? We have one who's greater than the angels. So everything that we think of or hold in high regard, Messiah is greater than. So in the Second Temple period, it was a worldview. This idea of heavenly places was a worldview that connected the things that we do here with. Finally got that piece of lettuce out of there. Sorry. Um, I had salad for lunch. I shouldn't eat healthy, that's the bottom line. That's how I'm that's how I'm receiving this. Don't eat healthy, is what I'm receiving. There is a lesson in that. So it connects what we do here with things in heavenly places. That's you know, that's what where we need to expand our vision of what we do when we come together. We're not just singing praise songs here, we're singing praise songs with the angels. We're singing praise songs with heaven. When we pray for someone, we're not just praying for someone here, we're praying for them in heavenly places. When we um, you know, do a doxology. We don't really do doxologies too much. I mean, well, um Kaddish kind of sort of is technically a doxology. Um, but when we do a doxology, we're standing with the witnesses, the cloud of witnesses praising. So it's connect, it connects not just what we do here with each other, but it connects us with glory. And I think that's one thing that we lose when in in the Christian tradition, because the Christian tradition, by and large, in the last hundred years, has demystified, actually, last 500 years, has demystified because that can you can go too far into that, but we've taken the majesty of what we're doing out of it. I think we need to return some of that to its proper place. So, what the what the Lord has done in Messiah is both cosmic and covenantal, both cosmic and covenantal. It's not just what he has done for me personally. American Western, actually, just the American version of the gospel as it spread to the world has emphasized, over-emphasized, I'd even say, individual salvation rather than the corporate salvation that we have, because we're all being, we're going to be ultimately saved and first the dead in Christ will rise, and then we who are alive will be transformed in the meeting, you know. We will be all ultimately see the fullness of the salvation together. Corporately. You're not going to be able to say, Um, hold on, Jesus, I know you're coming right now, but I don't want to be saved, all these people. I'm going to go over there and I'll wait till you're done with them, because I'm so special. No, we understand it personally, but you still have to understand it corporately. And I think that corporate aspect of it uh is downplayed a little bit too much. So, four through six, even as he chose us, that there's the language of choosing or election in him before the foundation of the world. You have to connect that. We go back to Moses interceding on Israel's behalf, blot my name out of the book you have written. Not that you will write, but you have written. Here before the foundation of the earth, the Lamb who was slain before the foundation of the world. We those who were written in the Lamb's book of life before the foundation of the world. So your your response, and I know it gets all kinds of, it gets technical, but it's the doctrine of assurance that you've responded to the wooing of the Holy Spirit as He brings you to Christ, to Messiah. It's not something of your own imagination, it's not something of your own choosing. He chose you, you do not choose him, and he brings you to himself. That is not an afterthought, it's an assurance. Paul is assuring those who have come to faith the Messiah that even though you were not born into this covenant family, just as they need to be born again into this covenant family in John 3, you were born again into this covenant family. So you are just as much a part of it as Peter, as Paul, as James, as John. Just as much as they are a part of this, you are a part of this. And that should give encouragement to know that you're part of the family. You know, we treat people, whether you're quote, members on paper here or not, we treat you as family. So we put you to work. We make you clean up after yourselves. See, you don't want to be treated as this isn't the Olive Garden, but we we do put you to work. And we treat you like family. Yeah, it reminds me of the Big Bang theory of the show, you know, when they're talking to Sheldon about the Olive Garden. And they say, Well, you they treat you like family. He says, Yeah, I wish they wouldn't do that. Somebody's foam. So he's speaking again in chosenness, as I said, here's the language of Israel. He chose Abraham, he chose Israel, he chose Zion, and now he is choosing you. You are also a place where he is making his name dwell. Alright? It's alright. We we we won't throw you out, we'll just put it in your record. You have to realize when you start attending services here at Messiah, your records that they talked about, that permanent record, goes into my office. So I have them, if you're wondering. So the Lord has chosen Abraham, the Lord has chosen Israel, the Lord has chosen Zion, the Lord has chosen you. The Lord chooses