Ephesians 1:3 Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,
who has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing
in Christ.

Blessings.  We have so many blessing in our life.  This was brought home
to me all the more when I opened an e-mail sent to me from one of our
former members.  It was an e-mail with flowers and butterflies on it but
that wasn't what got my attention.  What got my attention was the title:
"We are so blessed!"  Let me share that e-mail with you.
"If you woke up this morning with more health than illness, you are more
blessed than the million who won't survive the week.  If you have never
experienced the danger of battle, the loneliness of imprisonment, the
agony of torture or the pangs of starvation, you are ahead of 20 million
people around the world.  If you attend a church meeting without fear of
harassment, arrest, torture or death you are more blessed than almost
three billion people in the world.  If you have food in your
refrigerator, clothes on your back, a roof over your head and a place to
sleep, you are richer than 75% of this world.  If you have money in the
bank, in your wallet, and spare change in a dish someplace, you are among
the top 8% of the world's wealthy.  If your parents are still married and
alive, you are very rare, especially in the United States.  If you hold
up your head with a smile on your face and are truly thankful, you're a
blessed because the majority can, but most do not.  If you can hold
someone's hand, hug them or even touch them on the shoulder, you are
blessed because you can offer God's healing touch.  If you can read this
message you are more blessed than over two billion people in the world
that cannot read anything at all.  You are blessed in ways you may never
even know."
Now to be quite honest with you I don't know how accurate the statistics
in that e-mail are but the words surely give us all a pause for thought.
We are so blessed!  We have so much in so many ways.  The little things
we take for granted.  The big things we consider to be necessities but
are they really luxuries we have just grown so accustomed too?  How many
things do we have that we use and enjoy without ever giving them a
thought?  I think when we considered this we do indeed realize that we
are so blessed.
But what struck me is how this e-mail came when it did.  I was supposed
to be writing a sermon and I was stuck.  I had already chosen the text
but my head was on empty.  That's when this e-mail came.  It came
Thursday morning.  What a blessing from the Lord it was.  Let's then
consider our text under the theme: OUR BLESSINGS IN CHRIST.  1st. God has
blessed.  2nd. God has chosen.  3rd. God has adopted.
The text before is a part of the opening words of the Apostle Paul to the
Christian church at Ephesus.  Already in the opening greeting (v. 1-2)
Paul has established two facts: 1. The Ephesians are Christians who
believe in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior.  2. The Ephesians are also
"saints".  The word "saint" means that they are a people who through
faith are dedicated and consecrated to God.
After establishing these facts in his opening greeting, Paul now begins
his letter proper with words of praise and glory to God.  This is quite
usual for Paul.  It is his way of reminding every Christian of exactly
how they got to be Christians in the first place.  In these words of
praise, which is where our text is taken from, Paul shows clearly that
Christianity is not something we have done rather it is something that
God has done.  This emphasis on God's actions and not ours will set the
whole tone of this letter to the Ephesians.  It is a letter famous for
its "it is by grace you have been saved" message.
Just look at how this section of praise starts out.  Verse 3 says: PRAISE
BE TO THE GOD AND FATHER OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST, WHO HAS BLESSED US IN
THE HEAVENLY REALMS WITH EVERY SPIRITUAL BLESSING IN CHRIST.  The very
first thing you notice is that God and His actions are being praised, not
man and his choices.
Consider more closely these words.  The main message of this verse is
that GOD HAS BLESSED US.  GOD HAS BLESSED US WITH EVERY SPIRITUAL
BLESSING IN CHRIST.  Oh that every Christian might contemplate the joy of
these wonderful words.
This verse reminds us that everything we are and have is because of the
blessings of God.  God has showered upon us spiritual blessing after
blessing solely because of His love for us.  To get the full grasp of
this truth then listen to the words of Ephesians 2:1-5 "As for you, you
were dead in your transgressions and sins, in which you used to live when
you followed the ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of
the air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient.  All
of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our
sinful nature and following its desires and thoughts.  Like the rest, we
were by nature objects of wrath.  But because of his great love for us,
God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were
dead in transgressions-it is by grace you have been saved."

