Ephesians: "He chose us..."

Before the foundation of the world, God was writing a story of redemption—and in Christ, we've been brought into it. You are not forgotten, overlooked, or unwanted. You are chosen.

This message explores what it means to be chosen by God: desired by His love, adopted into His family, called to holiness, and invited into His purpose. The story you believe shapes the identity you embrace, the life you live, and the future you pursue.

No matter what you've experienced or what you feel today, the gospel declares this good news: in Christ, you belong.

Scripture: Ephesians 1:3–14

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

That's what church is all about. We're all we're here for community. It's wonderful. I'm Donovan. If I haven't met you yet, Donovan Odell. Wow. Some fans? Crazy. My wife is working in Kids Today, Aurelia. We moved here back in July. Actually, for a remote position that I was starting in June, I'm still remote. So the fact that I got moved here for a job that I still have not gone into the office for yet is crazy. But I really feel like God's purpose in that was meeting this wonderful community. And it's funny, my parents actually were part of a church plant when I was born. And there was a very small congregation that they met, and they ended up being like my best friends growing up, my best man at my wedding. So, like super cool to see that just like in the early stages. And I'm really happy to see you guys here. But we're gonna be reading Ephesians 1, verses 3 through 14. So I'll let you guys flip your pages or click on the buttons to get there, and then we'll jump in. I'm in ESV also, if if you're particular to click in the versions in the app. So yeah, let's do this. So this is obviously Paul. We're in Ephesians. So this is Paul. It says, Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the worlds, that we should be holy and blameless before him. In love, he predestined us for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, to the praise of his glorious grace with which he has blessed us in the beloved. In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace, which he lavished upon us in all wisdom and insight, making known to us the mystery of his will, according to his purpose, which he set forth in Christ, as a plan for the fullness of time to unite all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth. In him we have obtained an inheritance. Amen. Having been predestined according to the purpose of him who works all things according to the counsel of his will, so that we who were the first hope in Christ might be to the praise of his glory. In him, you also, when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and believed in him, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit, who is the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it to the praise of his glory. This is the word of the Lord.

SPEAKER_01 2:36

Let's go. Good morning, everybody. How are we doing? Awesome. Well, if we haven't met, my name is Blake Auders. I get to serve as the pastor here at Kingdom City Church, and we are so thankful that you are with us. We're in week three of our uh series to the book of Ephesians, and I've said this every single week. I don't know that I've ever been this excited to preach through a book in my life. And it's because I really, really love this book, but I also believe that Paul's letter to the Ephesians has something very particular specifically to you and specifically for us as a church community that I think is really special. The book of Ephesians or the letter, Paul's letter to the Ephesians, we we kind of get a little bit of this background in Acts chapter 19, which is really beautiful. If you, if you, if you ever, if you're able to read through the book of Acts and see kind of the movement of Paul's missionary journeys and the movement of church planting, you actually see where these letters begin to make sense that Paul is actually writing to churches that he himself has planted out of the overflow of his discipleship ministry. And so he's not just writing random letters and mailing them to various destinations. He is writing these letters to specific people that he has known out of the overflow of his ministry. And so in Paul's letter to the Ephesians, he's writing to churches that are in a particular area that have been birthed out of a church that started, that was started by Paul in Acts chapter 19. And so in Acts chapter 19, Paul goes into the city of Ephesus. Ephesus was a huge metropolitan hub at that time, huge uh Roman province, port city, huge Greek city that was ripe with it with a ton of different types of cultures that were happening in that space and place. And Paul engages that city. And what's interesting is in Acts chapter 19, it happens a little bit differently than we see it in other, in other books, is that Paul doesn't go and then and then launch some megachurch. Paul goes and begins to try to engage the city. And what we see first is that is that Paul's Paul's efforts aren't really that productive or that impressive. But what he is able to do is he's able to find 12 disciples, 12 disciples who were longing for Jesus, had heard about Jesus. And Paul lays his hands on him, prays over them. They receive the Holy Spirit, and they begin to follow Paul and receive from his ministry as disciples of Jesus. And Paul starts, he's he goes into the synagogue after that and just begins to try to preach and engage the synagogue to try to tell the Jews in that city of the finished story that Jesus, the Messiah, had come and they would no longer need to wait for a Messiah because he had already appeared and come, and his name was Jesus. But upon resistance and that message not being received, Paul leaves the synagogue and actually starts a discipleship school in a place called the Hall of Tyrannis in the city of Ephesus. And so I want you to think about this. He takes twelve guys, twelve people that he had dis that had become disciples and began to follow him, takes them into the hall of Tyrannis and begins a discipleship school. And what we learn is that after two years, all of Asia, all the province of Asia had heard the gospel. So I want you to think about this. Paul finds 12 disciples in a city, starts a school of discipleship, and within two years, the entire region had been reached. How does that happen? Well, I wanted to kind of put a like picture of it. I think I, yeah, I think I have these. So this is the beauty of discipleship and multiplication. Is I want I want to show you this because especially in a city like ours, what we tend to see is that people's methodology or strategy is how can we go to a very large city and how can we build the