We didn't do fireworks on 4th of July because we probably couldn't afford it. But we did fireworks on Labor Day when, what was known as cedar fest. And so when I think of fireworks, I think of cedar fest and my favorite part of fireworks displays are the very end. Right. It's almost like they ran out of time and at the end someone just goes light them. All right. Because it always starts out and it's like one like a tester, fireworks, you know what I'm talking about? Like, right? But at the end, it's like, that's a pretty good impersonation of a firework if I can save myself. But anyway, and so they're just going crazy, right? And everyone starts cheering. It doesn't seem safe at all. And it's the best part. And there's all these fireworks going on. I was curious. And so I looked it up. The largest fireworks display ever happened on New Year's Eve or technically New Year's Day. Their january 1st in 2000 and 16 in the Philippines. They, when the ball dropped in the Philippines, They had an hour long fireworks display that set off a world record 810,904 fireworks. And so why do I share that? Besides liking fire and things that explode. I'm sharing that because they normally end the show with the big bang, the big celebration where everything goes crazy that there's so much excitement that everything's just popping off Well today as we jump into the letter Ephesians paul actually starts off his letter how most fireworks shows end, He is so excited about the blessings of God and so excited about what God can do in people's lives and in the church's live in Ephesus, that he just starts sharing blessing upon blessing upon blessing. And that's why this morning's messages called Hashtag blessed. You know that phrase has been hijacked a little bit to become really a social media trending topic that if if you have your coffee or your home displayed in just the right way, never mind the unfolded laundry, not pictured, but in this corner in this frame and maybe you've had a horrible day, but you're able to feel better about your day. You take a picture hashtag blessed, right? And so we go through, but what does being blessed actually mean? So to give you a little bit of context, last week we jumped into a series called battles and blessings. It's because your life is filled with both and oftentimes in the middle of the battles that we experience blessings or on the reverse side, we experienced these incredible blessings, but it's followed up with a battle and so in the middle of your life, in the middle of whatever circumstances situation that you're walking through, what I want to do today is dive into the word of God and see what does it mean to actually be hashtag blessed last week we shared a little bit of the context of this letter, in Ephesians, How Paul had was seen as the main enemy or one of the main antagonist of early Christianity until he has an encounter with God on the road to Damascus found in Acts nine, he gets saved. He then becomes one of the early mouthpieces of the early church. Goes on to write a good percentage of the new testament. and he's traveling around planting churches, developing leaders. He spends about 2-3 years in the city of Ephesus, which was a major trade city at the time. He gets run out of town through a massive riot, continues planning churches fast forward. About 10 years later, he is in prison in Rome awaiting trial for preaching the gospel. And so he writes a letter around 60 or 62 A. D back to the churches in Ephesus, it's seen as a circular letter or it's going to go around to multiple locations and so here he is encouraging them them with a message that if he's got one thing to say, he's going to encourage them in christ. And last week we shared how your identity shapes your activity. Then he starts off the letter, he doesn't say, Dear dearly depraved, dear wretched Sinners, he actually says to the Saints in Ephesus to the faithful in christ jesus. And so he doesn't write from the perspective of sinner, he writes from the perspective of Saint and that is because our identity is received as a saved son or daughter of God. It's not based on what we do, but based on what God has done. And so because of that, we can define our identity, we can find our value and our worth in jesus and not in this world. And so he's going to jump right into it and he's not walking slowly into the pool, he's going full on cannonball, right? Like he's going crazy, he's jumping in. It's the end of the fireworks display. It's almost like they're like, hold on, paul, let's save everything for the end. No, they've got to get this boom boom boom boom boom. And so we're going to see one of the most theologically rich passages in all of the bible. In fact, we're going to look at just about 11 or 12 verses here, verses 3-14. And in the original language, it's actually one sentence. So paul was so excited. He writes this really long run on one sentence to talk about the blessings of God. The last song we sang on our front end worship set here was known as the docks. Ology and the toxicology is, is meant to remind us of the gospel, remind us on a regular basis of who God is and what