These words tell us that here was the world, lost in sin, enemies of God
because of the fall into sin of Adam and Eve.  We were dead to God,
incapable of making any choices or decisions for good.  We were a people
guided by and rejoicing in our very sinful nature.  Such is the meaning
of being dead in your transgressions and sins.
Yet God in love  took and made us dead people alive.  He did that through
the many spiritual blessings He has given.  Let me enumerate some of
those blessings.  In the Old Testament he promised to send a Savior from
sin.  In the New Testament God carried out His blessings by sending that
promised Savior from sin.  God has given us His Son Jesus Christ who
suffered and died on the cross for our sins.  God has raised this Jesus
from the dead and declared Jesus the Christ the only way to eternal
salvation. Those two facts alone say that God has provided all the
spiritual blessings we need in this life and for the life to come.
And still there is more.  God has given us His Holy Word, the Bible that
we might know Him and what He has done for us. Through the word we have
the wisdom and very power of God for the salvation of souls.  God sends
upon us the Holy Spirit.  The Holy Spirit is the one who calls us to
faith, gives us faith, keeps us in the faith and strengthens our faith.
More than that even, there are the wonderful promises of God for his
children: He will be with us, he will make all things work for our good,
he will never give us more than we can bear.  He will take us to be with
him in his eternal kingdom.  All of these things are the blessings God
has given.
But did you note that I only spoke of our spiritual blessings?  Think of
the worldly blessings that God has given.  Think about the words of that
e-mail I read and how true those thoughts are.  We live in the greatest
nation ever with the greatest of blessings ever and yet we so often just
want to gripe.  No, let's be thankful and grateful to our God and Lord
for his gifts.
And still there is more that can be spoken of when it comes to our
blessings.  Verse 4 says: "For he chose us in him before the creation of
the world to be holy and blameless in his sight."  Again notice that the
emphasis is not on what the believer does but on what God has done for
the believer.  In this case, the emphasis is on the fact that God has
chosen us, not that we choose God.
Perhaps the first thing we need to do is to understand just what the
meaning of "he chose us" is.  In the original language this word means
"to select, single out, choose from several or from a great multitude of
similar persons or things."  Even more pointed is the voice of the word.
This grammatical point of the verb causes the meaning to be, "to choose
for oneself."  In other words the emphasis of this word is on the one
doing the choosing not on the object chosen.  The one choosing makes the
thing chosen his very own property.  The thing chosen has now been place
in a relationship with the Choser and now in some way serves the Choser
and His interests.
I can't help thinking that God's choosing of us is really no choice at
all.  When God called Abram to be his own, it was not because Abram was
special or holy.  When God made Abraham's descendants His nation he did
that for His reasons not because they were better or holier than others!
God placed them in special relationship to him, gave them His Law, His
Promises of salvation, gave them opportunity to worship and serve him and
worked and ruled among them.  The whole relationship of God to Old
Testament Israel was caused and given by the Lord, not by the people.
It is the same with us.  We are Christians because God has chosen us.  We
have a special relationship with God because God chose us and blessed us.
 God gave His Son as our Savior as an act of His love, not as an act of
our love.  We were dead in sin, but God made us alive.  God gives us
faith, keeps us in the faith and works to strengthen our faith.  The
entire emphasis of eternal salvation is God's act of choosing, not ours.
That this is so is emphasized all the more by the fact that God chose us
"before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight."

Here is where we struggle the hardest.  Our human nature wants to take
credit for what we have and are.  The world and our sinful nature
operates under the belief that "those who do good get good and those that
do bad, get bad."  Yet it can be demonstrated that this "belief" of the
world is simply not true.  I can cite example after example of people who
live contrary to God's Word and yet they enjoy the best of this world.
Or we could speak of those who strive to be God's children in everything
they do and yet their lives are one struggle after another.  We need to
remember that what we have and are is an act of God's grace and not the
result of our personal goodness.  Having great material blessing is not
necessarily a sign of God working in you.  Having a wonderful feeling
about God's love because things in this world seem to be going good is
not necessarily a sign of God working in you or even that God loves you.
For that matter, even being a "good person" in the eyes of the world is
not necessarily a sign of God's working in you.  We need to remember to
cast aside such outside measures of faith and rely solely on God's sure
and true promises that He has blessed and chosen us in Christ.  Our
entire being rests in Jesus.
The importance of this truth is brought out in our next verse.  Verse 5
says, "In love he predestined us to be adopted as his sons through Jesus
Christ."  Here is something that we find hard to grasp but something that
proclaims neatly the divine truth of salvation.
We are saved because God has saved us.  When Scripture tells us that God
predestined us all that really means is that God has provided everything
necessary for our eternal salvation.  God provides His Word.  God
provides His Son.  God provides His Holy Spirit and faith.  Through the
death and resurrection of Jesus we are adopted as God's sons, because
Jesus died for the sins of the whole world and every single human being.
Salvation is the act of God and getting to heaven is about relying
totally on God.
The best way to think of this is to consider the practice of adoption in
our world.  When a couple adopts a baby that is something they did.  Yet
the baby receives all the benefits of that adoption.  The baby becomes
that couple's child, considered theirs, raised as theirs, loved as
theirs.  The baby is provided everything that it might be that couple's
child.  It was not an act of the baby, but of the adopting couple.
When that baby grows up and considers itself the child of so and so,
isn't it because everything has been provided that will make that so?
Even as an adult, the adopted child is the real child of that couple
because of the actions of the couple.  If the child should grow up and
reject the adoption, reject this couple and their standards, this is not
the fault of the couple.  This is the decision of the adopted child.  A
decision usually made because the child does not appreciate the blessings
that couple has given through the years.
Not let's apply that to our faith.  God has adopted us.  God has given us
everything that we need for eternal salvation through His Son Jesus
Christ.  Should we reject this adoption, it is not the fault of God.  It
is our fault.  Predestination says that all credit for salvation goes to
God alone because God is the one who has done everything.  To reject God
is to reject and not appreciate all the blessings He has given through
the years.
So what have we learned.  We have learned of the blessings of God.
Blessings sure and certain.  Not worldly blessings, for that is not the
measure God's children use.  It is the spiritual blessings of our God
that count.  His gift of salvation and life, His gift of forgiveness and
wisdom in Christ, His blessings that guide eternally!  Look to God for
salvation.  Trust what He has revealed.   Trust what He has done.  Enjoy
and appreciated the blessings of God in Christ.  Amen.