Saints in Christ (Ephesians 1:11-14)

Hello, I'm Pastor Creighton, and thank you for tuning into New Sun Churches Podcast.

We're a gospel centered church in Port Perry, Ontario, proclaiming the true and life-giving word of Jesus as we love and serve our neighbors.

May God bless you today through his life-giving word.

Our second reading this morning is from the book of Ephesians, chapter 1, verses 11 to 14.

Ephesians 1:11–14

In him we have also received an inheritance, because we were predestined according to the plan of the one who works out everything in agreement with the purpose of his will.

So that we who already put our hope in Christ might bring praise to his glory.

In him, you also were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit.

When you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation.

And when you devote believed the Holy Spirit is a down payment of our inheritance until the redemption of the possession, to the praise of the Lord.

Sorry, praise of his glory.

The word of the Lord.

Let's pray while you're standing.

Heavenly Father, we thank you for your word to us this morning.

We've gathered here, Lord, to be under your word, and we recognize that your word has been through millennia.

A word that changes hearts and lives and even nations.

So, Heavenly Father, we just pray that your word would touch every heart.

All of us would be drawn to Christ to know his voice and just bless our time together.

In Jesus' name we pray.

Amen.

So you may be seated.

Well, the end of October and early November always brings two important uh dates to mind, and I'm not talking about World Series, and that's all I'm gonna say.

Okay?

But it's the end of October.

We actually our anniversary is uh at the end of October, and there's always baseball going on around our anniversary.

So, but one anyway, I won't talk about it.

Uh I promise, that's it.

Yeah, no, no, that's right.

So these two dates that come up at the end of October and uh early November are first Reformation Day.

So Reformation Day is usually celebrated on October the 31st, and that's the day that Martin Luther, a Roman Catholic priest, took odds with the church and decided to write 95 thesis and nailed them to the door at the church in Wittenberg, Germany.

Those were 95 suggestions, 95 reforms of what needed to change.

Well, uh that came up a lot of action, a lot of discussion, and out of that 95 thesis, um we have the beginning of the reformation.

So that's kind of what we celebrate and Reformation Day, the Reformation.

Songs like Martin Luther, who wrote A Mighty Fortress is Our God, would be a good song.

We sing usually at this time of year.

Or also in Christ alone, just thinking about the words, in Christ alone we find our righteousness.

It's in him we are justified by faith.

So that's Reformation Sunday.

And usually around Reformation Sunday, another thing that kind of overlaps are we remember the martyrs.

So the Fox's Book of Martyrs is a great book, resource, or Voice of the Martyrs is a great organization.

Usually we bring to our churches at the end of October to remember the many martyrs, the many people who have given their lives, shed their blood for the building of the church.

It was uh Tertullian, one of the early church fathers who wrote in the third century, third, just the third, the blood of the martyrs is the seed of the church.

So here we are, and here we are.

I mean, here we are, it's uh 2025, and it's still the blood of the martyrs, whether you talk about Nigeria today or you talk about anywhere in the world.

Okay, so the blood of the martyrs.

Well, now today, and then we come into this today, All Saints Day and All Saints Sunday.

It's it's uh celebrated in both Catholic and Protestant churches.

In Catholic church traditions, they would be used to celebrate certain people throughout church history who were recognized for their extra faith, maybe something they've achieved, uh a particular amount of holiness or a closeness to God, and so they have their saints that they would recognize.

But we as a Protestant church, we take a broader view to All Saints' Day, that all followers of Christ are saints.

So just think about that.

Think about yourself.

Okay, put yourself in here now.

All of us as believers in Christ are saints.

So 1 Peter 2.9 says we are a chosen generation.

Then it says, we are a royal priesthood.

That's us.

A royal priesthood, a holy nation, his own special people.

So today we remember and praise God for the faithful who have traveled the Christian journey ahead of us, and then think about either the great marks of the faith that certain people throughout history have brought, or think about today is a good day to remember uh who invested into your life.

