March 22, 2026 | I Love My Church

I love my church.

We encourage you to wear these shirts this week in Walmart.

Please be nice if you wear it.

Okay.

It's a great opportunity for you to share with others where you go to church, invite them to church.

One of the things that I have found amazing is how the younger generation, which we often critique, they if they go to church, they really do love their church.

I have four older kids out of the house and they love the churches they attend.

I have my son's here this morning for spring break, but when he goes to his church, he actually gets there before church begins to go to something called Sunday school.

Yeah, because he loves his church.

My daughter in Chicago is on staff at her.

She loves her church.

Have two others go to a church in Florida.

And get this I was talking to my daughter this week, and she was trying to rearrange her schedule of traveling so that she can make sure she's back by Sunday morning to go to her church.

That should be convicting for some of you.

Do you ever just rearrange your travels?

Oh, we can just come back on Sunday morning.

No, we're gonna try to get back before Sunday because we love our church.

We want to be a part of our church.

And we hope you love your church.

And if you don't, Jim Neal's available for counseling.

For sure.

Go see him.

Don't come see me.

Yeah.

I love my church.

And what we're gonna look at this morning is some reasons why we should love the church as we study Ephesians chapter 1.

Ephesians 1 · chapter mention

So if you want to go ahead and turn there, we've been looking at all the spiritual blessings we have in Christ from adoption to redemption, forgiveness, election, predestination, summing up of all things in Christ, the sealing of the Holy Spirit.

We've been talking about some pretty amazing things.

But let's just be honest.

Some of us have not been moved.

We don't get too excited.

We hear the words adoption.

Ah, who cares?

Redemption, yeah, we believe it intellectually.

Sealing of the Spirit.

Okay.

I mean, we've been talking about things that are absolutely amazing, but let's go ahead and admit, some of us have just not been moved.

Paul prays, and what we're gonna look at this morning, so that you will be moved.

He has explained doctrine to you.

Now he's gonna pray that you get it.

So let's look at this prayer starting in verse 15 of Ephesians 1.

So far we've seen the blessings in 232 words of a sentence, 3 through 11.

Now we have a prayer, it's one long sentence, 169 words.

This is an amazing prayer for you and for me to get it.

Start in verse 15.

For this reason, I too, having heard of the faith in the Lord Jesus, which exists among you, and your love for all the saints, do not cease giving thanks for you while making mention of you in my prayers.

Your love for the church will grow as you thank God for other people, even for the small evidences of grace in their life, where Paul says that he sees their faith, he sees their love, and he thanks God for them.

Now, the challenge of being thankful for those within the church is that there is no perfect church.

There is a Gaither song that says, I'm so glad I'm a part of the family of God.

And sometimes we sing it and we look at each other and we say, I am surprised you're a part of the family of God.

I mean, because there's there are difficult people in the church.

There's always annoying people in the church.

There's someone who talks too much, there's always someone who complains too much, there's someone who has strong opinions about everything.

And if you cannot think of anyone, guess what?

It's you.

I'm just saying.

But apart from all the squabbles, we know there could be real church hurt.

I've been a pastor for almost 29 years of three different churches, and I can honestly say I love all three of the churches that I've served, and all three of the churches that I've served have tried to kill me.

That is no joke.

And I mean literal kill, I mean almost literal kill.

They've been very difficult at times.

I've been difficult at times, they've been difficult at times, including some of you have been difficult at times, not the whole church, but sometimes individuals can hurt you.

And some of you may come out of church hurt.

And for to show up on a Sunday morning, it's difficult.

Some are watching online right now because they don't want to go to church anymore because they've been hurt too much.

If that's you, I'm totally sorry.

And I know that pain.

But one of the ways that you can start to inch a little bit beyond that pain is to be thankful for people within the church.

To be thankful for those who are here, those who serve here, those in leadership.

And you're saying, yeah, but I don't see any evidences of grace in my life.

I don't see any evidences of good fruit and love.

Well, just look harder.

There's always something that you can be thankful for of others and the church.

And I believe your love for this church will grow if you start being more thankful for those that go here.

