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Lavished by Grace: Your Identity in Christ | Pastor Adam Mesa
January 8, 2026 · 43 min
Series Patria Sermons January 8, 2026 · 43 min · Patria Sermons
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Adam Mesa is Lead Pastor of Patria Church and speaks to a congregation of 12,000 about how the gospel of Jesus Christ brings purpose to every life. Patria
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0:00 Praise God. Well, so good to see everybody and happy New Year. But just a wave of hands, who was here on our New Year's Eve service? Was anybody here? Yeah. There's a we we had a a 3500 people pretty0:12 much that were here just at Rancho, Not mentioned online. It was packed out in the rain. I I man. So, I wanna say thank you so much during this holiday season. Feel like this was some of the most rain we've ever had0:23 during the holidays. And I'll tell you this, as a pastor in California, anytime we see rain, we get nervous whether anyone will go to church or not. Because, you know, people just can't even drive in the rain, let alone0:35 do anything else. And so, was amazing that everyone had come and showed out and really made it about the Lord this holiday season. And so, incredible Christmas, Christmas Eve services, New Year's Eve0:46 services. Thank you so much for coming and leaning into your relationship with the Lord. And like the video we just saw, thank you so much to all those that consider Patria your home church. If you have a physical Bible,0:57 I want you to prepare for the message by turning to the book of Ephesians. I definitely wanna encourage you, specifically during this first month of January, if you have a physical Bible, bring1:09 1 because it'll just help you follow along that much better. Or open up to your YouVersion Bible app and go to Ephesians as well and bring that and and hold that. We'll always have it up on the screen for those that1:21 don't have the Bible app or don't have a physical Bible. But it's just really good to follow along during this series because we're doing something a little bit unique that is kind of 1 of the first things that first1:31 times we've done a series like this where we are giving more of an expositional teaching. And all exposition means is that we are surveying a book by chapter by chapter and verse by verse. And1:43 so, for the first couple weeks, we're gonna look at verse by verse, and then we're gonna broaden in the book of Ephesians into the last couple weeks chapter by chapter. It would take us 16 weeks to do verse1:55 by verse in just the book of Ephesians. And so, we're doing it in 6 weeks. But here's what I do know. At the top of the year, oftentimes people make New Year's resolutions to say, I wanna get2:07 closer to God. I maybe wanna go to church more. I'm gonna start reading my Bible. You maybe participate in a prayer fast. And then what happens is when we don't build a habit in God's Word, or if we open it, we don't2:19 really always understand what we're reading, that's where those habits tend to die off. And so really, what we wanna do is start the month off not building necessarily a resolution, but a framework to say, hey, how can2:30 we read the Bible? How can we study the Bible? So that you can continue to do this throughout the year? And so, if you have your Bible, go to the book of Ephesians. Today, we're only in 14 verses. Ephesians2:42 1 1 to 14. We won't stand for this series just because we're gonna be looking at verse by verse as we discuss. And maybe later on through the month, we will go back to standing. We're gonna look at2:54 the book of Ephesians. Ephesians is written by the Apostle Paul. It's off for those that are new to churches, after Jesus' ministry. So, this is 1 of the Apostles of Jesus. The Apostle Paul was not 1 of3:05 Jesus' original 12 disciples. He was saved and converted later on. He was actually a fierce opponent of Christianity early on. He was a Jewish Pharisee and scholar. But then he had a3:17 radical confirmation and a radical conversion on the road where he met Jesus face to face. And he gave his life to Christ and committed the rest of his life to following Jesus and specifically3:29 planting churches, which is what the Apostle Paul did. So, he writes the book of Ephesians to a land called Ephesus, which is in Turkey. It's in modern day Turkey. If you ever wanna take a cruise3:41 through the Mediterranean, they almost always make a stop at Ephesus. The the the the area still exists today. It it it's in ruins, but you can see the original churches and amphitheaters. It's it's3:53 incredible experience to see for yourself. But here's the thing that I wanna encourage you during this series. Lean into God speaking, but also lean into the Word of God. Not every Sunday4:05 is gonna be a hip hip hoorah. Not every Sunday is gonna feel like, oh, I'm gonna leave and I'm gonna be I'm gonna be at a place where I just I feel like everything in my life is gonna be fixed. These messages stretch4:17 and challenge our heart. They stretch and challenge your relationship with God. And it's okay to go to church and leave and be like, Lord, I gotta I gotta make some adjustments. I gotta I4:28 gotta address some things. You aren't always gonna leave and be like, yes. Sometimes you leave and you're