biggest church possible? Because obviously big is going to be most effective in reaching and transforming a city, right? That's how we think, especially in the West. But Paul's strategy was totally different. And you actually see this in the gospels through the ministry of Jesus as well, is that Paul takes 12 people and invests his life into those 12 people, but then he calls those 12 people to invest their lives in a group of people. And so let's just, I just kind of did the math and was like, let's say Paul invests into four groups of three, and then he calls all three of those people to go find three more people. I feel pretty confident that anyone in here who's a follower of Jesus, you could probably do some life with three people and follow Jesus together. So not too super unrealistic of a strategy. So you look at it and you go, okay, let's multiply that by three. And you go, okay, that's four groups of nine. Well, let's say all of those, all of those nine, then go find three other people. Well, then that's four groups of 27. And then you can continue to see this like multiplication by three happen until what you see over on the far right is the total number of people who are being engaged and discipled through these little groups of three that are happening through organic discipleship with an intentional multiplication strategy, right? Of just, hey, I'm gonna pour my life into these three people for a few months, and then we're gonna go and we're gonna turn around and we're gonna invest our life into three other people. And we're just gonna keep doing that over and over and over again and believe it's gonna work. And if you go to the next slide, what you end up seeing is that over the course of several months, you're talking about a quarter of a million people who are in this city. Is that what can happen is over the course of these multiplied discipleship groups and these missional communities is that you can absolutely reach an entire region through that kind of strategy. This was the example that Jesus displays in the gospels, and this is the strategy that Paul deployed as he planted churches, is we see missional communities that are multiplied and then intentional discipleship that is happening through relationship. Why? Because discipleship relationship, relational discipleship, and a commitment to multiplication can go places that megachurches can only dream of, right? You can go places that no pastor and no megachurch can get to. You. And you can have influence in people's lives that no one else can. And Paul knew this. Paul knew that these people had influence in their day-to-day relationships and that the gospel was going to be most powerfully spread through these relationships and through these people. And so this is what happens in the city of Ephesus. And so what we actually believe is that this letter to the Ephesians, because it's a little bit different than Paul's other letters, in that Paul's language in the letter of Ephesians is a little bit more vague than it is in other letters. In other letters, he writes to specific individuals and names particular people and recalls specific memories. And in the letter to Ephesians, he doesn't do that. He writes a little more broad, and he doesn't necessarily name specific individuals, and he doesn't describe particular memories. And the reason is because Paul is writing a letter that is going to be circulated among these missional communities and among these multiplied churches. And what he's doing is he's laying a foundation for their ministry. And he's saying, He's saying, look, how can I sum up what God is doing and what God has done and what God wants to do in the future and give this to all of you so that you can be ready to minister effectively in the spaces and places that God has called you? Because what's happening in this city, in this super diverse city, not unlike our city, is that Paul is seeing Greek people, Jewish people, and all kinds of other people be encounter Jesus and then come together in a community. And he's going, How do I form these people? How do we form these people in a particular way to follow Jesus together, to understand what God has done, what their role in this story is, what we're trying to do together, what God's goal in history and in the future, how he wants to use them. And so Paul is saying, How do we do this? Well, so he writes this letter that Ephesians is one of the greatest works of writing that we have, of the greatest documents that we have. And it literally sums up the Christian story and the Christian life and the Christian community in six chapters. And so Paul is trying to condense all of this and equip these people to be able to walk and live out the way of Jesus everywhere that they go. And I want you to think about this that if you personally, if you, if you discipled three people a year, and what I mean by discipleship is literally if you got into committed relationship with three other people and you said, we're going to walk together and hold each other accountable for the sake of following Jesus and being obedient to Him and trying to reach other people, and you did that for a year, and then you multiplied every single year, you would disciple 75 people over the next 25 years. That is the average church size in America. That God could use you to disciple a church in your lifetime by you intentionally investing in three people every single year. It's pretty doable. It's pretty doable, right? And so Paul is trying to take these everyday ordinary people who have now encountered Jesus and been filled with the Spirit and equip them to be missionaries everywhere that they go for the sake of advancing God's kingdom everywhere that they go. And guess what? It's the same thing that God is trying to do with us. It's the same thing that he's trying to do in you and he's trying to do in me. And you may look at this and you go, that that doesn't sound quite, that doesn't sound quite right, right? I I'm not, I didn't go to seminary, I don't have all these gifts, I don't have this, I don't have that. And neither did they. That's the beauty of it. Is Paul finds 12 ordinary people, says, hey, will you commit to doing this journey with me? They say yeah. And he's like, All right, part of following Jesus means being sent by Jesus and investing your life into other people. Can you do that? Yeah, I can do that. All right, now let's just keep doing that and see what God does. And in two years, an entire region gets reached with the gospel. So Paul's letter is written to these disciples and written to these churches, multiplied out of that ministry. And these are both Jews and Greeks and a ton of different diverse people from diverse backgrounds. And now what is Paul wanting