people, places, things, seasons, and you're part of that choice that He's making. So from a Messian and Jewish perspective, when we look at this, election is uh fundamentally corporate in Messiah. It is, because it's copying the archetype that we find among the tribes of Israel, although personal, personally entered into by faith, right? It's uh in Messiah, it's not apart from him. There is no salvation outside of Yeshua. None. It doesn't matter what the religious system is, it doesn't matter how good someone may be. Heaven and and salvation uh are not based on goodness, they're not based on our merit. So no matter how good we might be according to our own evaluation or someone else's evaluation, look at Messiah means Messiah, why do you call me good? Now it's not that Messiah had any evil or any sin in him, but he's pointing the direction for us. He's pointing us again to the Father. And we'll get into that a little bit more later on. So I've already covered before the foundation of the world, and this is always part of a larger eternal purpose. So adoption also carries the covenant resonance, and we might say. This is the language of Israel, this is the language of the covenant. Uh, he predestined us. Now look at listen to this. He doesn't say he predestined me. He's saying he predestined us. So he's speaking to everyone who's hearing this for adoption to himself as sons. And of course, Paul goes into that in great depth in Romans 8, as sons. Now, sons, daughters, sons are it shares shares a root with the idea of stones. Okay, so it's the building up of is is kind of the building up of the house, the living stones. So all of this language has some subtlety to it that if you kind of understand the derivation of some of the terminology, you can see how the apostles spoke with one unified theology. It's kind of beautiful. Through Yeshua, Messiah, according to the purpose of his will. The purpose of his will. So Israel is called God's son. Right? It's not only the vision of the bride, he's all Israel is also a son. Again, we are sons and daughters of the Lord, but we're also the bride and Messiah. We are free, but yet we are also slaves. It's all of that, oh, he needs to use all of that language for us to understand who we are. I'm a prince in the house of the Lord, hallelujah. I'm not going to scrub those toilets. That's beneath me. Praise the Lord. No, if you are a son of the house, you're a servant of the house. If you are an inheritor of the house, you're sharing the inheritance. What is the sharing of the inheritance? The sharing of the message of the gospel. I think we were talking about that at the men's group this morning. We have really good conversations at the men's group. Sorry, ladies. Of course, I have no idea what you guys talk about. I have no idea what you guys talk about, but I did hear it was good. It was about integrity. I got that message like five minutes after you were done, which was wonderful. Heard it was really good. Actually led to a really good conversation. Uh sonship. But he's including the nations in this. So he's taken a term that is definitively connected and pointed to Israel, and he is connecting it to the body of Messiah. But he doesn't erase Israel. That's an important point. But he's speaking about Gentiles being brought into the covenant family of God. Let's read seven through ten again. In him we have redemption through his blood. Through my blood? No. Through your blood? No. Through his blood. The forgiveness of our trespasses. You have to go back to the sacrifices and look at the specific uh dynamic of that. According to the riches of his grace, it wasn't how you brought the sacrifice, it wasn't what you did, it wasn't how perfect you are. It is the richness of his grace now working in you. Now I wish I'm going to insert this here, but I wish we would stop self-condemning. It's the riches of his grace working in us. It doesn't somehow get replaced by our worthiness a later day. Um according to the riches of his grace, which he lavished. He wasn't stingy. He wasn't gracious to me, and only a little bit to you. He only got a little peppering of it. And I got a waterfall. No, he lavished his grace on all of us. In all wisdom. He knew what he was doing. An insight, making known to us what? The mystery of his will. What is the mystery of his will? The gospel. According to his purpose, which he has set forth in Messiah as a plan for the fullness of time. See, this is eschatological language here. To unite all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth. So the language is unmistakably exodus-shaped, deliverance-shaped, redemption, the geulah. Takes us back to the exodus from Egypt, Passover, the covenant renewal, and so on. All of this is given. But now Paul is showing us that there is a greater exodus. That is the exodus from the greater Pharaoh, who is the devil himself from the kingdom of darkness, the Exodus by death, sharing in the death and the resurrection of Messiah. Once you die in Christ, I wish people would understand this. Once you die in Christ, every covenantal tie is broken. You don't have to break any more after that. They're all