like, okay God, what are you saying to me right now? And that's where we find ourselves in Ephesians. So,4:39 Ephesians chapter 1 verses 1 to 14. What Paul is doing is he's building a foundation for identity. Because before you can ever act or do, your identity4:50 needs to be spoken to. If you are not living out of your identity with God, and you are merely following God with habits and rules for your life, then the reality5:02 is it'll never penetrate our heart. That's so good. So, following God is not about if I say, hey, how do I know that you have a relationship with God? If you immediately start sharing about all the things that you5:14 do, the habits that you do, it hasn't penetrated your identity. And so, here's what I know. Any veterans in the house, wave at me. Wherever you're at in the veterans. Number 1, thank you so much for your service.5:25 I'm not a veteran, but I got friends and you know, we got a young brother in the church who recently joined the Navy, and during the holidays he took a small break to come visit us. And here's what I know5:37 for anyone that joins the military, whether it's Navy, Army, Marines. Before you ever go to boot camp, what do they have you do in a little room? What does that5:49 Pastor Carl? Have you swear in. Swear into what? Swear into what you commit to, what you uphold to. What what before you ever do, they say, hey, out of your mouth right now,6:01 we wanna hear from you that you make an identity commitment before you even hold a gun, before you ever go off to any deployment, before you ever put a rank on your collar or on6:13 your shoulder. Right now, out of your mouth, make a confession. They do that oftentimes for doctors. Doctors have to know the HIPAA laws before they could ever do a surgery,6:25 before they could ever sit with someone. Then it's first saying, first thing they have to do is my identity as a doctor is to commit to blank. Same thing for lawyers.6:37 Lawyers who go and practice law and defend law, same thing. They have to make commitments. And even when you go to the stand, what do you gotta do? Right hand on the Bible. Immediately, right now, do you make6:49 an identity confession before a word is spoken, before a thing is done? Do you recognize your identity? And what Paul does for Ephesians chapter 1, he is telling believers, before7:01 you go out and do, first you gotta know who you are. Who your identity is. And he breaks it down so beautifully. So if you have your Bible, let's go to Ephesians chapter 1. I'm gonna first look at7:12 verses 1 to 6 today here. And if you take notes, here's the first point that we we're gonna see today. The first thing that Paul shows us is that you and I have been chosen by the Father.7:25 Your identity is absolutely settled with God. Amen. And you've been chosen by God. Let's look at in Ephesians chapter 1 verses we're gonna7:37 look at 1 to 3, and then 4 to 6. Here's a couple things I want you to note because you're gonna see it. And if you take notes and stuff like that, this is gonna this is gonna be overly portrayed to you today. The7:49 Apostle Paul right now says 2 words over and over. And it'll be important to note, and it's important for you to remember. He's gonna say in and through a lot. Why is that8:01 important? Because he's making it very clear that all the things that he's about to say is in and through only 1 person. Not a multiplicity of things. Yeah.8:13 Not not a bunch of stuff. In and through, 1 person. So, I want you to look. Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus, by the will of God, to the saints who are in Ephesus. These are the believers that are in Ephesus and are8:24 faithful in Christ Jesus. Here's right here. First 1 is in in Christ Jesus. Faithful in Christ Jesus. He's not writing the letter to people who claim to be Christians who8:36 are faithful in their job. Even faithful in their marriage. Faithful in their parent. Because a lot of times you think about it, we engage this thing called faith for these attitudes and8:48 habits and these descriptors that right away he's saying, this life, once you become a believer, it's about being faithful to God. Everything else flows out of that. But our faithfulness8:59 comes by first being in Christ Jesus, and then the Apostle Paul says, which is a very common greeting to him, grace to you and peace from our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Because if you can9:11 never fix a situation, what you can do is you can ask the Lord for continued grace from God and continued peace from God. So his letter greetings don't start with situational9:23 awareness, situation fixing. He'll often talk about it later on. Hey, this is what's going on in your area or region, and then he prays for it. But he always starts with saying to people, you gotta understand that I'm9:34 here to wish you that God's grace, unmerited favor, unmerited grace, this gift, and God's peace. Bible says if you can have God's peace, it9:46 surpasses all understanding. So he so he hands this to the church that that's his prayer for them. And then he says in Lord Jesus Christ, and he says, blessed be the God and the Father9:58 of our Lord Jesus Christ who has blessed us in blessing in the look at this, in the heavenly places. God's blessing comes10:10 from a kingdom that doesn't sit here on this