We cannot live a proper Christian life without proper worship. Our life is a reflection of our worship. The quality of our Christian life is directly proportional to the depth of our worship. If our worship is superficial and emotional, our life will be like that. Ephesians 1:3-15 is called the tallest praise of all human praise. It is the most profound doxology in all of Holy Scripture. Of all the Old Testament praise, Psalm 103 stands tall above all other eulogies as pure praise unto God. Ephesians 1 is like the Psalm 103 of the New Testament. It is the tallest praise of all human praise. No human praise has been raised higher than this praise of Paul for the concepts within it, for its comprehensiveness, and for its depth, height, breadth, and length. Praise to the Triune God, all His works, and all the blessings of salvation are included in this.
Many of you tell me these messages are having a deep impact on your lives. Why? Because our life is a reflection of our worship. As we are learning how to worship God with Paul, that is the impact you see in your life.
Paul, as he is praising God for the blessing of salvation, is not intellectually listing them, but is like a child who’s been brought into a room full of toys and gifts and told, “All this is yours.” And he stands back, amazed, exclaiming, “Ooooh, look at this! Ohh!” So Paul is like an excited child. “Look at this… oh, look at the past election, predestination in eternity, historical redemption for me before I was born, and then the present administration of Christ for my greatest good.” Now, moving on to verse 11, he looks at a future blessing and continues his marvelous worship. When we call people to worship, they often ask, “Do you have praise and worship?” We can say, “We are not interested in concert musical praise and worship.” Yes, we have Paul’s Praise and Worship. True worship is not a hot heart with an empty mind, but a hot heart with an enlightened mind. Let’s just join that.
Now we come this morning to verse 11. Let us understand it with three questions: What is this new blessing? How did you get this blessing? Why did you get this blessing? What, How, Why? All this tells us how glorious this blessing is.
What Is This Blessing?
Verse 11 says, “In Him also we have obtained an inheritance.” If you look at different translations, you will get different words. Different commentaries will explain it differently. You may say, “We don’t have time to read one translation, so how can we look at different translations? We trust you, Pastor, you just go on and explain.” There are some who do a deep study and compare verses, so I need to mention a few things for them. I believe we come here not to just get an emotional kick or a motivational speech, but to use our minds and conscience so we leave believing we have really heard God’s word. So if you, for five minutes, do some Bible trekking with me, I will teach you one of the most important principles on how to study difficult passages.
Our version, NKJV, says we have obtained an inheritance. NASB and many other translations say we were made a heritage. Commentators are divided on this. Many big commentators, like Hendrickson, say we are made God’s heritage. So which is right? The Bible teaches both. Has God made us His inheritance? Yes, the Bible teaches that in many places. If someone teaches that, it is not wrong. On the other hand, does the Bible teach that God gives us an inheritance? Yes. So both are biblical truths. How do we know which meaning Paul is using here? This is the challenge you face with some passages. For example, my dear brother Rajath was humbly debating with me, saying some people argue, and he also believes, that in verse 8, “wisdom and prudence” is talking about God’s wisdom and prudence, and not about us receiving wisdom and prudence.
Now how do we decide? This will be greatly helpful in your Bible study. In all such cases, the immediate CONTEXT is king. The reason I believe verse 8 talks about grace overflowing to us in all wisdom and prudence is because of the gospel, and here in verse 11, it is not God making us His inheritance, but we are receiving an inheritance. How?
Here are five reasons:
- Pre- and post-context. The whole context is all praise. Remember how he started this whole section? Verse 3 says, “God blessed us with every spiritual blessing.” He goes on with a long list of blessings that we have received. Therefore, anything that follows, we should be predisposed to think that Paul’s focus is upon a blessing we receive, because that’s the theme announced in verse 3. Not only the pre-context of verse 3, but the post-context also supports this. You’ll notice in verse 14, the Holy Spirit of promise, who is the guarantee of our inheritance, is talking about what we receive.
- Grammatical voice. The voice is passive, where we don’t do anything; we are not made anything; we just receive it as a gift.
- Analogy of Scripture. Compare other portions. Colossians is a parallel epistle to Ephesians with a similar flow. There, in Colossians 1:12, he talks about God having qualified us to be “partakers of the inheritance of the saints in the light.” You can see Colossians 1:9 also talks about wisdom and prudence, not as God’s. Verse 9 says, “Paul, I pray for you, and to ask that you may be filled with the knowledge of His will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding, that you may walk worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing Him, being fruitful in every good work.”