God has done. Those original words were penned around 1709 by a guy named Bishop Thomas, Ken. And it was seen as the last verse in the old hands in the 17 hundreds, 18 hundreds had like 13 stands, this kind of thing like 9, 10, 13 standards. And so we couldn't remember all of those, so we could remember the last one. And so we took that one and that toxicology has been sung all over the world for the past 200, almost really 300 years. And so today in this firework display, we're gonna see this idea of a toxicology found what is salvation, who is God and what does it mean to be blessed? And so if you have your notes, I want you to write this down, simply put in christ, You are rich in christ, you are rich, you are rich beyond every billionaire that has ever been born. Riches combined. And the key there are those two words in christ. Some commentators have said that all of paul's theology could be summed up in those two words in christ. In fact, you're going to see in him in christ in the blood multiple times in the passage that we're going to read today. And the reason is that everything is based on who jesus is and what Jesus has done. And the reason I can say you are more rich than all the billionaires combined is because those riches are defined by this world and our riches are defined by eternity. It doesn't matter how much money you have because you don't get to take it with you into the next And that people who were millionaires and billionaires just decades ago or 100 years ago, 200 300 years ago are no longer on our minds and they're forgotten because worldly wealth and possessions are temporary. Where the riches we talked about last forever. They're found in christ and you have access to them right now. It's not like we have to be Nicolas cage on a hunt. Like in the movie national treasure, right? Where he's like, I'm gonna steal the Declaration of Independence. It could be one of the greatest movie lines of all time, right? And nothing else. I would put Nicholas cage in a small group of people who I want to narrate my life if possible, wouldn't that be great? Like maybe him, liam Neeson or morgan Freeman, right? That'd be great. Like I want to know does Nicolas Cage go through everyday life at that level? You know, I'm going to get a gallon of milk and like it goes in and it's like searching through, right? And so the whole premise of the movie, if you haven't is a classic. And, and I think the document, I think it's a true story. And uh, and so searching for treasure hidden, they're in our nation's capital. And when they find that treasure, there's just crazy level of excitement, right? Well, in that same way paul, even when he's in prison and he's lost earthly wealth, he's lost earthly stuff. It's like he's found the treasure and he's realized that it is available to you and to me, but that treasure is found in christ. What do you think about the phrase in christ is that we tend to make salvation ultimately about us, don't you? That's why you hear phrases like asked jesus into my heart or you know, I prayed the prayer of salvation and Jesus is in my life and I asked jesus into my heart, pause for one moment. That sounds weird. If you're not churchy right, if someone is going to live in your heart, that's right, and what does that even mean? Well, the idea there is that the truth of who God is and what God has done, you believe in your head, but really you believe in your heart and in your soul and that and that you believe it to be true, that you put the weight of your life in christ. And so you accept that truth as truth and your God jesus as Lord and savior. And so I believe that it can be seen as accurate to ask jesus into your heart, that you can ask the spirit of God into your life. But the problem with that is that if we stay there, if that's all that jesus is to us is that jesus is a nice commodity or component of our lives, that if you think of yourself as your body, that even if you have something in your heart here and you think jesus is very important, but what I do on sunday doesn't necessarily connect to my job or connect to what I do on the weekend or my secret sent over here, or my doubts and questions over here or how I speak over here. And so we compartmentalize faith and we think it's okay because we asked jesus into our heart. But when you reverse the priority, you realize that it's not about jesus coming into your life, but you giving your life up to him now. What you're saying is that christ, I give everything that means in christ is my marriage in christ is my finances. In christ is my purity and my choices and my actions. So all the hangups, all the issues, all the struggles, everything that is me is actually in jesus. I give all that up to him and said jesus, this is your world, your life until they're in christ. We find that we are rich now to give a little bit of structure to this passage we're gonna read because it's so intense and it's so dense. I encourage you to read it beyond a sunday morning, but it sets up pretty cool. You see it actually talks about the role of the trinity now, the word trinity is not found in the bible. And so if you have