earth. It's a kingdom of heaven that is both in heaven and here. And he says God blesses you from heavenly places.10:21 You may say this seems pretty obvious. No. Think about it. God doesn't bless us from a regional land. God's blessing doesn't flow, friends, from Israel. God's10:33 blessings doesn't flow from Rome. God's blessings don't even flow from the White House. God's blessings flow from heavenly places. There's10:44 only 1 place where God's grace and peace comes from, and it is not in a physical location. It's not in Mecca. It's not in India. It's not in10:56 Pakistan. It's in heaven. And what happens is we find our hearts often because we want the physical to draw to a physical. If I could just get to this physical location or this11:08 place, then I can experience God's grace. Then I can experience God's peace. No, you can't. If you have access to the spirit of the living God in and through Jesus Christ, then you have access to11:20 heavenly places at all times. At all times. At all times. Let's go to verses 4 to 6. 4 to 6, he jumps in. And once again,11:32 even as he chose us, there it is again, in him before the foundation of the world that we should be holy and blameless before him. In love, he11:44 predestined us for adoption to himself as sons through Jesus Christ according to the purpose of his will. Why did God create an opportunity for you and11:56 I to be inheritors and adopted into the kingdom? And you wanna say, I want answers, God. How come you have given your children the ability to have relationship with you with you? It's because it's12:08 according to his will. It's his desire. It's his desire. That's important to note because we'll talk about it in a few moments. Why? And he goes, why? To the praise of his glorious grace with12:20 which he has blessed us in the beloved, which is once again a relationship with Christ. So what happens is the Apostle Paul begins to make things clear. And he says, in Jesus12:31 Christ, God has chosen us. Why is in and through so important? And what's this idea of God choosing us in him in him that's important before the foundation of the world. What the12:43 Apostle Paul is telling you and I, that you look at this door. And let's just say there wasn't, you know, an open wall on the other side. It's just a fully closed door, fully closed wall.12:55 And you wanna get to the other side. Well, if there was just say the wall continued over here, and I said, hey, you know on the other side is a relationship with the Creator of13:07 the heavens and the earth, and a relationship with God. And God has made a way that you and I can have a relationship with him. Do you desire that relationship with him? If the answer was yes,13:20 and I said, well, there's this door called Jesus. And if you would go in and through this door, you can become an adopted child of God. You can be in relationship with the13:32 Father because, and we'll see in a few moments, because of what Jesus has done for your life. And you wanna know what many people do in the world who have heard the gospel? They look at it, and then they say, I wonder if13:43 there's another way to get around this door. Come on now. Oh, yeah. That's good. Or or or can I take things with me in this door? You know, I like horoscopes. I like candles. I like13:55 crystals. I like so is it is there things that I could take with me in this door? And there no, you can't take it. You see, when you walk through this door, you walk through this door the way you came into the world with14:05 nothing in your hands and naked. Just you before God. And so, in and through is telling you and I, ain't no workaround, ain't no shortcut, ain't no ladder you can14:17 build big enough that's gonna get you around and over that wall. There is not a multiplicity of gods you can pray to. There is not a location you could go to. He says, what you're gonna see is that you've14:29 been chosen by God before the foundation of the world in Jesus Christ. This idea of Jesus coming to save us and redeem us was not God's backup plan. It was His first14:41 plan. And so for a Jewish person, what they would think is they would think, oh, so what? God just couldn't the the law couldn't save anyone, so God sent Jesus as a backup plan to save14:52 us? No. God gave us the law to show us that you and I can't live up to the law. The most perfect person in the world cannot live good lives and perfect lives. So, the law shows us that15:04 as Jesus comes to redeem us, there's only 1 door, and his name is Jesus. And the only way to access the Father is through this door. And then he says, he's15:16 brought us into adoption. You see, I love this term adoption, and Paul chooses it very specifically because adoption in Jesus' day and in biblical days is not like15:28 adoption that we would do in today's age. You see, adoption in Jesus' day would often be for full grown adults. It was for adults. See, what would15:40 happen was, is if you were someone that was wealthy, and you were someone that had an estate, and you had land, and you had cattle, and you had sheep, and you were now older. You were15:51 50, 60, 70 years old in that day, and you had no heir. Maybe you only at 1 point had daughters, or maybe at 1 point you just never had sons, or your sons maybe had died from16:03 illness and war and other things