What Is The Meaning Of Ephesians 1.7-8

“Why the Blessed Father Can Bless Us with Every Spiritual Blessing Reason 2 Part 1” Reason #2 Because Christ Has Redeemed Us Part 1: Redemption Through the Blood of the Beloved

Ephesians 1:7-8

INTRODUCTION What is the Meaning of Ephesians 1.7-8

Ephesians chapter 1. The verse that I began the service with this morning is taken from Psalm 49:7-8 . I gave my rendition of it to get us thinking….

Psalm 49:7-8 Certainly no one can redeem another or give to God the price for his life because the ransom price for a human life is too high [for him] and no payment [that he could give] would ever be enough.

No man could ever buy his way out of dying. What is the solution then? A few verses later … Psalm 49:15 But God will redeem my soul from the power of the grave, for He will receive me.

Redemption is all a work of God … He alone redeems.

One wonders as you consider those verses what kind of payment would be required for it to be enough to redeem us from the grave. If the value of a human life is so costly, what kind of a price will it take? What is the value of a human life?

Back in the first century, which was the century in which the book of Ephesians was written, the value human life did not seem so great.

Slavery was rampant. For the equivalent of a few thousand dollars, you could own a slave. The slave trade in the first century was not race-based, but largely war-based. Rome would go off to war and the slave traders would follow along and purchase these people from the Roman army.

And because the Roman empire was so large, they had captured many millions of prisoners. And so slaves made up a large part of the population. Some estimates were around 20% while others estimated up to 33% … Of the population of the Roman Empire were slaves.

There were different ways in which a slave in the ancient Roman world could acquire his or her freedom. It was rare, but it did happen. Unlike our conception of modern slavery, some slaves were able to earn money to purchase their own freedom. They would deliver the ransom price of their freedom to their master and thus acquire freedom and citizenship equal to that of any citizen of Rome. That’s just one example of a slave’s ability to acquire his freedom.

And of course Paul is writing to believers within the Roman Empire. And with the large population of slaves and the possibility of a slave acquiring his or her freedom, words relating to slavery would be commonplace.

More than one of those words made it into our Bibles. Today in in our passage, one word has that background and it’s the word: redemption. The word redemption or “to redeem” simply means “to buy back” … to purchase in order to recover ownership. Look at Ephesians 1:7-8…

Let’s read Ephesians 1:7-8 ⁷In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of His grace ⁸which He lavished on us.

And recall that these verses begin the second stanza of the hymn that’s found in verses 3-14. And each of these stanzas provides the reason for verse 3. Ephesians 1:3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ,

…why has God the Father blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ? Blessings like wisdom and insight…spiritual gifts…answers to prayers….Reason number one that God has blessed us spiritually is in verses 4-6: He can bless us like this verse 4 … just as or “because He chose us.”

Reason number 2 for why God the Father has blessed us with every spiritual blessing begins in verse 7…. God the Father has blessed us with every spiritual blessing because in Christ we have redemption.

So I would like to preach to you this morning on Redemption Through the Blood of the Beloved.

Why is it the Beloved? Because verse 7, it is in “Him” … that we have redemption …the “Him” there refers back to the end of verse 6, the Beloved. In the Beloved , we have redemption … it is through His …that is, the Beloved’s…blood.

We Have Redemption

Redemption simply means to “buy back.”

In some situations, a slave could pay a ransom price and “buy back” or “redeem” his freedom.

Now, in Scripture, this speaks to our salvation.

What does it mean when Peter writes that you should …

1 Peter 1:18-19 ¹⁸[know] that you were not redeemed with perishable things like silver or gold from your futile way of life inherited from your forefathers, ¹⁹but with precious blood, as of a lamb unblemished and spotless, the blood of Christ.

It means that Christ paid the ransom price to buy back our freedom from sin. Just like a slave could pay the ransom price to buy back his freedom from his master, Christ paid the ransom price to buy back our freedom from our slave master … our own sin.

We have redemption. We are set free from the power and penalty of sin! Now, only those who are in the Beloved have this redemption. Verse seven, “in Him, we have redemption.” To be “in the Beloved” or to be “in Christ” means to be spiritually united to Him.

Spiritual union in Christ only happens through faith in Christ. You must trust Jesus Christ to be saved from your sins or to be redeemed from your futile ways.

In Christ redemption the forgiveness of trespasses

When God redeems us, He has purchased us and the cost of that is blood.