- Word meaning and relationship of other words in the verse. Verse 11 says, “In Him also we have obtained an inheritance, being predestined according to the purpose of Him…” Where did we see “predestination”? Verse 5 says, “having predestined us to sonship.” Common sense tells us that if there is adoption, there will always be an inheritance, right? Even Scripture inseparably links sonship and inheritance. Romans 8:16-17 says, “The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirits that we are the children of God, and if sons, then heirs—heirs of God and joint heirs with Jesus Christ.”
- The progression of thought. The entire passage is a flow of blessings we have received from God, not what we are to God.
For all these reasons, I believe it talks about the inheritance we receive. Though both meanings are correct, they have different perspectives and applications. See how difficult it is to prepare a biblical sermon, not just to blabber something to make you feel good, but to accurately divide the Word. My son used to say when he was small, “What’s so difficult? You just sit on a laptop and type, and the sermon comes.” Now he is breaking his head preparing for youth meetings every week. I have a suspicion that God purposely makes some passages difficult. First, so we don’t throw pearls before swine and lazy people don’t get it. Second, to make us depend on the Holy Spirit. This passage has driven me to prayer so many times. “Oh Lord, what is Paul saying? Help me.” If it were easy, I wouldn’t have gone to God like that. Third, sometimes it is to make us realize that His ways are beyond our minds.
Also, I think a natural problem with many of us and with commentators is to interpret the Bible based on our own bias or experience. That is a big danger. If I don’t have much experience with wisdom and prudence and don’t experience much of an inheritance, I may say it is all talking about God’s wisdom and prudence, and not what we receive. We have to seek to experience what God has promised, but not interpret the Bible according to our present experience. Here, the author is Paul, who had experienced the height of God’s wisdom and prudence and in faith rejoiced about his inheritance.
Okay, Pastor, enough of the trekking; let us start the message. Okay, so what is this blessing? The blessing is an inheritance. Paul says we have also obtained an inheritance. Not only election in eternity, redemption, and forgiveness of all our sins in the past, but the present administration of a government to work all things for our good in our life now, but we also have a great, bright future hope. He calls it an inheritance. It is a wonderful word.
We have heard the story of an orphaned beggar living a miserable life, and one day a long line of cars picks him up and tells him he is the only heir to a vast fortune like that of Elon Musk, Ambani, or Tata. A very thrilling plot—overnight, he becomes the richest man. He didn’t receive this great inheritance because of anything he did. He is not a man who worked hard in life and came up, but the only thing that made him eligible for this vast inheritance was his birth into a family. Can you imagine his unbelievable excitement and joy? God wants us to experience an excitement far beyond any beggar becoming a billionaire overnight today.
That is Paul’s excitement when he thinks of his inheritance. This is the finale, the crescendo, the climax of his praise. You have seen the climax of a concert or a song will be very grand. I keep teaching people we should meditate until we are fired up like coals. Paul, sitting in prison, meditating on the panoramic blessing of salvation, felt a fire and suffering that started burning with unbearable pressure building up in his soul. As if a bomb had blasted, he began his praise, “Blessed be God the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,” and the bomb kept blasting and blasting. Now this is the climax of its blast: “We have obtained an inheritance.” We need to feel that heat of his heart.
This is not a small thrill for Paul. Looking at other passages, we can say this is his highest thrill. Maybe someone asked Paul, “God may have blessed you in eternity, redeemed you, and is working all things for good now by His administration, but you are suffering in jail. What is your future?” Oh, his face would brighten, and he would say, “Listen; I may be suffering now in jail. If you ask me why I am so joyful and hopeful even in the midst of these sufferings, it’s because I have a grand future, a future that will bring an unprecedented experience of blessings.” He says in Romans 8:18: “For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us.” And in 2 Corinthians 4:17: “For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison.” “There is laid up for me the crown of righteousness.”
There is such an amazing future inheritance coming to us. The Bible says no mind has imagined it, no eye has seen it, no ear has heard it. Now, how do you preach that eternal inheritance to people who are so absorbed in the temporary world? After the fall, our soul is dead, and all our excitement is for bodily pleasures, for the world, money, and food. How can we make you realize how glorious our inheritance is? We hear “inheritance” and think of crores of rupees and houses.
