The Exceeding Riches of His Grace

0:00the words to which I should like to call your attention this morning, are to be found in Paul's epistle to the Ephesians in the second chapter and the seventh verse, the seventh verse in the second chapter of Paul's epistle to the Ephesians, that in the ages to come he might show the exceeding riches of his grace, in his kindness toward us through Christ Jesus. Now that you will remember is the end of this great statement which begins at thus far, but God who is rich in mercy, far his great love were with he loved us, even when we were dead in sins as quickened as together with Christ, by grace he has saved and the thrazed us up together and made us sit together in heavenly places

1:00in Christ Jesus, that in the ages to come he might show the exceeding greatness, the exceeding riches of his grace in his kindness toward us through Christ Jesus. The apostle you remember as he had been reminding us of what it is that God has done for us in and through our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. When we were in that hopeless state God is intervened, God is active and he has quickened us together with Christ, he has raised us up together with him in newness of life and he has made us sit together with him in the heavenly places. But now the question arises, why has God done all this? What was the motive? What was it that led God to do all this for creatures such as we are? And the answer is given in this seventh verse

2:08and introduced of course by this word that which comes at the very beginning. He has done all this that in order that to the intent that with the object or with the objective in view that. Now this word that therefore is a tremendously important word and it is absolutely vital that we should consider together what it is the apostle tells us here concerning this great purpose. How important it is for us to study the scriptures carefully and to observe exactly what they say because we can so easily misunderstand as indeed we do. And here I think as we consider this verse together this morning we shall all probably feel up to a certain point of generate that our view of

3:08Christianity, our view of the church, our view of ourselves as Christian people is defective, it's inadequate. Indeed our whole conception of salvation tends to be inadequate. Now I think we've already seen that as we've considered those three great steps in our salvation. As we've seen what is already true of us as Christians because we are in Christ. We must have felt that we never truly realized as we opt the full meaning of regeneration. We hadn't fully grasped the completeness of justification and our standing and status in the presence of God and still less perhaps as we were looking last and the morning at that statement about our being seated in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus. How we fail and how tragically we fail

4:12to realize that that is the truth about us even at this present moment. In other words it seems to me increasingly that most of our troubles in the Christian life arise from the fact that we will always start with ourselves and we will live so much in the realm of feeling and the subjective. Now let's be clear about this. I've been making that point all these Sunday mornings and again it is of the very essence of what one must say in expanding this seventh verse. Thank God there is a subjective element to salvation. Thank God for every feeling, for every experience, for everything that we're aware of within ourselves. If we are not aware of this subjective element well then our whole position it seems to me is a very uncertain one. But on the other hand there is nothing which is quite so fatal as to think only in the subjective manner and to fail to grasp with our

5:16minds and understanding this objective presentation of the truth such as we have it in this section and in most of these new testamentary pistols. What I mean is this that if we only had this true scriptural conception of ourselves as we are as Christians and members of the body of Christ at this moment believe me most of the things that warriors would immediately fall off from us altogether. They'd appear to be so trivial, so small, so unimportant. Now this is something one can illustrate in this way. The best way to get rid of small things always is to look at big things. I wonder whether you ever read the interesting statistics which were provided I think by the medical authorities in Barcelona in Spain during the Spanish Civil War just before the last World War.

6:20They were very interesting. A given number of people had been receiving various forms of psychotherapeutic and psychological treatments of various kinds. But the moment the civil war came and affected Barcelona acutely the number dwindled almost to nothing. What was it due to? Well it was the larger concern that had driven out the lesser concerns and the same thing of course happened in this country during the last war. Many people when suddenly the crisis came and husbands have had to go after battle they forgot their eggs and pains. These things which had been so prominent in their lives and it meant so much to them they suddenly forgot all about them. Why? Well a greater fear had driven out the lesser fears. The bigger crisis had made other things so trivial as really to be quite irrelevant. Now we're all familiar with something like that.

7:23The big thing drives out the little things. Well it's equally true in the Christian life. We tend to go on and we are troubled by this and that and we tend to grumble and to complain and we wonder why God is dealing with us like this and why that's allowed to happen to us. And so we go on in the Christian life. I say the antidote to all that is rarely to see ourselves as we are objectively in the purpose of God and if we could but do that. All these things would disappear or if let me put it like this. If we rarely had but some conception of the glory which awaits us and to which we are going it would transform our view of life in this world and of the things that happen to us in this world. Well now that's the sort of thing that the Apostle I say is going to do in this seventh verse. This is the care for self-centeredness and

8:24self-occupation and self-conserv which leads eventually to introspection and morbidity and various other forms of trouble. The thing to do and that's why the Apostle writes this letter. That's why every new testament letter was ever written in order to get these people to lift up their heads and to see themselves objectively in the grand purpose and plan of God. Very well then let's look at it like this. Why has God done all this? Why is he intervened? Why has he quickened us and raised us and set us to sit with Christ in the heavenly places? Well the answer is as the Apostle, this is a part of his great and his grand purpose that in order of it. Now let me put it you in the form of a number of propositions. The first is this. The chief end intent and object of salvation is the glory of God. That's why he's done it. He's done it by that in the ages to come.

