Route 66: Ephesians - The Cosmic Drama of God's Eternal Story

If you don't have a Bible, you might find one in front of you and there in the Pew Bible, you can turn to page 1036, 1036.

So for those of you that are perhaps new here, first time here, our Route 66 study is one message per book of the Bible.

So starting in Genesis and going all the way to the book of Revelation, and it gives us a nice overview.

Obviously, I can't cover everything in the book of Ephesians in 20 to 30 minutes.

Four years ago we did a study of the book of Ephesians and we started in January 2021, I think, and we finished in December 2021.

So a whole year of looking at that book.

I'm not going to try to put 50 weeks of messages into one sermon.

So, anyway, let's pray together, shall we?

Father?

We're grateful to be gathered together and to have your word open before us.

There's so many places we could be right now and so many things that could be grabbing our attention, but, lord, by your good design, you've brought us to the place where your word is in front of us now and, father, we recognize that this is not just a moment in time, this is a moment in eternity, and so, father, we pray that you might help us to enter into it as we should.

We pray that you might help us to enter into it as we should.

The Word of God says that we should have our ears and our hearts open, and Jesus said listen.

If you have ears to hear, hear.

So, lord, we want to have those kind of ears and that kind of heart that welcomes your Word, that understands your glorious eternal truths and how they intersect with our life in our days, and how we might be aligned with you in your sovereign purposes in Christ Jesus, not only for now, but throughout all eternity.

So we ask that you might be with us.

We pray in Christ's name, amen.

I mentioned this earlier this morning that we live in a time of crisis and, yes, we might all have our ears attuned to some of the difficulties and challenges that are happening with the world powers today.

I just received a text about a half an hour ago from Ted.

He and Pat are planning on being in Turkey and enjoying some time there doing the footsteps of Paul, and just received news that the travel agents have decided to move their tour from eastern Turkey to western Turkey, and now he's frantically trying to get on the phone and find some way to get his flights changed in order to be able to do that and just sort of caught up in the moment, they're planning on leaving tomorrow.

So be in prayer for Ted and Pat as to do that and just sort of caught up in the moment they're planning on leaving tomorrow.

So be in prayer for Ted and Pat as they do that.

But I'm not talking about that kind of crisis, as important as that is.

I'm talking about a crisis that is one of identity and one of the immediacy of life.

And we live in a day and age where peer pressure is not just for those people around you in your close circles or maybe even in your class and school.

We have a worldwide peer pressure and it's found on social media, and we have, on social media, a lot of curated identities that are there.

We are brought into constant comparison with them, in comparison with them, and it's very difficult those kind of pressures that bear, if we give our time and attention to them, of how we are supposed to think, how we're supposed to dress, even how we're supposed to hold our cameras and take pictures of ourselves.

It's really difficult.

We find ourselves even in a time frame in which there's ever-shifting definitions of who we are, time frame in which there's ever-shifting definitions of who we are, even to the very point of our birth genetic sex and we're called into question, and so people are increasingly unsure of themselves at the most core level of their being.

A lot of ways, our society is just adrift, unanchored and being pulled one way or another by all of these kind of ideas.

But we also live in a crisis of the immediacy of things.

There's a thing, of course you've probably heard, doom scrolling, where we kind of get our head down and we get locked into just moving through one series of bad news after another and it just sort of zooms us right in as though that was affecting our very moment and we needed to do something about it.

Our bodies are raging with adrenaline or emotion when the reality is those things are far off from us and likely not to affect anything about our day had we not paid any attention to them.

I received a phone call from a dear friend in the middle of the pandemic and he was explaining to me just how anxious he was feeling, how disturbed his heart was, just how unsettled everything seemed to be, and I asked him one question.

I said how much time are you spending on social media?

And he was, and I said look, just shut the phone off, find your Bible, go sit down somewhere and just reflect on the good glories of God's grace to you in Jesus Christ, and I'm sure if you did that for just a day, you will find yourself in a better position.

It's too easy for us to lose sight of the forest, for all the trees, and life does that to us.

Obviously there are things that come at us and they need to be addressed, and they need to be addressed now, and we give our attention to them, as we rightly should.

