A Song of Praise for Ungrateful Worry Warts
Ephesians 1:3-14
I am an ungrateful so and so. I readily confess it. I am also a worry wart. I am easily spun into fear and anxiety at the prospect of want, or the threat of worldly insecurity. In my ingratitude I am like a little child who eats his fill at dinner only to cry for dessert. Ingratitude is selfishness. Ingratitude is greed. Ingratitude is impatience. To state the obvious, it is a failure to be thankful for what we have and what we have been given. Ingratitude tends to highlight in bold relief the ugliness of the sinful heart. It is not just improper desire, but improper desire in the presence of plenty, blessing and grace. Fear and anxiety for the believer is not just natural concern stemming from a frail human condition; it is the failure to consider the abundant wealth of God’s care and faithfulness in the past and his promise for the future. For the one redeemed from sin and death by the free gift of eternal life in Jesus Christ (Romans 5:16), ingratitude and anxious doubt become woeful sins indeed. They are a failure to recognize the greatest treasure of all that is his: namely, the righteousness and life of the Son of God himself.
In Ephesians 1:3-14, Paul offers up a hymn of praise to God as he thinks upon “every spiritual blessing” that is ours as saints through Christ. Paul piles up blessing after blessing that is secured for his people by the work of Christ: election, adoption, redemption, forgiveness, revelation, inheritance, and the down payment of the Holy Spirit. This passage is dense with theological meaning, yet it is primarily doxology before it is theology; it is praise before all else. It goes beyond thanksgiving that flows from the rich blessings offered to us; it is a whole life, a whole being, of praise. The greatest blessing in this hymn is found in the line, repeated three times, “to the praise of his glorious grace” (1:6,12,14). In verse 12, Paul states rather succinctly that the purpose of all of these blessings is that “we might be to the praise of his glory.” This great purpose should transcend all of our worries and anxious concerns. You are a child of God and exist for His glory! What earthly concern can overshadow this incredible truth? The great wonder of our salvation is this: that we become vessels that embody and reflect the greatest thing that exists in the universe – God and his glorious grace. All of the blessings set forth by the Apostle are wonderful, but they are not wonderful because of us and our enjoyment of them. They are blessings that result in the greatest blessing of all- a recognition and vision of God’s character, his person, his power, his glory.
Ephesians is broken into two sections: the first dealing with the doctrinal and theological foundation of our identity in Christ (1:3 – 3:21); the second dealing with our walk and behavior as new creatures and a new community in Christ (4:1 - 6:20). The order of this discussion is important: the indicative of who we are in Christ through the grace of God precedes the imperatives of how we are to walk and live. We find the undergirding truth of both the indicative and the imperative in Ephesians in this three-fold expression of praise. We are elected, adopted, redeemed, forgiven and recipients of every spiritual blessing by the glorious grace of God. We are to be thankful, obedient imitators of God for the “praise of his glorious grace.” Verses 6, 12, and 14 present us with the theme of Ephesians, the theme of Paul’s theology, indeed the very heart of biblical theology: God is the source of all grace, every good gift, and all glory in the universe; by his gracious will we have been made recipients and agents of his grace and goodness in the universe.
As we consider these things, how can we not lift our voices in harmony with our Apostle? How can we not burst forth with thanksgiving? How can we not live a life of joyful hope and blessed contentment? How is it that we so readily give way to anxieties and fears? How can we despise trials and tribulations that become to us, by God’s sovereign hand, a source of transformation and grace? How can we weep at worldly lack when we have every eternal, spiritual blessing through our Savior?
Calvin and Spurgeon say it best, so I’ll leave the conclusion to them:
“Paul tells us that the benefits which are bought us by our Lord Jesus Christ and of which we are made partakers by means of his gospel are so excellent that we must surely be extremely unthankful if we scurry to and fro like people who are never at rest or contented. And then he shows us also what we have in Christ in order that we should so cleave to him as not to presume to seek help anywhere else, but assure ourselves that he has procured everything for us.” John Calvin, Sermons on Ephesians
“O unbelief, how strange a marvel thou art! We know not which most to wonder at, the faithfulness of God or the unbelief of His people. He keeps his promise a thousand times, and yet the next trial makes us doubt Him. He never faileth; He is never a dry well; he is never as a setting sun, a passing meteor, or a melting vapour; and yet we are as continually vexed with anxieties, molested with suspicions, and disturbed with fears, as if our God were the mirage of the desert… ‘I have graven thee upon the palms of my hands’ (Isaiah 49:16). See the fullness of this! I have graven thy person, thine image, thy case, thy circumstances, thy sins, thy temptations, thy weaknesses, thy wants, thy works; I have graven thee, everything about thee, all that concerns thee; I have put thee altogether there. Wilt thou ever say again that thy God hath forsaken thee when He has graven thee upon His own palms?”