9:35He, God himself, might show the exceeding riches of his grace in his kindness toward us through Christ Jesus. God has done all this as well in order that he can present us tactical to all future agents, not only in this world but also in that which is to come. God is going to give a great demonstration. He is going to manifest his own glory. Now you notice that that is the thing which the Apostle puts first. That's the chief reason why God has done all this. He says, now we immediately see the question arises. Do we normally think of these things like that? Isn't it the truth to to say of all of us? Probably that we do the exact opposite. We start with ourselves.

10:36And we think of salvation as something for me, something I need, something I want, something that I'm concerned about. We are always subjective. We always start with ourselves. But my dear friend, the first thing we've got to learn is this. That the first objective and the first intent in salvation is don't misunderstand me in a sense nothing to do with us at all. But the glory of God. Now that's the teaching of the whole scripture from beginning to end. In other words, we must not start as we habitually do with even our own sins but with sin. We must learn to view all these things more historically. It's extremely difficult, isn't it? It's extremely difficult for any generation to take the historical view. Because you see here we are, we are in the world at this moment. And there are these problems.

11:42We hear the news on the wireless, we see the headlines in the papers. In this world in which you and I live at this moment, there are all these problems and trials and difficulties. And we are immersed in them and we tend to see nothing else. It's extremely difficult, isn't it, to realize that there were people in this world a hundred years ago. And that they had problems and difficulties. It's still more difficult to realize that there were people in this world a thousand years ago who never thought of us at all. We never entered into their minds, nor their calculations. We think we are so important and this is the world and this is the whole of history, our little sector. Then you nothing about us and never gave us a thought. And we can be equally certain that in a hundred years and if our Lord has not returned before then or before a thousand years, the generations at that time will never give us a thought at all. We'll seem indeed most unimportant and insignificant. But how difficult it is for us to realize that.

12:45And yet you know that's the sort of thing we've got to do. We've got to learn to view ourselves and the whole problem of men, the whole crisis of history and especially the whole subject of salvation in this objective historical manner. What I mean is this. Instead of starting with myself and my own sins and my own problems, I must learn to think in terms of sin and the whole problem of men and the whole problem of evil in this world. Now it's only as I do that that I'll begin to see what the apostle means when he says that the first intent and object of salvation is the glory of God. Now look at it in this way.

13:47It's very difficult for us to realize what sin and the fall meant to God. Sin is that which is utterly a personal and therefore what has happened as the result of sin leading to the fall and all its consequences in the world and amongst men is if I may put it reverently, a tremendous matter in the sight and in the view of God. You see we will persist in thinking of this whole problem in terms of particular sins. This thing that gets me down and the sins we put up in a list, even on drunkness and so on and so forth, led to us is the whole problem. You see we turn the problem of sin more or less into a social problem. It's either a social problem or the problem of my own personal happiness. I don't like the feeling of remorse. I don't like

14:47repentance. It's painful and so on. Now we reduce the whole great problem of sin to such proportions and to such dimensions but the Bible doesn't. The Bible views all this as an attack upon God. The devil came forward and he asserted himself against God. He raised himself up against the majesty and the sovereignty and the glory of God. He disputed this. He wanted to set himself up at the very least as a rival God. When he saw God coming to create the world and coming to create men and God looking at it and saying that it was all very good and God was pleased with it, the devil said, I'll show that this isn't the case. He entered in and what was his object? Do you think the object of the devil was merely to persuade Eve and Adam to do just one particular thing? Of course

15:48it wasn't the devil had that one idea in his mind and that was to detract from the glory and the majesty and the greatness of God. He wasn't merely concerned in what should happen to Adam and Eve. The devil takes very little interest in you and I as persons. We are not persons to him. We are pawns. We are simply things that he can use in the great game and yet you see we think of it all in terms of ourselves. The devil regards us with contempt as he did Adam and Eve. He found to them flat of them because he knew that that was the way in order to make pawns of them. He had no interest in them at all. His one object I say was to detract from the glory and the majesty and the greatness of God. He was out of spile God's work and God's world. He was out of ridicule it. He wanted to stand up and to be able to address all the holy angels and say God makes claims for himself. He says he's made a perfect world but look at it. There it is. That's the way to look

