R.C. Sproul (0:00)

The shedding of blood that was required in the animal sacrifices of the Old Testament certainly involved the death of those sacramental animals that were used. Now Christ, by shedding his blood means by dying, giving up his life as the payment for our redemption.

Nathan W. Bingham (0:28)

Ephesians 1:7 has this beautiful go that reads, 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. Welcome to the Sunday edition of Renewing youg Mind. I'm Nathan W. Bingham, and we're spending time on Sundays hearing R.C. sproul teach on the early portions of Ephesians. There is so much in this letter that Paul penned to the saints in Ephesus, so if you'd like to slowly walk through it line by line with Dr. Sproul as your guide, don't forget that you can request the Hardcover edition of His Commentary when you give a donation of any amount@renewingyourmind.org before midnight tonight. So what does it mean that we have redemption through the blood of Christ? Here's Dr. Sproul in Ephesians 1, beginning at verse 7.

R.C. Sproul (1:28)

In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of his grace, which he made to abound toward us in all wisdom and prudence, having made known to us the mystery of his will, according to his good pleasure, which he purposed in Himself, that in the dispensation of the fulness of the times, he might gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven and which are on earth in Him. In him also we have obtained an inheritance, being predestined according to the purpose of him who works all things according to the counsel of his will. That we who first trusted in Christ should be to the praise of his glory in him you also trusted after you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, in whom also having believed, you were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise, who is the guarantee of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession. To the praise of his glory, the apostle says in him that is in the Beloved. Remember that when Paul teaches predestination, it's never in the abstract. Our election is always in Christ Jesus. Supremely it is Christ who is the elect one and in God's plan of redemption from all eternity he has been pleased to elect some and give to his Beloved Son, that they may be adopted into that heavenly family. And so he says in verse 7 in him, in Christ we have redemption through his blood comma. I want to comment briefly on that phrase. The idea of redemption involves cashing something in for a particular benefit. And in the Old Testament, the idea of redemption had to do with a purchase, usually out of slavery or out of indentured servitude. If somebody was not able to meet his financial obligations and went into debt, he could indenture himself to the one to whom he owed the money and become a servant until he worked off what he owed. Or he could have a kinsman, redeemer. He could have somebody in his family put up the redemption money and pay what was owed and buy this family member back out of the status of servitude or slavery. Now, that's the metaphor that is in view here. The idea is that in Christ Jesus we have a redeemer, one who buys us back from our slavery, who pays the debt that we are incapable of paying. The New Testament tells us that we are debtors who cannot pay their debts. And when you cannot pay your debt and are insolvent, then you are helpless unless somebody comes alongside you and pays that debt for you. And that's the metaphor that is in view here, that Jesus pays our debt. The apostle elsewhere says, you are not your own, but you have been bought with a price. Now, the price that is paid for our release from servitude to sin and its consequences is set here to be through the blood of Christ. In him we have redemption through, that is, by means of his blood. Now, we've heard this concept over and over and over again in our Christian experience, that we've been saved by the blood of Jesus Christ. And I have a friend back in Pennsylvania. I mention him every now and then. Episcopalian minister by the name of John Guest. And I once heard John Guest make the observation, if Jesus would have scratched his finger on a nail, would that have been sufficient to redeem us? He said, there's blood, and it's the blood of Christ. And of course, John's answer was, no, it would not have been sufficient to redeem us. Because what is meant by being redeemed through his blood, it means being redeemed through his death. Because to the Jew, life was in the blood. And the shedding of blood that was required in the animal sacrifices of the Old Testament certainly involved the death of those sacramental animals that were used. Now, Christ, by shedding his blood, means by dying, giving up his life as the payment for our redemption. And so what value can you place on the life of Jesus Christ that is laid down to redeem us, to buy us out of servitude and out of slavery. In a real sense, this was foreshadowed by the Exodus in the Old Testament. The historical exodus for Israel was there being delivered out of slavery in Egypt. And it, in a sense, was previewing the ultimate exodus, not by which God in His mercy, redeems a people from the harsh tyranny of an earthly ruler, but