The Food That Lasts Forever

[This is the text of the message shared today during worship with the people and friends of Living Water Lutheran Church in Centerville, Ohio. Below that is a video of the day's worship service. God bless you.]

John 6:22-35

According to Jesus in today’s Gospel lesson, there are two kinds of foods. There is food that spoils and food that lasts forever.

Both kinds of foods are gifts from God. 

In the Lord’s Prayer, Jesus teaches to pray in the fourth petition for “our daily bread.” (Matthew 6:11) In The Small Catechism, Martin Luther explains, “God indeed gives daily bread to all, even unbelievers, without our prayer, but we pray in this petition that He would help us to recognize this so that we would receive our daily bread with thanksgiving.” 

Luther then goes on to explain what “daily bread” is: “[It]...includes everything required to meet our earthly needs, such as food, drink, clothing, home, property, employment, necessities…” and so on. 

In other words, in the Lord's Prayer, Jesus tells us to pray and thank God for the “food,” the “daily bread,” that we need to be sustained in this life. 

But, of course, all of this kind of “food” spoils or dies or runs out. 

Back when God’s ancient people Israel were in the wilderness between their time of slavery in Egypt from which God freed them to their entry into the land God promised them, God gave them manna, a bread-like food. The people were limited in how much manna they were to gather each day, an amount God calculated to keep them all healthy and well. But when some of them, apparently reasoning that they were free people who ought to be able to do whatever they wanted, gathered more than their allotment, the manna rotted and filled up with maggots.

It’s not wise to put too much faith in earthly food that spoils. 

I once heard the true story of a man who became extremely successful. But in centering his life on more than daily bread, he was destroying his marriage and family. His wife delivered an ultimatum: Find a different way to live or she and the kids would leave. Chastened, the man quit his job, cashed in his stocks, and moved his family to a place next to Lake Michigan. There was a little marina there that he and his family could run together. The marina was purchased and at first, all seemed to go well for the man and his family. The family got away often for sailing trips or getaways. 

But then, the man began to consider the "potential" in their little business. Soon, he sprang into action. He bought more lakeside property and expanded the marina, then put in a luxury hotel and a dockside mall. The place, no longer a family business, consumed him as he continued his pursuit of “the food that spoils.” His wife and kids left. About a year later, a visitor told him, “You must be so proud of all this.” But the man replied, “Every time I look at it, it makes me sick to my stomach.” Within a year, he was dead from a heart attack.

Today’s gospel lesson, John 6:22-35, occurs right after John’s account of Jesus feeding the 5000. According to John, the fed crowd wanted to make Jesus a king. But Jesus didn’t come into the world to be the kind of king who marches to the demands of self-centered mobs. 

So, while the disciples took off on a boat across the sea, Jesus went to a mountain to pray. Eventually, though, Jesus reconnects with the disciples and the crowd finds Jesus. Jesus knows their game. “Very truly I tell you,” Jesus says, “you are looking for me, not because you saw the signs I performed but because you ate the loaves and had your fill.” (John 6:26) 

Signs is the word Jesus used to describe His miracles; they were signs that pointed to Jesus being God the Son, the One in Whom we must believe in order to have forgiveness of sin and eternal life with God. 

That’s why Jesus tells them, “Do not work for food that spoils, but for food that endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you. For on him God the Father has placed his seal of approval.” (John 6:27) 

“Here you are,” Jesus seems to say, “tearing around the countryside, wearing yourselves out, to get your bellies filled with food that spoils, when I’ve come to give you food that never gives out!” 

Folks, what are you wearing yourself out for today? 

Are you wearing yourself out to get God’s approval or the approval of others so that you can get the things of this world you crave?

That’s where the crowd was at. After hearing Jesus’ promise of “food that endures for eternal life,” they ask Jesus, “What must we do to do the works God requires?” (John 6:28) In other words, they wonder what work they have to do to earn God’s favor? Do they have to be in worship every Sunday for a year? Do they have to give to the poor, tithe to the church, bring twenty people to the Lord, pick up groceries for a neighbor, take an elderly person to the doctor? What’s the key, they wonder, that will open up God’s storehouse for them? 

