Ephesians 1:1-2 Series Introduction: Several years ago an elderly couple was found dead in their apartment. Their autopsies revealed that they had both died of severe malnutrition. When authorities searched their home, they found several paper bags filled with cash; some $40,000.00 in all. How foolish is it to die of starvation when you have plenty of money to buy food?[i] In 1916 a woman named Hettie Green died. When she did, it was discovered that she had left an estate valued at 100 million dollars. That is an enormous amount of money today; it was an astronomical amount in those days. Hettie Green may have been wealthy, but she was known as America’s greatest miser. She would often eat cold oatmeal because it was too costly to heat the water to cook it. Once, when her son suffered a severe leg injury, she spent so much time looking for a free clinic that the leg had to be amputated. She even hastened her own death by allowing herself to get worked up into a fit of rage in an argument over skim milk, because it was cheaper than whole milk.[ii] Hettie Green was a woman who possessed great wealth, but she did not have the ability to tap into it. The book of Ephesians was written to people just like that. This letter was written sometime around 61-63 AD when Paul was imprisoned in Rome. The city of Ephesus was located at the mouth of the Cayster River, on the east side of the Aegean Sea. It was the capital city of the Roman province of Asia. It was a wealthy city known as a political, commercial and educational center. It was called “The Queen City of Asia”. A massive temple to Diana was located in Ephesus. It was one of the seven wonders of the ancient world. In Paul’s day, the city boasted a population of around 300,000 people. Yet, it was a city steeped in deep paganism, immorality and wickedness. In Acts 16:6, as Paul was about to commence his second missionary journey, he thought about going to Asia (Ephesus), but the Holy Spirit did not allow him to go there. Sometime later, the Gospel made its way to Ephesus, probably taken there by Aquila and Priscilla, Acts 18:18-19. Near the end of his second missionary journey, Paul finally made it to Ephesus, spending some three years there preaching the Gospel and helping the fledgling church get on its feet. Timothy followed Paul as the preaching elder in the church at Ephesus. Under Timothy, the church was plagued by the false teaching of Hymenaeus and Alexander, 1 Tim. 1:20. The church also has problems with legalism, false doctrine and foolish arguments among the members. So, here is a young church, best with problems. They are like the elderly couple I mentioned earlier. They are like Hettie Green. They are rich in the things of God, but they do not know. This book came to them to let them know just what they had in Jesus; who they were in Jesus; and how to spend what they possessed in Jesus! Verse 1 addresses this book to “the saints which are at Ephesus”. This letter was written to this church, but not to them alone. Many scholars believe that this was a circular letter. That is, it was copied many times and sent to all the churches in Asia Minor. Many ancient copies of this letter do not contain the word Ephesus. In many of them, there is a blank where the name would go. This would explain why there are no personal or geographic references in the letter. It is a letter, not just to one local congregation, but to, as verse 1 says, “the faithful in Christ Jesus”. This book was written to us too! Ephesians was written to teach us all about whom we are in Jesus Christ. What we have because of our relationship with Him. And how to use what He has given us for the glory of God. Today, we will begin a series of sermons that will take us paragraph by paragraph through the book of Ephesians. In this first sermon, I want to introduce the book and tell you about some of the great truths we will uncover here. This book has been given many soaring titles. It has been called “The Alps of the New Testament”; “The heavenly epistle”; “The crown and climax of Pauline theology”[iii]; Samuel Coleridge called it “The divinest composition of man”.[iv] Ephesians falls neatly into two parts. Chapters 1-3 are doctrinal in nature, while chapters 4-6 are practical. The first three chapters tell us what we have; the last three chapters tell us what to do with what we have. The first three chapters reveal our riches in Christ; the last three tell us how to spend what we have been given in Jesus. Someone has called Ephesians “The believer’s checkbook”. Imagine having an account upon which you could write checks as often as you wished, in any amount you wished, and that account would never be diminished. That is what the believer has in the book of Ephesians. This book reveals the riches of God’s grace to the believer. It teaches us about what we have because of who we are in Jesus. Then, Ephesians shows us how to spend what we have been given in Christ. This is a book about riches. · 1:7 – The riches of His grace · 3:8 – The unsearchable riches of Christ · 3:16 – The riches of His glory This is also a book about the fullness we enjoy in Jesus. · 3:16 – be filled with the fullness of Christ · 4:13 – to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ · 5:18 – be filled with the Spirit These riches and this fullness arise from: · 1:2, 6, 7; 2:7 – His grace · 1:2 – His peace · 1:5 – His will · 1:9 – His pleasure and his propose · 1:12, 14 – His glory
Posted on: Sat, 12 Jul 2014 02:28:05 +0000