Yesterday, I pointed to the wisdom Abraham passed on to his children and household; “to keep the way of the Lord by doing righteousness and justice” (Genesis 18:19). In this blog, I will list a few of the benefits that result from gaining wisdom from God. Many times, this wisdom comes to us through persons who have spent time with God and learned from experience, the principles that wisdom teaches. Think carefully about each of these:
· Wisdom teaches us the “fear of the Lord” (Psalm 111:10; Proverbs 1:7; 9:10). · Blessing comes to the person “who finds wisdom” (3:13). · In gaining wisdom, we “get insight” (4:5). · “Wisdom is pleasure to a man of understanding” (10:23). · “By wisdom a house is built, and by understanding it is established” (24:3). · Wisdom will deliver the person who walks in it (28:26). · The person “who loves wisdom makes his father glad” (29:3). · Wisdom helps Christians walk wisely among unbelievers (Colossians 4:5). The other side of these principles is that we suffer loss and consequences when we do not use the wisdom of God in the everyday circumstances of life. We must challenge each other to always seek His wisdom; not just for personal, marriage and parenting reasons, but for all aspects of life. Then the world will see us representing God through the use of His principles.
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Abraham is an amazing man. Not only is he commended for his faith in Hebrews 11:8-19, but his life was also marked by obedience to God’s call and instructions, even when they were difficult. God put Abraham through several tests to confirm the promises given to him and strengthen Abraham’s faith. The Lord gives us a glimpse into the character of the man Abraham in the following verses:
“The Lord said, “Shall I hide from Abraham what I am about to do, seeing that Abraham shall surely become a great and mighty nation, and all the nations of the earth shall be blessed in him? For I have chosen him, that he may command his children and his household after him to keep the way of the Lord by doing righteousness and justice, so that the Lord may bring to Abraham what he has promised him”” (Genesis 18:17–19). Notice the characteristics in Abraham’s life that made way for the wisdom of God to be passed on from his life to his marriage and family/household: · He had an intimate, active relationship with God; “Shall I hide from Abraham what I am about to do?” · He lived his life letting the promise of God actively guide him. Through a man like this, God will “surely [make] a great and mighty nation.” · Such wisdom in a person with active faith will cause “all the nations of the earth [to] be blessed.” · God purposely chose Abraham because God knew he would “command his children and his household after him to keep the way of the Lord by doing righteousness and justice.” The question for us is whether we are using and living the wisdom of God as we relate to our children and household? The word “command” means to “tell, instruct or give direction”. Solomon wrote Proverbs, mainly for his son, to give wisdom and instruction for so many areas of life. Children will not know or receive wisdom unless it is given to them as a regular diet. We will look in the next blog at some of the benefits of God’s wisdom gives when it is received. After Paul had written of the mystery of God’s plan and purpose for the Church in Ephesians 3, he outlines in chapter 4 through 5:21 how God’s wisdom is going to be seen through individuals. Then he takes that wisdom and applies to marriage. Both husband and wife are to display the wisdom of God in their relationship together. Each person in the marriage has a unique role that is using wisdom to reveal how divine wisdom affects every part of their relationship.
In each role, husbands and wives have responsibilities in marriage that are different from the other person, but with the intent that they uniquely reflect God’s wisdom; not just to each other and the children; not just to the Church body and the world, but to “the rulers and authorities in the heavenly places” (Ephesians 3:10). It takes both husband and wife working together in mutual submission to Christ and each other (5:21) to make this happen. Think of it, “this mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the Church” (5:32). Can you imagine the angels and heavenly rulers watching your life and marriage (if you are married) and seeing the wisdom of God being lived out in practical ways? We tend to confine our activities, words and motives to a very small circle of the home. God planned that the mystery of the Church would have a vast influence far beyond what we can see with our eyes. I trust this will help you reexamine how you reflect God’s wisdom through your role as husband or wife and make changes so this becomes increasingly true. A perfect example of God’s wisdom through individuals in the Church that we looked at yesterday in Ephesians 3:10 is found in Stephen. He was selected to handle a certain ministry in the Jerusalem church (with six others) because he was “of good repute, full of the Spirit and of wisdom” (Acts 6:3). That wisdom in Stephen came face-to-face with opposition in the synagogue; those who “could not withstand the wisdom and the Spirit with which he was speaking” (6:10).