Jesus’ answer is stunning: “The work of God is this: to believe in the one he has sent.” (John 6:29) 

There is nothing we can do, there is nothing we must do, to receive the food that lasts for all eternity. 

The food that never spoils is a gift from God that we receive only by faith in Christ.

It all seems too good to be true to the crowd. And so, clutching for their self-respect and their desire to be their own gods, they ask Jesus what sign He can give them to prove His authority to say this. 

Seeming to forget that He’s just fed them with five fish and two loaves of bread, they recall that in Moses’ day, their ancestors had been fed on manna. They attribute this miracle to Moses rather than to God. Jesus corrects them, reminding them that the manna, the food that spoiled, actually came from God and then points out, “For the bread of God is the bread that comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.” (John 6:33)

Back in John 4, when Jesus met a Samaritan woman by a well, He promised that, the living water He gives would mean that those who received it would never give out. "Indeed," He says, "the water I give [to people] will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.” (John 4:14) The woman, not fully understanding what Jesus meant, exclaimed, “Sir, give me this water so that I won’t get thirsty and have to keep coming here to draw water.” (John 4:15) Now, the crowd tells Jesus, “Sir...always give us this bread.” (John 6:34)

And Jesus says: “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never go hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty.” (John 6:35) 

Martin Luther writes of this passage:

"Out of the mass of powerful words in the holy Scripture there is almost no stronger word that Christ is a bread and meal given by God, and that whoever eats this bread lives forever and becomes content, no longer hungering or thirsting. . . . 

"It is a settled point that here in this chapter the Lord is speaking about spiritual food, for he himself explains it as the hunger and thirst of the soul. The soul wants to live forever, to not be cursed, to have a merciful God, to be able to stand before the wrath and judgment of God, to not be condemned by sin and the law or go to hell. Those are the soul’s desires. It is a spiritual thirst and hunger, for which we need a spiritual meal and drink. And so the Holy Spirit comes and says, 'If you do not want to die or be damned, then come to Christ, believe in him and cling to him. Eat this spiritual meal, believe in Christ, that is the most important thing.'”

Friends, we are born imprisoned to the sin, death, and darkness that comes from the devil, the world, and our sinful selves. As a result, like the crowd in today’s gospel lesson, most people in this world spend their lives thinking about what they can get by works, by wheeling and dealing, by shrewdness, or by theft from God, if they believe there is a God, or from the world.

Jesus is telling us today, quit your tearing around and wearing yourself out. If you’re doing a single good work because you think it will make God love you more, favor you more, forgive you more, or give you more, STOP IT! 

If you’re doing any of it to gain the compliments of good people that you think God will count in your favor, STOP IT RIGHT NOW! As God says through the prophet Isaiah, all our righteous deeds--or what we think are righteous deeds--are filthy rags in the sight of God! 

And, by all means, stop living your life simply to gain more of the stuff that this dying universe can give you, stuff that will do you no good when you meet God face to face on the day of judgment. 

Instead, turn to Jesus daily, trust in Him, call on Him even when your faith is weak, and He will save you. 

He will feed you Himself, through His Word and through His Supper, the living bread of heaven, the food that will eternally sustain you in the love, forgiveness, grace, and presence of God now and for eternity. 

“The work of God is this: to believe in the one he has sent.” (John 6:29) 

That’s it, folks. 

That’s all there is. 

Trust in Jesus.

Jesus is the food that lasts forever. 

And He is more than enough for us always. 

Amen

Two Ways of Living

[Below is the message from worship with the people and friends of Living Water Lutheran Church in Centerville, Ohio on July 25, 2021. If you'd like to hear the message as part of the entire worship service, a video of the service is also here.]

Mark 6:45-56
Two ways of life and of facing eternity are discussed in today’s Gospel lesson. One leads to death. The other leads to life. To begin, a story. Two men died and were buried. One of them had been active in his church. The other was a notable sinner, although, to everyone’s mystification, in his last years, he became a member of the same church. 