Who is the saint that told you about Jesus?

And so I want you to think about that.

Like if we if we go back in history, Audrey and I uh do a lot of different devotionals, but one of the devotionals we're reading is through uh the history of the church.

Almost every day there is someone who's given their life to Christ and some missionary.

So maybe you might think over history, people like, okay, Luther or Calvin, but you might go Tyndale, Wycliffe, Whitfield, Wesley.

I'll just mention some names.

Uh Spurgeon, Moody, uh Taylor, Hudson Taylor, Gladys Aylward, Fannie Crosby, okay, all these Mueller, George Mueller, Bonhoeffer, Billy Grimm, you might think about Jim Elliott or Elizabeth Elliott, okay, all these people who've gone on before us.

Or you might think about my mom, my dad, a grandparent who told you about Jesus, right?

So those are the saints who've gone on before us.

So today, maybe over coffee, or if there's a potlock lunch, I'm not sure what it is, you may take a moment and testify with each other about well, well, how did you come to know about Jesus?

Who told you?

What saint told you about Jesus?

So that's that's what All Saints Day is about, is talking about those people who have who have shared Jesus with us.

I I come from a Christian home, so my father was adamant about we're gonna go to church no matter where we are, whatever vacation, whatever campground, wherever cottage, we'll find a church.

And so he he had the church influence, but I had an uncle who uh was a man of God, who was more of a serious, uh, an elder deacon kind of person, a Gideon, and and I would talk with my uncle Dan about the Lord.

And so that would be my uncle.

And so there's different people maybe in your life, uh, a grandparent or an uncle or a or a friend, somebody in your family, maybe a Sunday school teacher, maybe a preacher, maybe a missionary.

Um we all have people like that in our lives, amen.

And so those were the saints who poured into our lives, and hopefully you'll just reflect on those today.

As I think about this passage this morning from we're gonna talk about Ephesians 1.

That's our key passage, so it's printed in your bulletin, or you can have it in your Bibles.

And uh as you think about this passage, I want to focus on the word identity this morning.

And so we're identifying who saints are, uh, but as we bring that home a little bit, I want us to identify like what is a saint?

How do we know we're a saint?

Um and and identity is a humongous word today, right?

It used to be a little simpler, but today it's become a very uh electric word in our society.

How do you identify yourself?

How do you choose to identify yourself?

These are big topics, huge issues.

With the determined effort of humanism in our world, with the determined effort of anything anti-God, this has become a confusing issue in our world.

Like, how do you know what you are and who you are?

So that becomes an issue in modernism.

We've got this uh this, you know, ever since Darwin, we've and and even before Darwin, anything just moving away from God is good, moving to God is bad.

And uh, and today, what is truth?

To uh, you know, good has become bad, bad has become good.

It's a very confusing world today.

So you try to fix your fit your identity, who am I?

Who I am, who am I personally, who am I in Christ?

Okay, these are big topics.

And if there is no God, which all the evolutionary people will push, no God.

And if there is no God, there can be no moral absolutes.

If there are no moral uh absolutes, then what are we dealing with?

How can I know who I am?

Okay, so it's it becomes a big, big issue uh in terms of identity.

If if if you have no identity, it's like uh where did I come from?

Where am I going?

What uh what is life?

Uh what am I living for?

Okay, so there's a lot of despair in our world today, a lot of brokenness, a lot of desperate people.

And so identity becomes really, really important.

Well, today, if you have keep your Bibles open to Ephesians 1, because I think we have big answers to that question in Ephesians 1, verses 11 to 14.

Ephesians 1:11–14

And in this passage, Paul writes to the Ephesian church and he speaks a lot about our identity, a lot about what it means to be in Christ.

He actually mentions living in Christ or being in Christ or Christ in us uh at least 14 times, just in the first four chapters of Ephesians.

So that's that helps a lot.

We are in Christ and what that means.

It brings uh our lives focus and direction.

And as you're thinking about identity and direction, let me just I want to give you a world picture.