a conversation with someone, so trinity is not in the bible okay. The word itself is not, but we weren't sure how to describe all these truths. And so we came up with the word trinity to describe what is in here. And so what is in here is the distinct role of God. The father, jesus, the son and the holy Spirit. And you see in this passage, you see the structure that we have God, God, the father who selects us and he chooses us. JD Greer puts it this way, he says, has it ever dawned on you that nothing has ever dawned on God, think about that for a moment, nothing has ever done. And on God, nothing has ever surprised him. That means God is not surprised by your circumstance right now that God is not surprised by this pandemic, but rather God operates all powerfully, but in all times and from the foundation of the world, we're going to see that God has chosen you. It's called election and predestination. This idea that God knew, but God chose you first. And why did he choose you? It's not like he, he had his disciple fantasy draft. It's not like he's looking at your worship stats, your prayer to answered prayer, conversion ratio, right? He had a few turnovers last week. I'm not going to play him, he's got a tough opponent this week. I'm not going to play that guy fell out stacked against them, right? It's it's not okay, I do play fantasy football and I love it anyway, um he didn't choose you based on what you could offer. He chose you because he loves you and he shows you based on what he could give and show. And that that is great. That is God's favor. And so he chooses you. And and there's this been this debate for thousands of years at this point between at what point how much of it is God's election and predestination and how much of it is based on free will. And and if you want to have those conversations offline, I'm happy to have those with you. The only thing I'm going to say today is the fact that it's in there and if it's in there that I'm going to choose to believe in that when God plainly shares what is there and that God has chosen you, that I'm going to rest in that because it's based on God, not based on me. And because God has chosen us, then we use our free will. We make that choice to love God back and to follow him in his belief. And so you're going to see here God selecting us. But then you see that Jesus saves us. That Jesus actually executes, runs the play of salvation comes earth because no one has seen God, but word becomes flesh, Jesus comes down to earth, Emmanuel God with us, lives on this Earth, lives a perfect life, dies on the cross as a payment for your sins and for mine. And then rises again on the third day conquering death, defeating sin and giving you the opportunity to experience forgiveness and salvation and eternity and abundant life and so he provides the way. And so God selects us God, The father jesus saves us and we have redemption. Now just pause there for a moment, you want to know what we bring to the redemption table. The only thing we bring to redemption is the sin required to be redeemed. Have you ever been to a party where everyone's got to bring something like potluck, right? If you have a go to side dish or casserole, like you typically you get chosen to bring that dish, you know I'm talking about, go ahead and if you're if you're known for a dish, go ahead and share that with your neighbor right now go ahead and share what that is. Okay, what that dishes? Okay And you got, you got family dynamics, right? And friends dynamics. So what do you give the person that he's either too busy or you don't trust their cooking? What do you ask them to bring chips, ice buns, right, okay, you bring all the meat, you bring this seven layer dip, you bring this casserole, you bring this perfectly cut up fruit, you don't need to bring the ice, right? And so if you look at the feast of all eternity and everything that God has to offer, the only thing we bring to the party is a sin that requires redemption, but yet jesus still loves us until then we see the Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit seals us. This is this idea of validation contents delivered. So the picture here is a seal from a king or a messenger on a passive package or a message that that seal represents or validates that what's inside is genuine, authentic and real. When my kids were younger we took to a very fancy restaurant, Mcdonald's sorry, sorry to flex on you guys like that, but we were there and we got a cheeseburger and you know there are some great workers at restaurants and then there's we'll just say not the best workers, maybe they're not motivated to be there not saying anything about that particular Mcdonald's but we got one of those workers right? Didn't care. Don't know if they even understood our order. Just punch things in, they talk like this. What do you want? Not even like a hello, like let's just say this person would not be hired at chick fil a that's all I'm saying. Okay. And so we place it, we got cheese, some cheeseburgers and fries, right? Kids are excited, they got the play paste, we got the cheeseburger fries, it's wrapped, it's sealed, it's