The challenge is, how can we teach a Stone Age tribal forest man about computers and AI? There are no examples in his world that can match the tech world. For most of us, this world is everything. We stand jaw-dropping at all the worldly things, like money. How can we explain the glory of eternal inheritance? Unless God opens our eyes, we cannot grasp it. That is Paul’s first prayer in verse 18: “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.”
I also pray God should open our eyes even as we hear His word today. Oh, if God would but draw back the veil! If He were to grant us even a glimpse of the unfathomable splendor that awaits us, the resplendent glory of our future, we would be thrilled to our very marrow, ignited with an unquenchable joy. In that radiant light, the wealth and comforts of this life would fade to insignificance, and we would be very happy to live like a beggar our whole lives, like Lazarus, if God opened our eyes to see our inheritance. It is worldly attachment that blinds us.
God has been trying to teach us about the glory of His inheritance with types from the beginning. The concept of inheritance is progressively revealed in the Bible, from Genesis to Revelation. Let us see these types.
The Old Testament type is the promised land of Israel as a type of inheritance. When the people of God were still children in spirituality, God used worldly things to teach spiritual realities. We are clearly learning that in Leviticus. When God made a covenant with Israel, He promised them an inheritance. That was the worldly, temporal, large, fertile land of Canaan, flowing with milk and honey. Under that administration of theocracy, dealing with them as a nation, He gave them the material blessing of the land of Israel. That was a shadow of the coming eternal inheritance. When God’s people were in a nursery class in their spiritual life. After the fullness of time, when Christ, the full revelation, came, God wants to bring us to graduate in the New Testament. But many people today want to go back to the nursery class and stick with the land of Israel, always watching the news of Israel. False teachers use those Old Testament physical blessings and cheat millions today with prosperity gospel, without knowing the ABCs of progressive biblical revelation, or having any saving faith or spirituality. But many true saints, even in the Old Testament, matured in faith and saw beyond the promised material land. Hebrews 11:16 says they “looked for a better, that is, a heavenly country. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for He has prepared a city for them.” This was the hope of all spiritual, godly people in Israel. The land of Israel was a sample type of the eternal inheritance.
Secondly, the Bible shows our inheritance is all the glorious eternal blessings summed up in the phrase, Kingdom of God. 1 Corinthians 6:9: “Be not deceived, know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God?” Galatians 5:21: “They who do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God.” Jesus will say on the last day, as in Matthew 25:34, “enter into that kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.” The idea is that our inheritance is so glorious that we will not inherit a dry, barren forest. But a prepared kingdom, filled with richness, glory, safety, happiness, vast wealth of gold, with God reigning and revealing His glory and grace. In those days, a big monarch would prepare a glorious kingdom and hand over their whole prepared kingdom to their children; it would be vast. And so, we will receive the whole Kingdom of God. How big and vast and rich the Kingdom of God will be! We will inherit a whole kingdom with all its glorious riches.
Thirdly, Peter says that however much we explain, you will not grasp it. So he will tell you negatively what our inheritance is not. 1 Peter 1:4 says, “to an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled and that does not fade away, reserved in heaven for you.” It has three traits.
My son was saying, “Dad, see my friend there, his father has a 3,500 crore asset. Don’t you feel anything?” I told him, “Once I used to beat my mouth and breast in envy, but I don’t have that feeling now, because I realized… with all that 3,500 crore, he will have more tensions and worries. But he will eat just like me, with one stomach. If he eats more lavishly, he will soon become sick and have to be on a diet; soon he will leave the world and then face eternal torment. But God has promised me something better.” “Here is my inheritance, and tell me if there is any 3,500 crore or Elon Musk’s 420 billion USD, or an Indian’s 3.5 lakh crore, if there is any inheritance that has these three traits.”