It could be like, okay, you're driving somewhere, and all of a sudden, and don't look to my wife at all.

This never happens to me, but uh it happens more than I care to mention.

Uh honey, I know it's the cottage road number four, just past the telephone pole, right?

That kind of thing.

And uh if you've ever been lost, or let's say you're hiking somewhere in the woods and uh you've made the wrong turn.

This would never happen to Jonathan, but uh just think about it, okay, and and okay, so now you're lost.

What would help the most if you were lost?

Well, there's a couple of things.

Number one, you can someone could come along and say, Oh, you're just over here if you just go and take the next turn left, okay.

That's how to get out of this being lost.

Or a map would be helpful, right?

A map and knowing where you are on the map would be helpful.

A compass would be helpful, first, north, south, east, and west.

So thinking about markers uh to know where we are is really, really important.

And what we have in this passage are four markers.

Interestingly enough, they're not the they're all start with P.

And I think there's one P that's similar because in our bulletins we have four P's.

I don't have the bullet in front of me, but I'm gonna talk about four P's.

And they're all inside this passage.

Four, I'm gonna call them identifying markers.

And it's like having a north, south, east, and west to know who we are, uh, more importantly, who we are in Christ.

So the first marker is uh the word predestined.

So just take a look at your passage.

And in in verse 11, in him we were chosen, having been predestined according to the plan of him who works out everything in conformity with the purpose.

Okay, just think about that word predestined.

Um, maybe you're struggling deep inside to know who you are.

This passage should help big time because this passage means you are not an accident.

This passage means you are not a fluke of chance or a byproduct or a random chance.

Uh, God is the giver of life.

God never does anything accidentally.

God is sovereign, he is creator over all things.

It says you've been predestined according to the plan of him, God, who works out everything in conformity with he's got a purpose.

So this is a beautiful passage of like, okay, I'm I'm created.

I I was born with a reason, with a purpose, and God created me uh with a design, which means we are, if you love passages of scripture, read Psalm 139.

You know, you are fearfully and wonderfully made.

God knew you before you were even created, and uh, God has a plan for your life.

So this is so true and so important.

Probably that kind of a truth is more important than a lot of things that are being said about life today.

But that you were created, God has a plan, you were predestined.

Audrey and I love a singer called Robin Mark.

He's Irish, he's out of Belfast.

We think he's kind of retired, he hasn't been to Canada now for a couple of years.

But Robin Mark sings this chorus.

I'm not gonna sing it, but let me give you the words.

It's a chorus he repeats in a medley, and he goes like this.

He says, You're everywhere.

He's talking about Jesus.

He says, You're everywhere and every place, and every time, and every space, and every breath I take, you lend.

You're the only one who satisfies, the only one who makes my life make sense.

Jesus.

I had my sister-in-law make a little poster, and we have it at the cottage without that chorus.

And it just reminds you constantly when like there's when things are kind of going crazy around you and you're kind of figuring how it all fits, this is so important that we remember Jesus, focusing back on Jesus, getting your eyes back on Jesus, that's the only one who makes our lives make sense.

Now, very simply, without getting too theological, because the word predestined, foreknowledge, you know, subscribe, and we can get into all kinds of theological discussion about pre-being predestined.

But predestined makes basically means God has a plan for your life.

That's what it means.

In verse 4, you can see in verse 4, he chose us in him before the foundation of the creation of the world.

Okay, it's that idea.

It means that your life has been marked out in advance for you.

Before you were even born, before you even thought of, because God lives outside of time.

So just think about that.

God knew you, God chose you, God planned your life before you were even born.

Amen.

Okay, that's a huge thought, but it should help and put some foundation to who you are.

That means he's known you for a very long time.

Everything.

You knew you would give your life to Jesus.

He knew you would put your faith in Christ and live with certain goals, purposes, and privileges to accomplish his plans.

But more importantly, it's that God loves you so much that he created you and has this plan for your life.

