Introducing Sermon Series
Dear Ascension Family,
I’m writing this week to let you know that we are beginning a new sermon series this coming Sunday, October 13. Over the next seven Sundays, we will be preaching through Ephesians, chapters 1-3. The title of this series is True Story: An Alternate Reading of Reality.
We live in confused and complex times, times in which there are all manner of competing narratives or descriptions of reality contending for our attention and allegiance. Stories about the past, whether positive or negative, stories about the present and our identities here and now, and stories about the future, the end to which we are either progressing or which we must endeavor to avoid. It can be profoundly difficult to remember what is most true and real.
Writing in 1978, the great Welsh preacher Martyn Lloyd-Jones described the world, in the preface to a collection of sermons on Ephesians, as “ in a state of utter confusion… wondering what its future is to be, and what the outcome of our present troubles is going to be, with men (and women) at the end of their wits, and the end of their tether.” Perhaps those words, over 45 years old, are a comforting reminder that the challenging times in which we live are not unique.
Even better than that reminder is the remedy to that confusion that Lloyd-Jones finds in Paul’s letter. He suggests that Ephesians is of primary use in helping us to “realize what we are, and who we are, what God has done in Christ and the way He has blessed us.” He argues, “the supreme object of this Epistle is to lead us into, and give us a view and a glimpse of the riches, the super-abundant riches of the grace of God.”
I need that. We desperately need a deeper understanding and appreciation of this alternative reading of our lives and our circumstances. We need to be more fully rooted in the reality of God’s abundant grace, lavished upon us in Jesus. As we move through these chapters over the coming weeks, may the truth of all God the Father has done for us in Jesus be made very real to us, such that our confidence in Him and His good ends might increase.
Please join me in praying toward this end. You might also consider spending time reading or listening (again and again) to these chapters, learning more about the epistle, and prayerfully meditating upon its words.
I’m excited to be reminded of the good and true story again with you.
In Christ,
Peter+