Today on Insight for Living... The wealth, you know where it began. It began at the cross where we first saw the light, where the truth of our inheritance became a reality. And we found out that we were not only sheep who belonged to the Lord, but we have a position in Christ that lifts us into the heavenlies with Christ reigning, if you will, in authority over the old nature that once dominated us. Anyone who decides to follow Jesus Christ has been granted a gift, a unique skill set to be deployed in the family of God.
Do you know which gifts belong to you? Today on Insight for Living, Chuck Swindoll presents another message in a series we're calling Becoming a People of Grace. We're looking at Ephesians 4 today and discovering the beautiful blend of gifts given to those who follow Christ. Along with unique spiritual gifts, God has given us the power to use them.
Chuck titled today's message His Gift and Our Gifts. In your worship folder, you will find a half sheet that lists the spiritual gifts, and you may want to pull that out and slip it into Ephesians chapter 4. I want to read verses 7 through 11 for you this morning. Ephesians 4, beginning at verse 7, when I'm through, you can just slide that half sheet right in there and mark our place.
Now, we're ending at an incomplete sentence, but time doesn't allow us to go further into this, so we'll just take liberty with the comma here and make it a period today at the end of verse 11. Look at Ephesians 4, 7. But to each one of us, grace was given according to the measure of Christ's gift.
Therefore, it says, and the it refers to Psalm 68, when your Bible has a change in the way it's printed, when the letters are printed in a verse, it's usually a quotation from the Old Testament, at least in the new American standard it is. Therefore, it says, when he ascended on high, he led captive a host of captives, and he gave gifts to men. Now, this expression, he ascended, what does it mean except that he also had descended into the lower parts of the earth? He who descended is himself also he who ascended far above all the heavens, so that he might fill all things.
And he gave some as apostles, and some as prophets, and some as evangelists, and some as pastors and teachers. Now, for just a moment before you close your Bible, see the parenthesis that begins at verse 9 and ends at the end of verse 10. This is another one of those Pauline diversions into a theological area of fascination and interest.
But, with minds like we've got, it's easy to get diverted in interest and to miss the point. Allow me, therefore, to omit the parenthesis and read again 8 and 11. Here we go at verse 8. Therefore, it says, when he ascended on high, he led captive a host of captives, and he gave gifts to men.
Verse 11, he gave some as apostles, some as prophets, and some as evangelists, and some as pastors and teachers. I want to tell you before I pray that the subject of spiritual gifts was one of the most transforming subjects I ever heard in my entire Christian life. In my entire Christian life, it became for me transforming in application as it related to me, and an understanding of why so much of what goes on in the church today is a study in frustration. I hope we can relieve the frustration and, in the process, be carefully instructed and applied this passage.
I'd like us to close our eyes and simply sit in silence for a few moments before the Lord. I want you to look back, and then look ahead, and then look at. Looking back, you may see things that need attention, or it may make you smile as you realize how gracious God has been. If you look ahead, you may feel a little fear.
It's a great moment to tell him that. Ask him for reassurance, a sense of peace. If you look at where you are, you may feel a little sense of dissatisfaction, discouragement, or, on the other hand, this may be one of the high points of your life. Let's think of him as king over all of it. Think of him as king for it all, as Lord and God and life. Our Father, we who operate in such selfish realms, often find ourselves preoccupied with stuff of our own, messes we've made back in the yesterdays of our lives, and fears of tomorrow knowing our propensity toward messing things up, and uncertain about where this all will lead.
And then, of all things, in this ever-present now, we find ourselves again preoccupied with what someone may think or say or do, or how we will look in their eyes. Deliver us, Father, if only for these few moments from this constant, plagued preoccupation with self. Help us to envision you as king, Lord, the very essence of life, God over it all, the God who forgives the messes, who understands the frustrations, who calms the fears, the king who reigns over our lives supremely.
Since we have come to the cross and met you at your terms, Lord, may we understand that your will is really best, even when we cannot explain it, understand it, or for that matter, at the moment, defend it. You're king. You're the monarch, the master. We're the servant. We're the clay.
You're the potter. And whatever it may be, Lord, that we're living with this day, and I have no way of knowing in a congregation of this size, I pray that you will calm our spirits and bring to our immediate attention your presence. May it eclipse everything else. May your sovereignty quiet us and your hand on our life humble us, your presence reassure us that you are king and Lord and life and God. And therefore, it is a pleasure to give to you first ourselves, then our praise, our obedience, and now our offerings.
In the great name of your Son, Jesus, our King, our Lord, our life, our God, and all the people said, amen. Well, first they called it Yates Field, and then they called it Yates Pool. Mr. Yates owned the property down in the hill country, rolling hill country of south central Texas, and he grazed his sheep on it, and when the Depression hit, he was convinced he wouldn't be able to keep his property because he couldn't make the payments on it. The principal and interest were too much for him, and therefore he applied and received government subsidy to keep the land.
