The Greek Exam

Our lesson this morning comes from the first chapter of Paul’s letter to the Ephesians. Ephesians chapter one, starting with the third verse.
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places. Just as he chose us in Christ before the foundation of the world, to be holy and blameless before him in love, he destined us for adoption as his children through Jesus Christ, according to the good pleasure of his will. To the praise of his glorious grace that he freely bestowed on us in the beloved. In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace that he lavished on us. With all wisdom and insight He has made known to us the mystery of his will according to his good pleasure that he set forth in Christ, has a plan for the fullness of time to gather up all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth. In Christ we have also been obtained. We have also obtained an inheritance, having been destined according to the purpose of him who accomplishes all things according to his counsel and will, so that we who were first to set our hope on Christ, might live for the praise of his glory. In him you also, when you had heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and had believed in him, were marked with the seal of the promised Holy Spirit. This is the pledge of our inheritance toward redemption as God’s own people, to the praise of his glory.
Friends, this is the Word of God for the people of God. Thanks be to God. Amen.

Some people know that I fear Starbucks. I’m just afraid of the place because you can’t order by number. You have to tell them what you want. And if you get something simple, they look at you like, simpleton. And I’ve been in there. When a guy walks in and says, I want a quad long shot Grande a venti cup, half caff, double cup, no sleeve salted caramel mocha latte with two pumps of vanilla substitute, two pumps of white chocolate mocha for the mocha, and substitute two pumps of hazelnut for the toffee nut. Half whole, half brave’ No whipped cream on top. Extra hot extra foam. Extra caramel drizzle. Extra salt. Add a scoop of vanilla bean powder with light ice well stirred. And oh, by the way, I have a coupon. I am not standing behind that and going, I want a coffee. You want to say to the person, hold on. What are you saying? I can’t keep up. You’re talking too fast.

It’s almost what I want to say to the Apostle Paul when he wrote what we read. Doctor Billy Simmons taught me Greek in seminary. He was one of a couple of Greek professors. And when you take an exegesis course in seminary, you have a Westcott and Hort Greek New Testament, and that’s the only Bible you’re allowed to bring in the exegesis course, one in Greek. And each night you go home, you translate the Greek into English. You parse the nouns and verbs. You read what the commentators say, because the next day Doctor Simmons is going to have Greek class, and you have to stand, and you have to read whatever passage he gives you in the Greek. Then you have to parse the nouns and verbs. Then you have to translate it. And then Doctor Simmons would ask, okay, tell me, what did you learn from this passage of scripture? Do the same thing when you take Hebrew exegesis courses, but their Hebrew is written backwards. So, you start in the back of the book. You move forward.

I took a class in Ephesians, and I believe we were also doing Philippians along with it. There were two books because Doctor Simmons says on final exam he said, your final exam is going to come from the book of Ephesians, and I’m not going to give you but just a few verses to translate. As a matter of fact, he hinted at us that you just may get a sentence or two to translate. We’re thinking this could be good. So Doctor Simmons walked in and wrote on the board in the class. Translate, parse and exegete Ephesians, chapter one, verses three through 14. In Greek, it’s 267 words. In Greek there are 21 times that the word he or him appears. And you have to know who the he or him is. But if you pull out your Bible now and you start looking at it while I’m preaching, who is Paul talking about? Is he talking about God? Is he talking about Jesus? The other thing about Ephesians, the first chapter, verses three through 14, in Greek, it’s one sentence. One run on sentence. And actually the second sentence in the first chapter is Ephesians 1:15 through 23. That’s another sentence. And you want to say to Paul, Paul, hang on. Because everything you need, every Greek doctrine of the New Testament is found right here in those verses three through 14 of the first chapter. It’s got it all right there, but it just comes at you like the people that go to Starbucks and know all the language. It comes at you and you’re not sure what to do with it.

It was like our old football coach on Friday night. We’d be in the locker room ready to go out, and Coach Webb would stand up by his chalkboard one more time and he’d draw one more formation, and he explained one more thing, and he would remind us of everything we’d been through in practice, from Monday all the way to Thursday and remind us of our reads. And he reminded us of the other team’s tendencies, and he reminded us of the formations that we get in and what they were going to run. It was like Coach! Slow your roll. Let us get out there and play the game. Paul, slow your roll. Let us absorb it before we try to live it. It’s all here. The book of Ephesians is kind of like the going out before the game talk.

The whole book takes you through what it is like to be a church, and what it is like to be a member of a church in the first century. But there’s a cool thing about the book of Ephesians. I’m going to read the first verse to you in Greek. Now I’m going to do the English translation for you so you can hear what the Greek text says. Paul will call out one to call out one of Christ Jesus by the will of God, to the saints who are in ______, and are faithful in Christ Jesus. It’s blank where the word Ephesus appears in your English version. There is no word in the Greek text because it’s an encyclical. As a matter of fact, there are copies of the book of Ephesians that it’s written to the saints at Laodecia. So, you can legitimately say this. Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus, by the will of God, to the saints who are Trinity and are faithful in Christ Jesus.