Revelation 5:9 And they *sang a new song, saying, “Worthy are You to take the book and to break its seals; for You were slain, and purchased for God with Your blood men from every tribe and tongue and people and nation.

The cost of the purchase is blood.

Now, when God buys us back from the slave market of sin, He delivers us from the penalty of our sin.

Titus 2:14 [Christ…] gave Himself for us to redeem us from every lawless deed […see, He delivers us from every sin … ], and to purify for Himself a people for His own possession, zealous for good deeds.

Did you catch that last part … listen to it again … Titus 2:14 who gave Himself for us to redeem us from every lawless deed, and to purify for Himself a people for His own possession, zealous for good deeds.

We are for His own possession. Whom He redeems, He owns. 1 Corinthians 6:20 For you have been bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body.

Picture yourself standing in the slave market of sin. Various “sins” are standing around you as you are up there on the platform, studied for all who wish to buy you that day. The very sins are slave owners. The sins of lust and greed, anger, and the love of money… Are all standing around yelling out their highest bid for you.

But when Christ came, he owns you. “He redeemed us to purify for Himself a people for his own possession, zealous for good deeds.”

We have been redeemed from our sins.

TRANS: And so naturally, along with redemption comes, there in the middle of verse seven, the forgiveness of our trespasses. Along with redemption comes the forgiveness of our trespasses.

What Comes With Redemption: Trespasses Forgiven

The word “trespasses” there in verse seven means deliberate sins. A conscious and willful act against God’s holiness. The word “trespasses” here does not refer to the mistakes that we make that fall short of glorifying God; there is another word for that.

This word refers to our “shaking our fists” at God kind of sins. The kind of sins where we can say, “I know this is wrong but I am going to do it anyway.”

Somebody may or may not say that in their hearts… But there is a sense in which all sin is willful. At what point do you sin and you did not do it? God’s people can sin this way and we all sinned this way before coming to Christ.

And sin described this way is horrible. Violators or trespassers like this must be punished.

IT’S REALLY BAD!

Since sin came into the world, everything has changed. Job says in Job 4:18 that even the Angels are charged with error and the very thing that we marvel at up there in the atmosphere ….and outerspace in the heavens …. Even they are not clean in God’s sight (Job 15:15). The very things we marvel at God views as unclean^[1]. How much more the things that we know are wrong and sinful!

In our best condition man is unprofitable and his life is fleeting. The earth is under a curse and the Bible says the whole creation is groaning because of it.

[!!] How utterly sinful must my sin be if Adam just ate a piece of fruit and the only righteous recourse for God was to curse the earth like this…with all the turmoil, pain, and suffering…how bad is sin? How wicked is your sin then?

TRANS: But in Christ, we have redemption … and along with that redemption, we have forgiveness of our trespasses.

If Christ came and He has bought you back out of the slave market of sin, He’s naturally forgiven you of your willful, deliberate sins against Him.

EXP: “forgiveness”

Forgiveness has the idea of a dismissal or pardon. When he forgive us, he buries our sins far away and removes them from us as far as the east is from the west.

ILL: It’s the “in thing” … it’s fashionable for my kids to ask me a question along these lines … “what does it mean that Jesus takes my sin away?” If he took it away, why do I still sin?

And I always clarify, if you trust Jesus and ask him to save you, then he takes your sin away which means that he takes away the guilt of your sin. And he can righteously do that because when Christ died on the cross, all of your guilt was transferred to Jesus and Jesus was punished instead of you having to be punished.

And forgiveness of sins is activated in someone’s life when they trust Jesus Christ to redeem them from their sins.

What marvelous love God has for us! He died so that we might have eternal life; how much do I owe Him?

ILL: I’m sure you are aware of the shopping goes on the day after Christmas. The year-end sales to clear the shelves attract shoppers and in some places they wait outside of these stores from early in the morning to get in line to buy their choice item. They are going nowhere … they impatiently wait outside until they open those doors and they can “buy back” that item.

Now, God as it were stands at the door of your heart and knocks. He is impatient as it were and is waiting outside your heart and he is eager to come in and forgive and to redeem you. If you have trouble with this idea of forgiveness… Thinking to yourself, “well, how could God ever forgive me.” Take God at his word… Think of all the other sinners in Scripture whom God has forgiven. God forgives at salvation and after you receive Christ for salvation … God forgives your sin when you ask Him.

1 John 1:9 If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

The picture we have of God is that he yearns over us when we sin; He is sorrowful with us because of our trespasses and wants instant reconciliation between you and him. And he is urgent and invites everyone saying … “Let me come in that I may cleanse you free from the guilt of your sin!” Yield yourself entirely to Him.