- First, it is incorruptible. What is there in this world that is incorruptible? The same Elon Musk is now fighting with Trump, facing major problems in his company, and his stocks are going down. We don’t know if 420 billion will become 4 billion. How many rich men this world has seen, with how many mansions, fortresses, and kingdoms? They all perished or are now old museums. There is nothing incorruptible, but God has promised something that is incorruptible. No one can destroy it or reduce it. Sir, you may have wealth for 10 generations to sit and eat, but I ask, “What about the 11th generation? The children will beg.” See, my inheritance is incorruptible for thousands of generations. A 3,500 crore asset, if I spend 10 rupees, the 3,500 is reduced, right? You cannot say you have a 3,500 asset now. All wealth in this world has a trait that will be spent and perish. Isn’t that our worry always? All our wealth here is perishable. Oh, we spend so much, we will fall into debt or become a beggar. But God promises an inheritance you can spend for all eternity, and it will never perish. Wow! Many rich people don’t enjoy their wealth with the fear of a reducing asset. We also live with that fear. Imagine how much we can enjoy for all eternity if we have an incorruptible, imperishable inheritance. Daily world tours in a 5-star hotel… you should see me then! How generous I will be! Never a worry about a budget.
- Second, it is undefiled. This talks about the defilement of sin. Everything in the world is defiled by sin. Even the money we give to God, the tithes we would have earned working hard, it could have been used for murder, adultery, or robbery. We don’t know. It is all defiled. We buy land, how many people have fought and killed to acquire lands? Then when buying the land, who pays the accurate government rate? The buyer and seller cheat the government. They don’t sell at the government rate. How many cheating and bribes happen when building a house? People may have pure 911 gold, but the money used to buy it… so much of it is defiled by sin. A 3,500 crore asset or some big Adani wealth… how much cheating, fraud, controlling the government, cheating the poor, tax evasion, cheating employees, not helping suffering people! See, our inheritances are all defiled. This is a sinful place, and it is purchased with a defiled cost. That is why it brings sorrow and sleeplessness. We live our lives with fear and tension, and then we die, and our children keep fighting for it. The ground is cursed, and all creation is defiled by man’s sin. Nothing is undefiled in this world.
- Third, it is unfading. Where is there an unfading inheritance? We build a wonderful house with the ultimate paint outside. My uncle said, “a glass palace.” They built an apartment in front of it for two years. All the dust and mud made the new house look faded. My car, 10 years ago, “Oh, what a nice, big car.” My son keeps asking, “When will you change this car?” All faded. Also, whatever we buy, we are so excited when we buy it. We are excited for a month, but later we get used to it and get bored. Why does it fade? That is the nature of everything in the world. You buy a car for 10 crore, a 100 crore palace, a 3 lakh mobile. All of it fades. But this inheritance… we will never get bored or weary. It is always fresh, always bright, and always an exciting inheritance. It is unfading.
So choose your pick: Do you want 3,500 crore here or this glorious inheritance? Jesus said, “where your treasure is, there your heart will be.” Where is your focus? On the perishing, defiled, fading world, or on an imperishable, undefiled, unfading inheritance?
So Paul is bursting with joy thinking about the expansiveness of God’s salvation in Christ. He sees our past—election in eternity, history, past sins all forgiven and redeemed. He sees our present—administration all for my good, summing up everything in Christ. The climax of his praise is his future: “we have obtained an inheritance.”
We have seen the blessing of inheritance. Let us now see how this blessing came to us and why this came to us. All this further amplifies the glory of our inheritance.
How Did This Come to Us?
Verse 11: “In Him also we have obtained an inheritance, being predestined according to the purpose of Him who works all things according to the counsel of His will.” Having been predestined according to purpose. This is the exact same phrase used in verse 5, meaning “to decide upon beforehand.” This is again a great doctrine of predestination. This doctrine comes from the fact that God is eternal, outside of time and space. In eternity, before He created the world of space and time, God freely determined His purpose and plan. It didn’t depend on anything or any man; nothing of time can change what He predestined. Those are His decrees. Though everything may seem to work against it, what God predestined will come to pass. Just as evil men crucified Christ, Peter says in Acts that this was predestined by God, and that is why it happened.
I called this sermon “Predestined Inheritance.” I was amazed that Paul uses the great predestination plan for what? For our inheritance. Why? This is not some “pie in the sky by and by,” some distant, abstract concept. It shows the unshakable certainty of our inheritance. This predestined inheritance should give us complete assurance of our inheritance. If I am a child of God, come what may, I have an infinitely glorious inheritance reserved for me and will enjoy this inheritance forever with 100% guarantee. You can doubt anything, but you should never doubt your inheritance. Why? Because it is a predestined inheritance that you will attain. If God predestined something, it means it is a done deal! A wonderful comfort is that this predestined inheritance was not based on anything in us, anything in time. Nothing of time can change His predestination.
