Delighting in Grace Part 3

Welcome to Delight in Grace, the teaching ministry of Rich Powell, Pastor of Grace Bible Church in Winston-Salem. How quickly we fall into striving in our Christian walk when God has offered us something far greater. He offers us the opportunity to know Him and delight in Him. To see and delight in His beauty will keep us soaring in our walk instead of wearily striving. This message titled Delighting in the Trinity Part 2 will give us a look into Ephesians 3, 14-21. Today we're tuning into the third and final part of this message first preached on September 3, 2017. We're not chicken littles running around saying the sky is falling.

Although, if you were to look at Facebook you would think that was the case. Too many Christians are acting like chicken little. But that is completely contrary to Ephesians 3, 20.

Completely contrary. John says that our faith overcomes the world. Do you believe that Christians?

Do you believe that? Instead of being chicken littles we are influencers who live in the outflow of our delight in God. It was Jesus who promised he who believes out of his heart will flow rivers of living water. Again, a direct reference to the presence and the power and the resource of the Holy Spirit. So let's look once again at our equipping. This is the resource that we have in God.

Let's look at our equipping. This is what we studied last time back in verses 16 through 19. And this is going to be a quick review, a quick review. But please, loved ones, I want you to know this.

You need to know these. This is Paul's prayer. I am praying that you will grasp this. That this will all be filled up and become true and real in you. And it comes through our delight in God. Through grasping the truths of Ephesians 1 to 3. Number one, our equipping, number one, that God empowers your spirit with his Holy Spirit. Verse 16, strengthened with power through his spirit in your inner man.

Empower your spirit with his Holy Spirit. To where number two, Christ is at home in your attitudes and ambitions. That Christ may dwell in your hearts and minds.

Dwell to settle down and be at home. Not a weekly visitor, but Christ is at home in my attitudes and ambitions. So that, number three, you will experience the immeasurable love of Christ. Have you experienced the immeasurable love of Christ?

Do you know it? To the point that you are, number four, overflowing with his goodness. You may be filled with all the fullness of God, he says in verse 19. What an amazing thought to be filled with all the fullness of God.

It means overflowing with his goodness. The perfections of God, every bit of it touches and anchors every aspect of my life. God isn't a part of my life. He is my life. He's the very point of my existence and my ambition. The psalmist said in Psalm 16, 5, Lord, you are my portion and my cup of blessing.

You hold my future. And he said in Psalm 23, 5, my cup overflows. Loved ones, I desire for you to be able to say that, for all of us to be able to say that. Imagine what would become of us as influencers in our dark and dying and thirsty world if this were true of us.

It can and ought to be. There's the daily sanctification for the believer is what we find here in this passage. The daily sanctification for the believer comes two things. And this is what I want to leave with you this morning. Consume his truth.

Please listen to me. The daily sanctification of the believer does not begin with the things you're supposed to do. It doesn't start there. The daily sanctification of the believer begins with you informing your heart and mind with God's self-disclosure and letting the purity of his truth pour over your cluttered heart and mind to transform it and renew it and purify it to become like Jesus Christ.

It has to begin there. Too many Christians simply look at the Bible as a checklist of things, ways a Christian is supposed to behave. That's not grace.

Becoming like Christ and being a Christian, walking the Christian faith is not about just simply trying harder to be a better person. You loved ones, listen, you need to, you must consume his truth. Consume it with hunger and passion.

Particularly the first three chapters of Ephesians. Know this, know this. Read it and then read it again and then when you're done reading it, read it again. Meditate on it. Practice the biblical virtue of meditation.

Think through it, think on it, memorize it. Let it renew your mind because your behavior is an outflow of what's going on inside of you. And God has given you a new heart and a new mind. Therefore, feed the new heart and the new mind with the purity of God's transforming truth. Consume his truth. Because if you do not, if you do not consume Ephesians 1 to 3, then chapters 4 to 6 become a drudgery. Chapter 4 to 6 sought to be the reality as the outflow of his power and love.

It's not a checklist of morality. Consume his truth, that's where daily sanctification begins. And then secondly, delight in him. Delight in him and the riches of his glory. How do you delight in someone?

The best illustration that God has given us is in the relationship between a man and a woman. Guys, how did you delight in that young woman that became your wife? You chased her, didn't you? I always say Andrea chased me, but the truth is I chased her.

I delighted in her. What do you do with regard to that which you delight in? You pursue it.

You pursue it. Delight in him and the riches of his glory. Worshipping God is what brings meaning to your life. Worshipping him is sensing him and serving him.

Both aspects there, sensing him and serving him. Delight in him and the riches of his glory. It is in your surrender to him that you receive his salvation, his forgiveness, his justification. It's in your surrender through faith that you receive eternal life. But it's in your pursuit of him that you are sanctified, that you become like him.

Put that checklist aside, loved ones. Yes, the commands are in there for a reason, but there's also a reason why they follow the first three chapters. Don't just jump to Ephesians 4, no Ephesians 1 to 3. And let God transform you at the core of your being so that your glorifying him then becomes an outflow. In closing, let me quote J.D. Greer. Gospel recovering the power that made Christianity revolutionary.

J.D. says, think of your relationship with Christ like a balloon. There are two ways to keep a balloon afloat. If you fill a balloon with your breath, the only way to keep it in the air is to continually smack it upwards. That's how religion keeps you motivated.

It repeatedly hits you. Stop doing this. Get busy with that. This is my life as a pastor. This is J.D.

Greer saying this, all right. People come on Sunday so I can smack them about something. Be more generous. And they do that for a week. Go do missions and they sign up for a trip. Every week I smack them back into spiritual orbit.

No wonder people don't like being around me. But there's another way to keep the balloon afloat. Fill it with helium. Then it floats on its own.

No smacking required. Listen to this, please. And this is in closing. Listen to this. It's said very well. Seeing the size and beauty of God is like the helium that keeps you soaring spiritually. The size and beauty of God, loved ones, is Ephesians 1 through 3.

Fill your balloon with the helium of Ephesians 1 to 3 so that it floats. And then chapters 4 to 6 will become true of your life. Watch God do that. Watch God do that. To Him be glory in the church. Pray with me, what if this were true of the church?

What would become of us if this were true of the church? Then let's resolve in our hearts and minds before God that by His Spirit it will become true of me and us. Father, we are so grateful for your self-disclosure. For we acknowledge, Father, that we are hopeless and utterly powerless without it. And you have given yourself to us in word, in person, in your Son and in your Spirit. To equip us and to empower us to be transformed. Father, we acknowledge that that transformation comes through our walk with you, our pursuit of you and our delight in you. Thank you that you are so good and so perfect. Challenge our hearts this morning, Father, that we would resign ourselves from pursuing lesser things, meaningless things. But that we would pursue you alone, that we may be transformed in our hearts and our minds. Thank you for what you have done and what you will do. In Jesus' name, Amen. Amen.