to do in these six chapters? Well, he's he's wanting to do a couple a few different things. He's wanting them to see and understand the story and the will of God and their role in it. One of the phrases that you see in this text over and over and over again is the purposes of God, the will of God. You see this over and over and over again because he's wanting them to see what God is doing and what their role in it is. There's so many of us, if you if you look at the most Googled questions right now, still today, one of them is, or at this point, the most chat GPT questions, today is, man, what is the will of God? What is God's will? And people sometimes are asking that at a macro level, but a lot of times they're asking themselves at a micro level, what is God's will for me? What does God want from me? And what Paul understood is that if you don't know what God's will is at a grand level, at a macro level, what God is writing, what God is doing throughout human history, you're not going to be able to find your specific role within it. And so he's trying to help them see and understand the story and the will of God because they don't understand. Five minutes ago, these people were worshiping a Greek goddess in the temple of Artemis. And now they've encountered Jesus and they're going, so what do we do with this now? And Paul's like, let's, let's, let's teach you a little bit. Let's tell you what's going on. And that's the same thing for you and me. I know that there are people in this room right now, you have encountered Jesus, he's changed your life, you love him, but you have no idea what he's doing throughout human history, what he's doing in the world, because no one's taught you. No one's taught you. And so what Paul is trying to do, because we have huge churches in America that have tons of finances and do tons of great gatherings, but we don't, but we don't teach people to where they understand what God is doing and what's my role in it. And so Paul's going, we can't let that happen. Because guess what? If you guys get really excited and start going all over the world to tell a story that you don't understand, this is gonna get really chaotic. He's going, man, let me help you understand what's God doing and what your role in it is. Secondly, he wants them to understand their identity and their inheritance in Christ. And so, once again, one of the things that we're gonna that we're gonna see in this text, especially in Ephesians chapter four, is that is that God's trying to unify people that don't naturally unify, right? God wants to take a community of people who come from all kinds of different backgrounds, have all kinds of different idols, have all kinds of different hurts and wounds and issues, and trying to bring them together in a community to where they have sacrificial love for one another and they partner together for the sake of the mission of Jesus in the world. That doesn't happen easily. That doesn't happen easily. People think America invented racism. Racism has been happening for all time, across every continent in every generation, is that people don't like people who are different than them naturally in their flesh. This is no different. Is that now these people have encountered Jesus and now they're having to get over all of these ingrained prejudices and biases that they've that they've picked up throughout their life, all in submission to Jesus as their common foundation, and that they're all pointed towards Him together and they're called to do this together as a diverse community. And he's saying this isn't gonna happen very easily. And so he's trying to bring them together as a community. And then thirdly, he wants them to be aware of the greatness of God's power to in and through them for the sake of his glory and the renewal of all things. Like he wants them to be aware the story they're in, the identity that they now have together, and now the power of God to do something miraculous through them. And he's like, This is what I want you to see. Paul's prayer at the end of Ephesians chapter one, which we're gonna get to in a couple of weeks, is this that they would see, that they would see and that they would understand. This is what he's trying to get at, and this is what he's trying to get at for you, and what he's trying to get at for me. Because here's something that we need to understand is that the story you believe and the identity you construct determine the life you live, the impact you make, and the legacy you leave. The story you believe, the story you believe that you're in, and the identity you construct will determine the life you live, the impact you make, and the legacy you leave. This is what Paul understands as he's writing to these people, and this is what we must understand today reading this is that we all are living in a story. We all have a worldview, we all have a way that we look and perceive the world, and we all live our lives in light of that story. We all construct our identities in light of that story. And then our lives are directed by that story that we live in. I I put it this way, I think I put a picture of a pyramid because it kind of helped me, it helped give me like a little bit of a visual of kind of the way that this works out. Is that we all live in a story or a narrative, right? And then out of that narrative or that story, we we find an identity because we have to figure out our role in that story. And then out of that identity come our values. What's most important? What do we prioritize in this life? And then as we prioritize our lives or live our lives in alignment with that priority, it leads to the the way that we live and our behavior. And then if you go to the next one, that ultimately leads to a destiny or a direction, right? This is the future direction of your life and the generations that follow. This is how this happens. And it all starts with the story that you believe that you're in. It all starts with the identity that you construct. The reality in a room like this is that there are people who you have a narrative in your mind and it controls a lot of your life. That narrative tells you why you're alive. That narrative tells you why you are or are not important. That narrative tells you who you are or who you should be. That narrative tells you what's wrong with you, what's right with you. That narrative tells you who's in charge, what the point of it all is. That narrative controls a lot of things. And there's a lot of people who put Jesus and put Christianity on a narrative that is not what the story that Paul is writing and trying to teach these people. We actually see this throughout Acts is that there's more, there's there's so many moments where Paul will go into a community