Therefore, I also, after I heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love for all the saints, do not cease to give thanks for you, making mention of you in my prayers: that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give to you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him, the eyes of your understanding being enlightened; that you may know what is the hope of His calling, what are the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints, and what is the exceeding greatness of His power toward us who believe, according to the working of His mighty power.
The entirety of Ephesians chapter 1 can be divided into two sections: Praise and Petition. The first fourteen verses are Paul’s praise for grand salvation blessings. Verse fifteen onward to the end of the chapter is a petition. After seeing the glorious praise of Paul, we enter his earnest, unceasing petition. What is his prayer? Verse 17: for the gift of the Spirit of Wisdom and Revelation. Second, the sphere or extent in which this gift is to be given is “in the knowledge of Him.” Third, the manner in which this gift is operative is described in verse 18: “the eyes of your understanding/heart being enlightened; that you may know.” The second part of verse 19, which translates to “I pray that He would give you enlightened eyes of the heart so that you may know,” further emphasizes this.
God has given us objective revelation in His Word, and it is a perfect, sufficient, and complete revelation. Although we are saved, we still have remaining sin within us, which produces a dullness and dimness of spiritual vision. Remaining sin creates an effect like a cataract across the spiritual eye, so we don’t see things clearly. Therefore, we need the spirit of revelation and wisdom to enlighten and illuminate us. The Holy Spirit takes the objective revelation of God’s Word, makes it real, and gives us a true sense of the superlative excellence of divine things.
I tried to emphasize the great importance of this petition for illumination so that Paul’s prayer becomes our regular prayer. This enlightening work of the Spirit saves us from a subtle, false Christian experience. Secondly, this enlightenment is the primary means for all Christian growth and fruitfulness. Thirdly, we saw a few desirable blessings of this enlightenment—things like the highest education, highest joy, and peace. A taste of divine pleasure weans us from the addictive pleasures of the world, empowers us to mortify our lusts, and transforms our soul.
This enlightening, illuminating work of the Spirit is progressive. It’s not like we pray, and boom 💥, one day the Holy Spirit fully opens our eyes, and we can see everything clearly all at once. No, it is a process; it develops and expands. That is why we see this prayer repeated again and again, as we do in Psalm 119. As we study the Word of God or listen to preaching, we must cultivate an attitude of constant dependence on the Holy Spirit and continually cry out to God that He would enlighten our eyes.
We saw that Paul prays that our eyes should be enlightened to see what? While we will be able to see many divine things, verse 18 onward shows that Paul specifically prays that we know three things by the Spirit’s illumination.
- The hope of His calling.
- The riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints.
- The exceeding greatness of His power.
If you want head theology, I can cover all this in one week. But we want to dig into Ephesians until we find gold, until we are illuminated and get a transforming sense of these realities. So we will thoroughly meditate on each of these in the coming weeks.
Today, we will see the first thing that God, through Paul, wants us to know with enlightened eyes: the hope of His calling.
The Calling of God
There are five headings for this topic:
- Nature of the calling
- Author of the calling
- Origin of the calling
- Hope of the calling
- Means of the calling
Nature of the Calling
When Paul prays that the Ephesians might know “what is the hope of His calling,” we must first understand what the calling is. When you look at the biblical meaning of the word “calling,” the Bible speaks about two kinds of calling: the general call and the effectual call of the gospel.
The general gospel call goes forth to all people in the world, offering salvation blessings and commanding them to repent and believe the gospel. It is an open, universal call, extended indiscriminately, without restriction or qualification. We can refer to many verses in the Old Testament prophecies and the gospels: all the verses that say “whosoever believes,” “whosoever comes,” “whoever thirsts,” and “all who believe will receive mercy, forgiveness, salvation, eternal life.” John 3:16 and Romans 10:13, which says, “For, ‘Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved,'” are examples. Mark 16:15 says, “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature.” This is the general, universal gospel call.
This call emphasizes invitation. It’s like when someone invites us to a grand feast. They call us with a nice invitation card. In our culture, close relatives will call us with a plateful of fruits, sweets, clothes, and even betel leaf and areca nuts. They say, “Betel leaf and areca nuts are here to invite you!” For what? For a grand marriage feast or a housewarming feast. In the same way, God calls sinners through the gospel to come to Christ and enjoy His salvation feast. That is why in Matthew, this call is compared to a grand marriage feast invitation, and He promises infinite blessings, from forgiveness and cleansing to eternal life.