like that. And so you have no 1 to pass your legacy, your last name, your heritage to. What you would begin to do is you would interview men in the city16:16 who were looking to have something better than what they were living in. And when the man would interview another young man who was in his teens, twenties, and thirties, he would16:28 make a decision and say, I'm gonna adopt you, and you're gonna be the inheritor to my estate. And here's some things that would happen when an adult would be adopted in Jesus' day.16:40 The first thing is they would have full legal status in the family. So according to all of their neighbors, according to all of their friends, according to the government, whatever that person's old last name was,16:52 whatever that person's old family was, full legal status is now in this new family. They're not allowed to identify the maiden last name. Right? That doesn't exist no more. They totally erase the idea17:04 of that. The next thing that they do is the name gets changed, but also they immediately be become part of the inheritance. They're already a benefactor to when this person passes away, they17:16 inherit the land. Additionally, what happens, which actually might shock you, is that if a young man had any debt whatsoever, the man who was gonna adopt the other man had to17:28 pay off all of his debts. He wasn't allowed to be adopted if he had any debt to his name. So, them student loans that you got, that you've had for 20 years, they'd have to be canceled17:39 out. He wasn't allowed to bring old debts into the new family. And then what happens is, it was irrevocable. So,17:51 that man who was adopting that other man, he had to know without a shadow of a doubt, because when he made this decision 2 months later, if that guy was just sleeping in his bed and just eating18:03 chips and kicking off his shoes, He couldn't go to the courthouse and say, hey, I made a mistake. I wanna erase this. They say, it's irrevocable. I want you to think about that. He18:14 has adopted us to himself. Gives you a new name, cancels out all of your debts, irrevocable, all because you and I've18:26 decided to have faith in this door, to have faith in Jesus. That's what adoption is. I got I got this friend that many years ago, about 7 or 8 years18:37 ago, him and his wife started the process of adoption. He's in another state. He's a pastor. And they were gonna adopt a brother and a sister. The sister was an infant, and the18:49 brother was a toddler. At the time, the adoption process was expected to take 6 to 9 months, 12 months at the latest. So they were really excited. The children that they were gonna19:01 adopt was coming from another country, a country that spoke Spanish. And this couple happened to be a white couple. And so what happened was is they started the process. And after about a year, the19:13 process was still going on. So then, after 2 years, the process was still going on. So after about the second year, him and his wife decided, well, by the time we get these children before when we were gonna19:24 receive them, they hadn't they hadn't been taught a language. They weren't speaking yet. But now, they're they're speaking Spanish. And they hadn't even met the children yet. They just had pictures of them. And they19:34 said, so we should start learning Spanish. So they start learning Spanish. Because like when we become their mom and dad, they're not even gonna be speaking our language. So they start learning Spanish. They start19:45 spending tens, if you've ever done an adoption process, tens of thousands of dollars. Documentation. And if it's in another country, it's appearing before judges, and it's going before American19:57 judges. It's going through their country judges. It's going through the child care system in that country, child care system in our country. And so what was gonna be a 6 to 9 month process for him turned into a20:09 process of a little bit over 7 years. It was almost 8 years. And so after about year 4, I remember talking to him and I said, hey, I know you and your wife really wanted20:20 babies. Are you just because he had every right to be able to do it. I said, are you ever just gonna call the government and say, hey, can we pass on those children and just can can because it was kind of the20:32 it wasn't the process for that children, it was the legal process between 2 that was COVID was mixed in that and stuff like that. And so I said, do you wanna kind of, I mean, I don't mean to be disrespectful, like almost20:43 start fresh? Those children never even met you. Do you like, do you and he said, my heart has already told me and my wife these are our children. And so he said, no, I won't start over.20:55 And so he ends up receiving his daughter and his son when his daughter started as an infant, and by the time he received her, she was close to 9 years old. The brother was close21:07 to almost 12 years old. And in this process, not only did he spend tens of thousands of dollars, not only did he become fluent in Spanish so that he could be21:18 ready to receive the children that he was adopting. But at the same time, I look at the process. I have 2 biological sons, Matthias and Thomas. And I look at the process that me and Ashley had to21:30 have them, which number 1 was fun. But number 2, 2, it really wasn't