On the Day of Jesus’ return to the created universe, the dead were called from the dust to stand before the Lord in judgment. To the lifelong churchgoer, Jesus said, “Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.” (Matthew 25:41) To the notable sinner with nothing apparently to commend him but joining a church in his last days, Jesus said, “Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world.” (Matthew 25:34)

The first man was baffled and outraged. “Lord!” he cried. “This isn’t fair. I gave money for the poor, served on church council, went on mission trips, cleaned the church building, and spent years listening to lousy sermons that I was assured were good for me. Yet I’m going to hell. But you’ve invited this drunken derelict, a user and a thief most of his life into eternity with You.” “Friend,” Jesus said with sorrow in His voice, “despite all your religiosity, You never trusted in Me. Your supposed righteousness was always your righteousness. This sinner came to the end of himself and realized how powerless to overcome his sin, death, and humanity. You never realized that. He turned to me; you never did.” 

Our Gospel lesson for this Sunday, Mark 6:45-56, continues the narration of the incidents recounted in last week’s Gospel. There, the twelve apostles return from a mission of preaching, teaching, healing, and exorcisms, wanting to tell Jesus “all they had done and taught.” (Matthew 6:30) Jesus invites them to a quiet place where they can “get some rest.” (Matthew 6:30) Jesus, as God the Son, knew all that would subsequently happen and none of it would be described by most people as restful. Jesus had compassion on a crowd that had torn after him, anxious to hear His teaching. Then, commandeering five loaves and two fish, He fed something like 12,000 people and put the apostles to work distributing the food and taking in the leftovers.  

As today’s lesson begins, “Jesus made His disciples get into the boat.” The twelve are to go to Bethsaida. The apostles may have thought, “Finally, maybe we can get some rest and tell Jesus about all the great stuff we did on our mission.” Jesus dismisses the crowd, stays on the land, and prays. But you know what happens next. A wind sets against the disciples. They strain at the oars. (Mark 6:48) It’s important not to confuse this incident with an earlier one, recounted in Mark 4. There, Jesus was onboard a boat with the twelve, when a storm threatened to flood the boat. Back then, the twelve were afraid of the wind and waves. But here, the twelve seem unconcerned by the waves. When fear does come to them, it’s Jesus Who terrifies them. “Shortly before dawn [Jesus] went out to them, walking on the lake. He was about to pass by them…” (Mark 6:48). 

Now, at this point, we should see, if the twelve didn’t, what rest Jesus was calling the twelve into back in Mark 6:31. They should have remembered the Old Testament, where Job spoke of God as the one who “treads on the waves of the sea.” (Job 9:8) They should have seen Jesus walking on top of the water and thought, “So, Jesus is God.” But that doesn’t seem to have crossed their minds.
And it’s very clear that Jesus wants the twelve to see Him as their God and Savior. In Old Testament times, God reassured Moses, “When my glory passes by, I will put you in a cleft in the rock and cover you with my hand until I have passed by.” (Exodus 33:22) And in 1 Kings 19:11, God tells Elijah, “Go out and stand on the mountain in the presence of the Lord, for the Lord is about to pass by.” (1 Kings 19:11)

In Jesus, the disciples were in the presence of the Lord, Yahweh! But far from being reassured, the twelve are afraid. They think Jesus is a ghost. Lliterally, in the Greek in which Mark writes His gospel, Jesus tells them, “Take courage. Ego eimi, I AM (that is, Yahweh). [The name by which God identified Himself to Moses and ancient Israel.] Do not be afraid!” (Mark 6:50)

Within the space of a few hours then, the twelve have seen Jesus feed thousands the way Yahweh fed thousands in the wilderness in Exodus; seen Jesus walk on waves the way Job said God did; seen Jesus pass by them in His power the way God passed before Moses and Elijah; and heard Jesus identify Himself as Yahweh. When Jesus climbs into the boat and the wind subsides, you would think that finally, the twelve will understand Who Jesus is. 

