Blessed be…  Bible Reading Ephesians 1:1-14

Introduction  https://youtube.com/watch?v=B6Po4542J50&feature=share

We mistakenly assume our outlook on spirituality is the best possible, but recently reading a theological paper I came across a description challenging these assumptions, “Having entered the classroom…I was surprised to see a Greek Archimandrite[1] among the students, I approached him, asked for a blessing and introduced myself …” My mind was taken back to time spent amongst Coptic Christians in Egypt, when I asked our guide why so many thousands were coming to a religious festival, or thronging to a weekly healing/deliverance meeting, he nonchalantly replied, “The people are seeking a blessing.” Did you come today seeking/expecting a blessing[2], through the songs, the sermon, the prayers or from the Lord’s Supper, of which Paul says so clearly, “The cup of blessing that we bless, is it not a participation in the blood of Christ?” (1 Cor 10:16). If faith is a confident seeking after the seal of God’s promises (John 6:27; 2 Cor 1:22; Eph 1:13; Heb 7:6-7 cf. 11:20-21), we are witnessing across the Western Church a crisis of faith that denies the freely available unlimited blessings of God as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit (2 Cor 13:14). This is strikingly evident in the generally miserable prayer state of our congregations. Having been made in the image of this God we are disposed[3] to seek blessings from heaven[4]. This is a powerful and often distorted truth.

Original Blessing

Some decades ago, a popular American author (Matthew Fox), wrote a book titled Original Blessing, which debied the primacy of original sin in favour of a creation spirituality based on Genesis 1:26-28, “Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” 27 So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them. 28 And God blessed them. And God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.””. This approach, amongst others, paved the way for present-day compromises about human sexuality based on the visible order of creation. Such heresies fallaciously begin with what God has made[5] rather than with the One whom God has revealed as the foundation of his plan for creation, “the Lamb who was slain from the foundation of the world.” (Rev 13:8)[6]. The crucified-and-glorified Jesus is the all-sufficient sphere of blessing for which God designed the world[7]. The Spirit of Jesus does not take us back to the primal blessings lost in Eden, the original glory of God (Rom 3:23), but leads us beyond sin and death to “grace multiplied even more” (Rom 5:20). In a time when many devout believers are tempted to become spiritually depressed, we need to fix our eyes on Jesus like never before[8].

Jesus as the Sole Sphere of Blessing

In visiting Israel some years ago, I sensed the Lord’s Spirit had been guiding us with a theme in mind, which became a teaching series titled “The Father of Every Blessing”.  We see Jesus at the Jordan praying, “the heavens were opened, 22 and the Holy Spirit descended on him in bodily form, like a dove; and a voice came from heaven, “You are my beloved Son; with you I am well pleased.”” (Luke 3:21-22). Before he has done anything to earn God’s favour, the Son is inundated with the presence and power of the Spirit and the favourable voice of his Father. In the overflow of this blessing Jesus declared what we call the Beatitudes “Blessed are…” which have transfixed generations of hearers. Later he went on to “take the five loaves and the two fish, he looked up to heaven and said a blessing. Then he broke the loaves and gave them to the disciples, and the disciples gave them to the crowds.”, the 12 baskets left over testify to the superabundant provision of the heaven (Matt 14:19-10). When at Caesarea Philippi Peter confesses, ““You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.”” Jesus overflows with ecstatic joy at the favour of the Father on his friend and prophesies, ““Blessed are you, Simon Bar-Jonah! For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father who is in heaven.” (Matt 16:16-17). These all evidence a sphere of blessing where the Father had begun to rule on earth as he does “in heaven” (Matt 6:9ff)[9].

The other Sunday our pastor was preaching from Matthew 11:6 where Jesus said, “blessed is the one who is not offended by me.”, but instead of leaping out of their seats[10] the congregation sat there like “stunned mullets”. Even though we were being told that as heirs of God’s kingdom we were greater/more blessed than the greatest of all the prophets[11] the people sat passively; in total contrast to the “unspeakable and glorious joy” (1 Pet 1:8) Jesus has at us being seated with him in the heavenly places (Eph 1:3; 2:6)! These great and wonderful truths do not yet speak to us of “the wonderful exchange” that delivers us from the curse pronounced on the world because of our sin.

Dealing with the Curse

The High Priest who put Jesus on trial knew his Bible. His probing question, ““Are you the Christ, the Son of the Blessed?”” (Mark 14:61) was designed to draw out a response leading to a verdict of crucifixion as undeniable evidence that Jesus could not be one with God as the fount of all blessings (cf. 2 Cor 1:3), i.e. he could not be Messiah.