Now, this general call can be ignored and rejected. Remember how many rejected the marriage feast invitation, giving lame excuses like, “I have bought a cow,” “I have a field,” or “I just got married.” But it goes to everyone, so this call on one side shows the magnitude of the grace of God, which is freely extended to all people, and on the other side, it shows the responsibility of people if they reject this call. John 3:36 declares, “He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life, but he that believeth not the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abides upon him.” If this was the only call God gave to dead sinners, no one would be saved. Praise God.
There is a second kind of call, and it is the effectual call of God. It is a powerful, efficacious call that always accomplishes its purpose. It is so powerful that it cannot be resisted by the person being called; that’s why it is also called irresistible grace. It is an internal, powerful, heavenly call of God that goes out with power to break impossible hindrances and brings men and women into the blessings of the Gospel. It goes beyond an invitation; it has the emphasis of a summons. I may invite someone to a place, and they may either ignore it or respond to it. But when I send a legal summons from the High Court, they must come. They will come. An effectual call is such a call that it will ensure that whoever receives it will come. That is the difference between a mere invitation and a summons.
Which call is Paul talking about here? Interestingly, you will find the general gospel call mostly in the gospels, but not in the epistles. Almost all words used for “call” in the epistles refer to the effectual call. So much so that the verb is changed to a noun, and believers are known as “the called” or “the called ones,” referring to the successful call of God.
The clearest example of this effectual call is Romans 8:30: “Moreover whom He predestined, these He also called; whom He called, these He also justified; and whom He justified, these He also glorified.” Many heard the gospel in Ephesus, but many rejected it. However, it was this effectual call that brought a few in Ephesus to faith and repentance, which resulted in their justification. “Whom He called, He justified.” So when Paul says you have to understand the hope of “His” calling, the nature of this call is the powerful, efficacious call of God that brought them out of the darkness of Ephesian pagan idolatry to the light of truth, and from bondage to Satan and sin to freedom in Christ. So we see the nature of the call.
Author of the Calling
Do you see the small pronoun in verse 18? Whose call is this? It’s “the hope of His calling,” not “your” calling. Oh, what an illuminating door opens when we grasp such small words in the Bible. When you realize who has called you, this call will appear so glorious. Who does “His” refer to? The closest proper noun goes back to the previous verse, verse 17: “the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory.” It is the living God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing. He is the author of this calling.
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If you want to grasp the glory of this calling, whenever we think of a calling, we should never look at outward circumstances or inward causes, but upward to Him. It is a heavenly calling. That’s the pervasive emphasis of the New Testament. 1 Corinthians 1:9 says, “But God is faithful by whom ye were called into the fellowship of His Son.”
This is the hope that Paul prays our eyes may be enlightened to see. Oh, see the nature of the call. Not a general call, but an effectual call. That call has all the power to accomplish its goals. Secondly, see the author of the call. This is the Father of Glory; all His attributes are reflected in the glory of His call. He is an immutable God; His calling never changes. The immutability of His call means He doesn’t call someone and leave them halfway or change His mind. Whatever He called you for, He will ensure He accomplishes it. Romans 11:29 says, “For the gifts and the callings of God are without repentance.” His whole character is staked in His call. All who are called will be justified, and all who are justified will be glorified. So we see the nature of the call and the author of the call.
Origin of the Calling
What is the origin or source of this call? Again, from Romans 8:30: “Moreover whom He predestined, these He also called.” Oh, the origin of this call didn’t start in time, but goes back to the eons of eternity to the electing love and sovereign purpose of God. God’s plan of predestination is a great plan done outside of time and space. Nothing of space and time can ever alter a single millimeter of that great plan. There, He predestined us to adoption, and this calling is an effect of that plan. Calling is always traced back to eternal election, love, and predestination. You can dread 2 Timothy 1:9 and 2 Thessalonians 2:13.
