The Best Is Yet to Be (Part 1 of 2)

Sometimes when you hear the news, you hear all that's going on in our world, it can seem like evil is winning the cosmic battle against good. But the Bible tells us otherwise. And today on Truth for Life, we'll learn how God is using his church in the midst of the battle, and why this causes angels to rejoice and demons to shudder. Alistair Begg is continuing our study in Ephesians with a message he's titled The Best Is Yet to Be. Well, I invite you to turn to Ephesians chapter 3, where our focus this morning is on verse 11 and 12 and 13. This was according to the eternal purpose that he has realized in Christ Jesus our Lord, in whom we have boldness and access with confidence through our faith in him. So I ask you not to lose heart over what I am suffering for you, which is your glory. Father, we pray that with our Bibles open before us, that the Spirit of God will quicken us, illumine our minds, teach us, change us, accomplish the purposes that you have appointed for your Word even in these moments. Now we pray in Christ's name.

Amen. Some of you will immediately recognize these words. As I was walking down the street one day, a man came up to me and asked me what the time was that was on my watch. And I said, Does anybody really know what time it is?

Does anybody really care? And if so, I can't imagine why. Depending on your age, you're saying, I never heard that in my life. Or you're saying, I can't believe that was 1969, Robert Lamb with Chicago. He was representative of the view of the world that was not locked in the late sixties. It remains today. James Taylor, in a recent album, tracks down the same line in a song called The Secret of Life.

Part of the lyric is as follows. The secret of life is enjoying the passage of time. Any fool can do it. There ain't nothing to it. Now, the thing about time is that time isn't really real. It's just your point of view. How does it feel for you? Einstein said he could never understand it at all.

Planets spinning through space. The smile upon your face. Welcome to the human race.

And on it goes. Now, does that stuff really work? I mean, how does that help you? Imagine tomorrow morning that your boss tells you you're late. And you tell him, I don't feel late. And he said, well, would you look at the clock? And you say, well, nobody really knows what time it is.

Nobody really cares. Why do we mark everything by time? Where does time come from? Why does time matter?

Now, we teach our children, don't we—our grandchildren? Before there was time, before there was anything, there was God. That time is part of God's creative handiwork.

And time is significant. The Bible speaks about it routinely, doesn't it? For example, now is always the time in the Bible when the claims of the gospel press in upon someone. It's always, today is the day of salvation.

Tomorrow is the devil's day. It's part of philosophy that leaves God out of the picture, to assume that time is just some kind of construct that is ultimately irrelevant. Now, when we come, as we have been doing, to the book of Ephesians, we realize that way and beyond any of these sort of trivial expressions in contemporary art, Paul makes it very, very clear that he is dealing with both history and with geography. He is dealing writing to a place—a real place, a wealthy port in Asia, a port that is in modern-day Turkey—and he's writing at a particular point in time, in the early A.D. 60s, and he's writing from a place, he's writing from the jail in Rome. And he is making it clear from the very, very beginning of his letter—and he begins way back in eternity, doesn't he? Verse 4 of chapter 1, he chose us in him before the foundation of the world. So he is dealing with matters of history and geography in light of eternity.

And he is pointing out, as we come to verse 11, that God's eternal purpose has been revealed, has been realized, in the person and work of Jesus. So, in other words, Jesus not only impacts our world in terms of all that he has said and done, but his very existence at a certain point in time has marked time itself. It's no surprise that when Mark introduces us to Jesus, Jesus steps forward, and his opening line is, the time is fulfilled. What time?

All of time! All that has preceded Jesus to that point, all of the anticipation that runs through the Old Testament, all of the Psalms, all of the prophecies, all of the events of the unfolding drama of the nation of Israel and so on. Jesus says that time is fulfilled. The kingdom of God is near, at hand. So, repent and believe the good news.

It's a staggering statement, isn't it? Is there any other person that would stand forward on the spectrum of human history and make such a declaration? What is Jesus saying? Jesus is saying that, I am the key to history. I am actually the key to history. You can't understand history if you don't understand me.

You can't make sense of the world apart from me. I am the King. I am present to establish my kingdom. It's going to grow as a result of the teaching of the gospel throughout the world, and one day it will be there in full, glorious technicolor when the whole thing is wrapped up, according to God's eternal purpose. When Paul writes to the Galatians, he puts it in the same terms. When the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son. All of the events in the history of the world are tied to God's eternal purpose.

Now, think about that for just a minute. Behind all the events of world history is the eternal purpose of God. God is not working on an ad hoc basis. The purpose of God from all of eternity is being worked out. That includes the microcosm of my tiny little life. That includes the ebb and flow of our lives together as a congregation.

That includes the moves and the changes of political history. And it is incumbent upon the children of God to keep their eyes upon the King. Now, in verse 10—and this was last time—we were struck by the strategic place that the church has given in this program.