Given that sin is a form of cursing God (Job 1:5; 11; 2:5, 9; Rev16:21), the punishment for sin is being exposed to God’s cursing of the earth under, around and above us[12] (Gen 3:7; 6:17; 8:20-22). (Best then never to complain about the weather!)[13]  The crucifixion of Jesus, in comparison to say a Jewish stoning or a Roman beheading, was a form of death by divine decree for someone was considered cursed (Deut 21:23) and excluded from the blessings of God’s covenant (Gen 12:1-3; 1 Sam 16:43). This is why Paul says in Galatians, “Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us—for it is written, “Cursed is everyone who is hanged on a tree”— 14 so that in Christ Jesus the blessing of Abraham might come to the Gentiles, so that we might receive the promised Spirit through faith.” (Gal 3:13-14). What theologians call the “wonderful exchange” means Jesus takes upon himself (2 Cor 5:21;1 Pet 2:24) all the destructive consequences of sin that he might give us the blessings of his heavenly Father (2 Cor 8:9). Martin Luther expounded this passage in Galatians unforgettably.

“And all the prophets saw this, that Christ was to become the greatest thief, murderer, adulterer, robber, desecrator, blasphemer, etc., there has ever been anywhere in the world. He is not acting in His own Person now. Now He is not the Son of God, born of the Virgin. But He is a sinner, who has and bears the sin of Paul, the former blasphemer, persecutor, and assaulter; of Peter, who denied Christ; of David, who was an adulterer and a murderer, and who caused the Gentiles to blaspheme the name of the Lord (Rom. 2:24). In short, He has and bears all the sins of all men in His body—not in the sense that He has committed them but in the sense that He took these sins, committed by us, upon His own body, in order to make satisfaction for them with His own blood.”[14]

In seeing Christ crucified we see God’s “No” our sin, in seeing the Lord’s resurrection we hear God’s “Yes” to our being made right/justified with him in Jesus (Rom 4:25; 1 Tim 3:16). But the gospel message does not end with the resurrection. In witnessing the Lord ascending to heaven as recorded in Luke, “lifting up his hands he blessed them” (Luke 24:50) we see the great High Priest (Heb 4:14ff.) doing what priestly mediators are called to do, distributing the limitless blessings of heaven. Jesus has returned with us, to “the glory that I/we had with you (the Father) before the world existed.” (John 17:5). In believing in this glorious ascension into heaven we confess with Paul, in Roma 9:5, that Jesus “is the Christ, who is God over all, blessed forever. Amen.” (Rom 9:5). Christ’s Father is now “our Father in heaven” (Matt 6:9; John 20:17; Acts 1:9-11; Luke 24:51). The implications of these great and marvellous things for our lives are enormous.

Christian Life

Therefore Paul can testify, “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with (not some not many but)  every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, 4 even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him.” (Eph 1:3-4). Through his death, resurrection and ascension Jesus has returned with us (Eph 2:6) to the heart of the Father (John 1:18) opening what was previously, the those under the old covenant,  a mystery, of how frail humans now possess the authority to “bless God”[15]. Though Father, Son and Spirit are eternally blessed in each other’s infinite love (Rom 1:25; 9:5; 2 Cor 11:31) in Christ we receive the inestimable privilege of being able to “rejoice his/God’s heart by blessing his name” (Sanders). Through the remarkable mystery of grace, we join in the scene in Revelation in praise with the four living creatures, the elders and all the glorified saints around the throne of God and the Lamb exclaiming, ““Worthy is the Lamb who was slain, to receive power and wealth and wisdom and might and honour and glory and blessing!” “To him who sits on the throne and to the Lamb be blessing and honour and glory and might forever and ever!”” (Rev 5:12-13).

We are united with the saints in heaven sharing in their insight that the one worthy to be worshipped/blessed is “the Lamb standing as slaughtered” (Rev 5:6). Even in glory Jesus still bears the scars/marks of his passion (Luke 24:40; John 20:20, 27-28). The revelation of the immensity of God’s love (cf. Rom 5:6-8) in the sufferings of Jesus is the proof that God is for us and never against us (Rom 8:31), evidence (Rom 5:8) sufficient to convert a world still suffering the aftershock of curse (Rev 22:3)[16]. The secret of what the apostle calls “the fullness of the blessing of Christ” (Rom 15:29) which brings growth and multiplication (cf. Gen 1:22, 28; 5:2; 9:1; 12:1-3; 2 Sam 6:12; 1 Chron 13:14) does not come to the people of God in an easy painless or casual way. Without a cross there is no crown, and the Son of Man must continue to suffer many things in/through his Bride (Acts 9:4-5) because suffering is the way to glory (Luke 24:26).

Conclusion

What then is our problem? Why do so many believers act like the first downcast disciples on the road to Emmaus before their eyes were opened to the glory of the Lord (Luke 24:31). Hidden shame is the principal “blessing blocker”. A veil of shame lies over the leadership of the Church of Christ in Perth because shame blocks us receiving the gracious blessing of God’s glory.  Whereas so many Christian leaders live as if weakness fear, anxiety, and struggle were things they need to hide from, Paul embarrassingly can “boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. 10 For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong.” (2 Cor 12:9-10). In an hour when by divine cruciform/cross-shaped wisdom the world is turning against the Church[17], we are about to discover Jesus’ deepest personal testimony is true[18], ““Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. 11 “Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. 12 Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.” (Matt 5:10-12).[19]. Christ is working to teach us that his Father’s will is always to bless and never to curse.