Look at the golden chain, the unbreakable golden chain. It started with eternal predestination, which resulted in God calling out of millions of people. It doesn’t stop with the calling; the chain continues. Notice the middle of Romans 8:30: “whom He called, these He also justified; and whom He justified, these He also glorified.” This is the unbreakable framework of His calling. The calling never comes in isolation. The effectual call has an eternal past story of electing love, predestination, and redemption, and then a future of glorification. This golden chain goes back from past eternity to future eternity, and in between, God is calling a people and keeping them by His power and grace until He glorifies them.
I hope the Holy Spirit enlightens our heart’s eyes to start seeing the hope of this calling. When I understand the nature of this call, the author of this call, and the origin of this call, I am prepared to understand the hope of this call. The nature of this call is not a general call. Why did the gospel have no effect on so many who heard it, but it had such a life-changing impact on me? Because it was an effectual call. That call has all the power to accomplish all its glorious goals. Secondly, see the author of the call. This is the Father of Glory, and all His attributes are reflected in the glory of His call. He is an immutable God; His calling never changes. The immutability of His call means this is an eternal, sovereign, omnipotent, gracious, and merciful call. See the origin of the call. It began in predestination and will infallibly accomplish its goal of glorification.
Hope of the Calling
The word hope is a most important truth in the New Testament. Next to faith and love, hope is set forth as being of equal importance as one of the three dominant graces of the Christian life. The trinity of Christian graces is faith, hope, and love. The classic statement is in 1 Corinthians 13: “Now abideth faith, hope, and love.” We will look in-depth at the concept of hope next week, along with the practical results of having true biblical hope. Just to introduce you today, we will get a full grasp of the phrase “hope of his calling.”
Paul says this calling gave us hope. Here is a simple example: when someone calls you to a special, grand feast at, say, the Leela Palace, what does it do? Well, it creates a certain hope inside of you, doesn’t it? As you travel and go to the function hall, there’s going to be a special, lavish feast waiting for you. It creates a hope that you will enjoy the pleasure of good-tasting food. Marriage food is so special in our culture. When we are conscious of our weight, we might even fast from morning so we can have a nice, big portion at dinner and be “stuffed to the gills” or “fit to burst.” That hope of calling makes you do that.
In the same way, God calls a person, and it creates hope in that person. The hope that the effectual call of God produces is the confidence that the God who called, forgave, and justified us with great, infinite power will continue to exercise the same infinite power until He fully glorifies me. It is the hope that I will enjoy the full and complete redemptive feast of God in eternity. It is that burning hope that drives our Christian life.
You see, when someone calls you to a great, grand dinner, you start to get prepared. You cancel other meetings for that day, select your best special dress or even buy a new one, dress up nicely, and start the journey to the function. Even a long journey is fine. What makes you do all that? Primarily, it’s respect for the person who called, but we also have hope that when we get there, a grand dinner is waiting for us.
In the same way, the effectual call of God does marvelous things now. It presently raises us from the dead, gives us new birth, forgives all our sins, justifies us, and gives us peace and joy. But all that is just a foretaste or a starter for the full blessing He has promised. The effectual call invitation promises the fullness of the eternal grand feast and full salvation. We came to Christ with that hope of the calling. That calling promised something. When God called us, He promised, “I’m calling you to heaven. I’m calling you to glory.” And that created a hope in us that we will experience those things. So we started the journey of Christian life with the hope of that calling, and we are in the process of traveling to that eternal feast of the full experience and enjoyment of what that call promised.
Now, we have not yet experienced all our redemption blessings. We are, as it were, on our way to the heavenly feast. We have started moving on the narrow street leading to heaven. You know what keeps us going? Sometimes, when we just go to the street where a big marriage function is being held, we start smelling the biryani flavors and spices. In the same way, on our road to heaven, we have only smelled the feast; we just had a vaporous foretaste. The more we progress, the more we smell the feast. It creates a fervent yearning and expectation of the full feast. “When will I eat the full biryani?” We can strongly smell the odor of the biryani coming from the window of heaven once in a while. If the smell is like that, what will the fullness be?
If you need my definition of hope, it is a fervent yearning and expectation of the full feast of heaven. It is a biblical definition. I will prove it next week. If now, when our assurance is high, so much joy sometimes overwhelms us, and peace like a river is beyond understanding—so much so that we feel God’s smile, presence, and pleasures—we feel like heaven on earth. All this is just the vaporous foretaste odor coming from the window of heaven. If this is so wonderful, oh, what will it be to sit down at the table with Christ and enjoy the full experience of all that that call promised when it was issued? We have not yet experienced that, but we have hope we will. Because He issued the call, we know that there is a table spread for us at the end of the road. That’s the hope of the calling.
