HOW TO HAVE A GREAT LIFE.
"How to Have a Great Life" is based on the
letter Paul sent to the Christians at Ephesus
about A.D. 60. You'll find references to
Ephesians as you read on and brackets indicate
our comments.
(The first step in having a great life is to get
right with God.
God runs the universe by a law of love and
justice. This requires us to genuinely love Him
and others. He leaves us free to live by His law
or go our own way. We all choose our way,
breaking His law. The penalty is spiritual
death. In the person of Jesus Christ, God showed
how much He loves you by paying your penalty and
dying in your place at Calvary. It's as if you
are a convicted prisoner being offered an
undeserved pardon from a death sentence.
You have the choice of:
-Rejecting the pardon and paying this death
penalty yourself - for God's justice will be
done.
-OR
-Accepting the pardon by genuinely turning to
and trusting in Jesus Christ.
If you want to do that, then tell Him in
words like these: "DEAR GOD, I'VE GONE MY OWN
WAY BUT NOW I WANT TO TURN AND GO YOUR WAY. I
BELIEVE YOU WILL FORGIVE MY PAST SINS AND
GIVE ME A NEW LIFE AS A MEMBER OF YOUR
FAMILY. I BELIEVE THE WAY TO DO THIS IS
THROUGH TRUST IN YOUR SON JESUS CHRIST.
THANKS FOR ACCEPTING ME."
From here on, what we say assumes you have
turned to Jesus and become a member of His
family).
May your experience of God's undeserved love and
peace cause you to praise and thank Him. Christ
in heaven has all God's blessings. As a
believer, you now share them all. He chose you
before the creation of the world to be clean,
pure and blameless in His sight. Out of love He
chose you for adoption as His child. You were in
sin's prison but Christ's death provided the
free gift of an undeserved pardon. You took it,
your sins were forgiven and you were set free
when you believed in Him. How great is God's
undeserved love, wisdom and understanding as He
is bringing you, together with everything in
heaven and on earth, under Christ's complete
control.
(Chapter 1: 1-10)
You are part of Christ's master plan, chosen to
bring praise and honour to Him. When you
responded to the truth of Christ's Good News and
believed, God the Holy Spirit took up residence
guaranteeing your ultimate destiny in heaven.
(Chapter 1:ll-14)
May God give you the Spirit of wisdom to know
Him better every day. May you have inner
certainty that you have eternal life. God used
His incomparably great power and mighty strength
to raise Christ from death and seat Him at His
right hand in heaven as supreme ruler of the
universe forever. God the Holy Spirit lives
within you with this power to accomplish His
will in His world through you.
(Chapter 1:15-23)
Before you turned to and trusted in Christ, you
followed the desires, thoughts and cravings of
your sinful nature. You lived according to the
devil's worldly wisdom, disobedient to God,
alienated from Him and, by nature, an object of
His wrath.
But now, because of His great love for you, God
has made you alive with Christ, raised you up
with Him and seated you with Him in the heavenly
realms. How incomparably rich is His undeserved
love (grace) and kindness to you. It is by God's
grace you have been saved through faith. It is a
gift of God which you didn't earn or deserve. So
you are God's workmanship created in Christ to
do the good works He has already prepared for
you to do.
(Chapter 2: 1-10)
Formerly you were far away, separate from
Christ, without hope and without God in the
world. But now you have been brought near
through Christ's blood. He is your peace, for
through Him,you have access to the Father by one
Spirit.
You are a member of God's household (or church)
whose cornerstone is Christ. He joins you with
other believers to become a dwelling in which
God lives by His Spirit.
(Chapter 2:11-22)
God's intention is that, through His family,(the
church) His manifold wisdom should be revealed
to heaven's rulers and authorities.
Remember that through faith in Christ, you can
approach God with freedom and confidence.
(Chapter 3: 1-13)
May God your Father strengthen you with power
through His Spirit in your inner being and may
Christ dwell in your heart through faith.May you
being rooted and established in love, have power
to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is
Christ's love. May you know Christ's love that
surpasses knowledge and be filled with all the
fullness of God.
Remember that God is able, because of His power
within you, to do immeasurably more than you ask
or imagine and therefore give eternal praise and
thanks to Him.
(Chapter 3:14-21)
Christ has called you to be His person in the
world, so live a life worthy of the call. Do it
by being completely humble, gentle, patient and
loving.
You and other believers are God's family. It is
one body, controlled by one Spirit just as there
is one God and Father of all who is over all,
through all and in all. Make every effort to
keep the family unified in Spirit and in peace.