Well, let's continue on.

What else does Paul say as our love for the church can grow?

Oh, this is one of my favorite, I keep on saying one of my favorite verses in the whole Bible, but this one really is.

Verse 17.

That the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you a spirit of wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of Him.

The prayer that He is praying is that they would know God.

The spirit of wisdom refers to the special insight given by the Holy Spirit into what is actually true.

And the spirit of revelation refers to something that has been revealed by the Holy Spirit to believers, so they have not figured it out on their own.

They have to have God giving them the insight.

I love this.

I pray this for my kids.

God, please give my kids a spirit of wisdom and revelation so they can know you more.

That's one of the best prayers you can pray for people.

I know a lot of the times we like to talk about intellectual things and that's important.

We like to talk about doctrine and that's absolutely important.

But did you know?

You can know a lot of the Bible and not know God.

You could know the 23rd Psalm and not know the shepherd.

We can know a lot of things, a lot of facts.

But even as a believer, we can know a lot of stuff, but there is no experience of God.

Can you can you imagine to say we have a religion that is all head knowledge and there's nothing that we ever feel?

That's not what's going on here.

He's praying that they will know him, they will know God.

And that doesn't mean just intellectually, but to know him experientially.

It's like you're talking to your father, you're sharing stuff with your father.

He's praying that they'll get it.

So when we pray for one another in our church, okay, yes, we'll pray they can be healed of cancer.

We'll pray the relationship will be mended, that's broken.

We'll pray that even the finances, the finances are a mess.

We'll pray that those we put back together.

But over all that, how about we spend more time praying for people to know God?

A spirit of wisdom and revelation to know God, to experience God.

You love your church when you're thankful for them, you love your church when you're praying for them to know and experience God, but it gets even better.

It gets even better.

Look at verse 18.

I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened, so that you will know what is the hope of his calling, and what are the riches of the glory of his inheritance in the saints.

Isn't it so cool to say, hey, your heart has eyes?

Your heart has eyes.

Internally, your heart has eyes.

Like who you are inside can either see and not see.

And before you were a believer, you were blind.

But now you see, and your heart has eyes.

But we still got to pray.

Open the eyes of my heart, Lord.

We got songs to sing all the time.

Lord, let us see.

We want to see.

And you say, okay, what is it you want to see?

Paul wants him to see three things.

He wants us to see hope, inheritance, and the power of God.

These are just amazing.

All right, so let's start with the first part.

Look at verse 18 again.

I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened so that you will know what is the hope of his calling.

So those who've been predestined, elected and adopted and redeemed have been called and invited to be his forever.

That means when you die, if you trust in Jesus, you'll go be with Jesus forever.

And it's not like, well, I sure hope that's right.

That's not the kind of hope that's talked about here.

Well, I hope so.

No, what we're talking about here is this this hope is this confident expectation.

It is not a wish, it's an as it's a certainty you haven't seen yet.

And this is so important in this retirement village that you have hope because I guarantee you, if you were living anywhere else in the United States, I mean, there's a few exceptions, but for the most part, you would not go to as many funerals as you go to here.

They should put that in the small print before you move here.

You're gonna go to a lot of funerals, a lot of memorial services.

And when you show up and you know they're a believer, you don't want to say stuff like, I sure hope they're in heaven.

I hope they made it.

No, when we talk about hope, this is a firm confidence.

And Paul's saying, I want your eyes to see that you have hope of eternal life in Jesus.

I want you to see it.

And so when fear creeps up on you in the middle of the night, you go, Oh, I don't want to die.

Oh, where am I gonna go?

And it's like, oh, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not good enough, which is true, you're not good enough.

Oh, I'm not done enough works, which is true, you can't do enough works, but you got to remind yourself that hope is in Jesus alone.

It's legit, it's not made up, it's not a hope so it's gonna happen.

So he wants them to see with their eyes of their heart about this hope, but he also wants to see something else.

He wants them to see this inheritance.

Look at verse 18.

I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened so that you will know what is the hope of his calling, what are the riches of the glory of his inheritance in the saints.

Now we spent a lot of time last week talking about this inheritance.