rather a greater exodus whereby we are delivered from our bondage to sin. And it is out of that bondage to sin that we are redeemed by the blood of Jesus Christ. We have redemption in him through his blood, comma, the forgiveness of sins. When we look at the atoning death of Jesus, where He gives his life for his people, he does that not only to pay the price, but to secure our forgiveness. And we talk a lot about forgiveness. And we can skate over that concept so lightly that we really obscure what it means. And we really consider what it means. That a holy and just God, against whom we have rebelled and sinned with every breath that we have ever taken in our life, that he would actually pardon freely and fully every sin that we have committed against him in our whole life. And that forgiveness is not something that we can earn, but that forgiveness is that which was acquired for us in the redemption through his blood, through in Jesus Christ, according to the riches of his grace which he made to abound toward us in all wisdom and prudence. That God's grace is rich and it's plenteous. It abounds toward us, and it comes from divine wisdom and prudence. And again, Paul has in view what God decided to do before the foundation of the world, before the elemental structures of the universe were ever created. God in all eternity had a plan which was a plan of redemption, a plan. He knew from eternity that he would create a world and that that world would fall into sin, and that he would, out of that sin, bring about redemption for the sake of His Son, the Beloved. And so he said, this was all done not by accident, not as a plan B, because God made a mistake in his first game plan, but according to God's wisdom, which is an eternal wisdom, which is a wisdom that flows out of omniscience, a wisdom that never errs, a wisdom that never is mistaken, but is always perfectly prudent in all that God planned. You know, this is the thing that scares me the way sometimes we fight so viciously against the word of God's revelation of God's predestinating and electing grace, as if God were not only evil, but he's stupid because we fail to see the wisdom of his plan of salvation. A wisdom that flows out of his own perfection, out of his own character, having made known to us the mystery of his will according to his good pleasure which he purposed in himself. There's a lot there, let me mention briefly about it, that he says that he has made known to us the mystery of his will. I love it. I just love that. Because this word that Paul uses here and elsewhere, such as in Colossians, where he speaks of the mystery of God, it is not a spine tingling, whodunit type mystery like we amuse ourselves with in novels and plots, in the movies and television stories. But the Greek word mysterion is the word that refers to something in the economy of God's revelation. That's something that was once hidden, it was obscure, it was not plainly known or understood. But then later, in the providence of God is made manifest. That's what once was hidden, but is now revealed. It is the mystery of God. And in Colossians he said, this mystery is Christ in you, the hope of the Gentiles. That part of this great mystery was the idea that God was going to make from all people on this earth one people of his own, not just Jew, but that his church in the Beloved would be made up of Jew and Gentile, of Greek, slave and free, male and female, and people from every tongue and every tribe and every nation. That mystery he now makes known. He says he's made known to us the mystery of his will. And again he uses the same phrase that he used earlier, according to his good pleasure, where Paul writes now for the second time about God's good pleasure. And you scratch your head and say, why would the Holy Spirit wastes any inspiration on telling us that God's pleasure is good? God doesn't have any other kind of pleasure. The only thing that is pleasing to God is that which is good. So we certainly should never have to be told that his pleasure is a good pleasure, the only kind of pleasure he has. But here's twice now in this opening chapter that Paul and the Holy Spirit underlines the idea that God's pleasure is good. And the other thing I can give as a reason for that is a kind of accommodation to the hardness of our hearts. Because we hear about God doing something according to his sovereign decree, according to his pleasure. We say, oh, that's arbitrary, that's capricious, that's whimsical. What kind of a God does this? He just plays the lottery with people. Now, God's pleasure is a good pleasure. Not just good, but it's superlative. It's supremely good. There's a goodness with no darkness in it whatsoever. So he'd made known to us the mystery of his will according to his good pleasure, which he purposed in Himself. You know, sometimes I get really impatient with people who kick against the ox, goad with respect to the doctrine of election and the doctrines of grace. Until I remember it took me five years as a Christian to stop my kicking and screaming against this. And so God punishes me by bringing in front of me all these people who are obstreperous about this doctrine. And so I have to deal with that and be patient about