and Jesus, the name of Jesus has kind of picked up some traction. And people begin to leverage the name of Jesus to communicate a message or try to do things that that Jesus isn't doing and Jesus isn't communicating. And they're trying to take advantage of people. This is one of the reasons that Paul is very aggressive when it comes to false teaching. Right? Paul is very gracious and encourages us to be kind and patient and merciful with people who are ignorant and don't understand. Right? We have all kinds of people in our lives who are not following Jesus because they don't understand. And we need to be patient with them, and we need to be kind with them, and we need to help them see and understand who Jesus is, his love for them, and what he's trying to do in their lives. There are other people who manipulate and take advantage of others and know exactly what they're doing. And Paul says we need to deal aggressively with those kinds of people. Why? Because the story you believe will control and dictate so much of your life. And he's going, man, we have to tell people the truth. And so, a few questions. Like when it comes to a narrative, what story am I living in, right? What's my worldview? What's truth? Identity, who am I? What role do I play? Values, what is right or most important, behavior, how do I live in response to all this? And then future, where do you inevitably end up as a result of all of these things? And so Paul is trying to get them to understand that they're being included and brought into a story that's been going on from the very beginning. And this is, I think, so many of us, especially in the, especially in the Western churches, is we emphasize a lot about our personal relationship with Jesus. There's a lot of people that, especially growing up, I heard this all the time, is it's not about religion, it's about relationship and your personal relationship with Jesus. And and and that is absolutely true, is that you personally have to encounter and follow Jesus. You have a personal accountability to Jesus, but you're also a part of a much larger story in a much bigger family. Like right now, there are millions of Christians, statistics say billions even, around the world that are technically your brothers and sisters, that the scriptures would say are even more intimately and specially connected to you than even your biological family because of your unity in Christ. Like you're part of that now. But not only that, Hebrews 12 tells us that there's a great cloud of witnesses from every generation of people who have who have tried to follow Jesus and prioritize them, and you're a part of that special lineage. Martyrs who have laid their lives down and shed blood of out of faithfulness to Jesus. You're a part of that family. You can you can pull down on that inheritance of faith, that you're now part of that. That that you are being included and brought into a story that's been going on from the very beginning of time. That they that you as an individual and we don't exist in isolation, right? And neither did they. And so he's trying to bring these people who come from all these different backgrounds to say, hey, you're part of a community and you're part of a story, and I need to help you see that. That God ultimately is bringing together a people, he's taking them somewhere and he's accomplishing something through them. This is what Paul's trying to communicate. He's bringing together a people, you're part of that. He's taking them somewhere and he's accomplishing something through them. And so ultimately, throughout this book, you're gonna realize that that he's trying, he's trying to give them a new story, a new identity, a new family, a new purpose, and a new destiny in six chapters. He's trying to, he's trying to teach these new disciples who are now completely having to reorient their worldview and imagination and identity, and in six chapters try to give them something that they can grab handlebars on and begin to apply in their lives so that the mission of Jesus can move forward in and through their everyday lives. One of the stories that that ultimately they're in continuation of is something that we look out the scriptures, is there's there's different covenants throughout scripture. That God, God makes covenants with his people, he makes commitments and he makes promises with his people and such intense promises that that he literally puts his, God puts his character on the line in order to say, I'm going to be faithful to these covenants. And what do we see over and over and over again is that despite God's faithfulness and intentionality with his people, his people do not are not faithful to the covenant with God. He's faithful to them, but they're not faithful to him. And we see this over and over and over and over again. And you look at it and you go, Well, well, shouldn't that lead to ultimately death for the people? And this is what's beautiful is that even though even though what rightfully people deserve because of their lack of faithfulness to the covenant with God is death, what does God do? Is that God in Christ actually takes their place because of their lack of faithfulness and he sacrifices himself in their place to atone for them in order to make a way for them to enjoy an eternal covenant with him. And this is why Paul is continuously writing, this is now true in Christ of you, in Christ. And so God makes covenants with uh he makes a covenant with Adam and Eve at creation, an invitation to intimacy and partnership with him, if they'll be faithful to him. He makes, he makes a covenant with Noah, he makes a covenant with Abraham, covenant with Moses, covenant with David. And ultimately we see Jesus be the fulfillment of these covenants in and of himself in order to give birth to a new covenant that God now has with his people, his new creation people. And in the and for the nation of Israel, they had to, they were marked by their covenant through circumcision. And now we are marked by the Holy Spirit. We are sealed by the Holy Spirit. It's no longer an external mark that proves our covenant with God. It's an internal rebirth that's now sealed by the Holy Spirit to say we belong to him. And then ultimately this covenant's going to be all summed up in the new heavens and new earth where we where he says I will be your God you will be my people and every nation tribe and tongue surround the throne of God as his beautiful diverse unified people. This is what he's doing. This is what he's doing. This is the story that we're in and he's trying to help them see that they're that they're a part of it. That they're that in we've said this before that you are so individually special. That man God created you in his image and you