But when those pressures increase, or they double up or they triple up or they quadruple up, the next thing you know you can't see outside of any of it and perspective is lost.

I saw this in my own son, matt.

He was diagnosed with myocarditis, an inflammation of the heart, and at a young age it was actually very dangerous A number of people, as you might know, sports figures dying on the basketball court or a football field from that sort of thing.

So when he went into the hospital, we were deeply concerned and they admitted him for several days there and while he was in hospital, the white walls of the hospital room just basically closed in on him, and each day he was there, he was becoming more and more institutionalized, if you will.

And after he was released by God's good mercy, he was released without any scarring or any damage on his heart.

God intervened in a very beautiful way, but as he was coming out we were going to the car he just kind of went whoa and just a reaction to the fact that now he could look into space rather than at the walls that were right in front of him.

And that's a picture of our hearts.

Often we get closed in, things draw us into the immediate and we can't see what's beyond it all.

And this is why the book of Ephesians is so very timely for us, because it's a letter that actually does lift up our eyes.

It answers the aching question of identity and it also restores our perspective by revealing God's eternal purposes.

And it doesn't just tell us what to do.

Wonderfully, this book tells us much, much more than that.

It tells us who we are.

It tells us where we stand, what we're a part of, where history is going, and by doing so it gives us roots as well as vision.

It allows us to see our identity and beyond the immediate in a wonderful way.

And what I love about the book of Ephesians is it does so with a sweeping sense of grandeur and drama.

If Ephesians was submitted to the academy for an award, I think it would win more than one Oscar.

I think it would at least win the Oscar for the best screenplay.

And I think it would win more than one Oscar.

I think it would at least win the Oscar for the best screenplay.

And I think it would win the Oscar for the best cinematography.

Because it tells a great story and it does so with great pictures.

And so, as we look at this, let's not just think of it as a cold heart dissertation of truth.

Think of it as an unfolding drama of redemption from our Lord.

Because if you were to simply read the book of Ephesians and miss the imagery of it, it would be like reading a screenplay and never seeing the movie.

Screenplays can be great, but a movie brings all of it to light, with all of its color and all of its texture and all of its nuance and all of its majesty, as the cameras and the colors bring us into places that words simply just can't do.

So this evening let's pull the curtain back and listen well to this story, and I want to bring us into two dimensions First the cosmic dimension and also to the worldwide dimension.

And as we look up and at up from our world and at our world, we're going to see the book of Ephesians giving us that kind of scope of understanding about ourselves and also of eternal things that we need in our day.

So let's look first of all at the cosmic dimension, the heavenly scope.

Ephesians begins by lifting our eyes into the glorious sweep of God's eternal purposes in Christ.

Just take a look at the first couple of verses and you can see that Right after the introduction that he gives, in the first couple of verses he says blessed is the God and father of our Lord, jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavens in Christ, for he chose us in him before the foundation of the world to be holy and blameless in love before him and predestined us to be adopted as sons through Jesus Christ for himself, according to the good pleasure of his will, to the praise of his glorious grace that he lavished on us in the beloved one.

Immediately we're brought into the heavenly realms and into the eternal perspectives and designs of God.

We are swept out of our world and brought into this wonderful place.

And this panoramic view is not meant simply just to inform us.

It's meant to comfort us and shape us, and, just like those humble believers in Asia Minor, we too need to be brought out of our own little world and to step out and to see it.

Just a couple weeks ago, we had Royal's niece with us and we found out that there was going to be possibly, just maybe, the ability to see the northern lights here.

Do you remember that?

Just a couple weeks ago?

So we went out east on the island to a place where we thought we might be able to see some darkness, and realized we weren't even close to dark and we were hoping well, and then things just didn't work out with the timing and all of that.

But we stood out in the midnight for a little while, just straining to see if we might find some glorious colors coming out of the north.

There was nothing to see.

But many years ago, royal and I were driving down the Mass Pike in Massachusetts on our way back toward Boston, and God put his pallet into the air that day and we were able to see the northern lights as we were driving down the Mass Pike and back.