Mark says, “...They were completely amazed [the word in the original Greek actually says they were troubled], for they had not understood about the loaves; [and then this:] their hearts were hardened.” The wills of the twelve who spent more time with Jesus than anyone else were, at this moment, hardened against seeing Jesus as their God and Savior. Friends, we are lost to sin, death, despair, and meaninglessness without Jesus. We are only found by God when the Holy Spirit fills us with faith in the Gospel Word that all who daily turn from sin and trust in Jesus have never-ending life with God that starts now in the busy-ness of everyday life. Jesus has done everything necessary for our sins to be forgiven and to have eternal life with God. He did that on the cross and through the resurrection. We can trust in Him and His Gospel. But if our hearts, minds, and wills are hardened to what Jesus gives to us, we will never receive it.

Rest in Jesus then is not about chilling, although there’s nothing wrong with us relaxing sometimes. Jesus called the twelve into a rest that included helping feed thousands and rowing a boat through wind and waves. Rest, true rest, is found in turning to Jesus and being assured of His presence and His unending love for us that cannot be taken from us even by death.  Jesus’ ministry liberates the whole idea of Sabbath from being a day of doing no work. Sabbath is about being with Jesus in His Word. That’s why in explaining the Third Commandment, “Remember the Sabbath, to keep it holy,” Martin Luther writes, “We should fear and love God so that we do not despise His Word and the preaching of it, but acknowledge it as holy, and gladly hear and learn it.”

In our lesson, the disciples, with their hearts hardened, refuse to rest in Jesus, God the Son. But others who haven’t spent time with Jesus, aren’t so hard hearted. They’re ready to receive what Jesus has to give, even if the disciples are still hung up on what good they can do to look to good to God or the world. Apparently blown fifty miles from their intended destination of Bethsaida, to a place called Gennesaret, Jesus and the disciples are surrounded by people who understand, at the least, that the power of God is active in Jesus, that all they can give Jesus is their needy selves and that He alone can do the rest. Some even think that if they just  touch the edge of His cloak, He will bring them healing. Do we trust Jesus like the crowds or are we like the disciples, our hearts, minds, and wills hardened to Jesus? 

Friends, as long as we insist on being in control, relying on our own goodness, virtue, accomplishments, feelings, thoughts, or effort, we will never know the rest that Jesus came to give us, whether now or in eternity. The two foundational truths of the universe are that God is God and we're not. Adam and Eve didn't like that and we've been burdened by the desire to be like God ever since. It was what burdened the churchgoing man in the story at the beginning of this message. And it was the burden of which the second man was freed when he kept turning to Jesus in repentance and faith. Jesus has come to take your burdens away and you can live in the Sabbath rest He came to give you, even in the busiest and most difficult of times. Trust in His Word as He passes by and reveals His glory and you will rest at peace in Him. Amen

The Old Testament Book of Genesis, Part 2

Here's the second part of our new Facebook Live study of Genesis.

The Old Testament Book of Genesis, Part 1

The Dilemma That Isn't

[This is the message shared with the people and friends of Living Water Lutheran Church, Centerville, Ohio, during worship on July 18. You'll also find the video of the worship service from that day.]

Mark 6:30-44

A dilemma, one dictionary says, is “a situation in which a difficult choice has to be made between two or more alternatives…” 

We all deal with dilemmas. 

Often I find, my personal dilemmas are driven by my sinful human nature. Like when confronted with a choice between the good I can do and the wrong I would rather do. 

A guy stands at the base of a freeway offramp and I see him. In a flash, I hear Jesus saying, “Give to everyone who asks you, and if anyone takes what belongs to you, do not demand it back.” (Luke 6:30) In the same flash, I find myself arguing with Jesus, “But, Lord, I’ve seen this guy here before. Why doesn’t he get a job?” And I sense Jesus telling me, “See previous statement, Mark. Don’t make a dilemma out of something that isn’t a dilemma. What part of ‘Give to everyone who asks you’ don’t you understand?” When the light turns green as I drift toward the intersection of ramp and road, I breathe a sigh of relief. 