all that hard in the grand scheme of21:42 things. God God was merciful in the process. So it some couple doctor visits, couple scary moments of her going to the doctor. But relatively speaking, we didn't do a whole lot of21:53 work to receive our sons. And all day, no 1 here could convince me just because Matthias and Thomas, look at me. Put that aside. They look like me and Ashley. You could never convince me that they're not my22:05 sons. You couldn't convince me. And why do I say that? Because my friends who adopted his children, if you ever walked at looked at them and you saw a white couple with these 2 little Hispanic22:17 kids that have broken English accents, and you said, I feel like you aren't their parents. He would be like, oh, be quiet. These are my children. I've held them in my heart22:29 for 7, 8 years before I ever saw them. I have cared for them now for 5 close to 5 years. He would tell you, those are my children. Y'all can't there is no logic you can bring22:41 that says, don't aren't his children. And here's why I'm saying that. Because there is oftentimes you and I doubt our sonship and daughtership when it comes to the Father. And because you've been adopted by God,22:53 and he's canceled your debts at, he's made an irrevocable decision to bring you into the family. If you and I could look at adoption process and say, I would never doubt the relationship between those parents23:05 and their mom and their dad and their children. Do not doubt your relationship with the Father. If you have walked through this door before, and you are living in Christ and walking your life through Christ,23:17 then you and I are an adopted son and daughter of God. You become a full, as Roman 8 says, a full inheritor of the kingdom of God. And there's no use in doubting it.23:29 So you and I, we gotta stop living like spiritual orphans. You don't need to earn belonging. You need to live from it. It's not about earning it. If I asked my friend,23:41 hey, what's in it for you to have waited that long for those children? He'd be like, what do you mean what's in it for me? I didn't do what's in it for me. I did it out of love because I love these children. And so what23:53 happens is often you ask God, God, what's in it for you? It's not that it's in it for him. It's his love for us. You don't earn it. We live from it. And you don't behave your way into the family.24:05 You behave differently because you're already in the family. That's the difference. You don't earn your right into God's family. You live from the fact that you're in God's family. You live from that place,24:17 not towards that place. And then here's the second point we're gonna see is, as we've been chosen by the Father, you and I have been redeemed by the Son, and your past has been handled. We are24:28 redeemed by the Son, and our past is handled. Look at verses 7 to 10. And I want you to see in 7 to 10, here it24:40 is. In Him, oh, there's that word again. We have redemption through, what? His blood, The forgiveness of our trespasses.24:52 We have redemption through His forgiveness for our trespasses according to what? According to the riches of God's grace. What is it according to? Why are we25:04 redeemed through the blood of Jesus? Because God is rich in grace. He has riches of grace. Unmerited favor, God has. Forgiveness for25:15 trespasses. And look at this. I love this. Probably 1 of my favorite words in the whole Bible is in this moment, which he lavished upon us. We some some of y'all, wait, my my wife don't mind25:27 being lavished upon. When we go out and I hey, get that perfume. I'm a take you to dinner. I'm hey, let me get you a nice jack jacket, whatever. What? She comes home. She's like, I've been lavished25:39 upon. Look. Look. You've been forgived of our trespasses through the blood of Jesus, which God has. He's lavishing on you. He lavishes on you. In all wisdom25:51 and insight, making known to us the mystery of His will according to His purpose which He set forth in Christ. What's the mystery of God's will that He's been made known? Which is26:03 a relationship with Christ, and a relationship with God, the Creator, the heavens and the earth, is through the blood of Jesus. That is the mystery that God makes available to us. Someone26:15 ever comes to you and says, how do I have a relationship with God? It's not a trick question. It's not a pop quiz. It's not made so that people can't find the answer, won't understand the answer. Is26:27 very easy. But the decision to step forward to it means that we rid ourselves of our past. Which means we set aside our pride, and we receive the grace that he lavishes. But the26:38 mystery that God has opened up to all of the world is this. The relationship between us and God goes through Jesus through the blood, His death for our26:50 sins. And His grace is available to be lavished upon us. It's not a secret. It's not like, you know, when you and I are in the holiday parties, and27:02 some of y'all know stuff and the rest of the family don't know stuff, and you wait for a chance for this part of the family to walk out the room so that you can continue the secret conversation you had before they27:13 arrived? That's not what salvation is. God isn't like, hey, let let's get the sinners out the room so I could talk to He's got these