In those days you had to stop at the toll booths and actually give them coin in order to keep moving.

And I was sitting there just taking it all in.

It was beautiful to behold.

And as we pulled up to the toll booth and the guy was sitting there waiting to take our money, I said have you looked up?

Have you seen what's going on in the sky?

And he just looked at me with a typical Massachusetts attitude what?

Look up at the sky.

I'm too busy to look up at the sky.

And I thought boy, you're missing something.

You're missing it.

It's glorious.

And so let's get out of ourselves and let's go into this cosmic realm.

And I want you to notice three things about Christ here in chapter one and we'll start early on in verse 20.

It tells us about the majesty of Christ as the exalted king.

Okay, he exercised this power in Christ by raising him from the dead and seating him at his right hand in the heavenlies, far above every ruler and authority and power and dominion and every title that is given, not only in this age but also in the one to come.

This is a remarkable statement about Jesus Christ.

The book of Ephesians doesn't take us to Calvary's road, it doesn't take us to the cross, it doesn't take us to the tomb.

It doesn't even take us to Jesus out of the tomb on earth.

He takes us into the heavenlies and shows us Christ there, exalted and enthroned, and this is an echo of Psalm 110 in verse 1, the most quoted chapter of the Old Testament.

In the New Testament, this is the declaration of the Lord to my Lord Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies your footstool.

So here Paul, as he writes to these Ephesian believers, is not just giving them a teaching, he's opening up a window into eternity and he's showing them that Christ is alive and that Christ is seated in a place of authority and that he is enthroned and exalted above all powers, anyone you might be able to name, anyone that you might be able to imagine in this life and the one to come.

He goes on later in verse 22, to show Christ not only the exalted king, but also Christ the conquering king, far above every ruler and authority and power and dominion and every title that is given, not only in this age but also in the one to come, and he has subjected everything under his feet.

Paul is developing another Old Testament thread.

He's teasing out the Old Testament, going to those messianic passages that talk about humanity in its most exalted position.

Here is Christ the God-man, now in a place of exaltation, but also now in a place of rule and conquering, and he's pulling out of Psalm chapter 8 and verse 6.

Psalms 8 · chapter mention

And he's pulling out of Psalm chapter 8 and verse 6.

Psalms 8 · chapter mention

You have made him ruler over the works of your hands and put everything under his feet.

That's a quote from Psalm 8.

And this is, as Scripture tells us, fulfilled in Christ in his exalted ascension into the heavenlies, having subjected everything under his feet.

Think about that All the forces and pressures and powers of human construct, be they government or be they societal norms, every construct or power of the unseen world, be they demonic forces or pressures of evil to conform to those ways, everything that tugs at our heart by way of the world, the flesh and the devil, paul is saying, sits under the feet of Jesus Christ, every bit of it.

He goes on to tell the Colossians something very similar and does so in a very dramatic way.

Having disarmed the powers and authorities, he has made a public spectacle of them triumphing over them by the cross.

And I love that little twist because, if we can put this, if we can speak in human terms, jesus, in his weakest moment, breaks the power of all of their strength combined.

That's wonderful.

When he was at the point of saying I give up my life, it is finished.

That's when he was crushing demonic forces and the powers that be In Ephesians 1 and verses 9 and 10,.

The result of this will be to bring everything together in Christ, both in things in heaven and things on earth.

In him, where is human destiny?

Where is this universe headed?

To be sat under the visible display of Christ's enthronement and his empowerment and his rule?

But we see one more thing here Not only Christ in his exalted position and in his conquering role, but we also see him as a benevolent king.

Let's keep reading this little passage that we've been looking at.

I'll back up just to sort of reinforce what we just read.

It said that he's at the right hand of him in the heavens, far above every ruler and authority, power and dominion, every title given, not only in this age but also in the one to come, and he subjected everything under his feet and appointed him as head over everything.

Now notice the next words for the church, which is his body, the fullness of the one who fills all things in every way.

You see, king Jesus doesn't just rule cosmically, he rules us in his care and in his benevolence.

All of that authority is meant to be for the betterment of his people.

Betterment of his people.