I nearly forget about the dilemma-that-wasn’t-a-real-dilemma until I later pray and realize I have something for which I need to repent. I feel like Paul in Romans: “I do not do the good I want to do, but the evil I do not want to do—this I keep on doing.” (Romans 7:19) This I keep on doing.

In today’s Gospel lesson, Mark 6:30-44, the apostles--Jesus’ sent ones--return from a missionary journey on which Jesus had sent them. They are exhilarated. The apostles had preached and taught the good news that, in Jesus, God’s kingdom had broken into the world and that, in response, God was calling people to repent and believe in the good news about the One Who had come to die for our sins and rise to give us life with God, Jesus. People had responded to the Gospel message presented by the apostles.Through them, people believed in Jesus. The apostles had also cured diseases and cast out demons in Jesus’ name. But now, exhilarated or not, the apostles were also exhausted. So, Jesus invites them to come with Him to a quiet place so that He can fill them again with the blessings of His Word. This, of course, is what Jesus invites us to do through weekly worship, the Sacraments, and reading and studying His Word. To all who have made the wrong choices when given the chance to do the right thing...to all born into sin and unable to free themselves (that includes all of us)...to all worn out from life, Jesus says what He effectively says to the apostles at the start of our Gospel lesson, “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest…” (Matthew 11:28)

But if the apostles thought that Jesus was inviting them to sit around a campfire with ‘smores so that they could brag about everything they’d done in Jesus’ name, they would quickly learn otherwise. Jesus, in fact, was going to present them with a dilemma. A crowd, anxious to hear Jesus’ teaching, had actually beaten Jesus and the disciples to a the quiet place they’d gone to on a fishing boat. The apostles may have been disappointed. But, Mark says that Jesus looked on the crowds and “had compassion on them.” (Mark 6:34) The root word for the one translated here as “had compassion” is σπλαγχνίζομαι. It means that Jesus looked on the crowds with a gut-deep sense of love and responsibility for them. 

The people were flailing under the abuse of self-serving would-be shepherds. 

People like Herod, who had just killed John the Baptist. 

Like Pilate, who crucified anyone he didn’t like. 

Like the religious leaders, who were more interested in influencing society than they were in sharing God’s life-giving Word with people. 

Jesus looked on the crowd the same way that He looks at you and me: sinners in need of forgiveness and grace, children who are born wandering far from God and from the life that only God can give. 

So, what does Jesus do? 

He teaches them. He probably points out that humanity is fallen and far from God and life, but that He has come to bring God near, to save all who turn to Him from sin, death, and darkness, to give new and everlasting life to all who daily take up their crosses and follow Him (Luke 9:23). He likely teaches what He has been teaching since the outset of His ministry: “The time has come...The kingdom of God has come near. Repent and believe the good news!” (Mark 1:15)

Jesus has spent hours feeding the crowd and the apostles on His saving good news, His gospel. Eventually, the apostles suggest that Jesus send the crowd away so that they can buy food for themselves. But Jesus confronts them with a dilemma, “You give them something to eat.” (Mark 6:37) The apostles, so recently intent on telling Jesus everything they had done, say that can’t be done. “That would take more than half a year’s wages!” (Mark 6:37) 

Isn’t it amazing that whenever Jesus tells us to do something, we can find reasons for not doing it? 

“We don’t have enough,” the apostles say. 

We say similar things, “We don’t have the time. We don’t have the words. We don’t have the expertise.” At Living Water, we might say, “We don’t have enough people”...even though we’re larger than 75% of the churches in the United States!

Jesus will never hold you accountable for what you don’t have or can’t do. 

And it’s good for us to know our limitations, what we can’t do. 