got the little content on it, we open it up. Alright, cool bun, yep, cheese, yep, something's missing cheese burger, they've forgotten to put the burger in the cheeseburger and had fully wrapped bun, cheese bun and that was it. And uh and so I looked at it and what was interesting is is my kiddos didn't notice for the first couple of bites and they're like I got a couple of bites in like wait a second, there's nothing here. And so I take it back up to the worker who seemed very concerned and cared about my well being and said stop the presses, I will do what is needed to make this right. Actually. His response was and I was like I ordered a plain cheeseburger plane. It's like no cheeseburger and I had to like explain to this gentleman that a burger anyway, so why do I share that a lot of what the world has to offer us and what we think of validation and value and worth is like that miss packaged cheeseburger like we think oh man it's gonna be great and we open it up and it's like bun Chee's something's missing and it doesn't deliver. What was sent what the Holy Spirit does in our lives is that it serves as the substitute presence of jesus, jesus actually told the disciples that it is to your benefit that I leave so that I can send you the helper or the advocate and the holy spirit actually dwells inside of you. This could be where we get the phrasing to ask God into our hearts and so we have the spirit of God dwelling within you. And so that validates that secures what has been delivered authenticates it, you know, we can gripe about technology all we want but I think we can all agree that we are grateful that amazon prime is in our lifetime right? Like I've never met anyone who says like man we need to cut back on technology. Does that mean amazon? Are you kidding me? What happens when I need that thing that I can order and it gets delivered like an hour later on myself? I don't even know how that's physically possible but it's there and we are blessed. So um so here's the thing. So if you think about amazon Prime right? You order something, you get a tracking number and it's delivered now in scripture for all of time. We have almost like an eternity product. We have everything available to us the keys of the kingdom given to us. Now now we eagerly await a time while there will be no more mourning. No more death, no more cancer, no more sickness, no more sin. But we have the tracking number. We have the authentication that God is with us that the Holy Spirit seals us, that we are from and of God as a son as a daughter as someone who is forgiven and redeemed and that we have a deposit securing our inheritance forever. That means that eternity doesn't start the moment you die, that eternity starts the moment you receive jesus and that you have access to God access to redemption and salvation and hope and freedom and joy and love right now, this very moment. Can you see where paul is excited? The other thing he says about the Holy Spirit is that he calls it a deposit because it's a deposit. Now the real estate market is going crazy right now have a conversation with my father in law's and and real estate and it's just going crazy right? Like the contracts are just going all over the board. And so to secure the house, you you you write up the contract, you put down the deposit, right? And then so that you get the house. Well the Holy Spirit in our lives is the deposit that we hold onto. So that when we're surrounded by darkness, when we're surrounded by sin. If you've ever found yourself asking that question, God, how could you let blank? Right. How can you let this happen? The reality is the contract has not fully closed yet, but we have the Holy Spirit that has secured our deposit. And while we're talking about the housing market, how do you determine the price of something? The value of something, What's based on what someone would pay? Right? You have to do an appraisal, how something is worth. Let me ask you this question then. How much would your soul be appraised for? We go of what was paid for. And that means that the very son of God was payment for your soul means your value, your worth is limitless and beyond comprehension because it is eternal and that's why in jesus christ we are ready all of this and we have not even read yet. But you've got to see this because there are so many words, so many concepts, we could spend weeks and months in here, but we're just going to read this through today and I want you to get excited as paul was. Here we go. Starting in verse three, blessed be the God and father of our Lord jesus christ. The idea here of blessing is to extol praise, to give praise or to give favor or a gift to one another. So 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. So blessed be God who has blessed us with every blessing that's blessings on blessings and blessings. Okay, this is awesome. This is a party, this is a firework show going off Verse four. Even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world that we should be holy and blameless before him in love. He predestined us for adoption as sons through christ, jesus or through jesus christ pausing