16:52at the problem of sin. The fall I say was a terrible thing in God's sight. That's the way to look at it. It is the social problem. It is this tremendous problem in the sight of God. And that you see is the way we must look at the world as it is today. Of course there is a social problem. Sin raises many social problems but that's the byproduct. That's not the real thing that makes sin. That's not the real problem. If I may so put it God would never have sent his son from heaven to earth and to the cross and Calvary to solve a social problem. He certainly wouldn't. And he hasn't. Oh no. The problem to God was his own glory, his own majesty, his own everlasting greatness. This has been queried and questioned by the devil and all who belong to him.

17:57And what is salvation? Well-salvation, the whole purpose and object of salvation in the first instance is to vindicate God. He is for God again to manifest the truth concerning himself. The devil is described in the Scripture as a liar and the father of liars. And the apostle John tells us in his first epistle in the third chapter that God sent his son into this world in order to destroy the works of the devil. That's the first object that the whole character of God should be vindicated. Of course the devil in an ultimate sense did not and cannot and could not affect the being and the character and the nature of God. But in the sight of created beings he can and he most certainly did. He succeeded in the case of all

19:02the fallen angels. He succeeded in the case of Adam and Eve and the whole of their posterity. And the whole problem in the world today is the attitude of men towards God. And God I say has initiated this great movement of redemption and of salvation primarily. In order to declare and to manifest and to vindicate again his own glory, his own greatness, the truth concerning himself. Why has he done it? He has done it that in the age of Christ a con he might foe display the exceeding riches of his grace. In his kindness toward us through Christ Jesus. Have you thought of salvation like that my friends? We are approaching the Christmas season. That's the question to ask why did God ever send his son?

20:05Why? God forbid that we should give some sentimental subjective answers only and fail to see that God sent him in order to vindicate himself. It's the grandest theodity of the ages. God is vindicating and declaring and showing the truth concerning himself. But let me put it then in the form of a second proposition. Salvation does this. In other words, it vindicates the greatness and the character of God in a special way and manner in which nothing else does. And there is no question about this. We learn certain things about God in this full movement of salvation and redemption, which we would never have known otherwise. Now that may sound a daring statement but I venture to

21:09make it. People have often asked the question, nobody can answer it but it's a question that many have asked and probably all of us have asked it. Why did the Almighty God ever allow the fall? Why did He ever allow men to fall into sin? I say the ultimate answer is that we don't know and we shouldn't inquire because it's beyond us. But at the end of it we can say this and we know this. If God had not allowed the possibility men would have not been entirely free and therefore He would not have been entirely perfect. Men as God made him really did have free will. He lost it by falling into sin but he had it originally and therefore it's a part of men's perfection but I want to raise another possibility. Is it conceivable I wonder that God permitted it also in order that through redemption he might display certain attributes of his holy being and nature and character

22:14which otherwise could never be known in this way but which now must certainly are known. The Apostle has already mentioned some of them. Listen to him. God who is rich in mercy. Would it be possible to have the same conception of the richness of God's mercy if men had not fallen into sin as he has done? It is through this that God manifests the endlessness of his mercy, rich in mercy. For His great love wherewith He loved us, well men knew something about the love of God before He fell. Adam knew the love of God. I wonder whether the love of God would ever have been known as its now known where it not for the fall and the movement of redemption. God showing it is displaying it is manifesting it. There is an unveiling of it in a manner that surely

23:21is not conceivable apart from this and then He goes on. You remember to this next great turn even when we were dead in sins of quicken us together with Christ by grace. There it comes in andeth by grace he has saved andeth raised us up together and made us sit together in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus that in the ages to come he might show the exceeding riches of his grace. Oh there's nothing that enables us to have some understanding of the extent of this grace of God such as this does. It's the ultimate measure of it and nothing can show it as this shows it. And then that last term is the term kindness you remember. In his kindness, in his look of benignity. Oh Adam knew something about the kindness of God but you know I do agree with Isaac

24:22Watts when he claims in his hymn in Christ the tribes of Adam burst more blessings than their father lost. I say it reverently and weighing my words that we in Christ know something of God which Adam didn't know and which in a sense I venture to say Adam could not know. I don't know it may be speculation but it seems to me to be the the teaching of the scripture that God has shown things here in a unique manner and in a way that he has never shown anywhere else but now this is the thing that rarely is most important for us my third principle. All this display and vindication of the character and the being and the greatness and the glory of God comes the past through the church.