But the God we know in Jesus can do anything! In our lesson, He takes five loaves of bread and two fish and makes it a feast for five thousand men, meaning that with the women and children who were with them, Jesus feeds between twelve- and eighteen thousand people. “Without Me,” Jesus says in John 15:5, “you can do nothing.” But consider what Jesus can do in and through helpless people: He can make the unrighteous clean. He can make the fallen sinner whole. He can answer prayers in His name, as we can testify here in this prayerful congregation. And in Holy Baptism, Jesus had made you a saint; through you, He can feed the hungry, provide for the poor, and, most importantly of all, give the saving good news that all who believe in Him have everlasting life with God, to all people.

After Jesus feeds the throng, the apostles gather up leftovers: “twelve basketfuls of broken pieces of bread and fish.” (Mark 6:43) 

A woman asked me once, “How could Jesus forgive me?” She asked as though the God we meet in Jesus couldn’t possibly have enough grace to go around for her. 

A man, cognizant of his own limitations but anxious to do God’s will asked me, “How could Jesus use me to share His Gospel with others?” 

When Jesus fed the 5000, there were leftovers, folks! Jesus can meet you in the wilderness and shower you with His love, forgiveness, and power. He can forgive your sins. He can give you eternal life. He can empower you to share Him and His good news with the world.

Most of the spiritual dilemmas that we face in life aren’t really dilemmas at all. They’re just instances of us arguing with Jesus. 

“How many loaves do you have?” Jesus asks in our lesson. 

“What have you got?” Jesus asks us. 

We answer, “Just me, Lord. That’s all I’ve got: just a sinful, finite, selfish, human being.” 

And Jesus says, “That’s funny. You’re exactly who I’m looking for. YOU are exactly the person to whom I want to give My grace and forgiveness, My peace and My life. You’re the person to whom I want to give rest in Me, respite from a world that’s constantly telling you to do better, be more. I receive you as you are and, as you follow Me, shape you into the person God made you to be. You’re the one for whom I died and rose. You’re the one to whom I’ve given the Holy Spirit in Holy Baptism. You’re the one to whom I have given My saving Word. You’re the very person to whom I give forgiveness of sin every time you hear the words, ‘Given and shed for you.’ And you are the person, forgiven and made new and clean in My grace, that I unleash as My agent in the world. All these blessings and more than you can imagine are Yours for the taking!” 

So, friends, take them. Amen  

The God Who Deserves Our Praise

[Here is the text of the message presented during worship with the people and friends of Living Water Lutheran Church in Centerville, Ohio, on July 11, 2021. Below it, you'll find a video of the entire service. I hope you find this helpful.]

Ephesians 1:3-14
Recently, during my quiet time with God, as I considered God’s incredible grace toward me, despite my sins, I was compelled to stop as I read the Bible to praise God. 

My words were inadequate and tumbled from my mind in an incoherent jumble. At that moment, I needed to praise and thank God for Who He has shown Himself to be in the crucified and risen Jesus. I needed to thank and praise God for Christ’s death on the cross, for His empty tomb, and for the way God the Holy Spirit daily comes to me in His Word, makes me part of His Kingdom, forgives my sin, gives me the gift of faith, and fills my life with purpose and hope.

I bet that most of you know what I’m talking about. There are those moments when God’s grace, love, and salvation, given in Christ, so overwhelm you that all you can do is praise Him!

Our second lesson for today comes to us from the New Testament book of Ephesians. It’s a letter written by the apostle Paul to be circulated among the Christians in the ancient city of Ephesus in about 60 AD. Paul wrote it to remind the church that would read it during worship of the spiritual blessings all who belong to Jesus enjoy (more on what spiritual blessings are in a moment) and of the unity that believers have because all alike have been baptized into Christ’s death and resurrection.

Paul wrote this letter while being imprisoned for his faith in Christ. This makes the passage before us today, Ephesians 1:3-14, all the more remarkable. That’s because these twelve verses, which are part of one single sentence in the Greek in which Paul originally composed them, are what we might call a doxological effusion. 