secrets that He's made available according to riches27:25 of his grace that he's lavished. Amen. You know it's been said. It's been said. Oh, I dropped it.27:33 It's been said. How many of you27:34 guys have ever heard this before that most of the the diamonds that are held in the world are actually held in safes and behind the scenes. And actually, diamonds I just wanna let you all27:46 know this is fake. Okay? So don't find me after service. It's from Amazon. It's a 4 carat Amazon diamond. It's worth27:58 1 cent. So it's been said that De Beers De Beers is the diamond mining company that holds 90 percent of the world's diamonds, and they mine 90 percent. The other 10 percent is other28:10 diamond mines. And what they do is for decades upon decades, is they store diamonds away, and they only release a few. And when I mean few, it's28:22 still millions. But when you look at the world globally, they only release a few annually so it keeps its rarity. So it keeps its specialness. And so therefore, they can still set the prices28:34 and all that because if they're harder to get ahold of it, it means you'll pay more and we'll we'll want more. And but it's been said if if they just opened up all of their safes and mines and just flooded the market28:45 with all the diamonds that are that are stored right now, that the prices of diamonds would go down by like 80 percent. Because they would be just that available. Like you could buy a 4 carat for your28:57 3 year old daughter if that were the case. Like, it's just so available. And the reality is, we treat forgiveness either our understanding of God's forgiveness for us or the way that29:09 we give forgiveness to other people. We deal with it as if it's this massive rarity. Like now, hey, listen. If I give you this, if I forgive you and I give you29:21 this, you better you better appreciate it. And you better make sure that I won't ever have to forgive you ever again, because I only got a couple of these. And I only open up the safe once in a29:32 while. And we take our human heart of how we forgive, and then we apply that to God, and we go, oh, God's mad at me. God's angry at me because he's got this rare thing called29:44 forgiveness. He's got this rare thing called grace that he doesn't hand out easily, that he doesn't make super available. But in fact, what God does is what we just read.29:55 According to the riches of his grace. He lavishes. He lavishes. He's got so much that go30:07 around. He has so much to give access. He's got so much mercy. He's got so much grace. And you say, God, where does it end? Where's the wall? There's no30:19 wall when it comes to God's grace. There's no wall when it comes to God's forgiveness. He's made it available to lavish on his children. To give to his children. For30:30 who? Well, for those in Christ. For those who have received the blood of Jesus over their life. Because there's more than enough blood of Christ. There's more than30:42 enough forgiveness of sin to go around. And so God doesn't go like this. You again, you were just here yesterday. It's it's not even 11 o'clock, and I've already30:54 seen you 3 times. I saw you in the parking lot. I saw you in your house. On. I'm running out of these things. What are you doing? God doesn't31:06 do that. God lavishes. He lavishes. You need more mercy. You need more grace. You need more forgiveness. God has more than enough. Amen. Now, you may be31:18 here and you say, well, if God's got all this mercy and forgiveness, then what's the point of living holy? What's what's the point of not sinning then? If I if I could sin and do what I want and get31:30 all this at the same time, what's the point? Well, here's the biggest thing. You you may receive God's grace, but you will also experience the repercussions and effects of unholiness.31:42 So grace is equal to everyone, but the repercussions of our sin and your decisions and the effects of how we live, oh, that happens all day. People talk31:54 to me all day. But I've asked the Lord for forgiveness. Yes, the Lord has forgiven you. But you're gonna live in those repercussions. That that is a part of it. Because you are we're not free32:06 from that all the time. But you are free from the heavenly place where God says, I've wiped the slate clean. And there are times if we are walking in Christ likeness, and we are walking in God's forgiveness, that people32:18 will experience the grace of repercussions falling. But in that case, it takes 2 to tango. In the book of Romans, the Apostle Paul says, if God's forgiveness is available for even every sin, even after you32:30 become a believer, if you do fall into sin, then what's stopping anyone? He says, should you just be able to allow to continue to sin? And he uses a curse word and he says, absolutely not. You could fill in the curse32:41 word in Greek. He says, absolutely not. He says, do not continue to sin because Christ has died for you. Because what he explains is he says, because when you understand that our sin was32:53 pierced in Jesus' body. When you understand he was beaten where his mother could not recognize him, and he had he has enough wherewithal to know all of us were in33:05 his mind. He says every time we go out there to make a conscious decision to sin, it's another lash on Christ. And he says, and if you would