Stephen’s message in Acts 7 was a further proof of God’s wisdom in him. It glorified the ways of God with Israel and at the same time brought divine conviction on those who were a “stiff-necked people, uncircumcised in heart and ears...always resisting the Holy Spirit” (7:51). Was this wisdom justified since Stephen was stoned to death? Was it really necessary that he take such a firm position on the state of their hearts? Was the persecution that followed worth this stand? YES! Living out the wisdom of God may at times bring out the worst in some, but God did and will use the personal commitment to be faithful. The revelation of God’s truth and wisdom is so the world and “the rulers and authorities in the heavenly places” (Ephesians 3:10) might have a powerful witness to God’s wisdom. This example leaves us with the challenge of whether we prefer living in ease and absence of conflict, or in the trenches of where truth and wisdom lead men and women into a personal relationship with Jesus. From those trenches, the gospel spreads to places that God intends it to go. As we have seen through Ephesians 3:8-10, it was God plan from ages past for His wisdom to be lived out through the Church. We know from Paul’s teaching in 1 Corinthians 14:12, that the Church is made up of individuals who through “one Spirit…were baptized into one body” (14:13). Each individual or member of the body, the Church, cannot think of themselves as independent of any or all the rest of the members in the body. In this analogy, he makes the point that “Because I am not a hand (like someone else), I do not belong to the body…As it is, there are many parts, yet one body” (14:15, 20).
What is the point of this? If the wisdom of God is going to be reflected through the Church to those in the world as a testimony to the truth of the gospel, and “to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly places” (Ephesians 3:10), then your personal life and mine must also be reflecting that wisdom. Where and how do our lives get this wisdom? There are numerous Scriptures that answer this question, but here are a few: “And he said to man, ‘Behold, the fear of the Lord, that is wisdom, and to turn away from evil is understanding.’” (Job 28:28). “Get wisdom; get insight; do not forget, and do not turn away from the words of my mouth.” (Proverbs 4:5). “And because of Him [God], you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, righteousness and sanctification and redemption,” (1 Corinthians 1:30). Please focus mainly on that last reference; Christ Jesus is wisdom from God! There is no wisdom of any value except what is in Him! Often, we get caught up seeking wisdom through humans who are just giving their interpretation, rather than going directly to the source of wisdom and asking the Holy Spirit to show us the wisdom in Jesus Christ (John 14:26; 16:12-14). As we submit our minds and hearts to the Holy Spirit, He will “teach us all things and bring to our remembrance all that” Jesus has said to us in His Word. When we receive His teaching and wisdom, it will be reflected in our lives and the world will see, the rulers and authorities will see. What do they see in your life? In my experience, it is rare that anyone in the Church speaks of the total scope of influence the Church was intended to have. In the plan of God, His wisdom is to be lived out through the Church in such a way that it “might be made known to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly places” (Ephesians 3:10). That is outside the realm of most of our thinking.
The more we examine God’s plan and purpose for us and the Church, the bigger the picture unfolds in our understanding. This great salvation and gospel of God’s glorious grace was prophesied by prophets in the Old Testament by revelation. These great things have been “announced to [us] through those who preached the good news to [us] by the Holy Spirit sent from heaven, things into which angels long to look” (1 Peter 1:12). Can you imagine that angels see what is happening in believers and in the Church and wish they could understand this amazing transformation of grace! This should open the spiritual eyes of our hearts “that [we] may know what is the hope to which he has called [us], what are the riches of His glorious inheritance in the saints” (Ephesians 1:18). It should also make us want to follow this plan of God with much deeper passion. What could be greater than our obedience to the Holy Spirit declaring God’s wisdom to “the rulers and authorities in the heavenly places”? This view of God’s plan for us `should dash our small thinking, our self-centered worlds, and make us yearn to live to glorify God and impact the universe. How short and small is your vision? A dark, damp prison cell became the place where glorious light flooded Paul’s heart regarding a mystery that was hidden for ages before the Spirit came. As he takes a piece of parchment and quill, Paul’s spirit is filled with the glory of the gospel. This mystery unfolds from the beginning of Ephesians, Paul’s first prison letter, as he recounts the blessings we have received from God the Father through Jesus Christ. All these blessings were to “set forth in Christ as a plan for the fullness of times” (1:9-10), where you and I are right now, in our time and culture.