it. But again, ladies and gentlemen, the purpose for God's sovereign election is not in you. It's not in me. He didn't consult you. He didn't consult me. He doesn't rule by referendum. The eternal purposes of his redemption is something that God purposed in himself, which is something that should not be surprising to us if we know anything about the character of God, that in the dispensation of the fullness of the times, he might gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven and which are on the earth. In him and him also we have obtained an inheritance being predestined according to the purpose of him who works all things according to the counsel of his will, that we who first trusted in Christ should be to the praise of his glory. Now, there's a lot there, but again he speaks of purposing in Himself what? That in the dispensation of the fullness of times, now that has an approximate fulfillment and then a ultimate fulfillment in redemptive history. We know that in the last day in the consummation of the kingdom of God, at the return of Christ, all things will be given over to the Father in perfect unity. The redemption of the world, the redemption of nature, the redemption of the animals and of the elect people. And God has appointed a time that when that fullness comes in the future, that all of this will be accomplished. But also there is, as I say, the proximate fulfillment of that in Christ's work of redemption during his incarnation. Because we are told, using the same language here, that he came in the pleroma, in the fullness of time, to affect this redemption that God planned in eternity. God planned in eternity that there would be a time in human history, a time that he appointed, a time that would be so pregnant that the World couldn't stop its bursting through. So Paul's already seen the first installment of that in the work of Christ, but that he would gather together in one all things in Christ which are in heaven and in earth. In him again, redemption is never in the abstract. For the Bible, it's always in Christ. It's by Christ, it's through Christ, and it's for Christ. You know, the biggest mystery I have about theology is the one, why me? Why do I get this unspeakable gift of being chosen by God's mercy and grace? I know it's not because of any foreseen good work in me. If God looked down the court of time, waiting for me to incline my heart to his will, or in my spiritual deadness, to reach out and accept Jesus Christ as my Lord and Savior, that God would wait for all eternity to see me do something like that. But he didn't wait for me to act any more than Jesus waited for Saul of Tarsus to come to his senses on the road to Damascus. But we had the divine intrusion, where God steps in and brings us to himself, brings all things in him and in him, he says also, we've obtained an inheritance. As a man and as a father, as a grandfather and a great grandfather, I worry all the time about providing for my family. And I want to make sure that after I'm gone, that my wife will be taken care of and that my children will be taken care of, and my grandchildren, great grandchildren. So I have built a legacy for them, an inheritance. And I keep thinking that legacy is one where thieves can come in and steal and that rust can corrode. And I don't have a whole lot of confidence in the stability of that nest egg that I put away for my family, not in these days. So I worry, humanly speaking, about that inheritance. But the other inheritance, far more valuable, is immune to theft and rust and decay. It is an inheritance that is incorruptible. It is the legacy of the Lord Jesus Christ, who said to his disciples in the upper room, peace I leave with you. Not this house or this acre, or this robe. My peace I give to you. Not as the world giveth, Give I unto you. This is my last will and testament. This is your inheritance. The inheritance that Jesus gives us is himself. So we become heirs of God, joined heirs with Christ of this incorruptible inheritance that he guarantees for his people. In him also, we've obtained an inheritance. We already have, it being predestined according to the purpose of him who works all things according to the counsel of his will. How do we know we have that inheritance? Because God has decreed it. And he has decreed it sovereignly and eternally according to his purpose. According to the purpose. The One who works everything. When Paul says all things work together for good to those who love the Lord and those who are the called according to his purpose, do you believe that only God can work all things together for good for his people? That we who first trusted in Christ should be to the praise of his glory? Here's a purpose clause that is the reason he does all these things is that we who trusted in Christ should be something we should be. We should be living sacrifices. That's our reasonable service. Paul says elsewhere we should be living manifestations of praise. The praise of his glory. You know, the basic concept of worship going all the way back to Adam and Eve and then Cain and Abel, is that worship is the sacrifice of praise. That is to say that the chief gift that we bring on Sunday morning in worship is praise of his glory.