are totally unique. There's been no one like you and there will never be anyone like you. And at the same time you're just another person. That you are both beautifully unique and special but you are also another person in this grand story and in this big population of people. And so it's so it's not about you right but you get to be part of it. And that's unique and that's special and that's beautiful. But ultimately it's a story that God's writing and God is weaving for the sake of his own glory. Ephesians 1 says for he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight. In him we were chosen in order that we might be for the praise of his glory. And so it's beautiful about this passage is that Paul goes into telling this this story and the first thing that he starts out with is here's what I need you guys to understand is that you've been chosen. You've been chosen. This is what we're going to kind of hone in for the next few minutes because once again he's can he's can he's helping us construct our identity. And and the reality is that you believe that you're an accident who's abandoned alone and isolated. You cannot be faithful to the way of Jesus you will not be faithful to the way of Jesus. You can't because once again yeah the narrative matters but your identity is going to dictate your values and your behavior and it's going to impact the way that you live your life. And so what what once again what God is trying to do is to form for himself a people and that requires all of us coming in alignment with what he says is true about each of us because we are now in Christ. And so if we claim to be in Christ we have to find the truth that's now in Christ and apply it to ourselves and what God says is that you've been chosen. You've been chosen. There's some of you in this room that even when those words are stated or said, they can't even really connect the way that they're meant to because of the different things that you've maybe been through in your life. And I want you to think about this text once again that Paul is writing to a group of Jews. He's writing to a group of Greeks he's writing to a group of people from all over who've believed all kinds of different things and he's trying to bring them together and he's trying to apply this identity to their lives. And man some of these people in this in this community have been rejected like even because of their faith in Jesus that they've lost their families. They've lost relationships they've lost their jobs they've been discarded they've been abandoned they've been ignored overlooked outcast and unwanted and there's some of us in this room that when you think about the narrative that's in your mind right now those are the words that come to your mind. And maybe they're the words that have been spoken over you by someone else unwanted rejected discarded abandoned ignored overlooked outcast and that narrative is controlling your life and what you need is a greater truth from a more powerful voice to break the chains of that lie over off your life and so three verses in four verses in Paul says here's what I need you to know you're chosen you're chosen you're chosen the apostle Peter in his own letter writes to a group of dispersed and persecuted Christians. In Acts what you see is that as as the church is beginning to be birthed and and it's and it's starting to grow, persecution comes against the church and they begin to disperse. And so this community of people that were once together in these in these beautiful relationships and had this deep community have now as a result of persecution had to flee from one another and flee from their cities and flee from their families in order to preserve their lives. But as they do the gospel goes forward but Peter writes to these dispersed Christians in 1 Peter chapter two and he says he says as you come to him the living stone rejected by humans but chosen by God and precious to him, you also like living stones are being built into a spiritual house to be a holy priesthood, offering spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. Then he says again but you are a chosen people a royal priesthood a holy nation God's special possession that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness and into his wonderful light. Once you were not a people but now you are God's people once you had not received mercy but now you have received mercy. Peter goes on to say dear friends I urge you as foreigners and exiles and so I want I want you to think about this because I it can be such a powerful a power powerful picture for us if we can get get this is that Peter is writing writing to people and he's saying he's saying as foreigners and exiles you are chosen by God so he's literally writing to those who are isolated and don't belong to those who have been kicked out of their own community or their own country for those who have nowhere to go and no place to call home you are chosen by God you're his special possession it's a beautiful it's a beautiful picture for those of us who may who may struggle to feel chosen and yet God's word speaks a better truth over our feelings that once again it's the story that we believe. It's the story that we believe. And so the story that we have to believe is that God has chosen us in Christ as his special possession. And what's what's important to recognize about these passages is that ultimately what we see in this context is that Paul starts out and he says he says blessed be God blessed be God who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing. And then he goes in to describe those spiritual blessings and starts out with your chosenness and what's important for us to see is that so many people get into these into these passages and they start to argue over minutiae wording and get into theological debate. But Paul's purpose and intention around telling these people that they're chosen isn't that they would spark theological debate but that they would fall on their face in adoration and worship of a God who has set his affection and love on them. There's so many of us that even as we begin to have these conversations, we begin we begin to try to analyze the wording and the verbiage and what it may mean and what God's trying to communicate is don't you understand that before the foundations of the world I set my affection on you? That I loved you that I've chosen you to belong to me and to be in this family and that this and that you you being chosen is about the praise of his glory that when you understand and rest in your chosenness the response that you have to God is praise and adoration because your being chosen isn't primarily about you. It's about looking at who he is and looking at what he's done in