And the sooner you and I discover and accept that plan, the better life's gonna go for us.

And part of that better plan brings me to my second identifying marker, and it's the word purchased.

So you're gonna see in verse 14, I think, who is a deposit guaranteeing our inheritance until the redemption, the purchase of those who are God's possessions.

So think about the word purchase.

You were predestined, and now you are purchased.

You and I are bought.

We are redeemed by Christ.

In other words, you belong to God.

You were bought, you were paid for by the blood of Jesus on the cross of Calvary, which means you are also very valuable to Him.

Life is valuable, life is priceless.

We need to get there.

We as a society often confuse self-worth with net worth.

What's this person really worth?

You know, how many cars, how many houses, how much, how much do they have in the bank?

We think about net worth, but net worth doesn't really mean anything in eternity.

It's self-worth that's more important for you and I.

There was an article, I found this article written in a medical journal that calculated how much every uh every one of the enzymes and hormones and and all the different parts of your body are worth.

And so this guy added them all up.

He came to the conclusion that your body is worth six million and fifteen dollars and forty cents.

Johnson, don't ask me what the 40 cents are worth, okay?

Okay, so somehow he came up with this.

That means that we are all six million dollar men and women.

Okay, but if you calculate the cost of every cell in your body, that value goes up to about six quadrillion dollars.

Or, in other words, you and I are priceless.

Just think about that.

You are priceless.

Life is priceless, that's what's important.

Remember that about life.

Jesus thought this way.

He thought every life was so important that we have this beautiful chapter in Luke 15.

So you know Luke 15.

Luke 15 is about three stories.

Three stories of lost.

There's a lost sheep.

Okay, the nine and you've got to go out and find a lost sheep.

There's a lost coin.

The woman just kept on cleaning the house, cleaning until she could find the lost coin, and then there's the lost son, the prodigal son, just took off, wasted his life, and then came back to the father.

And in that chapter, Jesus is really saying, every life is important.

Every life is priceless.

You are priceless, and God will do anything to bring you back to Him.

So that's really, really important.

You are valuable because you belong to God.

You are valuable because of the price Jesus paid.

Your life and your salvation is a free gift from God.

That is true.

It costs you nothing, but it costs God.

Think about it, cost you nothing, cost God everything.

Why?

Because he gave his son Jesus to die on a cross for your sins and mine.

So he purchased you with his blood.

Your true value has nothing to do with the enzymes, the cells throughout your body, but everything to do with knowing who you are in Jesus.

So your life is the first marker was predestined.

The second marker is purchased.

Now notice the third marker is that we are heirs to God's promise.

If you look at verse 13.

And you also were included in Christ when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, having believed you were marked in him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit, who is a deposit guaranteeing our inheritance.

So think about this: the promise.

I was trying to think of a best passage to support this.

And I love this passage in 2 Timothy.

So this is the last book that Paul wrote.

So Paul is probably in prison, has been in prison for a while.

He's probably down to nothing.

It's just terrible, horrible what he had to live in, but wrote most of his prison letters in prison.

But this is what Paul writes at the end of his life.

He said, So do not be ashamed to testify about our Lord, or ashamed of me, his prisoner, but join with me in suffering for the gospel, by the power of God who has saved us and called us to a holy life, not because of anything we have done, but because of his own purpose and grace.

I love this.

This grace was given us in Christ Jesus before the beginning of time, but it has now been revealed through the appearing of our Savior Christ Jesus, who has destroyed death and has brought life and immortality to light through the gospel.

And of this gospel, this is Paul writing, I was appointed a herald and an apostle and a teacher.

That's why I am suffering as I am.

And then he says, This, and yet I am not ashamed, because I know, and I'll kind of see the I'm gonna do the King James in this one.

Okay, I know.

Whom I have believed, and I am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I've committed unto him.

What is it?

Against that day.

Okay, that's how we in the in the NIV it says, I know whom I have believed, and I'm convinced he's able to guard what I have entrusted to him for that day.

