SPEAKER_00: Christ is risen.
SPEAKER_00: We are an Easter people.
SPEAKER_00: And alleluia is our song.
SPEAKER_00: So we'll continue to gather our hearts around the good news that Christ is alive, and in Christ we can have life.
SPEAKER_00: I want you to listen to this smaller section from the book of Ephesians for the good news that God has for you today.
SPEAKER_00: You also were included in Christ when you heard the message of truth, the gospel of your salvation.
SPEAKER_00: For this reason, you were marked with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit, a deposit guaranteeing your inheritance until the redemption of those who are God's possession, to the praise of his glory.
SPEAKER_00: For this reason, ever since I heard about your faith in the Lord and your love for all God's people, I've not stopped giving thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers.
SPEAKER_00: I keep asking that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the glorious Father, would give you a spirit of wisdom and understanding so that you might come to know him more.
SPEAKER_00: I pray that the eyes of your heart will be enlightened so that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the glorious inheritance of his saints, and the incomparably great power for those who believe.
SPEAKER_00: That power is the same as the mighty strength that God exerted when he raised Jesus from the dead and raised him into the heavenly places and seated him at the right hand of the Father far above every power and dominion, every rule and authority, every name that is invoked, not only in this age, but it also in the age to come.
SPEAKER_00: And God placed all things under his feet and appointed him to be head over everything in the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills everything in every way.
SPEAKER_00: As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins, in which you used to live when you followed the ways of the world and the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the spirit who's now at work and those who are disobedient.
SPEAKER_00: All of us also lived among them, gratifying the desires of the flesh with its cravings and thoughts.
SPEAKER_00: Like the rest, we were all deserving of wrath.
SPEAKER_00: But God, who is rich in mercy, out of the great love with which he loved us, made us alive together with Christ, even while we were dead in our transgressions.
SPEAKER_00: It's by grace you have been saved.
SPEAKER_00: And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms, in order that in the coming ages he might show us the incomparable riches of his grace expressed to us in the kindness of Christ Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: For it's by grace you have been saved through faith.
SPEAKER_00: It's not from yourselves, it's the gift of God, not by works, so that no one can boast for your God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for you to do.
SPEAKER_00: This is the word of the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Thanks be to God.
SPEAKER_00: My prayer is that one or two words or phrases maybe stood out to you.
SPEAKER_00: But the language can feel dense, and there's some big words, and if you're anything like me, you might have spaced out.
SPEAKER_00: And I started to sound like the teacher in Charlie Brown.
SPEAKER_00: So I want you to be able to walk out of here holding on to something tangible.
SPEAKER_00: If you hear me say anything, let it be this.
SPEAKER_00: You're called to hope, and Christ is exalted above all.
SPEAKER_00: On the afternoon of Resurrection Sunday, Easter, my husband Ben and I hopped into our car after I'd preached at the warehouse, and we drove to O'Hare to get on an Iceland air flight with a short layover in Reykjavik, and then we bopped over to the city of Manchester, and then we got on a bus and two trains and made our way to the city of York.
SPEAKER_00: We were in England for four nights.
SPEAKER_00: My husband's a teacher, it was his spring break.
SPEAKER_00: And in this blitz of a trip, we spent most of our time in the city of York, which is a stunning place.
SPEAKER_00: York is cool because a lot of the medieval architecture hasn't been replaced by high-rise buildings.
SPEAKER_00: You can maneuver the streets, it's gorgeous.
SPEAKER_00: There's a city wall that surrounds the city that you can actually walk on the top of, and you can walk the entire perimeter of the city.
SPEAKER_00: And like any good medieval city, there are gatehouses where folks would come in and out.
SPEAKER_00: And each gatehouse, some used to be prisons, some used to be tanneries, some used to be shops, now they're all coffee shops and pubs.
SPEAKER_00: We went to one in particular, I have a picture of it here, on our day that we were just walking the city walls.
SPEAKER_00: And I was struck by this particular coffee shop because we wandered up to the rooftop and there were these two women sitting there talking.
SPEAKER_00: They were very clearly like tourists in their mid-20s, enjoying their Easter bank holiday, is what they call it in the UK.
SPEAKER_00: And the barista was talking to them very excitedly about the love of Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: So we're facing in toward the city with our backs to them, eavesdropping on this live gospel conversation.
SPEAKER_00: And what struck me the most about it was first the very non-anxious and safe way that they were listening.
SPEAKER_00: Like he had clearly made them feel comfortable enough to be curious and engage in conversation.
SPEAKER_00: And the very fresh, innocent, almost childlike way in which he was talking about the love that God has for them.
SPEAKER_00: So we just eavesdropped for a little bit and then went on our way.
SPEAKER_00: And at the coffee shop desk, there were little invitations to Alpha at their church.