Christ. So real quick kind of as we begin to move the ball down the field what does it mean to be chosen? Like what is Paul ultimately saying when he's saying these things that you are chosen well the first thing that chosen means is it means it means being desired. It means desire one one of the terms that we see all throughout this passage is that you are chosen according to the will of God this this word will literally means the desire of God the intention of God that you've been chosen because God wanted you because God desired you've been chosen according to the will and the desire of God in in the gospels when Jesus is baptized and he raises up out of the water God looks at him and says this is my beloved son in whom I'm well pleased. You are mine, right? And he speaks this this affection and this and this adoration over his son before he's ever even launched into a ministry. And what Paul is now saying is that if you are now in Christ then the way that the Father feels the pleasure and adoration towards his son is the way that is the way that he now feels towards you if you are in him. That if you are in Christ you are desired you're desired by the Lord. One of the things that happens maybe you're here and you're not a follower of Jesus yet and you go well I'm I don't follow Jesus. I don't really care about any of this. So he he doesn't desire me right because I'm I'm a rebel or I've done the wrong things or here's my rap sheet. So I'm not wanted or desired by God. One of the things that that that people can mess up when it comes to the gospel is that is that people can can kind of paint this picture that that ultimately God has created you but because of your sin he doesn't like you can't stand you. But thankfully Jesus came into the picture to die for you and take your place so that God now tolerates you. And they go yeah Jesus took your place he made a sacrifice for you died for your sins and what God really wants to do is punish you but he can't because Jesus and that's what people paint a picture of the gospel. And so what that ends up having is a is a scared and and pessimistic disciple who doesn't actually believe that the love of the Father is on them but that he's forced to like them because of this theological loophole that Jesus presents. That's not the gospel. The beauty of the gospel John 316 right one of the most known verses in the world is that God so loved the world that he gave who initiates that God for what? Because his affection is on you. And so what does he do? He sends he gives his son to die for you to make him love you no because he already loved you he already desired you he already wanted you. And so Christ came generously not because God was withholding and saying hey can you just kind of make them somewhat okay with me so that they can get in you're like that's not beautiful at all. But God is going look I so desire unity with my people I so desire communion with my people intimacy with my people I need you to go purchase them and win them back because they're mine and I want them. And so Paul's communicating some message to go look I need you to understand whether you're Jew, whether you're Greek or whatever you've come from God set his affection on you to come after you because he wants you. He desires you. And there's so many of you you have you have certain stories or you have certain things that you've done in your life you come from a certain background and what you need to know is despite what you've gone through who abandoned you who hurt you what you've done that God's affection has been on you from before you ever took your first breath from before you ever took your first breath he says before the foundation of the world I chose you. I want you I desire you look I don't want you to look back in your story and try to find proof or evidence of the love of God. So many of us do that we try to isolate ourselves and we try to pick our lives apart to go all right God show me where you love me and where you where you cared about me. What Paul is trying to do for them and what Paul's trying to do for us is say no look step back. Stop isolating yourself step back look at what God has done and say oh my gosh God you stepped into the not only the story of humanity but you stepped into my story to draw near to me to take my place so that I could have communion and fellowship with you. Look at what you've done look at what you've done we don't we don't measure the love of God by the sin of other people we don't do that we measure the love of God by the generosity the kindness and the faithfulness of God that's what we do. And so he's saying look I I love you I want you I desire you I choose you because he wanted to not because he was forced to not because he had to and not because there was anything that you had done to make you more special to him it's because of his character and his kindness and his commitment to you that he loved you and came after you. The second thing is chosen means possession. Chosen means possession this is the language that's that that Peter uses that you're his special possession and so and so this idea that you that that that you are chosen by God that means that you you are his that you are his in order to be in order to be chosen by God means being means being God's special possession. There's so many people I think who who like the idea of being chosen because of what it does to to our insecurities and what it does to help us feel loved and the affection but then what we don't want is to actually be the possession of God. Right? We want God to choose us and love us and have affection for us but we don't want to actually be his possession. And this is what you see all through all throughout God's covenants in the Old Testament all the way into the new story he's gonna he's going look I want you to be mine but be mine. Like this is why God constantly uses language of covenant is imagine imagine a marriage imagine me and my wife if I was like look I want you to love me more than anything else I want you to be absolutely devoted and committed to me. I want to just walk in and feel my chosenness and your delight in me. But I just want you to know I might you know I'll probably have some other families out there because I really like how they make me feel too I got these other things going on that they're really my things okay I don't really I don't really need you in those things. You just sit here take care of the kid make me feel like you know amazing when I walk in okay see you in a few months babe you know that's not a covenant and yet that's the kind of relationship we want with the Lord I want you to choose me. I want you to delight in me I want you to cherish me and then let me do whatever I want to do