And if you want to go back to that sermon, feel free.

But basically, we said this when we talk about the inheritance, it's twofold.

You will gain an inheritance, and you are an inheritance.

You will gain an inheritance which you have now in redemption, forgiveness, and non-eturning with Jesus, but you also God's inheritance.

You are his heritage, you are valuable to him.

And Paul's like, I want you to see it.

I want you to see it with the eyes of your heart that you're gonna get an inheritance, and that you are an inheritance, which is basically saying you are of value, you matter to God.

And if you don't feel it, if you don't understand it, Paul's saying, I want you to see it, I want you to get it with the eyes of your heart.

Now we come to this part, which I keep saying it's my favorite, but this is the best.

Look at verse 19.

This is amazing.

And what is the boundless greatness of his power toward us who believe?

These are in accordance with the working of the strength of his might.

Okay.

We're saved in Jesus at one time in our lives.

We're gonna go to be with Jesus in heaven.

You know these, you know these.

But a lot of us right here, like, what are we supposed to do?

I'm struggling with the in-between, which we all do.

And a lot of times, this is where we go flat.

Paul Trepp, one of my uh favorite biblical counselors, he says this.

I want you to put this, if I have this quote here.

He says, Many believers live a gospel gap in their lives.

They have some sense of the past forgiveness of sin and the future of the promise of heaven, but without understanding or experiencing the power of the gospel at the present time.

The monotony of life lulls us to sleep.

I don't need a show of hands, but maybe raise your hand internally.

How many of you experience this gospel gap?

We have salvation, we know we're going for the eternity, but our lives right here are monotonous, they're flat.

Sometimes we're just going through the motions.

Sometimes we've been going to Bible study for 20 years and there's been no change.

What is going on?

It's the gospel gap.

And what Paul is praying, he's praying they would see that they are targets of God's power.

Of his power.

This is boundless, immeasurable, surpassing power.

It's God's power, and it's God's power that is in work in you.

And you go, well, what kind of power is this?

Of course it's Holy Spirit power, but how powerful is this power?

What's the power of the power?

Okay, let's look.

Verse 19, what is the surpassing greatness of his power toward us who believe?

These are in accordance with the working of the strength of his might.

Or here we go, which he brought about in Christ when he raised him from the dead.

All the power that was used to raise Jesus from the dead is now aimed at you, in you and through you, and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places.

The power that raised him from the dead, and then took him to the right hand of the Father, that power is now at work and targeted at you.

Far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in the age, but also in the one to come.

So God has exalted him and put everything under his feet.

That power is aimed and targeted at you, and put all things in subjection under a sea, and gave him his head over all things to the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all.

All that power that is exerted in Christ, raise him from the dead, it's seat him in authority, that power, Holy Spirit power, is at work and targeted at you.

Now, if you're charismatic, you kind of get this more than kind of us, right?

And if you come from a charismatic church, yeah, a little power, give me some more power, power to heal, power to work miracles, and maybe it's some of it, maybe it's some of that, right?

But I think it's talking about the power of just living and following Jesus on a daily basis, not just in the miracles, but in the daily following Jesus.

Now, get this.

This is something I guess I don't want you to forget, and maybe you can carry this with you for the rest of your life because some of you are gonna need it.

There have been seasons where you're going through a hard time where something's just crazy.

I I mean, I could tell way too many stories of just my my kids going into the ER.

I mean, just think about my son who's here today, Roman.

I mean, there's there's one one time he he busted his head against the wall.

He's a very active child, busted it, not to embarrass you, my son, busted his head against the wall, bleeding.

I took him to the ER.

The next day we get a call from foster care to come pick up a baby that is now my other son.

On that same day, my son Roman, two days in a row, decided to smash his head into a bar and bled everywhere.

Two days in a row.

Back in the ER.

And we have a baby now.

But sometimes I I can be honest with you, if I just what I described to you that just happened in a 48-hour period, a lot of that extended to years, two, three, four, five years of a lot of trials, suffering, and pain.

And maybe you've been there, maybe you're there now, and when you kind of get to the end of it, have you ever said to yourself, I'm so glad that marathon is over.