But as he would walk across it during the evening hours, he was convinced as time passed and times got even harder that he would lose the land. It was about that time that spontaneously a seismographic team from a major oil company showed up at his door, asked permission to drill a wildcat well. In those days, whoever owned land owned also whatever was under the land in gas or mineral or oil supply, and so he signed a contract that would grant him a greater part of the royalty if they happened to find oil. 1115 feet below the surface did they find oil. In fact, it wasn't long before that one reserve was pumping 80,000 barrels a day, and it was only growing, which caused the team to think there might be oil there as well, and so they drilled there, and here, and there, and before long, well, let me put it this way, Yates could make his payments on the land. In fact, the original well was now pumping 125,000 barrels a day, and everything seemed to just grow proportionately.
Yates' field became Yates' pool. When I hear that story and rehearse it in my mind, I think how it aptly describes, I don't want to say most, but I will say many of God's people who live like sheep grazing across the land, enjoying the grass, thinking someday we will be moved from earth to heaven, and won't that be great in the meantime, let's just sort of eke out an existence and do the best we can, not realizing that we have at our disposal a pool of the greatest resource ever imagined by a human mind, and that is the power of the resurrection at work in us, available to us if we would only tap into the reserve, which will never, ever run out, and as time passes and the gifts begin to multiply, it will only increase, and we will become again a healthy, wholesome body, as God designed us to be. You know, when you stop to think about it, we have the letter to the Ephesians to thank for knowing of our wealth. In fact, a number of people who have written on the letter to the Ephesians refer to the wealth. Ray Stedman calls his book Our Riches in Christ. Warren Wiersbe has a book regarding our wealth in Christ, referring, of course, to the letter to the Ephesians. The wealth, you know where it began, it began at the cross, where we first saw the light, where the truth of our inheritance became a reality, and we found out that we were not only sheep who belonged to the Lord, but we have a position in Christ that lifts us into the heavenlies, where we are now, with Christ, reigning, if you will, in authority over the evil spirits and an old nature that once dominated us, that we no longer need to be intimidated by an enemy, an adversary, who despises everything we love and loves everything we hate in Christ. We are not only not intimidated, we are, in fact, possessors of a limitless power at work in each one of us that comes out in a practical way in the exercising of our gifts, plural. Many Christians get only as far as the gift, the gift of salvation, and go no further from there. They just stop at the cross, and as great as that truth is, they don't get much beyond salvation. But the fact is, these letters of the New Testament are full and running over with instruction and encouragement and exhortation and even help in implementation of these truths on how to live above the drag and the dregs of our times.
But chances are good you're not living there. Nor are many in the body of Christ, because you simply think this is a field rather than a pool. Let me show you, for example, and by the way, this isn't hype.
This isn't cheerleading time where I'm hoping to get you all excited about something that really is not all that significant. I will tell you without exception and reservation, once you grasp an understanding of the gifts of the Spirit, not only will your guilt be removed in areas where you are not gifted and have tried so hard to make it work, your Spirit will soar in areas where you are gifted and find such joy and ease and effectiveness in exercising them. In Ephesians 4, verse 7, we read of the gift singular, but in verse 8 we read of our gifts, plural.
And there's a difference. The word grace in verse 7 is a one-word synonym for the gospel. The good news that Jesus Christ came to bear the sins of the world, and having borne the sins of the world, He overcame death, the grave, and the power of the enemy, and has been resurrected and has been seated at the Father's right hand, and He lives and reigns over us, His people. That's the gift to each one of us, grace was given. Do you remember reading of that over in chapter 2 in one of those few verses out of Ephesians you may have memorized? For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves it is the gift singular, it is the gift of God, not as a result of works lest anyone should boast.
That's salvation. That's when I, as a lost sinner, understand the claims of Jesus Christ, and I accept them personally, and I receive them as a gift, and I move to the other side of the cross and look back on sins forgiven, a past that has been eclipsed by His presence and washed clean by His blood. I have come to the gift and accepted it and become a part of the family of God. Verse 7, to each one of us, don't you like the way that reads?
Your name as a Christian could go there. When I read it, to Chuck Swindoll, grace was given. And to you, John and Joan and Shirley and Barbara and Bill and Ralph and Fred and Frank, to each one of you in the family of God, grace was given according to the measure of Christ's gift. Notice the verse begins with a little adversative but. It's because in the previous verse, everyone was in view. God is over all, we read at the end of verse 6. He is through all, He is in all, and the whole body of Christ is seen under God's gracious and sovereign hand of guidance and mercy. But, the zoom lens, if you will, the zoom lens of scripture suddenly tightens up, and you look through it like you look through a toilet paper roll.