Our inheritance is predestined by God, promised by His Word, testified to by His Spirit, and has to be believed in by faith as if we see it with our eyes. And hope does not disappoint. This assurance fills us with our hope of glory, gives us joy, confidence, and boldness, even in the face of opposition and affliction, just as it did for Paul. Oh, if God opens our eyes, we will be like Moses, of whom Hebrews 11:26 says, “He considered the reproach of Christ greater wealth than the treasures of Egypt, for he was looking to the reward.”
So the question is, “How did this inheritance come to us?” The answer is that it came to us when God elected us and predestined us in eternity. Remember, He predestined us to adoption as sons. At that time, God had predestined that we should receive this inheritance as the ultimate, final blessing of our election. This inheritance is not something that was decided later in time, but this was the ultimate blessing of God’s predestination in the past eternity.
See, it was not because we did something. It was not by accident or human choice, or because we asked for or earned this inheritance. It comes to those for whom it was prepared and planned in God’s predestination. Paul is able to lift up his soul in pure praise to God alone because not only did He elect and redeem me, but He has predestined a glorious inheritance for me. It is all because of the Father’s benevolent design. Yes, we receive this inheritance because Christ by His life and blood purchased this. Christ’s work could be the effectual secondary cause, but the primary cause of our receiving this inheritance is the Father’s gracious predestination. That is why Paul goes beyond the work of Christ and traces this blessing to the eternal counsels of God, and he acknowledges that the fountainhead of this blessing is the sovereign elective purposes of God.
Do you see that a man cannot raise himself to this height of pure worship and praise unless he understands these grand truths of election and predestination? There is no merit of his own, no nonsense about free will, but it all comes from the Father through the Son by absolute sovereignty and free grace. So Paul traces this great blessing of the inheritance back to the predestinating work of God.
Then, notice verse 11: “In Him also we have obtained an inheritance, being predestined according to the purpose of Him…” He adds, “who works all things according to the counsel of His will.” Why does he add that? If you have any questions about whether we are going to attain that inheritance, or if any devil, sin, world, or powers of hell can stop us from attaining that inheritance, he adds this phrase to remove every milligram of doubt in your heart and give us 100% unshakable assurance. The God who predestined you to this inheritance is also the God who “works all things according to the counsel of His will.”
Oh, how this should fire up our praise! The word “predestination” itself is a big word. If God predestined something, nothing can change it. That is amplified by saying He “works all things.” The word “works” is a very strong word; “whose almighty power works all things.” “Works” means that He actively brings these things to pass.
See, the idea is that this is not some distant working, but a present, active working in every aspect of your life. It is almighty power working outside of you by administration to work all things for your good, and His power, as Philippians 2:13 says, “God works in you to will and to do.” He is effectively, effectually, and energetically working to fulfill His predestination and get you to your inheritance. That is the reason He sent His Son, that is the reason He saved you and brought you to church, that is the reason you are sitting here today; He is teaching you all this, and He is working all things in your life.
The Father who has chosen you and predestined you to sonship is right now powerfully and energetically working all things in every realm—heaven and earth, men and devils and angels—to fulfill His eternal decree. That is what is called the providence of God. Those grand words, “predestination” and “God’s powerful working providence,” are given to you so you may have an infallible assurance, not a guess or an imagination, that you will attain your inheritance. Nothing in the universe will be able to stop that, because nothing can hinder His predestination and powerful providential working.
No wonder, even in jail, Paul is filled with joy and falls prostrate at the feet of this great, unfettered Sovereign of the universe, who has an all-embracing plan and who is actively accomplishing that plan on the earth. This is biblical worship, not the stupid, superficial, sentimental “God is love.” You cannot worship the God of the Bible without grasping His predestination. Oh, child of God, if you are wondering what God is doing in your life, God is taking you to enjoy this glorious inheritance.
Why Did We Get This Blessing?
So we have seen what the blessing is—an inheritance. And how did it come to us—through the predestination of the One who works all things according to His plan? Now for the third question: Why? Did we achieve something for this? Did we earn this? Do we even need this? Now, a great question: Why would this great sovereign God, at such a great cost to Himself, put forth such a plan? Think of it. It costed Him the greatest sacrifice. When we plan, we would plan things that are easy, that don’t involve big sacrifices, risks, and pains on our side. In fact, our plans are to avoid unexpected pains. Why would He make such a plan that gave Him such pain and such a sacrifice of His only Son on the cruel cross?