And it's at that point, God says, It's not a marathon, it's an iron man, and we're just getting started.

Yeah?

An iron man, right?

So you have you have swimming, biking, and running really, really far.

But in God's world, it's a reverse Iron Man because you just think you're wearing running a marathon, and you're like, are you telling me that this season of difficulty that I just went through is not over, but it's more to come?

Have you ever heard the phrase, God will not give you more than you can handle?

That is such a lie.

God will always give you more than you can handle.

Have you ever read the Bible?

There are plenty of people in there, most of the people in there.

He gives them far more than they can handle.

And he says to you, it's time to get on that bike.

We're still going to this season.

And you're like, Lord, I do not want to get on that bike.

I can't go anymore.

But by faith, I'm gonna get up and I'm gonna get on that bike, and I'm gonna keep going and suffering.

And what you're gonna find, what you're gonna find, I'll get this.

What you're gonna find is the bike you just got on is kind of like an electric bike.

Now, an electric bike is not like a motorcycle, an electric bike is often something called pedal assist.

You have to pedal for the battery to assist you to keep going.

And I think that's what it's like following Jesus.

We trust and obey.

We don't know how we're gonna make it.

This is far more than we can handle.

We have no idea what's gonna happen.

We just finished the marathon, it's still going, but I'm gonna get on the bike.

I have no idea how I'm gonna get up that hill.

Pedal assist.

Holy Spirit power to keep going, to keep showing up.

I don't know if any of you have ever been a caregiver of someone.

I mean, that I did it in my 20s with my grandmother.

That is the most, it's gotta be the most difficult and grueling thing I have ever done.

One of the top.

You're talking day in, day out, taking care of someone.

Day in, day out, grind.

And if you could sleep at night, that that'd be a good break, but you often can't.

I couldn't.

Oh, grandmother waking me up here in the night.

And if you've ever been through a season like that and you think, oh, the marathon, the marathon, oh, it's still gonna keep going.

Lord, I need your power to just show up today, to love today, to be patient today.

I need your power to keep going.

That's what Paul's praying.

To know that you're a target of God's power, Holy Spirit, power, marathon, it's over, get on the bike, keep going.

I love my church.

I love my church.

I'm thankful for you.

I can name many of you by name.

I'm so thankful for you, and I think it's important for us to be thankful for each person in our church as we can.

And I love that some of you have created days of the week where you pray for certain people, even certain people within the church.

Maybe that will help you to be more thankful.

Make a list of people you want to thank God for on a daily basis.

And keep praying for one another.

Pray, of course, pray for the healing, but pray that they would know God and just pray.

For Holy Spirit power just to follow Jesus day in and day out.

This past week I heard from a couple who moved away from our church.

They moved out of state and they were telling me they miss this church so much.

And it was so hard for where they're at now to plug in to a new church.

And I know that some of you have moved here and you're visiting here.

And I want to tell you something.

I guarantee you we are not a perfect church.

I guarantee you we will disappoint you.

Maybe we're not a good fit for you.

Who knows?

There's plenty of churches for you to go and see.

And if they are a perfect church, I guarantee you you will ruin it.

I've ruined this church.

I mean, we all do, we right?

We bring sin to the table.

But we want to love our church.

We want to be thankful to one another.

And we want to pray for one another to know God.

And that's what we're all about.

Let's pray.

Lord, it's so good to see people's faces on Sunday morning.

So good to be in a church that is loving and kind and supportive, not perfect, that you have put together many, many years ago.

You've planted this church.

So, Lord, I just want to say thank you.

And may we be people who are grateful and thankful.

And I know there's some that are going through the season, the marathon's over, and it's they're still getting they're going.

They're going.

There's so much ahead of them.

And we pray for their endurance, we pray for their comfort.

We pray that you give them power, Holy Spirit power, resurrection power to get up and to walk by faith and to trust and obey, and that you will empower them to keep going.

So, Lord, we thank you for creating your body of Christ.

We praise you for saving us and bringing us together so that we can praise you.

In Jesus' name, amen.