Wonderful promises in Scripture.

The other passage I was thinking about was John 14, when Jesus has been telling the disciples, I'm going to be crucified, they're going to nail me to a cross, and I'm going to be leaving you.

And they're all upset and worried.

And he says, Don't let your hearts be troubled.

Trust in God, trust also in me.

In my Father's house in many mansions, I'm going to prepare a place, right?

John 14, you hear it a lot of funerals.

But he gives this great promise of I'm going ahead of you.

I'm preparing a place.

I'll be there for you when you get there.

Okay, a great, great promise.

These are the promises.

These are the inherited promises we get as heirs of Christ.

And then the other passage I think is always so wonderful to hear is that because of Christ and because we know who Christ is, we are more than conquerors.

So no matter how tough life gets, no matter how hard, we are more than conquerors.

So let me remind you of this passage.

Paul writes it in Romans 8.

What then shall we say in response to this?

If God is for us, who can be against us?

He who did not spare his own son, but gave him up for us all, how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things?

Who will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen?

It is God who justifies.

Who is he that condemns?

Christ Jesus, who died.

More than that, he who is raised to life is at the right hand of God and is interceding for us.

Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?

Shall trouble, hardship, persecution, famine, nakedness, danger, or sword?

As it is written, for your sake we face death all day long.

We are considered as sheep to the slaughter.

But no, in all of these things, you and I are the same thing in Christ and conquerors through him who loved us.

For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything in all of creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Isn't that a great promise?

Nothing can separate us from the love of God.

So that's we need to take that to the bank.

Just live it, okay, that we are more than conquerors.

So as believers, as saints, this marker, this heir to the promise, also means that he gives us the Holy Spirit.

So we see that in this passage.

We even inherited the Holy Spirit.

He's the guarantee of Christ in us, the Holy Spirit.

And so at the moment of your salvation, at the moment you placed your faith in Jesus, the moment you knew your faith was solid and you wanted to live for Christ, uh you be you were reborn.

You were born spiritually, you became alive spiritually, you received Jesus by faith, you committed your life, and the Holy Spirit took up residence in your heart.

And now the Bible says in 1 Corinthians 3 that your body becomes the temple of the Holy Spirit, which means he lives inside of you and he's there.

But letting control your life is not as easy as we say, and uh it takes, we need to mature and live in Christ to be set apart, uh, being sanctified, surrendering our will to his.

Then as we do that, as we surrender our lives, this errors of promise means that we will grow and become more like Jesus as we grow in love, joy, and peace, and patience and kindness to the fruit of the Spirit and gentleness and self-control.

So our identity, as found in Christ, is knowing that we are predestined, knowing that we are purchased by his blood, knowing that we are heirs of his promise, and finally, knowing that we are to praise the Lord.

So you're gonna notice in this passage twice, in that I'll try to find it again here in Ephesians.

So in Ephesians 1, twice it's mentioned about praise.

So according to the plan of Him, of His, in order that we who were the first, verse 12, were the first to hope in Christ might be for the praise of His glory.

Then it mentions it again at the end of verse 14, to the praise of His glory.

So that should be the fourth marker.

Identifying markers, those who are saints are those who live to praise the Lord.

Okay, we are predestined, we are purchased, we are heirs of the promise, and we are to praise the Lord.

Now, A.

W.

Tozer, I don't know if he was an Anglican or not, but let's say he was.

Okay.

He said this, he had a church on Avenue Road for a while, even.

It's amazing.

But he says, I am going to say something to you which will sound strange.

It even sounds strange to me as I say it, because we are not used to hearing it within our Christian fellowships.

We are saved to worship God.

All that Christ has done for us in the past and all that he is doing now leads us to this one end, to worship God.

Amen.

Like so, praise needs to be a key characteristic of who we are in Christ.

Praise.

So think about this.

Um, it came up in one of our readings this week, Audrey and I were talking about it, praise and thanksgiving, and and you're thinking about it's an essential, powerful and anxiety.