Why, Lord, would you do this for such wretched, useless sinners? We can never pay You back, even if we glorify You for all eternity. Why would You shower not only election, redemption, and administration but even a future glorious inheritance? To redeem these depraved beings, run a government to save them, safely bring them to You, and bless them with an eternal inheritance? Why do such worms need such a glorious inheritance? You could just forgive them and leave them to survive somewhere.
Why? What is the ultimate goal of God in conferring this blessing? The answer is in verse 12: “that we who first trusted in Christ should be to the praise of His glory.” Wow! All He has done in conceiving this blessing and in conferring this blessing in His own sovereign counsel has as its specific goal that we should be to the praise of His glory. This means that we should be the means of causing His divine excellencies to be praised. The glory of God is the sum of all of His attributes, or any one of those attributes shining forth to men. That’s the glory of God.
But He uses a very interesting term. He says that we should be to the praise, not that we should just praise Him. This shows the glorious state we achieve when we receive our inheritance. What we become at that time, in our total person, will be such a reflection of the glory of grace that just being what we are will be an occasion for praise being rendered to God. Just our very being will make the universe praise God.
Now we are experiencing a foretaste of that inheritance. Ephesians 3:10 says, “that now unto the principalities and powers in the heavenly places might be made known through the church the manifold wisdom of God.” You may only see this building, the roof, and the people around, but do you know that the spiritual world is watching us? We may not have hundreds of pictures of angels and demons in the windows and roof as in a Catholic church, but spiritually it is true. Ephesians 3 says unseen spiritual beings called “the principalities and powers” are in the heavenly places. And what do they see? We who were wallowing in idolatry and the false religions of our forefathers, living in sin, now heard the gospel and are growing in truth. Christ has saved us and put us in His church. No power of hell can touch us. We come to worship God this morning from the heart, singing “Hallelujah! Praise Jehovah!” By just being God’s saved people, as new creatures, we are being prepared to be the cause for the praise of the glory of His grace, and those principalities and powers in the heavenly places have had to take note of what God has done in us and is doing in our lives. Just by being here this morning as believers worshiping God, you have been to the praise of the glory of His grace.
So when your full inheritance comes to you, you, in your very person, will be a reflection of the height of the riches of God’s grace, and you will be the cause for the praise of the glory of His grace. Not because you do something, but just by being you. Just as a lily, just as some exotic flower in a place where no one ever sees it, just by being there is a display of the wisdom and beauty of God. In the same way, you are to be to the praise of the glory of His grace.
So then, the ultimate goal in God’s salvation—so planned and applied—is that there should be this manifestation of His attributes, particularly His attributes of grace and mercy. The entire universe, all creatures, angels, and every being, when they see the inheritance God has blessed us with—such undeserving creatures blessed with such an indescribably glorious inheritance—they will, for all eternity, praise the glorious attribute of God’s grace and mercy. Our inheritance will reveal the height, depth, and width of God’s grace. Can you imagine how glorious, how thrilling, then, our inheritance must be?
Imagine a severely neglected, abandoned child, ostracized by society and considered utterly worthless. This child has no family, no prospects, and every reason to expect a life of hardship and despair. Now, imagine a powerful, immensely wealthy, and incredibly benevolent royal King and Queen. For reasons beyond comprehension—not because of anything the child did or deserved—they decide to adopt this specific child. They don’t just provide a roof over their head; they lavish upon this child a full, legal inheritance. They raise the child as their own, bestowing upon them education, love, security, and eventually, a co-heirship to their vast kingdom and all its unimaginable riches—a position previously unthinkable for someone of such humble, undeserving origins.
When the day comes that this adopted child, once the outcast, is revealed as a co-heir, seated in glory, inheriting boundless wealth and honor, imagine the profound reaction of everyone witnessing it. The “whole universal heaven and earth” (in this case, all the other citizens, servants, and even visiting dignitaries of the kingdom) would not primarily praise the child’s worth, but rather the King and Queen’s incredible, unfathomable grace and mercy. They would declare: “Look at the astonishing love of our King and Queen! To bestow such an indescribably glorious inheritance on one so utterly undeserving! This reveals the true height, depth, and width of their benevolence! Their grace knows no bounds!” This adopted child’s inheritance becomes a living, eternal testament to the incredible, undeserved grace and mercy of the royal family. In the same way, our undeserved, glorious inheritance in God’s salvation will eternally showcase the boundless attributes of His grace and mercy to all creation.