25:30God does this tremendous thing by means of us and through us in the first instance. I must read it again he's done all this that in the ages to come he might show the exceeding richness of his grace in his kindness toward us through Christ Jesus. Now this is to me the most overwhelming thought that you and I can ever lay hold of that the Almighty ever lasting eternal God is vindicating himself and is early nature and being by something that he does in us and with us and through us. That's Christianity that's the meaning of church membership that's what it is to be a Christian nothing less than that you see we've been taken right out of our little subjective states and moods and feelings and passing conditions and we see ourselves suddenly in this great plan

26:34of eternity which God brought into being and into operation as the resultant consequent upon the fall of man into sin. Now I want to show you something of this conception the Apostle teaches it very plainly here in this verse. Did you notice it in the reading at the beginning in the third chapter of this epistle in the tenth verse? Let me read it to you. The Apostle is again describing this great mystery which been had been hidden but which now has been revealed. What is it for? It is to make all men see what is the fellowship of the mystery which from the beginning of the world had been hidden in God who created all things by Jesus Christ. Now then we'll stand to the intent that the same idea this is the object this is the intent this is the purpose to the intent that now and to the princes and powers in the heavenly places might

27:42be known by the church the manifold wisdom of God. That's the idea. God is using the church and is going to use the church in the future ages. In order to give a demonstration and an exhibition to the principalities and the powers in the heavenly places God is vindicating himself and his character by you and by me by people such as ourselves by the whole of the church gathered out of the world in Christ. He's going to put us on display as if there's going to be a glorious exhibition. He's already doing it but it's going to continue in the ages to come and at the final end God is going to open his last great exhibition and all these heavenly powers and principalities will be invited to attend and the curtain will draw back and God will say look at them

28:46to the intent that now went to the principalities and powers in the heavenly places might be known by the church the manifold wisdom of God. And you and I have been prepared for that. You read of the artists preparing their paintings and their drawings for the exhibition don't you the final touches. The frame must be right must be put in the right position the light must be in the right position we all know about it you've seen people preparing animals to show them in horses or fruit and vegetables for a horticultural show the picking out the preparing well that's what's happening to you and to me that's the meaning of a service such like this it's just a part of it the exhibition the show the display it's coming. And the astounding and amazing thing is that it's through people like ourselves

29:51and as the result of what he's doing to us and has done to us and will do to us that God is going to vindicate his own eternal wisdom and his majesty and his glory and all the attributes of his holy person to the principalities and the heavenly powers. I rather like the way it's put in that portion of the book of Revelation that we read together at the beginning did you notice it it seems to me to put it all very perfectly. John has his vision I beheld a great multitude which now men could number of all nations and kindreds and people and tongues stood before the throne and before the land clothed with white robes and columns in their hands and cried with a loud voice saying salvation to our God with sit at the ponder throne and unto the land John saw them these people clad in the white

30:55robes and with the palms in their hands singing the praise of God and saying salvation to our God that sit at the ponder throne then it's the question I like. The angel that stood by him turned to John and said one of the elders while the renced saying unto me who are these? Who are these that are arraided in white robes and that are standing here with palms in their hands and singing the praise of God? Who are these? You see that'll be the question asked by the principalities and powers in the heavenly places the curtain will be withdrawn and there they'll be will in they know our white robes and with the palms who are these what are they what's this phenomenon what are these people where they come from that's the second question and the answer is of course that they're just Christian people

31:57the Christians of all the sensualies of all nations and tribes and countries and colors gathered out by the power of Christ's redemption throughout the ages all gathered together finally there they are in the glory who are these where have they come from what are they and the answer is these are the redeemed by the wisdom and the power and the glory and the love and the grace of God by the church you and I miserable creatures that we are with our aches and pains and monks and measles of the soul and our questions and hearings and why does God do this and that all I beseech you look into heaven cast your mind into glory shame on us Christian people

32:58for our wretched subjectivity and our failure to realize what's happening to us who we are and what we are and what God is doing in us and through us this is the intent of salvation that all this might be done to the vindication of the character and the glory of God I needn't keep you but I'll give you my headings the next principle is going to be this to show you how God does this through the church we needn't stay we've already considered it in a sense there we are in the white robes with the palms in the glory in the presence of God how we got there how has it happened well the first thing is that he's ever looked upon us at all such as we were dead in trespassies and sins working according to the cause of this world the