here. This phrase has even more meaning for me as my family have walked through this process of adoption that when we got you might see people post or celebrate Gotcha day and the reason people celebrate Gotcha day is because legally that child has the full rights of the family at that exact moment as an adopted child, they have the full rights of the family. This means that as adopted sons and daughters of God that we have full rights to the inheritance of God himself. He continues on. He says that all this according to the purpose of his will verse six 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. I love that phrase lavished upon us because that means that jesus didn't give us a little bit of blessing. Well blessed. Right, Why didn't you just give us that? Like he went all out. My middle son loves whipped cream out of the can okay who doesn't though? Right. I mean just the sound alone, it's worth having it. Right? So he asked me he was like, hey dad, can I have some yogurt and whipped cream was closer to bed and I said okay, but just a little bit of whipped cream buddy, like I know you love whipped cream. He said okay. And it goes in the kitchen in the living room so I can hear him but I can't see him and all I hear behind me is okay, like harder, A little giggle. Mhm. He used 3\/4 of a can On a one bowl of yogurt. And he walked out of the carter. I said a little bit and he goes, yeah you didn't say what a little bit. And he went all through and I gotta love his his desire for it. And so just to go big or go home. Right? And so here's what I love about God is that God lavishes his grace upon us. That he did not just give us a little dollop. That is just just like blessing upon blessing grace upon Grace upon grace upon grace. Like it is not some small thing that God does not withhold or just give you a little pebble or a little nugget? It is not like the little watering things. We give hamsters like the little water where we have to go right like this little give us some grace. God like he goes, you want some grace. I got Niagara falls coming your way like like it's coming like it is grace upon grace upon grace, blessing blessing upon blessing upon blessing that God lavishes this. Why? Because we lavish the ones we love that. We love to go out and to have fun and to celebrate and to lift them up. Why? Because we love them. And if you love your Children or spouse or friends or the community, how much more? So does God love you? And he continues on. They're lavished upon us in all wisdom and insight verse nine, 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 on earth in him we have obtained an inheritance having been predestined according to the purpose of him who works all things according to the counsel of his will. So that we who are the first to 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 a guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it to the praise of his glory. This sounds like someone who is rich in christ, doesn't it? Someone who has been beaten and suffered and alone and attacked and in prison and is writing a letter and he cannot even save that for the end. He's like if you don't read all the letters like you've got to get this, you've got it. It's like right out of the gate boom boom boom boom boom that you are blessed. And what's so cool about that is that you see that God selects us in the past that from the foundation of before the foundation of the world, God chose you. And then we see that Jesus saves you for the present meaning that he he saved he bought you on redemption really on calvary 2000 years ago on the cross. But it was for you and me right now in this moment that forgiveness as possible redemption is possible right now and then he seals us with the Holy Spirit to give us the promised future. And so we have a God who is the God of the past, our present and our future and that he has blessed us throughout but not for our glory. Did you notice that it's for his? So at the beginning part, God selects us to the praise of his glory, Jesus saves us now verse 12 to the praise of his glory and that the Holy Spirit seals us what not for our glory but for his glory. But he does all of this because he can it's because who is who he is. And so all of these blessings, let me just walk through five of them with you. We've kind of been talking about it along the way but let me just share five. What does it mean to be rich in christ? What does it mean to be blessed? They're chosen. Everybody loves to be chosen, pick your show. Doesn't matter what show it is from America's Got Talent two. Whatever dating show you want to go like everyone wants to be selected right to be chosen. Why? Because as little kids we long for that, don't we? Like you're a recess you're playing games right? Isn't it amazing that even on our worst day, we can take comfort in the fact that God chose and were adopted sons and daughters. That we have full rights and access to him. That we are redeemed that he paid for us, that for our souls. That that salvation, which means that we are forgiven. And then we are sealed with the Holy Spirit. So that even when the dark