understand that, would you do that consciously to33:17 our Lord? He says, we do not live out of that because we understand what we have been given this thing called grace. But here's what you gotta remember. Your past is handled, your present is redeemed, and your future is33:28 meaningful because of the forgiveness of God. And grace doesn't just erase sin, it will reorientate our life. When we experience the grace of God, it reorientate us. Here's the last33:40 thought and the last point. Is that you and I go from being chosen by the Father, redeemed by the Son, and through the Son, to sealed by the Holy Spirit. Sealed.33:51 Your future is secure. I want you to see this. Look at it. The last verses that we're gonna read together as we begin to close. Oh, there it is again, in him. He making it clear.34:03 Like, if anyone's like, I'm gonna read the Bible, and then they walk away and they're like, I think there are many paths to God. It's like, just read 14 verses of Ephesians and it will make it clear. There is not many34:15 paths to God. There's 1 way to God, and it's through Jesus. And he makes it abundantly clear in him, in him, through him, through Jesus, in his blood, in him. Because he wants to34:26 obnoxiously show us no matter how smart you are, you are not gonna find no loopholes. You are not gonna find a new scaffold around the door. There's 1 door. And he's like, you ain't gonna trick this. And34:38 so he says, in him, we've obtained an inheritance. Because he just talked about adoption. So, he's like, you got the inheritance. And he says, been predestined according to the purpose of him who34:50 works all things according to the counsel of his will, so that we who were the first to hope in Christ might be to the praise of his glory. Why does God redeem us? Why35:01 does God bring us into the family? It's so that we would praise him. So that we would understand that as he has restored us to a relationship, that we would give him glory. And so, our primary35:13 focus when we gather in the house of God is not necessarily so that we have just a fun, grand old time. It's not so that we fix our lives or we get the answer we've been waiting for. The35:25 first and primary reason why we gather together is to give praise for what God has already done. To give God glory for what God has already done.35:37 What God does from there is a beautiful grace of God that is a cherry on top. Because the greatest thing that God could ever do is give us a door to get35:49 access to him. Amen. Anything beyond this door is a blessing. But a lot of us, we treat other things as the door. We got these prayers. We got these things. We're mad about36:01 God. And we act like, God, if you fix that, I will walk to the door that will then experience a relationship with you. But that's not what it is. The door is Christ. We walk through it.36:13 The fact that God has given us access to a handle to have relationship with him is to give him glory and praise him. So when we gather, the primary reason why we gather, the primary reason why we pray and36:25 we read our word is not to treat God as a genie lamp that we rub to get all these things that we want and need. It's to say, God, I recognize in him I have an36:36 inheritance. I praise you for that. And that is endless. That is a well that never runs dry. Now, look at 13 and 14 as we36:48 close. Here's what it says. In him. I don't even need to circle it anymore. You get you get it. In him when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your37:00 salvation, the good news of your salvation, which is the blood of Jesus that redeems us, and believed in him, we're sealed with the promised Holy Spirit Holy Spirit who's37:12 the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it. Till you and I stand before God. And the spirit of God doesn't have to guarantee it in our spirit no more because we see37:24 the father face to face. He says, God has sealed you for redemption until the day we redeem that inheritance and you take possession of it. Once again, to praise God.37:36 God has sealed you to the day that we stand before him. What was a seal? Well, what happened was is when somebody would seal not just37:48 a letter, but let's just say an agreement. So let's just say you walked into a car dealership, and this was Jesus' day. And they said, hey. And you walked in, and you said,38:00 hey, I don't get paid for 6 months. I really want this car. Can you guys hold it for me? And they said, okay. Well, here's what's gonna happen. We are going to draft38:12 a contract that what happens is in 6 months, whether you want the car or not, you still have to pay for it. You can't back out. And if you sign on that,38:23 we're gonna put it in an envelope, and I'm gonna put my seal on it, and you're gonna put your seal on it. And so the day it'll be broken is in 6 months. Whether you're there or not, I will be there. And38:35 I will be waiting to collect on what it is that you have said you have promised to obtain. What God has said is God has said that for anyone that would call upon the name of Jesus38:47 by the Holy Spirit, he would peel put a seal on your life. Which means the day that you and I arrive in heaven to collect on that promise, God says, I will not revoke out of it.Show more
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