A doxology, of course, is a word of praise to God. The word is a compound from the New Testament Greek made up of doxos, meaning glory, and the suffix logos, meaning word or a word about. As Paul begins this letter, he praises God three times over for the blessings God has showered on His people. I pray that this message today will be a kind of doxology empowering and encouraging us to praise God along with Paul.

Paul’s first expression of praise for God comes in verses 3 to 6a of our verse. Paul says: “Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ. For he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight. In love he predestined us for adoption to sonship] through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will—to the praise of his glorious grace…”

It’s likely that as we read this section of the lesson, three words or phrases jump out at us. The first two are heavenly realms and spiritual blessing. Don’t get wifty here, folks. Paul is no New Age guru. In this entire passage, Paul isn’t talking about God taking people into some tingly nirvana of feel-goods. Paul is talking about how God took on human flesh and entered into our lives to set us free from sin, death, and darkness. To be blessed in “the heavenly realms,” Paul literally says in “the heavenlies” doesn’t mean that God is going to bless us someday in a mirky spiritual realm. It means that the God Who wasn’t afraid to get His uniform dirty, taking our sin and dirt and filth onto His clean and righteous shoulders at the cross, makes us part of His eternal kingdom, making all baptized believers His own dear children, even now.  

We might also notice in these opening verses two similar words, chose and predestined. A lot of mischief has been done with these words by so-called theologians who replace God’s revealed Word with their own imperfect thoughts. These mischief-makers teach that God had picked winners and losers, those who would be saved and those who would be damned, before any of us were even created. But Christ would not have commissioned the Church to share His Gospel and make disciples if God had already decided who would be saved. What Paul is saying here is that before the world began, He chose and predestined all who respond to His Word as it calls us to repentance and faith in the God ultimately revealed in Jesus to be saved. Paul is overwhelmed by the fact that, through Christ and our faith in Christ, God makes sinners who would otherwise be lost and damned for all eternity, “holy and blameless in His sight.”

In verses 6 to 12, Paul praises God for lavishing His grace--His charity, His forgiveness--on us through the revelation of Christ. There are people who believe that human beings can think or act their way into a life with God. “If I do the right thing, say the right thing, think the right thing,” they reason, “God will let me into His kingdom.” Folks, this thinking is straight from hell and can only lead to hell. The Bible teaches and experience should show us that we can’t do enough good, say enough good, or think enough good to make ourselves right with God. Instead, Jesus, God the Son, acting according to the plan of God, dies and rises for us so that all who repent and believe in Him have everlasting life with God. If our rightness, our righteousness, in the sight of God, depended on us in the least, we would be eternally lost. Our hope is in Christ alone!

Finally, Paul praises God the Holy Spirit for the miracle of faith. “When you believed,” he tells the Ephesian Christians (and you and me), “you were marked in him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit, who is a deposit guaranteeing our inheritance until the redemption of those who are God’s possession—to the praise of his glory.” (Ephesians 1:13-14) Do you know how hard, how impossible, it is for human beings to believe or trust in anyone or anything beyond themselves? Psychologists like Erick Erickson have told us that the first stage in human psychosocial development is negotiating the battle within us between trust and mistrust. In some ways, we never get past it. From Adam and Eve, we have inherited an intrinsic mistrust in others, especially a mistrust in a God Who loves us despite our sins and flaws, Who gives us love now and life beyond the grim reality of death. We would rather put our trust in ourselves and the things we think we can control. Yet the Holy Spirit comes to us in God’s Word, spoken and shared by God’s people, the Church, and, pointing to Christ’s death and resurrection, woos people into believing that we can entrust Christ with our past, our present, and our eternal future. Miraculous, world-defying, death-destroying faith in Christ that God gives to us--saving faith--is a reason for praising God now and always!

Even in shackles, Paul could praise God for choosing to make people His own through what Jesus has done for the whole human race; for God’s undeserved grace for sinners; and for the Holy Spirit’s gift of faith in Jesus Christ that makes sinners the saved saints of God. May we, as we encounter God in His Word, His Church, and the Sacraments, also be compelled each day to praise God for these blessings and the millions more He showers on us. Amen