Wednesday’s Column: Third’s Words

Ephesians 1.3 says, “In Christ, God has given us every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places.” What does that mean? We hear “spiritual blessings” and might gloss over it as another Christianese phrase. Here’s a short list of what those spiritual blessings are.  

• 1.4 — God chose us before Christ made the world. 
• 1.4 — He chose us out of love to be his special people. 
• 1.5 — He chose us to be his own children through Jesus Christ. 
• 1.6 — God gives grace liberally.
• 1.7 — We are free because of Jesus’s sacrifice. 
• 1.7 — We have forgiveness because of God’s grace. 
• 1.8-9 — God told us how we can get that grace. He didn’t set up a system that we would have to look super hard for, he made sure to preserve the information needed to find him.  
• 1.10 — He is bringing the heavens and the earth together through Jesus. 
• 1.12-13 — He made grace available to every country on earth, not just one group. 
• 1.13-14 — He gave us his spirit as a downpayment on our reward. 

While we won’t fully appreciate these spiritual blessings until later (Paul says these riches are “too great to fully understand” in 3.8), we’re still extremely grateful that God has done so much to give us hope for eternal life.