The primary thing …. the greatest thing that a sinner needs is to be pardoned, to be declared righteous in God’s sight. And so ….go ahead, weigh your life on God’s eternal balances and when you realize that sin after sin after sin is piling up on one side of those balances, know that you need forgiveness from God! He wants it; He’s waiting for you…rush in to Him for salvation. Receive forgiveness for your sins every day by confessing them to Him!

And if you have not yet received Christ you stand in the slave market of sin and are everyday a slave to your sin.

But if you are trusting in Jesus Christ, there came a day when yet again you were in that same slave market to see which sins would buy you and be your master today … But on that glorious day, Jesus Christ was the highest and final bidder…. And he said, “that …one… is mine.” OH! I’ve been set free…no longer does sin hold it’s power over me…no longer am I held underneath it’s future and eternal punishment.

Jesus Christ came in the flesh, God himself… And through his death he made Satan and sin powerless over us and he came …

Hebrews 2:15 to free us who through fear of death were subject to slavery all our lives.

TRANS: Oh, but what did this cost? With what did Jesus redeem? Certainly, “the ransom price for a human life is too high” … What could possibly have accomplished this?

Eph. 1:7 … “In him we have redemption …through … His blood.”

It took nothing less than the blood of Jesus, the Son of God incarnate.

Here is the cost of redemption: the lifeblood of the Beloved.

What Redemption Costs

Clearly, Jesus made a sacrifice. The Bible says that without the shedding of blood, there is no forgiveness of sins Hebrews 9:22 And according to the Law, one may almost say, all things are cleansed with blood, and without shedding of blood there is no forgiveness.

In the Old Testament sacrificial system, God’s people were required to sacrifice animals to temporarily “cover” their sins. But the writer to the Hebrews says Hebrews 10:4 For it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins.

Therefore when Jesus the Son of God came into the world, he came knowing that in those offerings God had taken no pleasure in to use them to take away sins. Instead, the Son of God came to do the will of God the Father and to be the sacrifice for sins through which we can be sanctified once for all of time.

So once a person trusts in Jesus Christ, God no longer holds that individual guilty for their sins. And that is because Jesus paid the ransom price to redeem you from the slave market of sin.

APP: So what have you done? Yes, sin is horribly bad. God takes it so seriously … it took the lifeblood of His Beloved Son spilled out for you to redeem you…. He did that willingly to redeem you from your sins and purchase you for God. He came to forgive you of your sins. He left his glory above and he emptied himself of “self” and He did that for you …what could possibly keep you from Him if he willingly died for you to purchase you?

What sin could you have committed that could separate you from Christ if it is the Beloved’s will that his lifeblood pay for that sin? Truly, “nothing will separate us from the love of Christ!”

The lifeblood of the Son of God in flesh is sufficient to pay entirely for your sins and remove your guilt before God.

ILL: Rosalind Goforth was a well-known missionary to China, along with her husband Jonathan. We actually named our little girl Rosie after her.

For many years, she labored for the Lord in China. Rosalind often felt oppressed by a burden of sin. She felt guilty and dirty. She always felt like she was a spiritual failure. Finally, one evening when all was quiet, she settled down at her desk with Bible and concordance. She was determined to find out God’s attitude toward her trespasses, the faults, and her sins.

She put these words at the top of the page: What God Does With Our Sins. Then as she searched through the Scriptures, she compiled this list of seventeen truths:

Just listen to these. If you want them, you can email me for them and I’d be more than happy to send them to you.

He lays our sin on his Son—Jesus Christ. Isaiah 53:6
Christ takes them away … . John 1:29
They are removed an immeasurable distance—as far as East is from West. Psalm 123:12
When sought for, they are not found. Jeremiah 50:20
The Lord forgives them. Ephesians 1:7
He cleanses them ALL away by the blood of His Son. 1 John 1:7
He cleanses them as white as snow or wool. Isaiah 1:18; Psalm 51:7
He abundantly pardons them. Isaiah 55:7
He tramples them under foot. Micah 7:19
He remembers them no more. Hebrews 10:17
He casts them behind his back. Isaiah 38:17
He casts them into the depths of the sea. Micah 7:19
He will not take our sins into account. Romans 4:8
He covers them. Romans 4:7
He blots them out. Isaiah 43:25
He blots them out as a thick cloud. Isaiah 44:22
He blots out even the proof against us, nailing it to His Son’s Cross. Colossians 2:14

Fellow believer and you who are in the Beloved, those sins are gone! Forever gone from before God’s eyes!