So, for the next six weeks, we’re going to run through the book of Ephesians, and we’re going to look at it like a pep talk. We’re going to look at it like an attaboy. You know, somebody is graduating, and you give them, attaboy. You did a great job. Now go out there and get a great job or have a great life or is somebody is going through a great life transition. You encourage them. That’s what the book of Ephesians is. It encourages us as a church. It encourages us as individuals to live as Christ has commanded. There are four things I want to say that are in this passage this morning. And on that final exam, I came up with four other things, because there are all kinds of things in there.

I made a list Monday when I started this again and just the first chapter is, several week sermon series that you’re going to get four things this morning. God has given us we are blessed in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places. It’s already ours. We have been given every spiritual blessing. And when we talk about spiritual blessings, we tend to turn those things into their ethereal. We tend to think that spiritual blessings are, you know, the fruit of the spirit all over again. It’s, love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. Those are spiritual blessings.

Sometimes people don’t get so fired up about those kind of spiritual blessings. Love. Joy. Peace. Good. Those are good things. How many of you have ever prayed for the spiritual blessing of patience? Kindness. Generosity. That one slows us down. Faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Those are true spiritual blessings. We’ve been given those spiritual blessings. But I want to say there are other kinds of spiritual blessings that God gives. You’re going to like this list much better. It comes from the 42nd chapter of the Book of Job and the Lord restored the fortunes of Job when he prayed for his friends, and the Lord gave job twice as much as he’d had before, and the Lord showed him sympathy and comforted him. The Lord blessed the latter days of Job more than in his beginning, and he had 14,000 sheep, 6000 camels, a thousand yoke of oxen, a thousand donkeys. He also had seven sons and three daughters. In all the land. There was not a woman so beautiful as Job’s daughters, and their father gave them an inheritance along with their brothers. And after this Job lived 140 years, and saw his children and his children’s children; four generations. And Job died old and full of days.

When you jump in your car today, understand that’s a spiritual blessing. Pardon me. Bear.
When you go in your house today; understand that’s a spiritual blessing.
When you look at your checkbook, understand that’s a spiritual blessing.

That yes, God blesses us with love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, gentleness, faithfulness, generosity, patience, and self-control. I think I put patience in there twice, but God’s spiritual blessings are also physical. He blesses us with good health. He blesses us with long life. He blesses us with family. He blesses us with children and grandchildren. He blesses us. With the good things he has brought into our lives. Never shy away from that. That God’s spiritual blessings are physical as well as spiritual. and give him thanks. God has blessed us with redemption. He has blessed us with the forgiveness of our sins. The forgiveness of our sins. Paul in writing the church at Rome, said it this way. For while we were still weak at the right time, Christ died for the ungodly. Indeed, rarely will anyone die for a righteous person, though perhaps for a good person. Someone might actually dare to die. But God proves his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. We didn’t have to clean up our act. We didn’t have to get right. We didn’t have to live a holy life. We didn’t have to confess, repent, come to the altar. While we were still sinners Christ died for us, and he loves us. And Paul underscores this by saying, you’ve been adopted. The Old Testament doesn’t have a concept of adoption. Adoption is not a biblical concept. It comes out of Roman law. And Paul was trying to use this image to explain that God has brought you in through a sacrifice of Christ. He has brought you into his family. He has made you a son or a daughter. The story that Jesus tells about a man who had two sons, and we all know about the younger son. He takes his father’s inheritance. He goes off into a far country, and he squanders dad’s inheritance on riotous living. And there’s a famine in the land, and he begins to be in what? In this nice Jewish boy who is starving, associates himself with the pig farmer and the pig farmer, probably knowing he was a nice Jewish boy, and knowing how all the Jews looked at swine, told him, go slop the hogs! And this young boy is about to put his face in the pig slop. He is about to demean himself that far and the Bible says, and he came to himself. He realized how many of my father’s servants are being fed right now. And I’m slopping hogs. I know what I’ll do. I’ll go back home to my father, and I’ll say, father, I’ve sinned before heaven and before you. I’m not worthy to be called your son. Treat me as one of your hired hands.

And we’ve been there. And we know what the prodigal is doing. He’s negotiating. Is he sincere? It’s doubtful. Does his father know? He’s probably not sincere. You better bet you his father sees the son coming, and he runs and greets him and falls on his neck and kisses him and welcomes him with the embrace, and says to his servants, bring the robe and bring the ring. The two things that were the sign of sonship, the two symbols that that young boy belong to the father. The father has the servants bring. He’s been restored to sonship. Meanwhile, the older brother hears the sound of rejoicing, and he comes in from the field, all sullen, because this young whippersnapper has gotten away with riotous living. And the older brother, if you read Luke 15, seems to know some details that we have not previously been told. And you wonder, how does the older brother know? Some of us are older brothers. We know stuff. And he says this, this son of yours. He blew it all. And you welcome me back with a party. And I’ve stayed here, and I’ve slaved for you, and I’ve worked for you. And I’ve never disobeyed you. And I’ve never even gotten a ham sandwich with my friends. And the father says to him, son, all that I have is yours. The inheritance is yours. The blessing is yours. The rights of a firstborn are yours. You are still my son. But this son of mine, this brother of yours. He was dead, but he is alive.