You remember this is exactly what he said in verse 6. “Why did God elect and predestine us?” Verse 6 says, “to the praise of the glory of His grace.” Now, when that predestined ultimate goal of granting an inheritance is also for the praise of God’s glory, he also concludes this whole praise in verse 14 with the same goal, “unto the praise of His glory.” The final goal is not human salvation or safety; it is the manifestation of divine glory. So the goal of election, predestination, redemption, and inheritance is that the creature should fall at His feet and cry from the heart, “For of Him, and through Him, and to Him, are all things, to whom be glory forever and forever. Amen.”
So we have seen what the blessing is: Inheritance. How it came to us: predestination. And why: to the praise of His glory.
Application
How many marvelous applications there are!
- First, how can we not bless this good God? Will this make us rise above our self-obsession and forget ourselves, our temporary difficulties, like Paul, and offer pure praise to God? He not only elected us, redeemed us, and runs an administration for our good, but He has also predestined a glorious future inheritance for us. Imagine, it was predestined from the foundation of the world. Matthew 25:34 says, “enter into that kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.” If this is a God who can create such a marvelous and beautiful world in six days, and if He has been preparing something for us from the foundation of the world, how glorious it will be! Paul said it is indescribable. I think it is possible that the Lord doesn’t tell us a whole lot about what Heaven looks like because He knows we couldn’t handle it. He knows that if we knew exactly what it was going to be like, we couldn’t think of anything else! It is a joy that is beyond our human capacities to comprehend and enjoy.
Moreover, this is God who works all things according to His purpose. Again, you will not grasp this when you are self-absorbed and thinking, “How can I deserve this?” Turn your focus to the giver; it is all for the praise of His glory. Oh, when I kept thinking about it, it melted my heart. “Oh, bless this God, bless this God; may He be glorified.” We should bow before His throne, lost in wonder, love, and praise.
- A true believer whose heart this melts should decide, “If God has made His glory the final goal in conceiving, providing, and applying such a salvation, then the goal of our short life on this earth should be, ‘whether you eat or drink, or whatsoever you do, do all to the glory of God.'” With all the difficult circumstances in my life, with all the temporary trials and pains, oh, may I determine with an iron will that I will not dishonor this blessed God for the small, light pains and difficulties of life, but glorify Him all my life. Every day I should praise.
- If we can just believe and praise that God works all things according to His purpose, how much peace we will have in life. If you are always tense, grumbling, and worried, you dishonor God. Paul taught in Philippians, “do everything without grumbling and arguing so you can shine as lights in a dark world.” If you are still sinning by grumbling, you need to meditate on verse 11: “who works all things according to the counsel of His will.”
It would be a scary world we are living in indeed if things were not under God’s sovereign control! Imagine that the great purpose of Iran or most Islamic governments is to convert the world to their religion—always by force. So they are trying to get nuclear power so they can have world power. One button, somewhere 1,000 kilometers away… imagine that Iran can send missiles into Israel 2,000 kilometers away. Any movement and some missile can fall into our country. Our Lord said more wars are coming, more tsunamis, more famine, more plagues like Covid. Oh, how tense you would be! You would become mental if we don’t learn to believe in the sovereignty of God. We have a God who works all things; nothing is beyond His control. We will be like our Lord, sleeping on a boat in the midst of a storm. Not that we will be indifferent to realities, but we will not be distracted from the main things of our life—seeking the kingdom and preaching the gospel.
Psalm 46 says: “God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble. Therefore we will not fear, Even though the earth be removed, and though the mountains be carried into the midst of the sea; though its waters roar and be troubled, though the mountains shake with its swelling.”
What does that mean in practical terms? Well, that means that you and I must not complain any longer about what life hands us. It is the Father who has made that choice. He has chosen to put us where we are and to put us into the situations where we find ourselves and to give us the problems that we have. Why? In order that, in the hurt and the heartache and the suffering, and in the joy and the blessing, whatever they may be, we are prepared for our eternal inheritance, making us more like Jesus. He is destroying the old man and renewing the new man in our home, our office, wherever we are. And as we respond with joy, praise, and acceptance of the situation we find ourselves in, God is glorified.