God has given each member of His family (the
body of Christ) different abilities, to prepare
His people for works of service. The goal is to
build the body of Christ up, until unity in the
faith and knowledge of Christ is reached and you
are mature, measuring up as a Christ filled
person.
(Chapter 4: 1-13)
Then you won't be taken in by religious
schemers, but speaking the truth in love, every
part of your life will grow and become Christ
controlled. He will join you to other members of
His body (the church) and it will grow, building
itself up in love as each member plays their
part.
(Chapter 4:14-16)
Put your former way of life behind you
completely. No more deceitful desires,
falsehood, anger, stealing, unwholesome talk,
bitterness, rage, brawling, slander and malice
for you.
Instead, since you are one with God the Father
and Son by the power of God the Holy Spirit
dwelling within you, let the fact of your new
self show. Let it show in right living,
separation from the world's ways, truthfulness,
getting rid of anger by sundown, working, so you
can share with those in need, speaking to build
others up, being kind and compassionate and
forgiving others just as Christ forgave you.
(Chapter 4:17-32)
Christ loves you so much that He died for you,
as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.
(Therefore confess and be cleansed of sin so God
is free to live His life of love through you).
God's light will shine through you in goodness,
right living and truth. Live wisely, controlled
by God's will and constantly filled with His
Spirit. Build other believers up with psalms,
hymns and spiritual songs. Sing and make music
in your heart to the Lord, always giving thanks
to God the Father for everything in the name of
our Lord Jesus Christ.
For you there must not be even a hint of sexual
immorality or of any kind of impurity, greed,
obscenity, foolish talk, or coarse joking.
Immorality, impurity and greed, means things are
more important than God. This is idolatry, the
disobedience that brings God's wrath. Those who
live that way have no place in God's kingdom.
(Chapter 5: 1-21)
If you are a wife, the Holy Spirit within you
will enable you to submit to your husband out of
reverence for Christ.
If you are a husband, you have left your father
and mother and become one flesh with your wife.
Therefore, being part of you, love her as
yourself. Christ died for you because He loves
you. Love your wife in that way, enabling her to
"stand before" Christ, radiant, unblemished,
pure and blameless.
(Chapter 5:22-33)
If you are a young person still living under
your parents' control, obey them and give them
honour.
If you are a father, be loving, kind and
understanding of your children, training and
instructing them in God's ways.
Workers, respectfully obey your employers and
serve with sincerity of heart, as if you were
working for Christ not men, for God rewards such
service.
Employers, treat your workers with sincerity and
respect, as if each one were Christ. God "knows
the score." He is your master and theirs.
(Chapter 6: 1- 9)
You'll never be able to live this way "on your
own bat." You can only live this life with the
strength and might God gives.
You are up against the devil and his schemes,
the rulers, authorities, powers and spiritual
forces of evil in the heavenly realms.
But God has given you the armour of victory. (As
Paul says in Romans 8:37, "In all these things
we are more than conquerors through Him who
loved us." In James 4:7 it says to resist the
devil [in Jesus' name] and he must flee from
you.). So put the following armour on and
keep it on:
The belt of truth.
The breastplate of righteousness (being
right with God by accepting His gift of
Christ, not through your own efforts).
The footwear of the Gospel (and readiness to
move with it).
The shield of faith (to extinguish the
devil's fiery darts).
The helmet of salvation (being SURE you are
God's child through faith in Christ).
The sword of the Spirit which is God's Word.
Keep alert and pray constantly under the
guidance of God the Holy Spirit within.
Peace and grace and love with faith from God the
Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
(Chapter 6:10-23)
HERE ARE SOME MAIN POINTS FROM EPHESIANS:
1. God loves you. His undeserved favour has
brought you home to union with Him. So you
are His workmanship, created to have the best
possible life - one of love surpassing
knowledge, filled with all the fullness of
God, in which He lives through you.
2. You and other believers are members of God's
family. (the name for your meetings together
is church). God has given each member
different abilities. When each uses his
ability for the benefit of the others,
everyone is helped to be more controlled by
Christ.
3. Christ decisively defeated Satan at Calvary.
Since Christ lives in you in the person of
the Holy Spirit you share the victory. But
Satan won't be "buried" 'til Christ returns
to earth. In the meantime, he causes as much
trouble as he can. So, you'll be involved in
spiritual warfare with a defeated enemy. For
this God supplies the armour but you need the
discipline of putting it on.
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