It’s as Peter says, you have not been redeemed with gold or silver, but with the precious blood of Christ. The cost of our redemption was not temporary riches… But eternal riches.

TRANS: As Eph. 1:8, we have been redeemed according to the riches of God’s grace which he lavished on us.

According to riches of grace which lavished on us

Ephesians 1:7-8 ⁷In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of His grace ⁸which He lavished on us.

We have been redeemed… According to the riches of his grace which he lavished on us.

He did not redeem us “from” or “out of” the riches of his grace, but according to the riches of his grace. In other words, when he redeemed us, it was in keeping with the riches of his grace.

A billionaire can give a dollar “out of” his riches. A billionaire can reach into his deep pockets and pull out one dollar. He gave “out of” his riches.

But if you were to ask that billionaire to give according to his riches he would be giving a dollar value that is in keeping with his wealth. $100,000 would be a tenth of 1% of his wealth.

Now, just latchet that up an infinite degree. When God redeems us, he redeems in keeping with the riches of his grace. What is 1%of … say…infinite grace! Answer, infinite grace!

This is God’s forgiveness! And it’s not just sprinkled upon us, either. Verse eight says that God lavished the riches of his grace upon us. The word for lavish means to display an overabundance and with words like riches and lavish…. We get the idea that God has displayed his infinite grace in an overwhelming abundance….all upon us.

ILL: I remember one year my wife and I went to Niagara Falls. If you’ve ever been there, you know how incredible the sight and sound of that much water.

You want to know how much water flows there? Every minute, on average, almost […counting…] 30,000,000 gallons of water flows over the Niagra Falls every minute. That’s about 125,000 tons of water.

Imagine standing underneath that? You wouldn’t survive! You know, God’s infinite grace is not held back … as if you could stop Niagra Falls from falling! We don’t have to beg and plead for saving grace every moment. It is flowing!

You don’t have to wake up every morning and wonder if God is going to be gracious to you today. Ask, but receive it! Would you have to wake up every morning and wonder if the Niagara would still be flowing?

God does not carefully ration out his grace…”Oh … perhaps there is not enough today …” And He doesn’t make you do somersaults in order to earn it. God’s infinite and loving grace is a Niagara of overwhelming abundance beyond our comprehension….all for you!

God’s forgiveness toward us is not meager… God is not stingy with his grace… But His forgiveness measures up to the worth of Himself.

The glories of His grace line up with the wealth of His glorious being. He not only forgives, but he remembers your sins against you know more. He does not just forget but he sets off the bells of rejoicing and cries aloud and rejoices over you with singing, saying …“Come, and rejoice with Me!”

And if you come and rejoice with Him because of His redemption of you and what he has done for you at the cross and in his resurrection, in your scars of sin he will set jewels of rich abundant grace and call you “My son” … “My daughter.”

CONCLUSION What is the Meaning of Ephesians 1.7-8

Someone who has experienced this kind of grace will never be the same. Ephesians 4:1… Now … live in a manner worthy of this calling with which you have been called.”

Romans 12:1-2 ¹… I urge you, brethren, by [these] mercies of God, to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship. ²And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect.

If this is your calling in Christ… This redemption…, how will you live? You’re a child of the King, redeemed out of the slave market, how will you spend your days?

If a slave was freed, how would he live? If someone purchased a slave’s freedom, what price does the slave owe his redeemer? He would owe him at least a few side jobs for free, right?!

But we’ve been freed eternally … should we not live for Him? It cost Him His Son’s lifeblood … Titus 2:14 He gave Himself for us to redeem us from every lawless deed, and to purify for Himself a people for His own possession, zealous for good deeds.

Should we not be zealous for good deeds?

In 1 Peter, Peter says that if you address God as “Father” … if you call Him Father….and He it is who will judge each person’s work …you better conduct yourself in fear during the time of your stay here on earth. And to help you to conduct yourself in fear… That is, the fear of God being afraid of disobeying and disappointing him… In order to help you to be afraid of disobeying God, you should know that you were not redeemed perishable things like silver or gold from your futile way of life, but you have been redeemed with precious blood…. The blood of the Messiah nonetheless.

Make sure your life measures up to a life that has been overwhelmed with the riches of God’s grace.

411

Go to BibleTrove.com Home Page from What is the Meaning of Ephesians 1.7-8

Go to New Testament Books Page

Go to Ephesians Main Page