I have explained this hope with the marriage feast example. Let me now demonstrate it from the Scriptures.
2 Timothy 1:9–10: “who has saved us and called us with a holy calling, not according to our works, that is, He didn’t summon us to Himself because we were good people… but according to His own purpose and grace which was given to us in Christ Jesus before time began, but has now been revealed by the appearing of our Savior Jesus Christ, who has abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel.”
What is the hope of the calling? For those who believe in God, the power and sting of death will be abolished, and eternal life and immortality will be our personal experience. That’s what we hope for. We came with that hope. Our dear brother Vasudevan lived with that hope until the end, and we can be sure on the basis of the infallible Word of God that God, who never lies, will ensure he experiences eternal life and immortality.
For him and for us, we know death will be abolished. Our souls will go to heaven at death, and at the Second Coming, we will rise with deathless bodies and sinless souls. All the effects of death will be undone. We will not be judged for any of our sins. In our next communion week, we will study how we will receive immortality, eternal glory, and an eternal inheritance. We will be welcomed with open arms and brought into eternal glory.
Let’s see what else was the hope of our calling: Hebrews 9:15. I just want you to see these verses; we can dig deeper next week. “And for this reason He is the Mediator of the new covenant, by means of death, for the redemption of the transgressions under the first covenant, that those who are called may receive the promise of the eternal inheritance.” Wow! Jesus Christ, by His death, purchased redemption for our transgressions and became the Mediator of the new covenant for what? So that those who are called may receive the promise of the eternal inheritance. The mighty and able Mediator who is able to save us to the utmost… The primary work of this Mediator is staked on the fact that we should receive our eternal inheritance. The hope of the calling is that we will receive the eternal inheritance.
Let’s turn to 1 Peter 5:10: “But the God of all grace, who has called us… and what has He called us to? He has called us unto His eternal glory by Christ Jesus.” Have we experienced eternal glory yet? No. What did our brother Vasudevan experience when he was with us? Nothing. What are we experiencing? Notice what comes next: “after that you have suffered a while, make you perfect, establish, strengthen, settle you.”
We are called to eternal glory; but on the way to our destination, we are experiencing suffering. Peter says that God will use all that suffering to perfect, establish, strengthen, and settle you. But we will ultimately experience that eternal glory, and that is the hope of our calling.
The final verse is Revelation 17:14. “And these shall make war with the Lamb.” Well, who is going to make war with the Lamb? The beast, Satan, and all forces of evil. The forces of evil will make war with the Lamb. “And the Lamb shall overcome them, for He is Lord of lords and King of kings. And they also shall overcome that are with Him.” How does he describe them? What’s the first word he gives? “Called, chosen, and faithful.”
Here, the hope of our calling is that one day the Lord of lords and King of kings will triumph over evil, and we will be on the Lamb’s side and share his victory. Now we are delivered from the penalty of sin and the dominion of sin, but when he comes, we will be delivered from the presence and all the effects of sin. That is the hope of our calling.
Just a few verses about our hope: We could go on talking about our hope until the cows come home. Very briefly, the hope of our calling is death abolished. We will experience immortality, as it says in 2 Timothy. Hebrews 9 says we will experience an eternal inheritance. 1 Peter says we will experience eternal glory, after a little suffering now. Revelation 17 says we will overcome with the Lamb all powers of evil.
Do you see what a glorious call this is? The nature of the calling, the author of the calling, the origin of the calling, the hope of the calling.
Finally, what is the practical means by which this glorious, effectual call comes? The means of the calling.
Those of you who sleep through sermons and who think we are talking nonsense week after week, children who are forced to come and endure this hour, biting your teeth—you should hear this. What is the means by which this calling comes? 2 Thessalonians 2:13-14 says, “But we are bound to give thanks to God always for you, brethren beloved by the Lord, because God from the beginning chose you for salvation through sanctification by the Spirit and belief in the truth, to which He called you by our gospel, for the obtaining of the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ.”
How does this mighty call of God come? It comes through hearing the gospel. Paul calls it “our gospel,” not one of the 101 false gospels in the world. It is the full apostolic gospel revealed in the scriptures. You can get all kinds of false prosperity gospel calls that don’t have any of these effects. This call always and only comes when you are hearing the true gospel revealed and explained to you.