He's been appointed head over everything to fill us with purpose, personally and in his presence.

We see something about that a little later in Ephesians.

So go over to chapter four for just a second.

In verses eight to 10, 10 tell us something.

It's speaking about Christ.

And here it says, in verse 7, according to the measure of Christ's gift.

For it says and it quotes the old testament, when he ascended on high and took captives captive, he gave gifts to people.

But what does he ascended mean, except that he also descended into the lower parts of the earth.

The one who descended is also the one who ascended far above all the heavens to fill all things.

And he gave some to be apostles and some prophets, and some to be evangelists and some to be pastors and teachers, to equip the saints for the work of the ministry and to build up the body of Christ.

Here Paul again pulls out of the Old Testament Psalm 68, a warrior song that brings God into the realm of battle and shows God going under the battlefield, winning the war and taking the spoils and receiving the tribute of those that he had captured and also the praise of those that he had battled for.

And Paul takes that and turns it around that this warrior king, who's conquered, has received all the tribute, received all the spoils, but is now pouring them back out onto his people and enriching them with the things that he's won.

And this is an image of Christ who was in the heavenlies and yet came to this earth in humility and in his humiliation and death actually conquered the demonic forces and the unseen powers, and he's now reigning in order to provide all that his people need.

He's giving the gifts.

He is not only a cosmic Christ, he is a loving, benevolent king who gives to his people.

You see, we're not simply spectators of this drama, seeing Christ exalted, christ conquering.

We're also enveloped into his care because all of that is for us.

Paul says that in Ephesians, chapter 2 and verse 6.

Ephesians 2 · chapter mention

He has raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenlies in Christ Jesus.

You see, we're not waiting for God's blessings to come through Christ.

We're not waiting for God's blessings to come through Christ.

We're participating in them already.

We live out of them, and that's why Paul starts this letter in verse 3 of chapter 1.

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord, jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavens, in Christ.

That's a past tense already given to you, and so we're part of heaven's story, even when we're walking the dusty streets of earth.

Our lives are lived in two realms.

Our lives are joined to the cosmic reign of Christ.

Our lives are joined to the cosmic reign of Christ, where he is the exalted king and we follow him, who sits on the throne, who embraces us above every anxiety, every authority.

In this age and the age to come, we are sat with Christ, the conquering king who has already triumphed, and we don't labor in this world in order to win a victory.

We fight in the light of one already given to us in Christ, and we live seated with Christ, the benevolent King, who reigns in heaven and yet equips us here on earth to fulfill all of his good purposes and design.

This is a glorious vision, and this is why I say a book of Ephesians really ought to win some Oscars here.

But not only is there a cosmic scope, there's also an earthly dimension to this book.

In Ephesians, chapter 1 and verse 3 to 20, we read this glorious truth about how the heavenly king forms his people and why.

Ephesians 1 · chapter mention

But when we get to chapter two, we start to understand more of those purposes and his worldwide scheme.

In doing so, it's not just a personal salvation, he's doing something on a worldwide scope.

We zoom in to ourselves, of course, but we also need to come out and see what he's doing in a global way.

And here in chapter 2, we find that Christ on earth, in this realm, is Christ the reconciler.

Take a look at verse 11 of chapter 2.

So remember, at one time you were Gentiles in the flesh, called the uncircumcised by those who are called the circumcised, which is done with the flesh, by human hands.

At that time you were without Christ, excluded from the citizenship of Israel, foreigners to the covenants of promise, without hope and without God in this world.

Through Jewish eyes of that time, the human family was divided into two groups.

There was the Israelites and there were the Gentiles, there was the chosen nation and then the wayward nations, there was the true humanity and then there were the beastly kingdoms of Daniel, chapter 7.

Daniel 7 · chapter mention

And the Israelite status was sealed by their circumcision.

And the Jewish people were surrounded, here as we read, by layers of separation, separation.

Think about that.

How many layers of separation.

This passage brought us to the religious scorn of a term called uncircumcised, outside the messianic hope, without Christ, it says in verse 12, strangers to Israel's covenant promises.

When it says excluded from the citizenship, separated from God's unfolding plan of redemption.