As Paul describes God’s purpose for us (“to the praise of His glory”, 1:12, 14), he shows that our salvation is totally a work of His grace. We are God’s “workmanship” (2:10) in spite of what we were or our ethnic background, and through His work has joined us into one in Christ, forming the church as “a dwelling place for God by the Spirit” (2:22). This was always God’s plan from “before the foundation of the world” (1:4). Now, Paul is ecstatic with joy for being chosen to proclaim these “unsearchable riches of Christ” along with what this revealed mystery is going to do. This plan of God was revealed “so that through the church the manifold wisdom of God might be made known” (3:10). I often see ways that the Church has missed the importance of this revelation. We become occupied with man’s ways and programs, conflicts and pettiness, personalities and material things, rather than God’s great and majestic purpose and plan for the Church and us who make it up. If God’s purpose and plan is going to be fulfilled in our day, we must be single minded in this plan. Otherwise, our ministry and lives will be spent in vain. The more we examine Paul’s heart for the gospel, the more we are amazed at his understanding of God’s plan and purpose. Let’s look at the next verse in Ephesians 3:
“To bring to light for everyone what is the plan of the mystery hidden for ages in God, who created all things” (3:9). Then you combine these thoughts with Paul’s words to Timothy, “First of all, then, I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for all people, for kings and all who are in high positions…This is good, and it is pleasing in the sight of God our Savior, who desires all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth” (1 Timothy 2:1–3). Paul knew that “the gift of God’s grace” in him was going to go out to everyone! This put in motion in his life a drive of proclaiming the gospel of God’s grace “to the end of the earth” (Acts 1:8). In this gift was the light of “the mystery hidden for ages in God” and with deep passion for the wisdom of God in Christ, Paul wanted to proclaim it to “everyone”! Jew and Gentile would be delivered from the darkness of sin and made in Christ a unified witness to the wisdom of God. The two people groups would become in Christ “one new man in place of the two, so making peace, and might reconcile us both in one body through the cross, thereby killing the hostility” (2:14-16). As this sinks deep in our souls, we find the Holy Spirit building the same kind of passion for missions that Paul had. Through us who are being transformed by this truth, the gospel will reach every nation, and the Lord will return (Matthew 24:14). “Of this gospel I was made a minister according to the gift of God’s grace, which was given me by the working of his power. To me, though I am the very least of all the saints, this grace was given, to preach to the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ” (Ephesians 3:7–8).
Read those two again! Do you hear Paul’s heart regarding this “calling” to preach the gospel? So often we hear the phrase from those in ministry refer to their work as a “calling” which it is, but that alone misses the real heart of what we are “set apart” to do. Proclaiming “the unsearchable riches of Christ” is an immeasurable privilege! The whole process of being “made a minister” of the gospel is a “gift of God’s grace”! It is not the result of education, denomination, status or rank. IT IS A GIFT FROM GOD! In addition to knowing that this ministry was a “gift of God’s grace”, Paul felt totally unworthy for this role, yet, “this grace was given” to him. The power of this truth emboldened and propelled Paul to let the Holy Spirit drive his life, even enduring unbelievable suffering, so that the message would reach the Gentiles. This vision of what God had done in His life never left Paul. To the very last day in a Roman prison, Paul “proclaimed the kingdom of God and taught about the Lord Jesus Christ with all boldness and without hindrance” (Acts 28:31). This makes me feel very small alongside Paul, but compelled to follow his model. What about you? In this blog I will point to several references in Acts where the Apostles give God the credit for what is taking place in hearts who receive the gospel. Through a series of events in Peter’s ministry, he was led to proclaim the gospel to Gentiles and they “heard…believed…[and] the gift of the Holy Spirit was poured out even on” them (10:44-45). As Peter recounts what happened to the church in Jerusalem, he said, “Then to the Gentiles also God has granted repentance that leads to life” (11:18). It was God working in the Gentiles that brought about repentance, not Peter.
When the Jerusalem council took up the question of Gentiles coming to faith in Jesus Christ, it was God “who knows the heart, bore witness to them, by giving them the Holy Spirit just as He did to us, and he made no distinction between us and them, having cleansed their hearts by faith.” (15:8–9). Only God can cleanse the heart by faith and give the Holy Spirit. In the same way, when Paul and Timothy met Lydia, they recognized that “the Lord opened her heart to pay attention to what was said by Paul” (16:15). No programs, methods, or gimmicks can accomplish the work of God. This forces us to depend on the Holy Spirit to work in those we present the gospel and God’s Word to. The more we realize this the more dependent we will become, and the more we will see God work as a witness to the power of the gospel. |
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