What a glorious revealing glimpse of God’s goodness, the book of Ephesians is. But when I go to copy a verse or two, to share it here in my blog post, it doesn’t seem to do it justice and ring out with the glorious truth of the entire book!
The first three chapters of Ephesians especially try to unveil the treasures that are ours – once we have given our lives to God through Jesus Christ. If you ever struggle like I do occasionally, with stressing over God’s do’s and don’ts, READ Ephesians.
God wants to lavish on us – His wonderful gift-giving through His Son. He has a glorious way of life planned for us that includes showering us with utter extravagance.
Ephesians 1:3 says it this way.
“…the God and father of our Lord Jesus Christ…has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ.”
Then, chapters 1-3 begin to describe, list, and name these gifts and blessings.
Paul prays. He wants us to:
“…know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in his holy people, and his incomparably great power for us who believe.” Ephesians 1:18
We have been given fullness. An abundant, over-flowing, never ceasing, fullness in Christ. We’re not to live a puny life of our small imaginings, but rather, we are to live a life that reflects the glory and grace of a great, wonderful, and amazingly-good God.
I challenge you and encourage you to read today the first three chapters of Ephesians. The NIV link is here at Bible Gateway. The Message version is here. Or they will take you to your favorite translation of the Bible.
To really consider what your spiritual blessings are – use your Bible or copy the first three chapters of Ephesians to a WORD document. Then, circle and number the benefits that are yours. What are your thoughts? Are you overwhelmed?
To be able to use and apply God’s blessings and gifts, first to ourselves, and then to share them with others, we must first, know what they are. They need to be real to us. To do this we must find a way to read the Bible, daily, and encourage others to do so, also.
To be able to know what God’s promises and provisions are, we must read, study, think on, consider, and make them our own.
As we think on, absorb, use, and lavishly share, we will be over-whelmed with God’s wonderful gifts!
God has provided all of this for us, and shared all of this with us, so that we can know His love, power, grace, mercy, and goodness.
“And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus, in order that…he might show the incomparable riches of his grace, expressed in his kindness to us in Christ Jesus.” Ephesians 2:6-7