If you’re like me, you love reminders. I have reminders everywhere; my workspace is full of sticky notes reminding me of tasks. My phone is set to remind me of birthdays, anniversaries and when to pay bills. I even have a reminder to check my reminders. Chapter 1 of Ephesians serves as our reminder of who we are in Messiah and how Mighty our God is! The Apostle Paul reminds followers of Yeshua of two foundational truths.
First, our value is grounded in Messiah:
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Yeshua the Messiah, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Messiah. He chose us in the Messiah before the foundation of the world, to be holy and blameless before Him in love. He predestined us for adoption as sons through Messiah Yeshua, in keeping with the good pleasure of His will- to the glorious praise of His grace, with which He favored us through the One He loves!
—Ephesians 1:3-6
The second reminder has to do with Yeshua’s (Jesus’) status and position, and who our Messiah really is (Ephesians 1:15-23). He is the Son of God. He is seated at the right hand of the Father. He is above any ruler, authority, power, leader and every other name that is named! All things have been placed under His feet and He has been appointed head over all things for His community. In a nut shell, I’m reminded that no matter the circumstances we find ourselves in, we serve an awesome God and, through His Son, we are highly favored, blessed, adopted into His family, and have the Holy Spirit as a down payment of our promised inheritance as sons and daughters.
For the past nine weeks, as the coronavirus upended the world with fear, stay-at-home mandates, financial loss and isolation, we’ve turned to Scripture for the hope we each need to endure rough times.
Ancient Israel had a hope: to return to the Land God had promised to give her. Yet, she had been in exile in Babylon for so long that I’m sure the hope of many began to wane, if not completely disappear.
Our God is the Master Composer. The intricacies He has purposefully arranged on His grand scale of time are often indistinguishable to the human ear, unless we strain to hear. As we journey through the story of Ezra-Nehemiah in the days ahead, listen in for a pattern, a 3-part harmony, as God composes another movement in His song through the mouths of His prophets. See if you can make out the sounds.
The words God gave to His prophets often told about events in the current time, near future and a time even further in the future. They are always pointing us forward, but what were they pointing us forward to?