whenever I want to do it. He's going that's not a covenant you want God to be your fan God's saying no no I want to be I want to be your treasure I want to be in a committed love relationship with you which means you get me and I get you that you're his special possession which means you're no longer your own but you belong to him when I stood and made a commitment and a covenant with my wife part of the vows is what I'm not mine anymore I'm yours. I'm yours I don't I don't I don't get to just go out here and be wildin' in these streets right I gotta come home to my wife my love my treasure even when she don't like me even when she don't like me she's still obligated to me because we're in a covenant there's gonna be moments that you don't really like God am I allowed to say that there's moments that you don't like him because you don't understand what he's doing but you have to trust I'm his and he's mine his heart is for me and towards me that I'm his possession and you you look from the very beginning to the very end and everything in between what does God constantly say I want you to be mine and I want to be yours. I want you to be mine and I want to be yours. Thirdly chosen means belonging means possession being you're God's special possession but it also means belonging and and and in particular I'm thinking about you belonging to a family you belonging to a family of people. The reality of being in Christ is that you are not the only one now chosen in Christ right that you you join a family of chosen people that God has made his covenant with that that from the very beginning of time is God was not just calling isolated individuals and having these one-off relationships. He was forming for himself a people who were together and unified together. And so in our in our personal relationship with Jesus narrative a lot of times we lose the fact that actually throughout the New Testament and throughout the Old Testament from the very beginning God has been forming for himself a people that they may be actually obligated to one another belonging to one another not just to him but belonging as one united family together. You cannot you cannot follow Jesus in isolation literally can a ton of his commands are in the context of relationship. All of the letters of the New Testament are written in the context of relationship to communities of people Jesus formed for himself a community of people Jesus launched the commission of his church to what? Form communities of people the birth of Acts what does the Spirit do? Preaches the gospel and what's formed a community of people and so there's so many of us that what we what we want to do once again is that is that we want to receive from a video or receive from a podcast but not have relational obligation to one another in the context of a belonging relationship. But the reality is that if you want to belong we got to belong to you right that that's what belonging means is that there's a tether of relationships a covenant of relationships together and that we experience the belonging in Christ to him but also the belonging of God's people but this is rooted in our mutual belonging to God. What's beautiful is that Peter actually says that Christ was rejected by people yet yet cherished belonging to God. And yet we can we can find so much of that in and of ourselves is that one of the things that you that you read about in the book of Acts is how these communities would so would so love and support and care for one another in the midst of their mutual rejection from the world. Like man if you want to be faithful to Jesus it's going to cost you some things and you need people who are going to be there to support you and hold your head up and keep you accountable. Because it's not easy to follow Jesus. And if you don't have other people who are committed to doing it with you, we won't make it. And so chosen means belonging but it doesn't just mean belonging to something but it also means helping others belong to something one of the visions that we have as we talk about this community is like man we want to see a diverse multi-generational community that learn how to mutually sacrifice for one another and love one another. Like we want to see single people sacrificing for young families or older people. We want to see we want to see retirees sacrificing for younger people who have not had a home cooked meal in ages and don't know how to cook one for themselves and they need you to do it. Communities that are able to love and and care for one another and it requires sacrifice from each other and showing up for each other. So many of us we show up to community and we want, we want, we need, we need, but we don't show up ready to give and the reality is that the beauty of the body of Christ is that you have ministry that God wants to do through you to other people. But we don't have that mindset or that readiness but if we all show up ready to mutually minister and build one another up it's amazing what a community can become and what you can receive as a result of it. Chosen means calling chosen means calling is that as God is forming for these people, he's calling them to something he's calling them to something the text says that that he's chosen you but why has he chosen you? To be holy and blameless. Peter says that these chosen exiles are in a are exiles in a foreign land what does that mean that they're different. They don't fit the world and the community around them that being chosen you've been chosen to be different. You've been chosen to be his to be his one of the things you see throughout the text is is he doesn't say you've been chosen because but you've been chosen that you haven't been chosen because you've done something to get God to choose you. Sitting dodgeball at PE on the playground. You're not doing something and proving yourself so that God now wants to choose you but God is choosing you so that he can now do something in and through you. He's chosen you so that you will be holy and blameless. He's chosen you that you might be filled with his spirit and used in the world and used in your workplace and used in your relationships and used in your family. There's so many of you that you've experienced generational pain from generations past and what God wants to do is write a new story in the future generations but that requires for you to allow God to do that through you that you may be holy set apart blameless unblemished unblemished that you don't get to belong to him if you're going to belong to him he is going to lead your life and it requires a posture of submission and surrender which is the last one is that your chosen means surrender. Chosen means surrender one of the interesting parts about this text