In verse 12, when it says aliens to the covenants of promise, wandering about without anchor or assurance, without hope and without God in this world.

And we were not only socially separated, we were also spiritually separated.

Because verse 13 says far off it's a pretty stark image, this wall of partition, this chasm of enmity.

Jesus tears down that wall, he breaks down that separation.

Take a look at verse 13.

But now, in Christ, you who are far away have been brought near by the blood of Christ, for he is our peace, who makes both groups one and tore down the dividing wall of hostility In his flesh.

He made of no effect the law consisting of commands and expressed in regulations.

Why?

So that he might create a new man in himself from the two.

What once divided us ethnicity, covenant, status, access to the presence of God all of it's now broken down in Christ.

He is our peace.

He is Christ the reconciler.

So now, on a human level, in this global scope, not just the cosmic scope we as God's people are now a new humanity.

Cosmic scope, we as God's people are now a new humanity.

Christ's flesh accomplished what the law could not do.

Christ accomplishes what behavior modification could not do.

Christ has accomplished what social peer pressure could not do.

Christ has accomplished what the United Nations can never, ever hope to do To bring two people, in so many layers of separation, into one family, to make them one Verse 15,.

One new man Verse 16, one body, a whole new humanity, no longer Jew and Gentile, but a new people altogether.

Paul put it this way in Colossians In him you were also circumcised, not done with human hands.

God has made you alive with Christ and forgiven you all your trespasses.

That dividing wall is torn down now, and in its place is the second image that Ephesians gives us, one of a living temple.

Take a look at verse 19.

Through him, we both have access in one spirit to the Father.

So then you're no longer foreigners and strangers, but fellow citizens with the saints and members of God's household, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the cornerstone.

In him, the whole building being built together grows into a holy temple in the Lord.

In him you are also being built together for God's dwelling in the spirit.

Here Paul moves the imagery again to that place where the people of Israel would have met their God, and he now says that he embodies his, his presence embodies his people, jew and Gentile alike, that we are together built up to be a habitation for God's glory, whether we're Jew or Gentile, because this new humanity is now also a new temple, but we're also a representative people.

This new humanity, this new family, this new place of God's worship is also meant to be a representation to the rest of the world.

And that's why Paul, at the end of Ephesians, in chapter six, tells us in verse 11, to be strengthened by the Lord in all his vast might and put on the full armor of God that you can stand against the schemes of the devil.

Once again Paul is drawing from the Old Testament to bring images to bear upon our daily life.

And here, as we'll find out soon, on a Sunday morning, when we get to chapter 59 of the book of Isaiah, that Paul is pulling out of that chapter.

And in Isaiah, chapter 59, you will see humanity failing, israel failing to stand as representatives of truth and justice and mercy in this world.

Isaiah 59 · chapter mention

And it is of truth and justice and mercy in this world.

And so it tells us that God, viewing out on humanity, failed in our original design and Israel failing in its chosen purpose.

That God himself goes into the armory room and puts on the weaponry of war and he enters in.

And this is what Isaiah 59, verse 17, says.

Isaiah 59:17

He put righteousness on as body armor and a helmet of salvation on his head.

Salvation on his head.

What could save humanity?

Only God himself, taking up the role that a righteous humanity should have had, that a righteous representative Israel should have been, and that Jesus, as the true Israel and as the true Adam, was the only one who could be.

And so he took up the weaponry of righteousness and salvation and came to conquer the forces that have defeated us and that we continue to use to defeat one another.

But now Paul is pulling this into the life of the church who live in 2025 on Long Island, and he's saying to us just as he did to the Ephesians in Asia Minor put on the full armor of God.

Christ's body does exactly what Christ did when he came to save, and he came to demonstrate the righteousness of God by truthful living and by demonstrations of grace and mercy.

We take on the same armor.

We put on Christ's armor.

We are Christ's representatives.

Put on Christ's armor.

We are Christ's representatives.

We are moving through this world in the same way he did when he was in this world.

We wear the armor and we walk into a world of lies with truth.

We walk into a world of disobedience with righteousness.

We walk into a world of avarice with peace.