Well, there’s no formal biblical image of adoption. The story of the prodigal tells us that God redeems us, forgives us of our sins, and adopts us. And then Paul says that we have been given the mystery of his will. We know the mystery of his will. The. The word mystery appears several times in the New Testament. And we go, what is that? What is the mystery of faith? I thought it was as simple as Jesus. Well, it is, but there’s another mystery associated with that. Paul says it this way. So, if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation. Everything old has passed away. And see, everything has become new. All this is from God who reconciled us to himself through Christ and has given us the ministry of reconciliation that is in Christ. God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespass against them and entrusting the message of reconciliation to us. So, we are ambassadors for Christ. And we’re telling the world that you’ve been invited to be reconciled with Christ. What in the world is the mystery? The mystery is how did the Gentiles get in? The Jews are God’s chosen people. Jesus was a good Jew. The first part of the church movement is to the Jewish community. How are all these Gentiles suddenly getting in and why does God want them? It’s the mystery of reconciliation. It’s God saying, you’re my children. Whether you’re saying or a sinner, I love you. You’re my children. Whether Jew or Gentile, I love you. You’re my children. Now go help the world practice reconciliation.

Yesterday in the afternoon, the family tribe was located in front of a television watching Netflix. And there’s something on Netflix. It’s a cooking show that involves barbecue, and they barbecue everything from cows to bison. And yesterday they were barbecuing raccoon. And my, my herd will sit there when Andrew’s home, and they will watch that all afternoon. And Andrew’s copiously scribbling notes and figuring out how to change his recipes. And right in the middle of that, I got a text message late in the afternoon from the most liberal Methodist minister I know. And he said, look at your news feed. Something has happened at the Trump rally. Please pray for our country.
That was it.

What happened yesterday has happened before in American history. But as I was watching the news last night and listening to the rhetoric. I thought, you know, God has just given us our ministry, the Ministry of Reconciliation, the ministry of learning how to disagree with one another. Without turning it into this big polarizing event. And I thought, there is no other entity in culture that can turn the thermostat down right now, except the church. And here’s the hard thing I want to say to you. And I just keep your brain with me and let me get the statement out. God is not on your side. God is not on the side of your candidate. God is not for your movement. The question we need to ask ourselves. Are we with God? So, in the coming weeks and the coming months, I hope the church would become good listeners. And maybe learn to turn the volume down. So that we can disagree and we can speak the truth to each other, and we can speak the truth to power, but do it in love. That’s the ministry of reconciliation. That’s the radical place the church was at. The church was a Jewish movement that suddenly became a Gentile movement. How did it do it? Because Christ called us to practice the ministry of reconciliation, to take the hand of our enemy, to take the hand of the one we disagree with, and said, together, let’s go to Christ. Together. We can turn the volume down.

And we can learn to have rational, informed discussions. And yes, rational, informed disagreements. Because that’s how this country was founded, and that is one of the freedoms we enjoy. We’ve been called to the mystery of reconciliation, and that is the mystery of his will, that we are a mixed tribe. And then Paul said that we have been given the Holy Spirit. Eugene Peterson, in his translation, The New Testament, called the message. When he gets to this part of Ephesians, he says, The Holy Spirit has been given to us. So, we are signed, sealed, delivered. That God in the Holy Spirit has given us the down payment and made the first installment of what? Eternal life. That he set us free from our sins. He set us free from the bondage of death. He set us free from fear. He has set us free to live as his children, to live rich, full lives enjoying material blessings which are really spiritual blessings and enjoying spiritual blessings. We have the freedom that we’ve been forgiven of our sins. We know the mystery that God has called us into this ministry called reconciliation. And we’ve got God’s Spirit that dwells in us, that empowers us, that allows us to do the seemingly impossible. But you want to say to Paul, slow down. I can’t take it all in. Slow down. There’s too much here.

For the next six weeks will be our pep talk. There’s a church, our pep talk to get ready for the future that God’s preparing us for. And it’ll start with Weekend of the Cross, and it’ll move to August the 18th. We have a church surprise getting ready for you on August the 18th, and it will move into the fall as some new ministries kick off and we see God’s people coming back to church. I want us to be ready for what God wants to do in us, through us, for us, in making Ruston and our world a better place in the name of Christ our Lord. Would you stand and pray with me?

There are too many words in those verses, Lord, one long run on sentence that confuses us. Yet the hope and the truth in those words encourage us and give us life. Help us to live out the commandments of God and live into the promises of God. As we seek to be world changers, we pray in your name. Amen.