This call doesn’t come when you climb Mount Everest or the Himalayas or go on all the pilgrimages in the world. No. This call comes when weak men like me are trying to explain the Bible, and you sit and listen to it with open hearts. In the midst of the man’s voice, in the midst of the general outward call, this heavenly calling comes not just to your ears, but you can hear in your heart and know the God of heaven has called you today.
Yes, this always comes through the outward call, the general call, but within that general outward call, there is an inward call in which God not only addresses the ears, he also speaks to the heart, and they hear the heavenly voice of God calling them. This is why Jesus says in John 6:44, “No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him.” 2 Timothy calls this a “heavenly calling.”
Here’s a beautiful example: In Acts 16, when Paul went to Philippi, he went to a riverside, where some women were praying. Paul began to preach the gospel. Verse 14 says, “Now a certain woman named Lydia heard us. She was a seller of purple from the city of Thyatira, who worshiped God. The Lord opened her heart to heed the things spoken by Paul. And when she and her household were baptized, she begged us, saying, ‘If you have judged me to be faithful to the Lord, come to my house and stay.’ So she persuaded us.”
You see, we have here the general call. All the women there heard Paul. Lydia also heard. But what was the difference? She not only heard him with the external, general call falling upon her ear, but we also see here that the Lord opened her heart. And as a result of the inward call, that inward working of God, she heeded the things which were spoken by Paul. Maybe none of the other women responded, but this woman did.
Application
Exhortation to believers, a warning to nominal Christians, and encouragement to unbelievers.
To Believers
If God has given us these resources, the most worthy thoughts and petitions that should dominate our hearts and minds are not these low-level, worldly, sinful, and selfish thoughts. God has given us such a high calling; we need to set our minds on high things. What better thing than to pray with Paul for a spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of God to enlighten the eyes of our heart so that we may know the hope of his calling?
How we struggle without this! Sometimes we wonder if we’re ever going to make it to heaven, filled with all kinds of doubts. That is when we lose our assurance, joy, and peace. We lose our motivation to live the Christian life and fall into temptations and a worldly mindset. See the glory of this call.
Realize the nature of this call: it is an effectual call. With that summons comes all of the power, all of the protection, and all of the resources that are necessary to ultimately deliver us into the very presence and wedding feast of Jesus Christ, where we may experience all that that call promised.
Realize the author of the call. The call of the immutable God never changes. By his powerful, effectual call, a person is absolutely ensured that one day he shall sit down at the table in heaven with Christ and enjoy eternal bliss.
Remember the origin of this call: he predestined us outside of time and outside of space. Nothing of time and space can change this call. When you and I think of our calling when we heard the gospel, we should learn to see it as a glorious effect of the eternal cause of election and predestination, and then it has a glorious future chain of glorification. From eternity to eternity, and in between, God is calling a people and keeping them by his grace. What a hope! It cannot be frustrated. Almighty God designed it in eternity, and he shall realize it in the world to come.
May the eyes of our heart be enlightened that we may know what is the hope of his calling, that we might rejoice in that hope and know that ultimately, regardless of the suffering we go through now, regardless of the problems that we face, there will come a day when we will sit at the table with the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords, and we shall be filled to the full with redemptive blessings in his presence. May God inflame our hearts with that hope and use it to help us to face the difficult times in this life.
Between the call and the ultimate experience of all the full blessings of the call, we have hope. Hope that will sustain us through all of the stumblings, through all of the stair steps, through all of the molding, windings, and washings that must take place before we get to the table.
We will see next week what marvelous practical effect this hope can have in our life if that hope is burning in our hearts. This is the foundation for our growth and fruitfulness in the Christian life. Let us pray to God that we may grow in this hope, to be strong, to be inflamed, and to be full and steadfast.
Nominal Believers
See the nature of this call: it is effectual and efficacious. This means that when anyone hears the gospel and claims to be saved, it produces results. You become a new creature, old things pass away, and new desires grow. It showed itself in acts of faith and love for the Ephesians. If your faith doesn’t produce any growing results of holiness in your life, it is not an effectual call. Each of us has a great duty to “make your calling and your election sure.” Make sure… “Am I effectually called by God? What results can I say are a result of that calling?”