34:05spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience amongst whom we all had our conversation in times best in the lusts of our flesh fulfilling the desires of the flesh end of the mind and where the children of wrath even as others how could he ever have looked upon us we deserve nothing but retribution and punishment and hell if you feel that you deserve anything better you don't know what you are as a sinner and you'd know nothing I'm afraid about the grace of God miserable vile foul wretched rebels that he ever looked upon us even water display of his being and of his holy nature we are the demonstration of that you see if he hadn't looked upon us we'd be still there and going to perdition but we are here in glory because he looked upon us and had mercy

35:08and had pity upon us not only that he devised and planned the way of delivering us he made the way of salvation himself man didn't ask for it man didn't want it man didn't know what he needed man wasn't consulted he hasn't put in a single suggestion salvation is entirely God's from beginning to end that's the apostles' whole point by grace you have been saved and nothing else what a display of the being and the character of God and then that he should have done to us what he has done that he should have made of us what he has made that we are already quick that he's put a principle of spiritual life into us who are utterly absolutely hopelessly dead he's put new life his own life his race does up together with Christ we are alive to him we have the new interests

36:10and the new outlook we are seated in the heavenly places as we've seen he's done all this already to us and you know by when we're there in the glory with the white robe and the palm we shall be absolutely perfect without spot or even a rink or any such thing not a suspicion of the blemish the most powerful magnifying glass will find nothing wrong about us absolutely a hole and entire purified from all traces of sin it's not surprising that the elders ask who are these and however they become like this what this spotless whiteness this glory and it all you see is but this manifestation of God's character and being he does all this not only through the church he does it in that particular way very well that brings me to my last

37:15principle which is just a series of questions how should we therefore think about ourselves in the light of all this well it's obvious isn't it if you think at all of your own goodness it just means that you've never seen this at all if you think that you're a Christian and a good church member because you've lived a good life and never done anybody any harm and indeed you're giving a good deal of your time to these things you're just telling me that you've never seen it if you can find anything in yourself at this moment to be pleased about well I just know that you've never seen this idea that God has done it all to the intent that now into the principalities and powers in the heavenly places might be known his own manifold wisdom that he might display the exceeding riches of his grace if you feel you've got any plea to offer at the throne of grace

38:21under mercy save the name of Jesus Christ if you've just never seen it you're just blind oh our one thought should be this a debtor to mercy alone of covenant mercy I say I am what I am I am the grace of God nothing in me nothing in my hands I bring I find no good in myself in me that is a say in my flesh to let no good thing at all I have nothing to recommend me I have nothing to burst of the tall I am nothing he is everything God his grace in Christ Jesus if you see this that's the inevitable way in which you must think and it follows from there doesn't it that we should also conduct ourselves in a given way every man that has this hope in him purify

39:27of himself even as he is pure a man who has seen himself as a member of the church and of the body of Christ in this way that we are looking at this morning will no longer want to keep us near as he can to the world and he won't regard Christy and it he has narrow because he knows in his heart of heart that it condemns certain things not for a moment if we could but see those whom who have now gone beyond the veil we'd say farewell to most of the things of this world it's because we don't see it we don't know it we don't rarely believe it oh any man who sees this any man who has this hope in him purify for himself even as he is pure if you know you're going to be absolutely pure and spotless well get on with it wash your hands cleanse your hearts he double minded these are the appeals get us far away from the world as you can haste the on from grace to

40:34glory the other thing I find here is the absolute certainty of it all and the assurance of it all if my confidence of my final salvation and of my ultimate perfection rested in myself my own energy my own zeal my own purposes and desires I know that I'd never get them my assurance is based on this that God the infinite eternal God he is vindicating his own eternal character through me and if he started saving me and then left it undone or unfinished and I ever arrived in hell so the devil would have the greatest julk of eternity he said there's a being that God began to

41:42save and failed to complete it's impossible it can't happen there is no more monstrous idea than the idea that you can fall away from grace that you can ever be born again and then be damned the character of God is involved it's impossible it's not merely to save me it's to vindicate his own being and nature and I'm being used to that end I'm getting all the benefits but the things absolutely certain because God's character is involved in it he that has begun a good work in will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ and the last word is an obvious one isn't it the privilege of it all the privilege of being used of God in this way to vindicate his own

42:46eternal glorious character why am I in this why did he ever look upon me as the elder asks who are these I ask who am I you remember David asking the questions when God gave him a glimpse of where he came into this great plan who am I or what is my house that this great honor should come to me don't we all feel like saying that who am I and what am I that God should ever have looked upon me and chosen me to be a part of his plan and his purpose to vindicate himself his greatness his glory his wisdom his love his mercy his kindness his compassion the for the prince's dependencies and the powers in the heavenly places Christian people think of yourselves like that

43:55and go on to glory