It was through the church, he said, that the manifold wisdom of God might now be made known to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly places. As amazing as it is, what God is doing now in local congregations is actually, says Paul, displaying a charcoal sketch, if you like, of a finished portrait which will appear in all of its brilliance and all of its beauty. So that all that is described as taking place in verse 10 is according to verse 11 the eternal purpose of God. So let's consider in verse 11 God's purpose. Let's consider in verse 12 the believer's privilege, and let's say a word from verse 13 about Paul's perspective—three Ps to help me remember my outline. And if that helps you, then we're both helped.

All right? First of all, God's purpose. The church, the existence of the church, serves, says Paul, as a strong reminder to the hosts of heaven that, as we often sing, death is dead, love has won, Christ has conquered.

The existence of the church, people who have been included in Christ, who have become the followers of Jesus, who have been forgiven of their sins, who have been filled with the Holy Spirit, who have been made members of one another—the church, in its existence, even a funny church like ours, causes the angels to rejoice and causes the demons to shudder, so that the reality of the heavenly hosts testify to the fact that Jesus has accomplished in time the purposes of God from all of eternity. That's why we often go back, isn't it, to the fifteenth verse of Genesis chapter 3 to explain the unfolding story. You remember, God says to the serpent in the garden, I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her offspring. And he—that is, the woman's offspring—shall crush your head, and you shall bruise his heel. Now, what that's called in theological terminology is the proto-Euangelion.

It is the proto-indication, the first indication, if you like, in the Bible of the gospel story itself. How is this going to happen? Why is there alienation? Why is there animosity? Why is there war? Why do husbands and wives not get along? Why do the racists squabble?

Why, why, why? The answer is that underlying all of that is this great battle. And this great battleground is being worked out throughout history. But the promise is that the seed of the woman will take care of the one who bruises his heel.

And so, when you consider the cross of Jesus Christ, where all hell is at leash against Jesus, it appears to be that the devil has won when, in point of fact, he has only bruised his heel. Now, I know that you know that my mind is capable of funny stuff—funny, peculiar stuff, actually. And I've been thinking funny stuff this week, and I just wanted to tell you. It's partly because I was in Kentucky. I was thinking about demons. And it was because I went down a street in Kentucky—I think it's called Stills Avenue, in case you wanted to Google it.

I'm sure it's online. And I have never seen such paraphernalia for Halloween in all my life. I mean, the one out here on 43 is not even on the—it's not even in the game. I mean, this street… I mean, I drove up and down it maybe five times, just like that. I thought I would take a photograph, and I thought, no, don't take a photograph.

No! Anyway, it was—and I thought to myself, do these people think that this is all a joke? And then I said, no, many of them won't think it's all a joke. And then I did a little research, and I found that some who clearly know that it isn't a joke have actually purchased homes on that street so that they can make expression of their conviction concerning death and the dark side of things. I wouldn't want to overstate it, but that's the report from the community. So you have, if you were to talk to these people, individuals who would have a very clear understanding of the activity in the heavenlies—a very clear understanding of demonic activity and the push that there is against the Lord Jesus Christ, as in Psalm 2.

In other words, that they would verify, if you like, what Paul is actually saying here concerning the drama that is unfolding. Now, I don't want you to misinterpret this as my big diatribe against Halloween. I want to be honest with you. I've always… I like candy.

I like stuff. And as a Scotsman, any time people are giving stuff away that I can walk around the neighborhood and just fill up bags full of it, I'm in. Okay?

So if I were not in India tomorrow night, I would be going up the street with my grandchildren filling up bags. So that's full disclosure, okay? So I've now encouraged one group and really annoyed another group. All right? I'm perfect for this.

I can do this with great ease. But here's what triggered my thoughts, then. I thought, well, imagine that the demons are talking to one another, right? And you can jump in at any point in the story of the Bible, but let's just say that they are talking to one another, and they said, you know, well, it looks like we're gonna shut the whole operation down immediately, because Herod has decided to have a program to kill all the boys under the age of two. And so this incarnation thing that they know about from their perspective in the heavenlies, we're gonna be able to stomp on this immediately, and it will be over. We'll get him.

It'll be done. And then all of a sudden, they realize, no, Mary and Joseph have taken off for Egypt, they've escaped, and that hasn't worked at all. But we've got him now, says one. Judas has betrayed him. He kissed him in the garden, he turned him over.

It's only a matter of time before we finish him off completely. Peter, one of his key fellows, he deserted him. He denied him.

He said he didn't even know who he was. The thing is crumbling. It's absolutely over.

Look at that, says a demon. They crucified him. He's finished. They entombed him with a big stone in front of it. Oh, how good of Joseph of Arimathea to give him that place so that we would never see him again.

I'm sure it's finished. Pardon? What, he's not in the tomb?

No. No, he's out. What do you mean he's out? He's alive! Oh, no, he can't be alive.