is is the the terms that we see over and over and over again throughout it in Christ. He says what you're chosen but how are you chosen in Christ in Christ and so it's almost like as you read this text you go okay God God has such a commitment to his own son such a commitment to his own son and his commitment to you is through his son and so right now you are all loved and desired creations of God but what we want to be is is is the chosen of God right but he says that chosenness comes through comes through your union with Christ and so you're you're being in Christ is what makes you part of these things. of these spiritual blessings that Paul is describing get you get you receive them how through and in Christ that you get in him and now everything that God is giving to his son you now have access to as a as an heir that you're now in him Jesus in john in John 17 he talks about the the love that God has for him that he now has for those who belong to him he talks about abiding in him and he talks about that that as you abide in him you get access to all that he has access to his father becomes your father what all what what is what is his is now yours. Every spiritual blessing that is Christ's is now yours because you're in Christ he's the air you're breathing the water you're swimming in everything is in him you being chosen is in him maybe you're here today and you're going man am I chosen super easy get in Christ and the answer is yes all you gotta do is get in him attach yourself to him surrender yourself to him submit to him belong to him and and you're his there's so many of us we like we look at our lives and we try to we try to kind of feel our way through the dark and go on like I want somewhere to belong and I want to be I want to be God's and I want him to be on my side and he's made it so clear made it so clear I say look be in union with me and you get all of me and being in union with me means I get all of you and this is what God wants to do. So what God wants to do in you and then collectively what he wants to do in us is that we would be in him and so deeply and beautifully enraptured in him that we would be so locked together as a beautiful community. Like God's will and desire for you isn't that you have these disconnected relationships that you occasionally occasionally see and say what's up to but listen to me your life life hurts the there's so many so many aspects in the New Testament where God's chosen people are a suffering people. And the moment that life hurts they don't start doubting whether or not they're chosen by God. There's actually one text where where where they're suffer they're that they suffer they've just been released out of prison and they begin to worship God that He chose them to be worthy of suffering for his name. And so let me tell you your life is going to hurt and it's gonna hurt a lot more if you're by yourself. A lot more and so man like there's some of us who have just this fake pride that you just got to get rid of this ego that you just got to get rid of or this narrative in your head that somebody hurt you once upon a time and now that's going to dictate the rest of your life and what what God is inviting us into is to go, I'm not going to choose to believe that narrative anymore. I'm not gonna choose to receive my identity from lies anymore. I'm not gonna allow those things to now dictate who I am and how I live anymore. I'm not gonna allow those things to now control the future of my life and what I pass down to future generations anymore. You got to get in Christ you got to receive the love and the affection and the truth of the Father surrender yourself wholly to him and live your life in light of what he is speaking over you so we're we're gonna move into a time of response and man all man God want God wants you. Like ultimately out of everything you hear today this is what we want you to hear is that God wants you. And there's some of you who who claim to be claim to be believers and yet you don't experience union with God you go to church you do some good things he he kind of shapes your moral some but you you're not living in the reality of union with Christ confident that you were chosen loved cherished by him living as one who belongs to him in covenant relationship with him and man today is an opportunity for you to just stick a stake in the ground doesn't have to look dramatic. It can just be you with a quiet resolve and commitment saying to the Lord I am yours and I'm not going to go to the left I'm not gonna go to the right and if and when I do would you bring me back because I want to belong to you. I want to belong to you because I've seen who you are and what you've done. Others of you you're in Christ and you don't you don't feel chosen because you're still believing a story and God wants to take control of the narrative and take control of the story and you need you need to believe the story that he's speaking over you. And then others of you you long to be chosen but you don't believe you can be you might even in this moment be carrying shame and regret from moments ago. You might in this moment be believing and carrying something that has brought you such deep shame and condemnation and and you long to be chosen but you don't believe you ever will be or can be. And so what you've done right now is you're going, God I'm just gonna do the best that I can and hope that at the end of all this you accept me. Can I tell you this? Not how that works. All of us, all of us are in desperate need of his mercy and his grace and he gives it freely and generously in Jesus. He's already come to prove it to you to show it to you all you got to do is call on him cry out to him surrender to him receive him and you receive all that is his you don't have to go around feeling in the dark anymore you can't earn it you'll never deserve it but you can receive it because of who he is and what he's done. So don't walk out today not being in Christ so Holy Spirit we ask you to come and have your way every single one of us needs you to shape our hearts to shape our minds to shape what we believe to be true shape the identity who we are how we live we need you to tell us and show us and then God everyone in this room needs to have the humility to actually believe you and and choose to live in light of that God you you want you want us you desire us you've chosen us if we will simply come to Christ come to him and be yours to be your people and stop trying to belong to someone or something else but to just belong to you to covenant with you so Jesus would you just come and do a work in all of our hearts right here right now that we may walk out with new affections and new certainty in who we are as yours. In Jesus' name