broken. Is my prayer after you're born again more powerful than the blood of the Lamb? Please don't give me that heresy. Every covenantal tie is broken in Christ. You just have to get up and walk it out. I'm probably going to get mail for that. But there's a greater exodus in Messiah. We have died in him. Now, any connection, any legal connection that the devil may try to know, we're dead. Those covenants, those connections, they're gone. To unite. So it's there's a cosmic uh the redemption is not just political or national, it's cosmic, is what Paul is uh emphasizing here. To unite all things, some things, all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth. That is the the vision of the great um renewal of creation. So this reflects, of course, that uh prophetic and eschatological vision of the prophets of all things being renewed under the Lord's reign. So the story of Israel is brought in Messiah to its fullness. So in him, it must be phone day for this study, and now my phone's going off. So 11 and 12, in him, I'm gonna try to try to make it to the end here, in him we have obtained an inheritance, having been what? Predestined according to the purpose of his will, who works all things according to the counsel of his will, so that we who were first, uh who were the first to hope in Christ, the Messiah, he's talking about the Jewish people, might be the praise of his glory. In him, you also, now he includes the Gentiles, when you heard the word of the truth, the gospel of your salvation, and believed in him, you were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit, who is the guarantee of our inheritance, our inheritance, not my inheritance, our inheritance, until we acquire possession of it through the praise of his glory. So this is the language of inheritance, the language of covenant, the language is beyond just the language of land or the language of promise that is uh terrestrial in nature. It's identity, it's part of the identity of God's covenant people that brings us to this full uh incredible vision that we see in Revelation 7 and verse 9, where people uh where the body of Messiah is there assembled from every tribe, every tongue, every people, every nation. Why? That is the renewed humanity, the bride of Messiah being brought before and presented to him, that he would then pitch his tent over his bride and bring us into the marital chamber. So what Paul is saying here in Romans he says to the Jew first and also the Greek. It's consistent language, uh so that we who were the first to hope in Christ, that was the Jewish people. In him you also, to the Jew and to the Greek. Now, why does he say Greek? I think uh it says Gentile or something in some translation. But remember, the Greeks were the archetypal enemy of the Jewish people. They represented you can, you know, the you be executed if you practice the Torah, if you if you were if you faith unto the Lord, if you practice Shabbat, if you practice circumcision, if you did anything that was given as command of the Lord in the Torah, you would be killed. And the Greeks did what? Antiochus Epiphanes did what? He went into the holy temple and presented himself as God. Right? And so there he is as a Greek, he is embodying the very Antichrist, or you know, that would set itself against all things that are holy, right, and good. So when we think about how he is using this language, uh, to the Jew first and also to the Greek, if a Greek can be saved, anybody can be saved. So he goes beyond just the Gentile. That was the question of the day. How is a Gentile saved? You know what the question of today is in the gospel in most theological circles? How are Jews saved? That's the question. It's reversed. It's reversed, that's the question. So the Messiah, both Jews and Gentiles receive the same inheritance, it's not a separate one, it's the same. So sealed by the Holy Spirit, and we'll kind of bring this to a conclusion here. Paul turns explicitly to Gentiles and he says, You also. You also. So this is the covenant reality, the hearing they've heard and they've trusted. They've heard and they've trusted in the gospel. So the seal, of course, of the Holy Spirit echoes several Jewish themes. The spirit promised by the prophets, Ezekiel 36, the renewed, the renewed spirit that would be in us. We'll talk about that in our Zoom discussion on the Holy Spirit. But to show the connection, to show the relationship between Father, Son, and Spirit, particularly in what I'm thinking about here, sometimes we have the Holy Spirit, he's also the comforter, the spirit of truth. And sometimes he is the spirit of the Messiah. Because the ministry of the Holy Spirit is to tell us about the Messiah. The Holy Spirit never talks about himself. He talks about Messiah. He reminds us of what he said. He continually leads us on to Messiah. As our paraclete, he comes alongside of us to lead us to Messiah. So the the seal of the Holy Spirit, the seal that's here upon our heart, we might say, right? Is the mark that we belong to God. So what happens when you were when the devil didn't care when you were dead in your trespasses and sins?

