Ephesians 1:4-5 “For he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight. He predestined us for adoption to sonship  through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will.”

Those who make the glory of God their end, and the Word of God their rule, the Spirit of God the guide of their affections, and the providence of God the dictator of their affairs, may be confident that the Lord goes before them, as truly as He went before Israel in the wilderness. We must live by faith.

Where do you, me, we put our trust?  Who or what is the most important thing to us in life?  If you ever had to lay down your life for someone or something who or what would it be?  The N.T. book of Ephesians is written to a group of believers rich beyond measure in Jesus Christ, but they are also a group of believers who continue to live as beggars!  That’s a real oxymoron isn’t it.  How can one be rich beyond measure and at the same time continue to live life as a beggar?

When we get up in the morning we have a certain series of actions that we automatically do.  That’s muscle memory, we don’t even have to think about it because it has become second nature to our spirit.  When we go out to our vehicle to drive somewhere, muscle memory kicks in and we don’t even have to look at the buttons or key location in order to get in and start your vehicle.  That’s what I mean by muscle memory.

Our muscle memory, or more succinctly Our Posture should be readily available to pull  the spiritual trigger whenever a situation arises – good, bad or indifferent.  So to move from poverty to prosperity, believers must first read and meditate on what God’s Word to discover God’s continual calling on our lives.  This is a progressive movement, more than just a one-time won and done.

Why is Ephesians critical to the church and thus critical to every single believer?  The Book of Ephesians is full of grace filled encouragement.  If you feel tired, worn down, beat up, discouraged, nowhere left to turn, lonely, confused, dejected, and rejected, welcome to Ephesians.  I’m telling you our souls need Ephesians to lift us up from wherever we stand!. We need the gospel promises everyday of our lives.  Paul is writing to ordinary people at Ephesus.  People just like us, some were young, some were old, some were wealthy, some were poor, some were middle class; it doesn’t matter.  They were Christians living in the world.  They first needed to understand spiritually who they were and then how to live in that reality, in their present time.

When God chooses someone, His soul delights in them, in you and I.  We were chosen by Jesus before the foundation of the world–this is better than being picked on a playground pick up game.  Remember those games, when the two captains would chose who  they would pick on their team and you hoped you would just get picked.  Well I came by to tell you that the captain of all captains has picked you and I before the foundations of the world – thus our posture aught to be straight, upright, proud, secure, sincere, faithful, hopeful and full of His Godly promises.

When a person truly understands that oxygen is a gift from above, they will not smoke.  If a person comprehends that good health is a gift from above, they are not going to abuse their bodies with drugs and alcohol.  When a Christan understands that grace is a gift from above, they will make the choice  to say “no” to wrong and “yes” to right.  It’s all about Our Posture.

That is the way a lot of us are.  Our posture shows how we are living our Christian lives. We’re so busy living it on a law leash.  Stop that!  Don’t do that!  Come here!  Read your Bible!  Pray!  Go  to church every Sunday!  There is nothing wrong with these things.  It’s just that a leash is jerking us around.  It gives us bad posture.

But have you ever seen a dog walked by its master without a leash and without ever leaving  the master?  The person walks and the dog walks.  The person stops and the dog stops. You can always tell the difference between a grace dog and a law dog when you walk into the house.  A law dog has its  tail tucked underneath.  It’s master intimidates it.  It’s afraid of it’s master.  It is a miserable dog.  But a grace dog’s tail is wagging when its master comes home because there’s a relationship there. Your Posture matters.

Those who make the glory of God their end, and the Word of God their rule, the Spirit of God the guide of their affections, and the providence of God the dictator of their affairs, may be confident that the Lord goes before them, as truly as He went before Israel in the wilderness, we must live by faith.

“For he himself is our peace, who has made the two groups (Jew & Gentile) one and has destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility, by setting aside in his flesh the law with its commands and regulations.  His purpose was to create in himself one new humanity out of the two, thus making peace, and in one body to reconcile both of them to God through the cross, by which he put to death their hostility.  He came and preached peace to you who were far away and peace to those who were near. For through him we both have access to the Father by one Spirit.”

We cannot change anything by our own works. The only thing that can change our condition. The only thing that can change our circumstances. The only thing that can change is our posture—the only way our condition changes and we receive a new spirit and a new life.

My posture, our posture, ought to continually reflect the newness in Christ that resides in each one of us.  Our posture ought to say to everyone and anyone who sees us that there’s something peculiar about that person, there’s something different about that person.

Christ himself is our peace.  Christ is our peace with God and with others. Christ has made us into one body in himself (verses 15-16).  We have become in spirit a new community.

Success in Christian works is not to be measured by any other standard of achievement.  It is not the number of new buildings or the crowds that flock to listen to any human voice, not even mine.  All of these things are frequently used as yardsticks of success, but they are earthly, not heavenly measures. Those who make the glory of God their end may be confident that the Lord goes before them, as truly as He went before Israel in the wilderness.  We must live by faith.

On Sunday, January 6, 1850, a young man not quite sixteen years of age walked through a village street in a little town some fifty miles from London, England.  On the bitterly cold day the snow fell heavily; but he was more concerned to find a church, because he was deeply conscious of his need of God, and of the breakdown, sin, and failure of his life even at the young age of sixteen.

As he made his way through the street with the snow falling, he felt it was too far to go to the church which he had intended to visit, so he walked down a back lane and entered a little Methodist chapel.

He sat down on a seat near the back, and it was as cold inside as it was outside. There were only about thirteen people there.  Five minutes after the service was due to begin at eleven o’clock, the regular preacher for the morning hadn’t come.  He had been delayed by the weather.  So one of the deacons came  to the rescue and began conducting the service, and after a little while announced his text, “Look unto me, and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth, for I am God, and there is none else.”  (Isaiah 45:22)

The deacon didn’t know much, so he only spoke for about ten minutes.  Charles Spurgeon himself tells what happened next.  “I had been wandering about, seeking rest, and finding none, till a plain, unlettered, lay preacher among the Primitive Methodists stood up in the pulpit, and gave out this passage as his text, “Look unto me, and be ye saved.” He had not much else to say that compelled him to keep on repeating his text.

I remember how he said, it is Christ that speaks. Look unto me. That is all you have to do.  A child can look.  One who is almost an idiot can look. However weak, or however poor, a man or woman may be, he or she can look, and if he or she looks, the promise is that he or she shall live.

Somehow in a very strange and amazing way that young man looked from the depths of his soul into the very heart of God.  Why?  How?  Because Christ had opened the door.  This young man went out from the church never  to return again.  He walked with a new sense of peace in his heart.  He had looked and lived. His posture had changed.

(Some commentary from Enduring Word is cited.)