So think about this, stress and anxiety cannot coexist with praise and thanksgiving.

So if you're struggling with stress and anxiety, turn your life to praising God and giving him thanks for what he's doing in your life, and that anxiety and stress will go away.

Something to remind yourself of.

Praise seems to be critical for the Christian life.

I'll remind you of this passage in Matthew 5.

It says, You are the salt of the earth, but if the salt loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again?

It's no longer good for anything except to be thrown out and trampled by men.

You are the light of the world.

A city on a hill cannot be hid.

Neither do people light a land and put it under a bowl.

Instead, they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house.

In the same way, listen, it says this.

In the same, let your light shine before men that they may see your good deeds and praise your Father in heaven.

Praise.

The other passage which is key to this whole message is from 1 Peter 2 9, where I read earlier, you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God.

Why?

So there's a good follow-through in the statement.

Why?

So that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light.

Once you were not a people, now you are the people of God.

Once you have not received mercy, now you have received mercy, you are saints in Christ.

Praise the Lord.

So praise becomes critical.

So for many Christians, worship is uh, I'm gonna say, the missing cord in your experience.

Sadly, many people equate worship and praise with coming to a church service in a building.

Okay, but friends, walking into a church building doesn't make you a worshiper of Christ any more than me walking into a garage makes me a Cadillac or a Mercedes or a Buick or a Chevy.

Okay, okay, walking into a garage does not make you walking to a McDonald's does not make me a hamburger.

Okay, walking into church doesn't make me a worshiper.

Okay, you got that?

Okay, from Romans 12, 1, I urge you, brothers and sisters, in view of God's mercy, offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God.

This is your spiritual act of worship.

Now we have amazing worship here at News Song.

I love the choir.

I love what Jonathan does.

I love so many of our great musicians.

So we've got great music.

We talk about our church in a lot of different places.

Uh and it's so important that we praise the Lord.

Just think about whether you put praise music on your stereo at home, you put praise music on your phones, whether you put praise music somewhere in the house or earphones.

Okay, just praise is so important.

So as followers of Jesus, we are called to give ourselves as living sacrifices, surrender to Christ.

We don't give a sacrifice.

This passage tells us we are the sacrifice that praises God.

So, in conclusion, let me ask you this: when it comes to identity, do you know who you are?

Or more importantly, do you know whose you are?

Right?

It's all about your identity.

That in Christ you are a saint.

And so from this passage in Ephesians chapter 1, we are reminded that if you are in Christ, you are predestined.

Ephesians 1 · chapter mention

That means chosen by God to live out a plan, a great plan He has for your life.

You are purchased by God and you now become His possession.

I belong to Jesus, bought and paid for by His blood.

You are heirs to the promise of the Holy Spirit, home and glory, and you are also to praise and glorify God.

That is who we are.

If we can keep those four things in mind when we're struggling, you know, it's been, we've had a couple of really gray days, haven't we?

Thursday, Friday.

I mean, it's just rain, rain, rain.

Okay, and you're kind of like uh it's good to remember who you are.

Your identity is not in what's going on around here, how bad the world is, your bank account.

Okay, it's got nothing to do with that.

Your identity is in Jesus.

That you are predestined, you are purchased, you are an heir to the promise, and you're here to praise God.

That makes us saints.

That makes us saints in Christ.

My prayer is that all of you know Jesus, and you can say, Yes, I'm a saint, and I'm gonna live like a saint and give God all the glory.

Amen.

We hope that you've been blessed by God's word today.

If you live in the Port Perry area, we hope that you'll come and worship with us in person on Sunday at 10 a.m.

If you'd like to learn more about Newsong Church, we'd love to connect with you.

Please find our contact information at newsongportperry.ca and reach out to us.

Newsong's ministry is entirely funded by the generous giving of those who worship and journey with us.

If you feel called to support our ministry with a financial gift, please go to newsongportperry.ca slash giving to make your contribution.

Go in peace to love and serve the Lord.