Yeah! His disciples are back on the game. Peter's preaching now.

Three thousand converted under his first sermon. Oh, so there's one demon to the other. This is no good. This is not gonna work. But we've got the ace in the hole—Saul of Tarsus. He'll finish it off. Saul of Tarsus hates that stuff. We can use him.

He'll be perfect. In fact, he's just set himself the challenge of stamping the whole thing out. What? Oh, he's a believer now.

Oh, this is not going well. You see, no matter where or when in history the forces of darkness seek to do their worst, God is accomplishing his eternal purpose. He has revealed this in and through the person of his Son. That is why, you see, the psalmist says that God sits in the heavens and he laughs.

He holds in derision the opposition which is so clearly there from the very beginning of things. And the Christian believer in Cleveland this morning, reading Paul's letter to Ephesus, we're supposed to then take this and bow down under the wonder and the weight of this—that God is actually doing things in his church that sounds the death knell of everything that is opposed to his church. That God actually is saving the most unlikely people. That God is putting together companies and congregations and assemblies that are not made up of a bunch of little self-righteous individuals who were always interested in trying to be nice and proper and so on.

No! If you can take the lid off the average congregation and find out what we were, then it will be an amazing testimony to the power of Christ, to the reality of God's purpose, to the triumph of his grace. That, you see, is the significance, surely, of 1 Corinthians 6, and the way in which Paul, in addressing the Corinthians there, says to them, Do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? If you're unrighteous, you'll never inherit the kingdom of God. How righteous do you have to be? Unless your righteousness exceeds the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, said Jesus, you will in no way enter the kingdom of heaven.

So we're busted. Then comes this great sentence, And such were some of you. You see, this is the mystery of grace, isn't it? How did these people find themselves in this position?

Because the blood of Jesus Christ cleanses us from all our sins. Last night, when I was waiting for the game to come on, I was clicking through, and I found Sister Angelica. How many of you know Sister Angelica? You know?

Yeah. She's gone now. Well, she's gone, but she's still there, because I saw her last night. And one of the questions that was called in to her was—she's a Roman Catholic non-incidentally, or was—one of the questions that was called in to her was, Well, what about purgatory? And why do we have to have purgatory?

And she said, Well, because purgatory is very necessary. And she said, You know, how… You couldn't… I mean, if you died, I mean, you couldn't go straight. You couldn't go straight to meet God. You couldn't go straight to paradise.

I mean, think about it. You've got to go somewhere to get cleaned up for the program. You're gonna have to have some mechanism so you can get fixed before the big interview. She said, That's why we have that. That's why it's necessary.

You shouldn't be concerned about it. So now I'm talking to the TV. I'm talking to Sister Angelica. I said to her, I said, Hey, sister, every priest stands daily at his service offering repeatedly the same sacrifices which can never take away sins. But when Christ had offered for all time a single sacrifice for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God. The reason that you have that is because you have a faulty view of the atonement. You don't understand that the ground of our salvation is in the work of Christ, and the evidence of our salvation is in the ongoing work of Christ, in the fruit that he produces in our lives.

Because God does not justify those whom he does not sanctify. You see, how vastly different these notions of what it means to know God and to meet God and to have access to God are. You understand why there was a Reformation, when God lit a flame in the heart of a Roman Catholic monk named Martin Luther who was desperately trying to figure out how he could be righteous enough to get in the kingdom of heaven. All of his time in Rome, the special pilgrimage, left him worse than he began until he suddenly realized, Romans 3, but now a righteousness from God through Christ to all who believe.

And suddenly the lights went on, and everything changed. You're listening to Alistair Begg on Truth for Life. Alistair has been explaining the amazing mystery of God's grace and the purposes of God in our world. Here at Truth for Life, it is our prayer that God will use this daily program to do three things. First, to convert unbelievers. Second, to root established believers more deeply in their faith.

And third, to strengthen local churches. In addition to this daily teaching, we look for books we can recommend to you to help you learn more about God's Word and his ways. And today we're recommending a book that will provide you with the tools you need to go deeper in your study of the Bible. The book is called Knowable Word, helping ordinary people learn to study the Bible. This book lays out a specific framework to help you understand and interpret what the Bible teaches and apply the lessons to your everyday life.

When you begin a project, it's important for you to begin with the right tools for the job. It's even more important for you to have the right methods available to help you study the scripture. So ask for your copy of the book Knowable Word today when you give a donation to support the Ministry of Truth for Life. You can do that on the mobile app or online at truthforlife.org slash donate, or give us a call at 888-588-7884.

I'm Bob Lapine. Thanks so much for joining us today. Tomorrow we'll learn why you can't be so bad that Jesus can't save you. Nor can you be so good that you don't need to be saved. The Bible teaching of Alistair Begg is furnished by Truth for Life, where the Learning is for Living.