2 Thessalonians 2:13 says Paul speaks of belief in the truth and the sanctifying power of the Spirit. You say you believe the truth; there needs to be an experiencing of the sanctifying power of the truth. And if you’re not experiencing the sanctifying power of the gospel, don’t talk about believing the truth. God’s effectual call doesn’t stop with the head knowledge of truth; it effectually brings changes and results in your life.
You have to examine yourself and ask yourself: “Have I been called?” I’m not asking you, “Have you made a decision for Christ, raised your hand, had the pastor lay hands on you and pray for you, and say you are saved?” The effectual call produces continuous effects of salvation. That’s why most of the salvation effects are given in the present continuous tense. “He that believeth, continues to believe; he that cometh.” John 3:16, that great gospel text, does not say, “God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whosoever makes an act of faith.” No, no, it’s “whosoever believeth.” It’s in the present tense in your English Bible and in the Greek.
“Whosoever believeth,” continuously relies and trusts in the Lord Jesus Christ, and continues in that state, “he shall not perish.” I’m asking you, has Almighty God called you?
You may say, “I never thought of it that way.” That’s the biblical way of thinking about salvation. Paul describes his salvation as, “God called me by grace,” not “I did this, I, I, I, I, I.” Have you been called through the gospel? This is a gospel that always comes in a context of showing the truth about sin.
Has the truth of your sin really gripped you? Have you seen yourself as the worst sinner in the mirror of God’s 10 commandments? While you may decently cheat people on the outside, have you realized that God sees your heart’s lusting, your heart’s murder, your heart’s robbery of covetousness? That you have offended a holy God? You deserve to be crushed by the wrath and anger of that God. Has that gripped you until you have inwardly trembled at the thought of your sin?
The gospel becomes glorious good news only when you have felt and realized the bad news of your sin. Only when you have felt the pain of sin and the ugliness of sin are your eyes opened to see the beauty of Christ. The gospel shows that Christ and his work on the cross are the only hope for sinners to be brought to God in a way consistent with all of his glorious attributes. Has the gospel become good news?
How about you kids? Every time you punch or hit your brother or sister and lied to mommy and daddy, that’s enough sin to cause God to crush you and send you to hell, even though you may not be ten years old. Has that really gripped you kids? Have you felt guilty, and when praying, you said, “Oh God, forgive my sins.” Do you kids know what that is? Oh, that is how the call of God starts.
So if you realize you have not been called, I plead with you in Christ’s name, “Come to the feast; it’s spread. Come. Come to the Savior. Cry to him for mercy.”
Encouragement to Unbelievers
We have children who tell us, “I have been praying for God to save me. Sometimes I feel, ‘Oh yes, I am a Christian now, I’ve become serious,’ then I drift away in two days. What do I do, Pastor?” The truth of the effectual call must be a big encouragement for you to believe and pray to God to save you.
Pray to God that he may effectually call you and save you, because unless he does that, you will not come. You will be sitting in your sins, indifferent and careless, half asleep. But when this call comes, you will not just hear the preacher’s voice in your ears, but God’s voice in your heart. For some, it happens in a very gradual way. For some, it is very sudden. For some, it happens in a way in which all the inward bells and sirens go off at full pitch. For some, it’s just a whispering.
What happens? The gospel begins to take hold of the mind. They begin to think seriously about God and his law and sin and heaven and hell. And the great facts of the gospel. All of a sudden, your eyes will be opened to see the utter need, beauty, and glory of Christ. Then you repent and believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. You experience the joy of forgiveness, a thrill you have never experienced in all the world, peace like a river flows in your heart, and you become a child of God, a true, saved Christian! How glorious!
All this can happen when you attentively hear the gospel. Because this call comes through the gospel, pray every week, “God, I am going to make my best efforts to hear your truth; please call me today, please call me today. May I hear your voice.”
Today, I am preaching the gospel to you. May God call you today through this gospel preaching. Oh, my friend, lay hold of Christ. Cast yourself upon him. Turn from your sin and from your unbelief.
Let us pray that God will not only help us understand the doctrine of effectual calling, but also show us in our church by his power what effectual calling can do for some unsaved people among us.
Grace Reformed Baptist Church, Bangalore 