That's what I'm thinking right now. It doesn't sound very sacred, but that's about that side. You look through a little tiny radius and you see one person's got your name on it. To each one of us, the gift of salvation was given. You didn't earn it, you don't deserve it, you can never repay it, and you will never lose it.
It's the gift. It's been given to us because Jesus paid it all. All to Him I owe, sin left a crimson stain, He washed it white as snow.
Donald Barnhouse paraphrased it. Some people would sing, Jesus paid 99 percent. One percent I owe. Sin had left a crimson stain, He washed it light pink.
It just not only doesn't rhyme, it doesn't work. He either paid it all or He did not pay it at all. He paid it all. And the gift was given and He stands waiting for any lost sinner to come in faith to Him. That means you, if you've never come to Christ. And then you can be a part of the each one in verse 7. God has a whole pool of resources available for His sheep, not just a field of grass to graze over.
And He begins to reveal them here. Therefore, verse 8 continues, it says, when you read in your Bible something like that, it says, you know he's quoting from some other source. And if you take your time to go back to Psalm 68 verse 18, you'll see something of what this says.
I say that like it because Paul takes a little applicational liberty. He uses some of the words from Psalm 68, 18, but he applies them to a broader perspective, a broader realm. It's a picture of a king moving in triumph over captives and bringing the spoils with him. And he's got that image in mind, except in this case, the king is Christ, and the spoils are the gifts, and the captives are those who claim Him.
And let me read it for you. When He ascended on high, the He is Christ, mentioned in verse 7, and capital H in verse 8 gives you the clue it's Christ. When Christ ascended on high, you got the picture? He has died for our sins, He has been buried, He has been raised, He is now leaving this earth and on His way back to the Father's right hand from which He came 33 years earlier. When He ascended on high, He did two things.
Look at them. Number one, He led captive a host of captives. And number two, He gave gifts to people like us.
Generically it reads to men, it means to mankind, to humanity, to those within the family of God. He gave gifts to His own, we could render it. From the fourth chapter of Ephesians, Chuck Swindoll presents a message called His Gift and Our Gifts.
And there's more coming, so please stay with us. We've set aside the final minutes of today's program to hear a few additional teaching points from Chuck. You're listening to Insight for Living. To learn more about this ministry, visit us online at insightworld.org. It's possible that today's topic has piqued your curiosity about spiritual gifts and which ones apply to you. Well, the best way to discover how God has infused your life with unique skill and passion is to open His Word and listen to His voice. And to help you dig deeper on your own, I'll remind you that Chuck has written an in-depth commentary that includes this attention to this process. Unlike many commentaries that are somewhat technical and academic, Chuck's book includes additional features that make his resource very practical and even fun to read. In the section for Ephesians chapter 4, he's included a list of the spiritual gifts and explained how they're expressed today.
You'll want to add Swindoll's Living Insights commentary on Galatians and Ephesians to your personal collection of study tools. You can purchase a hardbound copy at Insight for Living's website by going to insight.org slash store. Thank you for calling us. If you're listening in the U.S., dial 1-800-772-8888. And then as you measure the impact of Chuck's teaching on your life and as God prompts you to share this Bible teaching with others around the world, we invite you to join us in this worthy mission to make disciples of Jesus Christ. To send a one-time donation today, call us. If you're listening in the United States, dial 1-800-772-8888. Again, that's 1-800-772-8888. And then please know that many in our listening family have chosen to reinforce their commitment to this cause by becoming a monthly companion.
To join the team, give online by going to insight.org slash monthly companion. And now we've set aside a few more minutes to consider today's subject, his gift and our gifts. Here's Chuck. This is gifts, not gift. This is plural. So it's not referring to the gift of salvation, that's singular. It's not referring to the gift of the Holy Spirit, that's singular.
These are gifts. And they're somehow connected with his ascension. I don't know about you, but when I get to a section like this, I am fascinated.
This is what keeps me up late at night. I read over things like this and I think, oh, this is so good. I don't know what it means, but it is so good to see this. Now let me understand a spiritual gift and let me understand it out loud so that we're all on the same page. A spiritual gift is a supernatural ability, a supernatural skill that Christ gives us, which enables us to perform a function in the body of Christ with effectiveness and ease. And some, as we were going to see in a few moments, have more than one gift.
I think most Christians do. These are supernaturally gifted or supernaturally provided skills and abilities, which enable us to perform functions in the body of Christ with ease and effectiveness. They keep the body healthy, they make the body whole, and they cause the body great joy. They're given by the Lord, they are spiritual in nature, and they flow easily and frequently from us. Tomorrow, Chuck Swindoll continues his study in Ephesians called Becoming a People of Grace, right here on Insight for Living. The preceding message, His gift and our gifts, was copyrighted in 2000, 2001, and 2009, and the sound recording was copyrighted in 2009 by Charles R. Swindoll, Inc. All rights are reserved worldwide. Duplication of copyrighted material for commercial use is strictly prohibited.
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