We walk into this world full of rejection with faith.

We walk into this world of destruction with salvation for the glory of God.

We get so caught up in what the powers are being that we are fighting that we forget that we have the winning armory on.

And look at that.

How wonderful it is that, through these things, we might be able not only to stand but to withstand and, at the end, still be standing.

We're not executioners, we are ambassadors.

We are representatives.

We are ambassadors, we are representatives.

And so when God calls us, he calls us to be truth tellers, he calls us to be peace bringers.

He calls us to be his ambassadors.

So the book of Ephesians, when you look into the heavens and you see Christ reigning, when you see that he's got a footstool of all his enemies underneath his feet, the forces of darkness there defeated, when you see his riches distributed among his people, when you see enemies reconciled and made family, and when you see yourself clothed in the righteousness of Christ, emboldened with grace and equipped to stand and to serve in this wicked world, your vision clears and things aren't so important in the immediate as they were consuming your attention.

And your identity is far different, because you've looked well beyond what others are telling you about yourself, to what God is telling you about yourself.

And so he pulls us from the dark corners of fear into the open air of God's cosmic plan, so that we might see ourselves afresh, that we might be able to open our earthly eyes, and we won't be seeing ourselves through the lenses of social media or peer pressure, but with the kingdom of Christ.

And the book of Ephesians doesn't end with a theology.

It ends with a summons that, after we've lifted our eyes to Christ and seen him seated above, and after showing us that we've been raised with him, reconciled to one another, recreated and re-assembled into a new humanity, he tells us in chapter four, in verse one therefore, I urge you to walk worthy of the calling you've received, in other words, live like the people you are.

You're no longer a stranger, you're a citizen.

You're no longer alienated, you're adopted.

You're no longer the old self, you're the new self.

You're created in the likeness of God.

You're no longer part of this world's decay.

You're a representative of a new creation.

You no longer smell of the stench of disobedience.

You're now the aroma of Christ and his resurrection and life.

And this is why Paul tells us to put off falsehood, to put off bitterness, to put off rage, to put off sexual immorality, to put off greed, to put off obscenity and darkness, and to put on truth, to put on gentleness, to put on integrity, to put on sacrificial love and to put on truth, to put on gentleness, to put on integrity, to put on sacrificial love and to put on light.

And if you want to read about that, just read chapter four and five of the book of Ephesians Because these aren't meant to be simply rules that you have to do now that you call yourself a Christian.

They're who you are and they're a revelation to this world that God has come in Christ and that he's brought a new humanity into this world to show a watching world of what this world would look like if God touched the ground.

And he did, and that's why we're here.

And so the book of Ephesians tells us to walk in unity, to forgive, just as we've been forgiven, to speak life, to love like Jesus loved, because we're a representative of a world that's too much bound up and checking each other out to see how they should be living, and too often shielded from the realities of eternity because all they can do is see one foot in front of themselves.

Be imitators of God as dearly loved children.

Ephesians, chapter 5 and verse 1.

Ephesians 5 · chapter mention

Not from pressure, but from perspective, let's pray, father.

We thank you for the book of Ephesians and how it helps us to understand that we can live beyond the pressures of this world that want us to conform to what is there in our generation or what is facing us in our day-to-day immediacy.

We pray, father, that we might be cast into that eternal realm and see Christ as he is, exalted, conquering and loving, and that we might see Christ here, still, working in this world today, to reconcile people, to make a new humanity and a new temple and a representative people.

Father, I pray that we might therefore submit every conversation that we have, every decision and habit and priority to him, to set Christ as Lord in our hearts.

I pray that you would help us to walk in love, walk in light, walk in wisdom, walk as those who are joined together with an already raised Christ, so that we might fulfill what you tell us here in this book joined together with an already raised Christ, so that we might fulfill what you tell us here in this book.

Pay careful attention, then, to how you walk, not as unwise people, but as wise, making the most of the time.

So, lord, as your book calls us to lift our eyes, we pray that we would do so and that we would go with those uplifted eyes and that wider perspective to walk like the people that you've made us to be, and we pray this in Christ's name, amen.