SPEAKER_00: It was like a ministry of the local church coffee shop.
SPEAKER_00: And that barista sharing the gospel was the most clear picture I think I've seen in a while of someone whose eyes are wide open to the hope that they have.
SPEAKER_00: That's the prayer from Ephesians.
SPEAKER_00: I pray that the eyes of your heart will be enlightened so that you may know the hope to which you're called, the riches of your inheritance with God, and his incomparably great power for those who believe.
SPEAKER_00: His eyes, the eyes of his heart, were freshly awakened to the good news about Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: He was full of hope, so much so that he couldn't help but share about the hope that he was called to.
SPEAKER_00: And I wonder if that can be our prayer too.
SPEAKER_00: Don't you want that?
SPEAKER_00: Do you remember a time when the good news about Jesus and the love of God felt so real you couldn't help but tell people?
SPEAKER_00: That's the prayer.
SPEAKER_00: He's not praying that they would have this aha moment of salvation.
SPEAKER_00: That's already happened.
SPEAKER_00: We learned in chapter 1, verse 13 through 14, when they believed, they were marked with a seal of the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_00: The moment of coming to faith has already taken place, whether at one point in time or gradually across a life of grace.
SPEAKER_00: But here the prayer is that the eyes of the believers' hearts would be opened in a fresh way, in a new way to experience, to feel, to notice somehow that the hope of the gospel and the inheritance of the church and the power that were given in Christ Jesus, that it's that it's real.
SPEAKER_00: Can you remember a moment when that was true for you?
SPEAKER_00: I'm thinking of summer camp or the Passion Conference in 2015.
SPEAKER_00: Wonder what it was for you.
SPEAKER_00: But then the feeling fades, and the Sunday school answers you were taught appear to be cracking apart as the pain of life gets real.
SPEAKER_00: What do you do then?
SPEAKER_00: Take heart because that's the moment the prayer is for.
SPEAKER_00: The prayer is for the moment when the eyes of your heart are not opened to the hope that you already have.
SPEAKER_00: We're given these words as a prayer that we can offer in our moments of apathy, in our moments when faith feels monotonous, in our moments when we can't quite see clearly.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe this is your prayer this week.
SPEAKER_00: God, open the eyes of my heart so that I can see the hope you're calling me to.
SPEAKER_00: Open the eyes of my heart so that I can trust that you've given me an inheritance.
SPEAKER_00: Open the eyes of my heart so that I can experience the power you've given me in Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_00: It reminds me of that song from the 90s.
SPEAKER_00: Open the eyes of my heart.
SPEAKER_00: Oh to see you.
SPEAKER_00: Nice job, guys.
SPEAKER_00: You could you caught on a little louder than the 8 a.m.
SPEAKER_00: did.
SPEAKER_00: That's the prayer for the moments when our eyes aren't opened.
SPEAKER_00: And the the prayer that the author prayed for the Ephesians is a prayer that the communion of saints around the world is praying for you.
SPEAKER_00: If the prayer seems too hopeful or positive for you to pray yourself, we'll pray it for you.
SPEAKER_00: If you're not quite sure about faith, not even sure about God or church, we'll pray it for you.
SPEAKER_00: Let this community pray on your behalf that your eyes could be opened to the hope that you have.
SPEAKER_00: If you're the one who can't see right now by yourself.
SPEAKER_00: Are you with me?
SPEAKER_00: We'll pray it for you.
SPEAKER_00: One other York story that I have to share.
SPEAKER_00: There's this stunning cathedral there called the York Minster.
SPEAKER_00: And Ben and I, like the nerds that we are, signed up for the first historical tour of the day.
SPEAKER_00: We're standing at the door in our coats, getting into the cathedral.
SPEAKER_00: And our tour guide took us to all her pet favorite pieces of art in the cathedral.
SPEAKER_00: And then we started to catch on.
SPEAKER_00: Not every tour is the same.
SPEAKER_00: If you invade the next tour, you get a whole different look at the cathedral.
SPEAKER_00: So we went on three tours.
SPEAKER_00: First tour, we ducked out of early, joined a second tour, ducked out of that early.
SPEAKER_00: And by the time we got to the third tour, this gentleman took us back to the east side of the cathedral and showed us this stunning stained glass.
SPEAKER_00: I think he pointed it out because it's famous for its artistic glory.
SPEAKER_00: He explained to us that each of the square panels is a different scene from the book of Revelation.
SPEAKER_00: So if you look closely, you can see the lake of glass like crystal and all the gems.
SPEAKER_00: And then you can see the 700 monster from chapter 13.
SPEAKER_00: You can see the 24 thrones and the 24 elders sitting on the thrones.
SPEAKER_00: And you can see the lamb as if it had been slain, sitting on the throne in the middle of it all.
