Ephesians 1:3-4 - "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him."
Last night, sixty or so young men, aged 19 or 20, were chosen by thirty professional basketball teams to play on the best basketball teams in the world. As I understand it, each of the first thirty young men who were chosen are all guaranteed to make millions of dollars a year, at least for a few years.
I'm sincerely happy for the young men who were chosen, especially the ones who were not picked as soon as they thought they'd be and who gave testimony to their trust in God, even when things don't go exactly as you hoped.
But as sincerely happy as I am for those young men who were chosen, that whole selection process creates a reality where many, let's even say most, people in our society begin to compare the importance and value of their own life to the lives of these instant-millionaire, mostly-teenage, athletes, whose primary skill is pretty silly when you think about basketball as jumping up high to put a ball in a hoop! In sum, many people hear the soon-to-be million-dollar salaries of these teenagers and immediately begin to devalue and underestimate the importance of their "ordinary" life when compared to the ballplayers.
Well, here's what God has to say about that in today's Bible verses. God says, when you truly put your faith in Jesus Christ, you are given to know two very real and very important things.
First, when you truly put your faith in Jesus Christ, you are given by God to know that you were chosen for the most important team before the foundation of the world. In other words, God picked you for God's team, and he picked you long before there was anything, let alone professional basketball. Everyone who believes in Jesus is a first-round draft pick on God's team.
And second, God says, that since you are a first round draft pick for the team of the Living God, then your pay, to be sure, is not in the millions of dollars. It's actually more!!! "In Christ, [we have] every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places" (Ephesians 1:3-4). Wow! "Every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places!" How can you put a W-2 on that? You can't! Not only is it not taxed, but it is yours to have every single day, if you will just believe and pursue God's Word for instruction on how to claim it and enjoy it!
Friends, let's be happy for the instant millionaire teenagers who God gave talent to jump high and put a leather ball in a metal hole. But even moreso, let's rejoice that every single human being who will put their trust in Jesus is a first round choice of the Living God and therefore has infinite riches to claim!
Let us be found believing!
Praise God!
Pastor Chris
"The gospel is the story of Jesus [what God's only Son has done for us that we can't do for ourselves], spoken as a promise." - Robert Jenson
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