I don’t fully understand that, but I know it works. I know that is the way God is working. And therefore there is no escape from the heartache, hurt, and suffering. It is going to be there for us. But it is an opportunity, never an obstacle!
- This verse is a great examination of whether we are true believers or false believers. Today the world is filled with false believers. Do you know one great sign of a false believer? John Bunyan differentiated them with two characters: Passion and Patience. Passion wants all blessings now. He thinks, “Heaven, a pie in the sky, who knows what will happen after death. I want heaven now, prosperity now.” That is what makes them deceived by false preachers who lie to them, “God will give blessings now.” Patience decided to wait for the best things that are yet to come. Are you Passion or Patience? Do you want everything now or are you willing to wait for the best things? That will decide your eternal destiny. Passion can be rich or poor. Rich Passion is someone who is fully absorbed in the delights of the world—money, food, even good ones like family, children, husband, and wife—and hates to leave all this. Poor Passion is yearning for good things in this life but cannot get them. They are always dissatisfied and may even want to die sometimes, hoping it will be better on the other side of death. For them, “Everything is delightful now and I don’t want to leave it,” or “Everything’s bad now and I want to leave.” But a true child of God, no matter how rich he is, and no matter how many smiling providences he’s enjoying now—bills all paid, wife sweet, children healthy, everything cheap and nice and kind—he knows that this is not his heaven. And in the midst of all these things, he’s homesick. And he has to say, with the Apostle Paul, “we that are in this tabernacle do groan; the best is yet to come.”
So examine yourself: Are you Passion or Patience? Can you get excited like Paul about the thought of an inheritance in the world to come? I have no doubt that if a lawyer comes and tells you that your old uncle has died and wrote a will that all his 3,500 crore wealth is yours, you would get excited about that. Frankly, I would. I’d pay off my loans and get a new car. That’s just being human. But let me ask you something: Can you get just as excited about thinking of that inheritance obtained through the redemption of Jesus Christ? Is your relationship to this life and all that it involves such that you know the best is yet to come, and you long for that which is to come? In the heart of every true Christian, the consciousness of our inheritance is a source of great delight.
Let us not be bullied by the mocking world of the rich. The truth of our inheritance is that there is glorious, unimaginable bliss waiting for us, and Peter says it is “reserved for us.” All the wonderful blessings we experience in this world—redemption—are all just a foretaste of what is coming. How glorious and joyful our inheritance must be!
Not only can this passage help us differentiate between false and true believers, but it can also help us differentiate between false and true religion. The test of all sound doctrine is that it gives all glory to God and none to man. We are so man-centered that we think salvation is all about us. See all the false religions where a priest or pastor can give salvation, or Arminianism, “I believed and I was saved.” But, we need to understand that it is primarily about His glory. He saves us by His sovereign grace so that we will be to the praise of His glory. MLJ said, “In every view of salvation, the place given in it to the glory of God provides the ultimate test of every teaching.”
Is this inheritance promised for everyone? Verse 12 gives a condition: “We who first trusted in Christ.” Again, there is a big debate as to what Paul means when he switches to “we” and then says in verse 13 “you.” I’ll not go into that, but this thing is clear. This inheritance is promised to only those who trust in Christ. You don’t have to break your head wondering whether God has predestined you or not. If you put your faith in Christ, leaning the whole weight of your soul on Christ’s blood and His righteousness as He’s revealed in the Gospel, you have this inheritance. Think about what your hope for your future is. All the inheritance in this life you desire so much—nothing will come with you. They are perishable and will fade. True riches are only found in Christ.
Because if you don’t come to Christ, the Bible promises a terrible inheritance. You are adding to that inheritance every day, every minute. Romans 2:4-5 says: “Or do you despise the riches of His goodness, forbearance, and longsuffering, not knowing that the goodness of God leads you to repentance? But in accordance with your hardness and your impenitent heart you are treasuring up for yourself wrath in the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God.” Do you despise, or take lightly, God’s goodness? He is calling you to be saved, yet you are treasuring up wrath. Every day you live, as long as you are not obeying the gospel, you are only storing up wrath for your eternal inheritance. Oh, may God open your eyes to these divine realities and enable you to believe in Christ.
Grace Reformed Baptist Church, Bangalore 