SPEAKER_00: And then the tour guide said, in the time that the cathedral was constructed, there was widespread famine and disease and political division, and this would have been an anchoring image for the worshipers at that time that Christ is on the throne and evil does not have the final word.
SPEAKER_00: And then in his subversive way, he said, Don't we still need that assurance today?
SPEAKER_00: And I was standing in the back of the tour, like, preach.
SPEAKER_00: He clearly trusted Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: And he was sensitive to the reality that that week was a particularly anxious one when it comes to international politics.
SPEAKER_00: And as he said that, you could feel the anxiety of the group just release.
SPEAKER_00: Christ is on the throne, and evil does not have the final word.
SPEAKER_00: And that's what I'm hoping we'll be attentive to together from Ephesians.
SPEAKER_00: This movement is stunning to me.
SPEAKER_00: God exerting mighty strength to exalt Jesus from the lowest place to the highest place, to exalt him to the right hand of the Father in heaven.
SPEAKER_00: In whatever ancient conception of the cosmos the writer had, he's saying that God has brought Jesus from the lowest of lows to the highest of highs, from utter desolation to enthroned above, from hell to heaven, from rock bottom to king of it all.
SPEAKER_00: And the power that it would take to bring a whole human being from the lowest place to the highest place is the same power that is in you.
SPEAKER_00: That's the promise.
SPEAKER_00: And it doesn't stop there.
SPEAKER_00: The author says, okay, if Christ is exalted in the highest place, that means he's exalted far above every power and dominion, far above every ruler and authority, far above every name that is invoked.
SPEAKER_00: Not only today, but in 2026 and in the present, future to come.
SPEAKER_00: Christ is exalted above all, which means he's not only more powerful than any evil or corrupt spiritual or political force we could imagine, he has total authority over them.
SPEAKER_00: Far above it all.
SPEAKER_00: It reminds me of the movement of the Philippians 2, Christ him.
SPEAKER_00: After Christ had emptied himself and taken the form of a slave, God exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every name.
SPEAKER_00: That at the name of Jesus, every knee will bow and every tongue confess.
SPEAKER_00: Every knee is gonna bow to Jesus one day.
SPEAKER_00: And evil does not have the final word.
SPEAKER_00: That's the promise.
SPEAKER_00: Here is where it gets a little crazier in the Ephesians passage.
SPEAKER_00: Are you willing to wrestle a little bit theologically with me?
SPEAKER_00: Because I don't have it figured out.
SPEAKER_00: Okay, great.
SPEAKER_00: Somehow we are there too, exalted with Christ.
SPEAKER_00: If you look at chapter 2, verse 6, you'll read, and God raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly realms, in Christ Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: We're there too.
SPEAKER_00: And it's past tense.
SPEAKER_00: There's something true of us now with Christ in the heavenly places.
SPEAKER_00: And God raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places.
SPEAKER_00: There's more to your life with God than meets the eye.
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, you're sitting here, but you're exalted with Christ in the heavenly places.
SPEAKER_00: It reminds me of this helpful quote from Irenaeus: the Son of God became what we are in order to make us what he is himself.
SPEAKER_00: In other words, the most glorified, beautiful, truest version of a human.
SPEAKER_00: Somehow, in his fullness, in his glorified, resurrected humanity, Christ has made us like himself, exalted us with him in the heavenly realms.
SPEAKER_00: Colossians says we should set our minds on things above where Christ is, because our lives are hidden with Christ in God.
SPEAKER_00: How do we make sense of that?
SPEAKER_00: It can feel a little abstract to me.
SPEAKER_00: In some ways we can't, but somehow the reality of our life with God is mysteriously more than we can see by the power of the Spirit.
SPEAKER_00: I did turn to the Heidelberg Catechism to help us out because I have questions, but I also like answers.
SPEAKER_00: So listen to this.
SPEAKER_00: This is question 49, and it's answer.
SPEAKER_00: How does Christ's ascension to heaven benefit us?
SPEAKER_00: First, he is our advocate in heaven in the presence of his Father.
SPEAKER_00: Second, we have our own flesh in heaven as a sure pledge that Christ our head will also take us, his members, up to himself.
SPEAKER_00: Third, he sends his spirit to us on earth as a corresponding pledge.
SPEAKER_00: By the Spirit's power, we seek not earthly things, but things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God.
SPEAKER_00: I can't quite wrap my mind around it, but my heart loves it.
SPEAKER_00: So we'll go with that.
SPEAKER_00: Somehow, mysteriously, your life is joined to Christ.
SPEAKER_00: We're made alive together with Christ, which means his life is joined to ours and ours is joined to his.
SPEAKER_00: Ephesians have the final word.
SPEAKER_00: But God, who is rich in mercy, out of the deep love with which he loved us, made us alive together with Christ.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.