C.H. Spurgeon, Morning and Evening (on Isaiah 49:16)
I am an ungrateful so and so. I readily confess it. I am also a worry wart. I am easily spun into fear and anxiety at the prospect of want, or the threat of worldly insecurity. In my ingratitude I am like a little child who eats his fill at dinner only to cry for dessert. Ingratitude is selfishness. Ingratitude is greed. Ingratitude is impatience. To state the obvious, it is a failure to be thankful for what we have and what we have been given. Ingratitude tends to highlight in bold relief the ugliness of the sinful heart. It is not just improper desire, but improper desire in the presence of plenty, blessing and grace. Fear and anxiety for the believer is not just natural concern stemming from a frail human condition; it is the failure to consider the abundant wealth of God’s care and faithfulness in the past and his promise for the future. For the one redeemed from sin and death by the free gift of eternal life in Jesus Christ (Romans 5:16), ingratitude and anxious doubt become woeful sins indeed. They are a failure to recognize the greatest treasure of all that is his: namely, the righteousness and life of the Son of God himself.
In Ephesians 1:3-14, Paul offers up a hymn of praise to God as he thinks upon “every spiritual blessing” that is ours as saints through Christ. Paul piles up blessing after blessing that is secured for his people by the work of Christ: election, adoption, redemption, forgiveness, revelation, inheritance, and the down payment of the Holy Spirit. This passage is dense with theological meaning, yet it is primarily doxology before it is theology; it is praise before all else. It goes beyond thanksgiving that flows from the rich blessings offered to us; it is a whole life, a whole being, of praise. The greatest blessing in this hymn is found in the line, repeated three times, “to the praise of his glorious grace” (1:6,12,14). In verse 12, Paul states rather succinctly that the purpose of all of these blessings is that “we might be to the praise of his glory.” This great purpose should transcend all of our worries and anxious concerns. You are a child of God and exist for His glory! What earthly concern can overshadow this incredible truth? The great wonder of our salvation is this: that we become vessels that embody and reflect the greatest thing that exists in the universe – God and his glorious grace. All of the blessings set forth by the Apostle are wonderful, but they are not wonderful because of us and our enjoyment of them. They are blessings that result in the greatest blessing of all- a recognition and vision of God’s character, his person, his power, his glory.
Ephesians is broken into two sections: the first dealing with the doctrinal and theological foundation of our identity in Christ (1:3 – 3:21); the second dealing with our walk and behavior as new creatures and a new community in Christ (4:1 - 6:20). The order of this discussion is important: the indicative of who we are in Christ through the grace of God precedes the imperatives of how we are to walk and live. We find the undergirding truth of both the indicative and the imperative in Ephesians in this three-fold expression of praise. We are elected, adopted, redeemed, forgiven and recipients of every spiritual blessing by the glorious grace of God. We are to be thankful, obedient imitators of God for the “praise of his glorious grace.” Verses 6, 12, and 14 present us with the theme of Ephesians, the theme of Paul’s theology, indeed the very heart of biblical theology: God is the source of all grace, every good gift, and all glory in the universe; by his gracious will we have been made recipients and agents of his grace and goodness in the universe.
As we consider these things, how can we not lift our voices in harmony with our Apostle? How can we not burst forth with thanksgiving? How can we not live a life of joyful hope and blessed contentment? How is it that we so readily give way to anxieties and fears? How can we despise trials and tribulations that become to us, by God’s sovereign hand, a source of transformation and grace? How can we weep at worldly lack when we have every eternal, spiritual blessing through our Savior?
Calvin and Spurgeon say it best, so I’ll leave the conclusion to them:
“Paul tells us that the benefits which are bought us by our Lord Jesus Christ and of which we are made partakers by means of his gospel are so excellent that we must surely be extremely unthankful if we scurry to and fro like people who are never at rest or contented. And then he shows us also what we have in Christ in order that we should so cleave to him as not to presume to seek help anywhere else, but assure ourselves that he has procured everything for us.” John Calvin, Sermons on Ephesians
“O unbelief, how strange a marvel thou art! We know not which most to wonder at, the faithfulness of God or the unbelief of His people. He keeps his promise a thousand times, and yet the next trial makes us doubt Him. He never faileth; He is never a dry well; he is never as a setting sun, a passing meteor, or a melting vapour; and yet we are as continually vexed with anxieties, molested with suspicions, and disturbed with fears, as if our God were the mirage of the desert… ‘I have graven thee upon the palms of my hands’ (Isaiah 49:16). See the fullness of this! I have graven thy person, thine image, thy case, thy circumstances, thy sins, thy temptations, thy weaknesses, thy wants, thy works; I have graven thee, everything about thee, all that concerns thee; I have put thee altogether there. Wilt thou ever say again that thy God hath forsaken thee when He has graven thee upon His own palms?”
C.H. Spurgeon, Morning and Evening (on Isaiah 49:16)
Labels: Ephesians
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