world is around us, when we fall or we make mistakes, we can take to the spiritual banks, these truths that I am chosen, I'm adopted, I am redeemed, I am forgiven. I am sealed and I am rich in christ and notice who doesn't It's not even based on us. So you might have seen some of these words in the passage that we just read, but let me just share a couple of them with you. But the ways of God, the way this comes about is that it's God's purpose. God created you on purpose with the purpose specifically his purpose. That means that you have value and what you do and who you are. You can go into the workplace, into the conversation into the community to make a difference for him that it's God's plan, that it is ultimately God's promise. That's not based on you keeping your word. It's based on God keeping his and then it's God's power that if you think to yourself, I can't do it. You are correct. You can't. But God can and you have access to God. The sin leads to God's praise. And so if you're down and you take a moment and you just read this and you pray over and you meditate on it and you think through it and you realize and chosen adopted, I'm redeemed, I'm forgiven, I am sealed that, that God has given me his promise and his his power. And it's God's purpose. It's God's plan, it's God's praise. What is our response to all that God has given us? The only thing we can do church is to respond with worship. It will be here worship and obedience. That's why paul can end his life. And in prison writing letters about his richness in christ. Because the romans can't take that away. He knew that he's standing face to face with God right now in glory. He is still walking in the riches that he preached about this is not some marketing pyramid scheme that if you get this person and they get that person and you get that person and then and then maybe you might be blessed. It doesn't work like that. It's gotta it's jesus, jesus is the blessing. And so our response to him is here. I give you my life, I want to be in you. I don't want you just in my heart. I want to be in your story, I want to be used. I want to experience your kingdom. I want to experience your presence and God whatever you tell me to do, I'm going to do it as the band comes up on stage. I want to close with a story of a time when I most learned about the riches of God. I was on a mission trip down in Mexico and we took a group to go be a blessing to others. Right? We're going to do it with americans. They don't have anything. We have everything, God bless them. And we were in this orphanage and we're going to do a church service and in the middle of the church service they had testimony time and some of you might have heard me share this in smaller conversations. But this girl gets up who's working at the orphanage and she's got a joy about her. That's just, you can't, you can't explain what I'm talking about. Have you seen that? You've seen someone that's got something that spark that's just contagious. That's just infectious. That's just shouldn't use that word right now. But you know what I'm saying, right? It's as you see that and she just and everything like she just starts saying that God is so good. I am so blessed God, I'm so rich in christ like wow, this girl gets it, you know and tell her story and she says, you know, I didn't know where you know the richest of God Mhm I was a kid. My mom was a drug addict and left us. My dad was an abuser. So one evening to protect myself and my siblings and I grabbed my younger siblings and we left and we escaped for the next year lived on the streets. Mhm. And then I turned eight what? And then I turned eight. Yeah. I was like this girl had experienced more than her little lifetime that she shouldn't even exist right now. And she's got this what about 17 at the time? And she said that they found me and brought me in and they showed me that I have value and he showed me that I am in love and I experienced the love of jesus for the first time and I want to give back. And so that's why I'm working in the same mortgage that I really am rich. Mhm. That's a girl who gets it. I don't know what you're walking through. I don't know what you've been through. I don't know what doubts you have. But I want to tell you this that whatever struggles you have, you can be rich in christ you can find hope and purpose and freedom in him and love him because he is bigger than your sin. He is bigger than your circumstance is bigger than any of your doubts and that in christ you are blessed that God has selected you. That jesus has saved. And then you can experience his promise with dear God thank you for who you are and what you've done in you, jesus, We really are rich. That what you have to offer has been better than anything in this world and that you lavish us with your grace upon grace, upon blessing upon blessing because you love us. So help us find our worth, our value, our purpose, our joy and who you are. We believe in you, jesus. We commit our lives to you. I mean, we're living our lives knowing that we have everything we need. Thank you for saving. Thank you for letting us help us today. Thank you.