SPEAKER_02 54:19

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 54:19

He's one of us. He'll get himself and all he'll just keep going down and you know. But then when you were born again, he said, Well, let's see. Let's see how born again they are. Let me set a snare, let me set the bait of Satan here and see if he'll take the bait. The old nature, which is living in this flesh, still says, Oh, that looks pretty good over there. Let me see. Let me taste and see that it is okay. And Satan's going, Oh, you're making my job easier. Thank you very much. But you know, that seal is important. Just as we have the name of the Lord upon us, the seal of the Holy Spirit is upon us. And that seal is, of course, it goes to it goes to the very image of the seal that we have in Revelation. That it is sealed and it is to be opened at a particular time, right? So the seal tells us that a particular time when we are we are um transformed in the twinkling of an eye and of the eye, right? And we are caught up in the air and all of the imagery of that moment of his return, when we are brought to him, when that seal is opened and we are made one in him, it's bringing all of that imagery together in such a marvelous way. But it becomes the guarantee, the Arabon, the the down payment that we're his. And I said this before. We were bought with a price, we are not our own. Right? So sometimes, no matter how much we might kick or scream, I don't like this, I don't like that, the Lord says, I will do with you according to my will. I will do you with you according to my wisdom, I will do with you according to my insight, because your life serves a greater purpose than your life. You're living faithfully even in the midst of that valley. The promise of Psalm 23 is though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will feel no evil. For why? Because I'm all by myself. No, for you're with me. So in the valley, he's there. He's not separated, he's not away from. I had a conversation with a friend, he said, you know, I just don't feel God. I said, Well, scripture disagrees with you. He doesn't care if you feel him or not, he's there. People don't like to hear that because we want to make it a censure just exclusively based on what we feel at the moment. Look at your emotions, genuine. Okay, not yours. Let's look at someone's else's emotions. Would you trust their emotions? Probably not. Yeah, yeah, you're all trying to think, well, maybe not. No, maybe yes, I don't know. But this guarantees, it's a guarantee to the end, and a guarantee from the end on. So this is not a departure from Israel's hope, it's the fulfillment. And remember, you know, every time the nations praise the Lord, every time they lift up praise, every time the the uh faithful and messiah lift their voices unto the Lord, it is a a sign that the end has come. The end is now in motion. That all peoples, because the Torah has gone out from Jerusalem, and guess what? The announcement of the Torah from Jerusalem will bring people back to Jerusalem. Now, the the Jerusalem to which we will all return is that renewed Jerusalem. But the word has gone out, and the word is coming back too. And what should it do? It should provoke jealousy. Why? Because the the the riveres, for your sake, they are estranged from the gospel. They say, you know what, I want to be reconciled with my husband. I want to be reconciled with my covenant, Lord. Why? Because they see other people being blessed. Jealousy. So the spirit of uh the spirit is the sign that the age to come has begun. And that Gentiles are now fully brought into the covenant promises alongside of Israel and Messiah. And we'll talk about that towards the end of this book. So the gospel does not erase Israel from the Lord's covenant, uh, from the Lord's redemptive history, heaven forbid. It fulfills and expands the calling. It fulfills and expands as he begins the reconciliation of all humanity. See, unity in Messiah doesn't mean uniformity. You all did not show up today in this color shirt with this color pair of pants, wearing my shoes. So you clearly you're all in error, right? So it the unity that we have in Messiah doesn't mean uniformity. We're not all going to look the same, we're not all going to have the same, you know, cultural indicators. Um, but we are still united in him. And it's a beautiful thing. It glorifies him. It doesn't glorify us, it glorifies him. But it's a shared covenant identity. It's a shared covenant identity. So our identity is rooted not in ethnicity alone, but it's not detached from biblical history either. It's anchored in the Lord's faithfulness to his promises. So Paul writes as a prisoner, to wrap this up for my uh sake of the podcast. But his vision, he's writing this as a prisoner, but his vision is anything but confined. He might be locked in that room or in that apartment. People might be coming and going, but his vision is beyond that space. He is seeing things in the spirit that are far beyond us. The Lord is showing, the Lord is showing him a vision of what is to be that gives him faith, the encouragement, the integrity to see the mission to the end. And I know it's not biblical for us. I think of that moment, you know, the tradition tells us that Peter and Paul embraced when they were both on their way to their execution. I know that's not biblical history, I know it's tradition, but I think it's absolutely beautiful. Because we have the apostle to the Jews and the apostle to the Gentiles coming together at that one moment before they go in to receive their reward, right? And I think it's it's it's it's a beautiful vision for us to imagine and to hold on. So he sees a people chosen, redeemed, sealed of the nations and of the Jewish people, and not as isolated individuals, but covenant community being formed into one new humanity. What do we what is the kind of uh subtitle for Messiah Congregation? If you look on some of our literature that we publish or on our website, you'll see a one new man community. That's not easy. It would be easy just to be a church, it'd be easy just to be a Messianic Jewish synagogue. But to try to work these things together, a little bit, you know, that's why I'm a little crazy. It's alright. That's why I've got a few letters after my name. That really help, honestly. And we were doing this before I had the letters anyway. So uh this is the beauty, and I and I hope to unpack this for you guys as we move forward in a way that really shows the heart of Paul. This is this is we think of the theological um beauty and depth and richness and glory that he reveals in Romans. But if we want to know what congregational living among the faithful should be, what we are, who we are, it's Ephesians. You know, it's the beauty of Ephesians. So, Lord willing, uh, we will get and reveal that beauty in the days to come. Amen.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:31

Amen. Thank you for studying with us, and until our next episode, may the Lord bless and keep you all in the mighty name of Jesus, amen.